University should support students in housing debate

Putting students first. Your agenda is our agenda. Leadership, opportunity and involvement.

It's definitely what students deserve, but when it comes to the discriminatory State College Borough housing ordinances, it's not what they are getting.

At the University Board of Trustees meeting this weekend, USG President Sharon Entenberg asked if University President Graham Spanier would lend his vocal support for students fighting a losing battle in the borough.

Spanier's response: "Probably not." He went on to explain that the University should not be involved in the laws and ordinances the State College Borough Council passes.

But Spanier will ask the Rathskeller to discontinue the case race. He has no problem asking the police to help him chase students who had a few beers on a Thursday night.

He feels free to get involved in the practices of a private, downtown business legally serving alcohol to adults old enough to decide if and how much they want to drink.

The consistency of the administration is deplorable. If it is the students' welfare the University is concerned about, maybe it should take a look at the facts. If these ordinances pass, the students will have fewer places to live, will pay higher rent and will reside farther away from campus.

When the University pledged that no more housing would be built on campus, it simultaneously found itself responsible for its students living in the borough -- for their safety, their living conditions and for their community relations.

For more than three years, USG has been leading a fight they shouldn't be battling alone and losing to a borough council that has no inclination to care about the very people who are the majority of its constituency.

Students are 70 percent of this community and no matter how loud we yell, we don't have a voice. No matter how many students we pack into the public hearings, the council responds by shaking their heads and treating us like children who don't know what we're talking about.

They see a small percentage of students who have no respect for this town and plan to punish the rest of us for their actions instead of enforcing the codes and rules already on the books.

We hear over and over again that students are not a protected class -- that's why these ordinances are legal.

But students' protection needs to come from somewhere and it should, without a doubt, be coming from the leadership of Penn State University.

Students are the heart and soul not only of this University, but of this town.

We are not transient -- we have been here for 142 years and without us, this community and thousands of jobs and businesses would not exist.

The few trustees who voiced their concern that the University should be involved should be applauded and encouraged to continue their student support in town. Maybe with their leadership, members of the administration will follow -- it's critical for this to happen now.

It's also critical for students to take a careful look and keen interest in USG elections. For all the hoopla and insanity it can encompass, whoever earns this job holds a great responsibility in their hands. It's more than an office and a stipend -- it's representing students' needs and rights on both sides of College Avenue.

Undergraduates have the power to elect the people most capable of doing so.

At the same time, the University has the power to stand up for the people they should be most accountable to -- the students. Our problem is their problem, their agenda should encompass ours and their leadership should shine most when it concerns us.

The yearly case race at the Skeller pales in comparison to blatant discrimination in the borough.