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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 20, 1990)
ber 19,1J The Battalion Allergy attack Arm yourself against allergy symptons. See Page 4 n, -htlj he scene. Kj i by ambulaii! ly that Karto ve been caus iting beforei! of the wlioi said Tuesdii ltd the underl , he collapsed nit ... you coil gered the pro; was, it was pn d. However, 1 it had beend edical specials r Karkoska at ates, trainer es if he cot lent before il tiing has turnt ind of baffled g that do® at ion w r asab l for someth:; and deep levt about simp al standpoii t now.” ayed at theh# night, returnt to have son r consistenq'; le said. “Tha: this afternoo: things straigi -2, plays hosi n Saturday. imith kins guy,”Jo/insoE re fine. Ivlort m coming ou: should have laved it up. 1 good job. He t outstanding ers held ontc •t against the Stadium on ; understood Aikman were ted if a playet not playing,' : start winning appy family.' i rookie wide Wright, who DO yards fort : the Giants on. merest to give some expen- iid . “We wi ■s while we gel players expe on the same think Wrigli receiver. Thr him out the for us to bet Vol. 90 No. 14 USPS 045360 12 Pages College Station, Texas Keeping a cool head Photo by Fredrick D.Joe Thanks to the rain on Wednesday, the owner of this scooter parked by the Bus Stop Snack Bar got a helmet full of water. Students, faculty adjust to smoking policy By LIBBY KURTZ Of The Battalion Staff Smokers on the Texas A&M cam pus should make sure they’re in a designated smoking area before lighting their next cigarette. In an attempt to create a smoke- free public environment, a smoking policy was approved September 1989. But many A&M students are not sure where they can and cannot smoke. Jayda Bowden, a freshman bio chemistry genetics major, said she wasn’t sure where she could smoke when she first arrived at A&M. “I got caught smoking in the bath room and hallway of my residence hall,” she says. “My resident adviser gave me a verbal warning and told me not to smoke there again. Now I smoke in my room with the window open.” Curtis Graff, a senior environ mental design major and a resident adviser in Walton Hall, said he has encountered few problems with resi dents who smoke in his ramp. “They (the residents) pretty much Graphic by Jayme Blaschke abide by the smoking policy,” he says. The smoking policy prohibits smoking in the following areas: • academic areas • conference rooms • office reception areas • common/public areas — ie., res trooms and stairwells • all University vehicles in which one person is a non-smoker Dr. John Koldus, vice president of student services, chaired the smok ing policy committee. “I think the committee took a very realistic approach in attempting to take in consideration individuals’ needs and yet relate to a more smoke-free campus,” Koldus said. Koldus, who stopped smoking in 1983, said he was able to look at the issue from the perspective of a smoker and a non-smoker. Tom Murray, associate director of student affairs and a member of the committee, said they tried to be un derstanding when dealing with smokers, especially those living in residence halls. “We leave it up to each residence hall’s council to determine if and where the smoking and non-smok ing areas are going to be,” he says. The residence hall policy on smoking states: “Smoking is con fined to individual students’ rooms and those areas designated by the residence hall council as smoking area(s).” Smoking is not permitted in laun dry rooms or study carrels unless specifically designated. The Housing Office tries to place smokers as roommates to eliminate conflicts. ' “I tend to think there should be a smoking area in every residence hall,” Murray says. Murray, who is a smoker, noted there is not a smoking area in the YMCA Building where he works. “Before the sanctions, I was able to smoke in my office,” he says. “Now, I think twice before I smoke because it means I have to go outside and brave the heat or rain.” Building proctors in conjunction with appropriate unit heads may es tablish appropriate smoking areas. Javier Cuellar, a junior business major, says he disagrees with the smoking policy. “I think I should be able to smoke in class as long as I’m not blowing smoke directly into someone’s face,” he says. Graff says he has accepted the smoking policy. “I wouldn’t want someone to spit in my face, so I respect the smoking policy,” he says. The smoking policy relies on the consideration and cooperation of smokers and non-smokers for its success. Thursday, September 20,1990 Faculty loses interest money By CHRIS VAUGHN Of The Battalion Staff Texas A&M faculty members contributing to the Optional Re tirement Program could be losing thousands of dollars in interest during their careers because of the budget and payroll office’s procedures. Faculty members participating in the ORP contribute part of their paycheck to a retirement fund with their insurance com pany. The University’s budget and payroll office, however, mails the checks to the insurance car riers for faculty. The problem for many faculty members is that they get paid on the first day of the month, but their retirement contributions are not being received by insurance carriers until the middle of the month. This means faculty members are losing as much as two to three weeks of interest every month in their retirement accounts, which could add up to thousands of dol lars during a 20- to 30-year ca reer. Dr. Charles Zucker, director of the Texas Faculty Association, has studied the problem at A&M and blames the payroll office -for making late payments and losing interest earnings for faculty. “There is no excuse for late payments,” Zucker says. “The A&M administration has offered a number of excuses. They say the institution is too complex to do it any quicker, or they say they have too many retirement car riers to deal with, or that it would cost too much to fix the problem. “But the problem must be fix ed,” he says. “The administration has just not made it a high enough priority.” Thomas Taylor, A&M’s con troller, says the administration is looking into changing the present procedures, but he is convinced they are working fine now. “I am convinced that under existing procedures we’re getting the checks in the mail in a timely fashion,” he says. Taylor, who says retirement contributions from A&M faculty are put in the mail within days af ter payday, blames some delay on insurance carriers. The potential losses for faculty members are significant, Zucker says. A faculty member earning $40,000 over a 30-year period would lose about $9,000 in poten tial interest earnings, according to some of Zucker’s calculations. Dr. Benton Storey, a former chairman and present member of the Faculty Senate Personnel and Welfare Committee, says the committee passed a resolution See Retirement/Page 8 A&M Democrats focus on strategy By LIBBV KURTZ Of The Battalion Staff Texas A&M Democrats need to develop a strategy to overcome Texas A&M’s anticipated straight Republican vote if they wish to get anything accomplished in the next few years, Judge Sarah Ryan said. Ryan, who is running for judge for 2nd County Court-at-Law and Mary Ann Ward, Democratic candi date for Brazos County Clerk, spoke to the Aggie Democrats Wednesday night. “As a candidate, I can tell you that (the straight Republican vote) is my single greatest fear,” Ryan said. “This year, more than any other year, the Democrats are going to have to work real hard, not only in town, but also on campus to prevent this from happening, particularly with Claytie staring us in the face.” Ryan said one way to crack the Re publican straight ticket vote is to cre ate some basis of identity between the individual candidate, regardless of party affiliation, and the voter. She said that in this case, the vot ers are Republican students on the A&M campus. Ryan, who is a Bryan Municipal Judge, said the 2nd County Court at Law is the second highest level of trial courts in the state system. “About 68 percent of the cases that the court hears are criminal and juvenile law, and 27 percent of the cases relate to family issues,” she said. Ryan said her experience as both a prosecutor and criminal defense lawyer has prepared her for the po sition. Ward said she also is well pre pared for the position she is seeking. Ward has worked in the Brazos County Clerk’s Office for 17 years. “We are the official record keep ers of Brazos County,” she said. “We have records that date back to 1842 in our office.” Ward pledged to continue the successful policies established by re tiring County Clerk Frank Boriskie if she’s elected to office. “This (Brazos County Clerk’s Of fice) is my life,” Ward said. p to 'Wash'mf ht fond mem ory of the sea- Johnson saii n’t work dial eniember las Student group proposes recycling plan -S didn’t it- By ELIZABETH TISCH e Cowboys an Batta | ion Staf f If Texas A&M students had recycled the 3,045,120 ’ aluminum cans of soft drinks bought from vending ma chines around campus last year, they would have profit- M1 ted over $44,000. Concerned about this enormous amount of wasted ( money, A&M student Mark Cervenka, with the support of the Texas Environmental Action Coalition, drafted a 3 campus-wide recycling proposal to stop students from , throwing away products that, if recycled, could bring in $1,600 a week to A&M. Cervenka announced his official proposal that was : originally initiated by the Office of the Vice President I for Finance and Administration to student leaders and members of TEAC Wednesday night. “I want to show the Texas A&M administration that if they follow this program, the University can cut down the cost of supplies when recycling and buying recycled items,” he said. Each of the four phases of the recycling proposal must be accomplished before reaching a smooth proc ess of recycling on campus. Cervenka said phase one consists of placing distin guishable bins around campus strictly for aluminum cans. Various student groups will be asked to maintain these bins. During phase two and phase three, different recy cling methods will be tested. If the transitions between the previous phases run successfully, TEAC then will add different products to be recycled. Success of coed hall visitation policy attributed to roommate contracts By ELIZABETH TISCH Of The Battalion Staff The new 24-hour visitation policy for Southside coed halls is going smoothly, with much success attrib uted to roommate contracts. Wells Hall President Andrea Maisonneuve says. Each resident must sign a contract after roommates agree on preferred private times for studying and sleep ing, Maisonneuve says. “The hall councils designed a roommate contract, and what it does is open a line of communication where roommates must specify times when they don’t want visitors,” she says. “Without the contract, room mates wouldn’t talk about it.” Maisonneuve adds that conflicts occurring from failure to reach a compromise will be handled through resident advisers, like any other roommate problem. Wells Hall resident Joel Ehrlich, a sophomore biochemistry major, says he and his roommate are happy with the 24-hour visitation right. “I think the idea of a contract is good but it is too open-ended,” he says. “Although my roommate and I don’t have problems respecting each others’ privacy, there will be room mate conflicts, no doubt about that.” Maisonneuve says that so far she has not received any complaints. She also says this is true of other resident advisers in Wells Hall. Jeromy Hollenshead, vice presi dent of Wells Hall, says the only complaints he hears are from a few hall councils that say the 24-hour vis itation policy should not be limited to coed halls. “Any hall can draft a proposal,” he says. “It was just easier to pass for Eppright and Wells because it See Coed/Page 12 Independent candidate encourages area voters to focus on environment By CHRIS VAUGHN Of The Battalion Staff Congressional hopeful Michael Worsham took his environmentally based platform Wednesday to a group of A&M Consolidated High School students, many of whom are too young to vote for him. Worsham, a Texas A&M graduate student in civil engineering, is hop ing enough people in the 6th Con gressional District write in his name as an independent candidate in No vember to earn a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. The 29-year-old New York native spent Wednesday at A&M Consol idated speaking to and fielding ques tions from seniors in government classes about his stand on the envi ronment, nuclear energy, recycling and taxes. Worsham said the primary reason he is running for the House is be cause he said incumbent Republican Joe Barton has ignored environmen tal issues during his term and Demo cratic opponent John Welch has not run a serious campaign. Worsham, in contrast to Barton, strongly opposes use of nuclear en ergy. “I’m against nuclear plants be cause there is nothing to do with the radioactive waste,” he said. “You can recycle or compost some waste, but radioactive waste is forever.” The Comanche Peak nuclear power plant in Glen Rose and the Superconducting Super Collider project in Waxahachie, which will generate low-level waste, are in the same congressional district as Brazos County. Worsham said he wants better conservation of oil and other fossil fuels until another energy source, like solar power, is refined. He said solar power should be cheaper by the end of the decade See Worsham/Page 8