Western Front - 1999 September 20

              MONDAY, September 20,1999
Western Washington University Welcome Back Bellingham, Washington
Ballot to seek new recreation facility
Erin Smith
Trustees
overturn
WSL
vote
By Jenni Odekirk
THE WESTERN FRONT
The Washington Student
Lobby Fee, approved by
Western students in last
spring's election, will not be
implemented.
The Board of Trustees voted
5-%.. at its Aug. 6 meeting
'against implementing the $2
^ee after listening to students
L'gue that their democratic
vote
should be
validated
and Vice
President
for
Student
Affairs,
Eileen
Coughlin,
argue
that the
$2 fee
would be
difficult to administer.
Trustees Mary Swenson and
Natalie Quick, the student rep­resentative,
were unable to
attend the meeting.
"It's disappointing," said Erin
Smith, chair of Western's WSL
- chapter, about the board's deci­sion.
"(Right now) we're stuck
spending time looking for
money instead of looking for
issues, researching issues and
educating students about
issues."
WSL lobbies state legislators
for student interests, such as
lower tuition, more financial
aid and more full-time faculty,
Smith said. It has chapters at
all state universities, except the
Evergreen State College.
WSL suffered a drastic
decline in donations from
Washington State University
because of a registration glitch
and the loss of its executive
director because it couldn't
afford to pay his salary, Smith
said.
The fee would have changed
WSL's Funding method from a
positive check-off system to a
negative check-off system, like­ly
raising their revenue by
thousands of dollars.
From 1982 to 1987, when
WSL had a negative check-off
system, 70 to 80 percent of stu­dents
contributed to WSL per
quarter. Since 1987, when WSL
switched to a positive check-off
system, 5 to 34 percent of stu­dents
contributed to WSL per
quarter.
Students now decide whether
to donate $2 to WSL during
telephone registration. If the
board had approved the initia-
See WSL, page 3
By Jenni Odekirk
THE WESTERN FRONT
Western students are being
sought to plan and campaign for
a campus recreation facility.
Associated Students
President Victor Cox is organiz­ing
a winter-quarter referen­dum
asking students to pay a
quarterly fee for construction
and maintenance of a recreation
facility. To prepare for the elec­tion,
Cox said he is now seeking
seven students for a planning
committee and 12 students for a
campaign committee.
"Students need to be the ones
to shape this facility," Cox said.
The planning committee,
which will consist of students
staff and faculty, will organize
focus groups and surveys to dis­cover
the type of center students
want and make recommenda­tions
for the referendum, said
Jack Smith, Viking Union direc­tor.
The campaign committee,
which will consist of only stu­dents,
will publicize the election
and give presentations to resi­dence
halls and other campus
groups, Smith said.
The committees will work fall
and winter quarters with Senior
Associate Jeff Turner, a consul­tant
with Brailsford and
Dunlavey, a Washington, D.C.-
based facility planning firm.
Western hired Brailsford and
See FACILITY, page 6
Chris Goodenow/ The Western Front
New growth is slowly returning tothe banks of Whatcom Creek, which was charred by the June 10 explosion of
an underground gas pipeline. Three people were killed in the blast, and one-and-a-half miles of the creek was
l||stro^ilf£^
New provost looks to future
New provost
Andy Bodman
to tackle old
issues
By Lisa Curdy
THE WESTERN FRONT
Originally from western
England, Western's new
provost Andy Bodman would
someday like to be a cricket cor­respondent
for The London
Times.
Succeeding Roland L.
DeLorne, Bodman began Aug. 1
as provost and vice president
for Academic Affairs at
Western.
A geography professor, senior
vice provost and interim dean of
the Graduate College at the
University of Vermont, where
Chris Goodenow/ The Western Front
Provost Andy Bodman hopes to speak with students
about many issues, such as registration and GUR's.
he spent the past 21 years,
Bodman said Bellingham
appeared very similar to
Burlington, "Vermont.
"The physical setting is
See PROVOST, page 23
Crack open a cold
one — or not
Alcohol and
Western:
How beer,
good times, a
car and the
police can
affect
students lives.
See story, page 12.
Meet the 1999-2000
A.S. officers
Associated Students offi­cers
share their missions in
life — or the school year —
with Western.
See story, page 4.