College Housing Northwest (“CHNW,” “we,” “us,” or “our”) is committed to protecting the privacy and security of the personal information we collect, use, share, and otherwise process as part of our housing services, including the Affordable Rents for College Students (“ARCS”) program. This Privacy Policy applies to all personal information collected during any written, electronic, and oral communications or collected online via our website, https://chnw.org, and any other online services that link to this policy (collectively, the “Services”).

1. Information We Collect

We collect information about you in various ways when you use our Services, such as submitting an application, communicating with us via phone or email, participate in surveys, or when you provide or update your personal information to us. The types of information we may collect include:

• Personal Contact Information, such as your name, email address, postal address, telephone number, social security number, photographic identification, national origin, citizenship, and date of birth.
• Demographic Information, such as gender, and marital status.
• Educational/Institutional Information, such as your enrollment status, college/school, credits attempted, and grade point average. 
• Financial Information, including your payment information and financial aid details.
• Survey Information, in connection with surveys related to our housing services, which may be related to grants and funding.
• Usage and Preference Information, collected through your interactions with our Services, such as expressed preferences and settings.
• Sensory Data, including photos, videos, and sounds, including photos when submitting a maintenance request or similar. 
• Environmental, Social, Governance (ESG), such as monitoring and reporting on energy usage at both the community and individual tenancy level.
• Information Collected Automatically, such as your IP address, browser type, operating system, and the pages you visit on our site, to improve our website and Services. Please see the section entitled “Web Privacy and Use of Cookies” below or on our website’s privacy policy page (https://chnw.org/privacy-policy/) for more details on app, browser, and device information.  
• Collection By Web Vendors, when donating through our website you are subject to PayPal’s privacy policy (https://www.paypal.com/us/legalhub/privacy-full) and when applying for residence or using our tenant portal you are subject to AppFolio’s privacy policy (https://www.appfolio.com/privacy).

2. How We Use Your Information

We may use the information we collect for several purposes which are described in the release that you sign which accompanies your information disclosure. Some of the information uses include:

• To Provide and Maintain Services, such as managing your housing application and accommodations.
• To Manage your Account, such as your registration as a user of any of our services. 
• To Communicate, by sending you important updates about our Services, notices about our organization, and promotional offers.
• To Meet the Requirements of a Contract or Grant Agreement, such as demographic information or other aggregated data as occasionally required by outside funders or other entities.
• To Improve and Personalize Our Services, through analytics and data analysis to better understand your needs and interests.
• For Legal Reasons, such as to respond to a lawful subpoena, warrant, or the order of a judicial or governmental authority.
• For Safety Reasons, to protect the rights and safety of our residents and others, such as in an emergency situation.

3. How We Share Your Information

Your personal information may be shared according to the release that you sign when disclosing the information. Some of those uses include:

• Within CHNW, among our various departments involved in providing housing services, including our ARCS program and its partners.
• With Service Providers, third-party companies that provide services on our behalf, such as payment processing and data analysis.
• For Legal Reasons, when necessary to comply with laws, protect our rights, or respond to lawful requests and legal processes.
• In an Aggregated and Non-Identifiable Manner, where the information is combined with other data in a way that does not directly identify you.
• With Your Consent, we may disclose your information for another purpose not listed here, after obtaining your express consent. 

No mobile information will be shared with third parties/affiliates for marketing/promotional purposes

4. Your Choices and Rights

You have certain rights and choices regarding how we use and share your information:

• Access and Correction, you can request access to and correction or deletion of your personal information by contacting us.
• Opt-Out of Marketing Communications, you can opt out at any time from receiving marketing communications by following the unsubscribe instructions provided in these communications.
• Cookies and Similar Technologies, you can manage your preferences through your browser settings.

5. Data Security

We employ a variety of security measures designed to protect the personal information we collect, both during transmission and once we receive it. However, no security system is impenetrable, and we cannot guarantee the security of our databases, nor can we guarantee that the information you supply will not be intercepted while being transmitted to us over the Internet.

6. Retention of Your Personal Data

College Housing Northwest will retain your personal Data for as long as is necessary for the purposes set out in this Privacy Policy. We will retain and use your personal data to the extent necessary to comply with legal obligations (for example, if we are required to retain your data to comply with applicable laws), resolve disputes, and enforce our policies. 

7. Changes to This Privacy Policy

We may update this privacy policy from time to time. Any changes will be posted on this page (chnw.org/privacy-policy) with an updated revision date.

8. Contact Us

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or our practices, please contact us at: info@chnw.org

Web Privacy and Use of Cookies

1. Comments

When you leave comments on our website, we collect the data shown in the comments form, your IP address, and browser user agent string to aid spam detection. An anonymized string (hash) created from your email address may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. If your comment is approved, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment. The privacy policy for the Gravatar service can be reviewed on their website (https://automattic.com/privacy/).

2. Media

If you upload images to the website, you should avoid uploading images with embedded location data (EXIF GPS) included. Visitors can download and extract any location data from images on the website.

3. Cookies

Our website uses cookies to enhance your experience:

• Comments: If you leave a comment, you may opt-in to saving your name, email address, and website in cookies for convenience, so you do not need to fill in your details again when you leave another comment. These cookies will last for one year.
• Login: Temporary cookies are set to determine if your browser accepts cookies and are discarded when you close your browser. Additional cookies help save your login information and screen display choices; login cookies last for two days, and screen options cookies last for a year. If you select “Remember Me”, your login will persist for two weeks; if you log out, the login cookies will be removed.
• Editing and Publishing: If you edit or publish an article, a cookie will be saved in your browser indicating the post ID of the article you just edited. This cookie expires after 1 day.

4. Embedded Content from Other Websites

Articles on our site may include embedded content (e.g., videos, images, articles, etc.). Embedded content from other websites behaves in the same way as if the visitor has visited the other website. These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracking your interaction if you are logged in to that website.

5. Data Sharing and Retention

• Data Sharing: If you request a password reset, your IP address will be included in the reset email.
• Data Retention: Comments and their metadata are retained indefinitely to recognize and approve follow-up comments automatically. For users that register on our site, we store the personal information they provide in their user profile. Users can see, edit, or delete their personal information at any time (except they cannot change their username). Website administrators can also see and edit that information.

6. Your Rights

If you have an account on this site or have left comments, you can request an exported file of the personal data we hold about you, including any data you have provided. You may also request that we erase any personal data we hold about you, except for data we are obliged to keep for administrative, legal, or security purposes.

7. Spam Detection

Visitor comments may be checked through an automated spam detection service.