, 01 OPINION Page 4 Wednesday, December 9, 1981- The Michigan Daily Will the Cellar stay in the Union? By Richard Barr While students should look forward to the renovation and rejuvenation of the Michigan Union as the student center on campus, actions of the Michigan Union Director and others in the University of Michigan Office of Student Services may be depriving 'students, faculty, staff, and other Ann Arbor residents of an important resource: the discount college bookstore in the Union. The University Cellar was formed around 1970 after student protests over the excessive prices then charged by local private bookstores. Opened with the aid of a student assessment (which was refundable) and a grant from the University of Michigan, the. Cellar provided the community with discounts ranging from 5 percent to 15 percent off suggested retail prices when most, if not all, other similar stores charged full retail prices. The oversight of a board of directors composed of students, faculty and University administrators has guided the University Cellar and has assured that it continuesto serve the needs of the local community. Frank Cianciola, director of the Union, has decided to impose a 65 per- cent rent increase on the University Cellar. Furthermore, he has decided to force the bookstore to pay for about $400,000 of construction costs that are necessary only because he insists on moving the Cellar from its' present location in the basement of the Union to a far less desirable location down the hall. While most businesses might be able to adapt to this imposition by working out concessions from their landlord, the Cellar has run into a brick wall when it comes to seeking reasonable assistance from its landlord. The University Cellar, like all other bookstores in Ann Arbor, is not allowed to sell Michigan souvenir items because the Union insists on having exclusive, monopolistic rights to these items in the Union. Seeking to understand the rationale behind this insistance, I have spoken with Mr. Cianciola. His respon- ses to our inquiries have been evasive pay him a fee for the "right" to sell souvenirs in an ampunt equal to his ex- pected profits, he changed his rationale to concerns about whether a bookstore should be selling souvenirs. When we explained that practically every other college bookstore in the country is allowed to sell souvenirs, he changed his mind once again, turning to "we won't discuss the issue anymore," as a response to our cooperative desire to act in the best interests of the com-. munity by selling the products deman- ded. I have been a student at, the Univer- sity for seven years now, and have never heard such evasive non- responses to an organization-such as the University Cellar-that is desperately trying to fulfill its mission as a service to the community. I have ,heard administrators in the Office of" Student Services tell me that the University does not have any obligation to negotiate the terms of a multi-million dollar lease with the University-Cellar. "Take it or leave it," we are told. It might just be that the Cellar will have to "leave it." This will be a great loss to the Union: Surveys indicate that 55 percent of the students going into the Union go there because the Cellar is there. Students will be hurt too, because they will lose a student bookstore that has guaranteed -students substantial discounts for coursebooks and supplies. The University has pushed the student bookstore around because they think the students don't care. They think that this typical bureaucratic treatment of students is alright because they have gotten away with such insen- sitivity every other time. It's time for students to tell the University that they care about having a student discount bookstore. For if Mr. Cianciola and othersin the University's Office of "Student Services" think students don't care about having the Cellar around, it will be gone next year. Barr is a third year law student and the chairman of the Finance Committee of the University Cellar Board of Directors. A person browses at the University Cellar. at best. At one meeting, for example, he told me and other representatives of the Cellar that his estimates indicated he would make more money selling souvenirs if the Cellar were not com- peting with him. He claims that that is better for the students. When we responded by offering to 01 I l e tigan+ ttil W easel By Robert Lence Edited and managed by students at The University of Michigan 410 Maynard St. Yol XCII, No. 74 Ann Arbor, MI 48109 Editorials represent a majority opinion of the Daily's Editorial Board Developmental aid HE- 6 ooi-v a puE our ANY MINUTE. NOW. tnlHor I WEASEL.? t r " E T v I THER9HMEIt5 LKE A t~I~o.5e~ ' -yur L- WELL, sM ? "L-TTE BABY m~r? 110J WA Kr5 t* PTE t$. 8E1boe Apk4 CeQjsSOME n, oF M Mi;MA)6 ,MAI4 twrb TWIX a4sse, 1ii/VGC5 AU 416 IMLS! W44A1T cUTS! A MAL P-f (N&BRg~J,! 74iI rWAA6 TH6 papa 9? AATf, WGASa ! S THAt A - HEL L, S Cou7vF- 5LZPf FOR A1a"ell WEEK AT L&WT! THIS F cFMg R. 9. ismIr eves Gctw ro DE A BHA LLL N6E . ' cl J 4 r( 1 III 01 T HEY CALL IT "developmental aid." That's what the U.S. Com- merce Department has termed an ef- fort to send 86,000 pen-and-pencil sets' to school children in Cambodia. 'And, since the United States does not. recognize the Vietnamese-backed government in Cambodia, it is against U.S. policy to export any of this "developmental aid" to the people of this nation. Pretty foolish, isn't it? What this "developmental aid" consists of are denim bags containing notebooks, pen- cils, a ballpoint, an eraser, and a ruler. Officials of the Mennonite Church have organized a drive among children in the United States and Canada to make the sets in order to send them to the Cambodian officials. Mennonite officials have maintained that because the United States bombed Cambodia during the Vietnam war, it has some responsibility for the people there and, because school items are in particularly short supply there, they decided to send them. But the U.S. government has opted to stop them .from exporting the supplies to the children of this "strategic" nation. Who knows, perhaps the gover- nment fears that, armed with pens and pencils as weapons, these school children will march into Thailand and other nations spreading wicked corm- munism. Or perhaps, very simply, the children will have access tosome lear- ning aids which, in the long run, might help the country. The United States can progress much further in its foreign policy by supporting the people of all nations and creating a positive image of the United States around the world. Cutting off school supplies for children is no way to do that. LETTERS TO THE DAILY: Sowell artile shows sleeping elitism To the Daily: In "Sowell: Racism as Mythology" (December 4), Douglas Newman maintains that Ronald Reagan's economic policies are not "racist in in- tent"; neither, it would seem, is Newman's article racist in in- tent. But its sleeping elitist insen- sitivity is deadly. While praising the exodus of certain nineteenth-century, white ethnic groups from poverty into prosperity, Newman suggests that the sweatshops and subhuman dwellings endured by Jewish, Polish, and Irish im- migrants were simply a necessary evil, a normal stage in transit from a hungry nightmare to the American dream. He ex- pects that blacks, similarly, will integrate into the socio-economic mainstream of the United States, if only they are "left to their own devices," without the dreadful burden of a fair chance, in the form of heartless governmental assistance. Newman offers as supporting evidence the low position of American Indians on the "economic ladder": they, of all ethnic groups, have enjoyed "the closest involvement with the United States government." And who could deny that our gover- nment's close involvement with American Indians-particularly the intimacy of a series of delightful wars, kindly atrocities, and fair treaties-is the greatest single cause of their distress? Newman's belief that. programs like affirmative action, rent control, and minimum wage laws are obstacles to' the economic survival of minority groups betrays a false innocence loaded with dynamite. Sympathizing with black leaders in their condemnation of Reaganomics is not a suggestion that "blacks cannot think and get for themselves." It is a recognition of immediate, for- midable, racist barriers to economic and social dignity. The testimony of one revolutionary black economist may ease Mr. Reagan's conscience, but it can- not erase the simple fact that his administration is worsening the shameful inequities of an unjust past, by crippling impoverished urban minority groups while cut- ting the taxes of the wealthy white administrators-and Stan- ford economists of any color. Racism is real. It will not go away if we put quotation marks around the words, "black problem." Neither will racism{go away if we call it a myth. Nor if we groan about the "statist\.0 remedies" of "liberal mythology. When we begin, using the power of a university education to fight, not perpetuate, the blindness of selfish political regression, then we will have begun realistically to fight racism. But platitudinous innocence and wishful thinking will not do the job. -Michael Piret December 5 Apology not needed r 1'lleI ~ N VlkOWMNTAL E XTKEM15T5 1'AVSGENE SN TO I' 6R &EA K AND~ A FRONT MYAN FOR ITIE 1OLAN a '&AS CONPAW C- 1Th5Y'RC- CALLIN& ME ARR&AWN, EL'-" Rl(-yHTS", .FAI CAL.. FLATTERY WlAU L&ET TKWM MOW14ER To the Daily: Note is made of the November 18 letter to the Daily by Co- Chairpersons of the Washtenaw County Chapter of the National Black Independent Political Par- ty (NIBPP). The letter referred to the October 29 exhibition of the film, Birth of a Nation, at the Michigan Theatre. A representative of NBIPP met with the undersigned prior to that exhibition. At that time he let me know of the Party's feelings' about the scheduled event, and I let him know that I appreciated his coming to see me about it. He was also informed:' (1) The City of Ann Arbor had, nothing to do with that showing. , (2) The film was not being presented at taxpayer expense. (3) The City of Ann Arbor does not operate the Theatre. Michigan Community Theatre. Foundation, Inc. (MCTF) does. (4) Renting the Michigan from MCTF, a private commercial group (Classic Film Theatre) was presenting the film. (5) It is not the business of MC- TF to decide what a group shall or shall not put on in the theatre, so long as that tenant pays its bills and does no damage to the building. So, MCTF would not prevent the movie's being shown. (6) Further, it appears to me that minorities would be the first Nation (in part): i "This statement is presented on behalf of Classic Film Theatre, organist Dennis, James, the officers and mem- bers-of Michigan Community Theatre Foundation, and myself. "We find that the film, "Birth of a Nation", presents history inaccurately. "We abhor the racjal bias pictured in the piece. "We admire the work done in Ann Arbor to unify minorities within the general quality of life, and do not in- tend to exacerbate the good feelings current in the most of our community. "Also, however, the film exists. It is an example of cinematography the presentors feel should not be ignored. And as a work of technical art it needs to be shown at its best-with the proper tints in the print, with full screen, in a large theater, and with a fine organist playing the full, original score. "That we are doing - in the person of America's most scholarly and skilled expert of Debt owed GEO To the Daily: One of the TA s quoted in the Dec. 2 article about GEO stated that "anything that was won [for graduate students] wasn't won because of GEO." As participants in the 1975 *strike former members of the union executive committee, we would like to correct this impression. First, 'in 1974 the University administration was going to eliminate tuition reductions traditionally given to TA s and SA s. Vigorous unionization effor- ts prevented what would have been financial disaster for most graduate assistants. Second, we do not have a "natural right" to health in- surance. Other -University em- ployees are only insured if they. work, half time or more. In the 1975 contract (the only one the administration ever signed, won in the strike) GEO won health in- surance benefits for graduate reason to suppose that we would still have these benefits without the union.f Ms. Vitzhum's statement was in error in another respect. She said that we have a closed shop. We do not. In a closed shop, everyone must join the union. We have an agency shop. Those who wish to join the union do so, and pay union dues. All others who are protected by the contract pay an agency shop fee,' which may not, exceed union dues. Money from non-members can't be used for political purposes. This system is common to many unionized workplaces. All of us owe a debt of gratitude to the, union members and leaders who have worked hard since 1976 to ensure our right to have a union. They have given a great deal of time and energy to this fight, even when it seemed many GSA s didn't care about it. We also owe a debt ofgratitude to C) 1 i I