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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 26, 1982)
The Battalion Serving the University community M 75 No. 82 USPS 045360 12 Pages College Station, Texas Tuesday, January 26, 1982 AINS 3S iAHin' by Jane G. Brust Battalion Staff ■Texas A&M University System Ghaiuellor Frank W.R. Hubert, 66, this morning offered his notice of re- Bement, effective Aug. 31, to the Bard of Regents. I The Board accepted his letter, praising him for his performance while in office. “The Board is regretful to see him ,go, but he announced (this date) early on,” chairman of the Board, H.R. “Bum” Bright said. Attempts by the Board to change this date have been unsuccessful, Bright said. ■ In March, Hubert gave notice to Bright of his intention to retire from the chancellor’s office. He indicated at that time his announcement of retirement would be made between November 1981 and January 1982. The executive committee of the Board received Hubert’s letter Monday. In his letter to the Board, Hubert says: “It’s been my good fortune to serve Texas A&M University and the Texas A&M University System for 23 years in various administrative posi tions.” The letter also says, “I look upon the 10-year period between 1965 and 1975 as one of the most dramatic eras of expansion experienced by any col lege or university in the history of higher education in this nation.” The chancellor expressed his appreciation to the Regents and to staff members in the chancellor’s office during his tenure as chancellor. A selection committee has been appointed to select a new chancellor and Hubert will serve on that com mittee. Besides Hubert, the committee will consist of H.R. “Bum” Bright, John R. Blocker, vice chairman of the Board of Regents and Regent Clyde H. Wells. This is the same committee that selected president Dr. Frank E. Van diver in August. Vandiver told Regents, “I take the news of the Chancellor’s resignation with considerable less than enthu siasm. His service to the system is beyond thanks.” Hubert became chancellor Oct. 1, 1979. While at Texas A&M, he has served as Dean of the College of Li beral Arts, the Dean of the College of Education, and Dean of Arts and Sci ences. He has served on several Universi ty committees and councils, including the Research Council, Academic Council and the Texas A&M Re search Foundation. p.m. State agency bit by layoffs p.m. p.m. by Robert R. Green Battalion Reporter Walt Baker has been trying to find jobs for some laid-off workers lately. Since he manages the Bryan office of the Texas Employment Commission, that is not unusual. But these people are different. | They work for the TEC. p The Bryan office will lose 10 of its I employees Monday because of feder al budget cuts that, together with ear lier reductions, will leave TEC with 1)500 fewer staf fers statewide. I Two Bryan employees were laid off Dec. 31 after the earlier cuts, so the local office will have a staff of nine people in 1982. Last year, it had 21. Baker said the staff cutbacks will |make it harder to help unemployed people in Brazos County find work. 1 “The lines are going to be longer, the service is going to be slower — it’s Just going to be a tough situation,” [ Baker said. “I hate to view anything as impossible, but it’s going to be a very, very tough situation.” ■y Gov. Bill Clements has said private i employment agencies will be able to iDY/ll make up for much of the reduction in 92 #B EC serv ‘ ce > but Baker disagrees. ** Private agencies, which charge a fee to the employer or the job-seeker or both, will not find it profitable to ’47 help hard-to-place individuals. Baker said. “We place ... a lot of skilled craft- trade people, warehouse workers, truck drivers, oilfield workers, entry- level workers, trainees, food service (workers),” he said. “A lot of those people aren’t as easy to place.” Janice Ray, owner of Business Assistance Services, a College Station employment agency, agreed. “The people who are really going to be hurt are unskilled labor,” Ray said. “The kind of people who need to have jobs cannot afford to pay fees (to an employment agency). It’s going to be awfully difficult for them.” Ray said the policy at Business Assistance Services is that the em ployer, rather than the employee, pays the agency’s fee. Many em ployers will not find this economical when hiring less-skilled labor, she said. But Michael Miller, manager of Snelling & Snelling Employment Ser vice in Bryan, said he believes TEC officials’ fears are unjustified and the impact of the layoffs will be less severe than they predict. If private agencies are not able to fill TEC’s shoes, he added, funding for the commission can be restored. 1| ■ 3i sfjjF photo by Eric Mitchell Texas Employment Commission employee Gloria Schiavo helps Charles Mace fill out necessary employment forms. “You and I both know that if it Jon Ford, Clements’ press secret- (adjustment to the cuts) doesn’t hap- ary, said there is little the governor pen, there’ll be some reassessment af ter a while,” Miller said. See EMPLOYMENT page 12 Board treats AD search photo by Diana Sultenfuss JONE Regents Royce E. Wisenbaker of Tyler, Joe C. Richardson agendas during a meeting of the Texas A&M System Board ^ Jr. of Amarillo and Clyde H. Wells of Granbury study their of Regents Monday. ^oard accepts notice Hubert retires from System by Denise Richter Battalion Staff Members of the Texas A&M Uni versity System Board of Regents stated Monday that they participated in the search for a new athletic dire ctor but that University President Frank E. Vandiver had been kept in formed throughout the proceedings. Board Chairman H.R. “Bum” Bright of Dallas, who reportedly mas ter-minded the athletic director search, stated again that he had play ed no active role in the search that culminated in the hiring of former University of Pittsburgh Head Coach Jackie Sherrill as Texas A&M head coach and athletic director. After a Board committee meeting, Bright and regents John Blocker of Houston, William McKenzie of Dal las, and Royce Wisenbaker of Tyler, members of the search committee appointed to find a new AD, de scribed how the search had taken place. Bright said the three regents were chosen for the search committee be cause they would be able to “provide good input to Dr. Vandiver as to who good candidates would be.” After a candidate was chosen, he was interviewed by the committee, then by Vandiver, Bright said. After Vandiver met with the candidates, he recommended his choice to the Athle tic Council for approval, he said. However, Vandiver said last week that he was not aware of all of the proceedings: “All I can tell you is don’t ask me. I guess the loop will get around to me sometime.” Texas A&M sources said last week that Vandiver had offered his res ignation Jan. 18 but it was rejected by System officials. In an interview Jan. 19, Vandiver refused to confirm or deny this report. The regents refused to comment Monday on Vandiver’s statements of dissatisfaction with the handling of the AD search. During Monday's meeting of the Board, the regents heard a plan out lining a proposed research group that will conduct animal and human re search and study urban planning. If this plan is approved today by the full Board, Texas A&M Universi ty will join Rice University, the Uni versity of Houston, and Mitchell Energy and Development Corpora tion in the Houston Area Research Center, a research park funded by Mitchell Energy. Meeting as a committee of the whole, the regents approved a plan authorizing Texas A&M President Clayton election United Press International AUSTIN — The Texas capital is reeling today from Texas House Speaker Bill Clayton’s surprise deci sion to step out of the Texas political arena and the effects of his decision are being felt statewide. Clayton was midway through what appeared to be his announcement speech for the land commissioner’s race Monday when he stunned obser vers by saying he was withdrawing from any race for public office in 1982 because of a business opportun ity and what he believed to be divine guidance. Speaker Bill Clayton’s decision not to run for land commissioner this year temporarily interrupts his 20- year political career, but it may also allow Clayton to preserve his financ ing and considerable political influ ence for a later race for governor. Frank E. Vandiver to appoint four Texas A&M faculty members to serve on the Center’s board of directors. The Center will be in the Woodlands, a development north of Houston established by George P. Mitchell. Mitchell, Class of ‘40, is chairman of the board and president of Mitchell Energy. He also serves as general chairman of the Target 2000 Project, a long-range planning study for the Texas A&M System. However, the Board placed two re strictions on Texas A&M’s participa tion in the project: 1) that Texas A&M’s participation in the Center will not conflict with research at the University and 2) that research conducted at the Center will not compete with research programs at the University now or in the future. Vandiver said the University “will participate (in the Center) to the ex tent that our faculty would like to par ticipate” and that Texas A&M could withdraw from the project if any con flict developed. “You would simply have to instruct me to bail out (of the project),” he said. Mitchell Energy will provide $2.5 million to $3 million over the next three years to support staffing and provide facilities and equipment and will assist in raising an additional $6 million for the Center. The corporation also will donate 100 acres of land to the Center. Re gent John R. Blocker of Houston said the land probably is valued at $20,000 an acre. In other action, the Board heard a report from Regent William A. McKenzie of Dallas, the one-man committee appointed at the Novem ber meeting to raise $50,000 for a feasibility study of a proposed 15,000- seat special events center to be located on the west campus. McKenzie said the executive com mittees of both the Aggie Club and the Association of Former Students have agreed to recommend that their executive boards each donate $25,000 for the study. The Board also was expected to approve bids for the following re novations and construction: — expansion of the Cyclotron In stitute — construction of the Physics Teaching Observatory at Texas A&M — construction of the University Press building on the intramural field behind Duncan Dining Hall, sits out year There was widespread speculation Monday that factors beyond those outlined by Clayton — an expanded farming business and divine guidance — helped persuade him to stay out o£ politics for a time. A close Clayton ally suggested the speaker may not have been all that excited at the prospect of being land commissioner, and opted not to call in his numerous political debts for any office other than the one he really wants — the governorship. “He hasn’t said that to me, but I suspect if you speculated that was a reason you wouldn’t be far from right,” the source said. Clayton said his political surveys showed his acquittal on Brilab-related bribery charges is of decreasing im portance to voters, and he may have concluded a four-year wait would ive more time for that topic to fade rom voters’ minds. f fr Service groups help refugees adjust I Editor’s note: This is the second of a two-part I series on Polish refugees in San Antonio, the | problems they face now and the plans they have I for the future. by Daniel Puckett Battalion Staff SAN ANTONIO — Christmas Eve’s first star J appears; a nun takes the holy bread and passes I it around the table. The smiles seem forced and the laughter rings a little hollow — this is their first Christmas in America and it is not a season to be jolly. For Poles, Christmas is a family holiday; brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, parents and grandparents gather at home to celebrate Christ’s birth. They eat boiled carp and poppy seed cake. They exchange gifts and reminisce about old times, and at midnight they walk through the snow to mass. But Christmas 1981 was not that kindofholi- day. This year, the refugees gather with people who, until recently, were total strangers. They wonder during dinner what has happened to their friends and relatives and attend mass in a chapel which is a converted cottage. For the refugees, a traditional time of joy has become one of anxiety and pain. But they are not without help. A number of individuals and organizations have been help ing the refugees since they came to America and although the Americans can’t offer help for every problem, they have been able to smooth some of the bumps along the road to adjust ment to American life. The first organization with which the re fugees came in contact was the U.S. Catholic Conference’s Refugee Resettlement Program. The USCC contacted the refugees while they were in Austrian camps and found American sponsors for them. The sponsors are responsi ble for feeding, clothing and housing the re fugees for one year. Beyond this, the USCC does not go. Despite complaints that it is not providing the kind of support for Poles that it provided for Viet namese or Haitian refugees, the USCC’s San Antonio coordinator, Joseph Nguyen, says its help is really not needed. “Our role is a support role until these people can fend for themselves,” he said, “and by and large, they could do that within two weeks of arriving here. Some of our Indo-Chinese re fugees nave been here two years and still cannot hold a job.” Nguyen is no stranger to the problems re fugees face in a new country — he fled his native South Vietnam in 1975 when the Com munists overran it. “For us, the transition was very hard,” Nguyen said. “We didn’t know the language, but more importantly, we didn’t know how to shop in a supermarket, or cash a check, or drive a car. “Many of us didn’t realize that you have to show up at work on time or else you get fired — your whole culture is different from ours.” And although the Poles do have some prob lems in their adjustment to American life, Nguyen says, they have a big head start. “The Poles come from a highly industrialized Western country,” Nguyen said. “They know how See REFUGEES page 12 inside Classified P a g e 10 Local page3 National page 8 Opinions page 2 Sports page 11 State page 5 What’s Up page 7 forecast Today’s forecast: Sunny and warm with a high today in the upper 60s; low tonight in the upper 40s. Wednesday’s forecast: partly cloudy with warmer temperatures.