Social Justice in the Form of a Bus Line

When I look back on the events of this week, I think my all time favorite will be the news that in 30 days, we'll have a bus stop in front of our campus.  We've been working a long time to get a bus stop.

When I first started at the school, in the fall of 2016, I was told about the need for a bus stop and that the campus had been told that we couldn't get a bus stop until we had at least 250 students.  But as we looked at our campus neighborhood, we realized that we're not the only business on the street.  The nearest bus stops were over a mile away.

In August of 2017, I was at a Hollywood Chamber of Commerce breakfast, and I had a chance to speak to the mayor of Hollywood.  You may remember that I wrote about it in this blog post.  I realized I had one chance, and I introduced myself and identified the college campus, and then I said, "I know that a lot of government attention goes to the beach and the downtown area of Hollywood, and I live in the historic district, so I understand that it’s easier to work for the prettier parts of town. But the citizens who live out west need government help too.”

He said he would see what he could do.  I came home ecstatic, and my spouse reminded me that it's not just up to the mayor.  But throughout the months, we've seen the mayor at various events, and we've always reminded him about the need for a bus stop.

On Thursday, my boss told me to look out the window.  Lo and behold, there was a worker, installing a bus stop sign.  My co-worker (who has kept up the drumbeat for a bus stop even when others got tired) took this picture:

I realize that we may have had nothing to do with this bus stop.  There's been a lot of development, so an increase in bus lines may have been in the works long before we started advocating.

But I'm letting myself feel a sense of accomplishment anyway.  We saw a need, and we saw a solution, and we kept it in front of politicians.  I like the idea that there are still politicians who will do the work required to make life better for all of their constituencies, not just the rich and powerful.

I realize that some people might scoff at the idea that we've done anything worthwhile.  They might point to the crisis with immigrants being treated inhumanely at the border.  They might point to the Constitutional crisis that seems to be unfolding at the Federal level.

I would remind us all that most humans aren't wired to be able to respond to crises on this global level, at least not on a regular basis.  We are, however, able to help those that are within a certain radius of us.  We're more likely to understand the situation on a local level:  who's hurting and how we can help.  We're likely to be able to make those changes happen.

At the end of my blog post that I wrote back in August 2017, I wrote this:  "I can't make Trump quit sending out tweets that bring us to the brink of annihilation, but if I could get a busline to an impoverished area, that would make me feel proud."

Let me take a moment to feel proud.  And then let me keep working on making the world a better place.  It will take more than a bus stop, but for the people who need a bus stop, what we've accomplished is a big deal.