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CAMPOS BRIEFS
New chief of infonnation
technology to start Feb. 1
Larry Conrad will begin his role
as UNCs chief information officer
and vice chancellor for information
technology on Feb. 1. He has left
his post as chief infonnation officer
at Florida State University to come
to Chapel Hill.
Conrad has been involved in
meetings this week to learn more
about the University’s Enterprise
Resource Planning initiative, a
project that will replace UNC’s
computer system. The ERP will be
under his supervision as he takes
on his role at ITS.
Conrad replaces interim CIO
John Oberlin, who succeeded Dan
Reed.
Reed left the University to
take a job at Microsoft Inc. in
December.
Five senior habitat house
build days still available
Seniors interested in helping to
build the senior class Habitat for
Humanity house have five more
opportunities to participate.
This semester, there are three
more days in January and two in
February available for students to
sign up.
Shifts last from 8:30 a.m. to
noon or from 12:30 p.m. to 4 p.m.
Visit seniors.unc.edu for more
information. To sign up, e-mail
Lindsay Mirchin at lmirchin@
gmail.com.
Free-range burgers will be
sold every week at Lenoir
The Carolina Kitchen will be
selling burgers made with grass
fed beef.
Samples of the beef were avail
able on Wednesday at the entrance
of Lenoir Dining Hall. The meat
came from a local farmer.
Police officer honored for
work with Special Olympics
J.D. Parks, an investigative cap
tain with the UNC Department of
Public Safety, was honored Tuesday
for his involvement with the Special
Olympic Law Enforcement Torch
Run.
Parks, formerly a detective with
the Chapel Hill Police Department,
sold T-shirts and hats and hosted
numerous events to raise money.
He helped to organize a golf tour
nament with his agency that is
now in its 11th year and raises
more then $60,000 annually.
During Parks’ 14 years of involve
ment in the Special Olympics,
Chapel Hill police raised more then
$825,000 for Special Olympics
athletes. Law enforcement officers
from across the state will partici
pate in the Torch Run later this
year to raise money for the Special
Olympics of North Carolina.
CITY BRIEFS
New traffic pattern at Erwin
Road and Europa Drive open
Starting Tuesday, drivers are no
longer able to make left turns at
the intersection of Erwin Road and
Europa Drive. Drivers also can no
longer move through the intersec
tion to U.S. 15-501.
The traffic pattern, which is
part of the super street proj
ect by the N.C. Department of
Transportation, is meant to allevi
ate the congestion problem at the
intersection.
Carrboro Farmers Market
extends winter season hours
The Carrboro Farmers Market
is now open year-around, accord
ing to an e-mail sent to the mar
ket listserv. The market, at 301 W.
Main St, now is open from 9 a.m.
to noon until March 8 and has lon
ger hours after that date.
The market decided to extend its
hours through the winter because
the use of greenhouses and tunnels
have lengthened the crop season.
Sarah Blacklin will replace
Sheila Neal as the new market
manager.
‘I look forward to seeing many
new and familiar faces as we
enter an exciting 2008 season at
the Carrboro Farmers Market,"
Blacklin said in the e-mail.
NATION BRIEFS
Gov. Bill Richardson drops
out of presidential race
According to The Associated
Press sources, New Mexico Gov.
Bill Richardson is planning to
announce today that he is no lon
ger running for President of the
United States.
Richardson finished fourth in
both lowa and New Hampshire,
winning less than 5 percent of the
vote in each contest
Although he was the only
Democratic candidate with execu
tive experience, Richardson was con
sistently outshone by frontrunners
Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.
From staff and wire reports
Town gets new money man
IT to link up with finance, budget
BY TED STRONG
SENIOR WRITER
Chapel Hill is revamping its
finance department and integrat
ing information technology under
anew business management
director.
“I took the opportunity to kind
of rethink our organization,’ Town
Manager Roger Standi said.
Standi said he hopes the change
will allow for more integrated and
strategic planning and budgeting.
The town’s information technol
ogy director, Bob Avery, will work
for the new director, Ken Pennoyer,
but there will be no new finance
director.
50,000 ENJOY KIDZ
MUSEUM
Search continues
for a bigger space
BY TRACEY THERET
SENIOR WRITER
Two-year-old Ivan Krivacka
from Hillsborough had his first
Kidzu Children's Museum experi
ence Wednesday morning.
After an arts and crafts session
and pressing different buttons to
make Herald the inflatable drag
on come to life, Ivan played with
fire.
"1 cooking apples!" he exclaimed
to his grandmother, Joan Witt.
He threw a red plastic fruit into
a bucket sitting atop the flickering
pseudo-flame of an open stove.
"Yes, you are such a good cook,"
Witt replied with a smile as she
helped him turn the handle of the
nearby play rotisserie.
After hearing about the muse
um’s popularity, Joan Witt and
her husband, Peter, of Chapel Hill,
decided to join the museum for the
annual family dues of $75 for when
their grandchild comes to town.
"We think it’s wonderful." Peter
Witt said two hours into the fami
ly’s visit. "I thought we’d be out of
here long ago, but he’s engrossed."
"It has been so successful, so we
decided to join," Joan Witt said.
In fact. Kidzu celebrated its
50,000 th visitor Dec. 21, which
Executive Director Cathy Maris
said was no small feat for a local
museum that opened less than two
years ago in March 2006.
"Most new children's museums
in their second year of opening see
a 30 percent drop in attendance,"
Maris said.
From the time the museum
opened until the end of 2006, the
museum saw about 27,000 visi
tors, Maris said.
‘There’s been an enthusiastic
embrace of the museum from the
community," she said.
Peppy linden, executive direc
tor of the Virginia Discovery
Museum in Charlottesville, also
said that it is "not hard to start a
children’s museum, but difficult to
sustain it’
She attributed diminished inter-
SEE KIDZU, PAGE 9
Campus projects progressing
Science complex
work continues
BY KATY DOLL
ASSISTANT UNIVERSITY EDITOR
Several major construction proj
ects are still in swing this semester,
and a few new projects are under
way on campus.
Science construction
“The first phase of Genomics is
basically the work you see going
on now," said Bruce Runberg,
associate vice chancellor for facil-
ities planning
and construc
tion.
The
Genomics
project, also
known as the
science com
plex, includes
the new
Genomics
CAMPUS
CONSTRUCTION
i
Science Building and a 700-space
parking deck on part of the existing
Bell Tbwer lot
Runberg said the site work and
utilities work will be finished this
year.
Bidding for the building's con
tract will begin in coming months,
Top Nows
Pennoyer said he thinks Chapel
Hill will have more of the cross
departmental vigor he experienced
in Upper Merion Township, Pa.,
where he worked before his current
job as finance director for the city
of Durham.
"I think it just kind of clicked
with me," he said.
He wall miss Durham “terribly,"
he said, but such a big organization
creates certain hurdles.
"You tend to have sort of artifi
cial walls between these different
departments, and it takes a lot of
effort to get the communication
there," he said.
Local activist and former town
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Peter Witt reads to his grandson Ivan Krivacka, 2, at Kidzu Children's Museum on Wednesday.
The museum, which opened on FranklinjStreet in 2006, recently hosted its 50,000 th visitor.
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Extensive construction can still be seen in the Bell Tower Parking Lot where
a 700-space parking deck is projected to be finished by the end of the year.
and the whole project is planned
to wrap up in a few years.
‘All of that work is going to take
probably three years," he said. ‘So
we’re going to be busy down there
for a while."
The genetics medicine building
also is under construction and is
set to finish in May.
‘That’s about a $l2O million
project," Runberg said.
‘And it's a very critical proj
ect for research for the School
of Medicine and the School of
Ken Pennoyer
will come to
Chapel Hill
after serving
as Durham's
finance
director.
council candidate Will Raymond
said that the move wasn’t exactly
what he had anticipated but that he
thought it could pay dividends.
‘I could see maybe how this
might work," said Raymond, a for
mer chief information and techni
cal officer who works as a software
developer. “This is a great oppor
tunity because there’s a lot of work
to be done."
Raymond said the idea of a
Pharmacy."
Botanical garden center
Anew Visitor Education Center
for the N.C. Botanical Garden at
UNC will be built soon.
‘The hope is that by middle to
late 2009 we’ll have anew build
ing that we can use to educate
the public about native plants
and their beauty and utility," said
SEE CONSTRUCTION. PAGE 9
THURSDAY, JANUARY 10, 2008
department with an integrated
technological capacity looking at
long-term issues is something the
town needs badly.
“We’re very reactionary," he
said.
Stancil also praised the skill
Pennoyer had shown in working at
another municipality that is AAA
rated for bonds. The rating means
independent firms have decided
that municipal bonds from the
town are a good investment
While Upper Merion, located
about 20 miles west of Philadelphia,
doesn't have any colleges or univer
sities, it is home to about two-thirds
of Valley Forge, the historic site
where George Washington made
SEE FINANCES, PAGE 9
Play Makers showcases
emotion in ‘2.5 Minute’
BY ALYSSA GRIFFITH
STAFF WRITER
Lisa Kron’s acclaimed perfor
mance in “2.5 Minute Ride" blurs
the boundaries between pain and
comedy.
Kron unveiled her award-win
ning one-woman show Wednesday
for Play Makers Repertory
Company’s second-stage series,
PRC 2 , at the
Elizabeth Price
Kenan Theatre.
The autobio
graphical show
intertwines three
separate experi
ences in Kron’s
life.
Audience
members might
find themselves
unable to remove
their eyes from
Kron’s smiling
fm
Lisa Kron's
one-woman
show was
PlayMakers'
latest show.
eyes and animated features.
Onlookers at Wednesdays per
formance laughed at Kron’s wry
and raw language that strayed from
the norm. Audience members got
a taste of Krons humor when she
referred to all the members of her
family as either crippled or dead in
the play's opening moments.
Police
arrest 3
in cop
assault
Car stopped for
driving in reverse
BY ANDREW DUNN
SENIOR WRITER
An incident that police said
began with a high-risk 180-degree
turn ended with a man incarcer
ated Tbesday night.
Keith Kareem Parks, a 22-year
old Chapel Hill resident, was jailed
on misdemeanor charges of assault
on a government official and resist
ing arrest.
Brothers Andre and Antwan
Burnette, ages 25 and 23, also were
arrested for their part in the inci
dent, which drew more than eight
officers to Sunset Drive.
The Burnettes were charged
with resisting arrest and disorder
ly conduct and were released upon
signing a written promise to appear
in court All three are scheduled to
appear in court April 1.
None of the phone numbers the
suspects provided to law enforce
ment were correct, but police said
the incident began when a bike
officer spotted a car driving errati
cally shortly after 5 p.m.
The driver, Andre Burnette, was
moving southbound on Graham
Street in reverse and at a “high
rate of speed," Chapel Hill Police
Department spokesman Lt. Kevin
Gunter said.
The bike officer followed the
car as it approached a stop sign, at
which time the car switched direc
tions and drove down Rosemary-
Street.
The officer got the car to stop as
it reached Sunset Drive, but when
he tried to get information. Parks
became “extremely uncooperative,"
according to police reports.
Gunter said the officer then
tried to force the driver out of the
vehicle, at which time he “became
disruptive" and tried to pull away.
Parks, the passenger in the car,
then exited the car and began kick
ing the officer. That action. Gunter
said, earned Parks the charge of
assault on a government official.
“They clearly wanted to disrupt
the officers," Gunter said.
At least eight officers were called
to the scene before the dispatcher
said no further assistance was
needed.
Antwan Burnette became
involved when he saw the scuffle
with his brother. He ran to the
scene from a residence across the
street.
Gunter said police did not know
why the suspects were uncoopera
tive. He said the Chapel Hill Police
Department did not identify any
outstanding warrants.
But he did say the department
has not researched whether police
have had a history of interactions
with the trio.
And violent responses are unusu
al for traffic stops, Gunter said.
“Occasionally we will come
across someone who is uncoopera
tive," he said. “This escalated."
Contact the City Editor
at citydesk@unc.edu.
THEATER RE VIEW
2 J MINUTE RIDE
PLAYMAKERS REPERTORY COMPANY
WEDNESDAY
irkirtrk
The diversity of topics addressed
in ‘2.5 Minute Ride’ accentuated
Kron s versatility as an artist Kron
was able to crash together some of
the most emotional stories of her
life into a raw and emotional per
formance.
Krons tumultuous and chaotic
tales recount her humorous fami
ly vacation to an Ohio amusement
park, her brother's wedding and
a heartfelt journey to the infa
mous World War II concentra
tion camp, Auschwitz, with her
father.
Kron’s interwoven memories
demonstrate how grief and humor
can occur within brief moments of
each other.
Her seemingly disconnected
stories are accompanied by few
props: a stool, a cigarette and a
slide projector that only carries
blank slides.
While the slides are empty, the
SEE 2.5 MINUTE. PAGE 9
3