Blogs

Students are voting today in this year's student body elections. You can't walk through the main part of campus without being assailed by a horde of shouting, sign-bearing, leaflet-handing campaign workers. But, if you don't spend time on campus or read the DTH, you probably had no idea. While some local elected officials have certainly benefitted from their experience with student government (I'm looking to you, Mark Kleinschmidt), one might wonder just how much influence the student body president and congress has on the larger issues affecting the town and university.  I worked my butt off for Tom Jensen's unsuccessful 2005 student body president campaign, which was the first and only time I recall sitting council members weighing in (Tom was endorsed by Bill Strom and Sally Greene).  Other than that, do town folk care?

Below are excerpts from each Student Body President candidate's town relations platform...

J.J. Raynor:

In the initial news reports Buckhorn was touted as “a center like The Streets at Southpoint” (N&O, Jan 12). Over a million square feet of retail, hotel & movie theater uses are proposed on 128 acres at the intersection of Buckhorn Road and I40/I85. At the west end of one of the County’s Economic Development Districts (EDDs), this was for many years the site of a thriving flea market. Some of the materials submitted by the developers hint at the inclusion of residential and office uses, but most of their documents and statements to the press indicate that their interest in these is very low. They estimate the County would realize $7.2 million a year in sales & property tax revenues. But what might these revenues cost us?

That a development of such magnitude is being considered for the County raises questions like these: