Voting on change
Staff Editorial
Issue date: 11/5/07 Section: Opinion
If you haven't noticed, our college town is changing. With multiple student housing projects in the works, the East Campus development project promising to bring a plethora of new businesses to the area and the Metro's Purple Line plan cutting straight through the campus, College Park is on the verge of a huge transformation, one that will revamp the way we - and everyone else who visits our town - view the municipal home of our university.
And tomorrow, we will elect the people who will help shape many of the decisions on how that change will be incorporated into the town we already know and love; tomorrow is the day of the College Park City Council elections.
No matter what you think of the council members - whether you think they are incompetent or that they are irrelevant bodies in the grand scheme of your college experience - they are the people who will nonetheless be making major decisions on issues you will not be able to avoid. No longer can you count on living on the campus for all four years of college, in but insulated from College Park. Eventually, you will be subject to housing options that are subject to the city council. No longer can students disregard how city officials deal with policing the city. Students are continually the targets of criminals who operate in the city, and that's not something that's likely to change. No longer should students accept the dearth of businesses in College Park, where Wawa can no longer serve as a grocery-store stand-in and Rugged Warehouse stands as the only - and homely - clothing option. No longer can students allow themselves to have no say in how the city council slashes away at parking around their homes, as they did in the Knox Box area.
The point is, students must vote. City council members are only answerable to their voting constituents. In other words, they don't - and don't have to - care about their constituents who don't care about them. We, as students, must care about who sits on the city council and must show that we care by voting, even in districts that are uncontested. As long as students are seen to be lazy, non-voting ingrates who demand action from the city and then turn a blind eye to its leadership dynamics, we will continue to be disregarded.
And tomorrow, we will elect the people who will help shape many of the decisions on how that change will be incorporated into the town we already know and love; tomorrow is the day of the College Park City Council elections.
No matter what you think of the council members - whether you think they are incompetent or that they are irrelevant bodies in the grand scheme of your college experience - they are the people who will nonetheless be making major decisions on issues you will not be able to avoid. No longer can you count on living on the campus for all four years of college, in but insulated from College Park. Eventually, you will be subject to housing options that are subject to the city council. No longer can students disregard how city officials deal with policing the city. Students are continually the targets of criminals who operate in the city, and that's not something that's likely to change. No longer should students accept the dearth of businesses in College Park, where Wawa can no longer serve as a grocery-store stand-in and Rugged Warehouse stands as the only - and homely - clothing option. No longer can students allow themselves to have no say in how the city council slashes away at parking around their homes, as they did in the Knox Box area.
The point is, students must vote. City council members are only answerable to their voting constituents. In other words, they don't - and don't have to - care about their constituents who don't care about them. We, as students, must care about who sits on the city council and must show that we care by voting, even in districts that are uncontested. As long as students are seen to be lazy, non-voting ingrates who demand action from the city and then turn a blind eye to its leadership dynamics, we will continue to be disregarded.
Submit a letter to the editor or post a comment below.
Be the first to comment on this story