995
E
A
y\
]VE
U
N
V
R
esidence Recycling
i^M's summer
cycling pilot program
.as a strong success.
Page 2
O
Traveling Texas
Commuters can reduce
travel time by studying
maps on the Internet.
Page 12
Walking Wounded
The A&M football
team tries to get
healthy for '95 season.
Sports, Page 15
Battalion
r ol. 101, No. 186 (18 pages)
Established in 1893
Friday • August 25, 1995
&M settles lawsuit
ith former employees
Former A&M student
to stand trial for murder
The lawsuit filed against
(le A&M System by a farm
vorker while employed a
he Texas Agricultural Ex-
>eriment Station was settled
larlier this month.
!y Wes Swift
he Battalion
rThe Texas A&M University System
rill pay an estimated $86,000 in un-
mployment benefits and back pay-
aents to more than 400 Texas farm
workers as part of a class action law-
uit settlement.
■ The Aug. 15 settlement concludes
wo years of negotiating between the
System and Texas Rural Legal Aid,
n organization that gives legal help
o farm workers.
' The lawsuit, filed by Berene Muril-
o of Plainview, contended that work-
srs were illegally classified as “inde-
>endent contractors” instead of “em-
loyees” and were paid below mini-
aiim wage while working for the
i'exas Agricultural Experiment Sta-
ion (TABS).
e A&M System operates 18 ex-
V\
periment stations across the state.
The stations use farm workers to re
search growing and planting methods
for agricultural and horticultural
crops.
According to the suit, the misclassi-
fication also meant workers could not
receive unemployment benefits, since
contractors do not qualify for benefits
under Texas law.
Since the contractor status cost the
farm workers Social Security credit
for the work they did, the System will
also correct the workers’ Social Secu
rity records to ensure that
they receive all benefits enti
tled to them.
Kay Drought, a lawyer
with Texas Rural Legal Aid,
said she was happy with the
suit’s outcome.
“I am pleased with the set
tlement and with the way
Texas A&M handled the law
suit,” she said.
The settlement must still be ap
proved by U.S. District Judge George
P. Kazen.
During the Aug. 15 press confer
ence to announce the settlement. Bob
Merrifield, TABS deputy director,
said the System did not make a con
scious effort to cheat the workers.
“We acknowledge that mistakes
were made, but there was never any
overt attempt to defraud these work
ers,” Merrifield said. “We have moved
to correct these mistakes and imple
mented controls to ensure that they
do not recur.”
As part of the settlement, the Sys
tem has agreed to classify all future
farm workers as employees.
Murillo, 55, told the Associated
Press that she was upset because the
actions of the TABS would dramati
cally affect her.
“What really angered me was that
"I am pleased with the settlement
and with the way Texas A&M han
dled the lawsuit."
— Kay Drought
lawyer with Texas Rural Legal Aid
my bosses never paid into my Social
Security, because when I reach my
old age and won’t be able to work, I
won’t have anything to support me,”
she said.
Drought said the misclassification
is a problem that is widespread in
Texas and estimated that 90 percent
of all farm workers are affected at
some time.
□ Ron Shamburger, who is
charged with the Fall 1994
murder of an A&M student,
will stand trial in September.
By Javier Hinojosa
The Battalion
The trial of a 22-year-old former
Texas A&M student, charged with capi
tal murder and aggravated kidnapping,
will begin Sept. 5 in the 361st District
Court at the Brazos County Courthouse.
FVetrial motions were made Aug. 11.
Ron Scott Shamburger turned him
self in to the police on Sept. 30, 1994
and confessed to the murder of Lori
Ann Baker, a junior accounting major
from Kingwood, who was killed earlier
that morning.
The University Police Department re
ported that Baker was shot in the head
after she awakened to find Shamburger
burglarizing her home on Bayou Woods
Drive. Shamburger also confessed to
three other burglaries in the area.
Victoria Kohler, Baker’s roommate,
was abducted by Shamburger and put in
the trunk of her car, UPD reported.
Shamburger then drove Kohler to a
nearby street before returning to set
Baker’s room on fire.
During the Aug. ll pretrial, Judge
Carolyn Ruffino of the 361st District
Court considered several motions filed
by both the prosecution and the defense.
Defense attorney Kyle Hawthorne of
Houston filed a motion requesting that
pictures of Baker be turned away from
the sight of the jury when they were
not being used.
“These pictures are very graphic and
can draw a juror’s attention away from
the trial,” he said.
Vanessa Muldrow, representing the
district attorney’s office, said the court
should follow the examples of other
cases and leave the pictures up
throughout the trial.
“It would be too
much of an inconve
nience to have the
clerk get up and turn
the picture around be
fore and after every
time the pictures were
needed,” she said.
The judge denied
the motion and anoth
er motion by the de
fense requesting the
use of a video camera
to record the trial.
Hawthorne said a video tape of the
trial should be sent to appellate judges
in case of an appeal.
However, Muldrow said allowing a
camera in the courtroom would create a
disturbance.
“The camera would turn the case into
a circus,” she said, “jurors could be in
timidated, embarrassed or self-conscious
in front of a camera.”
Shamburger
pall scuba classes canceled,
expected to resume next year
3The scheduled scuba classes
lave been replaced with sections
aquatics.
ty Katherine Arnold
Fhe Battalion
(- Texas A&M’s Department of Health and Ki
lesiology will not offer scuba
living classes until Fall 1996
leiicause of problems uncov-
>red this spring.
I Texas A&M System’s Inter-
lal Audit Department investi-
ated the program and issued a
'eport recommending that the
rinesiology department take
neasures to alleviate the ap-
gkrance of a conflict of interest
>etween the personal interests
iflthe scuba instructors and the
Uterests of A&M.
■Dr. Robert Armstrong,
lead of the Department of
dealth and Kinesiology, said that as a
‘esult of an investigation, the kinesiology
lepartment canceled all scuba classes for the
fenmer and fall and dismissed the two facul
ty members who taught scuba, Tom Meinecke
Bid James Woosley.
1 Emma Gibbons, an associate professor in the
rinesiology department, said the students who
A&M SCUBA CLASS
registered to take scuba classes this summer
were offered classes in aquatics instead.
The department set up 12 sections of scuba
classes for the fall, but did not allow students
to enroll in them, pending the results of the
investigation.
The kinesiology department will replace the
sections of scuba classes with other aquatics
classes, Gibbons said.
Mark Poehl, assistant director of the Texas
A&M University System Internal
Audit Department, said the in
vestigation of the scuba pro
gram was prompted by a letter
submitted by an attorney repre
senting Wayne Cotter, owner of
Paradise Scuba.
The letter suggested that the
instructors refused to sign refer
rals to complete certification at
another location, used A&M
equipment off campus and sold
course materials directly to stu
dents without allowing outside
competition.
Armstrong said the depart
ment is currently investigating other
universities to see how different college
scuba programs are run. If a scuba program
can be developed that will not create a conflict
of interest, the department may offer scuba
classes in Fall 1996, he said.
See Scuba, Page 13
Stew Milne, The Battalion
Moving madness
Parking officer Doc Fletcher directs incoming students and parents to appropriate areas to park and un
load. Residence halls opened on Sunday.
Bowen approves withdrawal, Faculty Senate supports
Attendance policy changes pay raises for lecturers
□ Beginning this fall, if stu
dents visit the health center,
|iey must show proof of
treatment to receive an ex
cused absence.
By Katherine Arnold
■he Battalion
S Changes recommended by the Fac
ulty Senate to the withdrawal policy,
attendance policy and student griev
ance procedures were finalized earlier
ttris month by Dr. Ray Bowen, Texas
IA&M president.
| According to the new withdrawal
policy, effective in January, the last
day to withdraw from the University
will be the same as the Q-drop date.
Dr. Pierce Cantrell, Senate speaker,
said the revised regulation contains a
provision for students who need to with
draw after the Q-drop date for extenuat
ing circumstances.
The withdraw date was changed be
cause administrators were often flooded
with withdrawal recommendations from
students at the end of the semester.
Dr. Brent Paterson, chairman of the
Senate’s rules and regulations commit
tee, said he hopes the change will elimi
nate problems.
“Students should know by midterm
if they are failing a class,” Paterson
said. “If they are going to withdraw for
academic reasons, they shouldn’t hold
out for a miracle.”
Also to take effect in January is
the elimination of the withdraw pass
ing/withdraw failing classifications.
Currently, when a student withdraws
from the University, a grade of WP or
WF is given. WPs do not effect the
grade-point ratio, but a WF is calcu
lated as a failed course.
Beginning in the spring, a student
who withdraws will receive a W for all
courses. The grades will not be calcu
lated in the GPR.
Paterson said the decision to elimi
nate the WP/WF designations resulted
because some faculty members were
See Bowen, Page 14
□ A survey of A&M's lecturers
led to the recommendation of
an established merit-based
pay raise procedure.
By Tara Wilkinson
The Battalion
Texas A&M’s Faculty Senate recom
mended the development of a consistent
and fair way to provide lecturers with
merit-based pay raises at the Aug. 14
Senate meeting.
The resolution must be approved by
Dr. Ray Bowen, A&M president, before
it is implemented.
Members of a Senate ad hoc commit
tee, who drafted the resolution, sur
veyed in March 1994 lecturers’ and se
nior lecturers’ working conditions. Out
of 255 surveys sent to lecturers, 133 (52
percent) were returned.
Many lecturers indicated in the sur
vey that they had not received merit
raises or promotion-related raises, and
they were not aware of official stan
dards regarding the raises.
Diane S. Kaplan, co-chair of the Sen
ate ad hoc committee on the definition,
role and status of lecturers, said prob
lems indicated by the survey include
“low pay for lecturers across the board,
lack of merit pay for lecturers, and
See Senate, Page 14