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Vol.82 Mo. 102 GSPS 045360 12 pages
College Station, Texas
Thursday, February 19,1987
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Senate panel votes
to halt Contra funds
t reasure's supporters expect Reagan veto
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ASHINGTON (AP) — The
Jautodsenate Foreign Relations Committee
as veiHed 11-9 Wednesday to halt U.S.
aid to Nicaragua’s anti-government
neetfalHgi^rrillas in the First major test of
capaotejse|timent in the new Congress to
ward the Contras,
i, DAr.r"'
xorariir measure
ve nc -cofetrolle
lev couHiwii be vetoed by President Reagan if
praetii iit eventually passes the Senate and
rar.L. the House.
UtaofuHl think we have the votes on the
nger trfloor to pass it, but of course the
FRA. President will veto it and I doubt
thar we can override the veto,” said
|. Claiborne Pell, D-R.I., chair-
t, of the panel and an opponent
of Contra aid. No action by the full
Hate is likely for several weeks, he
75' said.
m. H'he vote came after more than
hanc three hours of debate, in which both
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Dune,
sides repeated their arguments fa
voring or opposing the program.
“This is one of the most crucial
war-peace issues we will face,” said
Sen. Alan Cranston, D-Calif., a
strong opponent of Contra aid.
Sen. T erry Sanford, D-N.C., an
other opponent, said Reagan is fol
lowing “a very dangerous and likely
unsuccessful policy.”
However, Sen. Paul Trible, R-Va.,
noted that the Contras have just be
gun receiving official U.S. help
again after a two-year hiatus and
said, “We ought to play this hand
over the next year or so” and see if
they can win.
The program has been highly
controversial ever since the Contras,
with secret U.S. help, began fighting
Nicaragua’s leftist government six
years ago.
Congress banned U.S. military aid
for two years but narrowly reversed
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A&M, UT cooperating
in effort to establish
joint marine institute
By Melanie Perkins
Staff Writer
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and iB
idacci-
;ty as a
ful and
Hask forces are being appointed
to study the possibility of a joint ma
rine science research institute and
doejk and ship support operations in
Galveston.
Hhe institute could enhance coop-
Ipion between Texas A&M and the
University of Texas, maximize the
Hof existing resources and possi-
blypave the state some money,
pftt its Jan. 26 meeting, the Texas
A&{M Board of Regents discussed
joiijjt developments between the two
universities in the areas of marine
sdehces and oceanography.
Dr. William H. Mobley, A&M
deputy chancellor for academic and
i^fturce development, said several
preliminary plans and options al
ready have been developed.
I One task force will study a joint
docking proposal, he said, and a sec
ond will begin looking at a wider
;inge of research and cooperative
efforts between A&M and UT in a
variety of ocean and marine areas.
! The task forces will be working
through the spring and probably will
have some recommendations by
summer, Mobley said.
Essentially, what we have now is
jBmgreement to study cooperative
ly,” Mobley said. “None of the detail
nas been worked out. The only tan-
gible thing is that there have been
several specific dock design options
identified.”
A&M’s ship operations now are
headquartered at Texas A&M at
Galveston’s Mitchell Campus on Pel
ican Island, while UT’s operations
are based at its medical branch in
Galveston.
Mobley said both A&M and UT
have the opportunity to expand and
strengthen themselves in the areas
of marine and oceanography facili
ties.
“The Select Committee on Higher
Education concluded that since
A&M and UT were both engaged in
ocean and marine kinds of activites,”
he said, “there might be some op
portunity for cooperation, coordina
tion — and thus, cost savings.”
A joint venture in this area also
would allow the two universities to
compete more effectively for federal
grants and major research contracts,
Mobley said.
Gen. Wesley F. Peel, A&M vice
chancellor for facilities planning and
construction, said UT first asked
A&M to look into extending and
sharing its dock facilities on Pelican
Island.
The idea is feasible, Peel said, but
how much dock space will be needed
is a matter of economic^ and detail.
Both school’s boards will have to
agree, he said.
itself last fall and voted for $ 100 mil
lion worth of aid, including $70 mil
lion in military help, for the current
fiscal year.
Much of the money already has
been committed by the administra
tion, but the final $40 million cannot
be spent until Reagan sends Con
gress a report saying the aid is
needed and the Contras are making
progress.
Congress could vote to block the
expenditure, but Reagan could veto
any such disapproval and it would
take a two-thirds majority in each
chamber to overturn his veto.
The bill sent to the floor Wednes
day would not specifically block the
$40 million.
It has no cut-off figure or date in
it.
The measure simply would ban
U.S. help for the Contras, and Sen.
Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., one of
the sponsors, said if it eventually be
comes law, it would halt whatever
part of the $100 million package had
not been spent.
A similar cut-off bill has been in
troduced in the House.
House Majority Leader Thomas
S. Foley, D-Wash., said Wednesday
there is no question that Reagan will
win the remaining $40 million be
cause there is no chance that oppo
nents will have enough votes to over
ride a presidential veto.
But Foley told reporters that Rea
gan’s anticipated request for $105
million in new Contra aid “is in
grave trouble.”
He spoke after attending a con
gressional meeting with Reagan at
the White House.
Spreading The Word —
Shawn Garza, a sophomore chemical engineering ment. Members of the Baptist Student Union gave
major, hands out a new version of the New Testa- away about 12,000 of the books Wednesday.
Official: Co-op is state's best chance
Center tries to land supercollider
By Christi Daugherty
Staff Writer
The superconducting supercol
lider is probably the greatest re
search coup a state could get today,
and if any group is going to get it for
Texas, it probably will be the Hous
ton Area Research Center, a HARC
official said.
Located in The Woodlands north
of Houston, HARC is a cooperative
formed by four Texas universities,
countless businesses and the federal
government.
The four universities involved
with HARC include Texas A&M, the
University of Texas, the University
of Houston and Rice University.
Dr. Jane Armstrong, vice presi
dent for program development at
HARC, said HARC’s objective is to
combine the resources and knowl
edge of Texas universities
funds from Texas businesses.
with
This combination should develop
new technologies that will address
the research needs of the private sec
tor.
HARC hopes to land the super
collider project for Texas, she said,
but whether or not it does, the cen
ter will continue to grow.
Originally incorporated in 1980,
the center was the brainchild of
Houston real estate developer
George P. Mitchell, who said he
stumbled onto the idea after reading
about research conducted through
major universities at similar centers
in other states.
“We just felt such a thing would
be feasible here, so we convinced the
boards of the four universities,”
Mitchell said.
Mitchell picked the Houston loca
tion because 31 percent of the state’s
income is generated in that area, he
said. ■ >
Each university appoints four
members of its faculty to HARC’s
29-member board of directors, and
this board decides which projects
will be pursued.
A&M has close ties to the center,
including HARC’s president, Dr. W.
Arthur Porter, who has served as di
rector of A&M’s Texas Engineering
Experiment Station.
Another link is the center’s re
cently acquired supercomputer.
A&M and the other universities in
HARC have relatively free access to
the computer, which currently re
mains in the testing stage.
The $20 million computer is the
first supercomputer produced by Ja
pan and the only one of its kind in
the Western Hemisphere, Arm
strong said.
Because of its size and speed, it is
considered to be the best research
computer in existence.
The computer is so immense that
it will take up over 16,000 square
feet in HARC’s new research facility,
which is under construction.
Dr. John Dinkle, A&M associate
provost for computing, said A&M is
using the computer heavily for re
search in areas such as molecular
modeling, meteorology and business
computations.
Meanwhile, HARC, like organiza
tions from 44 other states, is pursu
ing the multibillion-dollar supercol
lider, hungry for the prestige and
See HARC, page 11
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teachers join forces to request raise
A&M dean: Texas groups chose wrong time for proposal
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' By Daniel A. La Bry
Staff Writer
l Texas teacher organizations fi
nally got their act together on
Feb. 9 by making a joint proposal
toVtlie 70th session of the State
Legislature for a minimum salary
increase — the groups just picked
the wrong time to do it, said
Bryan Cole, an associate dean in
1 Texas A&M’s College of Educa
tion.
»‘With the economic situation
the way it is and the other de-
|fflands on the state resources, I
would seriously doubt they (tea
chers) would receive that kind of
an increase as a state minimum,”
Cole said.
Hfhe Texas State Teachers As-
jSOciation, Association of Texas
Professional Educators, Texas
Classroom Teachers Association
and Texas Federation of Teach
ers — which have separate legis
lative programs — banded to
gether to make one unified
proposal for a statewide mini
mum salary increase of $2,900
over the next two years.
jeri Stone, TCTA executive di
rector, said the four groups
wanted to send a clear message to
the Legislature that future sala
ries were a priority for all four
groups and that the groups had a
single and unified stand on the is
sue.
jlTrhe proposal calls for increas
ing starting salaries from the cur
rent minimum of $15,200 to
$17,080 for the first year and to
$18,100 for the 1988-89 school
year. The $15,200 minimum sal
ary was set in House Bill 72 by the
Legislature during the 1984 spe
cial session.
Stone said the proposal would
increase the salaries of current
teachers as well as those entering
the profession in the future.
wanted to avoid sending a mixed
message to the Legislature. We
didn’t want to have four propo
sals out there floating around.”
Cole said the presentation of
different proposals to the Legis
lature hurt the teacher groups in
1984 during the consideration of
House Bill 72.
“No question about that,” he
said. “One of the things that hurt
“With the economic situation the way it is ... I would
seriously doubt they (teachers) would receive that kind
of an increase as a state minimum.”
— Bryan Cole, associate dean in A&M College of Edu
cation.
The four groups based their
pay requests on the 1983 findings
of the Select Committee on Public
Education, which recommended
starting salaries of $17,080, she
said.
Cole said he believes the in
crease is justified, but said the
present economic condition in
Texas will seriously hinder the
proposal’s chance for success.
Stone said, “I think the present
economic situation is going to af
fect the consideration of any bill
that requires any type of expendi
tures— and probably negatively.
“But that was one of the rea
sons the four teacher groups
them during the discussion of
House Bill 72 was that all the tea
chers groups could not agree.
“It finally got to the point
where many of the legislators just
quit listening to any of them (the
groups) because they were con
tradicting each other.”
Stone said House Bill 72 in
creased the teacher salary sched
ule, but it increased entry-level
salaries considerably more than
career salaries.
“Traditionally we’ve had a
problem within the teaching pro
fession,” Stone said. “Virtually ev
erybody who is going to leave the
profession leaves within the first
five years, and we lose an incred
ibly high percentage of beginning
teachers within those early years.”
She said an increase in career
salaries, as well as beginning sala
ries, is needed to attract — and
keep — qualified teachers.
Cole said most of the students
he has dealt with are more con
cerned with the working environ
ment than the salary.
“While the money is impor
tant,” Cole said, “most students
are worried about the conditions
of the classroom setting and the
conditions being positive in which
a good learning experience can
take place.”
Since most A&M education
{ graduates are being hired by the
arger districts, salaries aren’t a
real problem. Cole said.
“In almost all the suburban
areas — Dallas, Fort Worth,
Houston and so forth — the start
ing salaries are in the $17,000 to
$18,000 range,” he said.
The concern over teaching sal
aries hasn’t been a real problem
as far as enrollment in the col
lege, he said. A&M had the fastest
enrollment growth of any college
of education in the country two
years ago.
Recently, enrollment in the col
lege has reached a plateau, but
Cole said he expects enrollment
to increase again in the fall.
UH budget committee
proposes elimination
of 3 school programs
HOUSTON (AP) — Three aca
demic programs have been targeted
for termination by a University of
Houston advisory budget committee
that also wants to cut five other areas
to fund research during difficult
economic times.
The 24-member advisory commit
tee recommended scrapping the siz
able College of Technology, along
with the recreation program in the
education college and the depart
ment of human development and
consumer science in the social sci
ences college.
Cutbacks were suggested in the
architecture college, music school,
sociology department, communica
tion school and graduate school of
social work, according to a draft re
port issued Tuesday.
About 1,500 students are enrolled
in the technology college, which pro
vides trained workers to the engi
neering, computer electronics and
construction fields. It employs 40
full-time faculty members.
Lawrence Wolf, dean of the te-
chonology college, called the pro
posed cuts “insensitive and incor
rect.”
“I think the primary issue is
whether a public university will pro
vide opportunities only for those
who seek to be the privileged or elite
or will include education for those
who do much of the essential work
in our society,” Wolf said.
The budget advisory council —
which includes faculty, student and
staff members — wants comments
on its draft report by mid-March.
President Richard Van Horn said
he will use the final report in devel
oping next year’s budget. He de
clined comment on the specific rec
ommendations.
“When you have limited funds,
you have to decide where to put
them,” he said.
Ira Shepard, a law professor who
chaired the council, said its recom
mendations are based on the prem
ise that another round of across-the-
board cutbacks is “totally undesira
ble.”
“You eliminate some programs to
keep the strength and momentum in
other programs,” Shepard said.
According to the report, the uni
versity’s “primary mission is to be a
national comprehensive research
university.”
epa
mate the cost savings of the cuts be
cause it is hard to judge how many
students the university might fail to
attract without them. The council’s
proposal would allow current majors
to complete their programs.
The report said affected faculty
should be placed elsewhere in the
university, if possible.