Please make a difference this year. I voted for you because I believed that you would stand up for students rights. I voted for you because you said that Blake (Bolton) had failed us with the Mardi Gras situation last year by doing nothing for the students. Last year, the city had no strong student voice present. You promised that something would be done so that another Mardi Gras martial law would not be instated. Please do something so that our voice as students will not be silenced once again. Although the city calls last year’s non-celebration an overwhelming success, it was an utter failure in city-student relations. Not only were the tender student-city relations worn even more thin, but there was a huge financial loss.
According to the New Times, the “virtual police state” cost the city a “half-million dollars police officials estimate they spent on planning and execution.” This doesn’t even include the money spent on advertising and revenue the city lost.When I hear that the city thinks its three DUI checkpoints were a huge success because they caught five people the entire weekend, it makes me sick to think of how much money was wasted. I understand that the city is afraid of a repeat of 2004, but please don’t let the actions of a few people destroy it for the rest of us, and destroy what little relationship the city has with its students once again.
There is a solution out there that will satisfy both sides, but we first need to try and work together for once.
Matthew Neal
Aerospace engineering junior