Western Front - 2004 March 2

              ISSUE 14
VOLUME 128
ON THICK ICE
New toy floats challenge
to students at Rec Center.
Sports, Page 11
SEX IS OK FOR US.
American culture should relax
social attitudes about sex.
Opinions, Page 14
A WALK IN THEIR SHOES
Reporter briefly lives the
life of a homeless man.
Features, Page 8
Western Washington University, Bellingham, Washington
The Western Front TUESDAY
MARCH 2,2004
Hanging for a cause
Potential activists
learn techniques
for defending trees
By Wolfgang Deerkop
The Western Front
Slowly inching v3p a ltKMoot rope into
the forest cano^rytp reach a small/wet
plywood platform swaying in the wind
may not seem like the best way to spend
an afternoon, but tiV ! experience can
change a person forever — especially if
he or she falls, said Deane Rimmerman,
an Evergreen College senior who refers
to himself as Dirt.
"Normally, we don't look down unless
we are looking at something small," said
Rimmerman, the workshop's lead
instructor. "But when you are up there,
you perceive the world as a whole sphere
because everything is below you."
Eighteen people — primarily Western
students — attended a tree-climbing
workshop on Sehome Hill on Sunday
afternoon to learn about tree climbing
safety and tree sits.
Tree sits — small platforms high in the
tree tops that house environmental
activists who use their bodies as human
shields to prevent logging — have
evolved as one of the most visible meth­ods
of protesting logging practices.
Activists such as Julia "Butterfly" Hill,
who lived in, a Californian redwood
named Luna between 1997 and 1999,
have garnered intense international
media coverage for the practice,
Rimmerman said.
The appeal of tree sitting has a certain
SEE TVee, PAGE 4
Ben Arnold/The Western Front
At a tree-climbing workshop in the Sehome Hill Arboretum on Sunday afternoon,
Western student Bobby Pogue prepares to ascend a tree.
Nearly half of all
people under 25
may have an STD
By Kaitlin King
The Western Front
Approximately half of all Americans will
acquire a sexually transmitted disease by their
25th birthday, according to two new reports the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
-released this past week.
The study showed that 15- to 24-year-olds
account for 48 percent of all STD cases in the United
States, even though that age group accounts for
only 25 percent of sexually active Americans. \ •
The Alan Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit, sex­ual-
help group for youth, issued a report Feb. 24,
according to which, the same population account­ed
for 9.1 million-of the 18.9 million new STD
cases in 2000. According to the report, the collec­tive
medical costs to treat the STDs for the entire
lives of those infected will total $6.5 billion.
Three infections — chlamydia, gonorrhea and the
human papillomavirus, or HPV, which can cause
genital warts and cervical cancer in women — rep­resent
raaeof 10 new-eases of STD infections in the
United States every year, according to the report.
" Th&majority of the costs results-from the treat­ment
of HIV and the small amount of HPV cases
that result in cervical cancer or genital warts.
"In general, talking about STIs (sexually trans­mitted
infections) is seen as an embarrassing prob­lem
in our society," Planned Parenthood health
educator Joanna Johnston said. "Teens often have
scary feelings when it comes to talking to their
partners about sexual history."
Catharine Vader, a registered nurse in Western's
Student Health Center, said many of the STD infec­tions
seen at the center are not curable and are
extremely contagious, such as HPV and herpes.
"A lot of times students are asymptomatic in
SEE Diseases, PAGE 4
Faculty members near
unionization approval
By Katie Scaief
The Western Front
By next fall, faculty members
at Western could be unionized.
The organizing committee of
the United Faculty of Western
Washington is working toward a
vote for a faculty union, said
Steven Garfinkle,
Western history profes- Public forum:
sor and member of the Facility members
steering committee. The ^ n rHopijSo
eight-member commit
p.m. in VU 464
tee coordinates the Unionization
organizing committee, Thursday at 3
the goal of which is to
form a campus faculty
union.
As the third step in a six-step
process, organizing committee
members are seeking signatures
from faculty members who are
interested in a union, Garfinkle
said. Identities are confidential
tration, he said.
State law requires 30 percent
of faculty members to sign
authorization cards before they
can vote for a union, he said.
"We have already exceeded the
state minimum," Garfinkle said.
Western's organizing committee
has set a goal to collect signatures
from at least half of
the faculty by
spring to ensure
support, Garfinkle
said.
After the organiz­ing
committee dis­plays
significant
faculty support
through the authorizing card
campaign, the Public
Employment Relations
Commission^ a state agency, will
verify the cards as'the fourth
and not shown to the adminis-step
toward unionization.
SEE Faculty, PAGE 5
Meridian school levy under fire
By Lauren Fior
The Western Front
If Meridian School District
does not pass a $1.8 million
maintenance and operations
levy, approximately .15 extra­curricular
activities could be cut.
At a public forum at Meridian
High School yesterday, district
superintendent Burton
Dickerson gave the audience
general information about
Meridian schools and what the
current levy funding provides
for the district.
"State and federal funding are
not adequate to meet school dis­trict
financial needs," Dickerson
said.
On Feb. 3, the school district
voted on the levy, which failed to
reach the. necessary 60-percent
approval by 0;63 percent.
In approximately three weeks,
the school board will vote to
bring-the levy back to the public
for a re-vote, Meridian School
Board member Bryan Vander
Krissy Gochnour/The Western Front
Bellingham resident Todd Williams listens as details of the
Meridian School District levy are outlined Monday night.
Yacht said.
Vander Yacht said, many peo­ple
aie misirifprmed and think
the levy will increase their prop­erty/
taxes, Vander Yacht said
approving the new levy would
renew the current levy, which
would lower property-tax rates.
Residents pay a rate of $3.46 per
$1,000 of assessed property valu­ation,
he said.
Citizens in the school district,
which encompasses the town of
Laurel, north of Bellingham, will
pay $3.25 per $1,000 of assessed
property valuation when the cur-
For news tips, call (360) 650-3162 or e-mail The Western Front at thewesternfronteditor@yahoo.com "www.westernfrontonline.com
SEE Budget, PAGE 4
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