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Due to an editing error,
Wednesday’s page 3 headline,
Baker advocates for more trans
portation,” misidentified Baker’s
position on transit.
He actually calls for a review of
current transportation programs.
The Daily Tar Heel apologizes
for the error.
Employee forum Wed. elicits
feedback for housing project
Employees responded with
questions and criticism at the pre
sentation of Carolina Commons, a
faculty and staff housing project,
at Wednesday’s meeting of the
Employee Forum.
Dwayne Pinkney, the University’s
representative for the project, told
the employees that plans to develop
some or all of the 63 acres owned by
the school are soon to be approved.
Current plans for the land,
owned through endowment, are
to build 50 townhomes, 48 condo
miniums and 43 lots for homes.
Staff and faculty will receive a
20-percent discount off the mar
ket value, Pinkney said, meaning
a home that is normally $200,000
will be $160,000.
But several employees spoke out
at the meeting, claiming the prices
were still too high.
“What part of any of these prices
do you call affordable? There is no
way that the average staff at UNC
will be able to afford that,” said Jill
Hartman, a forum delegate and
employee of the clerical and secre
tarial department.
For the full story, go to dailytar
heel.com.
Psychology class examines
popularity-induced reactions
Professor Mitch Prinstein’s class,
Psychology 155: Peer Relations,
will conduct an exercise through
out the day.
Students will wear bright yellow
T-shirts that say, “Voted most popu
lar at UNC” and observe their peers'
reactions. In turn, they are to record
their own feelings and behavior.
The exercise should demonstrate
the effects of popularity on others’
behavior, Prinstein said.
He encourages students to smile
and wave if they see anyone wear
ing these shirts.
For a detailed report on the
exercise, see Friday’s edition of The
Daily Tar Heel.
STAVE S NATION
Extra funds raised by DeLay
partly went to longtime ally
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Tom
DeLay deliberately raised more
money than he needed to throw
parties at the 2000 presidential
convention, then diverted some
of the excess to longtime ally Roy
Blunt through a series of donations
that benefited both men’s causes.
When the financial carousel
stopped, DeLay’s private charity,
the consulting firm that employed
DeLay’s wife and the Missouri
campaign of Blunt’s son all ended
up with money, according to cam
paign documents reviewed by The
Associated Press.
Jack Abramoflf, a Washington
lobbyist recently charged in an
ongoing federal corruption and
fraud investigation, and Jim Ellis,
the DeLay fundraiser indicted with
his boss last week in Texas, also
came into the picture.
The complicated transactions
are drawing scrutiny in legal and
political circles after a grand jury
indicted DeLay on charges of vio
lating Texas law with a scheme to
launder illegal corporate donations
to state candidates.
Scientists reconstruct killer
flu for modern-day insight
ATLANTA lt sounds like a
sci-fi thriller. For the first time,
scientists have made from scratch
the Spanish flu virus that killed
millions of people in 1918.
Why? To help them understand
how to better fend off a future
global epidemic from the bird flu
spreading in Southeast Asia.
Researchers believe their work
offers proof that the 1918 flu origi
nated in birds and provides insights
into how it attacked and multiplied
in humans.
On top of that, this marks the
first time an infectious agent
behind a historic pandemic ever
has been reconstructed.
The scientists involved in the
project contend there’s no real risk
to public safety.
The vials of this frightening
germ about 10 of them are
locked away at the federal Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention
in Atlanta, said Terrence TVimpey,
the CDC research scientist who
constructed the virus.
However, at least one ethicist
thinks there should be a broader
public discussiofi before scientists
take such bold steps.
From staff and wire reports.
UNC a site of racial progress
BY ADAM RODMAN
STAFF WRITER
In the morning of Feb. 26,2003,
Daisy Lundy, an African-American
candidate for student body presi
dent at the University of Virginia,
was assaulted as she reached for
her cell phone in her car.
Her assailant rammed her head
into the steering wheel, using a
racial epithet to tell her not to run
for president. That attack under
scores the state of race relations
on college campuses.
Vernon Taylor, a UNC junior
journalism major from Delaware,
says UVa. was one of his top col
lege choices until he heard about
its racial problems.
“I think that was one of the main
deciding factors,” he says. “It wasn’t
something I wanted to deal with
during my undergraduate years.”
Each year, The Princeton Review
ranks colleges according to race
and class interaction, and while
H POPULAR Popular dorm furnishings include standing lamps in f*
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r: ' pH ROOM waves and storage containers. College students spent REMR # j ~mm J
pHS FIXTURES $3.6 billion this year on dorm and apartment utilities.
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SAmA, A FEW OF Sophomores Alex Foley (right) m.
J THE HOT and Shawn Lawson spent
about $1,500 on electronics,
flßfj AH FOR THIS including a 30-inch Panasonic
f *] YEAR widescreen high-definition TV
L 1 and surround-sound speakers. '
DTK PHOTOS/LOGAN PRICE, PERRY MYRICK KATHRYN HUGHES
TRENDS ANYTHING
BUT DORMANT
Students break bank on dorm room amenities
BY SHANNAN BOWEN
SENIOR WRITER
A 30-inch Panasonic widescreen high
definition TV was the reason Alex Foley got
a summer job at Circuit City.
The appliance, surround-sound speakers
and other items would be essential for the
sophomore’s room in Ruffin Residence Hall.
“You want to have the best room on your
hall,” he said. “It’s kind of a way to get people
on the hall to know me.”
Foley, from Charlotte, spent $1,500 on
electronics and other supplies. And he wasn’t
the only high-dollar spender headed back to
college.
According to the third annual National
Retail Federation Back-to-College Consumer
Intentions and Actions Survey, conducted by
BlGresearch, college students and their fami
lies spent $34.4 billion this year on back-to
college items.
“College students have money to spend,
and they want to invest in home decor, elec
tronics and textbooks,” said Ellen Davis,
Cutson wants to cut
government spending
BY TED STRONG
CITY EDITOR
Robin Cutson doesn’t exactly
blend into the field of Town Council
candidates.
She’s vociferous when she speaks
at council meetings, decrying the
policy of the current council and
calling for changes that she feels
will advance her goals of environ
mentally and business-friendly
growth and fiscally responsible
government.
She’s also a wildlife advocate
for issues including live trapping
of beavers at Eastwood Lake and
local animal shelter services.
All of her pets have been adopt
ed, either as strays or from local
shelters, and Cutson likes hiking
in North Carolina’s mountains.
But it’s her outside take on
issues could be the key to win
ning a seat.
Terri Tyson, who ran unsuccess
fully for the council in 2003, said
Cutson is pushing many points she
Top News
UNC doesn’t appear in the top-20
list, it’s not in the bottom 20 either,
like its peer institutions UVa. and
Duke University.
As UNC’s student body grows
more diverse by the year 25 per
cent of the entering freshman class
identifies itself as nonwhite the
University finds itself facing a host
of new questions
in a rapidly glo
balizing world.
“Our vision
is that we will
continue to
make the cam
pus community
! supportive of all
students, faculty
RACE RELATIONS'
WEEK AT UNC 1
JUUL I
C
TOMORROW: Talking to i
students about what ,
diversity means to them'
and staff and work on eliminating
those traditional barriers of dif
ference, race or gender, ethnicity,”
says Archie Ervin, associate pro
vost of the Office of Diversity and
Multicultural Affairs.
The U.S. population quickly is
spokeswoman for NRF.
According to the survey, the average fresh
man spent $1,151.68, with $504.35 going
toward electronics. Sophomores weren’t far
behind, with $1,028.57 spent primarily on
textbooks, home furnishings and clothes.
A room away from home
Freshman Stephania Greendyk and her
roommate, Katie Blackmar, both from
Charlotte, planned their shopping lists
together this summer.
They purchased a rug from Home Depot
and standing lamps, a futon, a TV and a
microwave from Wal-Mart.
Those, along with dishware, bedsheets, pil
lows and mirrors, were necessities.
But something was missing in their Craige
dorm room.
So, like many students, Greendyk and her
roommate decided to add a personal touch
with posters, sketches and lantern lights.
“We wanted an open area, and we wanted
Candidate
Robin Cutson
has been vocal
in her criticism
of current
Town Council
policies.
agrees with and doesn’t think the
current body’s members necessar
ily represent.
“I believe that she’s offering a
little bit different point of view
as to solutions to some of the
problems we’re facing in town,”
she said.
Tyson cited issues such as
money for public art, which she
and Cutson oppose, as important
factors in her decision to back
Cutson in 2005.
Some political insiders have
been taken aback by what they per
ceive as Cutson’s aggressive style,
SEE CUTSON, PAGE 10
diversifying, and many universi
ties across the country are having
to stop to catch their breaths.
“The demographics are compel
ling,” says Bill Harvey, the newly
hired officer for diversity and equi
ty at UVa. “If you think about the
past 30 years, we haven’t done a
very good job at making the entire
university diverse.”
But having a diverse population
doesn’t necessarily mean students
of different races will interact.
Duke University has a 35 per
cent nonwhite population but was
ranked sixth on The Princeton
Review’s bottom-20 list.
“There always seems to be
this issue of self-segregation
and Balkanization,” says Julian
Sanchez, the director of the Office
of Intercultural Affairs at Duke.
“I think it’s kind of a bum rap.
I don’t see a problem with people
wanting to hang out with people
they have an affinity with,” he says,
to put a lot of color in the room,” she said. “It
made a big difference to the room because
the first week we were here, it felt like a iail
cell.”
Meleah Benfield, a sophomore from Lenoir,
decorated her Lewis dorm room with color
ful cardboard squares used as bulletin boards,
jewelry holders and picture frames.
“We just wanted our room to be really
pretty,” she said. “We wanted something
pleasant, where we could study and hang out
with friends.”
Benfield said that even decorations are
necessities for living comfortably in a dorm
room.
“I think you’re going to have to spend at
least S2OO (as a freshman),” she said. “It’s
hard being a freshman and coming in and
being happy in your surroundings.”
According to the survey, students spent
more money on electronics than other dorm
furnishings.
Foley and his roommate, sophomore
Shawn Lawson, connected their computers,
DVD player, Xbox and stereo to surround-
SEE DORM TRENDS, PAGE 10
. | MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS
r2OO 5 ™=
'KL. GETTING TO KNOW
THE CANDIDATES
Robin Cutson
■ Wants to preserve the environment
and discourage high-density growth
through land-use management.
■ Will demand fiscal responsibility
to minimize the fees and taxes
residents and businesses pay.
Find out more
rcutson@aol.com
robincutson.com
SOURCE: ROBIN CUTSON
DTH/STAFF
Jacquelyn Gist
■ Boasts a long history of advocating
for sustainable development and
affordable housing.
■ Wants to preserve area open
space, such as the recently
acquired Adams trad.
Find out more
jacquie@jacquiegist.com
www.jacquiegist.com
SOURCE: JACQUELYN GIST
DTH/STAFF
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 6, 2005
Race Relations Week
Thursday, Oct. 6
■ 12:30 p.m.*2:30 p.m. Stand for
SUDAN, the Pit
■ 6 p.m.-10 p.m. Movie: Journey to
a Hate-Free Millennium, Hanes Art
Center 121
■ 7:30 p.m. Diversity: Dinner, Hanes
Art Center Foyer
■ 8 p.m. Representatives of Race in
the Media, Hanes Art Center 121
■ 9:30 p.m. Diversity: Dessert, Hanes
Art Center Foyer
■ 10 p.m. Expressions After Dark,
Hanes Art Center 121
Friday, Oct. 7
■ 6 a.m.-8 a.m. Worker Appreciation
Breakfast
■ Noon Diversity Games, Union Plaza
adding that most students interact
with a number of different races on
SEE RACE RELATIONS, PAGE 10
Gist wants to create
more family housing
BY MEGHAN DAVIS
ASSISTANT CITY EDITOR
Alderman Jacquelyn Gist is
running for re-election this year to
round her 16 years of experience on
the Carrboro board to an even 20.
In those years, Gist helped craft
dozens of town policies that she
wants to see through one more
cycle of leadership.
She trails only one current elect
ed municipal official in consecutive
years of service.
But shaping Carrboro’s future
might have seemed improbable as
a recent high-school graduate half
a world away.
“When I got out of high school,
my father took ajob in Afghanistan,”
she said. “Instead of college I went
to Kabul, and I met Peace Corps
volunteers who were UNC grads. I
married one of them later.”
She moved to the area to attend
the University 29 years ago and
never left.
“I felt this incredible sense of
Business
policies
spur on
debate
Candidates muse
economic plans
BY JAKE POTTER
ASSISTANT CITY EDITOR
Carrboro Board of Aldermen
hopefuls got a chance Wednesday
night to share their thoughts with
business-minded town residents
eager to learn the economic direc
tion the municipality will take dur-
ing the next
term.
A commu
nity forum,
MUNICIPAL
ELECTIONS
2005
co-sponsored by the Chapel Hill-
Carrboro Chamber of Commerce,
Empowerment Inc. and WCHL
1360 AM, opened the floor for
alderman candidates to talk about
their economic platform points
with moderator and WCHL News
Director Dan Siler.
The question of whether the
town’s current economic strategies
cover all the town’s needs fueled a
great deal of conversation.
“I think the current economic
strategy is too small,” candidate
Katrina Ryan said, adding that
the aldermen should do more to
recruit businesses that offer ser
vices currently unavailable to the
town.
But incumbent Jacquelyn Gist
staunchly defended the current
group’s efforts.
“We do not wait and see who
shows up at our doorstep,” she said.
“We actively pursue them.”
SEE CHAMBER, PAGE 10
Third
hopeful
featured
at forum
BY KATE SULLIVAN
STAFF WRITER
In his 45-minute forum, the
third candidate for the Morehead
Planetarium and Science Center
transported his audience beyond
the outer edges of the galaxy.
“I want to take
you on a quick
tour of the uni
verse,” candidate
Ryan Wyatt said
as he engaged
the audience in
a presentation
about the galaxy.
Wyatt said
that if he was
selected as the
new director, he
would use those
kinds of innova
tive visualiza
ft I
Ryan Wyatt
stressed that the
Morehead can
fuel interest in
science at UNC.
tions to help the community inter
act with the center.
“We live in a unique time where
we have the technology to be able to
immerse an audience,” said Wyatt,
who serves as the science visualizer
SEE MOREHEAD, PAGE 10
Incumbent
Jacquelyn
Gist is seeking
to complete a
second decade
of service in
Carrboro.
place,” she said. “I just fell in love.”
Gist credited housing issues for
sparking her interest in town poli
tics.
“When I was in graduate school,
in my field placement I was real
involved in starting the homeless
shelter here,” she said. “That got
me into the political arena.”
After working on Carrboro pres
ervation issues, Gist served on the
board of adjustment.
“Some people approached me to
run for alderman,” she said. “I don’t
know if they meant never stop run
ning.”
SEE GIST, PAGE 10
3