Basketball extra: a team with no seniors
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Oregon Daily Emerald
An independent newspaper
www.dailyemerald.com
Since 1900 \ Volume 106, Issue 80 | Friday, January 14, 2005
Eugeneans back LTD drivers at demonstration
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Danielle Hickey | Photo editor
Justin Kemerer portrays "Pepper! The Greed Fighting Possum,” an informal mascot
for fighting management, pickets at the LTD Bus Station Thursday evening.
Union members protested contracts,
criticizing health care and leadership
BY MEGHANN M. CUNIFF
SENIOR NEWS REPORTER
Citizens from Eugene and the surrounding area rallied
sentatives have said a union strike would halt all LTD services.
According to LTD, nearly 3,000 University students and
employees use the bus to get to and from campus. LTD gets
$583,250 in student fees to provide students with “unlimited
ridership on all routes and schedules,” as stated in its
contract with the University.
Reynolds said the purpose of the rally was to prevent a
strike by showing LTD representatives the support the union
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Thursday afternoon with LTD bus drivers and
members of unions around the Northwest,
showing support for the drivers’ contract
negotiations with LTD representatives.
About 100 people picketed on the corner of
West 10th Avenue and Olive Street, holding signs
condemning LTD’s leadership and demanding
MOREONLIN^
For up-tcxiate information on
the LTD-ATU negotiations, visit
asuo.uoregon.edu.
For car pool information, vistit
ltd.org.
nas mrougnoui me community.
LTD bus driver Richard Shrope said all driv
ers understand how devastating a strike could
be and are hopeful one can be avoided.
“We’re hoping to get people aware of what’s
going on so maybe there can be some pressure
on people to get things resolved,” Shrope said.
Many LTD riders said they were unaware of
ua u uuci d new cumidci uidi uuei> uui ueu ease ueiiems.
“We felt we had to alert people because the negotiations
are deteriorating,” Amalgamated TVansit Union Division 757
spokesman Jason Reynolds said.
ATU represents 80 percent of LTD’s workers, and LTDrepre
a potential strike until tne rally and were alarmed at me
thought of being without bus service.
“It’ll put the public in a big crisis,” Bridget Perini said.
Perini, 23, who lives in Cottage Grove with her 3-year-old
LTD, page 5
East Wing
remodeling
underway
inside EMU
The Master Plan to modernize
the building crawls along as
administrators search for funds
BY ADAM CHERRY
NEWS REPORTER
All the doors weren’t on the hinges yet
at the newly expanded EMU Craft Center
Thursday afternoon. Craft Center adminis
trators, still without a real office, have sec
tioned off part of the large room to house
their desks and computers, which have
collected a thin film of sawdust.
Not that they’re complaining. The center
just received an expansion of more than
1,000 square feet.
“The wood shop is now roughly twice
as big,” Craft Center Coordinator Diane
Loffman said. The old one was becoming
a safety hazard because it wasn’t big
enough to fit tools, wood and people, she
added. Across the hall, the ASUO Women’s
Center just added more than 400 square
feet by extending its floor space into
the hallway.
“Before, people were right on top of each
other,” Women’s Center Interim Director
Erin O’Brien said, adding that the old office
only had space for staff. “There wasn’t a
usable space to fulfill our mission.”
These projects have one thing in com
mon: They took place in the EMU’s East
Wing, which, in May 2003, was slated to
be 70 percent demolished and reconstruct
ed in a more modern and efficient design.
However, the “EMU Master Plan,” a multi
million dollar face-lift on the 55-year-old
building, was indefinitely delayed in the
summer of 2003 due to budget woes. Now,
improvements are being made one section
at a time.
EMU Director Dusty Miller said the stu
dent building fee doesn’t have the more
than $40 million needed to complete the
Master Plan.
“So the plan has been delayed,” Miller
said. “There are only possibly four ways to
get this new building.”
EMU, page 3
Students' perceptions of diversity clash
While some non-white
students feel accepted,
others express uneasiness
BY AMANDA BOLSINGER
NEWS REPORTER
Her first class at the University
wasn’t until noon, and the fresh
man student thought she knew the
right building. She was wrong.
Lost, she asked a passing student
for directions, which confused her
even more. A second student guid
ed her to the right building and
told her the correct door was at the
building’s rear. It wasn’t. She
rushed back to the front of the
building and went inside.
Twenty minutes late, she
rushed into class, made her
breathless apologies and sat in
the first open desk she could find.
Then, she looked around the
room at her classmates and real
ized that she was the only minor
ity student in a full class.
This experience isn’t an isolated
one for freshman student Victoria
Chang and other minority students
at the University. With a campus
that is 87 percent Caucasian, even
the largest classes often have only
one or two non-white students.
“Often in the classroom I am to
kenized,” said Scott Lu, fourth
year student and member of the
Asian Pacific American Student
i
1.7%
White,
non-hispanic
Declined
to respond
Multi-ethnic
Native
American
Hispanic
African
American
Asian,
Pacific Islander
BretFurtwanglerI Grahic artist
Union. “If I am the only person of
color in a class, then I am expect
ed to represent and speak for all
people of color.”
With Martin Luther King Jr. Day
approaching, people are celebrat
ing the progress that has been
made in diversifying the commu
nity and showing tolerance, exam
ining current circumstances and
asking how far they have come.
Opinions vary as experiences vary.
Some students say the University
is relatively diverse. Others say it’s
not at all. Students’ perceptions
often depend on their personal
backgrounds.
Freshman football player
Kwame Agyeman said the Univer
sity is more diverse than his home
town, Chicago.
“I lived in the northwest sub
urbs of Chicago; it’s not nearly as
diverse as people think. 1 grew up
and went to school with all
Caucasians,” Agyeman said.
He has also found that on cam
pus people assume he is an athlete
because he is black and people are
quickly accepting.
“On campus, people are quick
to know if you’re black, you’re an
athlete, and you’re OK,”
Agyeman said.
Agyeman said it’s not just the
campus that is more diverse, but
that most people are more open
minded here.
"In Chicago, the parents were
kind of the last generation with
problems with things like interra
cial dating,” he said. “Here people
are much more OK with it and a
lot more laid-back. ”
Lu had other perceptions. He
grew up in Southern California and
remembers his impression of the
first day of classes at the University.
“I just looked around and
thought, ‘Wow, it’s really white
here. What am I doing here?”’
Lu said.
He also remembers that toward
the end of spring term of his fresh
man year he was on campus and a
couple came up to him and asked
him slowly and loudly where a
building was, assuming that he
was an international student be
cause he is Asian.
While the school doesn’t have
an open problem with racism, Lu
said it’s hidden and subtle here.
“It’s not that whites hate
blacks. It’s a multilevel problem
and it’s extremely subtle. People
think it’s all OK, but it’s not, and
it’s obviously not for the people
DIVERSITY, page 4
Finals Week library schedule in jeopardy
Lauren Wimer | Senior photographer
Erin Toews studies Spanish in the Knight Library on Tuesday afternoon.
BY PARKER HOWELL
SENIOR NEWS REPORTER
The Knight Library may no
longer offer students a place to
study around the clock during Fi
nals Week next year unless stu
dent leaders authorize incidental
fees to cover half the cost for the
popular service, a move senators
appeared hesitant to make during
Wednesday’s Student
Senate meeting.
The library began offering 24/7
service during Dead Week and
Finals Week in spring 2003 to
provide students a safe place to
cram for exams throughout the
night. Yet keeping the building
open — which costs about $4,000
a term for security — will no
longer be affordable after this
year for the cash-strapped library,
University Librarian Deb
Carver said.
Library records show that the
extended library hours are used
about 4,000 times per term,
Carver said.
“There’s a big demand,” she
said. “It’s ended up being a much
more popular service than I
would have expected.”
Carver said the library won’t
LIBRARY, page 5