The Office of Residential Life has advised students to refrain from engaging in disrespectful behavior in off-campus areas and has warned of plans from police to increase local patrols.

Over the past three weeks, city and county police have responded to an increased number of noise complaints in the Rosedale Heights and Ames Place neighborhoods, prompting the warning e-mail, which ResLife sent to students living off campus.

Students and administrators are hoping that the recent disturbances do not lead to more police citations and arrests over the remainder of the year.

“We had a fantastic fall,” said Jenni Harpring, an acting neighborhood liaison between the University and community and also a program manager for the Gephardt Institute. “Students were really respectful, and the residents in the neighborhood had really positive things to say. Hopefully, this is just a little hiccup, and we’ll be able to get on track back in the spring.”

Last year, the sheer number of noise complaints prompted University City Police to enforce a zero-tolerance policy. The policy, which was never explicitly articulated for students by the University City Police Department or the University, stipulated that students could be arrested or cited for making too much noise. Some supports of the policy have credited it with reducing noise problems in off-campus areas.

Already, police are increasing surveillance in student neighborhoods, according to Washington University Police Chief Don Strom.

“In conversations that I’ve had with U. City Police this week, they’ve indicated that they will be increasing their presence in that neighborhood and that they would be actively enforcing the ordinances of the city as it relates to noise, public consumption of alcohol and behavior that might be disruptive to the neighborhood,” Strom said.

Junior Chris Holt hosted one of the recently broken-up parties on University Drive. He is also a member of the Neighborhood Police Council, which works toward a peaceful relationship between students and residents. Before throwing the party, Holt went to all of his neighbors to alert them to the potential noise. He gave them his phone number and told them to let him know if the party was getting too loud so that he could shut it down.

The police still broke up the party.

Holt’s front door was stuck shut, and as a result, a group of people crowded around it just as a public security Neighborhood Security Patrol drove by. The security patrol called the police, and the party was shut down.

“They helped us get everybody out of there,” said Holt, who added that he was trying to get people to leave after it became clear that a larger crowd than expected had shown up to the party.

A group of students got into a confrontation with one of the neighbors as they were leaving, according to Holt. The students trashed the neighbor’s lawn.

Holt and the other hosts of the party are being held responsible by the University City Police for these students’ actions. They received a summons for exceeding the maximum occupancy of their apartment.

“If someone’s at your party, you’re responsible for them on the way and going back,” Holt said. “Parties are loud places, and students are considering the times that they walk to and from the party as the acceptable times to be acting like they’re at the party, and I think that’s the issue.”

When Holt met with the police in response to his summons on Sunday, the police suggested that the zero-tolerance policy would come back.

“One of the main points that [one of the police officers] mentioned is that they’re definitely going to be lowering the tolerance for these kinds of issues around here, because the issue has been persistent,” Holt said. “In the event these things happen again, there’s no guarantee that they won’t be making arrests. Their attitudes toward off campus partying is returning things to the way they were last year.”

Students have already noticed an increased police presence near student apartments. Junior Mike Graber, who lives on Kingsland Avenue in Ames Place, said that there were three police cars on his block Saturday night.

“I haven’t noticed it being any louder than usual the past couple of weeks,” Graber said. “We are more wary of where we go. If there is a party and there are a lot of people there, we try not to go because we assume it is going to be broken up. We try not to [throw parties] because we don’t want them to arrest us.”

Not all neighbors are hostile toward students.

“I love having Wash. U. students as neighbors. I have four kids, and everyone is pleasant with them,” Melville resident Christina Lawrence said. “I love the effort Washington University puts toward integrating the community. I see a constant effort.”

In the annual Ames Place meeting on Sunday, responses to student behavior were varied, according to Mike Brown, who lives on Pershing Avenue. Though residents acknowledged and appreciated the effort that the University extends toward positive relations, such as neighborhood parties that integrate students and residents’ families, they were also angry about student vandalism, such as stealing signs and urinating on people’s lawns.

No students attended the meeting.

“When it’s 1 a.m. and I hear people screaming, it’s not conducive to my lifestyle,” Brown said, acknowledging that in the past 18 months, he’s noticed that the neighborhood has been significantly quieter. “The folks on Trinity and Melville get the worst of it. I’ve never had anybody urinating on my lawn.”