Thursday* October 12, 1995
Page 9 • The Battalion
WBC, Roadhouse sponsor Bonfire benefit
□ Proceeds from the
benefit will go toward
concessions for those
who work on Bonfire.
By Lisa Johnson
The Battalion
The Women’s Bonfire Com
mittee and the owners of the
King of the Roadhouse bar are
sponsoring a Bonfire benefit at
7 p.m. tonight.
Rebecca Fields, a WBC coordi
nator and a junior environmental
design major, said the bar owners
are former students who pledge
their support for Bonfire.
“We’re really lucky to get a
place like the Roadhouse to
hold the benefit,” Fields said.
“The owners are old Ags and
are kind enough to volunteer
their place of business to help
us raise money for Bonfire.”
Tickets are $2, and proceeds
will be used by WBC to pay for
fuel for water trucks at cut site
and provide food for the redpots
and coordinators.
The money will be used to
buy the concessions that the
WBC provides to those partic
ipating in Bonfire activities on
the polo field.
Laura Wheelis, a WBC coor
dinator and a junior animal sci
ence major, said she expects a
good turnout based on the at
tendance of previous benefits.
“Last spring, it was packed,”
Wheelis said. “We had at least
250 to 300 people there, and I’m
hoping that at least as many peo
ple will attend this benefit.”
The Roadhouse hosted the
last WBC Bonfire Benefit in
the spring.
Hans Betten, a brownpot and
a junior agriculture and life sci
ence major, and his band will
provide music for the benefit.
“I couldn’t really tell you what
kind of music they play,” Fields
said. “Mainly, everyone just gets
up there and has a good time. It’s
all in fun and really gives the ben
efit a good party atmosphere.
We’re really looking forward to
seeing how many people come out
to the Roadhouse.”
In addition to the benefit,
the WBC is making plans to
hold a Thanksgiving dinner for
students who are staying over
the break to work on Bonfire.
Report shows many hate crimes remain unreported
o Crimes aren't being adequately
reported or prosecuted and are
increasing against homosexuals
in Texas, according to a report
released Wednesday by the Texas
Civil Rights Project.
AUSTIN (AP) — Despite a report that
shows hate crimes are decreasing in Texas,
the legal director for the Texas Civil Rights
Project said Wednesday the crimes aren’t be
ing adequately reported or prosecuted.
James Harrington, legal director for the
TCRP, released a report examining hate
crimes in Texas from 1992 to 1994.
He said if not for substantial progress be
ing made in Dallas and Fort Worth, hate
crime statistics would be up across the state-
“We cannot take much comfort from tfie
report for two reasons,” Harrington said. “In
the first place, the total numbers are still
unacceptably high.
“Secondly, the reason that raw numbers
of hate crimes have tended to level out is be
cause of very aggressive anti-hate crime ac
tivity by law enforcement in the Dallas and
Fort Worth areas.”
Harrington said prominent hate crime
cases in the Metroplex, including a black
man’s shooting death by a group of skin
heads in Arlington in 1991, have prompted
authorities to step up efforts against such
crimes. The efforts have resulted in a 41
percent decrease in hate crimes in the Dal-
las-Fort Worth area, Harrington said.“This
shows that good law enforcement tech
niques and effective prosecutions can, and
do, lessen hate crime in a community,”
Harrington said. “This, in turn, should pro
vide the model for law enforcement agen
cies in Texas.”
According to the Texas Department of Pub
lic Safety, there were 389 reported hate
crimes in 1994, down from 436 in 1993 and
484 in 1992. Overall, there was a 19.6 percent
decrease in hate crimes from 1992 to 1994.
But Harrington said the report only deals
with a fraction of the hate crimes being com
mitted. He said poor reporting of the crimes
by both police and victims have left many
hate crimes undetected.
“There is no uniform training for police of
ficers who investigate crimes to determine if
it could have been motivated by hate,” Har
rington said.
He also added that many victims are
afraid to come forward out of fear that they
will be stigmatized.
“Hate crimes continue to be a very perva
sive problem in Texas,” Harrington said.
He said reforms in the state’s hate crime
law approved by the 1995 Legislature should
prevent prosecutors from refusing to take a
case to court out fear that convictions would
n’t hold up on appeal.
“There is still a reluctance by district at
torneys to do enhanced sentencing under the
hate crimes law,” Harrington said.
The report recommends several ways to
help reduce hate crimes, including new police
guidelines for addressing and deterring such
crimes and amending public school curricu-
lums to address prejudice and hate violence.
According to the report, blacks are most
often the victims of hate crimes in Texas.
Department of Public Safety data shows that
41.7 percent of the hate crimes reported be
tween 1992 and 1994 resulted in bias
against blacks.
Anti-white crimes (22.2 percent) are fol
lowed by anti-gay crimes (12.6 percent),
anti-Hispanic (7.5 percent), anti-Jewish (6.5
percent) and anti-Asian (3 percent).
According to the report, crimes against ho
mosexuals continue to rise while hate crimes
against whites have decreased dramatically.
There were 64 crimes against homosexu
als in 1994 compared to 51 in 1993 and 59 in
1992, according to DPS records.
Crimes against whites totaled 73 in 1994,
a drop from 103 in 1993 and 129 in 1992, ac
cording to DPS records.
Amy Browning, The Battalion
Massage therapy
Nikki Willis, a junior kinesiology major, gets a free massage from
massage therapist Dan Arnold as part of the Health Fair that was
held in the MSC on Wednesday.
Hurricane Roxanne roughs
up Mexico’s Yucatan resorts
□ The storm had 110
mph winds which
ripped through
Cozumel, but there
were no immediate
reports of injuries.
TULUM, Mexico (AP) — Up
rooting trees, toppling streetlights
and leveling a concrete stadium.
Hurricane Roxanne swept
through a southern Mexican
provincial capital Wednesday
during a daylong march across
the Yucatan.
Roxanne’s 75-mph winds tore
through Campeche, a state capi
tal of 175,000 people. There were
no immediate reports of deaths or
injuries in the city or anywhere
else in the hurricane’s path.
Three thousand residents
sought shelter from the storm,
and television footage showed
people wading through waist-
high water.
The storm drifted westward
late Wednesday, sending
shrimpers and oil workers fleeing
to shore before it hit the city of
Campeche, on the western Gulf
coast of the peninsula, flinging tin
roofs into the air.
The U.S. National Weather
Service said Roxanne would prob
ably gain strength as it heads
west over the Gulf of Mexico and
menaces a broad swath of coast
line. It said flashfloods and mud
slides in areas already soaked by
Hurricane Opal last week could
occur without warning.
The oil-rich lowlands of Mexi
co’s southern Gulf Coast are still
recovering from floods caused by
Opal, which killed at least 11 peo
ple in Mexico before veering north
to hit the Florida Panhandle.
The National Weather Service
posted a hurricane watch the Gulf
on Mexico’s eastern coast as far
north as Tuxpan, about 350 miles
south of the Texas border.
Before the hurricane hit,
Campeche state Gov. Jorge Sa
lomon said about 150 shelters
were ready to receive 15,000 peo
ple, offshore shrimpers had head
ed to port and rail and highway
traffic were disrupted by ap
proaching winds and rains.
“We are taking all the precau
tions necessary,” he said.
The Weather Service said
that by 1 a.m. Thursday (2 a.m.
EDT), Roxanne’s center was
about 70 miles northeast of
Ciudad del Carmen.
The hurricane has lost force
since it hit Tulum on the Yu
catan’s Caribbean side late Tues
day with 110-mph winds. Tele
phone links with the island resort
of Cozumel remained cut Wednes
day, and plane and ferry services
were still suspended, leaving hun
dreds of tourists as well as some
35,000 local residents isolated.
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SOUTHWESTERN BLACK STUDENT
LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE
AWARENESS WEEK
Monday, October 9 - Friday, October 13
in the Commons Lobby and the MSC
also .
First Host and Hostess Meeting
For All Interested Students on
October 15th at 5 p.m. in MSC 212
CQF
fright-day
the I3ttv
...the guitgrror
begins at 8:00
lostmortem
Rudder Fbunfai
l art
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