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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 10, 1978)
( editorial lease is a lease, but rent is rent The ASUO Off-Campus Housing Office this week is alerting students about rental agreements and leases. Es sentially, the warning says “consumer beware,” when signing a lease or rental agreement. The most important difference between 30-day ag reements and a lease is that rent cannot be raised by the apartment owner while a lease is in effect. The same protection does not exist for 30-day agreements. If a land lord wishes to raise your rent for your next 30-day agree ment, it’s legal with 30-days notice. But over and above the consumer beware notice about leases, students are also concerned about the amount of money they’re paying in rent. One classified ad in the Emerald earlier this read like this: “One-bedroom apartment. Short person necessary because of low ceil ings.” The rent was $150 per month. There is a housing shortage in Eugene now; the va cancy rate in housing is about five per cent. That rate is more severe than what the federal government officially terms a housing shortage. Where’s the money going? Well, according to one Eugene landlord, it’s not going into the landlord’s pockets. He says the housing shortage is here now partly because banks are reluctant to loan money to apartment owners. The reason: money lenders think rents are too low in Eugene to ensure a return on the loan. Banks currently charge nine and three-quarters per cent on loans to apartment owners, and that’s where a lot of the money goes. Another bite out of your monthly rent check goes to taxes, according to the landlord. About 17-20 per cent of the revenue gathered from renters goes to various taxes, both state and federal. Other bites are taken out by man agement, maintenance and advertising. But to the typical student, this is small consolation for the rent. Currently, the average rent for a one-bedroom apartment is about $150. The going rate for a two-bedroom apartment is about $200 per month. With those rates, a call for rent control sometimes comes up, but usually has no support in political arenas. Land owners claim that with rent controls, they would not be able to maintain apartments and still make a profit. In addition, they argue that rent controls may actually aggra vate a shortage. So the Off-Campus Housing Office’s attempt to alert tenants to the intricacies of leases and rent agreements is laudable. In terms of leases and short-term agreements, the market is truly one of “let the buyer beware.” But in terms of the amount of rent you pay, it’s “let the buyer suffer.” etters History clarified The letter appearing in the January 9, issue of the Emerald contains errors concerning the Vil lard gift, Villard Hall and the type of institution that the University was prior to 1881, the year of the first Villard gift. The origin of the University was not religious — in fact, its Charter barred any test for religious beliefs and discrimination because of sex or race. It was from the start a state institution. The curriculum was limited to classical, literary and scientific courses. It did not offer any classes in religion. Henry Villard gave the Univer sity a sum of $7,000 in 1881 to aid in payment of a debt left over from the construction of the first build ing on the campus — Deady Hall. Deady Hall was constructed from private funds raised by Eugene and Lane County citizens, how ever, the funds raised were not sufficient to pay the full cost of construction. In 1881, five years after Deady Hail was opened to students, a number of creditors presented their requests for pay ment. The faculty, citizens of Eugene and Lane County initiated a campaign to pay the debt. Henry Viliard, in New York, read of the financial difficulties and of fered to pay the debt in a telegram to Judge Matthew P. Deady, Pres ident of the Board of Regents for the State University of Oregon. Deady informed Viliard as to how much Deady thought was needed and Viliard responded with the sum of $7,000. This was not suffi cient to pay the debt in full, but the amount raised locally and the Vil iard money did satisfy the cre ditors. Viliard came to the University in the fall of 1881 and immediately stated that he would give the Uni versity $1,000 to aid in laying the foundation for a library, $1,000 to aid in the purchase of equipment for the physical and chemical de partment, fund a chair in English literature for one year, and give six $50 scholarships to the most meritorious students at the Uni versity. In 1883 he gave the Uni versity $50,000 in first mortage bonds on the Northern Pacific Railroad, provided that at least $400 per year of the interest earned be devoted to the en largement of the library. The State Legislature, in Feb ruary 1885, gave the University $30,000 to construct a second building on the campus. This building was completed in 1886 and by a vote of the Board of Re gents was named Villard Hall in honor of the first benefactor of the University, Henry Villard. It was the first building on cam pus to be named. Deady Hall was referred to as “The Building,” “The University,” and after the construction of Villard, Deady was called “The Old Building.” In March 1893 Judge Deady died and the Board of Regents voted to name the old building in his honor. Keith Richard University Archivist Letters policy The Emerald will accept and try to print all letters and opinion col umns containing fair comment on ideas and topics of concern or in terest to the University community. Letters and opinions will be run on a fiist-come first-served basis. Wswisaid/wim imi msgmaiumuduxs mmtww Mo.vMMor,Bcss...>&,nowidrinktgqmuch...■but... -opinion--— India’s Desai should determine his own destiny Submitted by Ozodi Osuji Graduate, Political Science The editorial opinion “India shouldn’t touch Tar Baby” (ODE Jan. 6, 1978) appears to be well meaning. India, a country “where 45 per cent of the population lives in the squalor of poverty and where 50 million people are un employed" could do better than embark on the expensive luxury of nuclear arms race. It could chan nel the resources aimed at arms production to agricultural de velopment so as to feed her burgeoning population. All things being equal, of course. There is a snag, however. All things are never equal. We are living in a world of power politics. The self-proclaimed mighty strive to dominate the weak, and fall into self-righteous rage when their whims and dictates are not obeyed. It is reported that Presi dent Carter was irritated and angered by Premier Moraji Desai's rather courageous and adamant insistence that no exter na! authority dictate to India how best to allocate its resources. Un daunted by Desai's surprising as sertion of independence, Carter has said that he will send a “cold Piicrp d and blunt” communique to Desai to encourage him to cooperate with halting the spread of nuclear weapons. In other words, the President is resolved to influence India’s domestic politics. (It must be borne in mind that the Carter Desai dialogue was not meant for public consumption. It was by ac cident that a pressman taped this “bullying” session and thus di vulged the secret). Perhaps the episode is indicative of the pres sure western leaders bring to bear on developing countries’ leaders in private, while appearing friendly in public. The question that suggests it self is: why did the president lose his composure at Desai's insis tence on deciding his country’s destiny, given that he is the duly elected leader of India and not Carter? One could answer this question in several ways. For in stance, the President’s belief in humanity is so intense that he couldn’t bear to see Desai ignor ing the starving masses on the streets of Bombay, New Dehli, etc while devoting the scarce re sources of India to nuclear weapons. Another possiblity is much more subtle and speculative. Could it be that the President had expected to be listened to, to be obeyed, to be feared? A man does not easily get angry when his equal insists on doing his own thing. Anger is usu ally provoked when one assumes that the other ought to have done as we desired or lived up to our dictates. Anger betrays an un equal relationship. Now, psychological specula tions aside, has the encounter some political revelations? To be apparently frustrated because another head of state insists on self determination and to threaten to even send him a blunt com munique (read, reminding Desai of India’s dependency on foreign aid and hence necessity of kow towing — or else.) is Bismarkian. While western powers can go ahead and produce nuclear weapons and thus have the whole world at ransom — the nonwest ern world must be prevented from doing so. Of course we have the age-old rationalization. They (the world) are too poor, and should face the business of feeding themselves first, that is, if they are rational; otherwise they are “reck less” and unreasonable. Desai rightly argued “that the US should follow its own rhetoric in calling for nuclear disarmament before foisting its views on other nations.” This is a crucial test of sincerity of intent. Refusal to fol low it leaves us with no other al ternative but to suspect deceit. However, it could be argued that the US/west have a higher proba bility of preventing accidents in the nuclear business, given their highly developed technology. Ra tional? Well, the technological ar gument could be a specious strategy masking a double stan dard approach — the idea that some people are more like chil dren and therefore cannot be en trusted with complex respon sibilities. It is worthwhile to observe that while calling on India to give up its nuclear intentions in the spirit of preventing nuclear proliferations, the very apostles of peace and human rights have actually sold and built nuclear plants in South Africa. Yes, the public is given the impression that the South Afri cans are engaging in that venture by themselves. Actually, it does not take much thinking to realize that the international corporations making astronomical profits via cheap African labor have pre vailed on the western powers to build nuclear weapons in South Africa as a means of safeguard ing their economic interests. The rising demand for equal political participation by all the peoples of South Africa, they figure, must be dampened by the threat of nuclear annihilation. In conclusion, it is my view that as long as some human beings wield weapons, the rest of us are neither truly free nor safe. Control of the means of coercion has al ways been the most effective means of dictating obedience domestically or in foreign rela tions. Depending on the ' good in tentions” of the armed man to safeguard our lives, is a mis guided illusion. True indepen dence for India, or for that matter any third world country, is to pos sess those means of force which can enable them to protect their territory and sovereignty from ex ternal arrogant interventions. Cost is irrelevant when national survi val is at stake. A better but less feasible al ternative is complete disarma ment. In the meantime, Moraji Desai has as much right as any to engage in the race for mutual self-destruction.
