Ruby Sinreich's blog

WCHL will hold its third annual Forum tomorrow, putting folks from around the community on the radio for a marathon of local issue discussion. Last year's forum was pretty interesting, especially the hand-to-hand combat between UNC administrators and local elected officials.

While I have to repeat my now-annual complaint about not publishing the forum schedule on the website in advance, I will give WCHL kudos for putting the entire 2004 forum audio archive online after the broadcast.

Here is this year's schedule as it was relayed to me in the mail:

8:00 Town-Gown Relations10:00 Suburban Growth11:00 Civil Rights & Equality noon Carrboro 1:00 Downtown Chapel Hill 2:00 Violence & Crime 3:00 Affordable Housing 4:00 Education 5:00 Young Adults

The Daily Tarheel ran a pretty good article on Wednesday about student involvement (or lack thereof) in town issues. In 1991, I got appointed to the Chapel Hill Transportation Board and I helped get a fellow undergrad, Mark Chilton, get elected to the Town Council. Ever since, I have been advocating for a greater student voice in local politics. There can be no doubt that students are impacted by town policies (transit, sidewalks, housing, downtown businesses, University development, just to start.).

But many people forget how very much students have to offer the rest of the town. Students created what would later become the municipal bus system in in the 1970's. Students have brought many important social causes to the community's attention, from apartheid and sweatshops far way, to housekeepers and cafeteria workers and the civil rights movement here at home.