The Green Progressive Alliance met for the first time Tuesday, brainstorming ideas for involvement within the community and introducing key members who spoke about current projects and goals.
The GPA is a new group on campus, joining the Progressive Danes and UW Greens. The GPA hopes to find common ground to unite these and other groups, helping them to work together and provide a more united front. They plan to mobilize on campus, raise awareness of left-wing issues and develop forums to educate the community.
Dane County Supervisor Echnaton Vedder, Section 8, spoke about some of the issues the county board is currently working on, and expressed displeasure about the outcome of some of the recent decisions made by the county board.
“Many of the people on the county board have affiliations with real estate, and we’ve pretty much been rubber-stamping development,” Vedder said. “I don’t want to put too much of a damper on things, but the county board is being run by conservatives right now.”
Vedder also stressed the need for everyone to get involved.
“People think that by voting and getting someone elected, that that is the end of their responsibility,” Vedder said.
He said to make real change, students need to keep being involved, writing letters, speaking before the county or city board and doing whatever it takes to make their voices heard.
Madison School Board member Shwaw Vang spoke about how UW students can get involved. He asked for ideas and suggestions on funding issues and said the UW population was a very powerful voice.
“The UW is the support that really carries a candidate, especially if the candidate is an unknown,” Vang said.
He stressed the importance of groups like GPA and said he did not think enough people understood there are more than just the two traditional Republican and Democrat political parties.
He also said political party diversity is important.
City Council Alder Brenda Konkel discussed tenant rights issues, including the need for “inclusionary” zoning that would force developers to build a certain proportion of “affordable” housing.
Konkel spoke disparagingly of the way Mayor Sue Bauman runs Madison.
“The city is great at creating committees when they don’t want to deal with conflict,” Konkel said.
She highlighted many of her current projects, including a tenants’ bill of rights and equal-opportunity housing.
“You look at the mansions and the cookie-cutter houses on the edge of town, and it just makes you sick,” she said.
Konkel is also working on the loitering ordinance and appealed to the GPA for help, asking for volunteers.
One of the things Konkel needs volunteers for is to keep an eye on lobbyists by checking city and county paperwork. Konkel also said volunteers are needed to help begin a secret inquiry into whether a relationship exists between mayoral campaign donations and the committee appointments Bauman made.
“We need to stick up for what we believe in,” Konkel said. “To be the ‘party of principles.'”
