The question is not whether the new ordinance proposed to the Eugene City Council is just or necessary, for it is indeed both. Rather, the true question is whether we as a University community live in a vacuum or in a larger community with other individuals and other needs that stretch beyond our petty, self-centered compulsions and habits.
College students are notoriously greedy and are infamous for failing to look beyond the snot at the end of their collective nose, and this controversy is hardly an exception to the rule. Instead of asking why the community as a whole and respective leaders therein find the issue of “partying” so troubling, student government leaders seem bent on whining and complaining about the “oppression” of those “mean-spirited” bullies in city government. OK, so I’ll be the one to beg the question: Why the concern?
To answer the question, let us examine the problem as it really stands. University students love to drink and party, and very seldom do they take into consideration the schedules and needs of their working, non-student neighbors. For that matter, they seldom take into consideration the manifest needs of their working student neighbors either, and in both cases noise violations — which, oddly enough, take place statistically in this city when loud and obnoxious parties are held — often lead to police officers being called to the scene. This costs the community money, in many cases money that really ought to be used for other purposes. Ought the entire community pay the cost for the irresponsibility of a few, or ought the irresponsible themselves pay that cost?
Consider for a moment the implications of this statute in pragmatic application. One apartment could conceivably hold a loud and obnoxious party every 31 days — once every month — and still avoid any citation under the law. In my mind that is in essence uncivilized and at the very least rude behavior, and yet a few would say that this is still unacceptable. Well, why not? I mean, ought we not be allowed to annoy our neighbors and act like three-year-olds once a week? And people wonder why college students receive such a terrible reputation. It’s our own fault, really.
It comes down to a basic question of equity and consideration. In a state and era where dollars are few and resources limited for government at the local and state level, we ought to be utilizing our resources responsibly. Covering the inconsiderate, irresponsible actions of a few drunk college students simply is not acting in such a manner.