In the much-publicized race for First Ward alderman, both Kellogg Prof. Allan Drebin and incumbent Ald. Arthur Newman have raised serious concerns about the present status of Evanston’s relationship with Northwestern and the the city’s financial future.
Neither candidate has demonstrated a clear advantage over his opponent. Newman’s hard-nosed style and tendency to scapegoat NU for the problems of the city have abetted an era of bad feelings. Drebin’s relative lack of experience on the council and the weakness of some of his proposed ideas pose serious questions about the sort of leadership he will provide.
It is with reservations that we support Prof. Allan Drebin’s bid to become First Ward Alderman. We feel that his financial expertise and fresh attitude will affect a positive change on a tired and cash-strapped council. Even if ideas such as park user fees are not the answer to Evanston’s fiscal problems, we are confident that Drebin’s background and willingness to build partnerships is what the council needs.
Newman didn’t invent the discord between NU and the city. But while his adversarial tack brought administrators to the table, that attitude has strained relations to the breaking point and made progress a near impossibility.
We have no reason to believe that Drebin will kowtow to the NU administration. We believe his insistence that he will uphold the oath of office and maintain his independence.
A vote for Drebin won’t solve all the city’s woes. But the present council has taken ad hominem attacks and legal recourse against a single potential benefactor as far as they can go, and Newman has alternated turning up the volume on and short-circuiting that method for the past 10 years. It’s time to try something different.
Jean-Baptiste for Second Ward
Ald. Dennis Drummer’s retirement from the seat he has held for 17 years leaves a void in city politics. Both attorney Lionel Jean-Baptiste and community activist Betty Sue Ester seek to replace Drummer, but only Jean-Baptiste has the combination of community involvement, balance and vision to hope to replace Drummer.
The confident yet humble Jean-Baptiste, a graduate of Evanston Township High School and Princeton University, proposes to be a voice of reason and civility on a council that too often has been overrun by competition and antagonism. Although not a politician, he possesses a well-developed sense of how the game is played and, importantly, how it should be played.
Jean-Baptiste displays an admirable thoughtfulness about issues such as equitable community development, economic policy and the plight of young people in Evanston. He has called for good-faith discussions on Evanston-Northwestern relations and a renewed sense of partnership as opposed to competition between the city and the university. He resists the type of adversarial thinking that has poisoned the debate on both sides of the issue.
In Jean-Baptiste voters have a chance to elect a successor to Drummer who will faithfully represent their interests on the council and bring vision and balance to the city as a whole.
Ester, a 12-year resident with a r