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New Student Leaders Take Helm
Bv John O'Hale
Staff Writer
Outgoing student body officers tear
fully mused over their experiences as
campus leaders while touting their
accomplishments during Tuesday’s
yearly changing of the guard.
More than 150 students, parents and
administrators gathered in the Great
Hall of the Student Union for the inau
guration of new student body officers.
Newly swom-in Student Body
President Brad Matthews presented an
optimistic vision for his term. “I see pos
sibilities,” he said. “I see students being
better able to discover their passions. I
see opportunities for all of us to extend
student government beyond all of its cur
rent boundaries.”
Matthews related questions he
encountered as a tour guide in describ
ing the “Carolina experience.” “Imagine
yourself taking a chemistry class with a
professor who has won the Nobel Prize,”
he said. “Imagine yourself walking to
another building and taking a course with
the former attorney general of Ethiopia.”
With a pause and a smile he added,
“Then imagine yourself on Franklin
Street after the Heels reached the Final
Four. That’s the Carolina experience.”
Outgoing President Nic Heinke
urged students to make the most of their
time at UNC. “Look at the people, lis
ten to the conversations and revel in
(the University’s) beauty,” he said.
Both Heinke and former Graduate
and Professional Student Federation
President Lee Conner commented on
several unforeseen obstacles they had
encountered during their terms, including
the energy consumed by the campaign
See INAUGURATION, Page 4
Heinke Embraces Historic Year
Nic Heinke, now the former
student body president,
credits his Cabinet for the
success of his eventful year.
By Rob Nelson
Editor
Nic Heinke should never have
created a platform.
This year, UNC wrote it for him.
Amid the usual ceremony and emo
tion of inauguration, Heinke officially
left office Tuesday with a trail of historic
political moments and a markedly tur
bulent year behind him.
Less than three months after his elec
tion, the senior from Charlotte found his
then-fledgling administration in the
midst of tragedy as he delivered a tear
jerking speech at a July memorial ser
vice for the late Chancellor Michael
Hooker.
In September, Heinke’s administra
tion celebrated the political good fortune
of a $28.6 million bequest that will allow
for the construction of a freestanding
Sonja H. Stone Black Cultural Center.
An eight-year battle for the building
- which became fodder for several for
mer presidents’ platforms, including
Heinke’s - ended on his watch.
He then had to galvanize student gov
ernment into action, as North Carolina
coped with Hurricane Floyd and the
stream of charity efforts across the UNC
Students Continue Protest Against Labor Group
By Dekick Mattern
Staff Writer
Battling high winds to set up a chick
en-wire fence decorated with sweatshop
statistics from around the world, stu
dents continued their campaign against
the Fair Labor Association on Tuesday.
A dozen members of Students for
Economic Justice gathered on the steps
of South Building to chant slogans, hand
out fliers and wave banners denouncing
UNC’s involvement with the FLA.
Protesters held signs reading “UNC is a
Sweatshop” and chanted “FLA is a sham,
The very essence of leadership is that you have to have a vision.
Theodore Hesburgh
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DTH KATE MELLNIK
Brad Matthews is sworn in as student body president Tuesday afternoon. The student body officers were inaugurated in a ceremony
that included farewell speeches by the departing officers and visionary statements by those taking their places.
system that followed it.
In October, he stood at a podium in a
packed Morehead Faculty Lounge and
fought to stop the Board of Trustees
from passing a $1,500 tuition increase.
The trustees eventually passed the pro
posal, but not before Heinke received a
standing ovation from the swarm of stu
dent protesters who were watching.
And away from what seemed to be
an endless public spotlight surrounding
UNC’s tuition battles this year, Heinke
worked behind closed doors on the
Chancellor Search Committee. Most
likely, he will maintain that position
until the final choice is made.
As student body president, Heinke
constantly found himself weathering a
series of storms that swirled through
campus this year, often, he said, chang
ing the focus of his administration.
“At times, it felt like we were being
more reactionary than proactive,” he
said. “But that was a necessity.”
Heinke called his platform “incredi
bly challenging” and admitted some
goals, including off-campus Internet
access and fare-free busing, wouldn’t
come to fruition this year.
Still, he considers his term a success,
citing student government’s push to
raise the bar of accessibility and various
initiatives such as the upcoming Project
UNC on April 15, which will emphasize
campuswide community service.
Beyond the events planned for next
week, such outreach was a staple of the
Heinke administration. Through pro
workers’ rights we demand” through a
megaphone before an empty Polk Place.
The FI A is a nonprofit organization
composed of apparel and footwear com
panies, labor rights groups and universities
which investigates labor rights violations.
Last week, interim Chancellor Bill
McCoy decided to follow the Licensing
Labor Code Advisory Committee’s
unanimous recommendation to join the
Worker Rights Consortium and also
remain in the FLA. “I think there is an
agreement on the objective we’re work
ing towards,” McCoy said. “We’ll work
with both to ensure we have the best of
Wednesday, April 5, 2000
Volume 108, Issue 26
grams that put student government offi
cials in the Pit or those that had leaders
going door to door to solicit student
feedback, Heinke pushed for Suite C to
shed its overly political skin and put
greater focus on servicing students.
“Student government officials are no
better or worse than other students,” he
said. “If w'e act like we are mini-admin
istrators, we are losing the battle. I tried
to remember that this job was some
thing I was doing as student.”
Heinke is quick to renounce the easy
stereotype that he is a student politico. “I
like the idea and study of politics,” he
said. “But I don’t like being an elected
leader because I’m not good at the
yes/no decisions.”
Heinke remains humble and candid
about personal flaws and the few short
comings of his presidency. On Tuesday,
fellow student leaders applauded his
passion, inclusive leadership style and
efforts to elevate student government.
He, in turn, was equally quick to
thank them.
Calling his Cabinet the best team of
people Suite C has seen in a decade,
Heinke shies away from the credit that
most often falls on the shoulders of a sin
gle leader at the helm of an organiza
tion. “They were 21 dynamic individu
als,” he said. “We built a real family.”
And nowhere were these family ties
more evident than in the relationship
Heinke shared with Lee Conner, presi
dent of the Graduate and Professional
Student Federation.
both worlds. We should make progress
in the spirit of compromise.”
SEJ rejects any association with the
FLA because it is dominated by corpo
rations that only want to maintain a pos
itive public image, said Alana Glaser,
SEJ member.
Although SEJ focused on the FLA,
they also turned out to support the living
wage campaign of the local service
employees’ union UE-150. “Oui goal
today is to bring the issue back,” said
Emily Waszak, an SEJ member.
The SEJ has long been against
UNC’s association with the FLA.
jwt mw ■
DTH 'VICTORIA ECKENRODE
Nic Heinke, now officially a former student body president,
packs the remainder of his belongings from his Suite C office.
In sharp contrast to the tension that
existed between those in the positions
last year, Heinke and Conner often tag
teamed the barrage of campus issues
that erupted this year.
Strangers last spring, the brotherhood
between the two was clear Tuesday, as
Conner was visibly emotional while
addressing Heinke in his speech.
The WRC, comprised of universities
and nongovernmental organizations, is
in its formative stages and plans to veri
fy that manufacturers comply with codes
of conduct.
With their long-time goal of WRC
membership accomplished, United
Students Against Sweatshops will send
Courtney Sproule and Todd Pugatch to
New York on Friday to represent UNC
students at WRC’s founding conference.
“I think it’s good to make a statement,”
Pugatch said. “The chancellor’s decision
didn’t eliminate sweatshops, and we’ll
continue working until they are."
Conner called him “one of his his most
treasured friends.”
Such displays are typical for inaugu
ration, but that kind of emotion seemed
to be a trademark of Heinke’s presiden
cy. He often let his guard down publi
cally. He openly wept during his speech
See HEINKE, Page 4
McCoy will send Rut Tufts, labor com
mittee co-chairman and director of auxil
iary services, andjack Evans, committee
member and interim vice chancellor for
financial affairs, as UNC’s administrative
representatives to the conference.
But the conference has not distracted
SEJ from its other goal - to cut ties with
the I'TA. “We claim the WRC member
ship as a victory, but remaining in die FLA
is compromise,” Glaser said. “We are com
promising all legitimacy by being in both.”
The University Editor can be reached
at udesk@unc.edu.
News/Features/Arts/Sports 562-0245
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© 2000 DTH Publishing Corp.
All rights reserved.
Salon Scam
Spurs Legal
Boomerang
Some sales representatives
offered UNC students more
than S3OO in salon services
in a promotional SSO offer.
By Karey Wetkowski
Staff Writer
An advertising company hawking
salon services at UNC is embroiled in a
legal dispute with the salon, potentially
leaving some students with a SSO loss.
Since March, sales representatives
from Executive Marketing Systems, Inc.
have been at UNC selling salon services
from Beauty Quest Day Spa in Durham.
The representatives visited sororities
and approached students in the Pit and
in the area between Lenoir Dining Hall
and the Undergraduate Library, offer
ing 13 salon services, worth more than
S3OO, for a total of SSO up-front.
SOURCE?
In late March, the deal between EMS,
Inc. and Beauty Quest went sour, leading
to a dual lawsuit and irate students.
Students who called the salon to
schedule an appointment were told that
the offer was fraudulent. Jenny Kapur,
owner of Beauty Quest Day Spa, said
the representative from EMS, Inc. pre
sented a different agreement than the
one the company sold to students.
“A couple of weeks ago he came in
here wanting to do a package deal,”
Kapur said. “From the way he
explained everything, he’s misrepre
senting our salon.
“We thought clients would get a 10-
to 20-percent discount off of every ser
vice for six months.”
The package EMS, Inc. is selling is
13 services from Beauty Quest Day Spa
for six months for an inclusive, up-ffont
price of SSO.
EMS, Inc. branch Manager Nick
Ploutis said he had outlined the deal’s
details to Kapur and said was excited
about it. “We get SSO, and the hair salon
gets the clients," Ploutis said. “It’s up to
the salons to upsell them different things.”
But Kapur said this promotion was
not her understanding. “We’ve
launched a complaint to the (state) attor
ney general’s office,” she said. “We took
action right away. We didn’t want it to
ruin our reputation.”
To save the salon’s reputation, Kapur
said she was offering a 50-percent dis
count to students who bought the pro
motion. “We’re still losing money, but we
need to protect our reputation,” she said.
But Ploutis said it was the reputation
of EMS, Inc. that was being harmed by
the salon not honoring the offer.
He said he had sold offers of this kind
by other salons on many campuses in
North Carolina, to the students’ satis
faction. He sold the Beauty Quest Salon
offer to UNC and Duke University stu
dents for a week in March and received
complaints from jilted students, he said.
See SCAM, Page 4
Wednesday
Final Four Follies
A group of five UNC students tell of
their adventures on the road to the
Final Four. The mischievous bunch had
the experience broadcast via Webcam
on hoopstv.com. See Page 2.
Making Her Mark
/*•
Second baseman
Crystal Henderson,
one of only two
seniors on the North
Carolina softball
team, is on pace to
break the school
records for career
doubles and stolen bases.
See Page 7.
Today’s Weather
Sunny;
Low 60s.
Thursday: Partly cloudy.
Mid Ms.