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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 23, 1973)
EMU food price rises due to higher food costs By TOM MASCOTT Of the Emerald If you were wondering why the cost of some food items at the EMU cafeteria is up, the ex planation is the obvious one — economics. Soaring food costs were cited Wednesday by EMU Food Service Supervisor Ken Larsen as the cause of the recent rise. “The cost of food has gone up again,” Larsen said, “and meat prices are still going up. All beef and pork is more expensive now. Also, the prices for our paper and cleaning supplies have risen.” What items now sport higher price tags on the cafeteria menu? According to Larsen, the sandwiches and en trees received the boosts. “This is entirely because of the meat prices It was necessary for us to do this in order to operate efficiently.” he noted. He said the fact that there are no preservatives in the bread the cafeteria serves had a bearing on prices. “Rather than try to buy cheap bread, we wanted to order something healthy for the students,” Larsen said. A keen prospective will notice that the {nice of a plain hamburger has stayed the same — 45 cents. “We serve a large volume of hamburgers, and, knowing it is a popular item, we decided to maintain its price,” Larsen said. The food supervisor said that nearly all of the increases were only five or ten cents up from previous rates. “It was just an economy move. By making these nickel-dime raises we wanted to make it evident that we weren’t going to gouge the students.” Larsen said the food service is trying to add other things to even up the program. “We hope to attract more business in off-hours,” he said, “and one item in particular is the Fishbowl Follies venture on Monday through Thursday nights, when everything goes for a nickel (popcorn, coffee and soft drinks)).” One last piece of data that Larsen offered was a phone call to Swift’s meat company to check on price rises as compared to 60 days ago. The call disclosed a figure sheet which listed the following: roast beef is up 15 cents a pound, cheese has In creased by seven cents a pound, and fats and cooking oils have jumped three cents a pound in the same two-month period. At Demoforum D.A. supports plea-bargaining Lane District Attorney Pat Horton told the DemoForum Thursday that proposed revisions in Oregon’s criminal procedures code would bring “a breath of fresh air to legal proceedings.” By JOSH MARQUIS Of the Emerald The proposals are part of a report submitted by the Criminal Law Revision Commission at the Capitol The Commission, headed by Senator Anthony Yturri (R Ontario), delivered its final report to the legislature in November of last year. - Horton, who headed a project to teach Oregon police officers provisions of the new criminal code, spoke mainly on the subject of plea-bargaining. At present plea-bargaining is an informal but accepted practice whereby the defense and prosecution attorneys bargain for lesser charges in exchange for a guilty plea. The District Attorney said that approximately “80 to 90 per cent of all cases are bargained and never reach the trial stage.” Horton pointed out that the American Bar Association has accepted plea-bargaining as an aid to judicial economy. “Like all things, plea-bargaining can be abused, but in general I think it lends itself to an essential flexibility in the law,” said the DA. Horton said that the most dangerous thing would be if the law became rigid. “What we have to decide is whether a college student who has stolen a candy bar should suffer the penalty of being barred from his profession,” said Horton. “A person need not be ruined for life for an isolated act.” The criteria for plea bargaining include the assump tion that the person is responsible for his action, but that alter natives might be found that better serve the person’s interest than a prison term. Horton commented that the proposed revisions would codify and make clear practices that have been going on anyway. Undo- the suggested revision, both defense and prosecution attorneys would have to submit reasons for any agreement resulting from plea-bargaining to the judge, though the court would not participate in the negotiations. Former State Representative Leroy Owens said that he was afraid that the practice of plea bargaining was mere in regard to clearing up court dockets than anything else. Horton stated that he felt the proposals represented an improvement “because they put everything out on the table.” Petition for auditorium bond issue will be presented again By JOHN KNOWLTON Of the Emerald The Lane County Auditorium Association (LCAA) voted unanimously Wednesday to place its $5.5 million bond issue before Eugene voters May 24 through an initiative petition. The band measure, plus $2 million of donations, would fund the organization’s proposed auditorium center. To get the measure on the ballot, 7,000 valid signatures of Eugene voters must appear on the petition by the April 1 filing date, said campaign coordinator Sheila Johnson. The organization submitted the $5.5 million package along with a proposed downtown site to the voters last November. Eugene voters, however, rejected the proposal. A subsequent survey showed that the major reason for voter disapproval was the location of the site. If all goes according to plan, the May 24 ballot will offer not only the bond issue, but a choice of the original downtown site and an alternate site in Alton Baker Park. The May 24 date was chosen for several reasons, Johnson said. The first reason she listed is that University students will still be in school. In the November election, a majority of University students favored the measure. The second reason for the May 24 date si that it won’t interfere with any Memorial Day activities, Johnson said. “The third reason is that it gives us time to find out what’s happening in the legislature as far as tax reform is concerned,” she said. The organization had originally planned to build the center for $8.5 million. But a freeze on $1.25 million of Economic Development Administration funds forced the organization to drop the arena hall from plans for the proposed center. However, additional sources of funds are being sought, according to LCAA president Lee Bishop. “We have a responsibility to keep on top of things,” he said. “From the indication we’ve received, it will be sometime this fall before the federal freeze on funds” will begin to thaw, he added. While in Washington D.C., architect for the organization John Amundson “will check on acquiring a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts,” Bishop said. “If the auditorium center were to be located in Alton Baker Park along with other cultural facilities” such as museums, a conservatory and a botanical garden, then it woudl probably qualify for a National Endowment for the Arts grant, Bishop explained. He added that the nation’s bi-centennial an niversayy is approaching and that funds would be made available to Oregon. “There’s no reason some of those funds shouln’t go to Eugene,” he said. New tenant legislation protested by landlords By NAN HENDERSON Of the Emerald SALEM (Special — Landlords Thursday took advantage of their first opportunity to testify on SB 159, a proposed overhaul of the existing landlord-tenant laws, during a hearing before the Senate Local Government and Urban Affairs Committee. And, as was expected, they all opposed the bill which would: — Require landlords to comply with existing building and housing codes and maintain dwellings in “fit and habitable condition.” — Require landlords to supply water, heat and hot water and maintain all facilities and appliances in the units. — Give the tenant the right to make repairs and deduct them from the rent if the landlord fails to do so within 14 days after receiving from the tenant a written notice of intent to repair. — Limit the amount of combined deposits charged by landlords to no more than one month’s rent and require landlords to return the deposit or account for any deductions in the deposit. — Prohibit the landlord from evicting tenants for joining a tenants’ union or making legal complaints about the landlord. — Abolish the landlord’s current right to confiscate tenants’ property and lock tenants out of their dwellings. Supporters of the bill, who testified during two previous hearings on the measure, stress that SB 159 retains most of the current obligations of tenants such as keeping the unit clean, using all of the facilities in a “reasonable manner,” being quiet, allowing the landlord “reasonable access” to his property and abiding by “reasonable rules and regulations” prescribed by the landlord. But landlords said during Thursday’s hearing that they “cannot go along with this measure.” They argued that only low-income renters face problems with landlords, that enforcing current building and safety codes would solve any existing problems, that the bill contains “open invitations” for litigation, and most importantly, the bill would cause more problems for the low-income renters rather than solving problems. George Bimie, a Portland lawyer representing the Oregon Apartment Owners Association (OAOA), told the committee that his organization could not support the bill because, “in a word we feel that problem of low income people and the housing they must accept is not a problem that can be solved by altering the landlord relationship.” He said the problem of low-income families is a “social problem” that must be solved “by the government.” Bimie added that tenants in Oregon are not in the bad position they claim to be in. “There are organizations such as OSPIRG that help renters with their landlord relationship,” Birnie said. Bimie told the committee he has been a lobbyist since 1947 and said, “never have I seen a bill so studded with invitation to litigation.” He said if the committee feels landlord-tenant problems do exist, they “could be taken care of by small two-sentence statutes. We don’t need a great big bill to get to those problems.” The bill, which was drafted by the National Conference on Uniform State Laws after several years of study, was also criticized because it is a proposed uniform law. The commissioners that adopted the bill last summer at their national conference plan to introduce it in every state in the country. “But we don’t have the problems in Oregon which exist in big cities such as New York,” James Lafky, President of the OAOA told the committee. He said “an omnibus bill such as this is going to discourage per sons from going into the low-income housing business.” * Maurene Faw, also from the organization, who identified herself as a low-income landlord, agreed with Lafky. She told the committee that many renters preferred to live in “low-maintenance” dwellings to avoid paying higher rent. She said that the small landlord, in being forced to upgrade low income rentals, would have to raise rent. “As I look at this bill, I see it penalizing the poor person more than anyone else,” Faw said. A Eugene apartment owner, Marian Hessel, who said she “likes to rent to students,” told the committee that the bill was too vague and that many “unreasonable” persons would *^<:e advantage of the provisions outlined in the measure. “I am appalled at the stories our tenants tell me about landlords that are unfair,” Hessel said. “But I am equally appalled at what hap pens to our property.” She, like the other landlords at the hearing, felt the problems tenants now face could be solved by enforcing present laws. Another hearing on the bill, again scheduled for opponents only, will be held next Tuesday at 8:45 a.m. in room 309 of the Capitol. I City-wide teacher’s ! meeting called It will be sometime next week before the Eugene | Education Association (EEA) will announce what steps it | plans to take in light of the Eugene School Board’s decision not to raise teachers’ salaries to the level they had deman * ded. A spokesman for the EEA said Thursday that the | teacher’s organization had set up the machinery necessary for the calling of a city-wide meeting of all Eugene educators, i The meeting is scheduled for next week. The spokesman also said that no information on the EEA plans would be released to the public until after the city-wide meeting.
