Western Front - 1982 April 30

              Defiant AS tabs three for panel
Appointee threatens
search team boycott
WESTERN WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY VOL. 74, NQ. 27 APRIL 30, 1982
By DALE FOLKERTS
The AS Board of Directors
Wednesday appointed three stu­dents
to the Presidential Search
Committee, in direct defiance of a
Board of Trustees dictum allowing
only one student on the panel.
Student leaders selected Martin
Smith, Darcy Roenfeldt and AS
presidential hopeful Nancy Lee
Wampler after VA hours of syste­matic
questioning.
Seven students applied for seats
Advocates assess 'clique' rule
Greg Sobel
By DAVE MASON
Two top Associated Students
officers, both proponents of an
experience requirement for the
office of AS president, say they
now may support dropping that
requirement.
"I'm inclined that way," toward
eliminating all requirements
except full-time student status and
letting students decide who is qual­ified,
AS President Greg Sobel
said. He would not say to what
extent he is so "inclined."
Sobel proposed the requirement
for experience in AS organizations
or university committees, which
was adopted by the AS Board of
Directors earlier this month. A
candidate who knows nothing
about student government or
Western is "less likely to be a good
president," Sobel said.
But better coverage of candi­dates
by the AS Public Informa­tion
Office, The Front and more
information from candidates have
shown him voters will know
enough to determine who is most
qualified, Sobel said.
Therese Viator, AS vice presi­dent
for internal affairs, said peo­ple
outside the Associated Stu1
dents have persuaded her that
voters should decide who is eligi­ble,
so the experience requirement
should be dropped. But Viator
added the requirement that presi­dential
candidates attend Western
for five quarters and have a 2.0
grade point average should
remain.
Residency also is required for
vice presidential and at-large
representative candidates, but they
are not required to have previous
(continued on page 3)
on the search panel, which will
seek a successor to out-going Uni­versity
President Paul Olscamp.
Discussion of the search com­mittee
is conspicuously absent
from the agenda for the trustees'
May 6 meeting. AS President Greg
Sobel predicted AS board mem­bers
once again will call on trustees
to address still-unresolved ques­tions
about the trustees* handling
of the presidential search.
While Sobel implied he is ready
to make a deal with the trustees
about what the AS board has
labeled "token" treatment of stu­dents,
he also said, "It's hard to
imagine any way we could accept
less than three" students on the 10-
member panel.
Wampler took the hardest line
of the search panel appointees,
vowing to fight the trustees'
mandate.
"We have to insist on three sut-dents
. . . This is one issue we can­not
back down on," Wampler said.
If the trustees refuse to budge,
Wampler said she thinks a student
boycott protesting the search panel
would be more palatable than
(continued on page 7)
Off-field battle
Gridders fight referendum
AS polling i
auditor charges
By MARK CARLSON
The Associated Students elec­tion
code contains a provision that
is clearly illegal under state law,
Whatcom County Auditor Joan
Ogden said Wednesday.
The stipulation in the code,
which requires that all campaign
propaganda be at least 25 feet from
voter booths, runs contrary to a
state law calling for at least 100 feet
between candidate slogan sheets
and polling stations.
By having campaign materials
within 100 feet of polling booths,
"it would be an illegal election as
far as I'm concerned," Ogden said.
"If it (the AS election) was one of
ours, it would be illegal."
Ogden said students should con­duct
elections "as validly as we
do," and added that "the same
rules should apply."
AS Election Board member
Darcy Roenfeldt shrugged off
Ogden's remarks.
"I differ with her because I feel
25 feet has been honored in all
(previous) elections," Roenfeldt
said.
She also said the 100-foot rule
mandated by state law would be
unrealistic on Western's tightly-spaced.
254-acre campus.
"One hundred feet, in terms of
our campus, would really cut down
on our capacity," Roenfeldt said.
But she added that the 100-foot
rule "may be something to con­sider"
when next year's board
reviews the election code.
AS Election Board Chairman
Art Antram could not be reached
for comment.
The state law also would apply
to any on-campus polling booth
for local, state and federal elec­tions,
Ogden said. She said the ban
Candidates debate
statewide student
lobby —page 3
on campaign materials should
apply to "anything having to do
with political advertising."
The AS Board of Directors has
requested an on-campus polling
station, a request Ogden has said
she probably will spurn.
Ogden's remarks could snarl the
election board's expressed hopes
for a smooth election rather than
last spring's tumultuous fiasco.
That election was declared invalid
by the election board after it dis­covered
that several voting booths
were moved from their advertised
locations, in violation of the elec­tion
code.
Amid an atmosphere of insults
and partisan wrangling, a bitterly
divided AS board eventually over­turned
the election board's ruling.
If Western's football team loses
at the polls next week, it won't be
without a struggle.
The team is organizing a cam­paign
aimed at on-campus stu­dents
to "present the facts about
football," assistant coach Rick
Brudwick said.
Brudwick said football players
will begin ringing doorbells at
campus dorms before the Associ­ated
Students election next "week,
which includes a proposal that, if
implemented, would eliminate the
football program after next
season.
He said the players want to show
students that the program is not as
expensive as many people think.
"We're not speaking out against
the other sports," Brudwick said.
"We're just trying to point out that
football isn't spending all the
money."
Brudwick referred to athletic
department statistics that show on
a player-by-player basis football
(at $570-per-participant) costs less
than basketball ($768) and slightly
more than soccer ($508). The
greater overall cost of football is
because more players are involved,
he added.
Brudwick said he feels the
majority of dorm students favor
supporting football, and getting
them to vote likely will decide the
election.
"We don't want the usual 2,000
students voting when there are
10,000 enrolled," he said.
Brudwick said he hopes students
will focus on the participation as­pect
of football, rather than its
attendance or win-loss record. Par­ticipation
benefits the 55 football
players involved, the fans and the
community, he said, noting that
many Whatcom County residents'
only ties with Western are through
the football team.
He said that turmoil concerning
football, in addition to severely
damaging the recruiting process,
also could scare away students
who want to attend a school that
has a football team. This could
further reduce Service and Activi­ties
funds, he said.
About $60 of each student's
tuition goes toward S&A fees,
which fund a variety of programs
and activities, including football.
; S&A Fee Split Committee Chair­man
Tom Quinlan recently ex­pressed
concern that Western will
experience a major enrollment
decline next year, which would
reduce the S&A fees collected.
The Departmental Related
Activities Committee, an S&A fees
recipient that finances many extra­curricular
activities, unanimously
denounced the proposal to drop
football. Many of DRAC's con­stituents
would benefit from the
redistributed funds now used for
football if the program was
discontinued.
Assistant coach Rick Brudwick discusses strategy designed to
beat back a referendum that would endanger football.
Inside:
Antigone an
ancient trip
—page 8
Panel slams
GOP shams
—page 7