4 - The Michigan Daily - Tuesday, January 31, 1995


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JEAN TWENGE

THE ERASABLE PEN

420 Maynard
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
Edited and managed by
students at the
University of Michigan

Ir

MICHAEL ROSENBERG
Editor in Chief
JULIE BECKER
JAMES NASH
Editorial Page Editors

'Laundiymat 2 bis, bed in
kitchen' -the hunt begins

Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of a majority of the Daily's editorial board. All
other articles, letters, and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily.
The curtain rises
... and the code stars in comedy of errors

The University has finally held its first
open hearing of a case tried under the
Statement of Student Rights and Responsi-
bilities, otherwise known as the code. Ini-
tially, the University attempted to hide be-
hind a misconstrued code clause, which sev-
eral law experts clearly showed to be a paper-
thin excuse for secrecy. When this misbegot-
ten maneuver failed, the hearing was an-
nounced open only hours before it took place
and only after the complainant, Yaakov Lavie,
agreed to open the proceedings because he
wanted the hearing to commence - and
Melanie Welch, the defendant, refused to
attend a closed hearing. Despite the eleventh-
hour fumbling, making the hearing public
was a positive measure. It was a move toward
the openness so essential to protection of
student rights. However, the botched pro-
ceedings quickly overshadowed any possible
gains, validating concerns
that students and others
have been expressing for a
long time. The process byx
which the code handles stu--
dent cases is lax, inadequate£
and unfair.£
Lavie was pressing as-
sault and harassments
charges against Welch for aa
1993 incident in which
Welch allegedly attempted
to spray water at his wife
andchildren,kickedhimand
scratched his wife. Welch
was irritated at Lavie's
smoking habit, but denied
dousing him with a garden °
hose. AtFriday's code hear-1
ing,Welch was found guilty A peek into the c
ofharassment but cleared of revealed little, as
the assault charge. prohibited photog
Welch's few reasonable taking pictures of
requests at the beginning
of the hearing were categorically denied. She
submitted three procedural motions: to allow
her attorney to represent her, to limit testi-
mony to include events not more than six
months before the complaint was filed, and to
allow media tape recorders at the meeting, or
at least to release a copy of the official record-
ing to the press. The request for a lawyer was
flatly rejected - as would be expected under
the code, which denies defendants the repre-
sentation of counsel despite the supposedly
"legal" nature of the proceedings. Judicial
Advisor Mary Lou Antieau admitted evi-
dence predating the six-month limit, yet could
not point to the part of the code that backed up
her decision - though it is solely her job to
be an expert on code interpretation. Faculty
chair English Prof. Peter Bauland forbade
audio taping because of a "possibility of
exploitation," but refused to elaborate and
discussion on the matter was squelched. One
must question whose interest is being repre-
sented in these hearings.
Moreover, the officers presiding over the
process and making judgments were unprofes-
sional, even bordering on immature. Bauland
found itnecessary tominterject opinionated com-
ments and added procedural rules not specifi-

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cally stated in the code. Jurors interacted
with the participants, and one juror com-
plained to Welch of "losing concentration,"
indicating that a sound decision would not be
reached. Welch was allowed to address the
panel without Lavie or Antieau present.
Also, several discrepancies exist in the
information presented in the hearing. Two
different filing dates are mentioned. The De-
partment of Public Safety report differs from
the Housing Division report, which in turn
differs from the county court records. Prior to
the hearing, Antieau admitted shredding a
version of a complaint that mentioned Lavie's
ethnicity as a cause forharassment, andreplac-
ing it with a falsely dated document.
This case is a typical example of how the
code jeopardizes rather than protects students'
rights. Charges against Welch had already
been dismissed by Washtenaw County Dis-
trict Court. The code hear-
ing only served to try Welch
a second time for the same
tk .set of alleged events -and
to whose benefit? Lavie is
not a University student,
yet was allowed to file
charges under the code.
Welch is a student and
wanted to file against Lavie
under the code, but could
not because of his non-stu-
dent status. Whom is the
code protecting?
The code is ablatant vio-
lationof civil liberties. Lore
Rogers, chair of the
Washtenaw County ACLU,
stated, "There's a problem
le proceedings with the issue of the Univer-
he University sity of Michigan personnel
iphers from essentially functioning as
he hearing prosecuting attorney and
judge." Rogers quite cor-
rectly believes that the University should
abolish the non-academic offenses because
"there are criminal and civil laws that would
apply to anyone who is aggrieved in that
area."
Last night, a student panel had secured the
necessary quorum to make amendments to the
code. While this fourth attempt to open the
documenttorevisions is long overdue, ithardly
guarantees a democratic code. The panel should
force the University to shed light on code
hearings.
With the code the University imposes
unnecessary burdens on students, going be-
yond its jurisdiction as an educational facil-
ity. This case points to the code's utter inad-
equacy to fulfill its intended purpose. The
code does exactly the opposite of what the
administration claims - time and again, it
wreaks havoc on the life of students. Cer-
tainly Antieau's at best blundering interpre-
tations of the document add to the inherent
procedural flaws. However, even if imple-
mented properly the code is a flimsy pretense
at providing justice. This first glimpse at a
code hearing has confirmed what students
have voiced from the beginning: The code
must be abolished.

M y apartment search this year began
with the classifieds. I was doing an
optimistic scan when an ad caught my eye:
"Carlson Properties is all rented. Leasing
for May 1997 begins October 1, 1996."
If we started signing leases any earlier in
Ann Arbor, we'd be looking for next year's
apartment before we moved into this year's.
At least it would be warm then - the
current system gives the apartment hunter
the added pleasure of waiting for landlords
in ice-filled parking lots in subfreezing tem-
peratures.
Finding an apartment is a time-consum-
ing process that requires many precise steps,
all taken eight to 10 months before you
actually expect to move in. There are three
basic ways to begin your apartment search:
1) the classifieds, where you will learn the
language of euphemism (Do not be fooled.
"Cute" means small. "Studio," as the book
"Entry Level Life" puts it, means
"Habitrail."), 2) the flyers at the Housing
office, where, blinded by yellow and fuch-
sia paper, students plunk down the equiva-
lent of a semester's tuition for anything
close to campus ("anything" = closet), and
3) asking your friends with the only good
apartment in Ann Arbor if they're moving
out, beg them to move out when they say
they're not, and finally hide yourself in their

cabinets banging pots together until they're
convinced the place is haunted. Success at
last!
Once you've skipped your classes for a
week to go looking for places, it's time to
get organized. What is important to you in a
place to live? Size? Parking? Price? Run-
ning water? "Ideally," says Entry Level
Life, "you want an apartment with such
amenities as roof, walls and floor, but you
may have to settle for something afford-
able."
Then it's time to start pounding the
pavement. Plan to see at least 15 apart-
ments, because by the last one you'll be so
sick of seeing apartments that you'll sign
the lease right then and there, on your knees.
It's a good idea to take notes, but since
you're trying to look around, take notes and
look attentive at the same time, they're
likely to be entirely illegible. "Laundrymat
2 bls," "clothing area in bedroom," and'"bed
in kitchen" were a few of the gems I scribbled
and now have no clue how to interpret.
After a while you'll get even better at
understanding landlord's descriptions.
"Modern building" means a square brick
monstrosity with metal stairs left over from
the 1960s and '70s building craze.'"Charm-
ing" means that the bathroom will have a
slanted ceiling which makes it impossible to

stand up and take a shower, or better yet, a
coat closet converted to a bathroom. "Great
campus location" means you will be sur-
rounded by people whose idea of a week-
night is a headbanger party with 50 of their
closest friends. "Furnished" means a couch
that has recently become the mailing ad-
dress for numerous fleas, roaches, empty
Cheetos bags and 1970s remote controls
with the cord still attached to the television.
Looking for an apartment is easier if you
have no life. Portraying myself as a quiet,
studious grad student (which is actually
pretty close to the truth) was the ticket in to
several places I saw. My cat, on the other
hand, was the ticket out. Instead of asking
"Do you allow pets?" I probably should
have asked, "What will you do to my cat if
he just happens to follovime home?"
Fortunately my apartment search ended
Saturday. I found a very nice apartment
on Packard which has the added advan-
tage of costing less than my monthly TA
check. Now all I have to do is find a
storage space for that mysterious last week
in August when all Ann Arbor apartment-
dwellers are left homeless and wandering
around State Street fighting with the bums
for the best doorhang. I'd better find one
now, before all of the spaces are taken for
August 1997.


Jim LASSER

SHARP AS TOAST

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BANK
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NOTABLE QUOTABLE
"Unit schmoonit.
Iwas in a
paratrooper unit
and never jumped
out of a plane for
God's sake."
- English Prof Peter
Bauland, faculty chair at
Friday's code hearing,
dismissing a question
about the complainant's
military service

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LETTERs

Code abridges
student rights
To the Daily:
Sifting through the Univer-
sity's Statement of Student
Rights and Responsibilities is a
game of "Guess What's Uncon-
stitutional?" The University has
used the convenience of federal
mandates on sexual assault and
sexual harassment and drugs and
alcohol to implement an unnec-
essarily broad-based code of
non-academic behavior. The ap-
plication and interpretation of
this code raise serious questions
of constitutionality.
As members of the Univer-
sity community, students are
guaranteed rights in Article IX
of the MSA constitution. Stu-
dents' rights such as jurisdic-
tion over Non-academic Rules
(Clause 13 under the MSA con-
stitution), governance by a
Democratic Government
(Clause 15), right to Due Pro-
cess (Clause 19), and protection
from Double Jeopardy (Clause
20) are systematically violated
by the code's policies.
The very existence of the
code is superfluous. While fed-
eral law requires University
policies on specific issues, the
present code goes well beyond
these mandates. City and state
laws are sufficient for the pros-
ecution of criminal and civil
violations. Allowing charges
under both the code and public
laws puts students in double
jeopardy, as they can be tried
for the same crime twice.

The score in the game is
grim, as students lose to a code
of questionable constitutional-
ity.
Brian Elliott
MSA Engineering represen-
tative
Fiona Rose
MSA LSA representative
Code flawed
To the Daily:
The faculty moderator of
Friday's 10-hour Lavie-Welch
hearing stated: "I'm not inter-
ested in the procedure ... I'mjust
interested in getting at the truth."
But is.it possible to get remotely
near the truth in the system cur-
rently dictated by the code? In a
procedure biased by its methods,
we think not. The "open" Lavie-
Welch hearing raises serious
questions about the rights of the
media and other interested par-
ties under the First Amendment
and the Freedom of Information
Act. Though the hearing was
"opened" at the last minute, the
procedure suppressed the rights
of the press. Claiming a prece-
dent she could not cite, Judicial
Adviser Mary Lou Antieau de-
nied all independent access to
photographic, audio or video
records of the proceedings. The
"official recordings" of the hear-
ing will be unavailable to any
party not directly involved in
the case, while the University
will deny copies even to the
complainant and the accused.
While a non-student may
charge a student it is of question-

take their responsibility seri-
ously. But 'even after being
trained in a day-long session,
part of which was closed dis-
cussion, they were not familiar
with the code's procedures.
Other questions center
around judicial objectivity.
Welch requested a student panel
hearing, to which Lavie acqui-
esced. However, the judicial
adviser and faculty moderator
were present during "closed"
deliberations of the student
panel, including the final deci-
sion and sanctioning. (MSA's
Disclosure Amendment ad-
dresses and improves these is-
sues.) Civil liberties are further
violated in that neither party
may have attorney representa-
tion in the proceedings.
Anne Marie Ellison
Pamela Short
Students' Civil Liberties
Watch
Daily distorts
gun control
To the Daily:
Your Jan. 23 editorial,
"Outgunning the NRA," shows
your ignorance of firearms and
firearm laws is nearly matched
by your disregard for journalis-
tic integrity. You praise the
Brady Law, claiming it has "pre-
vented more than 23,000 pos-
sible felons from purchasing
firearms over the counter." Pos-
sible felons? You're saying you
don't know if these people were
felons or not, but they were de-

You state that the Crime Bill
of 1994 only bans "19 types of
automatic and semi-automatic
weapons." My ignorant editors,
automatic weapons have been
banned from civilian use since
the .1930s! Although only 19
types of firearms were banned
by name, over 100 other types
were banned because they pos-
sessed a combination of cos-
metic features which some
equally ignorant bureaucratic
fool decided to make them look
dangerous. You had best hope
that some safety-minded bu-
reaucrat doesn't someday de-
cide that opinion pages are also
dangerous to the public good.
Calling for the adoption of a
British-style gun club system
illustrates your naivete. The
British system is rife with gov-
ernmental abuses of its abso-
lute control over gun owner-
ship, and the state continues to
find ways to fully remove fire-
arms from its subjects' hands.
If you knew any gun owners,
you would know they would
accept such a system about as
readily as the media would ac-
cept governmental censorship.
American gun owners are
angry and tired of being blamed
for the diseases found in
America's urban sprawl.
They're also sick of a blatantly
biased news media. That is why
the National Rifle Association
(NRA) has become a powerful
political voice you have con-
demned. Its 3.3 million mem-
bers believe in responsible pri-
vate firearms ownership and

0

iow TO CONTACT THEM
Ann Arbor Mayor Ingrid B. Sheldon (R)
Ann Arbor City Hall
100 N. Fifth Ave.
Ann Arbor, MI 48107
994-2766

Tobi Hanna-Davies
Peter Fink (R-2nd Ward),
Jean Carlberg
Peter Nicolas

City Council:
(D-1st Ward), Patricia Vereen-Dixon (D-1st Ward),
Jane Lumm (R-2nd Ward), Haldon Smith (D-3rd Ward),
(D-3rd Ward), Stephen Hartwell (D-4th Ward),
(D-4th Ward), Christopher Kolb (D-5th Ward),