On municipal politics

I’ve thought up a short piece, probably done in mockumentary style. It goes something like this:

CHIARA (36) and REBECCA (67) are two members of the Neighbours’ Association of the European Quarter in Brussels. After finishing her studies in anthropology and political sciences Chiara moved from Turin nine months ago to work for the administration of the European Council. Rebecca has been living her entire life in the same house which has been in the family for longer than she cares to admit. Fifteen years ago she opened up a locally sourced delicatessen on the first floor of the building. Before that she worked in middle management for P&G Benelux. The two are currently the only nominees in the race for the presidency over the Neighbours’ Association. Chiara’s campaign is centred around the upkeep of local green areas, while Rebecca advocates for an increase in waste disposal frequency. Election day is set a week from now. We follow the two protagonists as they make their rounds around the neighbourhood, working to sway the voters in their respective favours. A live-streamed debate is set to take place two days before the election. While it could be said that both women identify as being on the same side of the political spectrum, their division in opinions is stark. Chiara is involved in a grassroots community movement that focuses on actions which can be undertaken by the citizens themselves without the involvement of public institutions. While she agrees with Rebecca that there is a dire need for better waste management, she posits that having to pay for more garbage collection days would fix the problem. To the contrary, she believes it would only exacerbate the issue by demotivating people from sorting their trash and being more mindful of what they purchase and discard. Chiara’s proposal is to bring people together by way of a shared custody of all local green spaces. She would go as far as to dismiss the communal services offered by the municipality in favour of a residents’ cooperative. She thinks that this would make all the inhabitants more engaged in the communal life of the neighbourhood and therefore trickle out into other aspects of communal living. Rebecca, on the other hand, derides Chiara for her youthful idealism which she considers unproductive and moralising. She claims her campaign in more grounded in reality, with a no-nonsense approach. The streets, she argues, have become exceedingly filthy insofar as they pose a health and safety problem for the residents. Given the sheer amount of money they are asked to set aside for taxes, this is deemed unacceptable and beyond reproach for the capital of the European Union. She promises boycotts and intense lobbying for the municipality to allot more of taxpayers’ funds towards a more frequent waste pickup schedule. The two opposing camps’ efforts have gone somewhat off the rails. Each side has been sucked into a vortex of slander and scare tactics, methods they usually despise from their political opponents on a broader scale.