Town Conversation ends with pledge to dialog

Greg Chute, pastor of the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, leads the discussion at Newark’s first Town Conversation.

3:32 p.m., Nov. 16, 2004--More than 100 Newark residents, city officials and UD students and administrators discussed their concerns and experiences as a community and pledged to continue the dialog.

The discussion was the first-ever Town Conversation organized by the Town & Gown Committee on Wednesday, Nov. 10, and held at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship on Willa Road.

The Town & Gown Committee is a group of city and UD officials dedicated to addressing issues affecting the campus and the community. The Town Conversation was an open forum designed for interested persons to express concerns and discuss the relationship between the city of Newark and the University of Delaware.

Titled “Sharing Our Community,” the conversation addressed a variety of issues, from traffic safety to neighborliness and drinking. About 30 students who attended received applause for participating.

“It was very good,” April Veness, UD associate professor of geography, whose students in an undergraduate course, “Newark, Del.--People, Politics and Place,” assisted the Town & Gown Committee in its efforts, said. “I’m glad it was a nice back and forth. It pretty much did what I thought it was going to do--air a lot of things.”

Mayor Vance Funk praised the cheerleaders and HRIM students who took part in the first-ever Taste of Newark festival, and the hundreds of fraternity and sorority members who joined him during a recent parks and street cleanup campaign.

“These students are really trying to become part of our community,” Funk, a member of the Town & Gown Committee, told Newark residents. “There are always a minority of people who are going to cause problems. Our job is to find out about the problems before you find out about the problems.”

Matthew Ardakanian, a student representative of the Dickinson Community Council on West Campus, suggested that an underpass be built under Elkton Road at the Amstel Avenue intersection to make it safer.

Funk said the Delaware Department of Transportation is working on a five-year plan to redesign Elkton Road. He said that the city would forward the suggestion about an underpass to DelDOT officials.

City Councilman Karl Kalbacher said outreach is “a two-way street” that requires the city to reciprocate the efforts being made by the University.

“We do some of it, but we need to do more with regard to students who come into our city,” Kalbacher said. “What I’d like to see the Town & Gown [Committee] as well as our city staff and elected officials do, is to have a more direct outreach to the students, maybe during the orientation week when there are any number of sessions where students are brought together and given information from the University. The city should be there as well.”

John Bishop, UD associate vice president for counseling and student development, said the Town Conversation was a good first step and more such forums would be worthwhile.

“I was very pleased,” Bishop said. “We made progress, and I think the main benefit from it was simply that it seemed to open lines of communication among various parts of the community. There were particular topics identified that the Town & Gown Committee was being encouraged to consider, and that is the advantage of having that type of discourse.”

Article by Martin Mbugua
Photos by Jon Cox

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