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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 9, 1986)
Editorial ASUO should push escort plan ahead Requests for nightly escorts surged by about 140 percent last term, but the University has yet to see the ASUO’s pro posed shuttle van service. The increase in escort requests should prod the student administration to move the plan from the drawing board to the streets. Student requests to the Office of Public Safety, which operates its own service in addition to the Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity’s walking escort service, jumped from an average of 35 per night to 85. To try to accommodate the ad ded demand, the office recently replaced its door-to-door service with a shuttle that makes hourly rounds. The system is less convenient for students, but the office appears to be making the best of a bad situation. The ASUO-sponsored shuttle service has been the crown of the current administration’s proposed fight to stop violence against women since Lynn Pinckney and John Dreeszen campaigned for their respective offices of ASUO president and vice president last April. The proposed system was spotlighted in October when the project’s com mittee announced plans to implement a women-only system, which would bar men from using or participating in the service. The plan’s committee, composed of members from the ASUO administration, the Creek system, the Rape Crisis Network and the Women’s Referral and Resource Service, is divided into two subcommittees. ASUO University Affairs Coordinator Ray Veillet heads the subcommittee responsible for obtaining program funding. ASUO State Affairs Coor dinator Debra Kester chairs the subcommittee responsible for mapping out the program itself. Initiating an escort service is not easy. I ne committee must obtain vehicles and liability insurance. It must deter mine the route, secure funding, determine administrative policies and obtain security clearances for proposed drivers from the Public Safety Office. But even though the program's committee appears to be sincere about providing the service, it has not pursued im plementation vigorously In the seven month’s since Pin ckney and Dreeszen announced they would instigate the plan, the project’s committee has failed to raise a single pen ny. It does not know where vans will be obtained. It has not settled on a final route. And those at the forefront of the pro gram’s planning, Kester and Veillet, seem confused about program details. Kester blames the plan’s stalled introduction on a lack of funds. She said if the committee had the funds in hand, the program would be off the ground within two weeks. As it is, the program will begin operation by the end of this term, she said. Veillet said the committee won't request funds until a comprehensive package can be presented. He does not know where funds will be obtained. He set the operation date at somewhere between the end of this term and the middle of spring term. It is interesting to note that it took Lambda Chi Alpha only one week to implement its service following the final decision to provide it. A walking escort service requires less planning than a shuttle service, but the exceptionally short time span demonstrates what determination can accomplish. The ASUO shuttle van service would be a welcome ad dition to the University. Campus Security has offered to discontinue its service and focus on other areas of operation if the ASUO’s shuttle service can adequately meet demand. The ASUO should step up efforts to deliver the system it promised. Oregon Daily Emerald The Oregon Daily Emerald is published Monday through Friday except during exam week and vacations by the Oregon Daily Emerald Publishing Co., at the University of Oregon. Eugene, Oregon, 97403, The Emerald operates independently ot the University with offices on the third floor of the Erb Memorial Union and is a member of the Associated Press The Emerald is private properly The unlawful removal or use of papers is prosecutable by law General Staff Advertising Director Susan Thelen Production Manager Russell Steele Classified Advertising Vince Adams Assistant to the Publisher Jean Ownbey Advertising Sales: David Wood Sales Manager. John Boiler, Michael Gray, Robin Joannides, Carlos Lamadrtd, Marcia Leonard, Shawn Leuthold, Julie Lewis, Catherine Lilja, Anne-Marie Vranlzan, Laura Willoughby. Production: Vince Adams, Kelly Alexandre, Shu-Shing Chen. Ellen Cross. Monica Dwyer, Stormi Dykes. Manuel Flores. Steve Gibbons. Rob Hare. Mary Lewis, Jim Marks. Ross Martin, Mary May, Mary McGonigal, Rob Miles, Angie Muniz, Kara Oberst, Charts Parker, Ken Parrott. Jennifer Peterson, Jim Pfaff, Geoff Rainville, Michele Ross, Alyson Simmons, Peg Solonika, Gregory Tlpps Editor Julie Shippen Managing Editor Diana Elliott News Editor Joiayne Houtz Editorial Page Editor Michelle Brence Assistant Editorial Page Editor Scott Harding Sports Editor Robert Collias Photo Editor Karen Stallwood Friday Edition Editor Sidelines Editor Night Editor Associate Editors Community Features General Assignment Student Activities Student Government University Affairs Reporters Sean Axmaker, Deborah Janes, Kim Kaady Chuck Thompson Sheila Landry Allan Lazo Joiayne Houtz Scott McFetridge Gary Jimenez Julie Freeman Mary Lichtenwalner Linda Hahn Kirsten Bolin Dan Coran, Ron Gutlberg, Andrew Lamar, Capl Lynn, Photographers Kamila Al-Naijar, ShuShing Chen, Steve Gibbons, Rob Hare, Derrel Hewitt, Jim Marks. Ross Martin News and Editorial 666-5511 Display Advertising and Business 666-3712 Classified Advertising 666-4343 Production 666-4361 Circulation 666-5511 -snsasr?i=! Commentary Germany's mirror future for U.S. forests Every weekend, an average of 50,000 people stroll through the forest outside of Stuttgart. West Germany. As they walk, they are confronted with yard-high white crosses painted on dead and dying trees. The cause of this forest's ail ment, German scientists believe, is air pollution deposited directly on the trees by fog. mist, rain or dry par ticles. or absorbed through the soil — or a combination of these factors. Nationwide, the effect of this pollution, coupled with insect infestation and other natural forces to which the ail ment trees are doubly vulnerable, is ominous. •By November 1984. 50 per cent of Germany’s forests show ed some degree of stress and il lness. ranging from premature leaf loss to standing dead; •In the Black Forest of the Southeast, where the first signs of tree damage were seen in 1970. the proportion of “nearly dead” trees went from 11 to 25 percent in two years; and. •In the Fichtelgebirge Forest, a remote area stretching over the border of Czechoslovakia and East and West Germany, the damage level has reached 79 percent. , •. last November. °thd. German Marshall Fund'°bf the. United States organized a tour*of Ger- . many's forests so that' U.S. forest company executives, Congressional .aides and en vironmentalists could see first-’, hand what is happening in the # Federal Republic. The tour par- •. ticipants met ‘scientists, foresters, private citizens' and government officials ' involved in the increasingly frantic race to diagnose the cause „of (Ger many’s dying forests and recommend solutions before time runs out. What are the implications for the United States? The Director of the German go.vern-0 ment's Air Pollution Research Program believes that forest , stress “is not only a Germany problem any.-.‘more” Citing forest problems .-in New England, the Rocky Mountains, _ Central Europe and. southern Sweden, he contends that “forest stress is a problem of the Northern Hemisphere." Indeed, high-elevation forests . in the North and Southeast of the United States are decreasing in vitality, and in some instances, dying. Yet, it has been known for over a century that air pollution causes vegetative damage An English scientist noted this in 1852, and decades later the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) corroborated it with research showing crop damage from air pollution. The current scientific debate, therefore, centers on which pollutant or pollutants contribute to forest stress. Dr. Peter Schuett, professor of forest botany at the University of Munich, believes that “it is difficult to look for the answer in a single (air pollution) com ponent.” The question, then, is first, which of the many air pollutants are the principal con tributors to forest death, and se cond, do these pollutants act alone" or In" combination with; /one another? » f' / .In* an effort' to find the--' .elusive aftswers, .Congressman • Jim Weaver,' D-Cke.. held *hea*r*. ings on July 17’bnthiaeffecisof, air pollution on;:fore,st--. ecosystem* Representatives' from the'£PA,°4h'e U.Sf forest Tn: . dusiry.'and-the sclentifid-and eh-, viroiimental. communities' ; testified- *on both /the issue ; at: hand’ana'Weayer’s bill 2983 »t- authorizing a’ lQ-yoar.'." rtiseiirch' program ' within" the" . 0‘U S..forest'Service.* Meanwhile, the 0,S.\ forest . industry ' is , investing ,$j.3o million this year into resear ching the effects of air'pollution.*- • on forest health. As the Naticinal • Forest Products Association and' the American Paper Institute said at Congressman We«v«F'® • hearing,. ",. .our business, like no one else's, depends on rnaln-:'^ taining the health of America's forests.’' But it will be what, scientists find and Congfoas .' does that will in large part ; determine the health «of U.S. , forests. However, the time, for. fin- . ding the answers to Our quo*-; tions is now. West Cermarty's experience has proven this with the increase from eight percent of its forests damaged in 1982, to 34 percent in 1983, to 50 per cent damaged in 1984. indeed, as he stood among his sick troes last winter, a forester in West Germany's Black Forest captured the sense of urgency that we may soon hear in our country: "Wo can research as much as we want, but the forest will die if nothing is done." By Beth Millemann Beth Millemann is an en vironmentalist who recently toured German forests as part of a German Marshall Fund project.