University-Community Land Use Dispute
Universities that want to engage with their communities often try to figure out how to make the campus a more welcoming and accessible place. However, occasionally the idea of the university as a public space can get out of hand, as this story indicates.
The Las Cruces (NM) City Council approved a resolution to have "a civic and convention center built [on] the New Mexico State University campus." Amendments were adopted after the councilors heard testimony from faculty and students, but it appears that the council - at least at first - did not consider that university people are also constituents.
I don't know any more about this issue than is reported in the brief story. But my sense is that it exemplifies three issues that are all too common. (1) University and community are out of touch. (2) Universities take land out of circulation but don't use it productively. (3) The community values the campus more as an "economic engine" than as a place of learning and discovery, and all economic engines are potentially fungible.