ai
THe Batta I
Serving the University community
i a
S:jl. 76 No. 170 USPS 045360 8 Pages
College Station, Texas
Thursday, July 7, 1983
u ltbdiv;l
TUD doubles grant
r CS development
by Kelley Smith
Battalion Staff
(liege Station will receive a
1,000 grant from the department
Housing and Urban Development
Bie development of lower income
eas, a spokesperson from U.S. Sen.
B Tower’s office announced
Bnesday. The grant is twice the
Ibunt the city has received in pre-
aus years.
■onditions of the Community De-
lopment Block Grant state that the
oney must be used for programs
■ as housing assistance, street con-
don and park improvements,
JKE Stevens, community develop-
ent coordinator for College Station,
id.
|■'he grant is given yearly to cities
IBnated as entitlement cities if the
j■itions are met. In previous years,
College Station’s appropriation has
been about $300,000.
The primary reasons for the in
crease, Stevens said, are the results of
the 1980 census. The census showed a
rapid population growth for the area
and a higher number of lower income
residents.
The higher number of low income
residents resulted because the census
includes many students in that categ
ory, he said.
The program bases much of the
criteria for the grants on the amount
of lower income residents, Stevens
said.
“The grant is provided to the city to
design and implement programs that
will benefit lower income residents,”
he said.
The work provided for by the
grant will be confined to the lowers
income areas of the city, Stevens said.
st apply
money, which is specifically reserved
for the program by the U.S. govern
ment. In the application the city must
specify for which programs the city
will use the money. The application
was approved by the College Station
City Council.
The city was notified before it sub
mitted the application that the
amount of the grant would be in
creased.
A large portion of the funds, which
should be received in the next few
weeks, will go to an on-going housing
program. The funds also will be used
to begin street and park improvement
and construction programs that
should begin in the fall.
“We’re going to be working along
the same lines,” Stevens said of where
the money would be used. “But on a
larger scale.”
killing may accelerate
death penalty appeals
fnVC in United Press International
^ WASHINGTON — The Supreme
(ftllfifltpurt, in a major death penalty rul-
p-fP" g,upheld 6-3 Wednesday a new leg-
ir shortcut that could accelerate the
■ of executions nationwide.
■cting in the case of Thomas Bare-
a Texas murderer who came
in 11 hours of being executed last
iry, the justices in essence ruled
id not deserve a last legal appeal
could have been put to death.
Tie capital punishment ruling,
h has major repercussions for the
202 Death Row prisoners, speeds
^ processing of last-minute appeals
bth condemned inmates who have
1 but exhausted ways of prolonging
leir lives.
■From now on, when an execution
^imminent a federal appeals court
lay compress the time it usually takes
Bully consider a prisoner’s legal
Bns, give a hurried rejection and let
Rexecution take place on schedule.
|“Although the (5th U.S. Circuit)
rtof Appeals moved swiftly to de-
e the stay, this does not mean that
Itreatment of the merits was cursory
or inadequate,” Justice Byron White
wrote for the court.
“On the contrary, the court’s re
solution reflects careful considera
tion,” he said.
While the court’s handling of Bare
foot’s case was “tolerable,” White said,
that “is not to suggest that its course
should be accepted as the norm or as
the preferred procedure.”
Instead, White suggested the
appeals court adopt clear guidelines
for the “fair and efficient considera
tion” of last-minute death penalty
appeals but said they may include
“procedures that allow a decision on
the merits of an appeal accompanying
the denial of a stay.”
Barefoot’s case raised the issue of
how last-minute requests for stays of
execution should be handled by fed
eral appeals courts, generally the
next-to-last hope for condemned
prisoners.
The topic grows in import as more
and more condemned prisoners ex
haust the last of their appeals.
In spelling out the new guidelines,
White said appeals courts “may adopt
expedited procedures” provided the
prisoner “has adequate opportunity
to address the merits (of the case) and
knows that he is expected to so.”
“If appropriate notice is provided,
argument on the merits may be heard
at the same time the motion for a stay
is considered, and the court may
thereafter render a single opinion de
ciding both the merits and the mo
tion,” he said.
If time before execution is so short
the prisoner’s claims cannot be
argued and decided carefully, the
court said, the execution should be
postponed.
In Barefoot’s case, the appeals
court took only seven days from the
filing of his request for a postpone
ment to hear arguments and decide
there was no merit to Barefoot’s con
stitutional challenges and no reason
to delay his execution.
Barefoot, 37, was scheduled to be
executed by injection Jan. 24 for the
August 1978 shooting death of
policeman Carl Levin of Marker
Heights.
staff photo by Brenda Davidson
Won’t someone open up a window?
Workers were busy Wednesday installing
windows in Sbisa Dining Hall. The dining
hall, which was built in 1912, still
contains many of its original window
frames and glass. Sbisa was named after
Bernard Sbisa, who served as steward of
the mess hall for 50 years after coming
to Texas A&M College in 1878.
Iranian jet hijacked
United Press International
PARIS — French authorities re
versed themselves and granted per
mission for a hijacked Iranian jet to
land in Paris after the pilot warned
the armed air pirates were threaten
ing their 185 hostages, airport offi
cials said Thursday.
The jet, which left Kuwait late
Wednesday once the hijackers re
leased 186 of their hostages, circled
over Geneva for about an hour wait
ing for approval to enter French airs
pace.
Permission was at first denied,
according to air control officials, but
was granted when the plane’s pilot
said he and others on board were
being threatened with guns.
There was no indication which of
several Paris-area airports the Boeing
747 would fly to or whether the
French government set any condi
tions for the landing rights.
There was no immediate report on
the hijackers’ demands, if any.
The jumbo jet was refueled in
Kuwait and the hijackers set off late
Wednesday with 185 male hostages
on a flight they expected would take
them to Paris.
tuerrillas extend execution deadline to today
United Press International
IAIROBI, Kenya — Guerrillas
:atening to kill five Western aid
)rkers Wednesday in the southern
Tan extended their execution
>dline, giving negotiators a day to
leet their ransom demands, diplo
ts and relief agency officials said.
Despite the extension until this
lorning, there was no indication the
Tncies involved would meet the de-
ids of clothes, cash and drugs, di-
la ts said.
Negotiators established a two-
mte radio contact with the guerril-
i shortly after dawn and the five
hostages, including two Americans,
were presumed to be alive.
“There have been ongoing nego
tiations and there has been an exten
sion of the deadline until Thursday,”
a Sudanese embassy spokesman said.
Aid agency negotiators and West
ern diplomatic sources confirmed the
extension.
Wednesday’s 12 noon deadline
passed with no definitive word on the
fate of the hostages until news of the
extension reached Nairobi from Juba
in the southern Sudan.
The radio contact was the shortest
since the hostages were taken June
23, a Sudanese embassy spokesman
said.
“The contact was with the guerril
las and no one was permitted to speak
with the hostages,” the spokesman
said. “We presume they are still alive.”
The rebels seized the five aid work
ers in the east African nation’s remote
Boma National Park and threatened
to kill them today unless relief agen
cies hand over $189,000 in cash and
almost the equivalent in clothes, food
and medicine.
Western diplomats in Nairobi said
Tuesday negotiations had reached a
“super-sensitive stage.”
“Our trust is in God and we will be
praying for a miracle,” said a spokes
man for the Across relief agency,
which has been handling the negotia
tions with the guerrillas of the South
Sudan Liberation Front who kidnap
ped the five June 23.
But Sudan’s ambassador to Nairobi
Ibrahim Ayoub said, “We are expect
ing a breakthrough soon. The talks
have had a positive tone and the guer
rillas have treated the hostages in a
humane fashion.
“Based on negotiations in the last
two days we don’t think that some
thing disasterous will happen,”
Ayoub said Tuesday. “We do not
think they will be harmed in any way.”
He said his government and relief
agency negotiators had spoken by
radio with the guerrillas and each of
the captives.
“They all said they were in good
health and cheerful,” Ayoub said.
The negotiations were being con
ducted via shortwave radio from the
southern Sudanese town of Juba, ab
out 200 miles from where the guerril
las were holding the hostages.
The guerrillas, fighting to separate
the mainly black and Christian south
ern Sudan from the predominantly
Arab, Moslem northern part, have
dropped earlier demands for broad
cast time on the Voice of America and
British Broadcasting Corp. radio net
works.
The hostages have been identified
as John Haspels, 36, of Lyons, Kan.,
Ron Pontier, 29, of Clermont, Fla.,
Martin Overduin, 32, a pilot from
Komoka, Ontario, Willem Noort, a
Dutch missionary and Alois Tscheidt,
a West German zoologist.
Cyclotron
Yoke arrival spurs building
by Angel Stokes
Battalion Staff
Construction of the machines in
the new Texas A&M cyclotron be
gan last week with the arrival of the
iron yoke, the largest single piece of
the cyclotron.
The building housing the
machinery was recently completed
after about five months of construc
tion.
Texas A&M engineers and physi
cists are doing most of the construc
tion, said Dr. Dave Youngblood, di
rector of the Cyclotron Institute. He
said that although the yoke was built
elsewhere, much of the small equip
ment is being made in workshops on
campus.
The expansion, funded by the
University and the Robert A. Welch
Foundation of Houston, will cost
approximately $7 million.
Youngblood said he hopes the
cyclotron will be operable by 1985,
but it will not be in full operation
until 1986 or 1987.
“Its very complicated equipment
and may take months to get working
properly,” he said.
The two most important compo
nents of the cyclotron are the iron
yoke and the circular wire that car
ries the current that generates a
magnetic field, Youngblood said.
The yoke, which weighs approxi
mately 100 tons, will surround the
circular wire, he said, so that the
magnetic field can be guided and
confined to the shape needed to
change atomic nuclei into high-
energy particles used for sciehtific
experiments.
The new cyclotron will include a
highly advanced superconducting
accelerator. There are only two su
perconducting accelerators in the
United States. There also is one in
Canada and one in Italy.
Very few superconducting
accelerators are being planned be
cause many countries probably
don’t have the technology needed,
Youngblood said.
An advantage of the cyclotron is
that students can get “hands-on” ex
perience in research with scientists
in addition to classroom work, he
said. There are now 16 students
working on research at the cyc
lotron.
Along with graduate research,
juniors and seniors are working on
projects.
The cyclotron now operates 24
hours a day, because of the demand
of users, he said. When the new
equipment is working there will be
an increase in research.
He also said there will be a signifi
cant demand for use of the facility
by world-wide users. The demand
will try to be accommodated, he
said.
The iron yoke for the new cyclotron weighs 100 tons.
Add-drops end
next week, class
begins Friday
Classes for the second summer
session begin Friday. Late registra
tion will continue through Tuesday,
which also is the last day to add new
courses. Wednesday is the last day to
drop courses with no record.
Students graduating in August
must apply for their degrees be July
15.
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forecast
Clear to partly cloudy skies today
with a high of 92. Easterly winds of
around 10 to 15 mph. The low
tonight near 72. Partly sunny skies
Friday with a high near 91.