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Opinion
Wednesday, March 8, 2000
Students should stand ground with landlords
University and city need to unify to protect tenants' rights
The landlords of Lawrence are not going to clean up the structural blight of this city on their own. It might be wrong of them to avoid this duty. However, the only solution seems to be for the City of Lawrence, the University of Kansas and the student tenants to take responsibility to force their landlords to clean up the messes.
Many landlords allow their properties to fall into disrepair. They are business people and they work from a position of self-interest. Their interests lie in charging the most for a property and spending the least in maintenance. It is commendable when landlords make every effort to maintain their properties, but expecting across-the-board volunteerism by landlords and management companies is a utopian fantasy.
They must be policed, and this burden falls on to the shoulders of the city, the University and the students themselves. We must come to the realization that many landlords are not going to make repairs or respond to tenants' requests until all three of these groups are prepared to act together.
The city has the primary responsibility to police landlords. City administrators are accountable for setting and enforcing apartment standards. The concentration of complaints from the highly student-occupied Oread Neighborhood may explain why the city is reluctant to pursue derelict landlords. Because this is an issue of chief concern to students, and not permanent residents, it seems to be a lower priority for the city.
Students seem to exist in Lawrence only in a transient way. But by signing a lease and paying taxes, a student becomes a deserving recipient of the city's attention. There are not enough resources committed to the problem of inadequate housing maintenance. City administrators must reevaluate their priorities and establish a larger body of housing inspectors who can stay on top of the numerous building violations.
The Lawrence Association of Neighborhoods' proposal would be a productive step for the City Commission to take. Registering local agents, imposing fines and not allowing rentals of other properties would hit landlords in the purse and make them more responsive to regulations. The city now is firing paper bullets at landlords.
The University can do more to help stu
dents with their problems. Because the city has the responsibility of balancing the rights of landlords and tenants, the University must step in and speak for students. If you live on campus, the quality of your living space is ensured by the University, but if you live off campus, you are relatively on your own. Students who don't know whom to turn to when their landlords won't fix their apartments would benefit from an organization committed to advising and
speaking for students.
landlord, but the court backlog makes a legal
challenge ineffective. What the University should establish is an organization that would take on student complaints and pursue them with the city and the landlords. With stronger enforcement by the
know the laws and regula-
know the laws and regulations, and they benefit from the their tenants' ignorance. They also benefit from their tenants' apathy. If you live in an apartment with no heating, cooling or adequate electrical wiring, and simply accept it, then you are making the problem worse for your fellow students. Moving to a new apartment only dumps the burden into another
student's lap. Students need to learn their rights as tenants and when necessary, take proper legal action.
As students, we must make strong demands of the city to champion our needs and to treat us as a permanent part of Lawrence's population. We must demand
Brett Watson for the editorial board
Diallo verdict blemishes the idea of Black History Month
You will have to pardon my exuberance, but I'm still experiencing the pride and glory of post-Black History Month syndrome. I hope that everyone understands that last month symbolized freedom and hope for the future to my people. What can I say? A month full of lectures, exhibits and television specials contributed explosively to my moment of retrospective celebration.
This usually leads to a dramatic close, when I actually question the success of my celebration's caise. Interestingly, I have come up with a few questions about last month's questionable existence.
Eric M.
Tullis
guest columnist
opinion@ansan.com
1. Celebrating Black History Month obviously was a worthy
2. Because we are all in this together, shouldn't it have been a month celebrating the reunion of humanity?
cause, but do we really have a legitimate reason to celebrate?
celebrating the reunion of humanity:
My third question was postponed by society's predictable "dagger in the heart" of my hope. On Feb. 4, Amadou Diallo, a Guinean resident of the Bronx in New York City was gunned down in front of his home by four NYPD officers in plain clothes.
Unarmed and innocently cooperative, Diallo was fatally shot 19 times in an array of 41 bullets. Recent rallies and protests that have drawn attention from the likes of the Rev. Al Sharpton, Johnnie Cochran, Khalid Abdul-Muhammad, Susan Sarandon and members of prominent Jewish organizations have joined millions of people in disbelief of the acquittal of all four officers involved in the shooting.
After learning about this incident, I was reminded of a reality that Black History Month could never dream of. Supposedly, the United States is recovering from a miserable history of racial oppression and separation. Today, I realize that Black History Month is just a comforting anesthesia for the pain that the nation always will suffer.
Ban Black History Month! Until Black people have the security to live in a city without fears of being gunned down by authorities, ban Black History Month! Until Black citizens receive justice, ban Black History Month! I refuse to be a hypocrite in my celebrations.
Sure, Black America was proud of its historical perseverance, but more importantly, Black America was glad finally to be included as much as the dominating culture was. Black History Month was and always will be
a humanity month, that and only that.
In 1976, when the nation established Black History Month, Black America was grateful for the recognition. Those outside of the Black culture watched from the sidelines as if the culture had finally received its big break. These same people also were blind to the fact that this significant month subliminally symbolized humanity's declaration of unity.
a humanity month, that and only that. So, here we are today on a planet inhabited with humans of all cultures who still refuse to act orderly. Consequences for officers involved in incidents such as the Diallo shooting must strictly be enforced, especially when two of the officers involved had received prior accusations and court dealings with unjust shooting incidents.
Ladies and gentlemen, you have just been introduced to a modern-day lynching. Why even celebrate Black History Month when participants and speculators cannot see eye-to-eye. I will be proud to have a month only when my pride is cushioned with security and hope. I really am hoping that humanity helps each other with this and somehow applies it to this social brutality.
Civil rights activist and Black Panther Eldridge Cleaver reminds us in his literary insight, Soul on Ice, that the police are only an instrument for the implementation of the policies of those who make the decisions. He goes on to state that police brutality is only one facet of the crystal of terror and oppression.
I beg humanity to end this terror and oppression in an effort to sway the decisions of those who have complete authority. After all, this is a human effort, right? Upon completion of this collective milestone, we can exalt the existence of a Black History Month and celebrate a new and improved type of unity.
Tullis is a Wichita junior in communications.
I want to commend the Kansan for its insightful deconstruction of the impending Student Senate elections in Monday's edition.
Feedback
'Leave Me The Hell Alone good idea for coalition
True, few students vote. Rather than blaming apathy, obviously coalitions are at fault. By only selecting candidates living in residence halls, greek houses, scholarship halls and off campus, they have ignored the needs of many, apparently at least 80 percent of all students. The perfect way to include them would be through forming this "Leave Me the Hell Alone" coalition mentioned in the cartoon.
The disaffected can sweep this coalition into office, with its campaign
promise to abolish annoying populai elections. Their attitude could trans form Senate. When asked to participate on committees, this coaltion would scowl at the administration and say, "Leave us the hell alone!" That would show them! Students are tired of having a voice in issues such as the Kansas Union renovation. It's time for a change.
The University of Kansas has had a strong student government for decades. All that does is bother students on the way to class. With the Kansan's help, students can finally put an end to their voices on campus. Stopping the Vote in 2000 ...
By cutting off these troublemakers' funding in Senate, the coalition could make campus a place where you can fill out credit card applications in
Positive change wouldn't stop there. Student organizations are always stirring up trouble. They clutter campus with "programs" and "speakers."
I'm sorry, but students just want to be left the hell alone.
peace.
Chris Eckert Towaco, N.J., junior
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Once a week, I go to the College Corner Laundromat at 19th and Louisiana streets. This might not sound too
streets. This might not sound too extraordinary, unless you consider the fact that I don't bring along any dirty laundry or detergent. Not even any fabric softener. I go to play Galaga.
Galaga, released in 1981 in the United States, is probably the closest thing to arcade game perfection ever invented. It's also one of the most simplicial games.
Why would I choose to play something so two-dimensional when there are so many more complex games to choose from? Perhaps because of its simplicity. Maybe I have some unknown connection to Galaga because we were born during the same year. Maybe I just have too much free time.
Luke
Wetzel
columnist
opinion@bkansan.com
All I can tell you is that when I step up to the controls, the academic and social concerns of college life begin to subside.
When I drop my quarter in the coin slot and hit the yellow fire button for the first time, my concerns are obliterated completely.
Moving the toggle around with my left hand and hitting the fire button with my right, I feel like Tommy the Pinball Wizard. Of course, I'm not a deaf, dumb and blind kid; it isn't pinball, And The Who didn't write a rock opera chronicling my life. But you get the idea.
Playing Galaga, however, isn't completely mindless video game escapism. During the course of my many games, I've found a few ways of philosophically spending all those quarters. It's the game's differences from real life, and a few key similarities, that make it such an effective means of recreation and relaxation.
For example, in almost 20 years, the price of a game of Galaga has stayed the same. No
tuition increases. No extra dime to accommo date the growing expenses of telecommunication. Just a flat 25 cents.
There are no grades in arcade game outer space, no scheduling mix-ups and definitely no 8 a.m. calculus classes. There is no parking department to tow away your spaceship and no vandals to spray paint anti-parking messages.
Floating along the expanses of digital eternity, the multi-colored flashing stars whizzing by my ship. I am free of the tiring cycle of the Western calendar. Games may last only 10 minutes, but they take my mind off all constraints of time.
The game is a testament to the strengths of individuality, but skilled players will tell you the only way to succeed is to get sucked into an enemy tractor beam in order to add a second ship. That's called teamwork.
While I'm off fighting my cosmic battles manipulating the fates of spaceships and aliens in an imaginary galaxy, I'm reminded that sometimes life is just a game.
Perhaps these lessons are a bit grandiose to pull from a 2-decade-old arcade game, and I admit it is a somewhat sad way to escape the harsh realities of college life. It's probably even worse that in a year of national and campus presidential elections, the only thing I can bring myself to write about is how much I like to play Galaga.
Either way, it doesn't matter anymore. After a particularly exhausting Friday night, I went to play a game of Galaga to revive my spirit Instead, all I found was a dark, lint-covered screen and a message saying the machine no longer worked.
Thus, my laundromat visits have ceased, not with a high score, but with an out-of-order sign. Now I must look beyond the computerized skies. I suppose I could take comfort in the fact that College Corner no longer will be getting my business. But somehow, I don't think they're going to miss it.
Wetzel is a Westwood freshman in journalism and English.
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Broaden your mind: Today's quote
"Every society honors its live conformists and its dead troublemakers." — Mignon McLaughlin