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ECU Recoups From Floods as Classes Resume
By Matthew B. Dees
State & National Editor
GREENVILLE - “Is this a joke?"
one student asked, himself half-joking,
as he loaded what was left of his pos
sessions onto a flat bed truck. “Yes,”
laughed another in reply. “You’re going
to wake up tomorrow in Maui.”
Such humor and wishful thinking
were about the only things many East
Carolina University students could cling
to as they continued picking up the
flood-soaked pieces of their ravaged
homes Wednesday.
Although ECU students were due
back in class Wednesday, many off
campus residents had more on their
minds than revised syllabi and class
make-up dates.
Residents of Tar River Apartments,
named for the river whose overflowed
banks left a large portion of eastern
North Carolina under 30 feet of water,
spent the day trying to salvage their
drenched possessions.
Orange Xs on mud-stained glass
doors branded each flood-ravaged
apartment as a condemned structure.
Yellow police tape and bright orange
barricades cordoned off the pond of
flood waters that still covered several
rows of apartments.
PAN Wr ?
Opinions
Divided
On Law
No arrests have been made
in the year since Chapel
Hill officials implemented
a law limiting panhandlers.
By Ryan Stewart
Staff Writer
A year has passed since Chapel Hill
put the brakes on local panhandlers,
but some say the problem still has not
been solved.
On Sept. 28,1998, the town passed
an ordinance to curtail aggressive beg
ging, soliciting and panhandling,
which town officials said caused prob
lems on and around the 100 block of
Franklin Street. There have been no
arrests on an aggressive panhandling
charge since the ordinance went into
effect.
While some business owners said
they had seen police enforcing the
ordinance, others, such as Maria
Nicholas, co-owner of Hector’s at 201
E. Franklin St., said she had seen little
improvement
“They’re not doing a damn thing
about it," Nicholas said. “I don’t think
the law has helped in the least.
“I have people come in from out of
town and tell me they’re scared to
come in my restaurant.”
Other business owners, such as
Varsity Theater Manager Justin
Ansley, said they had not experienced
much of a problem.
“I can’t say that we’ve had them
around the theater,” Ansley said. “You
can tell they know the law.”
In addition to curbing overtly
aggressive behavior, the ordinance
also prohibits panhandling that is con
sidered aggressive simply because of
See PANHANDLING, Page 12
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DTH/MATTHEW B. DEES
Mildewed possessions strewn on an apartment floor signify the damage
left by Floyd. Flood waters left many ECU students' apartments in ruins.
The residents able to get into their
front doors loaded bags of drenched
clothes and any other odds and ends
that survived the flood onto pick-up
trucks. Others donned filter masks to
protect them from the rancid stench that
permeated the entire complex as they
fled ruined apartments with their few
remaining possessions.
Owners of Tar River Apartments
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DTH/JEFF POULAND
Kevin Campbell finds shelter from the rain outside Sephora on Franklin Street. Campbell, who has been homeless for three years, needs a
Social Security card and a pair of glasses before he can hold a job.
Battle Still Looming Over Location of IFC Shelter
By Jenny Stepp
Staff Writer
Controversy surrounds the future of
the Inter-Faith Council Community
House as town leaders and local busi
nesses struggle with competing visions
of the facility’s impact on the
community.
Debate first erupted in March when
the IFC attempted to extend its lease
for an additional 25 years and expand
its current location at 100 W.
Rosemary St.
■
Human kind cannot bear very much reality.
T.S. Eliot
Thursday, September 30, 1999
Volume 107, Issue 85
refunded each resident’s deposit and
waived their obligation to fulfill their
lease agreement.
But the material and emotional dam
age clearly had taken its toll on the
bewildered students.
The damage was so devastating for
one ECU student and former Tar River
See DAMAGE, Page 12
The IFC task force, formed by
Chapel Hill Mayor Rosemary
Waldorf, is exploring the possibility of
moving the shelter to a location on
Homestead Road, near Chapel Hill
High School, instead of renovating the
Rosemary Street shelter.
While some community members
are hesitant to move the shelter out of
the downtown area, business owners
say a move will greatly improve the
atmosphere of downtown Chapel Hill.
Maria Nicholas, co-owner of
Hector’s at 201 E. Franklin St., said the
Professors Focus on Floyd
On Students' Ist Day Back
By Matthew B. Dees
State & National Editor
GREENVILLE - Students returned
to classes at East Carolina University on
Wednesday to find a soggy but relative
ly unscathed campus.
The university cancelled nine days of
classes to allow flood waters to subside
and clean-up efforts to begin.
Most students interviewed said their
professors used the first day back for a
discussion about the emotional drain
and material losses caused by Hurricane
Floyd, leaving most academic pursuits
on the backbumer for the time being.
“I think they’re easing up on us,” said
junior Wells Tyson, 20, of Wendell.
“My professor said something about
a take-home test, so it might be a bless
ing in the end,” he said with a laugh.
But some students had a less cheery
outlook on the decision to return to
class.
shelter negatively impacted the
Franklin Street business community.
“I can tell you by the people com
ing from out of town all the negative
comments they have about all the
homeless people loitering in front of
the (Franklin Street) post office,” she
said. “They park and then they’re
afraid to walk by the post office.”
Robert Humphreys, executive
director of the Downtown
Commission, said he agreed that the
homeless population was a problem
for local businesses.
“Coming back’s hard. I don’t know
why they’re even starting school up,”
said Chance Komegay, a 21 -year-old
junior from Louisburg, as he filled out
an application for university aid to cush
ion the financial blow after Floyd ruined
his apartment.
ECU officials established a flood
relief center in a campus dining hall that
offered everything from legal advice for
student conflicts with landlords to
vouchers allowing students to borrow
books for the rest of the semester.
The unusual mix of devastated stu
dents seeking aid and relatively unaf
fected students reuniting with friends left
little room for academic concerns.
“It’s been like the first day of school,”
said Miranda McLean, 21, a senior from
Elizabethtown, between cracking jokes
with her friend Tamika Mackey, a senior
from Greenville. “I’m not focused. I
See STUDENT, Page 12
“The problems that we have with it
are not the people that use the shelter
in the way that it was intended, but the
people that abuse that system,” he
said. “It allows people to have three
meals a day and then the money that
they raise (from panhandling) they can
use for alcohol or drugs.”
Barry Jones, a resident of the
Brookstone Apartments at 2701
Homestead Road, said moving the
shelter would prevent many members
See IFC, Page 12
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Chapel Hill, North Carolina
© 1999 DTH Publishing Corp.
All rights reserved.
McCoy Sets
Disclosure
Deadline
The interim chancellor
decided on a firm deadline
rather than a target date
for full disclosure.
By Aisha K. Thomas
Staff Writer
After three weeks of deliberation,
interim Chancellor Bill McCoy has set
a March 31, 2000, deadline for full dis
closure of manufacturing sites that pro
duce UNC-licensed goods.
The next step in the disclosure plan
is to have letters sent to licensees
explaining details of the full disclosure
policy.
Based on his review of recommen
dations from the Task Force on Labor
Codes in Licensing McCoy decided to
make March 31 an official deadline for
full disclosure rather than a target date,
he stated in a letter to Caidin Salemi,
sweatshop action coordinator for
Students for Economic Justice.
“It was called a target date,” McCoy
told the Daily Tar Heel Wednesday.
“But we were serious about that date.”
On Sept. 7, SEJ students sent a letter
to McCoy asking him to set a firm dead
line instead of just a target date for
implementing full disclosure.
“I am very pleased that the chancel
lor was able to make that deadline,” said
Salemi. “I think that decision is a crucial
step in addressing the sweatshop issue.”
In McCoy’s letter he called for labor
task force members to develop a third
party complaint mechanism as soon as
possible, although the system would not
go into effect earlier than Jan. 1, 2000.
The mechanism would address prob
lems that might arise when companies
disclose their manufacturing sites. “I
think in general terms the main thing is
to have a reasonable and practical sys
tem from the standpoint of doing on-site
reviews when needed,” McCoy said.
Task force member Todd Putgatch
said the committee had already begun
discussion about the main components
of the complaint mechanism. “I am con
fident that the committee will come up
with a proposal by (Jan. 1, 2000).” he
said. He said the main focus was to set
basic standards by which all licensees
See MCCOY, Page 12
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INSIDE
Summer Reading
Best-selling author Alex Kotlowitz will
discuss his book “There Are No
Children Here” at 7 p.m. today in
Memorial Hall. All UNC freshmen
were assigned to read the book this
summer. See page 10.
Extra! Extra!
Applications are still available for the
Fall 99 Joanna Howell Fund, which is
named in honor of the former DTH
editor who died in the 1996 Phi
Gamma Delta fire. Applicants have the
chance to prepare a full-page article
that will be published in the DTH in mid
November. Necessary forms can be
picked up in our office in Suite 104 of
the Student Union.
Today’s Weather
Sunny;
Mid 70s.
Friday Sunny Mid 70s.