The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
NEWS BRIEFS VOTE
From Page 1A
WASHINGTON
ton, a co-chair of the event, said
Lawmakers, W hite she hoped the event's abstract
Ho s m v format would encourage students
H1ouse move closer not to pick a candidate because of
aid agreement his or her name recognition.
to a"We hope that the event will
open people's minds to vote for
Pushing deficit concerns aside, the issues that they think are
Democratic and Republican lead- important," she said.
ers moved closer to agreement with LSA sophomore Jasmine Rob-
the White House yesterday night erts said the eventhelped take the
on emergency tax cuts and benefit emphasis off the leading candi-
increases to jolt the economy out dates who receive the most media
of its slump, including opening new attention.
financing windows for some home "The candidates were repre-
loans. senting a point of view, which I
Congressional leaders were to think is better because the media
negotiate into the evening with sort of chooses our candidates for
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, us," she said.
underscoring the urgency of the
effort.
Lawmakers learned during the
day that the government's deficit REPORT
already would swell to $250 billion From Page 1A
this year because of falling corpo-
rate tax revenues - then they sig- of resources used by each cam-
naled they were willing to balloon pus building between 2004 and
it higher by more than $100 billion 2007, along with the Universi-
with a stimulus package. ty's total carbon footprint. The
report found that the University's
LANSING carbon output decreased from
about 430,000 pounds in 2004 to
Legislation calls for 390,000 pounds in 2007.
Andy Berki, manager of the
more renewable University's occupational Safe-
ty and Environmental Health
energy by 2016 department, said the University
has increase the use of materi-
Within eight years, 10 percent of als and technology that conserve
the electricity sold to Michigan con- resources in both new construc-
sumers would have to come from tion and renovations to old build-
renewable energy sources such as ings. Those energy saving devices
wind under bipartisan legislation include the installation of more
passed Wednesday by a state House efficient lighting and wiring, as
committee. well as motion sensors that shut
The standard would nearly triple off lights when rooms are vacant.
by the start of 2016 the amount of Berki said the University also
renewable energy now being sold by plans to improve conservation
utilities and other power producers efforts on campus. In order to
in the state. determine in which buildings
Because renewable energy can practices can be modified to save
be more expensive to produce, the resources, the University created
standard could cost residential cus- Wolverine Teams consisting of
tomers an extra $36 a year, com- engineers, environmental experts
mercial customers an extra $199 and marketing representatives
and industrial customers an extra who evaluate campus buildings
$2,250. and make recommendations.
The teams try to reshape how
WASHINGTON building occupants use resources.
. They start at a basic level, telling
EPA: California occupants to turn off comput-
ers when they're not being used,
greenhouse gas Berki said. He said the teams
plan to track 30 buildings a year
waiver was justified and teams have already been dis-
patched to 17 campus buildings,
EPA officials told the agency's he said.
administrator that California had one concern Wolverine Teams
"compelling and extraordinary con- have is that occupants will return
ditions" to justify a federal waiver to wasteful behavior once the
allowing the state to reduce green- teams leave campus buildings.
house gas emissions from vehicles, Berki said adesignated personwill
accordingto excerpts of documents periodically check each building
released yesterday. to prevent occupants from back-
Yet when Administrator Stephen sliding.
Johnson denied the state's request The report also calls for indi-
for a waiver in December, he said viduals to increase their own con-
the California standards were not servation efforts.
needed to meet "compelling and ex- The Graham Environmental
traordinary conditions," one of the Sustainability Institute, part of
criteria in federal law. the School of Natural Resources
The excerpts from Environmen- and Environment, is teaming up
tal Protection Agency documents
were released by Sen. Barbara Box-
er, D-Calif., whose environmental
committee is investigating John-
son's decision and has called him to (.
testify at a hearing tomorrow.
RAFAH, Gaza Strip
Thousands of from t
Gazans cross into
Egypt to shop
On footin cars and in donkey carts,
tens of thousands of Gazans flooded
into Egypt on Wednesday through a
border fence blown up by militants
- puncturing a gaping hole in Israel's
airtight closure of the Gaza Strip and
giving a boost to Hamas.
In a shopping spree that was both
festive and frenzied, Gazans cleared
out stores in an Egyptian border
town, buying up everything from TV
sets to softdrinks to cigarettes. To play: Complete the grid
As waves of people swarmed and every 3x3 box Con.
through the destroyedbarrier- some
estimated the crowd in the hundreds
of thousands - Egyptian security There is no guessing
forces lined up on one side of the bor- just use logic to solve.
der and Hamas forces lined up on the
other side. None of them interfered Difficulty: Easy
in any way, and it appeared Hamas
militants actively participated in the 5
border breach.
- Compiled from 6
Daily wire reports 6 9
9 4
0 i 6 1I
3,931
Number of American service mem-
bers who have died in the war in
Iraq, according to The Associated 2 3
Press. The following service mem-
bers were identified yesterday: - 7
Cpl. James M. Gluff, 20, Tunnel "
Hill, Ga. Pzlbystf
Sgt. Michael R. Sturdivant, 20,
Conway, Ark.
After the mock election, Hinton
and Nwachukwu discussed the
importance of the black female
vote in the upcoming election,
saying it will play a large role in
determining the winner between
Barack Obama and Hillary Clin-
ton for the Democratic Party
nomination.
Although the focus of the event
was on understanding issues
important to the election, event
organizers also tried to explain to
students the voter check-in pro-
cess.
In order to receive a ballot,
attendees had to present a valid
form of identification -like their
MCard - in a simulation of actual
voting procedures.
During elections, voters must
show ID or sign an affidavit con-
firming their identity.
with campus activists to develop
a public forum for students to
address environmental concerns
at the University. Although the
forum is still in the planning stag-
es, Berki said he hopes that it will
encourage more student input in
University policy-making.
Chris Detjen, president of the
Michigan Student Assembly's
Environmental Issues Commis-
sion, criticized the University for
failing to garner student input on
environmental policy decisions.
"Not enough efforts were made
to incorporate students' interests
and efforts into this report," he
said. "I wish there had been refer-
ences made to what students have
been doing with environmental
issues on campus in past years."
Detjen said he appreciates
the work put into the report but
thinks the University has a long
road to sustainability ahead.
Currently, about 45 percent of
the energy used on campus is gen-
erated at the Central Power Plant
on East Huron Street. The rest is
purchased on the grid from DTE
Energy, which uses carbon-pro-
ducing coal for much of its elec-
tricity production.
So while the campus power
plant burns relatively clean natu-
ral gas, campus buildings still
contribute to greenhouse gas
emissions.
Jonathan Bulkley, co-direc-
tor of the Center for Sustainable
Systems in the School of Natural
Resources and Environment, said
he thinks the report shows the
University's increasing commit-
ment to environmentalism. He
said since the report's first issu-
ance seven years ago, the Universi-
ty administration has consistently
supported of its development.
"The information is there and
can be acquired reasonably,"
Bulkley said. "The challenge now
is to plot a course and say where
we'd like to go."
Bulkley was also optimistic
about the public's increasing
interest in environmentalism.
"There's a sea of change taking
place among young people who
are mindful of achieving sustain-
ability," he said.
MPAA
From Page 1A
should focus its anti-piracy cam-
paign elsewhere. He said college
campuses are "among the most
responsible Internet service provid-
ers" because they educate their users
on the legality of file sharing.
"Before the MPAA had this
research conducted, the University
was thinking about how to help edu-
cate people about peer-to-peer file-
sharing," Bernard said. "We think
there's a better place for Congress to
spend its time," he added.
Bernard said he was skeptical of
the original statistic because the
data used to estimate the figure were
never made public.
"When those numbers came out,
we questioned them because they
seemed so high," he said. "Clearly
the MPAA has come out and said
they've made a mistake interpret-
ing their data, and we're glad they
came out and are trying to correct
the record."
s
GROUPc
From Page 1A
t
that may think student govern- S
ment doesn't do anything," he t
said. s
The Multicultural Commit-
tee hopes to attract students who t
belong to organizations outsideu
the Greek system.
When asked how many LSA-
SG members belong to campus
fraternities and sororities, Miller
E-MAIL
From Page 1A
sages, which can slow the mes-
sages down.
"Routine messages are
designed for traffic flow, so they
move through the system as
expeditiously as possible without
interfering in other traffic," he
said.
Tom O'Leary, vice president
of sales in North America for
GroupMail, an e-mail software
company, said there is no clear
answer for how quickly e-mails
can be sent out to a large group of
people.
"There are so many factors
involved, like size message, server
capacity, Internet connection rate
and anti-virus software," he said.
For 72,000 people on one serv-
er, he said, "10 hours sounds about
right."
Laura Quinn, director of Ide-
alware, a company that reviews
software, said spam prevention
aid the assembly is "heavily"
Greek.
"The main thing we're doing
o increase the diversity in LSA-
SG is going out to student groups
hat are traditionallyunderrepre-
ented on campus," he said.
One such group, Miller said, is
he Office of Lesbian, Gay, Bisex-
ual and Transgender Affairs.
- Daily Staff Reporter Andy
Kroll contributed to this report.
Thursday, January 24, 2008 - 3A
software might slow the mes-
sage's flow. But even if that were
the case, Quinn said, the amount
of time it took for the emergency
alert to reach all of campus still
seemed long.
"Ten hours, even for such a
large database, does seem like a
long time," Quinn said.
Levy agreed, saying that the
University needs carefully craft
mass e-mails so they're not fil-
tered as spam. The way the Uni-
versity sends mass e-mails is
standard, but after last week's
incident, he said, there will be
discussions about making the
process much quicker.
He said emergency e-mails
could be sent out more quickly if
the University uses different pro-
tocols like expatiating emergency
e-mails using upgraded software.
"The University has excellent
email infrastructure," he said.
"The issue in terms of the deliv-
ery of the mass email last week
had to do with the specific way in
which it was sent out."
WANT TO JOIN
THE DAILY?
Come .to our
mass meeting.
Sunday at 7 p.m.
420 Maynard St.
The Fr. Gabriel Richard Lectures
Calling us to examine current issues in light of our faith
War,. Politics and Ethics:
Choices for the Country and the
Ciry in an Election Year
Monday, January 28, 2008
4:00 pm - Weill Hall
Annenberg Auditorium
735 S. State St.
Speaker: Rev. J. Bryan Hehir
Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor
Practice of Religion and Public Life
Kennedy School of Government
Harvard University
Co-Sponsored by:
Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy
President's Initiative on Ethics in Public Life, and
St. Mary Student Parish
fI o
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