Howard: New beginnings for governing bodies means students should stay aware

Freshly back from break and facing a new semester unmenaced by proposals for a tuition tax, I… Freshly back from break and facing a new semester unmenaced by proposals for a tuition tax, I understand how tempting it must be to turn our collective eyes away from local issues and once again focus our advocacy on Africa’s ills, but to do so would be shortsighted.

A lot has happened while we’ve been away on break, and it all justifies a closer attention to local issues on our part.

For instance, the make-up of City Council has changed significantly and now has a new president. Elected as president with five votes on Monday, Darlene Harris represents the North Side and was a supporter of the Fair Share Tax. Harris is also notable as a product of the city’s Democratic machine and has been identified by Randall Taylor, a former colleague on the Pittsburgh Public School Board, as an anti-intellectual with class biases, according to a 2003 Post-Gazette article.

She might have been a compromise candidate voted into office by Bill Peduto, but she doesn’t promise to be a friend to Pittsburgh’s students.

On a more positive note for students, two of the tuition tax’s proponents — Tonya Payne and Jim Motznik — left Council and were replaced by two younger individuals who don’t yet exhibit the “get off my lawn” attitude that both Payne and Motznik exuded while on the Council.

The composition of City Council is better for students today even if its president might not be. But a more interesting and immediate development in local politics that none of us should ignore is the new relationship between Pitt and the mayor. As part of the deal averting the tuition tax, the University of Pittsburgh joined with Carnegie Mellon and Highmark in something called the “New Pittsburgh Collaborative.”

As part of the New Pittsburgh Collaborative, Pitt agreed to increase its contribution to the city but did not cite a specific figure nor agree to a specific timeline. The University also agreed to help Ravenstahl lobby Harrisburg for either state handouts or new powers of taxation to help solve the pension crisis.

Although I’m sure we’re all pleased that the tuition tax was averted, we should be cognizant of the University’s new role in the city as well as its new financial obligations to the mayor’s office. In assuming partial financial responsibility for the pension mess, Pitt is functioning less as an institution of higher learning and more as a business concerned with its political position in the city and we must remember that any money Pitt gives to the city to solve the pension crisis ultimately comes from our pockets.

Speaking of our pockets, perhaps students will start asking the University some hard questions about the tuition hike scheduled to take effect this fall. Announced last semester over Thanksgiving break, the tuition increase has yet to gain much attention among Pitt students who can expect to pay between roughly $500 and $1,000 more in tuition next semester depending on whether they are from in or out of state.

Whether Pitt students choose to oppose the tuition increase or not, we should at least be asking questions about the necessity of the increase and just how much of the increase will pay for the University’s new tithe to the city. Of course, the University isn’t saying a word about how much it will give to the city in 2010 nor about how much money it has given the city in the past.

With the tuition hike and the University’s new relationship with the city, perhaps we should focus less on what City Council is up to and focus more on what the University is up to.

Of course, with a new semester and a new Student Government Board President, students should also be mindful of what SGB is doing. Remember, as a board member last semester, President-elect Charlie Shull got involved in an ugly fight with Pitt’s Students For Life in which he denied them an allocations request. Shull, who later worked with other board members to give Students for Life funding, said he was initially concerned “that this group is going to prostelytize as a lobbying organization.”

I don’t remember Shull trying to halt funding for the College Democrats or Hindu Students Council. I simply hope that students will keep as close an eye on Shull this semester as they did on City Council last semester.

There’s a lot to be mindful of this semester and a lot of local governing entities that need to be watched. Perhaps if we expend some energy this semester making our presence felt in the new City Council, SGB and the University administration, we won’t be made to pay for our apathy at a later date as happened with the tuition tax last semester.

Continue the conversation at Giles’s blog, http://www.gilesbhoward.com/blog/, or e-mail Giles at gbh4@pitt.edu.