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by EllEn Cushingand MElissa shubES enior S taff W riterS

JuicyCampus.com the contro- versial Web site or anonymousgossip around college campuses died quietly last week, another victim o the nancial crisis.

The sites ounder and CEO,Matt Ivester, announced in a state-ment on Feb. 4 that the site wouldbe shutting down. Citing a loss o online ad revenue and venture

capital unding, Ivester reportedthat the growth o the site out-paced our ability to muster theresources needed to survive thiseconomic downturn.

The site, which encouragedusers to post gossip about their peers anonymously, only removedcomments that violated copyright in ringement, a policy which al-lowed comments that were per-sonal and hostile to stay on thesite.

It was really sick and twisted

how people could go and trash whoever they want, said SamBaker 11.

Some Brown students inter- viewed last night in the SciencesLibrary and Ivy Room were happy to see the site go, though otherssaid they would miss the diver-sion. Many, too, said they had not heard o JuicyCampus.

Haley Strausser 12, who saidshe went on JuicyCampus maybe

www.brown ail heral .com 195 An ell Street, Provi ence, Rho e Islan heral @brown ail heral .com

News.....1-4Arts........5-6Sports...7-8Editorial..10Opinion...11Today........12

FEEling thE pinChTom Tru eau 09 sa s theeconomy is be innin toaffect NBA teams.

Sports, 7lEgal at lastThe Rho e Islan legislatureis set to create medicalmarijuana ispensaries.

Metro, 5sEll pErkins, CitKevin Roose 09.5 thinkshe knows how to fix theUniversit s finances.

Opinions, 11

i n s i d e

D aily H eraldthe Brownvol. cxliv, no. 15 | Tuesday, February 10, 2009 | Serving the community daily since 1891

C : S by brigitta grEEnES enior S taff W riter

President Ruth Simmons requestedand received a reduction in compen-sation o approximately 20 percent

or the current scal year and morethan a 10-percent reduction or theprevious year, Chancellor Thomas Tisch 76 said yesterday.

In all o her actions, she has beenextraordinarily aware o the toughtimes that everybody has been acing, Tisch said. Its just another data point as to why, every day, the Corporationis honored to work with her.

Though Simmons has previously

hinted at a reduction in her own pay,neither she nor the University has yet to announce such a step.

Its not a P.R. stunt, Tisch said.She is animated by a sense o appro-priateness, proportion and a tirelessdedication to Brown.

In response to a question ollowingan Hour with the President addressduring Family Weekend in October,Simmons told the audience that she was planning to talk to the Corpora-tion about reducing her executivecompensation.

She urther emphasized the point in a Jan. 27 e-mail to the Brown com-munity announcing major projectedlosses to the endowment and plannedbudget cuts. I ully understand that the pain must begin at the top, she wrote, and we in the senior adminis-tration are making major cuts in our own budgets in order to meet thischallenge. In that e-mail, Simmons

recommended a $4.5-million reduc-tion in the overall budget or admin-istration or the fscal year beginning Jul. 1 a budget that includes thesalaries o senior University admin-istrators.

Last week, Simmons wrote in an

e-mail to a Herald columnist that shehas over the past two years asked

or a reduction in pay. She could not be reached or additional comment Monday a ternoon.

Many o the highest-paid univer-sity presidents across the country have recently said they would giveback a raction o their pay or giveup their raises, according to a Nov.22 article in the New York Times,though Tisch said voluntary conversa-tions about salary reductions are not conversations you expect to have with the leaders o top schools.

Simmons earned $775,715 in thescal year ending in June 2007, the

last period or which the Universityspublic tax records are available. Tisch added that other senior

members o the administration havecome orward this year to ask or sal-ary reductions, but did not provideadditional details.

G ,

by annE siMonsS enior S taff W riter

More than 140 graduate studentsreceived late paychecks last monthdue to administrative hangups, theGraduate School said.

The problem, which meant somepaychecks due Jan. 30 were not is-sued until Feb. 4, was caused by several actors in an alignment o planets, said Dean o the GraduateSchool Sheila Bonde.

An un lled vacancy in the pay-roll department resulting rom anemployees departure in Novem-ber and late fling o administrative

orms rom graduate programs con-

tributed to the problem, she said.On Feb. 3, our days a ter theFriday when the paychecks o a -

ected students were due, ninegraduate students co-signed ane-mail to Bonde, President RuthSimmons and other administratorson behal o all the students who were not paid on time.

The students alleged that they had not received any direct o fcialstatement as to why this occurredor when and how the issue will beresolved and called the lack o communication unacceptable.

Later the same day, Bonde re-plied in an e-mail to the studentsthat the Grad School was awareo the problem and was working

ull-bore to x the problem.We very much regret the in-

convenience this problem caused you, she wrote.

Elena Tenenbaum GS, a student

in the cognitive and linguistic sci-ences program and one o thea ected students who co-signedthe letter, was angered by the latepayment, she wrote in an e-mail to The Herald.

Her paycheck is usually auto-matically deposited into her bankaccount and her bills are paid au-tomatically rom that account, but because her check was late, sheoverdrew on her account and wascharged $99 in ees, she wrote.

There should have been noticebe orehand i there was going to bea problem so that we could havemade alternate arrangements, shecontinued.

Heather Lee GS, president o theGraduate Student Council, wrotein an e-mail to The Herald that some graduate students aroundthe campus do not eel their workis valued or recognized enough by the University.

To them, one indicator is the re-cent paycheck issue, she added.

Bonde said Grad School admin-istrators did everything they couldto solve the payment problem asquickly as possible and acknowl-edged the inconvenience to stu-dents.

Grad students depend on their paychecks, she said.

Employees at the Grad Schoolcollaborated to manually cut checks

or about 140 a ected students, saidBrian Walton, the Grad Schoolsassociate dean o nance and ad-

F IP A by talia kagan

C ontributing W riter

A greater number o Brown stu-dents, aculty and sta are usingRhode Island Public Transit Au-thority services since the statewideprogram UPass allowed them to doso or ree starting in September 2007.

But despite increased bus rider-ship, the University continues to

ace a parking crunch, said Eliza-beth Gentry, assistant vice president

or Financial and AdministrativeServices.

From last September to Decem-ber, a monthly average o 3,560 rid-ers swiped their Brown IDs or anaverage o 28,630 RIPTA rides nearly a 23 percent increase in bothcategories over the same period in2007, Gentry said, adding that about

Kim Perle / HeralIncrease RIPTA usa e is not stemmin the Universit parkin crunch.

Min Wu / Heral File PhotoPresi ent Ruth Simmons hinte at askin for a re uction in her salar inremarks she ma e at Famil Weeken in October.

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s u d o k u

Stephen DeLucia, President Michael Bechek, Vice President

Jonathan Spector, Treasurer Alexander Hughes, Secretary

The Brown Daily Herald (USPS 067.740) is an independent newspaper serv-ing the Brown University community daily since 1891. It is published Monday through Friday during the academic year, excluding vacations, once duringCommencement, once during Orientation and once in July by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. POSTMASTER please send corrections to P.O. Box 2538, Provi-dence, RI 02906. Periodicals postage paid at Providence, R.I. O ces are locatedat 195 Angell St., Providence, R.I. E-mail herald@browndailyherald.com. World Wide Web: http://www.browndailyherald.com.Subscription prices: $319 one year daily, $139 one semester daily.Copyright 2009 by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. All rights reserved.

E p e: 401.351.3372 | b e p e: 401.351.3260

D aily H eraldthe Brown

TUESdAy, FEBRUARy 10, 2009THE BROWN dAILy HERALdPAgE 2

CA P S wS Thin s are ettin so tou h, people are oin to start takin the bus. Clau ette Santos, supervisor for facilities mana ement

2,700 o the riders were students.Many students use RIPTA to

commute to work and volunteer programs and to make shoppingtrips downtown or to East SideMarket .

Anna Ninan 09, who has tak-en RIPTA with various volunteer groups, is leading a start-up groupthis year that sends mentors to sev-eral local high schools by bus. Prior to the ree service, she said, theSwearer Center or Public Service would distribute trolley tickets to

volunteer groups, but there wasa shortage so I always ended uppaying out o pocket.

Sta and aculty mainly use RIP- TA or daily commuting purposes,Gentry said, noting that a parkingshortage on campus is a big incen-tive or employees to take publictransit.

Though Gentry said she didnt know the number o community members parking on the streets,she pointed to the increase in Brownridership o RIPTA as a sign that

ewer people are bringing cars to work.

In a sta survey on RIPTA useconducted last year by the Sta Ad- visory Committee, about 13 percent o respondents with parking spacessaid they had given them up touse RIPTA exclusively. The com-

mittee also noted that ree RIPTA service is not extended to visitingscholars, but wondered whether it should be.

Gentry said she hopes increasedRIPTA ridership will help solve theparking shortage. But those whocontinue to drive to work cite con- venience as the main actor or not switching to the ree service.

Claudette Santos, a supervisor or acilities management who works in

Keeney Quadrangle, said she bringsher car to work. Because the area around Keeney only has three-hour parking, she has to move her car

every day at 11:30 a.m. Instead o spending 15 minutes searching or a new spot, she said she usually swapsplaces with a colleague.

Even so, she has received quite a ew parking tickets. Ive been to the

court so many times, Santos said.Ive been booted many times.

Santos said we all bring our carslike idiots because it is convenient,adding that the in requency o many buses makes RIPTA a hassle.

She lives fve minutes away romcampus by car, but taking the bustakes hal an hour, she said.

Santos said many o her sta em-ployees do use RIPTA, especially in light o the economic climate.Things are getting so tough, peopleare going to start taking the bus,she said.

Gentry also said there were big

bumps in ridership last September and October, citing high gas pricesas a possible explanation. As the

uel prices started pushing towardsour dollars a gallon, more people

considered other orms o transpor-tation, she said, adding that utureincreases in uel prices might havea similar e ect.

But while this service is ree tostudents, aculty and sta , its not

ree or Brown, Gentry said. The University currently pays an

undisclosed fat rate or every rideby a University community member,but Gentry said that given RIPTAsbudget situation, it is likely theyll want to negotiate a higher rate. The

Universitys next contract negotia-tions with RIPTA are in August.

Though the University has worked with RIPTA in the past to create more convenient trol-ley routes to campus, Gentry saidRIPTA is likely to make uture routeand schedule changes because o itsown budget problems.

The quasi-public authority, whichreceives 39 percent o its annual

unding rom the state, had origi-nally estimated a $12-million defcit

or this fscal year, but that fgure isnow down to $1.3 million, the Provi-dence Journal reported Jan. 27.

At the negotiations, the University will also discuss the issue o trans ers

on multi-stage trips, Gentry said.RIPTA gives riders a discount-

ed price on the second ticket o a trans er, but the system currently charges Brown the rate or two ullrides, she said.

Gail McCarthy, a Dining Ser- vices employee, said the UPass pro-gram is a great service but addedthat some sta members who takethe bus at night are worried about

uture RIPTA service cuts.Gale Nelson, assistant director

or the Department o Literary Ar ts,takes the trolley every morning, but said that, or some, there is a grow-ing disincentive to use (RIPTA) when buses run less requently.

Talia Ka an / HeralThe number of RIPTA ri ers usin Brown Ids increase 23 percent between September an december of last

ear, but the Universit s parkin crunch remains mostl unsolve .

IP A

continued from page 1

ministration. Walton, along with the Depart-

ment o Human Resources and the

Payroll O ce, stepped into highgear, to get people their checks assoon as humanly possible, Bondesaid.

Because o the University-widesta hiring reeze currently inplace, Grad School administratorshad to appeal to the Vacancy Review Committee to receive permission toreplace the payroll specialist whodeparted in the all.

They were the rst group tomake a case to the committee or

hiring another payroll specialist,Bonde said, and have now hired a replacement who will start March 1.

The other major cause o theproblem was late appointment

orms, Bonde said.Graduate programs must turnin a orm or each graduate student who will be working or them dur-ing the semester, and the deadlineis 10 days be ore a payday.

About hal o the students a -ected were the result o a process-

ing error and hal were the result o late appointment orms, Bondesaid.

The current system is a paper-intensive process, Walton said.

The Grad School hopes tostreamline the process in the utureand make it more electronic, hesaid, which might cut down on the volume o late orms, he added.

Daniella Wittern GS, another student who was a ected by thepaycheck issues, credited the GradSchool in an e-mail to The Herald with working really hard to cut every single one o those checksby hand.

I dont think there is any question that once the problemoccurred, the Graduate Schooldid everything they could to re-solve it as quickly as possible,she wrote.

40 continued from page 1

www.browndailyherald.com

a couple times a week, was sorry to see the orum go. When Fa-cebook got boring, it was alwaysan entertaining alternative, shesaid.

It was a good way to pass thetime, said Alison Wong 12. Iguess now Ill do homework in-stead.

But Sophia Manuel 11 saidsome o her riends were men-tioned on the site. They didnt

appreciate it, she said. I wouldnt

want to be on it.She added she was happy to

hear that it shut down.It was exploiting people or

pro t, said Mark Dee 11. It ap-peals to the most basic and shallow parts o the human soul.

JuicyCampus provoked pro-tests rom students and adminis-trators on many college campuses and even a subpoena rom theNew Jersey attorney general.

None o the uproar managed to

result in signi cant change to the

Web site or its policies.While there are parts o Juicy

Campus that none o us will miss the mean-spirited posts andpersonal attacks, Ivester said inthe statement, it has also beena place or the un, lightheartedgossip o college li e.

Ivester thanked everyone whohas engaged in meaning ul dis-cussion about online privacy andinternet censorship, and said that he hoped the dialogue would con-

tinue.

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by EMMa bErryS taff W riter

Thomas Forsberg has encounteredsome strange sa ety violations dur-ing his tenure with the O ce o Residential Li e, but the one that sticks out most in his memory oc-curred almost 10 years ago.

We had an undergraduate dis-assemble his motorcycle and put it in his room gas tank and all,said Forsberg, associate director o Housing and Residential Li e.

But as ResLi e prepares to beginresidence hall inspections acrosscampus this week, its assistant director or operations, RichardHilton, said that last semesters

inspections o 704 rooms on cam-pus uncovered 84 less surprising violations. The most common violations were or excessive walldecorations, unsa e power stripsand blocked exits, which Hilton, who oversees the inspections, said was typical.

According to Hilton, thedorms that will be inspected to-day, Wednesday and Thursday include Barbour Hall, Gradu-ate Center, Keeney Quadrangle,Little eld Hall, New Pembroke1 through 3, Perkins Hall, Slater Hall, Emery Hall and Hope Col-lege. Wayland, Harkness, Marcy,Buxton and Diman Houses will alsobe inspected.

Students are noti ed by e-mailin advance o when their residence

halls will be inspected, Hilton said.Several days later, volunteer sta -ers rom ResLi e and other Univer-sity departments enter each roomto look or violations that involvefre sa ety and what Forsberg callsli e sa ety, such as unsa e lo t construction or pets, which may induce other residents allergic

reactions. When inspectors discover a vio-

lation in a room, Hilton said, they leave a slip explaining the violationand asking the resident to correct it be ore a subsequent inspection.

The notable exception to this

CA P S wSTUESdAy, FEBRUARy 10, 2009 THE BROWN dAILy HERALd PAgE 3

What in the worl can you say in 140 characters? Eric Johnson 11, a Twitter user

S : B w b 2.0

by laurEn pisChElS taff W riter

Students procrastinating in the li-brary and Brown administratorsmay now speak in the same charac-ter-limited language: Twitter.

Twitter, a kind o miniature blog-ging service that allows people toupdate their riends, or ollowers,on their lives in tweets o 140characters or ewer, was recently taken up by the University as anexperiment in public relations.

Among University-related eedsnow on Twitter are brownuniver-

sity, which automatically provideslinks to news rom Media Relations,Brown Alumni Magazine, Today at Brown and Brown.edu Web sites,and MHollmer, a li e sciences-themed Twitter run by Mark Hol-lmer, senior media specialist in theLi e Sciences.

We will give it a good test or the rest o the semester, said MarkNickel, director o University com-munications, adding that the pri-mary purpose o the sites is media outreach. The brownuniversitypage was set up last all, and theO ce o Public A airs and Uni- versity Relations began runningMHollmer just two weeks ago,according to Twitter.

The public a airs o fce initially chose li e sciences as the disciplineto experiment with, Nickel addedin an e-mail to The Herald, becauseli e science writers are a airly well-delineated media group.

We really havent had enoughexperience with Twitter to know whether or how well it might work

or us, Nickel wrote. It may endup being one o several methods weuse to distribute news about Brown,but will probably not be the most important one.

Other University-related eeds

include the Brown University menslacrosse team on Twitter, Brown-Lacrosse. Mens lax put a beatingon a very good young alumni squad.great physical game (sic), reads anupdate posted on Saturday.

Parents o the players post teamevents or relatives who are unableto attend the game, according to Jake Westermann 10, whose ather contributes to the teams separateblog.

Brown also appears on Ivytwit-ter.com, launched last April. Theseparate site ollows all o the Twit-ter posts related to the eight Ivy

League schools. The Ivytwitter eed or Browndisplays all content on Twitter withthe words Brown and Universityin the tweet.

Some posts, though, are seem-ingly and perhaps inevitably random.

I hope to God that I get intoBrown, Cornell, Duke or Washing-ton University in St. Louis. Please. They are my dream colleges. April1st! reads one tweet.

Twitterers can be institutions as well as people. Starbucks, or exam-ple, has one. So does 10 DowningStreet (DowningStreet), the Britishprime ministers residence.

Though the University is just be-ginning to explore the technology,some students are already adept Twitterers.

When I frst joined, I was really skeptical o this, said Eric John-son 11, a newscaster or WBRU who started using the service or networking or the radio station.What in the world can you say in140 characters?

I think it really changed the way people who have blogs get their (word) out there, he said.Its very easy to get your message

out to people.

D b S by Colin ChazEnS enior S taff W riter

A teachers union organizer and aneducation re orm lobbyist sparredlast night in a wide-ranging dis-cussion about the uture o the American education system. Thespeakers, both Democrats, di eredprimarily over whether re ormsshould ocus on improving the cur-rent system or expanding the useo charter schools.

Joe Williams, executive direc-tor o Democrats or EducationRe orm, advocated greater fex-ibility and spoke against power ulinterest groups that oppose major changes.

There was a notion i you sup-ported anything other than thestatus quo, than investing in thesystem as it is, you couldnt be a

Democrat, Williams said. The

teachers unions are telling us not to have these conversations.

Patrick Crowley, assistant exec-utive director o the Rhode IslandNational Education Association,argued that teachers are not theenemies and should not be blamed

or systematic problems.Its not summers o and get-

ting out at two oclock, Crowley said. The enemy is a lot o thepolicies that the people in power have always used.

The discussion, which wassponsored by the Department o Education, the Brown Democratsand Students or Education Re-

orm, came ahead o a pending$800-billion ederal stimulus pack-age that will allocate billions o dol-lars to education projects acrossthe country. Both speakers saidthey are hope ul that President

Obama will bring positive change

to the education system, but de-scribed a litany o contradicting views and opinions on what typeso re orms are needed and which will be success ul.

Pick a study and Ill show onethat says the opposite, Crowley said, in re erence to ederal andprivate studies o various types o charter schools. Veteran teach-ers will tell you, every ve yearstheres the next big thing. Theyrethe ones that are still there.

Williams said the current system needs to be adjusted toprovide good teachers with in-centives, whether higher pay or greater choice, to take on di -cult positions in the nations worst schools.

Those schools that nobody wants to teach in are the ones that

Kim Perle / HeralBrown uses blo in service Twitter as a me ia outreach metho tosprea news an event information aroun campus.

Kim Perle / HeralA toaster, a li hter an can les were amon the prohibite items founb ResLife urin previous room inspections.

D b

continued on page 4

- by hEEyoung MinC ontributing W riter

Is your drinking water sa e? I youare living o -campus, it might not be.

Though lead- ree water is now

available in all campus buildingsand residences, some o -campusbuildings including the housesand apartments many students callhome may still contain lead-

contaminated water.Lead levels in Providence have

risen slightly in recent years,said Clay Commons, senior envi-ronmental scientist or the RhodeIsland Department o Health.

A ter discovering in 2006 that

some water samples had leadlevels higher than ederal limits,Commons said, his department began a process o changing thechemical composition o treated

water to lessen pipe corrosion. The treatment will reduce leadlevels in the long term, but con-tributes to the current higher levels, he said.

Though Commons said there isno direct evidence o lead contami-

nation in o -campus buildings,he added that there is no clear evidence that all residences are

continued on page 4

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TUESdAy, FEBRUARy 10, 2009THE BROWN dAILy HERALdPAgE 4

CA P S wS you can have thin s in our room an just hi e them.Melissa Lo an 11, on orm room inspections

sa e rom contamination. The problem o lead contami-

nation in campus buildings wasbrought to the Universitys atten-tion in 2007, when three under-graduates examined lead levels incampus buildings as part o a classproject.

Libby Delucia 09, Matthew Wheeler 09 and Megan Whelan 09

ound high levels o lead-contam-inated water in several University buildings, The Herald repor ted in2007.

Sampling lead in water is not required in most buildings, but a ter learning that two academicbuildings tested above the (Envi-ronmental Protection Agency) ac-tion level, the University tested the water in all Brown buildings, saidDirector o Environmental Healthand Sa ety Stephen Morin. A ter collecting hundreds o samples and

sending them to an independent laboratory or analysis, EHS dis-covered that 17 buildings exceededthe action level.

EHS alerted building occupantssoon a ter receiving the results,

Morin said. All buildings that ex-ceeded the EPAs action level wereprovided bottled water or water

lters, he said, adding that theseinitial steps are acceptable long-term solutions.

Students living o -campus inUniversity-owned housing arealso sa e rom lead-contaminated water.

All housing (has) been testedor lead levels, said Gail Med-

bury, director o auxiliary housing.Those with high levels o lead havebeen provided with a lter.

But or those not living in Uni- versity-owned housing, Morin saidhe recommends having running water sampled and using lters or drinking bottled water.

The only way to determine whether a households water is a -

ected by higher than acceptablelevels o lead is to send a sample toa qualifed laborator y, which costsbetween $20 and $100, according

to the EPA Web site.Morin said individuals shouldtake this step because requiredsampling is limited and every build-ing is di erent due to such actorsas age o construction, type o water

systems and type o solder used.He also suggested running cold

water in the morning or a ter longperiods o non-use to decrease thelevels o lead in the water. Only use cold water or drinking andcooking since hot water can havehigher levels o lead.

According to the EPA, leadound in water usually comes rom

the corrosion o pipes or solders inplumbing, with very new and very old plumbing systems at greatest risk o leaching lead.

The most common source o ingested or inhaled lead is paint and dust particles containing themetal, but lead in drinking water can contribute to an individualstotal exposure, according to theEPA. Lead remains in the body or a long period o time, and a signif-cant buildup o the metal can causeacute and chronic health e ects,including damage to the centralnervous system, the liver and the

kidneys.Children are particularly vul-nerable to over-exposure o lead, which can contribute to a range o physical and mental developmentaldelays.

-

policy, however, is candles, whichare con iscated immediately whether or not (theyve) ever been lit, Forsberg said, adding that theyre the number one cause o residence hall res.

Students are ined $100 or each candle, a policy that resultedin a total o $500 during the allinspections.

Students expressed mixedeelings on the subject o room

inspections. While Melissa Logan 11 said

she believes inspections are neces-sary or sa ety reasons, she addedthat she did not like the idea o someone coming into my room,especially when Im not there.She said she would pre er havinginspections only when the resident is in his or her room.

Allison Perelman 09, whoseroom in Young Orchard was in-spected in October, said inspec-tors rom ResLi e got angry when

they saw that she had completely covered her walls with removable wallpaper.

Perelman said that while her roommate was cited or the vio-lation, she was advised only that the wallpaper must be removedby the time she moves out in May.They were concerned about it,she said. They kept calling it a gray area.

I have a sneaking suspicionthat in a couple years theyll havea speci c r ule against wallpaper,Perelman added.

Stephanie Yin 12 lives in Emer y,one o the buildings to be inspectedthis week. Though she said she hadnot seen the e-mail rom ResLi e,

which Hilton sent Feb. 6., Yin saidshe was not worried about the in-

spection and did not expect to becited or any violations.

I dont know how much they can accomplish giving advance no-tice, Yin said. At the same time,it would be aw ul to have unan-nounced inspections.

Logan agreed. You can havethings in your room and just hidethem, and theyll never know, shesaid. My roommates do.

Forsberg acknowledged that students can easily hide prohibiteditems but said he hoped students would think seriously about sa ety rather than see what (they) canget away with.

I I dont see it, I dont see it,he said. But i you engage in an

unsa e thing, I hope that we dont have anything horrible happen.

4 continued from page 3

continued from page 3

t m ec e : 704t f : 84

Power strips/ext. cor s: 17Excessive trash: 11Woo en construction: 1E ress blocke : 15Fire safety equipment foundin room: 8Space heaters or AC units: 1Smokin /incense: 6Excessive wall ecorations: 25Halo en lamps: 1Can les: 5Unauthorize appliances: 6

Loun e furniture in room: 4

r m i ecb e n m e

get teachers straight out o educa-tion school, Williams said. Weshould create an incentive systemthat allows teachers that are up or a challenge to go.

Crowley said incentive systems were unrealistic no system exists

to properly evaluate and rewardgood teachers and shi ting themost well-regarded teachers to thenations worst schools will only ex-acerbate problems.

Those teachers dont stay, hesaid. Its always a white teacher andalways brown kids. Its a TV movieo the week, and Hallmark doesnt

get to set education policy.Both speakers agreed that great

inequalities exist under the current system and that the DemocraticParty needs to be an advocate or serious changes.

We should take the ederalstimulus money and rethink how we und education, Crowley said.

D b continued from page 3

The Brown dail HeralA stimulus packa e for our brain

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etroThe Brown dail HeralTUESdAy, FEBRUARy 10, 2009 | PAgE 5

Most police officers ... ont want to arrest sick an in people. Jesse Stout 06, executive irector, Rho e Islan Patients A vocac Coalition

.I. by alExandra ulMErS taff W riter

The economic stimulus packagecurrently pending in Congresscould provide Rhode Island withhundreds o millions o dollarsto be invested mostly in schoolsystems, tax cuts or workers andother local expenditures.

The ederal stimulus package o cially titled the AmericanRecovery and Reinvestment Act o 2009 aims to create jobs na-tionwide, including in the OceanState, whose 10-percent unemploy-ment rate is second highest in thecountry. One version o the billhas already passed in the Houseo Representatives and another ispending in the Senate, with the

nal version expected to be rati-ed by early next week.

The bill is expected to allocate$220 million this year to RhodeIsland schools and government tocover urgent services, $132 mil-lion to road and bridge repairs and$46 million to improve the sewer system and drinking water in thestate, according to a Feb. 4 WhiteHouse statement.

The bill also o ers a re und-able tax credit aimed at 95 percent o working Americans ranging

rom $500 or individuals to $1,000or amilies and a $300 payment

to Social Security bene ciaries,according to the statement.

Rhode Islands DemocraticSenators, Sheldon Whitehouseand Jack Reed, have expressedsupport or the bill.

The bill will give a tax cut to470,000 Rhode Island workersand amilies, provide hundredso millions o dollars to jump-start shovel-ready projects and cre-ate 13,000 jobs in the state, wrote Alex Swartsel, Whitehousesspokesperson, in an e-mail to The Herald.

This plan isnt per ect and inthe end it may not be enough,Swartsel wrote. But its a strong

rst step.

But Gov. Donald Carcieri 65

has criticized the bill or allocat-ing nearly 30 percent o its aid toprograms that do not stimulate jobgrowth or consumer con dence,said Amy Kempe, Carcierisspokesperson. Its not about more or less money, its about how you target that money.

Though Mayor David Cicil-line 83 said the House versiono the bill makes investments inkey areas o job growth, such asin rastructure and education, andprovides bold actions or thelong-term health o our econo-my, he is concerned about someamendments made in the Senatethat reduced aid to job creation.

According to Elliot Krieger,spokesperson or the Rhode Is-land Department o Education,the bill will bene t under undedschools in the state.

The majority o unds allocatedto education will go to schools with economically disadvantagedstudents, where they will help pre- vent uture budget cuts, increaseaccess to computers and improve

acilities, he said. But the exact manner and target o allocationremains unclear.

The ederal government is not really calling out to states at thispoint, Krieger said. We havemore questions than answers.

The stimulus bill will provideshort-term x but is not likely tosustain (recovery), Thomas Dan-iels, chairman o the board o re- view or the Rhode Islamd Depart-ment o Labor and Training, wrotein an e-mail to The Herald.

Ideally, unding should be allo-cated to states on the basis o their unemployment levels and statesshould then be able to decide where to invest, Daniels wrote.

Many groups are looking or- ward to receiving unds or vari-ous programs.

For months, the Rhode Is-land Department o Transporta-tion has been assembling a list o 50 projects it hopes to und,Charles St. Martin III, a spokes-

person, wrote in an e-mail to The

Herald. Estimated at a total cost o $170 million, the projectsrange rom bridge repairs tocommuter rail projects and im-proved handicapped access, St.Martin wrote.

Nearly every Rhode Islandcommunity would bene t, he wrote. Many are projects that have been de erred to uture yearsdue to unding limitations.

The unding currently project-ed or weatherization assistance will partly be allocated to Provi-dence Community Action, a non-pro t that weatherizes homes inProvidence. Were expecting that it will be substantial, said HelenLallo, coordinator o the groupsLow Income Home Energy Assis-tance Program. Well be able tohelp a lot more low-income people

save on energy.

j b

b By Sara SunShineS enior S taff W riter For Rhode Islanders su ering

rom terminal illnesses or chronicpains, medical marijuana can pro- vide badly needed relie .But getting the marijuana in a sa e,legal manner can be problematic

or these patients which is why state legislators have introduceda bill allowing or the creation o up to three nonpro it CompassionCenters to grow and distribute theplant.

The bill was introduced in thestate Senate last week by Sen.Rhoda Perry D-Dist. 3 P91 and will be introduced in the House o Representatives today by Rep. TomSlater D-Providence. It is a reincar-nation o a 2008 bill which ailed topass the House despite winning a 30-5 vote in the Senate.

When the Rhode Island MedicalMarijuana Act was passed three years ago, ill Rhode Islanders nolonger aced the threat o incar-ceration or using a doctor-recom-mended medication, said JesseStout 06, executive director o theRhode Island Patients Advocacy Coalition. Since then, patients havebeen able to receive a license togrow and use marijuana rom thestate Department o Health.

The medical marijuana programhas been a success, Stout said,accumulating 561 patients. Ingeneral, patients are getting themedicine they need, he said.

But patients do not always know how to grow marijuana or lack ad-equate space or unds to pr oduceit. In these cases, Stout said, someare orced to turn to the black mar-ket or drug dealers.

We dont have a legal and sa e

method to distribute marijuana,said Perr y, who began advocatingor medical marijuana a ter losing

a nephew to AIDS. The bill places the dispensa-

ries under the regulation o theDepartment o Health and con-tains restrictions on how muchmarijuana the centers may storeat any given time.

Stout said he was optimisticabout the bills chances o pass-ing during the 2009 congressionalsession. The new presidential ad-ministration is more riendly tothe sentiments behind the bill andunlikely to inter ere, Stout said,and local lawmakers will be morelikely to lend their support sinceit is not an election year.

Though medical marijuana iscurrently legal in 13 states, nonehad state-run distribution centerslike those proposed under the billuntil New Mexico passed a law last year, Stout added.

The bill, which now has 50 co-sponsors in the House, also enjoyspopular support. A 2008 poll paid

or by the Marijuana Policy Project ound that 69 percent o Rhode

Islanders avored allowing regis-tered patients to obtain marijuana

rom state-licensed, state-regulated

acilities. A variety o organizations, such

as the Rhode Island Academy or Family Physicians and the RhodeIsland State Council o Churches,have endorsed medical marijua-na.

Although they initially hadsome hesitations, Rhode Islandlaw en orcement is now also co-operative, said Stout. Most po-lice o icers would agr ee that they dont want to arrest sick and dyingpeople.

Gov. Donald Carcieri 65 will

most likely veto the bill, but thereare enough avorable votes in theRhode Island General Assembly tooverride his veto, Stout said.

Some questioned the bene it o making medical marijuana more widely accessible.

I think medical marijuana isanother example o something that is in theory a good thing but it al- ways has the ability to be abused,said Bryan Smith 10. It probably does have the ability to help somepeople but I dont know i ... thats worth the har m it could cause.

Though the Compassion Cen-ters would most likely not be ully

unctional until 2010, some patientsare satis ied just to see progressbeing made.

Bobbi Brady Cataldo, a singlemother o ive, had been taking Vicodin or her multiple sclero-sis be ore medical marijuana waslegalized. Cataldo ound that shedid not react well to the pain-killer,

eeling drowsiness and nausea.I didnt have room to be

drugged out ... you have to either deal with the pain or take medsthat make you a complete idiot.

But when Cataldo tried medicalmarijuana, she said it was a mira-

cle. The relie was so immediate,I was loored, she added.Other Rhode Islanders have

been very supportive o her pre-scription, Cataldo said, but it stillis di icult to obtain the marijuana she needs. Due to her condition,Cataldo cannot access the base-ment the only suitable place inher house or growing the plant.

You shouldnt have to go tothe streets to get your medicine,Cataldo said. The dispensaries will make medical marijuana moreaccessible and a ordable or pa-tients, she added.

Levi Gadye 10, who has a medi-cal marijuana license rom Cali or-nia or back pains and insomnia,said he supports the bill.

Gadye said the stubbornnesso the ederal government hasprevented reasonable legisla-tion such as the CompassionCenter bill rom being passed.Its another step to have a law toprotect people who grow medicalmarijuana, he added.

Passing such a bill would helpurther the national conversation

about medical marijuana, Gadyesaid. I states are having this dis-cussion themselves, the ederal

government will have to listen.

$220 million for localschools and to local ov-ernment to cover ur entservices

$132 m o for roa anbri e repairs

$46 m o to improve thesewer system an rinkingwater

Refundable tax creditaimed at 95 percent ofworkin Americans, ran -ing from $500 for in ivi u-als to $1,000 for families

$300 payment to SocialSecurit beneficiaries

$12 million for Weather-ization Assistance

$2.1 m o for energy ef-ficienc rants

E ec e fe em f

Brian Van er Bru / Los An eles TimesThe National Park Service is tr in to et fun in from the stimulus packa e to rebuil the infrastructure inparks. The last time there was a national works pro ram was un er Presi ent Franklin d. Roosevelt.

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Sports uesdayTUESdAy, FEBRUARy 10, 2009 | Page 7

The Brown dail Heral

w. , f b - -bby andrEw braCaS portS e ditor

The womens hockey team shut out No. 8 Dartmouth on Friday or 54minutes be ore fnally surrenderinga goal to su er a 1-0 de eat. Com-bined with a 4-0 loss to Harvard the

ollowing day, the games continueda trend o close losses to top oppo-nents in the Easter College Athletic

Con erence, dropping the Bears to5-18-1 overall and 4-13 in con erenceplay, good or 11th place.

Captain Nicole Stock 09 con-tinued to shine or Bruno in goal,making 47 saves against Dart-mouth (16-6-2, 13-3-2 ECAC) and41 against Harvard (13-7-3, 12-4-2ECAC), but the o ense could not break through, leading to toughlosses.

It was really disappointing be-cause we were so close in all thegames, said Stock, a Herald sportssta writer. We played really wellagainst Dar tmouth, especially. Wecame out with a lot o energy andplayed a good de ensive hockey game, but its rustrating when youcant put goals on the board.

Against Harvard, the samekind o thing happened, she con-

tinued. We were with them, (but)they got a couple lucky goals and we werent able to put anything inthe back o the net.

Last month Dartmouth embar-rassed the Bears at home, winningby a score o 9-1, but the Bears wereready or their trip to Hanover,N.H.

B by ElisabEth avallonES portS S taff W riter

Despite alling short o Bridgeport Universitys 191.150 points this Sun-day, the gymnastics team per ormed with dedication and earned a season-high 189.575 points, Browns best team score since 2004.

The meet was the motivation we needed to prove our scoringpotential to ourselves, said HeadCoach Sara Carver-Milne. The jus-ti cation o knowing that we havethe potential to quali y in Ivies right now, and earned a score as high asCornell, who is currently ranked

rst, is extremely exciting.

As a captain, it was really excit-ing to see the team score the highest that it has in years, said Stephanie Albert 10.

Leading the Bears, Chelsey Binkley 10 placed rst on the foor exercise and earned a personal best in every event she competed in.

We had some great per ormanc-es this weekend, Chelsey Binkley inparticula r. To score a personal best in every event she competed on isoutstanding. It helped motivate theteam and keep us going, Carver-

Milne said. Lauren Tucker (12)stepped it up as a reshman, in her

rst meet at ull strength a ter anankle injury. To show that she couldcome back at ull strength with allo her skills was amazing.

Leading o or the Bears on vault, Carli Wiesen eld 12 (9.600),

Binkley (9.575) and Lilly Siems 12(9.550) earned third through th,respectively. Tucker (9.425) andMelissa Bowe 11 (9.325) brought the total tally to 47.475, just shy o Bridgeports 47.925.

BA I there was ever any doubt about whether the economy would sig-nifcantly impact pro essional sports,there certainly isnt anymore. Na-tional Football League ad revenue isdown, the league is still without radiopartners or 2009-2010 and nearly all the leaguessponsorshipagreements,i n c l u d i n gmany partnersmired in deep

economic dis-tress, are set toexpire withinthe next three years. The Arena Football Leaguecanceled its 2009 season due toincreased expenses and debt. NA-SCAR aces serious issues becauseo its reliance on sponsorship dealsthat just arent there anymore. Anddoes anyone still even watch prohockey?

But perhaps Major LeagueBaseball is showing the e ects o a struggling economy the most o any major sport. Multiple ormer all-stars (Orlando Hudson, Adam Dunn,Luis Gonzalez, Nomar Garciaparra,Moises Alou, Bobby Abreu and Gar-ret Anderson just to name a ew) and

uture Hall o Famers (Ivan Rodri-guez, Tom Glavine, Curt Schilling,Ken Gri ey Jr. and Frank Thomas)are aced with little to no interest

rom teams wary o giving out any type o guaranteed contract.

Meanwhile, the National Bas-ketball Association is no di erent

rom the other major sports tryingto adapt to an un amiliar economicclimate, in a time o great uncertainty about just how bad things might get.Executives across the league nd

themselves having to resort to morecreative measures to attract ans togames, o ering di erent types o packages and coupons on top o al-ready discounted ticket prices, all while trying to appease season ticket holders that still pay ace value. Un-like the NFL, where the vast majority o money in contracts is not guar-anteed, or Major League Baseball, which is wrapping up its o -seasononly now, NBA teams already doledout big-time contracts like it was 1999this past summer. The result was in-stant buyers remorse (ask the Sixersi theyd sign Elton Brand again, or i the Clippers still eel good about inking Baron Davis), as more teamslook to nd ways to shed salary.

The unprecedented and increas-ingly serious situation is what makesthis years NBA trade deadline po-tentially one o the most interestingever. Player contracts have alwaysmattered because salaries essentially have to match or most trades to belegal. The provisions set out in themost recent Collective Bargaining Agreement only allow teams over the salary cap to make trades i thesalaries are within 125 percent plus$100,000 o the salary given out,

Justin Coleman / Heral File PhotoThe mnastics team earne a season-hi h 189.575 points on Sun a .

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TUESdAy, FEBRUARy 10, 2009THE BROWN dAILy HERALdPAgE 8

SP Sw k D We still have a little work to o on the bars. g mnastics Hea Coach Sara Carver-Milne

We just played our systems a lot better this time, Stock said. We just had more energy and knew that the (bad) game that we playedagainst them at home was a fukeand were a better team than that. And I think we played much moredisciplined hockey we didnt takeas many penalties.

A ter Brown held Dartmouth to just a 9-8 advantage in shots dur-ing the rst period, the Big Greenturned up the intensity in the ol-lowing period to post a 19-4 shot advantage. But Stock held frm, andthe Bears took pride in heading intothe second intermission tied with a national power.

I think it built a lot o confdencein our team, Stock said.

Although Dartmouth once againattacked Browns crease in the thirdperiod, posting a 20-7 lead in shots,the Bears held rm or 12 minuteinto the period. But with 7:34 re-maining Sasha Van Muyen 10 was whistled or hooking to give theBig Green the man advantage. Lessthan two minutes later, DartmouthsSarah Newnam beat Stock top shel

with a slap shot to put her team onthe board. A ter Stock was pulled rom the

net, Bruno produced some o ense with the extra skater but was not able to net the equalizer. Assistant captain Andrea Hunter 10 led theBears with our shots, but Big Greengoalie Carli Clemis made 19 savesin the game to shut out Brown the seventh time Bruno has beenblanked this season.

Saturdays game against Har- vard in Cambridge, Mass., was even worse or the Bears, as 2006 Cana-dian Olympian Sarah Vaillancourt notched two goals and two assists

or the Crimson. The game began scoreless or 14

minutes be ore Jenny Brine scoredto give Harvard the lead with 5:17le t in the opening rame. It appeared

the lead would remain 1-0 headinginto the rst intermission, but Vail-lancourt doubled the lead with 17seconds remaining on a fuky play.

It was like a weird, pinball kindo shot it hit a couple people andkind o foated into the net, Stocksaid. I think that hurt us a little bit going into the second. I think we were down a little bit even though we had played well and were pretty even with them in the rst.

Harvard scored twice more, in-cluding a power-play goal, to take a 4-0 lead with 8:37 le t in the secondperiod, concluding the scoring. Al-though Brown recovered to post 27shots, Crimson goalie Christina Kes-sler stonewalled all o them, and theBears were shut out or the ourthtime in their past six games.

The close loss to Dartmouth con-tinues a trend in Browns season,in which the Bears, despite their poor record, have been surprisingly competitive against the top seventeams in the ECAC.

Bruno beat the two teams tiedor third, Colgate and Princeton, lost

twice by a single goal to No. 6 St.Lawrence and lost by two goals or

ewer to each o the other our teams

in the top seven, but still remainsmired in 11th place.Weve played tight games with

many o the teams that are aboveus, so I think its really rustratingthat were on the losing end o thoseclose games, Stock said. Some-times it takes a little bit more totry and beat those teams, but when youre that close it just tells you that the con erence is pretty tight, and we just somehow need to get onthe winning end o some o thesegames.

The Bears will have the oppor-tunity to do so this weekend whenthey begin a ve-game homestandat Meehan Auditorium.

They will host struggling Union(2-25-3, 0-17-1 ECAC) on Friday at 7p.m. and Rensselaer (13-13-3, 8-8-2ECAC) on Saturday at 4 p.m.

w

in order or the trade to be ac-cepted.

This year, contracts will mat-ter even more. Owners who are willing to take on additional salary stand to pick up big-time talent inreturn or little more than expiringcontracts.

Some general managers arelooking to get their ranchiseout o the red. The New OrleansHornets, whom an anonymousexecutive described as com-

pletely broke in a recent CBSsports article, are trying to shedtheir payroll despite already beingunder the luxury tax threshold.Other teams, such as the New York Knicks, are simply trying to

ree up cap space or the already in amous summer o 2010, which will eature such marquee reeagents as LeBron James, Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh.

Whatever the motivation,there is bound to be plenty o movement, motivated primarily by dollars. It is telling when someo the most desirable assets this year are the expiring contracts o Wally Szczerbiak, Rae LaFrentzand Drew Gooden not exactly cornerstones o a championshipteam.

The names switching teamsmight resemble ridiculous videogame trades more than a regular NBA trade deadline. The Nets would likely move Vince Carter and the remaining $33 million stillowed to him a ter this season. Ac-cording to multiple sources, thePhoenix Suns are motivated tomove Amare Stoudemire, who isamong the games best and most athletic low-post scorers. Even

Shaq can be had or anyone will-ing to pay him $20 million next season. Ditto or Jermaine ONeal,Baron Davis and Mike Miller.

Its possible that the deadline will come and go with mostly just talk. Some trades that might havebeen might not be, simply becauseteams are wary o adding salary.But i owners are willing to capital-ize on other teams growing con-cern or the long term nancialhealth o their own organizations,this trade deadline stands to beone o the most exciting in recent memory.

Tom Tru eau 09 will tra ehis roommate plus a lotter -

protecte first roun pickfor a subscription to NBA

Lea ue Pass.

T BA

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Tucker claimed third on beam,scoring a 9.750. Binkley ollowed inf th with a 9.650 as Victoria Zanelli11 (9.550), Wiesen eld (9.550), Si-erns (9.350) and Izzy Kirkham-Le- witt 10 (9.125) rounded out the scor-ing or the Bears. Again, the Bears

ell short o the Purple Knights by a raction o a point, earning a 47.825

to Bridgeports 47.875.

On the bars, Bowe fnished withBrowns top score in third with a 9.450. Kirkham-Lewitt (9.325)

ollowed in sixth, Siems (9.125)in eighth and Zanelli (9.050) inninth.

We still have a little work to doon the bars. We obviously didnt hit as well as we would have likedto this weekend, but to still scoreso high without hitting shows our true potential, Carver-Milne said.

Brown tallied 45.925 in the event, asBridgeport posted a 47.400.

Following Binkleys rst-placeper ormance on the foor (9.825),Helen Segal 10 scored a person-al best o 9.800 or second. KatieGoddard 12 also earned a personalbest o 9.675 and fnished in our th. Tucker grabbed sixth with a 9.550, Wiesen eld ninth with a 9.500 and Whitney Diederich 09 posted a 9.400 to fnish o or the Bears, who

won the event with a total o 48.350,compared to Bridgeports 47.950.

As a team, we have been repeat-edly told how much potential wehave or this season, and we arereally starting to prove that poten-tial week a ter week, building uponevery team score, Binkley said.

The Bears will compete next Feb.13 at Arizona and Feb. 20 against Oklahoma, Missouri and West Vir-ginia at Oklahoma.

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ditorial & LettersPage 10 | TUESdAy, FEBRUARy 10, 2009

The Brown daily Heral

C H R I S J E S U L E E

A

C O R R E C T I ON S P O L I C Y The Brown Daily Herald is committed to providing the Brown University community with the most accurate in ormation possible. Correctionsmay be submitted up to seven calendar days a ter publication.

COMMENTARY POLICY The editorial is the majority opinion o the editorial page board o The Brown Daily Herald. The editorial viewpoint does not necessarily refect the views o The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. Columns, letters and comics refect the opinions o their authors only.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR POLICY Send letters to letters@browndailyherald.com. Include a telephone number with all letters. The Herald reserves the right to edit all letters or length and clarity and cannot assure the publication o any letter. Please limit letters to 250 words. Under special circumstances writers may request anonymity, but no letter will be printed i the authors identity is unknown to the editors. Announcements o events will not be printed.

ADVERTISING POLICY

The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. reserves the right to accept or decline any advertisement at its discretion.

The University recently announced its intentions not to expand theUndergraduate Teaching and Research Award program as previously planned. Some students may be concerned, especially those seekingalternative summer-work opportunities in the ace o a collapsing jobmarket. But in this time o crisis, its important to keep in mind thereality o Browns inancial constraints and not to orget the numerousopportunities still available to students.

As President Ruth Simmons stated in her e-mail addressing theUniversitys inancial standing, the goal right now is to preserve thequality o academic li e the key word here being preserve. TheUniversity has not cut the UTRA programs budget, only maintainedthe roughly 200 awards granted last year which, at $3,000 per award,is no small eat.

That being said, the University does o er other programs that un-dergraduate students can take advantage o . The Career Development

Center grants approximately 40 Brown Internship Awards o $2,500each, and the Aided Internship Program awards 25 summer earnings waivers o as much as $2,650 by no means do Browns summer workopportunities end with UTRA.

Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, dont count out all internships just because inancial irms are lailing. According to Eric Normington,chie marketing o icer at University o Dreams, a Cali ornia-basedcompany that matches interns with employers, in certain disciplinesthey need interns now more than ever. Normington went on to explainthat in ields such as public relations, event planning and advertise-ment, the impact o the inancial crisis has been such that employers,

orced to cut ull-time employees, are desperately seeking part-timeinterns to help ill the gaps.

Theres no doubt that the UTRA pro gram is a antastic way or un-dergraduate students to gain valuable work experience and acclimatethemselves to li e in academia. We hope that as soon as inances areback on track, the University will resume its expansion o the UTRA program, but in the meantime we understand that the administrationis doing everything it can or its students in this time o inancialupheaval.

Editorials are written by The Heralds editorial page board. Send commentsto editorials@browndailyherald.com.

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t e E :

Regarding Tyler Rosenbaums 11 column Whats anactivist to do? (Feb. 4): The actions o SDS and other activists are not about a will to revive the old activism. These actions are based on the idea that change happensdynamically, by doing things BOTH inside and outsideo conventional methods.

While many activists at Brown are aware that werepart o a long tradition, our steps are primarily orientedtoward the uture, not the past.

We think o the ir replaceable role student mobiliza-tion has played in establishing A ricana studies, eth-nic studies, need-blind admission, airer contracts or campus workers and the universitys stance on cer tain

global justice concerns not with a glazed nostalgia, but rather as inspiration. Brown, like most o the world,is run by a stifing bureaucracy that o ten hamstringsevery administrators best intentions.

Those o us who do try to mobilize student power understand that movement rom below is one o the only checks we have against nigh immovable bureaucracies(governmental, corporate, etc).

The assumption that people would protest simply toprotest is ridiculous. People do things or a reason. Ac-tions have motives behind them. We in SDS spend tonso time organizing, planning and working on achievingour goals and anti-activist-anti-people-love-o -authority types who neither work with SDS members nor withadministration to address real problems are both un-productive and hypocritical.

Detractors who sit around and criticize SDS whileremaining actionless on the issues they admit to be a -

ecting Brown and the world would do better to spendtheir time constructing change instead o tearing it

down. Instead o criticizing one o the only catalysts o change that this school has, these people should usetactics that they believe are correct organize or student government or orm other groups to createthe changes that they want to see.

And i the spirit o activism is largely dead, as it may seem like it is, this is not because the largest barriers toour achievement and contentment are sel -imposed.

Practically all the things students care about gotheir way, says Rosenbaum but what about tuition?Everyone will be paying more to come here this Fallduring a time when the price tag o Brown is already too big. What about cultural/racial barriers to admis-sion like the SAT?

What about issues o elitism and white supremacy

that continue to homogenize education through practiceslike the SAT? And then, what about global justice issuesthat may not directly a ect Brown students, but whichdo in act a ect us all?

Students should not be tearing each other apart over a debate o tactics. We should all work in coalition, prac-ticing the di erent tactics that we believe in, in order tocreate change. We should take the oppor tunities givento us, certainly, but those who see the need or moredrastic changes should never be limited to the optionsprovided the o cial channels especially whenthey lead nowhere.

k J 09s be 09

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As youve probably heard by now, Brown hasa pretty severe money problem.

Two weeks ago, President Ruth Simmonsannounced via a campus-wide e-mail that theUniversitys endowment, which once stoodat a ormidable $2.8 billion, is projected to be worth $800 million less by the end o June, a loss o almost 30 percent o its value.

Its easy to lose perspective in this time o billion-dollar Ponzi schemes and trillion-dol-lar bailouts, but let that number sink in or a second. Brown just lost $800 million.

Thats more than the entire Obama cam-paign raised.

Its more than the combined payrolls o the Yankees, Mets, Tigers, Red Sox andCubs.

For $800 million, every student at Browncould get his skin surgically removed and re-placed with a huge array o iPhones, and wecould all just walk around campus sendingFacebook messages on each others quadri-ceps (I hear they actually do this at Princ-eton).

So now what? Faced with the worst globaleconomic crisis in decades and a donor basethat doesnt eel much like giving, how canBrown ever hope to recoup its losses?

President Simmons e-mail outlined some

cost-saving measures, including reezing sal-

aries or most aculty members and halting

the planned growth o the Graduate School,but its not going to be enough. Our schoolis in serious trouble, and the ate o uturegenerations o Brown students hangs in thebalance.

We need new solutions. We need to re-

gain our nancial oothold. We need our $800 million back. President Simmons, Ihereby submit my plan or Browns econom-ic recovery:

First, as Ben Bernstein 09 points out (O depression and diversions, Feb. 6), westill havent built the long-awaited NelsonFitness Center, and, presumably, Mr. Nel-sons check or $10 million is lying uncashedin somebodys desk drawer. Lets convincehim to spend it on new dorms or revamped

classrooms instead. Brown has more urgent

priorities than a new gym, and at this point,

giving $10 million to the Universitys money managers or sa ekeeping is like letting Mi-chael Phelps babysit your pot stash.

And while were on the subject of thegym, lets get realistic and sell the 80-pounddumbbells in the OMAC. No o ense, olks,

but this is Brown were talking about, not Ohio State. The last time a Brown student li ted 80 pounds with one hand, he was bulk-ing up to enlist in the Franco-Prussian War.

More things we should sell: Perkins(too ar), the CIT (too weird) and thosethree-wheeled electric scooters our DPS o -

cers ride (too Klingon Honor Guard-y). When springtime rolls around, lets

have Facilities Management tear up thegrass on Wriston Quad and replace it with

a permanent Slip-n-Slide. It would eliminate

seeding and mowing costs, and the grate ul

brothers o Sigma Chi might stop asking meto write an angry column about the campuskeg ban. Everybody wins.

Id like to see the UndergraduateCoundil o Students implement a system o

nes to reduce obnoxious behavior and re-plenish Browns co ers at the same time. Just imagine it. A $20 ne or every personin my English seminar who talks about theshi ting zeitgeist. A $100 ne or a cappella groups who sing Ben Folds songs. A $200

ne or people who reserve multiple BlueRoom tables during the lunch rush. A $500

ne every time a Jew rom Long Island usesthe phrase Thats how I roll.

And if all else fails, Brown can intro -duce a micro-sponsorship plan and auctiono the naming rights to bits and pieces o campus property. Sure, Sidney Frank canget his name on a building, but what about those o us who dont have millions to spare?Id gladly give a couple bucks to the Uni- versity i I could wait in the Kevin B. Roose09.5 Omelette Line, throw my co ee cup inthe Kevin B. Roose 09.5 Trash Can or evendo my business in the Kevin B. Roose 09.5Urinal. Brown may have overestimated thestrength o its investments, but it shouldnever, ever underestimate the narcisism o its opinions columnists.

Kevin Roose 09.5 is an En lish concen-trator from Oberlin, Ohio. He can be

reache at Kevin_Roose@brown.e u

TUESdAy, FEBRUARy 10, 2009 | PAgE 11pinionsThe Brown dail Heral

One o these things is not like the others; oneo these things just doesnt belong. Can youtell me which thing is not like the others, by the time I nish this song? Steven Chu, Lisa Jackson, Carol Browner, Ray LaHood.

Who? Incoming Secretary o Energy Ste- ven Chu led renewable energy research asdirector o the Lawrence Berkeley NationalLaboratory. Environmental Protection Agen-

cy Administrator Lisa Jackson, while com-missioner o the New Jersey Department o Environmental Protection, introduced a planto reduce state carbon emissions 80 percent by 2050. The presidents new climate czar,Carol Browner, is an ardent environmentalprotector and lawyer who oversaw the EPA

or eight years under President Clinton.Ray LaHood, newly ordained secretary

o transportation, is a representative roma mostly rural part o Illinois where peopletend to get around just by driving cars. Onmass transit he has a thin and mixed record,giving Amtrak lukewarm suppor t but oppos-ing high-speed rail in his own state.

Well, its too late; Congress just wrappedup the con rmation song, and it isnt clear that President Obama could answer my question any better than Cookie Monster. Or that he gets the inextricable connections be-tween climate change and transportation.

Brown students might not ully realizehow good we have it on College Hill. Fromdorm rooms at Brown, we can walk or take a

short bus or bike ride to restaurants, book-stores, grocery stores, the mall, the train sta-tion and the bus depot. From the train sta-tion we can reach all the cultural amenitieso a major city in an hour and a hal .

When we graduate, some o us may moveto cities that developed when eet and horses were still the dominant modes o transporta-tion. But others will wind up in areas whereit is nearly impossible to enjoy a com ortableli e without at least one car. Even many o those who embrace city li e will later want to

join the suburban masses in the land o high- ways, strip malls ... and sa e streets and goodpublic schools.

Un ortunately, this car-centric means o geographically organizing and transportingourselves is utterly unsustainable. The ast-est-growing category o emissions is those

rom cars, SUVs and other gas-burning vehi-cles, which cause nearly a third o all green-house gas emissions in the U.S.

What should be screamingly obvious toanyone who hasnt orgotten the price o gas last summer or worries about climatechange is that we need a massive ederal in- vestment in public transportation.

Your choices o transportation are amongthe most environmentally consequential de-cisions you make. When it requires almost asmuch energy to recycle as to make productsout o entirely new materials, keeping onemore bottle out o a land ll may be a laud-able gesture, but it wont save the earth.

Burning a ew gallons o gas every day in-stead o riding, biking or walking, though, isa signi cant contributor to climate change.Its no wonder Manhattan residents, ew o whom own cars, emit less than one-third as

much carbon as average Americans.But where there is no decent alternative

to the automobile, the latent environmen-tal concern shared by many uture Brownalumni is wasted. Higher gas prices, either caused by the market or created by deliber-ate policy, are more likely to bankrupt work-ing amilies than bring about vast changesin driving behavior. People will combine a

ew errands or think twice be ore taking a discretionary trip, but they still have to com-mute to work every day.

So, short o taking wrecking balls to thesuburbs and orcing everyone into new high-rises, the only way in the short term to dra-

matically reduce car usage is an enormousexpansion o intra-city and regional light rail,intercity high-speed rail and clean-operatinglocal buses.

Light rail is particularly e ective withinmetropolitan areas. Much less expensivethan subway or elevated rail lines, it runs at ground level so tracks can be installed intoexisting streets. Many U.S. cities, even thoseas small as Spokane, Wash., are beginning toinstall light rail systems.

High-speed rail is widespread in Europeand Asia but absent here. For intercity trav-el, high-speed rail is cleaner than airplanesand o ten as ast. I Cali ornia can avoid im-plosion amid its current budget crisis, thestate plans to lead the way by connecting

San Francisco and Los Angeles in two anda hal hours.Local buses, though mundane, are less

expensive and easier to implement than any rail system. Upgraded and expanded buslines can provide the most immediate andcomprehensive transit options on a neigh-borhood level.

Less than one percent o the current $819billion stimulus bill is directed toward masstransit. Public transportation must be a toppriority i we are to maintain our long-termstandard o living and avoid environmentalcatastrophe. Lets hope either Secretary La-Hood decides to hop on board, or that Presi-dent Obama intends to single-handedly turnSesame Street into Sesame Station.

Nick Ha ert 10 isnt reall from Port-lan , Ore on just a nearb suburb.

But it oes have li ht rail!He can be reache at

nicholas_ha ert @brown.e u.

T

( ) $ 00

Face with the worst lobal economic crisis ineca es an a onor base that oesnt feel muchlike ivin , how can Brown ever hope to recoupits losses? Presi ent Simmons e-mail outline

some cost-savin measuresbut its not oin to be enou h.

Even man of those who embrace cit life will

later want to join the suburban masses in thelan of hi hwa s, strip malls an safe streetsan oo public schools.

NICK HAgERTyo pinions c oluMnist

KEVIN ROOSEo pinions c oluMnist

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