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Opinion
The Battalion
Page 9 • Monday, September 20, 2004
Pace Design • MATT RIGNEY
Jacked
| TS must stop ticketing trifling offenses and focus on rampant campus bike theft
A:
n anonymous
sage once
said, “don’t
steal — the govern
ment hates competi
tion.” Sadly, theft is
a problem even on a
campus whose honor
code declares that
Aggies must not steal
or tolerate those who
do. Appropriately, stu
dents at Texas A&M
are having a hard time tolerating University
employees who are doing nothing active to
combat the rampant bike theft that occurs on
this campus.
From Aug. 1 to Sept. 8, 37 bikes, with a
combined value of $6,405, were reported
stolen, according to The Battalion. In an
article published in the same paper on Sept.
9,Sgt. H. Allan Barron of the University
Police Department said none of the bikes
have been recovered.
The criminals who are stealing students’
bikes are obviously the ones to blame
here. However, it’s troubling that so many
crimes can occur in such a short amount of
time and escape the attention of employ
ees responsible for patrolling the campus.
Since bike theft is such a problem, it
would seem only proper for Transportation
Services employees to make it their prior
ity instead of petty parking violations.
This crime is one that seems to have
fallen through the cracks between minor
violations that TS is responsible for han
dling and the major ones that UPD moni
tors. Officially, TS regulates parked bicycles
while UPD regulates moving bicycles, so
it would appear that the theft of parked
bicycles falls under the authority of TS. It’s
time that they stop caring so much about
who forgot to put their parking tag in their
car or ran two minutes over in a 30 minute
parking spot and begin doing something to
combat bike theft.
Reassigning the priority of TS officers
wouldhave benefits for students and the
organization. First, it would stop a crime
that has cost students thousands of dollars
each year. UPD statistics show that during
the 2001-2002 school year 289 bikes were
stolen and during the 2002-2003 school year
312 bikes were stolen.
An important fact to consider is this is
only the number of bikes reported, rather
than actually stolen. Given the failure rate
of the University in returning bikes to their
owners, many Aggies don’t bother reporting
their loss.
“1 don’t think it’s worth the time or
trouble to go and report a bike being stolen,
especially with the success rate that the
UPD has had in recovering those bikes,”
said Michael Murphy, a senior sports man
agement major. “I don’t think there’s much
they can do, because it’s such an untrace-
able crime.”
A shift in policy for TS should lead to a
decrease in this type of crime, which would
bolster the faith in TS’s ability to resolve
important problems on campus. Further,
merely the attention to a problem that
affects students maybe just the boost in
reputation TS needs, as it has been suf
fering due to widely unpopular parking
plans implemented at the start of this
school year.
There are, of course, many actions
a student can take to avoid becom
ing a victim of bike theft, such as
using case-hardened U-Locks and
properly securing the bike frame
to a bike rack. In addition, the
University offers an engraving of a
student’s identification number onto
the bike itself.
While this tactic may help in
recovering a lost bike, it may offer
another solution that seems to be
overlooked. “Students often lock
their bike with a case-hardened
lock through the front tire only,
but bike thieves can easily slip the
front wheel oft’ and take the frame,”
Baron said.
But it stands to reason that it takes
time and effort to rip off a bike in
this fashion. TS employees could
extend their monitoring of parking
lots to include nearby bike racks and
question anyone who is exerting
a suspicious amount of effort in
freeing a bike from its rack. The
engraved number can then be
compared with the student’s ID card to
resolve the matter.
There’s no denying that parking viola
tions deserve warning or ticketing as per the
agreement all Aggie drivers accept when
purchasing their parking passes, but it’s time
TS realized that there are more important
things to worry about than these minor
infractions. Instead of taking money away
from students with petty fines, they should
be working alongside UPD in prevent
students from losing even more money over
bike theft.
Mike Walters is a senior
psychology major.
n Antonio
/a, Texas,
degree in
wrer. The
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'eaders.
scovering
at discov-
TheNev,
ors As a
practices
Joshua Dwyer says America’s poor
aren’t as strapped as many think
John David Blakley wants more benefits
for the country’s poverty stricken
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Family
that en-
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f Rheto-
"n a report by the Census
Bureau, the number of U.S.
.citizens living in poverty
1 \\ WWMj rose to 35.9 million people in
A..:*. S 2003 or 12.5 percent of the
)OSHUA population, up from 12.1 per-
dwyer cent in 2002. Though this
figure doesn’t represent the
number of people who were in poverty all year
long, it caused many activists, commentators and
politicians to lament the apparent fact that poverty
is rising and insist the national government should
do something about it.
A little understanding of who actually lives in
poverty will produce a more accurate and less bleak
view of the current economic picture in the United
States. Most of the 35.9 million people the govern
ment considers to be living in poverty are not as bad
off as the average American might assume. More
over, if people had a choice about which country
they would like live in if they had to be poor, most
would say present day United States.
Without a doubt, there are citizens in the United
States who cannot provide the basic essentials for
their families. Nearly everyone would consider
these individuals poor and in need of assistance. But
the number of people who fall into this category is
nowhere near the 35.9 million the Census Bureau
suggests by its designation of those in poverty.
A study published by a public policy research or
ganization, the Heritage Foundation, found the fol
lowing infonnation about people living in poverty
according to various government reports.
Home ownership among people classified as
poor is at 46 percent and the average poor home
has three bedrooms, one-and-a-half bathrooms, a
garage and a patio or porch. Thirty years ago, 36
percent of U.S. population had air-conditioned
housing; today, 76 percent of poor people have air
conditioning in their homes.
Average individuals in London, Paris and
other European cities have less living space than
the average poor American. This is not a com
parison of European poor to American poor, but
American poor to average Europeans. Only six
percent of households considered poor in Amer
ica are overcrowded.
Nearly three-quarters of poor Americans own a
car, while 30 percent own two or more cars.
Ninety-seven percent of poor households have
a color television; more than half of the poor
households have two or more TVs. These TVs are
well equipped: Seventy-Eight percent of the poor
homes have a VCR or DVD and 62 percent have
satellite or cable reception.
The same study found almost no difference
between the average consumption of vitamins,
minerals and protein by poor children and middle-
class children.
These facts should not be interpreted as dimin
ishing the hardship those actually too poor to meet
their needs. According to the U.S. Department of
Agriculture, in 3.5 percent of all U.S. households at
least one person — usually a parent — experienced
hunger at least one day in 2002. Even for relatively
short periods, the existence of hunger anywhere in
the United States should be combated by the rest of
the population through charitable contributions, not
government programs that create dependence.
Often the people who live in poverty are there
because of poor choices they made, arguably when
they were younger. The National Center for Policy
Analysis, a nonpartisan think
tank, found that completing high
school, getting any kind of frill
time job and getting married all
reduce poverty substantially.
The prevalence of single-parent homes beneath
the poverty line in the Census report and the 1.3
million children bom out of wedlock each year
also suggest the need for individuals to make bet
ter decisions, including waiting to engage in sexual
intercourse until they are married and marrying the
parent of their child. Obviously, this isn’t the an
swer for all instances of children in poverty, but the
Fragile Family and Child Well Being Study being
conducted by Princeton and Columbia Universities
seems to suggest that it would drastically reduce the
number, according to the Heritage Foundation.
Poor Americans are better off in the United
States than any other country because they are not
destined to remain poor. Poverty seems to have a
high turnover rate with individuals remaining poor
for a few months in most cases, according to Cen
sus Bureau statistics. Additionally, the abundance
of opportunities in the United States provides many
in poverty to better their economic situation: Only
2 percent are chronically poor, according to Census
reports, and 38 percent of people in the lowest in
come group move up within three years.
The best way to reduce poverty in the United
States is not to institute another grandiose govern
ment program like the War on Poverty in the 1960s,
nor to expand the abundance of federal welfare pro
grams already in existence. Behavioral changes and
reforming welfare to motivate individuals to im
prove themselves as a condition of receiving ben
efits will lead to fewer welfare recipients as well
as fewer people in poverty. And that should be the
goal of any assistance.
Joshua Dwyer is a sophomore
political science major.
JOHN DAVID
BLAKLEY
PICO CON
hroughout his presiden
cy, former President
Reagan told the Ameri
can people a myth about a
welfare queen, who drove
a Cadillac and sipped cham
pagne — whose flamboy
ant lifestyle was subsidized
by the American welfare system. The poorest
Americans, those who benefited from the welfare
system, were not to be pitied but distrusted and
labeled as the indolent source of America’s prob
lems. Of course, the welfare queen’s existence is
as factual as the idea that living on welfare pro
vides a glamorous life of riches, champagne and
$50,000 cars.
But a powerful picture of the
penniless was painted in the
minds of Americans by Reagan’s
bogus statement. Today, Ameri
cans continue to believe people live in poverty due
to choice or laziness. According to the Census Bu
reau, the number of Americans living in poverty
increased by 1.3 million last year, while the ranks
of the uninsured swelled by 1.4 million. The census
pointed out that both groups have increased over
the past three years, and children made up more
than half of the increases this past year.
The rising numbers are linked to the long
slump in the job market, according to The New
York Times, and the Bush administration’s slow
response to a sluggish economy. Job loss and.
outsourcing concentrated on blue-collar work,
as well as taxation favoring the wealthy, has
further polarized the economic spectrum. The
United States has the most unequal income dis
tribution in the developed world, as the 13,000
richest families in the United States now have
almost as much income as the 20 million poor
est, according to The Houston Chronicle.
There is much truth within the catchphrase
two Americas, which Democratic vice presiden
tial nominee John Edwards uses to describe the
results of the United States’ income disparity.
The Bush administration’s lack of knowledge
about hardship and poverty shows through every
time Vice President Cheney mocks this idea of
two Americas — one rich and one poor.
The same insensitive perspective on poverty
has been brandished by President Bush since
his younger days when he called the New Deal
socialist and declared “people are poor because
they’re lazy,” according to one of his professors
at Harvard Business School.
The result of this mindset is a lack of action
from the administration when it comes to rising
unemployment (37 percent since Bush took of
fice, according to the Labor Bureau), gas prices
(11 percent since Bush took office, according
to CNN), health care premiums (17 percent last
year according to The Times) and college tuition
rates (35 percent since Bush took office, accord
ing to the College Board) as well as a tax policy
that favors the wealthy (8.5 percent of tax cuts
for the bottom 60 percent of wage earners, ac
cording to Citizens for Tax Justice). Every day
life for poor Americans has become increasingly
difficult, and the government provides little aid.
Many conservatives blindly look to charities
as the solution. However, a recent survey by the
Brookings Institute showed that only 15 percent
of Americans have confidence in charities, al
luding to a lack of accountability and efficiency
within such organizations. The study cited cases
of “charities taking part in tax shelters used by
corporations and wealthy individuals, insiders
using charitable assets for their own purposes
and donations being spent on private jets and
European vacations.” Ironically, the solution
put forth by the report is more government regu
lation. The reality that people have this over
whelming suspicion of charities, blended with
the haves’ and have-mores’ reluctance to fund
government-run welfare programs, makes it hard
to believe that separate, uncoordinated charities
can swallow the immense task of aiding 35.9
million Americans living in poverty.
When the choice is between dealing with the
haves and have-mores (those making more than
$200,000, according to John Kerry’s plan to ex
pand health care coverage), griping about higher
taxes or dealing with parents choosing between
health care and food for their children, the gov
ernment should choose the former. When the
choice is between another yacht for the wealthi
est Americans or health care for American chil
dren who lack it, the government should defer to
the concerns of its weakest citizens. And when
the government has the means to improve the
quality of life for Americans who toil daily for
minimum wage and still cannot pay the bills, it
should act.
Earning one’s keep and providing for one’s
family are arduous undertakings but not back
breaking impossibilities. There is no better mea
sure of a nation’s moral worth than the fashion
in which it treats the needy. The government
should stop pointing fingers and help those truly
in need.
John David Blakley is a junior
political science major.