Western Front - 1987 November 10

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WESTERN FRONT
VOL. 79, NO. 53 ^^^^^^n^^^^^ni^^B^^^^^s TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 10,1987
Men's rugby canned as club sport
By JIM THOMSEN
staff reporter
The men's rugby club got the boot from
Western.
In a letter distributed at an emergency
meeting Friday morning to the Club Sport
Council, club sport adviser Marie Sather
stated "the men's rugby team is no longer
recognized as a club sport at Western."
The decision, she said, was made with
the advice of "administrators." Sather de­cided
to cut off the club's annual money al­lotment,
estimated between $1,200 and
$1,500.
The unexpected "death penalty" cul­minated
a series of events, the latest of
which was the alcohol-related vandalism of
Sigma, Mathes and Fairhaven residence
halls Oct. 28.
After the incident, University Police
stopped and questioned three men outside
Sigma who were dressed in army fatigues
and wearing face makeup. They were later
identified as men's rugby club players.
Residence hall staff filed incident
reports indicating members of the rugby
club were involved.
The terms of the action, including
suspension, will remain in place until the
1989-90 school year, at which time the club
may reapply to the council for reinstate­ment,
according to Sather's letter.
Until then the club will not be
permitted access to university fields for
practice sessions and games.
After the emergency session, which
Sather called "strictly informational," the
rugby club swiftly responded. Team repre­sentative
Steve Biggs issued a prepared
statement which read, in part:
"Because of the total lack of evidence
connecting this event to the Rugby Club,
and the fact there is no charge by the police
or security of any wrongdoing, we feel there
is no justification for any action taken by
this council or its advisors against our club
or its individual members."
?MI!Mfi§iiiW§^
Mourners recall
special moments
By ANDREA LIGHTBURNE
staff reporter
Thousands of mourners
gathered in Carver Gym Monday
afternoon to console each other
over the loss of President G.
Robert Ross and vice presidents,
Donald Cole Jr. and Jeanene
DeLille.
Flower arrangements of
peach, pink, amber, burnt orange
and white covered the platform.
Two of the arrangements were
red, white and blue accented with
miniature American flags.
Family members, friends,
Gov. Booth Gardner, Mayor Tim
Douglas, administrators, faculty,
staff and students wept and
reflected.
Craig Cole, vice chairman of
the board of trustees, officiated at
the service.
He said he was asked by
school officials to sum up the con­tributions
the three have made to
Western and the community.
"Together they have cut a
wide swath through our lives," he
said.
Ross was a man who had vi­sion,
Cole said. He constructed
bridges that made the university
and the community one.
He said, (Don) Cole was a
truly public citizen and was
responsible for making Western
one of the most efficiently run
campuses in the nation.
Cole said DeLille was "tire­less
and evangelical" in her sup­port,
and everything she handled,
she handled well.
"These three people have
caused us to hold our heads
high," Cole said.
He said the trio laid the foun­dation
to continue to make West­ern
a nationally recognized uni­versity,
and it is now our
responsibilty to maintain that
status.
Shirley Osterhaus of Catholic
Campus Ministry offered a prayer
followed by Rabbi Michael
Oblath who recited Psalms 90.
Western's concert choir per­formed
a Mozart selection before
and after the eulogies.
Dan Wood, AS president,
who attended the fund-raising
alumni dinner the night of the
crash, shared some of his
Please see MOURN, p.4
DAN TYLER
Mia Hecht, niece of Don Cole, and Sara Cole, Cole's
daughter, (at right), hug their grandmother at the
memorial service yesterday.
Cause of airplane crash remains a mystery
By KARIN STANTON
staff reporter
Investigators still are sifting
through evidence to determine
the cause of the plane crash that
killed Western's president and
two vice presidents last Wednes­day.
The Cessna 310, chartered
from Cascade Flight School,
crashed seven miles northwest of
Bellingham International Airport,
killing Western President G.
Robert Ross, Vice President of
Business and Financial Affairs
Donald Cole, Jr., Vice President
of University Advancement
Jeanene DeLille and pilot Ty
Hardan.
The investigation could take
up to a year to complete and Na­tional
Transportation Safety
Board chief investigator Dan Dai­ly
estimates it will be two to three
months before he files a facts-and-
circumstances report.
"I've got stacks of paper all
over my desk of leads to follow
up," Daily said. "(But) we have a
methodology that pretty much
makes sure nothing falls through
the cracks."
To begin the investigation,
Daily and three other investi­gators
were on the scene of the
crash at 7 a.m. Friday to "doc
ment the condition" of the pis
and the crash site and help Iocs
all pieces of the wreckage, he sa
The plane was "bao
destroyed," Daily said. But "the
was no evidence of fire or an t
plosion."
Parts of the plane were li
tered for almost a quarter of
Please see CRASH, p.5
Biggs commented while waiting for the
Club Sport Council to adjourn its closed-doors
meeting, "I think what's going on
here is Marie is ticked off ... embarrassed
because she dropped the matter and then
the Front picked up on it. She thinks we lied
to her (when rugby club members talked to
her following the Oct. 28 incident) so now
she's on the warpath, you know. She wants
to make sure she hits us real hard.
"The really weird thing is that we've
gotten no forum to defend ourselves. It's a
real railroad system."
Please see RUGBY, p.3
Sonics game
earns $5,000
for students
By DEBBIE BRADSHAW
staff reporter
The Seattle SuperSonics exhi­bition
game Nov. 1 earned West­ern
a $5,000 profit that could go
toward athletic talent awards.
"This is the first time Western
has made the total profit," Lynda
Goodrich, director of athletics,
said.
The money will go into a
reserve account and be given later
as talent awards.
Goodrich said she would like
access to an award fund that
would be allocated the same
amount of money each year. In
past years, the money for talent
awards has been raised indepen­dently
by coaches.
The awards will be based on
financial need. Athletes must have
a loan or be on the work-study
program to qualify.
Goodrich said she hopes the
athletic fund can be used to
recruit future athletes. "The
precedent has been set in other
departments where awards are
based solely on talent," she said.
Goodrich said Western is the
only school she knows of that
does not give money to athletes as
incentive to come to the univer­sity.
Athletes will go where the
money is, she said.
Goodrich hopes to make the
Sonic exhibition games at West­ern
an annual event.
"It is a good money maker
and also allows a lot of people to
see the Sonics who never would,"
she said. "It creates enthusiasm
for sports."
Although the Sonics were
guaranteed $12,500 before the
game, it was not a big risk. "It was
well calculated. We had very good
odds of covering i t ," Paul
Madison, sports information
director, said.
The Sonics also received 30
Please see SONICS, p.2