{"id":737,"date":"2011-03-02T12:17:37","date_gmt":"2011-03-02T17:17:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www3.law.harvard.edu\/journals\/hlpr\/?p=737"},"modified":"2015-10-02T15:58:05","modified_gmt":"2015-10-02T15:58:05","slug":"student-representation-and-local-government","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/2011\/03\/02\/student-representation-and-local-government\/","title":{"rendered":"Student Representation and Local Government"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yevgeny Shrago<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Residents of DC\u2019s posh Georgetown neighborhood have succeeded in keeping most urban disturbances out of their little bubble: the Metro conveniently\u00a0misses<\/a>\u00a0the neighborhood and they have successfully fought to close down\u00a0any<\/a>\u00a0restaurants<\/a>\u00a0that made noise. But they still have one enemy ruining their idyll: the students of Georgetown University. As they can\u2019t eliminate the university entirely, the residents have come up with a new plan over the last 20 years. \u00a0 The residents\u00a0keep out the poor.<\/a>\u00a0It works there because the people who want to fight it aren\u2019t\u00a0represented<\/a>\u00a0and it could work here for the same reasons.<\/p>\n

The latest salvo in this battle came with the Georgetown Advisory Neighborhood Council\u2019s\u00a0recommendations<\/a>\u00a0for Georgetown\u2019s new ten year plan. According to the Council, Georgetown should cut enrollment and strictly limit the number of students living off campus, bar student commuters from parking in the surrounding neighborhoods and should not be allowed to acquire more land in the Georgetown area without approval from the Board of Zoning Adjustment. Once the undergraduates are safely contained within the university, the owners in the surrounding neighborhoods will be able to reap all the\u00a0positive externalities<\/a>\u00a0of having a prestigious university nearby, while forcing the university to internalize the negative ones, usually to the detriment of the students.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t have to be this way. Georgetown\u00a0enrolls<\/a>\u00a07,000 undergraduate students and another 8,000 graduates. Although not all these students live in the area, a large percentage do. According to the\u00a0census<\/a>, the 20007 zip code that encompasses Georgetown has roughly 29,000 permanent residents. If only half the university\u2019s students live in the area, they would constitute a third of the people living in Georgetown. Mobilizing those students to vote and run for office in local elections would completely change the dynamic. Suddenly, instead of scoring easy points by attacking students, local leaders would have to take their interests into account.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t a pipe dream. The last time DC City Council passed restrictive parking regulations, Georgetown students turned out and\u00a0elected<\/a>\u00a0two ANC commissioners. Madison, home of the University of Wisconsin, where students constitute about 20% of the population,\u00a0regularly<\/a>\u00a0elects a student representative to city council.<\/p>\n

There are two major obstacles to overcome before students can have a voice. First, many localities specifically gerrymander their electoral districts to split the student vote. Ann Arbor\u00a0divides<\/a>\u00a0their ward map like a pizza, with the University and its students at the center. Students are not the majority in any single ward, though they constitute a third of the city\u2019s population. Second, student turnout in these elections is low. Part of this arises from students\u2019 orientation toward national issues, but another factor is based in attempts by poll watchers and neighborhood groups to confuse or even intimidate students about their voting rights to ensure that they don\u2019t provide a challenge to the status quo.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0answer<\/a>\u00a0is organization. Wherever students constitute a significant portion of a locality\u2019s population, those omnipresent get-out-the-voters shouldn\u2019t just be pushing for turnout in elections with national implications. When a student complains about an inability to get a street parking permit or the level of noise restriction, there should be a student group saying \u201cstop complaining and get all your friends to vote.\u201d Changing the student orientation toward local government could change local government\u2019s orientation toward students.<\/p>\n

Edit:<\/em>\u00a0It was pointed out over in the comments of\u00a0DCist<\/a>\u00a0that such an organization already exists in DC:\u00a0DC Students Speak<\/a>. I applaud their work and encourage them to think bigger than just ANC seats. 15% of DC\u2019s population is students, which could mean a huge influence on citywide elections. Student organizers in other towns should take a look at their model and see if it will work for them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yevgeny Shrago Residents of DC\u2019s posh Georgetown neighborhood have succeeded in keeping most urban disturbances out of their little bubble: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-737","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peZQka-bT","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/737","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=737"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/737\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=737"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=737"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=737"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}