Erik Mellgren noticed it his freshman year: a "huge swamp" of unpaved earth north of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's Beadle Center on 19th and Vine streets. In the spring the ground softens and turns to mud, challenging the shoes – and patience – of students and professors parked in the Beadle Center's north lot.
Mellgren, a junior biology major, and Hannah Ledford, a junior international studies major, and junior music major Matthew Boring have a plan to change that.
The three head the CONCRETE Party, a student election group running in the Association of Students of the University of Nebraska's March election.
CONCRETE registered Feb. 4, the application deadline for this race as outlined by the ASUN Electoral Commission Rules.
CONCRETE's purpose statement reads simply, "We want to build a sidewalk to the Beadle Center."
CONCRETE will hold their formal announcement at 6 p.m. today on the steps of the fountain outside the Nebraska Union. The CONNECT Party and the Party of Hope and Change have registered for the election last semester.
Unlike most ASUN parties, CONCRETE has just one election platform: Installing the sidewalk. Mellgren, whose other political activities include acting as president of the UNL Young Democrats, described his group as "outside the establishment" of ASUN. To him, that's all for the better.
"(Past ASUN parties) will say one thing, and then do nothing. They'll promise a bunch of things in their platform, and none of it is achieved," Mellgren said. "This is a real problem that's actually achievable. We don't want to make a lot of promises we can't achieve."
CONCRETE has talked with several contractors about the logistics of installing the sidewalk, which would cost less than $400 and require no additional student fees, Mellgren said.
But if CONCRETE is elected and the sidewalk goal completed, then what?
"We're kind of leaving ourselves open," said Ledford. "There's a lot of big issues … and something needs to be done about them, but I'm not prepared to say that we're going to stick it in our platform or promise to fix it when I know that we probably won't be able to, because nobody else has."
"I've been here three years and I've been promised tax-free textbooks, coffee in every building and a lowering of student fees, and none of that has happened," Ledford said.
Ledford is optimistic that with official ASUN titles and the weight of student support behind them, CONCRETE can carry out its platform.
"If you can say that you were elected because the student body wants a sidewalk here, I think it carries much more weight than just a single student walking into whoever's office and saying, ‘My shoes got muddy today. Can you do something about this please?'" Ledford said.
"I mean, it's a lot of work, but it's still the most efficient way to get it done."
renaeblum@dailynebraskan.com
is a member of the 
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