The depiction of the remote desert town of 'Alice' in the bestselling novel 'A Town Like Alice' in the 1950s spurred a wave of migration that changed the face of Australia, driving a million British migrants, whose homeland was battered by winds, to the other side of the planet. With its attractive nature, the town of 'Alice' became the ideal model of a small town, attracting a generation exhausted by war. However, 75 years later, 'Alice', as Australians know it, has become a source of concern, marked by the conflict between Indigenous and white populations.Racism is rampant in 'Alice'. Amidst this racial turmoil, a young woman, Aylsa Hill, the new mayor of the town, stepped into this challenging situation. Hill, 37, spent her childhood in this town. Born to parents she describes as outcasts—a Danish mother and an English father—Hill began her life in the small village of Mutitjulu, where her parents, the only white residents, ran the village store. The family moved to 'Alice', which became a dark place Hill wanted to escape from.Hill says, 'I couldn't get out of here fast enough.' Hill was elected mayor of the town eight weeks ago. But Hill managed to leave 'Alice', excelled in her studies, and trained as a lawyer. She became a judge's associate and served at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, where she worked on the prosecution of Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadžić for genocide. She later worked as a human rights lawyer in Johannesburg before moving to New York to complete a master's degree on a prestigious scholarship at Vanderbilt University.After a tragedy in her home, she returned to the town: her brother, musician Raoul (23), drowned while rowing on the town's river, which deeply grieved her, and she returned from New York to her family home. When Hill returned to 'Alice Springs' ten years ago, she worked as a prosecutor at the town court and as a defense lawyer for the most vulnerable groups. Hill sometimes admits she felt 'complicit' in working with the justice system of the Northern Territory, a system that imprisons criminals at a rate nearly nine times higher than that of England and Wales, with approximately 90% of prisoners being from Indigenous communities.Now that she is mayor, Hill wants to save 'Alice', breathe life back into its shops, which have become fortresses, and restore the good reputation that attracted many to the town. She also wants to provide shelter for the most marginalized people in the town's community. Her predecessor, an electrician, had overseen consecutive night curfews amid rising youth crime and even called on the Australian army for help.Hill's plans do not seem to differ much from her predecessor's. She wants to build a large, safe, and airy public library for the youth of 'Alice'—a place young people and those who feel bored will love. She also aims to keep the public swimming pool open at night with reduced entry fees and to reduce the number of intimidating surveillance and security systems that fill the city.Source: 'The Times'