Businesses seek recompense
■ Insurance companies are
processing claims for many who
received wind storm damage
By Brook Reinhard
Oregon Daily Emerald
Local businesses that lost power
last weekend after Thursday’s vio
lent wind storm started picking up
the pieces as best they could. Most
were open for business, but owners
have started to question who will
pay for the revenue lost because of
the storm.
House of Recofds music store on
13th Avenue lost its power when a
tree crashed through its roof and sev
ered the power line running over
head. The Eugene Water and Electric
Board had the store’s power restored
Sunday, and the gaping hole in its
roof has been patched with tarps, but
manager Raenie Kane wants to know
who will pay for the estimated
$6,000 worth of business she lost.
“We lost power because the tree
that hit the building snagged a power
line,” she said. “How often do we get
a freak windstorm like that?”
Insurance companies are scram
bling to process the claims resulting
from the windstorm. State Farm In
surance spokesman Jeff Aeschliman
said a national team has been assem
bled just to work on the claims,
which they have been processing at a
break-neck speed.
With a typical business package
policy, “Most the damages would be
covered,” Aeschliman said. He
added that every claim is handled in
dividually. While a tree crashing into
the roof would most likely be fully
covered, “In general, if there’s no
physical damage, the loss of power
isn’t covered,” he said.
Farmers Insurance Group Branch
Supervisor Steve Hendrickson said
his company is also taking the
claims seriously.
“Our adjusters are the ‘storm
troopers.’ They go around from
storm to storm,” he said.
The owners of Pegasus Smoke
house Pizza are welcoming the extra
help. Their basement-level bar flood
ed when an electric pump failed to
operate and stop water from flooding
the basement floor.
The business had no power until
late Sunday afternoon, and co
owner Paul Reader said the pizza
place lost $10,000 of business dur
ing the weekend.
Reader and his wife, Lori, also a co
owner of Pegasus, believe EWEB was
negligent in returning power prompt
ly to his business and the surround
ing campus area, and is planning to
sue the utility for out-of-pocket ex
penses incurred during the outage.
EWEB spokesman Lance Robert
son said he’s surprised the restaurant
is suing the utility.
“It’s the first I’ve heard of it,” he
said. “I’m not sure what grounds
they would sue us on.”
EWEB’s six crews and eight addi
tional crews from Portland worked
18-hour shifts over the weekend,
clearing the more than 300 fallen
trees littering the city and replacing
the 60 utility poles that were de
stroyed by the storm.
“This is probably the worst storm
we’ve had in years,” Robertson said.
E-mail reporter Brook Reinhard
atbrookreinhard@dailyemerald.com.
ASUO
continued from page 1
developing a campus-wide leadership
development program. We’re going to
be working on housing standards. In
stead of trying to get across the entire
housing code as an all-or-nothing sort
of deal, we’re going to implement hous
ing standards — passing one piece of
legislation at a time—that way we see
improvements continually.
Q: How do you define diversity?
And how do plan to bring together
the diverse voices on campus?
A: To us, (diversity) is just the
recognition — and acceptance is the
biggest part — of different human at
tributes and making sure that there’s
a presence for each of those. That can
be defined by age, gender, ability,
physical or mental ability, sexual ori
entation, race, economic background
and education level.
Q: If two student groups were at
odds with each other, how would
you resolve the conflict?
A: It depends on the nature of the
conflict. If there were two student
groups at odds with each other over
more of a belief issue, I think the
only way to work on that would be
to create a safe and open forum so
that people from within the groups
could try to come to a compromise.
Q: If you could change one thing
about the University instantly,
what would it be?
A: We would like 100 percent
voter turnout. Not that necessarily
there’s a lot of apathy, but there’s a
lot of people who are just unaware
of what’s going on.
Q: How would you do things dif
ferently than the current ASUO Ex
ecutive?
A: When new leaders take their po
sition, a lot of times there’s a big ten
dency to completely reinvent the
wheel and that is something that we
don’t want to do. We’re not going to
come and recreate everything they’ve
done. We’re going to add to that and
hopefully be more effective as a result.
E-mail student activities editor Kara Cogswell
at karacogswell@dailyemerald.com.
PFC
continued from page 1
“It’s not really fair to all the groups
that came before SIS. We need to
continue to be consistent. ”
PFC decided to drop the Minority
Law Students Association’s budget
to equal to what it received for
2001-02 — $1,616. The Native
American Student Union received
a decrease of $50 for a new budget
of $19,659. The Oregon Marine Stu
dent Association’s budget was also
reduced, from $4,795 to $3,296.
PERMIAS’s budget was decreased
from $5,433 to $4,290.
PFC decided not to decrease the
Oregon Marching Band’s budget
of $104,841. PFC members said
OMB had spent money well in
previous years.
PFC will hold another meeting
Thursday at 8:30 a.m. to decide on
further budget recall action.
E-mail reporter Diane Huber
at dianehuber@dailyemerald.com.
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There will be an informational meeting on Thursday,
February 21st in the football theater located on the
2nd floor of the Casanova Center (next to Autzen
Stadium). Meeting will start at 7pm.
Pick up your application in the football office on
the 2nd floor of the Casanova Center. Interviews
will be held February 26 — March 1, 2002. You
can sign up for your interview time when you pick
up your application.
| APPUCATION DEADLINE IS FEBRUARY 22,2002