Dear Editor,  

I am a college student.  I like to socialize at night downtown with my friends.  But I also want to respect the community that I am a part of. To many, these last two statements may not seem to go together.  

College students downtown at night are loud, reckless and often inconsiderate of those around them, negatively impacting their respective communities.

Homeowners and their families want to be able to have a good night’s sleep without the interruptions of students stumbling around their houses from midnight to two, three or four a.m.  

Most kids don’t realize the impact they have at night while they are walking around from place to place or socializing at a party.

I recently attended a noise violation session at the Burlington Community Justice Center because I was one of those culprits at night. My house had received noise violations over the summer.  

I had come to the session to learn about the negative impact my roommates and I had caused our surrounding community, and about the $100 ticket we received.  

The session was eye opening and informative. Dare I say enjoyable, too? It was not a lecture on how I was a bad community member, but rather a forum on how we could become better ones.

For all the college kids reading this article, listen up.  You aren’t the only ones living in downtown Burlington. On nearly every street there are probably other families that live there.  

If a police officer is walking or driving by slowly enough to hear your party, it is too loud and, sadly enough, you probably deserve a noise violation.  Even more so, if a community member can hear your party at night, they have every right to call the police.  

It is possible to socialize at night in Burlington. If you go out for the night, just remember to keep your voices down while walking around, and, if you choose to have a social event, make sure it cannot be heard from the street because, as I said earlier, it is too loud.  

In conclusion, social events will happen – that does not mean we should throw all respect into the wind every weekend.  

We need to remember to respect our community members because they are in every way as big of a part of the Burlington community as we are.  So, if you choose to socialize, do so in respect of your community.  Remember, Burlington is rated as the best place to raise a family, and we don’t want to lose that, do we?

Sincerely,

David King

Class of 2014