T UfsSDA. /
June 5, 2001
blume 107 ~ Issue 149
6 pages
Slews in Brief
— State
in admits on tape
killing CS woman
enneth Ray Kelly, a 27-
k-r-old Bryan resident, has
Blitted to the murder by suf-
Bition of 21 -year-old Mandy
'ollersheim at Willowick
rtments Sunday,
ccording to information
i the College Station Police
)artment (CSPD), Kelly first
■ame a suspect when his
*her approached them with
Brmation that Kelly had
ui dered Wollersheim and
used her keys to gain en-
r' |ce and burglarize her place
lowing car Bmployment, Harp's Bar in
event was m. n
■n.
| Bolice later arrested Kelly at
^ Casa Loma Motel and ob-
~ ■ a tape recording of him
BBiitting to Wollersheim's
# urder. Kelly is believed to
-j known Wollersheim as a
^Ipnjsral acquaintance.
^Belly is currently being held
■ie Brazos County jail and
e investigation continues as
atectives question additional
Besses.
Is
ho
pass
e u|
wo-year-old dies
ler being left in
o automobile
■.Hit
Itlren holed .
I iiesday after:
as arrested
Id neglect ch:
■ALLAS (AP) — A 2-year-
OINT,Idaho 9 1:io y whose parents had
Idren \vhosur ,r i ott:en he was in the fam-
a five-da iin/| ar ^ as died because of
deputies at: 1 e temperatures, law
me will star ■ sa id.
id undlajud:: jh e unidentified child,
►vill hannen r ho was pronounced dead
rhoriti Jnday night at RHDMemo-
'^^Bdedical Center in Farm
’s Branch, had apparently
?er left in the vehicle in
Bt of his family's home for
veral hours.
. i, The Dallas Police Depart-
ent's child abuse division
Wday h n investjgate the death
k ic\a to h. mi |y m ern b ers told officers
ous oiaudKir at th had forgotten the
ill elated thatP ;i|d was jn the car
ec out \ve. autopsy was under way
-Giinty Prose, t[|e Da||as County medica|
mson. \er am j ner / s 0 ffj ce No ruling on
° ^ estr ‘ 11lU ' j death has been issued yet.
ildren were Kite to ban visitors
s'nunlav Th 0E 5 having paper
idinga 15-yearloney in prisons
]° had T^ HUNTSVILLE (AP) — Visitors
. uv, sure | A ? y exas p r ’, sons can carry only
ae hospital S ^ jntQ the jnstitutjon ^ as ^
and f 6t? l keI a st to cut down on an in-
a ., p'of paper money in in-
. ites' pockets, officials said,
ng \vasejq|P® e y exas p r j son S y S tem will
o c etermine v j s jt ors from carrying
en will stay ft 3e r mQn because
ys,Robinsonsfj seen an y ipcrease jn paper
m w leie tll . l)n by j n ce || s and work areas.
!lu) ! '^ soners are prohibited from
n'mil Walker yir f9 ca sh, which is typically
i ‘ n ?d[ for illegal activities, said
ecideiftlTeaty. oh " 5 ° f n ' f! 1 eCt ° r of
tody ofthechilf 5 Institutional Division.
16/die judgei nma ^ es ® nd vlsltor5 o -
return die chit 1 cau 9 ht passing bills
, • )Ufh-to-mouth while kiss-
>r send them l»i' pison officials said.
• mother under:
scrutiny.
>rney for then' 1
n McGuckin,
lot yet been al
hi Idren.
very relieved
fe, and she can’t
lem a highug.’i
Biyce Powell
■hildrcn agre
after ne L
1 to try to help
ther. Bonner f
I Phil Jams said'
'■fit the children
together “if 11
to say about it » -
iators got a hre4^
v when the chi
iefly with two ft
lirough a wall®
dcCiuckin sent
i to her childre 1
ises they would
- indicating she
hey should coope
Aggielife
• Texas offers
a variety of
festivals
to battle
summer blues
Opinion
• Court
R decision on
f golfer Martin
goes along with
Disabilities Act
sttalion News Radio:
57 p.m. KAMU 90.9
ww.thebatt.com
Water main breaks, A/C fails
University employees allowed to leave
Stuart Hutson
The Battalion
Battalion
The police and fire departments responded early Monday
to a fire alarm at the Chemistry Building. No fire was found
but a broken Physical Plant water main caused overheating
to the building's air conditioning causing a haze.
University employees were
allowed to leave work early
Monday because of a campus
wide air conditioning failure that
reportedly caused some build
ings to reach temperatures high
er than 85 degrees.
A 8-foot break in a 12-inch
water main crossing Agronomy
Road near Raymond Stotzer
Parkway resulted in the shut
down of the Physical Plant early
Monday. The plant relies on
steam produced from the water
supplied by the main to power,
among other things, electric
chillers that produce cold water
for use by the campus’s air con
ditioners, said Richard Williams,
assistant vice president for the
Physical Plant.
Williams said the “gusher” re
sulting from the 3:30 a.m. break
lowered the water level in
A&M’s 40-foot tall, 2-million-
gallon water tower at a rate of
five feet every 15 minutes.
“I’ve never seen anything like
it in my life,” he said. “In my 10
years at A&M I’ve never seen a
break this big.”
Cold water began to be re
stored to A&M’s air condition
ers around noon, hut Williams
said the temperatures in most
buildings did not begin to lessen
until 2 p.m.
To prevent the temperatures
from adversely affecting A&M
workers, Vice President for Ad
ministration Charles Sippial re
leased a memo at 11:30 a.m. stat
ing that department heads may
give employees the option to
leave if their work environment
See A/C on Page 2.
A&M researcher studying impact
of the proposed Alaskan drilling
Robin Lewis
The Battalion
The Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge
(ANWR) is among the most complete,
undisturbed ecosystems on earth. Locat
ed on the northeastern tip of Alaska, it is
rich with wildlife including 160 species of
birds, 36 kinds of land mammals, nine ma
rine mammal species and 36 types of fish.
It is also a hot topics of political debate
today.
To meet the future energy needs of
Americans, President Bush is searching for
a plan to appease the energy shortage in
America while preserving the wildlife in the
ANWR.
To help widi research on the impacts of
drilling in this area, the National Academy
of Sciences, a nonprofit organization that
provides advice to the federal government,
has nominated a committee to evaluate how
drilling will effect the citizens and wildlife
in Alaska.
Mahlon “Chuck” Kennicutt II, director
of the Geochemical and Environmental
Research Center at Texas A&M, is a
member of this committee. He will travel
to Alaska and report on what has hap
pened to the environment on the North
Slope.
“Alaska has been the location where oil
and gas have been discovered and produced
for the last 30 years,” Kennicutt said.
The committee has been asked to take in
formation from past years and predict what
continued drilling will do to the Alaskan en
vironment 50 years into the future.
T he committee will meet five times
within a year and a half, with the ultimate
outcome being a written report and eval
uation on environmental issues in Alaska.
Kennicutt said the committee is com
posed of several people ranging from dif
ferent areas in the United States to their
field of expertise.
“I’m a contaminate chemist,” he said,
“so I was tasked with looking at all the lit
erature on contamination on the North
Slope.”
As odiers evaluate daeir area of expertise,
it will create a variety of infonuation com
ing from several different areas, Kennicutt
said.
During the committee’s first visit to
See Alaska on Page 2.
RUBEN DELUN
Battalion
Mock tornado
ANDY HANCOCK/7h£ Battalion
Area fire fighters attend to a victim of a mock torna- volunteer fire fighters participated in the drill to pre-
do Monday afternoon in Kurten. All Brazos County pare them for an actual tornado.
Let the summer games begin
Shauna Lewis
The Battalion
For some students, the sum
mer brings a dull routine of
kicking around the house
watching endless television re
runs, but for students like
Shawn McAden, the only kick
ing summer brings is on a soc
cer field.
McAden is an intramural
soccer captain and one of many
students who have chosen to
stay active by competing in
A&M’s summer intramurals
program.
“You get to do stuff with your
friends and be competitive with
people,” he said.
Stephanie West, assistant di
rector of intramurals, said in-
Intramurals provide Aggies with
low-cost summer entertainment
tramurals are a relatively cheap
and easy way for students to
keep active during the summer.
Prices for team sports range
from $10 to
$40 a team,
and individ
ual or dual
sports are
free with the
exception of
golf, which
requires a
green fee.
To com
pete in intra
murals, West
said students need to fill out an
entry card at the Member Ser
vices desk at the Rec Center,
pick a division and league and
pay the entry
Students
then re
ceive a rules
packet with
pertinent in
formation
about playing
that sport.
Students
who wish to
play a team
sport but do
RUBEN DELUNA/Tw Battalion
not already belong to a team
may enter the Free Agents Pro
gram, which allows teams with
out enough members to pickup
additional players.
Once the application dead
line passes, a single elimination
schedule for each sport will be
filled out and posted at Member
Services.
West said there are many
benefits of intramural sports,
including the opportunity to
compete, socialize, learn a new
sport and exercise.
She said some students join
to meet other students and
make friends, while others play
on teams with their friends to
See Games on Page 2.
Interest
rate cut
on loans
Federally backed
student loan rate
to drop 6 percent
(AP) — Paying for college is
about to get less expensive for
students and families saddled by
education loans.
Starting July 1, the interest
rate on federally backed student
loans will be reset to what’s be
lieved to be the lowest level since
the student loan program began
in the 1960s.
Interest on student loans will
drop to 5.99 percent, down from
the current 8.19 percent, the
U.S. Education Department
said Monday. Students start pay
ing off the loans six months after
leaving school and typically have
10 years to do it.
The rate for parents borrow
ing in their own names for a
child’s education will drop to
6.79 percent from 8.99 percent.
T hose loans are owed immedi
ately, like credit card debt.
“This is the lowest rate in the
history of the student loan pro
gram, lower than even the 7 per
cent in place when the student
loan program began in 1965,’^
said John E. Dean, lobbyist for
the Consumer Bankers Associa
tion, whose members are the
largest commercial banks in the
student loan business.
The new rates apply to loans
first disbursed on or after July
1, 1998. A borrower could also
benefit from the lower rates by
consolidating loans taken be
fore then.
The federal government es
timates the new rate will save
the student borrower with a
standard 10-year repayment
plan about $136 for every
$1,000 they owe.
See Loans on Page 2.