I taanr Ninety-nine years of editorial freedom Vol. C, No. 10 Ann Arbor, Michigan -Wednesday, September 20, 1989 ea s* Hurricane Hugo devastates. thousands SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) - National Guards with automatic rifles patrolled San Juan yesterday to prevent looting after Hurricane Hugo devastated the island, leaving tens of thousands of people homeless and causing food and water shortages. Hugo walloped thenortheastern part of the island, then skirted its populous northern coast on Monday. It churned on to the northwest and toward open water, and whirled past but missed the Dominican Republic. Water in some of areas was reported cut off or in short supply, and resi- dents of poorer communities outside San Juan used buckets to bathe in or to store drinking supplies. Puerto Rican Gov. Rafael Colon said,"This is a tragedy of major pro- portions." He also said that losses from the storm would amount to "hundreds of millions of dollars... At least 50,000 people lost their homes or had them severely damaged." Relief officials asked for cots and plastic sheetings to use for shelters for the thousands of islanders whose homes were crumpled by Hugo, and Colon said he would react by asking the federal government to declare the island, a U.S. commonwealth, a dis- aster area and seek immediate relief aid. MSA new i passes udget ease Cuts to be equalized among committees A resident of Point-A-Pitre looks at the damage caused by hurricane Hugo hurricane killed 80 and left more than 10,000 homeless. However, American Red Cross spokesperson Brian Ruberry said in Washington there were reports of 12 deaths and 100 injuries in Puerto Rico, and that three-fourths of the is- land's residents were without power. Coast Guard vessels from Puerto Rico scoured the waters off the is- land because of reports "there are a lot of people stranded (on boats) out in the water," said Coast Guard Lt. Stan Douglas. The governor initially estimated late Monday that 27,900 people had been made homeless by the hurri- cane. Two people died on Puerto Rico while trying to remove a TV antenna Sunday in preparation for the storm, according to Maria Oronoz of the governor's office. She said no other deaths had been reported on the is- land. At least 25 people in the Associ,, ress on the Place of Victories. The Caribbean died from the storm, said Cizanette Rivera, a spokesperson for the Civil Defense in Puerto Rico. She also said two Puerto Ricans were among those 25 as Hugo slashed through the region Sunday and Monday with 125 mph winds. Looting by machete-wielding mobs was also reported on the island of St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands. by Mark Katz and Josh Mitnick Daily Staff Writers The Michigan Student Assembly overwhelmingly passed a signifi- cantly amended budget last night de- spite persistent objections from President Aaron Williams. By a vote of 26 to 5, with two abstentions, the assembly approved a budget that contained amendments designed to equalize budget cuts orig- inally slated for committees and commissions. Williams repeated charges after the vote that the amendments were politically motivated. "Dolgan and his cohorts have opposed me as long I have been on the assembly," he said. He called the cuts "hasty" and "fiscally irresponsible." Williams de- fended the budget produced by the summer assembly - the budget he proposed at last week's meeting - claiming that every committee and commission had an opportunity to contribute to the budget process, but most didn't choose to participate. One abstention came from Vice President Rose Karadsheh. "Unfortunately it turned out to be a big political move and I didn't want to get involved in that," she said. The amendments were drawn by Rackham Rep. Corey Dolgan and set base cuts of 40 percent for all but two committees. It also reallocated $1,500 from MSA's advertising budget to the Communications and Minority Affairs Committees. After the amendment passed, two attempts to table a vote on the bud- get to next week's meeting failed. Earlier in the meeting, University Vice President for Government Relations Richara Kennedy and Director of Public Relations Walter Harrison each offered presentations explaining their respective roles at the University. Kennedy discussed how the University obtains funding from the state and other sources, and then how that money is disbursed throughout the University via the budget. MSA delegates questioned Harrison about the University's mi- nority recruitment policy. "We don't know what our figures will be (for minority recruitment), but it doesn't look like we'll do as well as we thought we would in terms of first- year students," Harrison said. In other assembly business, rep- resentatives from the Palestinian Solidarity Committee (PSC) made an appearance at the meeting to dis- cuss the experiences of a delegation which traveled to the Middle East this summer. Former MSA delegateMike Peterson and third-year law student Donald Blome were the MSA-spon- sored members of a group which met with "students of all ages" in Israeli- occupied territories, said Tom Abowd, a PSC member who accom- panied the delegation. "We talked with elementary, sec- ondary, and kindergarten students who established underground schools to learn while the schools were closed," he said. The PSC members said it was difficult to meet with Israeli students when they were there. See MSA, Page 2 Political by Noelle Vance Gaily Government Reporter groups seek For the University's College Democrats and College Republicans, political involvement in recent years has mainly focused on congressional and presidential campaigns. But in this off-election year, as membership increases, both groups are seeking a more visible role in campus and state-wide issues. For the Democrats, greater in- volvement begins at the state level, where the issue of abortion is being hotly debated. College Dems., Reps. focus on state, University issues impact issues as their rallying point. "Campus Issues come first," said College Republican Chair Glenn -Kotcher, an LSA senior. "We're looking for the same type of student government that (MSA President) Aaron Williams supports... We don't want MSA to be used as a rad- ical platform for students on campus anymore." Kotcher said the group will lobby MSA for more for campus services like Safewalk, the nighttime walk- See POLITICS, page 5 Rallying behind pro-choice groups like Planned Parenthood and the Ann Arbor National Organization of Women, the Democrats are launching a major campaign to protect what they be- lieve are women's reproductive rights. The issue gives the group a plat- form that most individuals can agree upon, said College Democrats President Roger Kosson, an LSA senior. The urgency of the issue may be one reason membership in the College Democrats increased this year, Kosson said. The Republicans, on the other hand, are looking towards campus ,Area group, fights possible hazardous *dumpl si~te by Sara VanLooy Concerned citizens of a local community are work- ing not only to keep their town free of toxic waste, but to help other midwesterners fight similar piob- lems. Members of Milan Citizens Against Toxic. Substances (M-CATS) have been working for over a year to prevent Milan, a town of 4,500 residents south of Ann Arbor, from becoming home to an 1,800-acre toxic waste dump. The dump is planned by the Augusta Development Corp., and would include an incinerator, holding tanks, and 400 acres of landfill. "This is probably the most important environmen- tal siting decision in recent Michigan history," said Michael Garfield, Environmental Issues Director for the Ecology Center of Ann Arbor. Local residents are concerned. The site includes 140 acres of designated wetlands, and is atop an aquifer (underground water) which extends under Lake Erie. The landfill would be the second largest such operation in the nation, receiving wastes from the entire East Coast. The presence of a railway at one edge of the planned gte suggests that waste will be transported by rail, concerning some M-CATS members who remember the recent derailment in Freeland, Mich., that drove people from their homes for a week. Many worry that this will set a difficult precedent to break. "Building a huge new incinerator/landfill would be counterproductive to efforts to properly man- age toxic waste," said Kimberly Dunbar, chair of M- 'U' students building solar car for 1990 race across country by Ian Hoffman While Icharus dreamed of reaching the Sun, a group of about 75 University stu- dents will be content with just harnessing it. Their work on the solar car Lux Fiat, Latin for "Let there be light," began last January and will culminate in the 32 school, 10-day GM Sunrayce U.S.A. The 1,800- mile race will be run in July, 1990, from the Epcott Center in Florida to the GM Tech Center in Warren University project Chair Susan Fancy, an engineering and LSA senior, said she spends about 35 hours a week coordinating all aspects of the project, including planning, fund raising and publicity. "This is the op- portunity of a lifetime," she said. "Even if I weren't getting credit, I would be doing this." Fancy, along with about 60-100 other engineering students creating the car, will earn three engineering credits. Academic credit is instrumental in draw- ing students to the project, Fancy said. She said about 250 engineering students have shown interest in working on the car. "We were praying that we would get the people, and we obviously did," Fancy said. So far the group's biggest setback has been fundraising; the students are hoping to raise a half million dollars to help bankroll the project. "It's simple - money dictates speed," said second-year Business School student Michael Lynch, the administrative manager of the project. But not all of the students are in the College of Engineering. "This is breaking ground. No project that we know of at the University has ever had the multitude or amount of interdisciplinary scope of this one," said technical consultant Bill Kaliardos, an engineering senior. There are 12 Business School students, as well as others with art, meteorology, jour- nalism and math backgrounds, devoting their time to perfect the Lux Fiat. Though primarily student run, engineer- ing Prof. Bill Rivens serves as a faculty ad- visor to the project. "Rivens serves as an in- terface between students and the things they need," Kaliardos said. "He cuts through the red tae. The purpose of the first ever GM-spon- sored Sunrayce is twofold, said Tom Stumpo, the race's public relations director. "We are holding this race for the benefit of student engineers in North America and be- cause we think it will serve as a vehicle to encourage young people to go on to careers in science and engineering," he said. See RACE, page 2 ASlot.d Press And you thought we had it bad... Students at Michigan State University search the stacks of an East Lansing bookstore. Classes begin this week at MSU; maybe these poor students will be out of line in time. Come to think of it, when did MSU students learn how to read? Gorbachev attempts to reform Kremlin