Duluth's oft-strained campus-community relations -- at the heart of a News Tribune Opinion page series this year called "We're a College Town" -- aren't lost on the University of Minnesota Duluth's ninth campus leader, Lendley "Lynn" Black, who became chancellor on Aug. 1.
He lives those relations every day.
As News Tribune education reporter Jana Hollingsworth will report in Sunday's paper, Black chose, quite deliberately, to live in a neighborhood near the UMD campus. He originally attempted to rent a house for sale there but was thwarted by the city's 300-foot rule.
"We wanted to be part of a neighborhood that's close to campus that deals with campus-community issues," Black told Hollingsworth this week in an exclusive interview that preceded a meeting yesterday with the News Tribune editorial board and others from the newspaper. "We have a house two doors down rented out by students. We've not had any problems."
In Duluth less than half a year, Black has taken encouraging steps already to keep problems at bay, for the good of the university, its nearest neighbors and the community at large.
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He launched a comprehensive, strategic, planning effort, the likes of which UMD hasn't seen for years. The effort is to identify a vision and then to write a mission and goals for the university. Black involved not only faculty, staff and students but Duluth residents, which demonstrated a commitment to community. He wants the visioning, including specific actions to implement, completed by end of spring semester.
In addition, in August, during his first days on campus, Black called for a two-day summit on inclusiveness and the campus' climate. The summit followed a well-documented incident of student harassment via Facebook, which included racial slurs. It also followed other, less-
publicized incidents of "bad behavior," Black said in yesterday's meeting.
Since arriving in Duluth, a very active Black has had meetings with the business community about internships and the prospect of expanding opportunities for students to gain practical experience.
He talked with Mayor Don Ness and others about creating an area for students with apartments, coffee shops, storefronts and other businesses that cater to campus life. Such a place has long been long envisioned, including at the former Woodland school or at the old Armory on London Road.
"I hesitate to use the word Dinkytown," Black said yesterday. "We're not going to be copying what's happening in the Twin Cities."
Black also has had initial conversations with city officials and with others about holding art exhibits and maybe even classes downtown, something certain to breathe new life into the city's old core.
"In spite of the great building that's happened over the last 10 years we're still strapped for space," he said, referring to UMD's campus space. "We're going to need to look at other options."
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As Black and the university do, the entire community can remain open to opportunities for collaboration, cooperation and tighter, more-active campus-community relations. The new chancellor is giving every indication he wants to move in that positive direction. The community can embrace becoming the college town it wants to be and the best college town it can be.
"The university and community are even better than I thought coming in, and I had high expectations coming in," Black said yesterday. "I look forward to finding the right niche (and) moving forward as assertively as possible."
