HANOVER — A new apartment-style residence building for Dartmouth undergraduate students on West Wheelock Street will be named in honor of Dartmouth alumni Gina and Tom Russo, who made a $30 million donation toward the building’s construction, the college announced this week.

The gift, made at the Board of Trustees’ fall meeting last weekend, kicks off a $165 million fundraising campaign to help fund the building’s construction on a 1-acre property at 25 West Wheelock Street.

The Russos’ gift, the largest for undergraduate housing to date, is part of a broader $500 million campaign the college has launched to fund new student housing, according to an Office of Communications article released on Tuesday.

“It is crucial that we create more high quality, energy efficient housing on and around campus in order to attract the best talent to Dartmouth at every level— student, faculty, and staff — and to help alleviate the shortage in our region,” said Dartmouth President Sian Leah Beilock in the Office of Communications article.

Russo Hall, which is anticipated to open in two years, is expected to include 285 of the 1,000 beds Beilock committed to adding for students, faculty and staff over the next 10 years in her inaugural address last September.

Demolition of three two-story apartment buildings that originally occupied on the West Wheelock acre took place this summer and construction is underway on the new hall, which will house juniors and seniors in a mix of double, triple and quadruple occupancy units, each with a full kitchen, living room and storage space.

The college’s broader goal is to raise the percentage of undergraduates living on campus from the current rate of 85% to 90% over the next 10 years both to strengthen the Dartmouth community, and to free up housing in the greater Hanover community.

“The housing crisis is real and it is big and it’s going to take a lot of individual pieces adding up together to really make an impact,” said Senior Vice President of Capital Planning & Campus Operations Josh Keniston in a phone interview on Thursday. “I don’t think we’re under the impression that any one of these projects is going to totally solve it but I think it’s part of a holistic view of how we tackle it.”

The vacancy rate in Grafton County in 2023 was 2.1%, the highest in the state, but still well below the 5% rate which is considered healthy, according to the 2023 NH Residential Rental Cost Survey Report.

In terms of affordability, the 2024 report found the median two-bedroom rent in Grafton County is $2,027, the second highest in the state only behind Rockingham County, which has a median two-bedroom rental cost of $2,069. A rent of $1,420 for a two-bedroom unit is considered affordable for a median renter household.

Marlene Heck, senior lecturer emerita of history of architecture, sat on a bench on the green on Wednesday critiquing buildings. She said the new dorms are “long overdue.”

Over the 34 years she’s lived in the area, she’s seen staff and faculty commuting from farther and farther away because of a lack of affordable housing close to campus.

Despite the housing crisis in the Upper Valley, this will be the first new undergraduate residence built in over two decades.

“Dartmouth has been putting off building new dorms,” said Heck. “It’s not sexy to build dorms.”

Dartmouth sophomores Sheba Duan and Rai-Ching Yu also said they think building new dorms is a good idea.

“I look at where my friends are living and I’m like, ‘You’re paying to live here?’ ” said Duan while catching up with Yu on the Green on Wednesday.

Heck commended this administration for its commitment not only to building new residence halls, but also to rehabilitating old ones.

The college plans to renew and upgrade about 60% of current undergrad beds, according to Keniston. The upgrades have already begun.

Andres Hall, part of the East Wheelock House community, came first and reopened in 2023. After a year of construction, students are back in Zimmerman Hall and Brace Commons, which are also part of the East Wheelock House community. Zimmerman and Brace include 24 new beds between them and have improved accessibility and common spaces.

Fayerweather Hall is currently under renovation and is expected to be completed by summer of 2026. The three halls that make up Mass Row are next on the list.

The buildings are more energy efficient than previously, playing a part in the college’s efforts to become carbon zero by 2050. Russo Hall is designed to be net-carbon neutral and the three rehabilitated buildings all have LEED — which stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, and is a widely used rating system — Gold certifications for sustainability, health and safety.

Alex Taft, senior planner for the town of Hanover, said the town’s position has typically been that adding undergraduate housing should assist in alleviating some of the availability in the market but it is unknown exactly by how much.

Keniston noted that solving the housing crisis relies in part on cooperation between the town and the college. Hanover changed its zoning rules to allow denser residential living on West Wheelock Street, which made the construction of Russo Hall possible.

Dartmouth also announced it has doubled its commitment to the Upper Val ley Loan Fund — a fund created by eight major Upper Valley employers that loans money to developers to build workforce housing — to $3 million.

“We’re obviously excited about this particular piece for Dartmouth, but in s ome ways its this broader ecosystem that’s being created in the Upper Valley that I think has the potential to be really powerful,” said Keniston.

Emma Roth-Wells can be reached at er othwells@vnews.com or 603-727-3242