{"id":10478,"date":"2015-08-08T02:33:47","date_gmt":"2015-08-08T02:33:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=10478"},"modified":"2015-08-08T02:33:47","modified_gmt":"2015-08-08T02:33:47","slug":"young-people-rally-behind-mpev","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=10478","title":{"rendered":"Young people rally behind MPEV"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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My path crossed those of two women today. Both are friends. One is a retired businesswoman, the other is an elected Potter County official.<\/p>\n

I spoke to them separately, but the subject of our conversations was the same: the multipurpose event venue that’s been in the news lately.<\/p>\n

The retired business owner seems to be quite against the MPEV. She calls it “a ballpark.” Yes, it is that. It’s also — as the name suggests — potentially much more. Indeed, its very name — “multipurpose event venue” — connotes a place where much more than baseball can be played.<\/p>\n

The MPEV is going to a vote of the people this November. My retired businesswoman friend thinks it’ll go down in flames, that voters will reject it because they see no future for a ballpark in downtown Amarillo. The Amarillo City Council is under no legal<\/em> obligation to follow the dictates of the voters, but it certainly faces a serious political<\/em> obligation if it goes against the voters’ will. Thus, the referendum becomes a de facto<\/em> binding event.<\/p>\n

It’ll fail at the polls this November if those who support it do not start a major sales campaign to educate Amarillo residents about the possibilities that this event can bring to the downtown district.<\/p>\n

Which brings me to the other friend with whom I spoke this afternoon.<\/p>\n

She told me she supports the MPEV. She also thinks it’s likely to lose at the ballot box this November, but said the election results could be close.<\/p>\n

But she offered a glimmer of hope. It rests with the involvement of the city’s young residents, specifically those who belong to a group called the Amarillo Millennial Movement.<\/p>\n

AMM\u00a0has formed specifically to be champions for the city’s comprehensive downtown revival effort. It puts its message out on social media — Facebook, Twitter and maybe other outlets.<\/p>\n

My elected official friend is quite thrilled — as I am — that young residents are becoming engaged in this process. “They usually sit these things out,” she told me, adding that the involvement of this group — and perhaps other young people — might be decisive at the polls in November.<\/p>\n

I hope she’s right.<\/p>\n

They’ve spoken out to the Amarillo City Council, making the case that downtown Amarillo needs to be a place that attracts young people to it and keeps young residents from moving away.<\/p>\n

Time will tell if they can organize their enthusiasm into a meaningful political force of nature.<\/p>\n

My hope there as well is that they can.<\/p>\n\n

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My path crossed those of two women today. Both are friends. One is a retired businesswoman, the other is an elected Potter County official. I spoke to them separately, but the subject of our conversations was the same: the multipurpose event venue that’s been in the news lately. The retired business owner seems to be … Continue reading Young people rally behind MPEV<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[288,320,1436,3153],"class_list":["post-10478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-amarillo-city-council","tag-amarillo-millennial-movement","tag-downtown-amarillo","tag-mpev"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10478"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10478\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}