LOCAILISTAIrt
The Michigan Daily - Friday, April 7, 1995 -
zo l
U.s. 23 head-on
crash kills 1
A car heading north on southbound
U.S. 23 proved deadly for one driver
n a head-on collision around noon
Tuesday. Two others were injured
and transported to University Hospi-
tals.
William Harper, 31, was declared
dead at the scene of the accident due
to multiple injuries. He was going
the wrong way in his 1985 Pontiac
when he crashed into a 1993 Lin-
coln.
The driver of the Lincoln, Terry
Marks, 48, was airlifted by Univer-
sity Hospitals' Survival Flight for
treatment at the Trauma and Burn
Unit. His passenger, Jennifer
Hoover, 22, was treated and re-
leased, a University Hospitals
spokesperson said.
"It was a head-on collision," said
Green Oak Township Police Sgt. Ron
Crowe. "The Marks vehicle was
southbound on (U.S.) 23 behind an-
other ambulance. The ambulance,
from another part of the state, was en
route to either U-M or St. Joseph
Mercy Hospital with a patient.
"The driver of that ambulance saw
Mr. Harper coming and swerved out of
the way to avoid acollision with Harper,
but the Marks vehicle apparently did
not have enough time to see that - it
collided head-on," Crowe said.
U.S. 23 connects Ann Arbor to
Flint and Toledo. A median divides
the northbound and southbound lanes
- making the accident all the more
perplexing,police said.
"Witnesses said they had ob-
served Mr. Harper previously driv-
ing northbound on old U.S. 23,"
Crowe said. "When he got to Silver
Lake Road, he made a right turn then
made a left turn onto the southbound
exit ramp and went north on
southbound (U.S.) 23."
Investigators expect the results of
an autopsy performed Tuesday back
within three weeks. The accident is
still under investigation.
Armed and
dangerous
According to reports from the
University's Department of Public
Saftety, police investigated a "suspi-
cious" vehicle in the University's
Thompson Street Parking Structure.
The car belonged to a 34-year-old
who had no outstanding warrants. The
subject was taken into custody for
carrying a concealed weapon.
A fully loaded .22-caliber revolver
was recovered from the back of the
car. The owner was transported to the
Washtenaw County Jail.
Student locates
stolen bike
A student reported her bike stolen
last week to the Ann Arbor Police
Department. On Tuesday, she located
her bike in front of the Student Activi-
ties Building's main entrance. Police
went to the area and attempted to cut
the lock.
- Compiled by Daily Staff Reporter
Frank C. Lee
Proposed nuclear waste
site creates controversy
na...nrcn....-,
Caged in
Associate psychology Prof. James Hilton agreed to be taken during his
lecture for an Amnesty international protest on the Diag yesterday.
PolickSriticizes
GOP, 'Contras-ct'
By Daniel Johnson
Daily Staff Reporter
Politicians, geologists and science-
fiction writers have all joined in the
debate to determine the viability of
Yucca Mountain, Nev., as the final
resting spot for the nation's future
nuclear waste.
The site, about 100 miles north-
west of Las Vegas, has been under
investigation by the Department of
Energy since 1987 to determine its
potential as a storehouse of nuclear
waste. If the DOE tests find it suit-
able, high-level nuclear waste will be
buried 1,000 feet below the
mountain's surface. .
Nuclear power plants, which are re-
sponsible for,about 24 percent of the
nation's electricity, transform nuclear
energy into steam, which is then har-
nessed to generate electricity. The high-
level waste, which is a by-product of
energy production, needs to lie undis-
turbed for 10,000 years in order to de-
compose to safe levels.
The continuing production of
nuclear waste and the lack of a final
repository poses a problem across the
country. The Michigan Attorney
General's Office along'with 27 other
states filed a lawsuit in a federal court
against the Department of Energy in
June 1994 for breach of contract. The
suit is still pending.
"We're only ensuring that our
money is being used to find a solution
to the nuclear waste disposal and stor-
age problem," said Don Keskey,
Michigan's assistant attorney general.
The DOE is bound by federal leg-
islation to locate a repository for the
safe storage of high-level nuclear
waste by 1998. Keskey claims that
the Yucca Mountain facility still will
be under study in 1998, despite the
DOE's collection of billions of dol-
lars nationally and $250 million from
Michigan alone.
The DOE's failure to provide a fed-
eral repository is bound to create na-
tionwide storage problems as at least
one site in Michigan has already met its
on-site storage capacity. Consumers
Power Co.'s Palisades Nuclear Plant
near South Haven is presently storing
waste outside of its containment build-
ing in II cement casks about 450 feet
from Lake Michigan.
Environmentalists contend that this
temporary storage could prove disas-
trous without further investigation.
"We're spending billions of dol-
lars to study Yucca Mountain, yet
we're placing nuclear waste in inex-
pensive concrete casks without pub-
lic hearing and environmental impact
statements," said Mary Sinclair, co-
chair of Don't Waste Michigan, a
group opposed to placing low-level
waste sites in the state.
The casks were approved for use
by the Nuclear Regulatory Commis-
sion in 1993.
"We wouldn't be using this sys-
tem if the federal government had a
final repository," said Mark Savage,
Palisades' public affairs director.
More and more sites like Pali-
sades will likely crop up if interim
storage is not established while Yucca
Mountain is under study.
"By default, we're going to have
these sites in 78 locations and 33
Palisades Fermi it
Started Started
operation in operation in
December January
1971. 1988; at 80
percent
D. C. Cook power last
Dual reactor; week.
one started Ann .
operation in Arbor
August 1975, ,~.
the other in July
1978.
JONATHAN BERNDT and KEVIN WINER/Daily
states near population centers and
environmentally sensitive areas,"
Keskey said of the nuclear plants that
will be forced to store their waste in
dry casks due to lack of storage space.
Alternatives to on-site storage
would evolve if a House bill goes
through Congress. The bill requires
that the DOE establish an interim
storage site and facilitate transporta-
tion routes to Yucca Mountain.
A coalition of 33 utility compa-
nies, including the Detroit Edison Co.,
has drawn up a contract with a
Mescalero Indian reservation in New
Mexico to establish an interim stor-
age site on Native American. lands.
The facility would receive high-level
wastes from about 95 power plants
nationwide.
"There has been no solution to the
waste problem," said Jesse
Deerinwater, a member of Citizens'
Resistance Against Fermi II. "All of
their solutions end up dumping waste
on Native lands. The nuclear mafia
should not be allowed to decide which
tribe is the next to go."
The Yucca Mountain facility is
projected to hold 77,000 metric tons
of waste if determined suitable for
storage. "We will continue to do site
suitability, and if we determine it is
suitable and we receive a license, we
hope to have it opened by 2010," said
Joanne Johnson, DOE spokeswoman.
'U' Law student
publishes book
about waste
By Daniel Johnson
Daily Staff Reporter
Sarah Ginsburg, a second-year
University Law student, recently
capitalized on her interests in poli-.
tics and geology by publishing.
"Nuclear Waste Disposal: Gam-
bling on Yucca Mountain."
The book's publication by
Aegean Park Press marks the frui-
tion of her undergraduate study at
the University of California atSanta
Cruz.
Ginsburg, a native of New"
Mexico, became involved with the
issues of waste disposal when she
worked for Rep. Bill Richardsow.
(D-N.M.) and Sen. Jeff Bingaman
(D-N.M.) during consecutive sum-
mers in Washington.
Both congressmen opposed the
New Mexico Waste Isolation Pilot
Plant, a facility proposed to receive
low-level radioactive waste from
across the country. The facility
opened 10 years ago, but has yet to
receive any waste due to a number
of lawsuits.
"New Mexico is such a poor
state," Ginsburg said. "This type of
thing is tempting to people." The
issues in New Mexico are similar to
those at Yucca Mountain, a possible
waste repository site in Nevada.
Ginsburg's book surveys the
volatile political and scientific is-
sues surrounding the government's
investigation into the possibility of
storing 77,000 metric tons of nuclear
waste in Yucca Mountain, Nev.
The investigation was mandated
by the Nuclear Waste Policy Act
Amendment of 1987, which desig-
nated Yucca Mountain as the only
candidate to house the nation's
nuclear waste.
"Politically, no one wanf
(nuclear waste) in their backyard,"
Ginsburg said. "New Mexico hasn't
generated any of this waste. Why
should it receive all of the risks
without any of the benefits?"
Ginsburg's book traces the his-
tory of nuclear waste build-up in
this country and even gives consid-
eration to alternatives once re-
searched by thie government. Be-
fore Yucca Mountain was declared
as the proposed site, alternatives
such as sending the waste into space,
disposing of it in the ocean floor and
embedding it in continental ice
sheets were considered.
By Deborah G. Weinstein
For the Daily
Former state Sen. Lana Pollack
criticized the social repercussions of
the "Contract With America" last
night in West Quad's Wedge Room.
Her speech reflected the on-going
dispute about legislation in Congress
after the Republican victory in the fall
elections. There are 10 provisions
within the Contract with America,
which include the balanced-budget
amendment and the Criminal Cre-
ation and Prisons Job Act. Pollack
limited her discussion to proposed
education spending and welfare cuts,
and their implications.
At the opening of her discussion,
Pollack said, "I think it is a 'Contract
on America,' which implies not only
consent with the people, but an under-
standing of participating agreement. I
see politics today as a battle of classes
- the haves and have-nots. Most
important, I see this as a battle be-
tween generations.
Pollack asked about who would
benefit under the Contract and an-
swered with the difference between
that group and those on welfare.
'Twenty-eight percent of our taxes
goes to pay those who lend the govern-
ment money," she said. "Children are
the majority of people on welfare. The
battle against welfare programs is a
battle against children and mothers."
Pollack doubted the effectiveness
of using welfare cuts to reduce teen-age
pregnancy. "They think if they stop the
money ... that this will cut down on
babies born to young girls. Is it realistic
to think a 16-year-old would consider
welfare policy before having sex?"
Pollack then described the Con-
tract as economic, but with social,
educational and environmental con-
sequences.
"I ask people who support taking
away opportunity for social advance-
ment, economic advancement. I would
lead more to a society that looks more
like Mexico than America. I have yet
to find a good answer."
LSA senior David Kramer said of
Pollack's speech, "I think it is a quick-
fix attempt that sounds good, but the
substance is at odds with what most
American believe in. It benefits a
select few, but touches the majority of
Americans in a negative way."
LSA first-year student Rebecca
Long said, "I think a lot of what she
said is right on. I'd been swayed more
to the conservative side. Funding for
domestic policies is essential. I think
it raised consciousness."
Defenders of the Contract were in
the minority, but vocal. Engineering
senior Michael Wheaton said, "The
Contract with America is a mandate
from voters who voted overwhelm-
ingly Republican.
"The Contract with America is a
mandate from the voters," he said.
"They voted overwhelmingly Repub-
lican. The Democrats want to scare a
lot of people.The Republicans are
committed to vote on ten issues in the
first one hundred days. That is some-
thing to be proud of."
I
What's happening in Ann Arbor today
FRIDAY
O "Children's Theatre Serve Week
Performance," Michigan Union,
Wolverine Room, 5 p.m.
U "Data-Intensive Computing," spon-
sored by Department of Statistics,
Chemistry Building, Room 1400,4
p.m.
[ "Gender, Ethnicity, and Identity:
The Muslims of Late Imperial Rus-
sia," sponsored by CREES, Rack-
ham Building, West Conference
Room, 4 p.m.
U "Moral Virtue," sponsored by Stu-
dents of Objectivism, Michigan
League, Room A, 5 p.m.
O Ninjitsu Club, beginners welcome,
761-8251, IMSB, Room G 21,6:30-
8 p.m.
li Northwalk, 763-WALK, Bursley, 8-
11:30 p.m.
[a "Public Observing Night," spon-
sored by Student Astronomical
Society, Angell Hall, Fifth Floor, 9-
11 p.m.
0 Safewalk, 936-1000, UGLi lobby, 8-
Q "The Funerary Arts in Ancient
Egypt," sponsored by Kelsey Mu-
seum of Archaeology, Angell Hall,
Auditorium C, 7:30 p.m.
Q "The Implications of Welfare Re-
form: Initiatives for Change or War
on the Poor?" teach-in, sponsored
by Social Work Action and Change
Coalition, Rackham Building, 9
a.m.-3:30 p.m.
Q "The Life and Witness of Dietrich
Bonhoeffer: Bonhoeffer Com-
memorated," sponsored by Luth-
eran Campus Ministry, Lord of Light
Lutheran Church, 801 South For-
est, 10 a.m.
Q Taekwondo Club, beginners and
other new members welcome, 747-
6889, CCRB, Room 2275, 7-8:30
p.m.
SATURDAY
Q "Bosnia Benefit Concert," spon-
sored by Ann Arbor Committee for
Bosnia, First Methodist Church,
State St. and Huron Ave., 4-6 o.m.
Thinking: Detroit, Art and Architec-
ture Building, Room 2104, 9:30
a.m.-5 p.m.
Q "Thinking Your Way Out of the Dis-
ease of Postmodernism:
Postmodemism and the Social
Sciences," Angell Hall, Auditorium
A, 10:30 a.m.
Q "Timarlo Wilkins' Senior Recital,"
North Campus Commons, 8 p.m.
SUNDAY
Q "Activation," sponsored by Alpha
Phi Omega, Michigan Union, Kuen-
zel Room, 5:15 p.m. pledges, 5:30
p.m. actives
Q "AIPAC Policy Conference Meet-
ing," sponsored by Hillel, Hillel
Building, 7 p.m.
Q Ballroom Dance Club, 663-9213,
CCRB, Main Dance Room, 7 p.m.
Q ECB Peer Tutorial, 747-4526, An-
gell Hall Computing Site 1-5 p.m.
and 7-11 p.m., UGLi, second floor,
1-5 p.m.
U Northwalk, 763-WALK, Bursley, 8
i
I