| A different tempo |
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| Written by Sarah Sakai - Argonaut | ||||||
| Thursday, 11 March 2010 | ||||||
 Moscow goes slow during spring break Spring break is infamous. It’s the break that holds no obligations. Family can wait until Easter, a serious job can wait until summer, and the clouds can wait until a good way into December. It’s a time to take that random road trip to California or fly to Mexico. It’s party time. Just not in Moscow. “It definitely dies off quite a bit,” said Allison Cerrillo, an employee at Moscow Bagel & Deli. “Everything is a lot quieter.” Many store hours change to account for the quietness. Sister’s Brew cuts its closing shifts, employee Matt Bonner said. He has been working at the café for three years and said while there are fewer students coming in and studying, there are morelocals coming in, grabbing coffee and going on their way. It’s a different kind of business during break. The same is true at Moscow Bagel & Deli. “The late night crowd is gone,” Cerrillo said, “but more locals come in because the students aren’t here.” Moscow Bagel & Deli closes earlier during spring break, though they keep their late hours on Friday and Saturday. This leaves fewer shifts to work, but also fewer employees to cover them. “Everybody wants more shifts but they don’t necessarily get them,” Cerrillo said. While many places around town experience the lack of student business, others don’t see much of a difference: The Moscow Police Department is one of them. Granted, the same number of patrols goes out each day, but the call volume decreases quite a bit, Lt. Dave Lehmitz said, but for the most part things stay about the same. They still give out noise violations and parking tickets. They don’t have a productivity standard, Officer Rick Whitmore said, so they aren’t out looking for bad tickets to give. The one change they do see happens after spring break. “We will come back and take a ton of theft calls,” Lehmitz said. Both Lehmitz and Whitmore urged students to lock things up in the trunk of their car rather than in their dorm room, and to make sure that they lock their door when they leave. Howard Hughes Video is another business that doesn’t feel much of a difference during break. The student business drops off a bit, said manager Beau Newsome, but students rarely come into Howard Hughes to begin with, so if there is a change, it’s a small one. Due to more recognizable names, most students from outside Moscow frequent Hastings, Redbox or Movie Gallery. Those that do rent through Howard Hughes generally grew up in Moscow, and local students seem to be the ones that stick around for spring break. “A lot of students, if they don’t leave, will rent stuff,” Newsome said. “They have time off and they’re relaxing.” Ben Handel, a junior history major at the University of Idaho, has lived in Moscow for seven years and said he has never gone anywhere for spring break. “We are already home,” Handel said about why local students tend to stick around, “and we don’t always have the money to go party somewhere else.” Even if they do have the money, some local students enjoy Moscow more when the others are on break. “Stores are less busy, streets are less busy,” Cerrillo said. “Honestly, we like it when there are not a lot of students here.”  Add as favorites (28) | Views: 638
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