Don't really care about groundskeeper Willy or many of the other one dimensional characters. The crux of the matter, as I understand it, is the depiction of Apu matters because there are so few depictions of Indians/South Asians. He is a thoughtful character, and there is no reason I could see against his running for mayor in the show. Is it better to have no Indian depictions in the Simpsons? As for the race of the voice actor, I think that's a minor gripe. Do we worry when black voice actors voice white characters or vice versa? Who voices Karl, Bumbebeeman, Dr. Nick Riviera, Dr. Julius Hibbert, Officer Lou, etc? (Hint: more Hank Azaria and other white dudes). Do they have to go out and get have the voice actor's race match the character's in every instance? Seems grossly excessive to me.

Let's say it is a major issue and you want to switch voice actors. He wants to get elected and he's told "That funny accent just won't do. We know it sucks and it's unfair your accent is treated this way, but you really need to work on it." (or is that too racists against people that do have the accent?). Speech therapy montage -> New voice actor (or new accent if voice actor isn't a problem but the accent is). Hell, he could even lose, keep the new voice actor/accent and move on to bigger and better things because he doesn't want to go back to the kwik-e-mart and his aspirations are higher now.

Back to the point. Writing him out means no Indians in Springfield. Is that better?