More than 100 local residents gathered last night to voice their concerns about the current student housing located in Urban Village neighborhood.

The public input meeting was the second of three meetings open to residents to discuss the Urban Village Revitalization Plan.

Residents, property owners, borough council members, students and rental property owners gathered in the Unity Church of Jesus Christ, 140 N. Gill St., located in Urban Village, to receive an update on the revitalization plans and the chance to voice their opinions about the area.

Urban Village is located west of Atherton Street and is comprised of 98 percent student rental housing, Keith Weaver of EDSA Inc. said.

As part of the revitalization plan, Weaver suggested moving student housing to the north side of the Urban Village neighborhood in order to be closer to campus.

Weaver said he believes this will be more beneficial to students and would unify the west side of Penn State's campus with the Urban Village neighborhood.

"We are trying to work with the campus in order to make everything seamless rather than having two areas hitting one another," Weaver said.

Although Weaver said it is in part of their initial plan to move student housing to the north side of Urban Village, there are no plans to add more commercial student housing to the area.

State College resident Rhonda Stern said she believes having students in one condensed area would only lead to more problems.

"If there would be students and home owners and families in the same area, that would be a healthier mix," Stern said. "These students are very respectful and it is not fair to isolate them."

When State College resident Keith Martin asked how the developers of the Urban Village Revitalization

Plan would give incentives to property owners to not rent to students, Weaver said they do not have an answer to that because they are still working out the details of the implementation plan.

Landlord and State College resident Dale Trout said he was deeply offended by the comments made toward students and the idea of moving them to another location.

"This whole plan is based on the fact that there is something wrong with Urban Village. I like Urban Village and I am tired of people bashing the students here," Trout said. "If you don't like students, then don't live in a college town. Students are people too. "

Zoë Boniface, State College Design Review Board's liaison to the planning commission, said she believes many of the properties in Urban Village get a bad reputation, not because of the students but because of the landlords.

"Some landlords are marvelous and others are notorious and give everyone else a bad name," Boniface said. "If there was something to regulate the landlords that would be great."

Alan Zhou (sophomore-finance) said his parents have property near Urban Village. He echoed Boniface's thoughts.

"If you are looking for a better environment, you should look at the landlords not the residents, he said.

State College resident Dan Rowland said he agrees that students are a large part of what the Urban Village is all about.

"It's a lifestyle location," Rowland said. "People want to commute without cars and walk to school, they want to take the advantages of a small town. It is just a matter of making sure the place that has gone down hill comes back up."

Currently the Urban Village Revitalization Plan is still in the first two stages of planning, Karen Dickinson of Delta Development Group said. She added that phase one and two of the three-phase plan will hopefully be done sometime in March.

The borough plans to hold another community input meeting at the end of January.