Every year, the end of the Cornell school year is accompanied by several large parties in Collegetown. Generally these parties take place with little damage to the community- at worst, a few people's lawns get some unwelcome addition of fertilizer. In 1996, a permit was granted for a party on Linden Street, and the party took place without any serious incidents. The next year, however, the party was accompanied by over 200 arrests and broken beer bottles were thrown at Ithaca police.
The difference: in the meantime, Ithaca had denied a permit and doubled the fines for public urination, public intoxication, and open container violations, interpreted by police on the scene as stepping onto the sidewalk outside the houses where the party took place with a beer. The introduction of these policies, reminicent of the War on Drugs or of racial profiling in major cities, by Alan Cohen and his friends on the City council, turned what was a peaceful event into a near-riot and a source of over $60,000 in fines to the City treasury.
I was present on that evening, and as I saw the Cornell-Commons shuttle bus taking loads of people down to the station for processing, mysteriously Alan Cohen himself arrived to direct the repression. The crowd, obviously aware of what the city had done to them, began chanting "Bring back Nichols!". Apparently students are more politically aware than most people think.
The Ithaca Journal, reporting on the event, failed to mention the increase in fines and a police source praised Alan Cohen on his "courage" in "facing" this threat to our community. The next day a letter to the editor from one of the poeple who the Journal habitually refers to as Collegetown "residents", as opposed to mere "students" who apparently do not live there, thanked Cohen for taking "action".
Whatever you think of Collegetown parties, one thing should be kept in mind. These parties are held during Senior Week, when most underclassmen are out of town. Thus, the vast majority of the people there are over 21, and they are planning on leaving town. Apparently the City Council believes in mugging them on the way out in order to promote our city's image to Cornell alumni. One wonders what sort of hatred these people harbor for students- or perhaps of other segments of the community which their constituents might find distasteful.
