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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (March 30, 1973)
Other members Holcomb, Hoffnagle, Hernandez, Gonzalez Andy Holcomb Gail Hoffnagle New constitution \full of holes9 The incidental fee committee consists of two Chicanos, a homosexual, a woman interested in athletics, and Andy Holcomb. A male Caucasian with no special interests, perhaps born in a log cabin, Andy is a minority because he isn’t a minority. Gail Hoffnagle, the girl athlete, jokingly says “I don’t know how Andy got here.” Indeed he almost didn’t. He defeated Carol Whitcomb by the narrowest margin of the incidental com mittee election, 493 to 486. Holcomb was elected to the ASUO senate winter term and served on the fiscal committee. He is a senior in Political Science, and he has yet to decide whether he will go on to grad school, medical school, or law school. Since the abolishment of the ASUO senate, Holcomb has been worried about the system of checks and balances in student government. He says that the new constitution is “full of holes.” One of those “holes” is the clause concerning a spring term election of a new incidental fee committee. The present committee members would not be allowed to run again, either. “That’s possibly a good thing,” he says, citing the obvious amount of power the committee has. “But we should have been told.” He thinks the fee com mittee should be elected twice a year. Holcomb is also worried about the lack of checks on the ASUO executive. He says the fee committee will fight the executive’s use of $3000 out of the senate reserve fund to pay off a tax debt. Another one of Holcomb’s views regards the Athletic Department budget. He thinks scholarships should be based on need, and that the Women’s 4Great, interesting9 Manuel Hernandez: senior, business major, former assistant to minority programs budget offices, Chicano, interested in minority representation. That is perhaps the best way to describe Manual Hernandez: straightforward, blunt, to the point. Because that is the way he strikes you. Straightforward. He answers questions shortly and tersely. What did you think of the first budget meeting, Wednesday night? “Great. Interesting.” Is that all? He nods his head. He ran because he was con cerned that when the senate was abolished, minority represen tation might drop with it. “If you get five people on a board who are not sensitive to. minority needs, it could be bad,” he says. So you would think that since the fee committee has two Chicanos, Hemancez could stop worrying. But there are other things. “The executive likes this committee setup,” he says, adding that there is room for executive manipulation of the committee “We’re in a shaky position.” He maintains that the late winter term election of the fee committee was a move by the executive to solidify their stand on the validation of the general Oregon Daily Emerald election and the abolishment of the senate. “They needed a fast, legitimate body,” he says. The danger now is that the fee committee may or may not be up for election again this spring. The executive must decide that, and since the present committee members could not run again (under the new constitution), the decision on another election could be used by the executive against the committee. Hernandez recognizes the threat, but he adds that “I don’t think they’re going to kick us out before we do the damage.” The committee has to review the executive budget along with the others. How does he think the five person fee committee compares with the senate in incidental fee allocation? “Looking at last year’s budget, I think most agencies must have' had friends in the senate,” he answers. “I think changes will be made.” He characterizes the com mittee with such adjectives as ‘‘hard-working” and “cooperative.” Besides the executive budget, Hernandez says that the com mittee will have to give extra attention to the Athletic Department and EMU budgets. Recreation Association and Club Sports funding should come under the AD budget. But he admits that “a lot of students get more out of the Athletic Department than other programs.” Holcomb thinks that the committee “worked very well” in Wednesday night’s first round of hearings. “We will begin to get a feel for what questions to ask as we go along,” he says. ‘Interested in recreation ’ it ATcrne Bunker were to review the incidental fee com mittee, he might come up with a rather amusing list of first im pressions. He would be unlikely to use such civilized terms as “Chicano”, “homosexual” and “longhair.” But then there would be Gail Hoffnagle. “Oh, now there’s a nice-looking kid,” he would say. Which is actually a pretty good way to describe Gail. She just plain looks dependable. “I’m sort of quiet and shy in my own sort of way,” she says. Gail is more outgoing than she seems, though. It seems one would have to be to survive the politics of an incidental fee committee election. Last year Gail was a non-voting member of the senate fiscal affairs com mittee, and she was interested enough in fiscal matters to pursue the fee committee position when the senate was abolished. Originally, she was a representative for the Women’s Recreation Association, which at the time needed more voice in senate fiscal matters. “I’m very interested in the recreation program,” she says. “I’m also an athlete...I like to compete.” She is the only fee committee member who does not support cutting the athletic budget. “I don’t think we have to cut the AD budget every year,” she says. She contends that the recreational programs are worth the money spent on them. Gail joins her committee colleagues in condemning the recent use by the executive of $3000 in senate reserve funds. “I really consider it rather in sulting,” she says. She even goes so far as to call it “unlawful”. She says the committee itself is “more understanding than I thought it would be in the beginning.” She says she is constantly amazed by the number and diversity of programs the University has to offer. Gail, like most of the com mittee members, is an optimist. Although the EMUIU addition calls for a tremendous incrrease in the EMU budget which will undoubtedly put a squeeze on other programs, she foressees no financial crisis. In fact she maintains that the incidental fee for each student will not have to be raised, and may even be lowered. “It’s really important for us to be fair to all these programs,” she says. “They think we’re out to get them, but that’s just not true. Once in a while we catch them.” Committee member interviews by Ken Mays ‘What I like is program improvement* Gloria Gonzalez doesn’t strike you as the kind of person who would be involved in political intrigue and high finance. Most people in that category love to be interviewed. They relish the chance to explain any number of things to a reporter. Gloria hates to be interviewed. And when she does sit down to talk, she does such politically strange things as admit her weaknesses. “I still don’t know what these people do,” she says about the vast numbers and varieties of programs she has been con fronted with in the past few weeks. “I want to find out more.” Her main concern is that each program gets a fair con sideration. Being a Chicano, she is of course concerned with minorities, but she says she is no puppet. In fact she points out that the MEChA budget needs some paring, and she will discuss the budget with members of that organization. In early meetings, the In cidental Fee Committee decided to split up the various programs among committee members for research purposes. Gloria drew the Cultural Forum, OSPIRG, Foreign Student Organization, the International Education Center, the Student Bar Association and Repertory Dance. “None of which has anything to do with minority groups,” as she puts it. What does she look for when confronted with the budget of a program she knows little about? “What I like is program development,” she answers. “I don’t think program development should be cut.” But she adds that mm she is very skeptical about some of the salaried positions, par ticularly when a program has more than one assistant director. Gloria is a senior broadcast major. She came here as a transfer student from Denver, where she was a student services coordinatin'. She calls the fee committee “well representative.” The committee includes another Chicano, Manual Hernandez, but Gloria is careful to point out that even though they belong to the same ethnic group, they think differently on a number of sub jects. Gloria is a believer in com promise, which she says will be a key to the budget decisions. “We just have to see what they really need,” she says. With emphasis on the word “really.” Manuel Hernandez Photos by SteveTwt-Jt Gloria Gonzalez
