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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (April 2, 1975)
Weather: Partly cloudy and cooler Wednesday. Today’s high' 69. Low tonight 38. Fair and cool Thursday with northerly winds. High to morrow 67. Cbe Battalion Vol. 68 No. 97 College Station, Texas . Wednesday, April 2, 1975 Inside Over the wall 3 Parr 4 Women’s basketball .p. 8 Large vote margins put in councilmen By GERALD OLIVIER Staff Writer Participating in Tuesday’s election are James Rice (C) and Glenn Hemann (R), while Jerri Ward (L) and Jean Lauter supervise. photo by David McCarroii Senate seats 9 of 17 lack competition Gary Halter, Bob Bell and Larry Bravenec were chosen by wide margins to serve on the city council of College Station in Tuesdays elec tions. In Place 1, Halter won by a 800-vote margin over Jim Jett. Hal ter, a TAMU political science pro fessor, pulled 75 percent of the total vote. His weakest box was on cam- City Editor The Brazos County Commission ers Court voted in a special meeting early this week to cancel the County Court at Law referendum it scheduled to coincide with the April 22 state constitutional amendment election. County' Judge Bill Vance said the County Court at Law would proba bly be established for Brazos County by the Texas Legislature be fore the date of the election. The referendum would have only served to determine public opinion in the county toward getting the new court. Only the Legislature can actually establish the court. State Senator Bill Moore of Bryan introduced the bill creating the court. Moore s bill calls for abolish ing the current County Court’s civil and criminal jurisdiction and replac ing it with the County Court at Law. The County Judge would no longer be both the administrative head of the county and judge for civil and criminal court proceedings, but would be left solely with administra tive duties. According to the bill the new court would have its own judge to be paid no less than the amount paid to the County Judge, who cur rently makes $18,000 a year. The bill has already passed the Texas Senate and the House Com- pus, Precinct 20, where he polled only 67 percent of the 348 votes cast. Halter garnered 78 percent of the Precinct 10 (south of Dominik Drive) votes for his best showing. Bell, a radio station manager, was a convincing victor in Place 3 over incumbent Don Dale with 62 per cent of the vote. Bell’s strongest support came in Precinct 10 with 71 percent. His weakest point was the mittee on Judicial Affairs. It is ex pected to be considered by the en tire House this week. The bill is sponsored in the House by State Representative Bill Presnal of Bryan. Presnal said in a press release that by 1977, there will be a definite need for the new court in Brazos County. The Commissioners Court and Judge Vance disagree with Presnal. The commissioners recently passed a resolution condemning the legisla tion creating the court. They said the County Judge’s case load and administrative duties are not great enough to warrant establishing the new court. The resolution stated that to allow for an increase in work, the County Judge will be paid “a salary commensurate with fulltime service effective Jan. 1, 1976.” Vance currently maintains a part- time law practice. Concurring with the commis sioners court, Vance said Tuesday the county court case load has not increased significantly in recent years and the new court is unneces sary and a burden on the taxpayer. The commissioners court esti mated the additional cost to the county with the new court to be $75,000 in the first year and $60,000 annually afterwards. A&M Consolidated Middle School Box, Precinct 9, where he pulled only 56 percent of the 585 votes cast. In Place 5, incumbent Bravenec, a TAMU accounting professor, pul- Halter, Bell and Bravenec will be sworn as councilmen tomorrow at a meeting of the council at 5 p.m. in the city council chambers at City Hall. led the third landslide. He tallied 69 percent of the 2,293 votes cast in the city. Greg Magruder, Bravenec’s op ponent and a TAMU sophomore, was the only loser to carry a box. Magruder polled 73 percent of the campus votes and finished with a 30 percent overall. Bravenec’s biggest support came at the College Hills Winners Need a good reason to throw a party? Win a city council election. The two new faces on the College Station city council. Bob Bell and Gary Halter, both had celebrations at their homes Tuesday night. Larry Bravenec, the other winner, spent election night transporting bees. Both Bell and Halter were pleas antly surprised at the relatively large voter turnout. Neither fared differently from the expected, they said. Both candidates won by large margins over their opponents. Bell beat incumbent Don Dale by 556 votes. Halter was victorious over realtor Jim Jett by a 1,125-vote mar gin. Halter’s house was pan demonium. Supporters including most of the TAMU Political Science Department, were there drinking beer and passing around congratula tions. When asked how it felt to be the wife of a city councilman, Linda Halter said, “It feels great, now he’ll Elementary box where he got 81 percent of the 534 votes cast. The voter turnout in the city was better than last year, with 20.47 percent of the eligible voters casting ballots compared to last year’s 17 percent. The campus box, though more than double the votes of last year, was behind the city average with a 11.35 percent turnout. The votes by precinct were: 10) Fire Station Place 1 Halter — 122 Jett— 33 Place 3 Dale — 44 Bell — 108 Place 5 Magruder — 43 Bravenec — 113 20) TAMU University Center Place 1 Halter — 223 Jett — 108 (see PRECINCT, p. 3) react be home working on the new addi tion to the house, instead of being out campaigning. ” Halter was content to soak up his victory. He said all he is planning right now is to be sworn in. Halter’s supporters were a bois terous group. The talk was loud and cheerful and the telephone rang constantly with friends calling their congratulations. The scene at Bell’s house was a bit calmer. At 10:30, with Halter’s party still going strong, only a small group were at the Bells’. Lane Stephenson, Bell’s campaign man ager, a couple of neighbors, and this reporter were almost the whole crowd. Talk of the election and the com ing year predominated. Bell con ceded his victory to an “anti-Don Dale” vote. Bell said the party had been ear lier and the crowd had already left. The phone was quiet, but the beer and congratulations were the same as Halter’s. There’s no competition yet in the race for senate seats and nine of the 17 places on Graduate Student Council are still open. With filing in progress until Monday, none of the colleges has reached its quota of representa tives. The election of yell leaders, class officers. Senate executive commit tee and Residence Hall Association will be held April 8, from 8 a. m. to 6 p.m. Polling places will be the married student housing office, the old ex change store, Krueger-Dunn Commons, the Corps Guard room, Fowler lounge and the MSC. Because of the lack of filing, the election of senators and GSC has been postponed until April 15. Five of the eight seats from the college of agriculture are still open, one of the two from Architecture, two of the three from business and both of the education seats. Six of the seven seats from the college of engineering are still open, three of the four from liberal arts, and half of the six science seats. The single geoscience seat has not been filed for, and two of the three from veterinary medicine are still open. Two of the three spots for the Corps of Cadets, five of the six for off-campus graduate, half of the 12 off-campus undergraduate seats and married student housing’s one posi tion are still open. No filing has been made for the housing areas of Hotard-Walton- , Schumacher, Crocker-Moore- Mclnnis, Cain-Law-Puryear, and Kethley-Fowler-Hughes. Each area is allowed one representative. In each of the races for Dunn- Utay, Krueger-White, Hart- Legett-Milner and Davis-Gary- Moses one person has filed for the position. The Graduate Student Council is composed of graduates from each of the colleges. As of 5:00 Tuesday, the four seats open from the College of Agricul ture had three contenders, the three seats from the college of en gineering had three contenders, the two seats from the college of educa tion had one contender and the one liberal arts position had been filed for by one person. The colleges of Geoscience and Science are allotted two seats apiece, neither of which have been filed for. Architecture, veterinary medi cine and business have one seat which are also still open. Batt, Aggieland draw 8 for race Commissioners stop referendum By ROD SPEER Some party, some move bees Judiciary Council reports increasing caseloads on low courts By STEVE GRAY Staff Writer Lower courts in Texas are bearing the burden of increasing caseloads, according to a special interim report issued by the Texas Civil Judicial Council covering the first six months of 1974. The report, released in March, showed that 580 new cases were filed in the Brazos County Court during that time period. The total includes 51 civil, 455 criminal and 74 probate cases. County Judge Bill Vance said Tuesday the workload in court “is probably inching up,” but, unlike other areas of Texas, “it is not un bearable. ” According to the report, 2,651 cases were filed in three of the county’s five justice of the peace courts. Misdemeanor traffic cases accounted for 1,989 of the cases plus 483 nontraffic misdemeanor and 179 civil cases. Justices of the Peace Joe Novosad of Precinct 5 and Mike Calliham of Precinct 7 are reportedly working on their reports and should have them completed soon. This is the first time the justice council has released a report on the activities of the state’s county, jus tice of the peace and municipal courts. In the past the council has released statistics on the state dis trict courts and is now trying to sur vey the entire court system in the state. It is presently collecting data on the state’s lower courts and will issue its first annual report for 1974 sometime in April or May. Although the council released no figures last year on the county’s share of the caseload for 1973, Jus tice of the Peace B. H. Dewey said Monday the situation isn’t getting any better. “My position is a fulltime one just like the county judge’s but my salary is not up to par with the amount of work I do,” Dewey said. The municipal court of College Station reported that 2,309 cases were filed during the first half of 1974, including 1,958 traffic cases and 351 non traffic cases. Bryan Municipal Court reported 4,481 cases were filed during the same period, including 3,616 traffic and 865 non-traffic cases. The judicial council said 1,716,697 cases of all types were filed or appealed in the courts re porting to the council, including county courts, justice of the peace and municipal courts. During the first six months of 1974 a total of 1,539,931 of those cases were dis posed of. The council pointed Out that 53 per cent of the county criminal court cases and 38 per cent of the civil cases were dismissed or settled prior to trial. The council’s report also showed a high percentage of convictions in the county courts. Defendants were convicted in 99.4 per cent of the cases. During this period 313 de fendants were acquitted, compared to 51,120 convicted. The high rate of convictions, the report said, should be viewed “in relationship to the high rate of dis missals prior to trial in these same courts to obtain a true conviction- acquittal ratio in the county courts. ” Of the 454 cases disposed of in Bryan County Court in the first half of 1974, 35 cases were dismissed while 419 cases received convic tions. Of the seven defendants to plead not guilty, none were re ported to receive aquittals. Judge Vance said the main cause of dismissals is insufficient evidence for the state to make its case. Justice of the peace and munici pal courts received $26,454, 141 in revenue during the six-month re porting period. Court costs of $2.50 per case were remitted to the state’s Criminal Justice Planning Fund. Justice courts received $9,265,904 and municipal courts collected $17,188,237. Most of the money was collected from traffic fines. Four students have applied for the editorship of The Battalion and four others for the editorship of the Aggieland. Will Anderson, junior journalism major; James Breedlove, senior journalism major; Sherry Lynn LaBuda, sophomore political sci ence major; and LaTonya Perrin, senior journalism major, are vying for Battalion editor. Gary Baldasari, senior environ mental design major; Lynne Ed wards, junior economics major; Bill Slingerland, junior wildlife and fisheries science major; and Anita Williams, junior education major, seek the Aggieland leadership. Anderson has held positions of reporter, news editor and managing editor on The Battalion. He is pres ently assistant editor. Breedlove served an internship with the Bryan Eagle. He also served as interim managing editor of The Battalion last month. LaBuda has worked on a county paper and was co-editor of her high school paper. She was a feature wri ter on The Battalion during the fall of 1973. Perrin has been a reporter on The Battalion and now serves as manag ing editor. She completed an in ternship with The Odessa American this past summer. For the Aggieland, Baldasari was photo editor of The Battalion last year and head photographer of the Aggieland this year. He has com pleted summer internships with the San Diego Sentinel and the San Diego Reader. Lynn Edwards has worked for the Aggieland for three years, on the organizations section her freshman year and the activities sections the next year. The first semester of this year she was photo editor and now serves as the adviser of the military section. Slingerland has served as resi dence hall section editor, student life section editor and is now busi ness manager of the Aggieland. Williams was assistant editor of her high school newspaper, and has worked on the junior and senior class sections of the Aggieland. Eastgate walls The torn-up ground and mounds of dirt at the east entr ance are not signs of wider streets; they are part of the million-dollar plan to encom pass the campus with a wall. Planter beds containing ivy will be placed in the road medians and eight-hundred more feet of brick wall will be placed bet ween the University road signs along with some wrought-iron fences. Mercury vapor flood lights will be installed to light the wall at night since this new construction addition is meant to “mark” the east entrance to campus. Construction of the walls are scheduled to be com pleted at the end of this year, including the walls at the south and westgate entrances. Photo by Kevin Fotomy