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The MIT Tech
Two MIT Alumni to Run For
City Council in Fall
By Frank Dabek
August 6, 2003 Two recent
MIT graduates have thrown their hats into the Cambridge City Council
race. Matthew S. DeBergalis 99 and Aimee L. Smith PhD 02 have
announced their intention to enter a field of up to 20 candidates
each seeking a spot on the nine-member council. DeBergalis, who
majored in Courses VI (Electrical Engineering and Computer Science)
and XVIII (Mathematics), is running on a platform of bicycle safety,
affordable housing, and influence over the Cambridge Licensing
Commission. His campaign is focussed on civic participation by
students. If 3,000 students vote, even for someone else, the
campaign will be a success, he said. Smiths campaign theme is
influenced by her role as one of the campuss most outspoken
activists. Smith, a Course III (Materials Science and Engineering)
graduate, hopes to create community that is going to be able to make
demands for change by running for council. Smiths platform includes
support for rent control, protection of immigrant rights, and an
increased focus on the influence of universities on the city. All
nine incumbent councillors have announced their intention to run for
reelection, making the task of these recent students seeking office
in a city often openly hostile to the universities it hosts even
more difficult. However, Cambridges proportional representation
system of voting guarantees that any minority group of a sufficient
size can elect a representative. Students, should they defy
historical trends and turn out at the polls, easily constitute such
a group. Slightly more than 1,700 first-place votes were necessary
for election to the city council in the last election; more than
10,000 graduate and undergraduate students are enrolled at MIT
alone. The last recent or current MIT students to run for the
council were Erik Snowberg 99, who received 429 first-place votes in
1999 and finished as the 13th most popular candidate and Steven Jens
98, who received 278 first-place votes in 2001 running on a
libertarian platform. |
