The Michigan Daily - Friday, January 13, 1995 - 5


.3 charge
with
i O
racism in
.$1 suit
By ROBIN BARRY
Daily Staff Reporter
Three University dental employ-
ees filed suit yesterday for $1 million,
charging that they had been fired on
the basis of their race.
George B. Washington, a Detroit
attorney who is representing the three,
said he had received a call from the
University officially offering the em-
ployees reinstatement.
About 25 activists rallied at a so-
called "press conference" on the Diag
yesterday afternoon, where the three
fired employees angrily denounced
the University as "racist."
The three employees, Dawn
Mitchell, Delano Isabell and Theresa
* Atkins, were dismissed in December
after being accused of falsifying their
time cards. They said their termina-
tion resulted from the racist attitudes
of their supervisor and of the admin-
istration.
"I think it was unfair that the three
of us were fired without any type of
investigation," Mitchell said. 'They
went on accusation without finding
out the other side of the story.
x "We are here with our backs
against the wall. ... Racism is the
mentor of the University and it has
earned its maste;'s degree," she said.
University spokeswoman Lisa
Baker said Wednesday that the Uni-
versity has attempted to make an ef-
fort to resolve the situation. Last night
she reiterated that the incident was
not racially motivated.
* "We have found no evidence of
racism in this case, furthermore, we
have found no evidence that the super-
visor acted inappropriately," she said.
In addition to filing suit, the former
employees are also calling for the su-
pervisor involved in the incident to be
fired and for them to receive back pay.
LSA sophomore Dorma Burnside
participated in the march.
O "Action needs to be taken on this
matter," she said. "At most they should
have been suspended, there should
have been an investigation."
Reno considers
laws to protect
abortion clinics
WASHINGTON (AP) -The Jus-
tice Department is considering whether
new legislation is needed to curb anti-
abortion violence, Attorney General
Janet Reno said yesterday.
She ordered another review of
legislative needs, particularly pos-
sible revisions in the Freedom of
Access to Clinic Entrances Act of
1994, after two people were killed
and five wounded Dec. 30 in attacks

on two Brookline, Mass., clinics.
John C. Salvi III, a 22-year-old
hairdresser, has pleaded innocent
to federal gun charges and state
murder charges in the Brookline
case. Reno said she was awaiting a
report from Donald K. Stern, U.S.
attorney in Boston, before deciding
whether to file additional charges
against Salvi that could carry a death
penalty.
Reno said she would not decide
whether to seek new legislation or
amendments until hearing from the
criminal and civil rights divisions
and the Justice task force investigat-
ing the possibility of a national con-
spiracy behind clinic violence.
Abortion-rights groups have sug-
gested the clinic-access law does not
adequate address incitement to vio-
lence. But Reno said she had not
received any such complaints from
federal prosecutors.

League sets future goals

U Michigan League to
expand conference
rooms, add parking
below buidling
By LEONID FELLER
For the Daily
xAfter four months of intensive
meetings with students, faculty and
staff, the Michigan League is pursu-
ing a strategic planning process to
identify the League's future direc-
4 tion.
These meetings, which occurred
between August and Thanksgiving
break, were an attempt to receive
input from all facets of the University
community to adapt the League to
better serve the campus.
u1y 'ILeague Director Bob Yecke said,
"In any changes, our first priority
must be to balance the League's his-
' torical nature with the needs of the
students of the 1990s and the year
,y n k 2000."]
According to Yecke, a chief pri-
ority is the need to maintain the
League's integrity and history. How-
ever, Yecke said, there exists the ne-
cessity of "updating the genteel shab-
biness (of the League) with a flair for
the next century."
Central to the League's plans is
the newly christened "League Un-
JUDITH PERKINS/Daily derground," the building's base-
The University plans improvements for the 66-year old Michigan League. ment. Up until this school year, this

area served as the site of the
building's cafeteria.
However, losses in excess of
$150,000 annually forced the caf-
eteria to shut down operations and
some of its menu and facilities
moved upstairs to the League Buf-
fet.
Currently, this area serves
merely as overflow seating for the
buffet and as a study space for stu-
dents. However, future intentions
include the installation of a big-
screen TV, the opening of a "coach's
corner" and the creation of a weekly
variety program.
The variety program will feature
performances in rock, jazz and com-
edy. The coach's corner, slated to
open around Feb. 1, will feature vari-
ous coaches of the University's ath-
letic teams in question-and-answer
sessions as well as appearances by
student athletes.
Currently, League officials are
searching for a restaurant to take over
the abandoned cafeteria to provide
food for these events and for various
group meetings also slated for the
Underground. The restaurant would
have to be capable of providing two
meals a day.
In addition, the League plans to
expand its assortment of conference
rooms, add parking underneath the
building and create a high-tech meet-

ing place, while maintaining the at-
mosphere of the building and its sense
of elegance.
School-supported renovations are
scheduled to proceed throughout the
year.
"We're trying to be all things to
more people," Yecke said. "One of
my goals is for the League to become
a more student-orientated facility."
However, Yecke added, "We
shouldn't become another Michigan
Union - we have to find our own
niche."
LSA sophomore Scott Nagle
agrees. "The League is a fantastic
place to have lunch when you're try-
ing to get away from it all to study or
just have a private lunch with some-
one. In some ways, its far superior to
the Union."
The League, built in 1929, was a
female answer to the Union, which
barred women. In the late 1950s, the
League became a co-ed facility.
Today, the League consists of a 21-
room hotel, the League Buffet, a
newsstand and various conference
rooms.
Yesterday, the League Board of
Governors met to prioritize and cat-
egorize information received from
various surveys taken during the meet-
ings. The board has future plans to
develop another survey to gain addi-
tional information.

South Quad prepares to open $900,000 computing site

By JENNIFER BUCKLEY
Daily Staff Reporter
After four months of construction delays
and two years of promises, South Quad's ninth-
floor computing site and library are finally
nearing completion.
South Quad ResComp head Wendy Hart
said the site "provides a nicer working area
for the students" computing in the residence
hall. The new site cost about $900,000 to
construct. South Quad's computer site was
formerly housed in a small classroom in the
basement.
"It had been under discussion for a long
time," said Vicky Heuter, Housing design group
manager, but construction of the site only be-
gan over this summer.

Hart listed additional computers, offices, a
classroom, and the integration of computing site
and library staffs as benefits of the new location.
While the ninth-floor site was under con-
struction, students continued to use the old base-
ment site.
Residents first learned of the new develop-
ment two years ago through letters sent by the
University.
The site had finally been scheduled for
completion before the academic year began.
However, "lots of little things" and construction
delays made that impossible, said Heuter.
"We didn't want to do it during the school
year," Heuter said, "but we didn't get the con-
struction documents in on time. We did com-
plete the majority of the noisy construction

before the students arrived."
Hart said South Quad's ResComp is pleased
that the site is finally finished.
"The completion date that was talked about
originally was sometime in September, then
October. It became glaringly clear that it just
wasn't going to happen. ResComp was as dis-
appointed as anyone."
Recently, progress was halted by "a delay
with the fire suppression system," said Dino
Anastasia, South Quad's computing coordina-
tor. "Some of the construction couldn't be com-
pleted until those elements were in place."
Residents of Central Campus' largest dorm
were angered by delays.
"We were told that it was going to be done in
September when we got here. If they're going to

set a deadline and tell students that it's going to
be available, then it should be ready," said
first-year LSA student Rachel Hegmann.
Testing of the fire suppression system is
planned for today and will remove the final
obstacle to the site's opening, Anastasia said.
Hart couldn't be happier. "It's really very
nice. The amount of time this site will be open
and available and useful for students will make
it all worth it."
Anastasia sees the development as "a new
focal point in a living-learning community
within a residence hall.
"This will have far-reaching implications
on how students interact and how they gather
information while learning here at the Univer-
sity."

'U' Press serves as force
for scholarly publishing

By DANIELLE BELKIN
Daily Staff Reporter
The University has its own hospi-
tal, nuclear reactor and observatory.
But students may not know that the
University also has its own press.
"We are not a printer and we don't
produce University of Michigan work
exclusively," said Mary Erwin, the
assistant director of the University of
Michigan Press, one of the largest
university book publishing houses in
the nation.
"The U-M Press is a competitive
scholarly publishing force - like
Oxford, Cambridge or MacMillan -
not a small-town publishing house to
serve the faculty," she emphasized.
The University Press publishes
about 135 titles a year and its income
ranges from $2-5 million.
The funds to sustain the press are
primarily self-generated, but it is a
unit of the Rackham School of Gradu-
ate Studies.
The press was first approved by the
University Board of Regents in 1930
with a small staff and has since evolved
into a prominent publisher of scholarly
work with a staff of 43 people.
"It came out of a need for faculty
to publish fairly narrow work," Erwin
said. Currently, the press publishes
about 30 to 35 percent of University
faculty work out of the nearly 140
titles it produces a year.
The core of those titles are con-
cerned with nine disciplines: gender,
law, political science, literary criti-
cism and theory, anthropology, his-
tory, classical studies, English as a
second language, and regional works.

"(The press) competes for U-M
work as much as any other work,"
Erwin said. "The material has to fit
into the publishing program, it is not
necessarily published because it is a
U-M faculty member.'
So, how does the press choose the
titles to be published? There are differ-
ent ways the press is informed of new
work. Authors may send a letter of
inquiry to see if the press would be
interested in a work in a particular field.
Networking - asking individuals
or departments at other schools the
publishers have worked with before
- can also be a good way to find a
new book.
The acquisitions editor plans for
what type of book the press wants to
acquire. When the editor decides on a
book, the manuscript is sent out for peer
review - an expert report on the qual-
ity and scholarship of the work. If the
review is positive, the book is reviewed
by a board of nine University faculty
members from different fields to deter-
mine if it will be published.
"The Female Body," edited by
University English Prof. Laurence
Goldstein, is one of the books that
was ultimately published.
The work to create a book at the
press does not actually involve a print-
ing press, although that is a popular
misconception. Press employees are
involved in editing, design work,
proofing text and marketing, not the
setting of the type.
"The U-M mandate (for the press) is
to be one of the best university publish-
ers in the country," Mike Kehoe, the
marketing director for the press said.

Eggs, toast & e Mthfn Bailg
g s~toa t &Make it part of your morning.
fjn hiOrley AChishoim
Former New York Congresswoman
wi// present
VIEW OF DR. KING 'S
LEGACY IN TODAY'S
AMERICA"
on
ris uther King Day

ary 16,

1995

1:30 PM
' at

Friday
31 "8th Annual UMAASC Art
Exhibit," sponsored by Asian
American Student Coalition,

G 21, 6:30-8 p.m.
U Shorin-Ryu Karate-Do Club,
men and women, beginners wel-
come, 994-3620, CCRB, Room

sponsored by School of Music,
Recital Hall, 4 p.m.
Sunday