A i~ -r444i The Michigan Daily - Friday, March 3, 1995 - 5 Murder trial of 'U' employee postponed The trial of former University Hos- itals employee James M. Chatman - accused of killing a 2-year-old child on the University's North Campus - has been postponed to May 1. Judge Karl Fink postponed the trial on Feb. 22 at the pre-trial conference held at the 22nd District Court. "The trial was initially scheduled for April 10," said Department of Public Safety Sgt. Paul Vaughan. *Chatman's attorneys said they would not be prepared with their defense in time. Also, the co-counsel has a con- flicting jury trial scheduled in federal district court." Chatman, 31, is charged with sec- ond-degree murder and first-degree child abuse. He remains in Washtenaw County Jail on $50,000 bond. The de- fendant allegedly beat to death Jaylon Jones on Aug.31 while baby-sit- ting the boy and his twin sister, Charde, at an apartment in the 7 .1 U n i v e r s i t y 's Northwood V complex. Charde was not harmed, Vaughan said. ones Second-de- gree murder carries a maximum sen- tence of life in prison. First-degree child abuse carries a maximum sen- tence of 15 years. Chatman knew the child's mother; both worked for University Hospitals. "The autopsy shows death by blunt impacts to the head - causing swell- ing of and injury to the brain," Waughan said. On Aug. 31, Chatman called 911 from a neighboring home. Chatman claimed he had been unable to resus- citate the toddler after the boy fell in the bathtub and lost consciousness, but since then he has said little to police in his defense. Serial molester still em the loose Ann Arbor police have not made significant progress in their attempt to apprehend a man thought to be responsible for four sexual assaults on women dating back to April 1990. The man police are looking for is described as a white male, 5 feet 8 inches to 6 feet tall, with an inch-long orayish-brown beard. He has a medium uild and is between 30 and 40 years old with a pointed nose and gray eyes. Police found a mask believed to have been worn during the abduction of an University student. She was kidnapped at gunpoint from an Ann Arbor church Oct. 23, 1994. The mask was found the day of the kidnapping on Newport Road. Four of the attacks occurred in the area #ordered by Miller, North Maple and Newport roads. "I've had her come in and look at pictures," said Ann Arbor Police De- tective Dave Burke. "She hasn't been able to identify anybody yet. I'm still developing some leads, but, no, I don't have any solid suspects right now." The man typically binds or hand- cuffs his victim, threatens rape and fondles them. The victims describe heir assailant as apologetic and gentle. All four of the women talked the suspect out of raping them. - Compiled by Daily Staff Reporter Frank C. Lee Preserved books at Yale available over Internet By Stephanie Jo Klein Daily Staff Reporter Paul Conway's job is to find new ways to preserve old books. The University alum discussed digital pres- ervation of materials at a School of Informa- tion and Library Studies convocation yester- day afternoon in the Ehrlicher Room of West Engineering. Currently the head of the Preservation De- partment at Yale University, Conway is also the operation manager of Yale's Project Open Book. Conway described the project as "a virtual library." "Using microfilm only available at Yale, we are putting together a digital collection of pre- served books," he said. The project, which began in 1990, was the first of its kind on such a large scale, Conway said. But initially Yale had difficulty finding personnel qualified in digital technology. A lack of proper job descriptions and trained per- sonnel caused an eight-month delay. After the initial setback, project organizers planned the technical work of converting 10,000 volumes from microfilm to digital imagery. The actual production and conversion phase began in August 1994, Conway said. "We're converting 3,000 volumes in the space of 12 months," he said. Project coordinators wanted the collection to be topically meaningful. They sorted the entries by subject. "We have very unique features in our collec- tion," Conway said. He added that Yale has the authoritative collection on local perceptions of Abraham Lincoln. Cost remains a challenge to the project, which is nearly completed. "There is very little cost analysis of image data technology, which makes things very difficult," Conway said. He explained the careful details of cataloging and categorizing time and monetary costs. Cornell and Indiana Universities are attempt- ing similar projects, funded largely by major corporations. Xerox Corp. has provided finan- cial backing for the Yale project's major re- source expenses. Intellectual and physical access to the mate- rial are main goals of the project. The staff members are making it easier to access the books by creating well-structured indexes and also plan to have the complete collection available on the Internet through the Yale campus network. The first on-line images from the collection will be available on the World Wide Web within the next two weeks. The URL access address is http://sounix.library.yale.edu. It can be viewed by clicking on "Preservation at Yale" and then on "Open Book." 'U' to change start of clsseol~s, spring break :. JUDITH PERKINS/Daily City Councilmember Christopher Kolb examines a memo at former mayor Liz Brater's town meeting last night. LizBrteaddresses tax cuts, enionet ttown meetIni By Thekla Fischer For the Daily State Rep. Liz Brater (D-Ann Ar- bor) met last night with concerned citizens and five local officials to discuss issues ranging from tax cuts to the environment. Brater opened the town meeting at Ann Arbor's public library with the "bad news" that the state Legislature had passed Gov. John Engler's five- year $1.5 billion tax cut. The plan cuts Michigan's income tax by raising personal exemptions, which Brater said benefits the wealthy. Brater expressed concern that the tax cuts would threaten future educa- tion funding, including "the total de- struction of the adult education pro- grams." She said she would rather save the money for a "rainy-day fund" to hedge against a predicted down- turn in the economy, but acknowl- edged that the Headlee Amendment to the state constitution inhibits this. According to Brater, 70 percent of the money was collected from indi- viduals. However, 50 percent of the surplus tax dollars will be returned to businesses, she said. Brater was displeased with Clark Durant, the new head of the state school board. Brater said Durant would "put God back in the schools," violating "the division of church and state." Brater also said Republicans are launching an attack on Act 307, "Michigan's landmark pollution cleanup law." The act invokes the "pol- luter pay principle" and "ensures pub- lic knowledge of polluted sites and cleanup efforts." Brater said she intends to support legislation on 'pollution prevention assistance for businesses and tax in- centives for businesses engaged in pol- lution prevention initiatives." Other issues discussed at the meet- ing included the repercussions of a reduction in military spending for local bases, welfare and minimum wage adjustment, and capital punishment. Ann Arbor resident Richard Ratler addressed the lack of working class voter participation, which he said is due to the inconvenience of voting on Tuesdays. "The government doesn't want us to vote," Ratler said. Brater plans to introduce legisla- tion to make it easier to vote by mail. Brater said she was "grateful to the citizens for coming out. ... It's always a reality check." By Ronnie Glassberg Daily Staff Reporter For the first time in 36 years, the University will change its academic calendar next year, with fall term classes beginning two days earlier and spring break scheduled one week later. Fall term in the past has started the Thursday after Labor Day, and with the shift, classes will begin the day after the holiday. Spring break will begin March 2 next year and classes will resume March 11 - one week later than in previous years. The University will not cancel classes for President's Day, which fell during the break in the old calendar. Associate Provost Susan Lipschutz said fall term has aver- aged between 65-69 class days, while winter term has been between 68-70 days. "We are trying to make the two terms more comparable in length," Lipschutz said. "Faculty teaching the same or similar courses found it trou- bling. I think starting classes the Tues- day after Labor, Day will mean we will have to have University offices open on Labor Day." The University has been using the current calendar since 1969. "Before that, the University started before Labor Day for quite a few years," said Assistant Registrar Tho- mas McElvain. "The University had started in August, at least a week before Labor Day." At the same time, the committee recommended spring break become a full week. Before that, McElvain said the break was only a few days. "It is '69 that the concept of a real spring break came out," he said. The change in the calendar will bring shifts for the University's Hous- ing Division. Move-in will be TuesdayAug.29; Wednesday, Aug. 30; and Thursday, Aug. 31. For returning students, the residence hall leases will begin Aug. 31, and the leases for new students will begin Aug. 29. Food service will begin the Thurs- day before Labor Day. Last year, tfhe board contract started the day after Labor Day, five days later. In fall 1993, the Housing Division changed the start of move-in to the Thursday before Labor Day. Before that, the division had started move in over Labor Day weekend. Housing Division spokesman Alan Levy said he does not anticipate any problems from the shift in the start of classes. "If the change had happened with- out the two years of experience, we would probably be nervous," Levy said. "We're going to do what we did last year, but even better. It will not have a very profound impact for useat all." The change in spring break will move the vacation to the middle of winter term. "The break seems to come too early. Its aim is to break up the semester, but it does it sooner than it should," Lipschutz said. In addition to these changes, the University also will not schedule exams on the Friday before spring commencement. The rest of the cal- endar will remain the same as in the past. LSA junior Libby Hoxsie said she has no problems with starting earlier and likes the new time for spring break. "I would prefer to have it a week later because other colleges have it then," she said. The calendar shift, which was ap- proved by the University Board of Regents in April, will be in effect for the next two years. "Both of these are experimental. We thought it was worth a try." Lipschutz said. AATA launches rider campaign By Maureen Sirhal Daily Staff Reporter In response to declining ridership, the Ann Arbor Transit Authority is launching an aggressive campaign to increase the number of people who take the bus. The AATA has experienced a 1.6- percent fall in ridership, according to its annual report for 1994, released earlier this week. Manager for community relations for the AATA, Lizabeth Nowland- Margolis said the decline is not in any particular area of Ann Arbor. "The only thing that we can at- tribute (the decline) to is that gas prices are really low," she said. The AATA campaign is partially aimed at students. "We are going to do a promotion along with Briarwood Mall aimed at U-M and Eastern University students so they know about the differ- ent routes and can get where they want to go," Nowland-Margolis said. The AATA has announced several plans in the past year to resolve on- going problems such as traffic jams and parking problems around the Uni- versity Medical Center. To combat this, the AATA, in cooperation with the Medical Center, has closed off a parking structure to staff and offered bus passes to all Medical Center staff. "We are addressing businesses as well. Businesses like Great Lakes Bancorp and U-M medical center and fast-food restaurants such as Burger .M Wat'happening in Ann Arbor today King are buying passes for their staffs," Nowland-Margolis said. Currently, the AATA runs stop at 10 p.m. on week-nights and 6 p.m. on the weekends. There is also a shared-ride pro- gram that runs from I1 p.m. to 6 a.m. in conjunction with Yellow Cab. This service is aimed at providing rides around Ann Arbor late at night. The cost is fixed at $2 and passengers can go anywhere in Ann Arbor. One student shared mixed con- cerns over the AATA system. "I will take the bus if I need to go to Briarwood Mall," said LSA sopho- more Sara Gallagher. "It's easier for me to go with friends since I don't know where the buses go." Waldenbooks comes to A2 By Andrew Taylor Daily News Editor Waldenbooks announced yesterday the company will move its national headquarters to Ann Arbor this spring. Spokeswoman Kathryn Kavickey said about 100 of the Stamford, Conn., office's 600 employees are expected to relocate to Ann Arbor. The com- pany owns 1,200 stores, including one on South State Street. Bookstore officials have consid- ered the move since last November, when parent company Kmart, of Troy, Mich. announced Waldenbooks Don't Panic!! 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