Invisible man
Staff editorial
Issue date: 9/12/07 Section: Opinion
Are you satisfied with College Park? If the City Council sauntered up to students and asked them this, one could intelligently guess the typical response would be something like a "Hell, no!" followed by a string of complaints - no parking, subpar retail, high rents, poor policing, insufficient housing, an anti-college attitude in what could be a remarkable college town. We know this because we've heard it all before and dealt with it ourselves, and it's all legitimate and pressing. We are, most certainly, swamped with more issues than we know how to handle these days.
But the council isn't going around asking, and they're never going to. And the city is notoriously comfortable with sweeping any knowledge of student discomfort under the rug. That's why the fact that, just nine days before the elections, not one student has registered for candidacy for the College Park City Council - nor even projected serious interest in it - is not just a serious disappointment. It's a veritable disaster.
But it's not a new one. Student candidates have always been the stuff of our dreams, as reality has consistently produced slim-to-none pickings. True, a few bold students have stepped to the fore, but their campaigns have been marred by poor planning and political misguidance.
Just last winter, David Daddio and Nick Aragón appeared to be promising student contenders to take the seats of two outgoing council members. Both were disappointments. Daddio never made it to the ballot, and Aragón, after raising more funds than his opponent, was dragged down by political dirt-flinging, poor student support and a student-unfriendly election date.
Too much is on the line this time. An energized, energizing, idealistic candidate must work - as past candidates failed to - from the inside out, sewing support first in the student body without fretting over the city's opinion. Nearly 30,000 student votes cannot go to waste in a city with only about 30,000 residents, and bridges with city residents can be built later. The odds for our success are too great, and the outcome of our failure far too grim.
Ignorance is not an excuse. If you're reading this, you should have known about it - we called for a student candidate, right here, on Aug. 29. If you occasionally glance at The Diamondback, you should have known - we've had a countdown to the council elections on every front page since the first day of the semester. If you live or learn in College Park, you live the unpleasantness of our student-dom every time you pay to park in an overcrowded lot, every time you cut a ridiculous rent check and every time you see a Chapel Hill or a Tallahassee and realize what a college town could be. No, what it should be.
But the council isn't going around asking, and they're never going to. And the city is notoriously comfortable with sweeping any knowledge of student discomfort under the rug. That's why the fact that, just nine days before the elections, not one student has registered for candidacy for the College Park City Council - nor even projected serious interest in it - is not just a serious disappointment. It's a veritable disaster.
But it's not a new one. Student candidates have always been the stuff of our dreams, as reality has consistently produced slim-to-none pickings. True, a few bold students have stepped to the fore, but their campaigns have been marred by poor planning and political misguidance.
Just last winter, David Daddio and Nick Aragón appeared to be promising student contenders to take the seats of two outgoing council members. Both were disappointments. Daddio never made it to the ballot, and Aragón, after raising more funds than his opponent, was dragged down by political dirt-flinging, poor student support and a student-unfriendly election date.
Too much is on the line this time. An energized, energizing, idealistic candidate must work - as past candidates failed to - from the inside out, sewing support first in the student body without fretting over the city's opinion. Nearly 30,000 student votes cannot go to waste in a city with only about 30,000 residents, and bridges with city residents can be built later. The odds for our success are too great, and the outcome of our failure far too grim.
Ignorance is not an excuse. If you're reading this, you should have known about it - we called for a student candidate, right here, on Aug. 29. If you occasionally glance at The Diamondback, you should have known - we've had a countdown to the council elections on every front page since the first day of the semester. If you live or learn in College Park, you live the unpleasantness of our student-dom every time you pay to park in an overcrowded lot, every time you cut a ridiculous rent check and every time you see a Chapel Hill or a Tallahassee and realize what a college town could be. No, what it should be.
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