By Maya Kaufman

There was not a peep from the basement of Old Kenyon Residence Hall after midnight this Halloween. Last Friday, the Peeps O’ Kenyon, commonly known as “PEEPS,” hosted a Halloween party that Campus Safety shut down just under two hours afters after it began.

The hosts received a warning from the Office of Campus Safety an hour into the party, due in part to students with underage-marking X’s on their hands seen holding drinks, an alleged smell of marijuana inside the party and beer bottles and cans on the ground, signifying that students brought in their own drinks, which is not permitted at an all-campus party. The PEEPS called Safety roughly half an hour later to report overcrowding, at which point Safety discovered that the party did not have any pizza left.

According to Safety’s party policy requirements, all-campus parties must provide five pizzas per keg and have food available throughout the night. Safety officers notified the PEEPS that they would have to buy more food in order to continue the party. The group opted to shut the party down for the night after contacting safety themselves.

Thomas Mattes ’15, co-president of the PEEPS, believed that the pros of shutting down the Halloween party outweighed the cons, given that the organization had already garnered several party violations. However, a lack of food is, he said, “almost never a reason for a party to be shut down.”

Associate Dean of Students Tacci Smith said that the PEEPS party was bound to be a “recipe for problems” as the only all-campus party taking place on Halloween night, though she said that the PEEPS managed the party effectively.

“I’m proud of them for calling Safety and saying … [the party was] getting unmanageable,” Smith said. “When you get to a point where it’s kind of out of control or it’s past your ability to manage that, then you need help. … I think they did all that they could do.”

For Mattes, the Halloween party indicated that the party scene at Kenyon could be improved. He said that attendees were not respectful to the PEEPS, and that some crowded around the bar and swore at the bartenders.

“I think Halloween might need to be re-thought,” Mattes said. “It’s more than an issue of space — it’s an issue of attitude. … People don’t really know how to behave at parties.”

Director of Campus Safety Bob Hooper also commended the PEEPS for reaching out to Safety for help. He acknowledged that College party policies could be improved.

“As a department, we always look to make things better,” Hooper wrote in an email to the Collegian. “We, as a collective group, should have conversations [such] as, ‘Is the policy working to benefit and protect everyone’s safety? Is the current policy in anyway outdated to what and how we need to be today?’”