Rethink College Park

The Diamondback gave so thorough and so nuanced an analysis of Doug Duncan’s selection for university VP of Administrative Affairs that we will deffer to them on the issue. We can’t help but recognize the irony of the selection given the general shuffling of positions statewide. Duncan’s involvement in and audacity during the Downtown Silver Spring project (FP-Argo did Downtown Silver Spring and is now in talks with the university to develop East Campus) gives us hope that East Campus will proceed swiftly and efficiently.

Duncan to assume top university post, The Diamondback 3/26 – Ben Slivnick
–Diamondback Analysis of the pick and Staff Editorial (“Thinking Bigger“)

We’d be remiss if we didn’t take this opportunity to point out the Diamondback’s second botching of the Impact Fee Waiver controversy. Their first article (3/14) was completely off base in it’s assertion that student leaders (namely the SGA and GSG) had done nothing to fight the proposed narrowing of incentive zone for student housing and that the student stakeholders were upset with the compromise reached at the time (we, the SGA, and the GSG were extremely happy with it). Today’s article, asserts that a second “compromise” was reached last week (3/19) when in reality the City Council further limited the zone from the actual compromise we reached at their 3/12 worksession.

The 3/19 “compromise”, which most notably takes away housing incentives for the Koon’s Ford Property cannot be deemed a “compromise” since the issue was taken up outside of a City Council work session, there was no opportunity to respond to comments, and no Rethink College Park representatives were present or consulted on the new boundaries. Real compromise remains elusive on this issue and we (RTCP and whomever else is willing) will vigorously fight any legislation that does not provide adequate space for 5,000-7,000 beds of student housing.