Monday we told you the City Council was going to the National Whitewater Center this year for its annual planning retreat.
We predicted, somewhat light-heartedly, that might signal rough water might be ahead. Well, let's just call today's chapter "as the turbulence swirls." Here's the skinny:
District representatives Michael Barnes and James Mitchell wanted the retreat, coming up in less than three weeks, to be held at UNC Charlotte and took issue with the planning committee's recommendation to hold it at the Whitewater Center.
Barnes, a Democrat whose district includes the university, suggested the committee had dissed UNCC without even considering it. The city council ought to make a gesture and work on that relationship, he said, especially after a 2007 retreat on campus was cut short by ice and snow.
Then the water really started to roll.
Hear, hear, councilman.
Barnes is right to insist that the City Council give the university the prominence its due as a valuable community resource. But this frantic last-minute paddling looked more like party wrangling and posturing for respective constituencies. Stay tuned, and get out the life jackets.
- posted by Mary Schulken
We predicted, somewhat light-heartedly, that might signal rough water might be ahead. Well, let's just call today's chapter "as the turbulence swirls." Here's the skinny:
District representatives Michael Barnes and James Mitchell wanted the retreat, coming up in less than three weeks, to be held at UNC Charlotte and took issue with the planning committee's recommendation to hold it at the Whitewater Center.
Barnes, a Democrat whose district includes the university, suggested the committee had dissed UNCC without even considering it. The city council ought to make a gesture and work on that relationship, he said, especially after a 2007 retreat on campus was cut short by ice and snow.
Then the water really started to roll.
"This is ridiculous," said Council member Andy Dulin, a Republican who represents south Charlotte. "The committee gets together and plans it and we show up."
"It (UNCC) did not come up in two meetings where we discussed this retreat that we ought to move it to UNC Charlotte," said John Lassiter, a Republican who served on the planning committee. "We are taking our eye off the ball of what we've been trying to do here. It's what people are not happy with in the subject matter that we ought to be talking about."
Hear, hear, councilman.
Barnes is right to insist that the City Council give the university the prominence its due as a valuable community resource. But this frantic last-minute paddling looked more like party wrangling and posturing for respective constituencies. Stay tuned, and get out the life jackets.
- posted by Mary Schulken
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10 comments:
Once again community leaders completely ignore UNC Charlotte. Complete apathy for the most important resource this community has is disappointing. But I'm not very surprised. When Susan Burgess came out to help introduce Bill Clinton at a rally in Halton Arena earlier this year, she talked about tarheel blue and how exciting it is to be UNC. :(
Barnes has handled the situation poorly, judging from the post, but the real problem is that no city council member thought about UNC Charlotte previously.
What's the likelyhood that anyone on the city council, or county commission, or school board, or any of our state senators and legislators have even taken one class at UNC Charlotte? We have to forge our own destiny, independent of the state and apparently independent of the city we're named for too. Football will help this somewhat but until we drop that UNC off the front of our name and take that med school from the hands of the money theifs in Chapel Hill that they want to build in OUR backyard, we will continue to be ignored.
I'm a Chapel Hill alum and I think UNCC is tretaed disgracefully by both state and city. UNCC could and should be a huge resource for Charlotte, as a major university is for any city in which it sits, but nobody champions UNCC very much. Dick Spangler, where are you?
This is really an issue? Where they hold their retreat? REALLY? Who cares where they have their retreat?
Aren't there a lot more pressing issues to be working on than that? Those on the council turning this molehill into Everest need to get slapped.
Lets get real here. UNCC is so far superior in every aspect to any typical scumbag politican and always has been so what is the fuss? Anybody who gets into the filthy dirty nasty business of politics is a slimewad anyway and like they say religion and politics are always the last refuge for the scoundrel.
The higher the politican the bigger the scumbag. These locals are only mice anyway compared to the big rats in DC.
Please dont feel that UNCC feels dissed. The truth is UNCC could care less as the 23k students and alumni are on a much much higher plateau.We say thanks for not coming and sliming up UNCC with your stupid retreat to waste tax money. Stay away while you are at it please.
Others who cant see this get a life. UNCC is and always has been a pristine santuary for the creme of society. We do not want to be tainted. We appreciate these dirtbags staying away.
I'm an alum and I don't feel "dissed", but the councilmen from that district should have brought UNCC up as an option earlier. More could be done by the city of Charlotte to showcase the campus. I saw Obama there during a rally and there were over 25k people there. I hear that the school is still shortchanged by the state when it comes to receiving funds for an institution our size (as is CPCC)and we should focus on changing that.
No one from the Observer editorial boards steps foot on campus, which should we expect the city council to ?
CLTIndependent has the right idea about the Observer needing to focus on WHY the state is happy with shortchanging its soon to be 2nd largest school. Unfortunately the O Ed Staff is too busy trying to destroy UNC Charlotte Football, a completely separate issue from STATE FUNDING that would rely entirely on ALUMNI and FAN funding, to help us get a fair shake from the state on funding for academics. At least this soon to be closed down news paper has its priorities straight, hold UNC Charlotte back while helping to starve it, lovely.
I took some accounting and math courses at UNCC. I thought that it was a very fine institution. Except for the foreign substitute professors, all the professors were kind and dedicated. Unlike CPCC students, my fellow UNCC students gave me credit for having some intelligence.
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