Members of the University of Wisconsin’s student government have entered the early stages of planning a campus forum to address Madison city services.
On Monday, Legislative Affairs Chair Hannah Somers said city officials encouraged her to host the forum. Currently, she is waiting to hear responses from city officials on the particular content of the forum, which will be hosted in an effort to include students’ responses to city services.
The discussion is likely to include city services such as snow plowing, trash removal and other basic services, Somers said. She added the forum will be important in providing a student voice, which is generally unheard on Madison issues.
“Most students live off campus for three years, and most students use these services and probably don’t get invested enough to have an active voice like a lot of other community members do who have been there longer,” Somers said.
Somers said the committee is looking tentatively at hosting the forum in April. The forum will be open to the entire UW campus, but will specifically target students who do not live in university housing.
At a Monday meeting, Legislative Affairs member Sam Seering added the forum can provide an opportunity for the city to evaluate how effective their services are, as well as make their upcoming budget more responsive to the needs of both students and Madison residents.
The committee also planned for the upcoming Associated Students of Madison lobby day to take place on March 6. Committee members plan on lobbying against tuition increases, in part associated with the Wisconsin higher education grant.
They will also lobby on the Special Task Force on UW Restructuring’s flexibilities on placing a cap on tuition increases, Somers said.
Seering said the committee is also looking at encouraging the task force to establish institutional, local boards which would connect the 26 UW campuses to their local communities.
“They would do outreach and make it so the university is responsive to the needs of the community and the community knows the needs of the university,” Seering said. “So it creates a special contract between the community and the university.”
Legislative Affairs members also continued to voice opposition to current state legislation on tenant rights, which they argued could make tenants more uncomfortable speaking to their landlords about their basic housing rights, which could result in infringement on those rights.
Somers pointed out because many students are first time signers, they may not be sure of what to look for in a lease. New tenants also may not realize certain clauses are illegal, which could harm future tenant-landlord relationships.
The bill also allows a landlord to dispose of any property a tenant has left behind, without notifying the tenant first. Somers said the committee is planning on delivering letters to the Senate’s committee in charge of the tenant legislation.
“We think this legislation will contribute to the kind of already negative dynamic between landlords and first-time renters,” Somers said. “Because of how complicated the process is … it will be even less clear on what they can and can’t do after this passes.”
