As the dust settled Wednesday, we began to ponder what a Paul Soglin administration means for students. In an interview with the Herald Editorial Board last month, Soglin was right in saying there are two main issues students care about: Housing and alcohol policy.
We’re interested to see what Soglin changes about the city’s housing policies, including his opinions on Ald. Bridget Maniaci’s proposal to move forward the Nov. 15 showing date.
But let’s focus on the sexier student issue: alcohol policy. Namely, three things, all of which were pet projects of the Cieslewicz administration: The Alcohol License Density Ordinance, Halloween on State Street and the Mifflin Street Block Party.
ALDO, passed by the City Council in 2007, puts a cap on the number of taverns in the downtown area. Ald. Mike Verveer has long given out the same quote for why the Council passed the law: “We didn’t want State Street to turn in to Bourbon Street,” a reference to the infamous New Orleans avenue filled with bars and drunks, and few other reputable establishments.
“Our goal is to have a downtown that’s as vibrant at 3 in the afternoon as at midnight, so that means different kinds of businesses,” Cieslewicz said of the bar ban in a 2010 interview with the Herald.
But Soglin doesn’t buy that argument, and he thinks it’s a silly way to try to enforce alcohol policy.
“I am very skeptical that the present programs work or that they are founded on good data,” Soglin wrote in an email to the Herald last week. “When I was mayor we made a number of findings. I want to know if they are true today – First that the most abusive consumption of alcohol takes place in private settings, not in licensed establishments. And, secondly, that the majority of cases involving transport to hospitals and detox from the campus areas originated not in taverns but as a result of drinking in private settings.”
Outgoing Ald. Bryon Eagon and Verveer have come up with several proposed changes to ALDO, but we wonder how those will change – or if ALDO will be scrapped all together – once Soglin takes office.
Beyond that, there are two major parties the UW campus cares about, and the city has been getting more and more involved in them under Cieslewicz: Mifflin and Halloween.
“Freakfest,” as the city calls it, has been a relatively successful attempt to end riots and save the city money. But Soglin was critical, at least early on, of the fences and police presence involved with Freakfest.
“You are in the land of the perpetually progressive perfect where we decry the Bush Administration’s Patriot Act but will not allow you, without the payment of $5.00, to walk a city street,” Soglin wrote in 2006 on his blog, Waxing America.
And his election comes in the middle of a debate over revamping the Mifflin Street Block Party, in which the event would be co-sponsored by Majestic and Capitol Neighborhoods, Inc. We don’t know Soglin’s thoughts on this plan, but as someone who was at the first Mifflin Street Block Party, we’d hope he is as wary of it as we are.
Regardless of the mayor-elect’s views on these issues, we’re excited to see how he works with students, and we wish him the best of luck.
