Page 2
Viewpoint
The Battalion
Texas A&M University
Wednesday
August 31, 1977
One of the newer and less glamorous traditions at this University reap
peared earlier this week when over a hundred students waited in line, some
more than than 24 hours, in a last-ditch effort to get a dorm room on the
Texas A&M campus.
The shortage of dorm rooms is nothing new. But the problem has become
more and more acute in recent years, especially for students who simply can
not live off campus, whether for financial or other reasons.
Demands for space on campus, coupled with increasing costs to maintain
older dorms forced University officials to convert the oldest dorm on cam
pus, Milner Hall, to office space last year. That cut dorm space on campus to
under 8,000 beds. Another old dorm, Legett, narrowly escaped the same
fate during the July board of regents meeting.
During a committee discussion before that regents meeting. Chancellor
Jack Williams argued persuasively that Texas A&M can’t afford to eliminate
any more dorm rooms. One regent disagreed strongly, saying that from a
business standpoint office space was a greater concern than dorm space. But
the majority of the board agreed with Williams.
The board did appropriate $5,000 to begin a study of construction needs
for a new women’s athletic dorm, to be financed through stocks given to
the University specifically for that dorm.
Vice-chancellor for administration Clyde Freeman was at that time study
ing the respective benefits and costs involved in building additional dorms.
Although a final conclusion has yet to be made, any benefits provided by
new dorms will have to outweigh the considerable problems they pose.
Cost is a major stumbling block. With skyrocketing, construction costs and
the many special requirements for dorm construction, any new dorm large
enough to help the housing problem would cost many millions of dollars.
That would have to be locally-generated money, because state funds can
not be used to build dorms. But most of the local money going for dorm
expenses comes from the dorm fees students pay each month, so new dorm
rooms could well make all the University’s rooms too expensive for most
students. The decision just to renovate Leggett Hall and keep it as a 187-bed
dorm will cost every dorm student $30-40 more per semester.
Then there’s the time factor. Because of the numerous steps necessary in
proposing, planning, designing, financing, building and finishing a dorm, a
new one started this month wouldn’t be completed before Sept., 1980. That
requires some real long-term planning.
Space is another problem. There is very little open space on the main
University campus, and that space isn’t where parking and traffic created by
dorms would be permissible. The west campus is more isolated than many
College Station apartment complexes.
Planning a multi-million dollar project that many years ahead is risky,
especially when it depends on the uncertainty that enrollment will continue
to increase and that students will continue to clamber for any available
space. The demand for dorms has been certain as death and taxes in recent
years, but that’s no guarantee for the future.
Local construction, especially in apartments, is running at break-neck
speed to meet housing demands. In fact, many community and university
experts believe that construction boom has already passed the demand for
apartments. If so, coming years will see a “buyers market” in apartments,
with a resulting drop in prices as apartment managers again compete for
student tenants.
Yes, there are advantages for students living on campus. Being “right
here, ” not having to fight for parking space every day, avoiding the myriad of
landlord, rent and utility problems that accompany apartment life — all are
benefits for dorm students.
But are those advantages worth the major gambles entailed in building a
new dorm? The question must be considered long and hard before taking
those risks.
L.R.L.
Slouch
Jim Earle
“I KNOW YOU MAY THINK THAT SOPHOMORES KNOW IT ALL NOW,
BUT LATER YOU’LL KNOW BETTER WHEN YOU SEE THEIR GRADE
POINT RATIOS!”
using
By DAVID S. BRODER
WASHINGTON — It is an oddity of
President Carter’s foreign policy that the
scope of his initiatives seems inverse to
the size of the countries involved.
The President has made a treaty with
Panama, an agreement with Cuba, and
any number of proposals to Rhodesia, Is
rael, Vietnam, Korea and the other
welterweight-class powers.
But it has taken almost eight months for
the administration to discover the huge
mass of China. And Secretary of State
Vance, who was there last week, repor
tedly is operating under presidential in
structions to make no waves.
Just why the President likes to take
giant strides in tiny lands and baby steps
when dealing with big powers is not clear.
But it is certain that he does not do so
based on unanimous advice from fairly
qualified experts on China — a category
that most emphatically does not include
this reporter.
As noted here last spring, the panel of
experts assembled for the American Soci
ety of Newspaper Editors convention in
Honolulu included several who argued, in
effect, that the President should stop frit
tering away his energies at the edges of
the Asian continent in Korea and Vietnam
and the Philippines — and go to the
source, which is China.
That view reached the center of Ameri
can politics last week when Sen. Edward
M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) said the time has
come to establish full diplomatic relations
with Peking, while downgrading the rela
tionship with Taiwan to one of unofficial
support for its military security and eco
nomic prosperity.
Murray Marder, The Washington Post’s
veteran diplomatic correspondent, said
the Kennedy speech reflected the views of
China specialists “inside and outside the
government.” Some of those specialists,
Marder reported, were in the National
Security Council and the State Depart
ment. While the department formally dis
owned any collusion with Kennedy, it was
reportedly pleased that Kennedy’s speech
had brought the Honolulu dialogue to the
Mainland.
The only point worth noting, however,
is that in this administration’s foreign pol
icy — like almost every other major policy
— is really made by only one “specialist. ”
And his name is Jimmy Carter.
Carter’s approach to the Chinese ques
tion is one of great caution. There may or
may not be solid diplomatic considerations
that weigh against the bold move the
China hands are recommending, through
Kennedy, to cement U.S.-Peking relation
ship and forestall any rapprochement be
tween Peking and Moscow.
But there are obvious domestic cautions
against such boldness. Carter is willing to
challenge prevailing public opinion by
proposing the return of the Panama Canal
to Panama. But he must cringe at the
storm that would blow up if he simulta
neously shifted America’s diplomatic rec
ognition from Taiwan to Peking.
A survey taken in April and released re
cently by Potomac Associates showed that
62 per cent of its respondents viewed fa
vorably the prospect of American relations
with Peking. But only 28 per cent favored
taking the step of diplomatic recognition
on the conditions that Peking has set.
They would require a renunciation of
our diplomatic recognition and defense
treaties with Taiwan, even if softened by
an expression of presidential concern
about the Nationalist island’s security and
prosperity.
The survey found very cautious at
titudes toward active American participa
tion in the defense of Taiwan, but even
greater skepticism toward any deliberate
effort to strengthen China as a rival to the
Soviet Union.
As the authors concluded, “Clearly
there is no set of China policies that will
win unanimous support. . . . The task of
the President. . . is to articulate a China
policy which. . . best suits his overall
view of American international interests.”
A start on that task, one hopes, will not
be long delayed after Vance’s return from
Peking. Big countries demand attention,
even when big actions are untimely.
(c) 1977, The Washington Post Company
Washington s hot check expert
Bert’s our kind of budget director
By DICK WEST
United Press International
WASHINGTON — Business leaders
used to complain that FDR’s “New Deal”
programs were being run by egghead pro
fessors and ivory-domed theoreticians
“who never had to meet a payroll.”
A similiar complaint could be made
about one of the newer agencies, the Of
fice of Budget and Management.
Traditionally, federal budget directors,
although presiding over some of the
greatest deficits the world has ever
known, have been individuals whose per
sonal finances had always been in the
black.
It seems almost paradoxical, but we’ve
had some budget directors who never
knew what it was like to be overdrawn at
the bank.
It’s difficult to see how a budget director
with sufficient funds in his accounts could
properly relate to all that red ink in the
government’s ledgers.
He would, I should think, tend to look
upon federal deficits in a detached, objec
tive manner than with a view colored by
his own experiences.
Ergo, administration of the deficit
would not necessarily be a subjective chal-
lenge that would inspire creative man-
agement.
The foregoing explains why I think Bert
Lance is potentially the best budget direc
tor we’ve ever had. It’s understandable
that President Carter would be loath to
lose his services.
Show me a banker who has tried to take
more money out of an account than he had
The lighter side
put into it and I’ll show you a banker who
is intimately acquainted with the first
principle of deficit financing.
Some critics have suggested that
Lance’s overdrafts indicate he is not com
petent for the OBM job. Just the opposite,
I say.
A budget director deals in nothing but
deficits. There is never enough money in
the federal coffers to cover the withdraw
als.
A person who has demonstrated a cer
tain agility in fielding overdrafts is ideally
trained for coping with the federal budget.
Carter has made balancing the budget
one of his administration’s goals.
The typical budget director of yore
might have been philosophically in favor
of that campaign, but would have had no
feeling of empathy.
Lance, however, can bring to the effort
a strong sense of identification. He knows
first hand the main cause of imbalance —
that when a check is written for an amount
exceeding the funds available, the transac
tion acquires a negative aspect.
Other budget directors undoubtedly
were familiar with the rule in the abstract.
But only those who have tested it person
ally — even if inadvertently — can attest
to its reliability.
Carter says he has written overdrafts
himself at times. Thus he was able to con
firm that “it’s better not to.”
That awareness surely is the first step
toward achieving a balanced budget. And
Carter obviously picked the right man to
help him attain it.
New dorms —an expensive gamble
Top of the New
Campus
University Library gets fall how
Fall hours for the main university library will be from 7:30am,til
midnight Monday through Thursday, and until 10 p.m. on Frida;
Weekend hours are 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday and 1 p.m.uni!
midnight on Sunday.
State
Houston may have first
encephalitis case
Health officials in Houston have reported the season’s first s
pected case of St. Louis encephalitis. A 24-year-old man whofelltl
on Aug. 19 is being tested for the disease, said City Health Direct( |
Albert Randall on Monday. The disease, which is usually limited!
warm, damp, climates, is transmitted from birds to humans byailn
mosquitoes. Last year, there were 26 cases of St. Louis encephalll
in Harris County and 19 suspected cases. In 1975, there were!
cases and two confirmed deaths from the disease.
Branijf seeks Texas-London route
Braniff International board chairman Harding L. Lawrence said
yesterday that the airfine will ask the Civil Aeronautics Board tj
approve daily flights from Dallas-Ft. Worth to London ata roundtiip
cost of $349.
Lawrence, who was scheduled to speak before the board today it
Washington, said that the route award was “in the public interest
President Carter has asked the board to give the route “expedil
consideration.”
Houston schools show student
decline
Houston Independent School District appears to have suffered its I
largest enrollment decline since court-ordered busing ended to
years ago.
Spokesmen for the district said an unofficial count showed 3,533
fewer students in school Monday than were present opening day last
year. The decline occurred mainly among white students, who com |
prised more than 36 per cent of the 175,558 enrolled Monday. Last
year, there were 179,091 students in school the first day, 38percenl|
of them white.
Nation
Air Force pilots missing in
North Sea
The Air Force yesterday released the names of two Louisiana m j
declared missing after their jet fighter plane crashed into the Nortli
Sea. The pilot was identified as 1st. Lt. Mickey L. Johnston, 26, of
Baton Rouge. The weapons officer was 1st Lt. Patrick H. Phondrom,
24, of New Iberia. The jet was on a training mission from Germany
to England when it crashed into the North Sea about 7 a.m.
Humphrey recuperating in
Minnesota
Sen. Hubert Humphrey, D-Minn., continues to gain strength after
his cancer surgery and is looking forward to going home, says a
spokesman of the Minnesota Hospitals. Humphrey said he planned
to return to his home in Waverly later this week. But neither the
senator nor his chief surgeon would say which day he would be
released.
World
Tito cheered by crowd in Peking
President Tito of Yugoslavia, once denounced by China as a traitor to
Communism, arrived in Peking today to the cheers of 100,000 per
sons in the city’s Tien An Men square. The 85-year-old Tito flew into
Peking aboard a special plane from Pyongyang, North Korea, where
he had called for the withdrawal of American troops from South
Korea. Tito was met by Chinese Communist Party chairman hm
Kuo-feng and two party vice chairmen.
Mexican universities ‘buffer for
unemployment
Mexican universities serve primarily as a buffer to protect young
people against the nation’s 30 per cent unemployment rate, says the
president of the Technological Institute of Monterrey. Fernando
Garcia-Roel said yesterday that higher education in Mexico was often
a palliative until the government can consolidate economic resources.
“The universities have to act as cushions for the intense social pres
sure of unemployment on government,” he told the Pacific Chemical
Engineering Congress meeting in Denver, Colo.
Western envoys silent in Africa
U.N. Ambassador Andrew Young and British Foreign Secretary
David Owen arrived in Kenya yesterday on their African peace safari,
silent on their much-opposed proposals to end bloodshed in
Rhodesia. Young told a news conference that the trip had been in
teresting, but both envoys dodged questions about their faltering
discussions with white and black leaders. Owen and Young were
scheduled to spend today briefing Kenyan leaders and an officer
from the organization of African Unity. They were also awaiting the
outcome of the Rhodesian elections before their Thursday trip to
Salisbury. M
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