Western Front - 1998 April 21

              WESTERN WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY VOLUME 104 ISSUE 6
TUESDAY
April 21,1998
BELLINGHAM, WASHINGTON
Students try to educate Western
Front/Erin Fredrichs
A conglomerate of Western students weaves its way through Red Square during a hate
crime awareness march between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. on Monday. The march was meant
to inform and educate other students about the hate crime that occurred two weeks ago.
By Samantha Tretheway
The Western Front
Monday, Memory Lane was more
than bricks and marble commemorat­ing
Western graduates from 1912-1997;
it was the starting point of a march for
awareness and education.
A small group marched from
Memory Lane toward Huxley College
and came back to Red Square Monday
during lunch.
After a recent hate-bias crime on
campus, involving a man yelling the
word "dyke" while throwing a rock at
a woman's head, some students real­ized
they didn't know what policies
were in place if they were victims of a
hate-bias crime, said Ryan Hawkes, a
participant in the march.
Participants carried signs asking
students, "What defines a hate crime?"
and chanting, "Education, not blame."
"I didn't really think it happened at
Western; I-guess I was just unaware,"
said a Western student named Sarah.
"Isn't that what a liberal arts school
is about — education?" asked Terry
Cook, a business and accounting
major, after the students passed her
with their signs. "They're just bringing
attention to one of society's extremely
offensive ways of acting out," she said.
"This is America, right? — freedom
of speech as long as you're not hurting
anyone else physically," she said.
Alan Bender, an accounting major,
agreed that the marchers had a right to
do what they wanted.
A male student who saw the
marchers said he was confused about
"who they're trying to educate or what
they're trying to educate about."
Hawkes said the march was about
raising awareness and educating peo­ple
about what a hate crime is so they
know what to do if they experience a
hate crime.
If the victim of a hate-bias crime
reports the incident immediately to the
campus police, their policy is to begin
the investigation by interviewing the
victim and any witnesses, University
Chief of Police David Doughty said.
The investigation is usually "case-specific,"
he said. Initial reactions
depend on how soon a case is report­ed.
"You do an initial investigation as
you would with any other crime,"
Garcia said. "There has to be an intent
... motivation for the crime is the bias,
even if (the perpetrator) is incorrect."
After writing a report, the officer
takes photographs of the crime scene
and immediately calls Theodore Pratt,
the director of Student Support
Services, who directs the officer
toward what might be appropriate in
such a sensitive situation, Doughty
said.
When a recent hate-bias crime
involving a woman on campus was
reported, the incident report that was
available to the public neglected to
mention that the assailant yelled the
word "dyke" before he threw a rock at
her head. Doughty did not think the
oversight was intentional because it
was part of the report available to
police officers.
However, he said, "in this case, it is
a very salient point and probably
should be in the summary."
Lieutenant Dae Jamison of the
Bellingham Police Department said he
was aware of the assault but didn't
know how he was aware of it.
University Police shares information
with the BPD and has the authority to
enforce city ordinances but is in no
way subordinate to BPD or its policies
and procedures, Doughty said.
"We would tell them and they
would tell us ... but it's not an obliga­tion,"
he said.
However, Doughty said campus
police worked successfully with BPD
on a malicious harassment and assault
case three years ago, when a group of
white supremacist skinheads beat up a
group of African Americans off cam­pus.
See Educate, -page 4
Faculty voices concerns to Morse, De Lorme
By Ken Brierly
The Western Front
Western President Karen Morse listened
Monday toquestions raised by members of
the Faculty Senate concerning last month's
perceived firing of Arts and Sciences Dean
Peter Elich and said she intends to write a
letter to faculty addressing the grievances
raised.
Some said they felt Morse needed to
openly address the questions many faculty
had regarding what really happened dur­ing
the week of March 16 — the week Elich
was supposedly fired, effective August
1998, and rehired to counter enormous
protest from several chairs and faculty. The
protesters complained Elich's dismissal
was in contempt of the school's process of
shared governance, among other things.
Conflicting information has been circu­lating
around campus via administrative
and committee memorandums and in the
faculty newsletter, FAST. Morse and
Provost Roland De Lorme say according to
letters they wrote to the faculty, Elich was
never fired — he only believed he had been
fired due to miscommunication between he
and De Lorme.
Members of the Dean's Advisory
Council Steering Committee, Psychology
Chair Ron Kleinknecht, Liberal Studies
Chair Bill Stoever and Chemistry Chair
Mark Wicholas, said just the opposite in a
memo dated April 9 in regard to a closed
meeting De Lorme held with the Arts and
Sciences chairs: "In this meeting he stated
that he had indeed on Monday, March 16,
contrary to accepted principle and proce­dure,
requested the resignation of Dean
Elich effective August 1998. He further stat­ed
that he understood this to be a directive
to him from President Morse."
De Lorme refers to the contents of that
letter as "regrettable," but he would not
elaborate yesterday.
Kleinknecht stands by the interpretation
of the meeting written in the letter by the
members of the DAC Steering Committee-that
Morse asked De Lorme to ask for
Elich's August resignation.
"We (faculty) want some open forum
that will answer the questions,"
Kleinknecht said.
Some of the explanations faculty may get
from Morse's letter include: how such a
lack of communication "concerning an
action of such major impact," could have
occurred and why it took four days before
the dean was reassured he still had his job.
"On March 16, the provost has a meeting
with the dean; the dean believes he has
been asked for early retirement," said man-
See Morse, page 3