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Eighty-Seven Years of Editorial Freedom
420 Maynard St., Ann Arbor, M1 48109
Tuesday, February 22, 1977
News Phone: 764-0552
Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan
GEO faces a tough ight
Well, the University has denied it a thous-
and times since negotiations with GEO be-
gan, but it's beginning to look as though
the charges were accurate - the adminis-
tration is out to bust the union.
This is a powerful charge, and not one
that we make lightly. But, in view of the
University's actions over the weekend, we
would be hard pressed to reach any other
conclusion.
Thursday, GEO presented a proposal to
the Regents to end the haggling that has
been going on since last spring over a con-
tract for the 1900 GSA's at this University.
Yesterday, the details of that proposal were
released. The union basically complied with
the offer that the administration made on
November 18, the day negotiations broke
down. On that day every item of the con-
tract wassettled except one - the clause
determined who was covered by the agree-
ment. The union had (and still has) a, griev-
ance pending against the University con-
.erning this clause, and the administration's
bargainers refused to sign a contract un-
less this grievance was withdrawn. Al-
though GEO refused at the time, it has re-
considered, and decided to accept its fate
and withdraw the grievance. But, although
the union's proposal of last week is es-
sentially the same as the University's last
offer, it is the administration who now re-
fuses to settle on those terms.
In a statement released yesterday, chief
University bargainer John Forsyth told
GEO President Doug Moran that the Uni-
versity intends to fight this matter in the
courts, and with the Michigan Employment
Relations Commission (MERC).
This is simply unbelievable.
They are trying to settle a contract that
will be retroactive to September 1, nearly
5 months ago, and yet the University has
spurned a most reasonable offer in favor
of dragging this matter out even further.
Since any MERC decision can be appealed
all the way to the courts, this single dis-
pute could forestall the signing of a con-
tract for up to four years!
This morning at 10:00, the two sides will
meet with a MERC representative in the
first step of the legal battle to come. GEO
has tried everything to avoid a long delay
in this settlement, but the University has
been totally unresponsive. It seems clear
the University never took the union serious-
ly once the strike vote failed, and it seems
equally clear that the administration is
out to destroy GEO. For example, at to-
day's meeting the University plans to pur-
sue the legal question of whether or not
GSA's are employees or students. As ludi-
crous as this sounds, the University ac-
tually has precedent on its side. In a simi-
lar case, the teaching assistants at Stanford
University were ruled to be students, not
employees. If the administration wins this
case, it would spell the end of GEO, for
without employees there can be no union.
Without a union, GSA's would be at the
University's mercy - a familiar depend-
ence to all us undergraduates, and one that
we would not like to see inflicted upon
anyone, much less GSA's. But, since the
administration has firmly stated that it in-
tends to fight this matter to the end, we
no longer even have much to hope for. A
speedy settlement is out of the question,
and we can only pray that the courts re-
cognize the University's intentions of de-
stroying the union, and will rule in favor
of GEO. But whatever way the decision
goes, it will take a long time. And that's
no good for any of us-except the Univer-
sity.
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NOW THAT THE federal straitjacket is off, the nat-
ural gas business may become profitable enough to
encourage new drilling and exploration. And now that
consumers will be forced to play what natural gas is
worth, they may finally abandon their spendthrift habits.
Higher energy prices are probably the best way to
ensure energy conservation. Everyone understands mon-
ey. But an equally compelling reason was broached by
President Carter (during a rare fit of sanity) in his fire-
side chat.
The amount of energy Americans waste is roughly
equal to the amount of foreign energy - gas and oil
- that we import. Therefore, Carter observed, we can
achieve energy independence almost immediately through
a concerted program of energy conservation.
ENERGY INDEPENDENCE should be a foremost na-
tional goal. If the United States is to maintain its po-
litical strength and independence, its slavish dependence
of foreign energy must be broken.
Actions which tend to compromise the strength and
independence of the United States cannot and must not
be tolerated. The current prodigal and senseless waste
of energy compromises our independence, and must be
brought to a halt.
Rising prices and voluntary sacrifices will cut con-
sumption somewhat. But stronger measures will be nec-
essary. Incentives should be provided for conservation.
Tax credits for the installation of storm windows, in-
sulation, and more efficient heating systems would be
a good start. But such incentives must be coupled with
penalties for continued prodigality. A heavily graduated
tax on home consumption of fossil fuels and electricity
would encourage citizens to limit waste.
Greatest of all will be the psychic rewards of con-
servation. Energy independence will provide a pacific
means for inflicting on third-rate Middle Eastern poten-
tates the humiliation and degradation they so richly
deserve.
TO TI
MAR-
My KCUAlS
'by CHUCK ANESI
LOW MEMA
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DOWRM R
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Not just another love story
Should AFSCME settle ?
THIS afternoon, hundreds of campus food
service, maintenance, hospital and
grounds workers will vote on whether to
accept the terms of a new contract with
the University.
It's not our policy to make any recom-
mendations to a local branch of the Ameri-
can Federation of State, County and Munic-
ipal Employees (AFSCME), but seeing as
their decision may determine whether stu-
dents have to suffer the effects of a mas-
sive strike and a possible shut down of this
campus, we feel our views are fundamen-
tal.
To AFSCME: Face, it, the offer of about
a five per cent wage increase is all you are
going to see this year from your employer.
That amount is all any of the other campus
unions have seen. You couldn't realistically
have expected to receive the 15 per cent
increase which you were seeking. The Uni-
versity's financial problems which you read
about every day are not the figment of
some fat administrator's imagination. In-
flation is not only a problem facing you,
it is threatening the students, the programs
and the principles of this University. Your
bargaining team worked to make up eco-
nomic disappointments by establishing new
benefits in the way of job promotion and
transfer procedures, and upgrading in work
classifications. While wages may mean
the most to you as individuals, they are
only a small portion of the settlement.
Think about the rest of your contract, and
ask yourself, frankly, if you could really
get any more than you have already re-
ceived.
TO THE University: While you would like
to think of yourself simply as an
institution for learning,the fact is you are
also an industry. You function through peo-
ple, and these people must eat. When you
tell AFSCME that your cupboard is bare,
you are only saying that the cupboard is
bare for AFSCME. It's an old tactic that
is year by year more infuriating. The time
has come to change priorities. You may not
be able to do anything about changing your
priorities this year, but you've go to do
something about it next year. All the unions
on campus took five per cent pay increases
this year while the cost of living went up
nearly seven per cent. This is an outrage.
Our AFSCME employees already make less
than their counterparts at every other Uni-
versity in this state, and now they are
being asked to take what amounts to a
pay decrease! Well, they aren't going to
take it much longer. The time has come
to reallocate funds so that you'll be able to
offer employees a contract that doesn't in-
sult them. It is time to give them wage
parity with the other campus service work-
ers in the state. Their jobs may not be very
prestigious, but they, like your faculty, are
the workhorses of your industry, and they
deserve better.
HAVING A JOB which requires my attendance
H during the evening hours, I rarely have a
chance to sample TV's treats. (It is for this
reason that I have, thankfully, missed Char-
ley's Angels). But every now and then I luck
onto a program that is worth watching. One
of which is often Tom Snyder's Tomorrow
Show.
Just the other night, for example, they had
a remarkable pair on the show, by name of
Mr. and Mrs. Burt Pugach. Pugach is (was?)
a lawyer from New York who was very much
in love with a woman named Linda. So much,
in fact, that in a fit of jealousy and rage he
hired three men to throw lye in her face, blind-
ing her, as he says, so that no one else would
want her.
To make a long story short, and to avoid
having to mention dates of which I am not
sure, Burt Pugach was sent up the river; did
in fact about fifteen years of time, and of course
was disbarred. During the course of that time,
he wrote letters to Linda, which she received
and complained vocally about to the police
(though, as she told Snyder, she actually en-
joyed receiving), and also received phone calls.
Pugach was really quite ingenious about getting
hold of her unlisted number. He did some kind
of fandango with a con artist he met in the
pen. It seems that there was some kind of
flaw in this guy's case, and Pugach agreed to
do legal work for him if he'd procure T.inda's
phone number. The man got trie numoer. tnougn
Pugach never said if he delivered with the legal
help. Let us hope so.
In any case, after he was paroled, under the
terms, he was not allowed to contact Linda per-
sonally in any way, shape, or form. But ap-
parently the idea that she might contact Burt
was not excluded.. So he was invited onto two
separate talk shows in New York - one on
Channel 5 and the other on Channel 11, and
proposed to her right there and then, over the
air.
Well, she got into contact with him and ac-
cepted, also virtually on the spot (this was
1974), and they were married.
And for once in my life I wished I was Tom
Snyder. Thing of all the marvellous questions
one could ask!! Of course, Snyder got off quite
a few all on his own. At one point he asked
Linda, after first obtaining general agreement
to the statement that all married couples have
their quarrels, doesn't she ever have the urge,
in anger, to throw this thing back in his face,
to say, in effect, "look what you've done to me!"
Up and .COMMng
By JEFFREY P. SELBST -
She replied that, no, once she decided to
marry him she put all that behind her, some-
thing that's obviously there (she said as she
pointed to her dark glasses) but not talked
about. I guess that's fair. She knew what she
was marrying after all.
Snyder asked Pugach how he would handle
his case, were he another lawyer to whom
Burton Pugach had come for defense. Pugach
responded, after a moment, that no, what he
himself had done would not affect the confi-
dence any would-be client should have in him,
were he to have his license to practice law
reinstated.
Snyder paused a moment. Clearly this wasn't
a question he had asked. And just as he was
rephrasing the one he had intended to (and in
fact did) ask, the show cut for a commercial.
. It seems to me that Pvjgach and Linda must
share a certain non-hearing kind of capacity
that allows answers to be given questions never
asked. I wonder how it would be possible to
survive otherwise. Think of the mental anguish
the two of them probably have to go through,
enduring the embarrased behavior and con-
strained uncomfortable silences the two of them
must have to endure from well-meaning ac-
quaintances. I think aural selectivity niust be-
come automatic, as a defense mechanism.
Well, the two of them are begging for it.
They wrote a book just out, called "A Differ-
ent Kind of Love Story," which I'll concede is
probably a fair assessment, and have done the
talk-show round to promote it. Linda describes
the agony of reliving their ordeal as a needed
therapy.
What it amounts to, is self-aggrandizement
of a punishment seeking type. This should sur-
prise no one. They must both be gluttons for
it.
But it rebounds on them, of course, for Sny-
der's next guest was Max Rabinowitz, author of
"The Day They Scrambled My Brains at the
Funny Factory," also just out. Anyone who
watches much Snyder will know that he com-
poses thematic programs, and lumping the
Pugaches together with Rabinowitz becomes a
subtle editorial comment on their mental
health.
Which I think was rather unneeded, because
obviously the point is certainly made without
help from some sly producer. Oh, well.
Ho-hum, dorm rates are up
ITS GETTING TO BE monotonous.
On Saturday, the Regents made official
what was already a foregone conclusion-
raising dorm rates 8.4 per cent. What this
means in terms of dollars and cents to a
university community nearing the financial
breaking point is that those who wish to
live in the solitary splendor of a dorm single
will now pay $1,906 for the privilege. Those
wishing to partake in the experience of hav-
ing one roommate must dish out $1,638, or
if they want to have this experience on a
low budget, they can have a dorm "econo-
my" double or triple for the low, low price
of only $1,444.
Where is it all going to end?
THE UNIVERSITY of Michigan offers its
students the highest dorm rates of any
state-supported institution of higher learning
in Michigan. Our dorm rates are also sig-
nificantly higher than any university in the
Big Ten.
Edintriat Staff
What do Michigan dorm residents re-
ceive for all of the extra money that they
spend?
Michigan dormitories give residents 13
meals per week. Other Big Ten universi-
ties offer their dorm dwellers either 20 or
21 meals per week. No fringe benefits
there.
Many Big Ten schools provide linen ser-
vice in the dorms. Here at Michigan, we
have broken down, lint infested washing
machines that are located in the dusty dorm
basements and cost 25 cents a load. Cer-
tainly no fringe benefits there.
So where then is the difference made up?
Housing Director John Feldkamp alluded
to one possible answer when he said that
our dorm rates are "below the rates charg-
ed by our academic peers." Aha! We're
paying for prestige. All of the extra money
is spent propagating the mighty Michigan
myth that it is the educational equal of
Harvard, Stanford and Yale.
IN LIEU OF more plausible explanations,
we can only assume that we are pay-
ing exorbitant housing rates as a status
symbol. Whatever the reasoning, it is bla-
tantly obvious that students living in Mich-
igan dormitories are paying higher rates
and receiving inferior service that fellow
institutions in the state and among its con-
ference affiliated peers.
Coupled with a possible tuition hike, the
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Editorial Staff
LIPINSKI
Editors-in -Chief
ANN MARIE1
JIM TOBIN
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