For all of you still lingering on campus and not burning rubber on the highway bound for Panama City Beach, here it is: your Spring-Break-forever-y’all edition of
Darts & Laurels
Gainesville residents have been steaming over the city’s newly instated biomass plant, which could be a factor in residents’ steadily climbing utility bills. Gainesville Regional Utilities has quietly been raising its rates — first in October and then in December. The higher rates are associated with GRU’s increased projected annual contract cost with the biomass plant. The cost was originally projected to be $102.4 million, but GRU gave a presentation at the City Commission’s Oct. 17 meeting stating the adjusted cost would be $104 million.
But in our Tuesday story about the jump in students’ January utility bills, representatives said the reason for the hike was the cold weather. They said the high frequency of freezing temps caused students to use their heat more.
While this is most likely true, they didn’t attribute any of the changes to the biomass plant and its impact on residents’ utilities cost — and that’s shady as hell. This week, we’re throwing a DART at GRU for dodging the truth: This biomass plant is costly, and residents are ticked off.
This week, the Reitz Union and Fresh Food Company made major strides in realizing the university’s goal of zero-waste by 2015. The Reitz and Fresh Food Company signed a contract that involves a plan to start composting some of the 2,000 pounds of food waste produced each day by the dining halls. So this week, we’re handing off a LAUREL to the Reitz and Fresh Food Company for their commitment to reducing campus waste.
During the past few days, students have been tweeting and Instragramming photos of racist fliers spotted around campus. The fliers depict a photo of a dog along with a poorly written mock ad for a restaurant called “Happy Fortune Buffet.”
Ugh. Really? How many times do we have to remind racist morons that it’s 2014 and this kind of unfunny bulls**t doesn’t fly anymore?
Stupid “jokes” such as this one are not only bottom-of-the-barrel-scraping attempts at humor, but they’re offensive and target an already marginalized group of people. UF morons get an are-you-effing-serious DART this week.
On a brighter note, UF was recently ranked within the top 20 universities with the most alumni currently in Congress — UF has 12 alumni congressional representatives, and FSU has four. This next LAUREL goes out to all the political Gators doin’ work and makin’ bills — congressional bills, that is. So when you’re in Cancun drinking Coronas on the beach with all the other college students, you have something to brag about in between keg stands.
Happy Spring Break, Gators.
And don’t forget: If you’re going to drink, STAY AWAY FROM BALCONIES.
Seriously.
[A version of this editorial ran on page 6 on 2/28/2014 under the headline "Darts & Laurels"]
