When UT freshman Dave Thadani tells voters he is running to be on the Austin City Council, people almost always ask if he is old enough to run. But for Thadani\u2019s campaign, he said his policies are more important than his age.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of students don\u2019t know that they can get involved,\u201d Thadani said. \u201cStudents (are) almost getting left behind in a city that prides itself in its flagship university.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thadani, a computer science freshman, said he became interested in politics during the 2016 presidential election. He said he began researching how to run for office as soon as he enrolled at the University, and is now running for the Austin City Council District 9 seat, which represents UT and West Campus.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201c(Running has) genuinely been a long time coming,\u201d Thadani said. \u201cI saw a problem in Austin, and I just wanted to help. I just wanted to be the change that I wanted to see.\u201d<\/p>\n
UT alumnus Zohaib \u201cZo\u201d Qadri, who currently holds the seat, has served on the city council since 2023 and is seeking re-election. Thadani will face Qadri, former UT professor Rich Heyman<\/a> and UT alumna Katie Kam<\/a> in November.\u00a0<\/p>\n As a current student, Thadani said he understands the unique issues facing UT and the West Campus, which he is running to represent better than the alumni running alongside him. These candidates have \u201clived\u201d the student life, but are not \u201cliving\u201d it, he said.<\/p>\n \u201c(Alumni) are no longer in the same struggle that a lot of these students are currently in,\u201d Thadani said. \u201cYou can\u2019t say that you know exactly what it\u2019s like when you\u2019re not in that exact situation.\u201d<\/p>\n Thadani said students in West Campus are \u201cbeing taken advantage of through predatory lease contracts, as many students are first-time renters,\u201d with many students unaware of the defects of apartment buildings before signing.\u00a0<\/p>\n Thadani proposes launching a landlord transparency portal, an online platform to centralize public building complaints, such as reported maintenance issues and apartment code violations, according to his website.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIf we were to consolidate that (information) and promote it as a way to check if your apartment is great \u2026 it would provide that peace of mind, not only for students who have been here, but also for parents who are sending their children here,\u201d Thadani said.<\/p>\n He also said he will advocate for more publicization of the 3-1-1 app, an app where Austin residents can report non-emergency issues, Thadani added.\u00a0 He said students should know they can report landlords and code violations on the app.<\/p>\n \u201cYou don\u2019t have to live in an environment that\u2019s not suitable,\u201d Thadani said. \u201cYou have the right to a natural home, a place where you can call home without being worried about getting sick.\u201d<\/p>\n Thandani also advocates for the University Neighborhood Overlay<\/a> program, which is a high-density redevelopment plan for West Campus that has been continuously postponed<\/a> for nearly a year, as a top priority. He said he also advocates for safe and sustainable city planning by pushing for more green spaces and sustainable transportation.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cOne of the main reasons we have the urban heat island effect and why Austin is becoming so much hotter is because we haven\u2019t practiced that sustainable development that we all like to pledge,\u201d Thadani said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Thadani said he plans on continuing his studies at UT if elected. He added how being a student while being in office would make him uniquely qualified to be a city council representative.<\/p>\n \u201cA lot of people ask me if it\u2019s challenging being a student and running for office at the same time, but I think that\u2019s the point,\u201d Thadani said. \u201cI\u2019m living an experience that everybody has to live.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When UT freshman Dave Thadani tells voters he is running to be on the Austin City Council, people…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":254008,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133],"class_list":{"0":"post-254007","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-austin","8":"tag-austin","9":"tag-austin-headlines","10":"tag-austin-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=254007"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254007\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/254008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=254007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=254007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=254007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}