Just like last year, Vox is helping you get on top of “news you can use” with an excessively comprehensive review of last year’s important news stories. Today, we cover the off-campus issues that made headlines; noise, cronyism, and cannabis come after the jump.

We’ve got the campus plan blues

Every ten years, Georgetown must submit a campus plan to the D.C. Zoning Commission detailing proposed construction and land-use on its property.

Before the Zoning Commission approves the plan, it must hold hearings where civic associations in nearby Burleith, West Georgetown, and Foxhall Village can air their many grievances.

Neighborhood associations are irate [PDF] because some Georgetown students are loud and drunken. If the Zoning Commission doesn’t force us on-campus, they say, the neighborhood will become a “student ghetto.” To support this cause, which has gained the endorsement of several D.C. councilmembers, they are putting up yard signs, forming coalitions, and speaking out in public forums.

These activists also have recourse to a unique form of hyper-local government called the advisory neighborhood commission. There are 38 ANC’s throughout the city that provide official community input on everything from liquor licenses to traffic and land-use planning. In keeping with its history, Georgetown and Burleith’s ANC 2E opposes the 2010 Campus Plan. Because of clever gerrymandering of the dorms, there is only one student commissioner, Jake Sticka (COL ’13), on that commission.

The University, for its part, has tried reaching out to neighbors and stumping for support across the city. Georgetown has also ceded to several neighborhood demands, from scrapping graduate housing just off-campus to turning the Leavey Center Hotel into a dorm, in hopes of winning the endorsement of city agencies.

The D.C. Office of Planning didn’t return the love; they recommended a hard cap on undergraduate admissions and 100-percent on-campus residency. The Zoning Commission is due to issue its ruling in November. Depending on the verdict, neighborhood groups or the University will petition the D.C. Court of Appeals to reverse the directive.

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Today, DC Students Speak, YouthPAC, and the DC Federation of College Democrats will host a forum for the candidates running for At-Large DC Council Seat. The date of the election is April 26th.

[Editor's Note: An earlier version of this post incorrectly reported that DC Student Speak's voter registration drive ends today. In fact, only the dorm registration efforts end today. We apologize for the error.]

Today marks the final day of efforts by grassroots advocacy group DC Students Speak to register voters in University residence halls, as the group works towards its broader goal of registering at least 1,000 students to vote in the District by November 2012.

The group was founded in November 2009 to give students a greater role in D.C.’s political process and encourage cooperation amongst university students across the district.

According to Scott Stirrett (SFS ’13), a principal organizer of the drive, the lack of students registered in D.C. hinders the student voice in city government.

“There are 100,000 students in DC, but 98 percent of students aren’t registered to vote in D.C.,” he said.

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A group of Georgetown students launched stopcrimenotparties.com on Sunday, giving students the opportunity to report encounters with local residents, the Metropolitan Police Department, the Department of Public Safety, and the Student Neighbor Assistance Program.

The website’s goal? To document any instances of “questionable behavior” observed by students during those encounters — especially in the wake of an amended disorderly conduct law that outlaws any loud noise between 10 p.m. and 7 a.m. that could be considered “likely to disturb one or more persons in their residence.”

Although no students have been arrested under the law since it took effect last month, it inspired the site’s launch.

“Obviously the new noise law means that things are changing a bit,” Adam Mortillaro (COL ’12), one of the founders of the site, said. “We just want to keep an eye on this as the ordinance moves forward.”

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D.C. Student Alliance, an advocacy group made up of elected student leaders at universities in the District, recently sent an open letter to city officials asking for a clarification of the vague new amendments to the District’s noise law.

Mayor Vince Gray’s office was the first to respond to the letter. DCSA has not yet heard from Council Chairman Kwame Brown, Police Chief Cathy Lanier, or Acting Attorney General Irvin Nathan.

Gray’s office expressed interest in meeting with the signatories of the letter to discuss the recent changes.

Georgetown University Student Association Senate Speaker Adam Mortillaro (COL ’12) signed the letter on behalf of GUSA and the Georgetown student body.

Read the letter from DCSA to city officials after the jump.
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In Sunday afternoon’s Georgetown University Student Association senate meeting, the senators unanimously passed a resolution regarding the recent amendment to the District’s noise ordinance.

Introduced by GUSA Speaker Adam Mortillaro (COL ’12) and four other senators, the resolution condemns the law for “instituting unnecessary and unreasonably harsh sanctions for an infraction with an ambiguous standard of behavior.”

In addition, the resolution calls for GUSA to formally submit a letter of protest to the D.C. City Council requesting them to review their decision. GUSA will also request a clarification from the Metropolitan Police Department on its standards of enforcement.

Although not specifically cited in the resolution, GUSA has reached out to the American Civil Liberties Union. The ACLU is currently reviewing the case.

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D.C. Students Speak, a student-run advocacy group that was behind the petition in support of the 2010 Campus Plan, has created a petition opposing the recently amended D.C. noise law.

The recent amendment makes it “unlawful for a person to make an unreasonably loud noise between 10:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m. that is likely to annoy or disturb one or more other persons in their residences.”

DCSS claims that the amendments to the law are too vague, as there is no definition in the law of what is to be considered likely to annoy or disturb.

Under the changes that took place at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday, the noise violation is an arrestable offense and carries a penalty of up to a $500 fine and/or 90 days in jail.

As of early this morning the petition had more than 1,000 signatures, over 80 percent of which are from the D.C. area.

For those who want to fight for their right to party (or have a conversation outside after 10:00 p.m.), the petition is available to be signed online.