The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Monday, February 2, 2009 - 3A
The Michigan Daily - michigandailycom Monday, Fehruary 2, 2009 - 3A
NEWS BRIEFS
LANSING
Granhoim urges
tuition freeze for
public universities
Aides to Gov. Jennifer Gra-
nholm say she will urge public
universities and community col-
leges to freeze tuition rates in her
State of the State address.
The aides tell the Detroit Free
Press in Sunday editions that
schools keeping tuition at cur-
rent levels for the coming aca-
demic year will receive some of
the money Michigan expects to
get from the federal stimulus plan
pending in Congress.
Granholm spokeswoman Liz
Boyd says the governor will ask
the Legislature to work with her
to reduce state aid for schools that
don't hold the line on tuition.
Michigan's15 public universities
raised tuition for the current school
year by an average 7 percent.
House Minority Leader Kevin
Elsenheimer, R-Kewadin, says a
tuition freeze "makes sense,"but he
expressed misgivings about tyingit
to the stimulus package still pend-
ing before the U.S. Senate.
CHICAGO
Blagojevich fights
to stay out of prison
Now that he's been ousted
from the governor's office, Rod
Blagojevich is pinning his hopes of
staying out of prison on a father-
and-son duo of defense attorneys,
one of whom grabbed the lime-
light at R&B superstar R. Kelly's
sex tape trial.
"These are two of the most flam-
boyant attorneys in town," DePaul
University law professor Leonard
CavisesaysoftheteamofSamAdam
and his son, Samuel E. Adam.
Cavise predicts fireworks if
Blagojevichgoes to trial on federal
corruption charges, including al-
legations that he tried to sell the
Senate seat vacated by President
Barack Obama.
Federal prosecutors are ex-
pected to obtain an indictment by
April. Blagojevich was arrested
by FBI agents in December and
was booted from office Thursday
when a state Senate impeach-
ment trial ended with a 59-0 vote
against him.
Some are already question-
ing the Adams' legal strategy
- including their decision to let
Blagojevich go on a whirlwind
New York media tour before his
impeachment trial ended, fielding
questions about the criminal case
from Barbara Walters, Diane Saw-
yer, Larry King and more.
BLAKELY, Ga.
Inspection reports
from peanut plant
vary widely
AGeorgiahealth inspectorwho
toured the peanut butter plant
now at the center of a national sal-
monella outbreak noted only two
minor violations in October. Less
than three months later, federal
inspectors found roaches, mold, a
leaking roof and other sanitation
problems.
Food safety experts say the lapse
is a major concern and shows state
inspectors are spread thin and
might need more training on how
to spot unsanitary conditions.
"It's surprising to me that that
many major deficiencies were
observed at one time, and none of
these were picked up previously,"
said Michael Doyle, head of the
food safety center at the Univer-
sity of Georgia.
In October, state inspector
Donna Adams noted only two vio-
lations in her report on the Peanut
Corp. of America plant: tote con-
tainers with butter residue and
"black buildup" and "mildew and
possibly some static dust on ceil-
ing of butter storage room."
MOLO, Kenya
Kenya Red Cross:
89 dead in oil blaze
An oil spill from a crashed
truck erupted into flames yester-
day in Kenya, killing at least 89
people who were trying to scoop
up free fuel, officials said.
Patrick Nyongesa, the regional
manager for the Kenya Red Cross,
said 89 people died and more than
200 were injured died after a
crowd gathered around the crash
in search of free fuel.
The crash was in Molo, sev-
eral hours outside the capital,
Nairobi.
- Compiled from
Daily wire reports
TRANSFERS
From Page 1A
Colemansaid the reason the Uni-
versity doesn't usually accept many
sophomore transfers is because
attrition from the freshmen to
sophomore year is very low.
"Normally we don't have slots
for transfers at the sophomore level
because our retention rate is so high
from freshmen to sophomores,"
Coleman said. "We don't expect that
there's going to be huge numbers,
but we also don't want to let these
TOWN HALL
From Page 1A
and the actual students they're
supposed to be accountable to, so
hopefully this is one step in mend-
ing that rift."
One reason to have all the stu-
dent governments in one place
- besides allowing students to
complain at once - is to figure out
solutions to students' concerns
that might involve more than one
government, Madison said..
Gibran Baydoun, MSA's cam-
pus governance chair who worked
with Madison to plan the event,
said anyway to hear students' con-
student fall through the cracks."
Additionally, Sullivan said for a
sophomore to transfer to the Uni-
versity requires much more paper-
work than a junior transfer, as the
student's college and high school
career must be considered. When
a student applies for a junior trans-
fer, the University only considers
the student's college career.
On average from the fall of
2004 to the fall of 2008, about 840
transfer students enrolled at the
University every year. A little less
than 38 percent of those students
were sophomore transfers.
cerns and ideas is reason enough
to hold an event.
"Any time that we have the
opportunity to hear what's on the
students' minds is always a good
thing," Baydoun said. "Ifa student
comes and is complaining about a
dorm issue, (Residence Hall Asso-
ciation) is there. Ifa student comes
to complain about an LSA issue,
LSA-SG is there."
Engineering freshman Scott
Wilson said he's interested in going
to the event to find outwhy student
.government hasn't done all it said
it would during elections.
"Basically going is about hold-
ing them more accountable," Wil-
son said.
Congress mulls stimulus
Republican leader
Mitch McConnell
says both sides are
uneasy about bill
WASHINGTON (AP) - Repub-
licans suggested overhauling the
Senate's stimulus proposal because
they said it doesn't pump enough
into the private sector through tax
cuts but allows Democrats to go on
a spending spree unlikely to jolt
the economy.
"When I say start from scratch,
what I mean is that the basic
approach of this bill, we believe, is
wrong," said Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizo-
na, the No. 2 Republican. He added
that he was seeing an erosion of
support for the bill.
Senate Republican leader Mitch
McConnell of Kentucky said he
WIRELESS
From Page 1A
"It was a hassle if you just want-
ed to take your laptop somewhere
else to work," he said.
Currently living in West Quad,
Stoklosa and his friends have cho-
sen a more enterprising alternative,
using a password-protected wireless
connection from a router they pur-
chased earlier in the year. He said
having personal WiFi access means
not having "to worry about cables."
Stoklosa said he was aware this
is against dorm policy.
Alan Levy, ITCS director of
communications, acknowledged
that the issue of wireless Inter-
net access in the dorms has been
repeatedly discussed among Uni-
versity officials. He maintained
that with about 3,000 access
KEYNOTE
From Page 1A
doubted the Senate would pass the
bill, contending that Democrats as
well as Republicans were uneasy
with it. He renewed a Republican
complaint that Democrats had not
been as bipartisan in writing the
bill as Obama had said he wanted.
"I think it may be time ... for the
president to kind of get a hold of
these Democrats in the Senate and
the House, who have rather signifi-
cant majorities, and shake them a
little bit and say, 'Look, let's do this
the right way,"' McConnell said. "I
can't believe that the president isn't
embarrassed about the products
that have been produced so far."
Democrats defended their
almost $819 billion version ofPresi-
dentBarackObama's stimulus plan,
which is set for debate this week,
and said they were open to consid-
ering changes by Republicans. But
they said the unrelentingly bleak
economic news demanded action.
points and a continuous process
of upgrading the network, cover-
age at the University is typically
good.
Levy said ITCS has instead
focused its efforts on improving the
security of the network established
on campus by encouraging stu-
dents, faculty and staff to use the
new MWireless network, which is
more secure, over the existing UM
Wireless system, which has been
around for years.
"Our primary focus at this point
is establishing MWireless as the
WiFi environment for the vast
majority of campus," he said.
The University's developing
wireless Internet infrastructure
is just one aspect of a larger land-
scape of technological growth and
how that affects the current gen-
eration of students.
Engineering lecturer Jeff
dropped out of college and began
mass-producing worm poop to sell
as fertilizer.
"There is no such thing as gar-
PRISONERS
From Page 1A
plan's intention is not to save
money by decreasing safety but
rather to move toward rehabilitat-
ing newly released prisoners into
mainstream society rather than
keeping them jailed for unneces-
sary long periods of time.
The plan, which is supported
by Gov. Jennifer Granholm, would
put Michigan on par with the
other states around the country
including California, New Jersey
and South Carolina, states that are
currently looking at re-evaluating
their sentencing policies.
The analysis does not advocate
for releasing prisoners early but
rather that their minimum and
maximum sentences be more rep-
resentative to the crimes they com-
mitted, according to the report.
By creating a tighter timeframe
for which criminals can be jailed,
the state will only be keeping pris-
oners as long as necessary for the
sentence to be fully effective, the
report says.
John Cordell, a public informa-
tion officer in the Department of
Corrections, said the money saved
could be reinvested into other cor-
rections programs that are designed
to keep these prisoners from re-
offending. Cordell said the money
could also be used to fund other
strugglingstate departments.
"There is some reinvestment
that will occur into correctional
and criminal justice depart-
ments," he said. "Once that hap-
pens, we can free up those monies
for things like parks, education
and expenses for college."
Supporters of using the study's
findings to transform prison sen-
tencing laws hope to have the leg-
islature pass the proposal by April
and to have it melded into budget-
ary decisions for the 2009-2010
fiscal year.
State Sen. Liz Brater (D-Ann
Arbor) said that she supports mak-
ingthestate'sprisonsentencingmore
like other states but thinks the report
only addresses some of the issues
within the state prisonsystem.
"I think it's a good start," she
said. "I think we have to start from
here and then there's obviously a
lot more we can do. The issue of
people with mental illness is not
addressed, and these people are
ending up being criminalized."
Brater said that the legislature is
currently taking a look at the prob-
lem of people with mental illnesses
being put in prisons as opposed to
gettingthe care they need.
"We are currently doing a study
to analyze the incidence of men-
tal illness among the Michigan
prison population," Brater said.
"Hopefully this issue will lead us
to redirect that money to mental
health care. Treating someone
with a mental illness as an outpa-
tient would mean spending $8,000
to $11,000 each year as opposed to
$32,000 in the prisons."
With a reduction in the num-
ber of prisoners, some argue that
there is potential for a reduction of
the employees needed to maintain
the prison system.
Public Policy Prof. Paul Courant
said he thinks the legislature will
not only be debating the possibility
of having more previously convict-
ed felons free than in jail, but also
that legislators of certain constitu-
encies will have to consider the
potential loss of employment by
people who work in the prisons.
"The state budget is under pres-
sure, and there is a lot of interest
in cutting costs, but people in the
legislature don't want to appear
soft on crime," he said.
"We cannot delay this," said Sen.
Dick Durbin of Illinois, the Demo-
crats' No.2 leader. "Wecan'tengage
in the old political rhetoric of say-
ing, 'Well, maybe it could be a little
bit better here and a little bit better
there.' We've got to pull together."
Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.,
agreed that more could be done
in the area of housing, though he
said tapping money in the separate
financial bailout fund would be a
more likely way to pay for mort-
gage relief.
Under Obama's plan, strained
state budgets would receive a
cash infusion, projects for roads
and other infrastructure would
be funded, and "green jobs" in
the energy sector would be cre-
ated. In its centerpiece tax cut,
single workers would gain $500
and couples $1,000, even if they
don't earn enough to owe federal
income taxes.
Ringenberg said he has observed
the Internet playing an increasing-
ly important part of students' lives
in the last five years.
He added that wireless Internet
access in the classroom has been an
effective tool in delivering infor-
mation and facilitating "student-
driven learning."
Ringenberg noted that tech-
nology is a double-edged sword,
and the benefits of WiFi in the
classroom to supplement course
content must be weighed against
the inherent distractions of
access.
"I don't think it's important to
always be connected, but I think
it's important to always have the
option to be connected," he said.
"Everyone has to be able to unplug
atsome point, toturnoffthee-mail,
to just sit back and allow the mind
to relax."
panies and asked them if he could
collect their used products from
their customers and upcycle them
to create an entirely new product.
The companies, who were des-
perately seeking "green" solutions,
gladly accepted.
Since items likeyogurtcartons are
traditionally nonrecyclable, there is
no choice for the consumer besides
throwing them out. Through Terra-
Cycle, people now have the opportu-
nity to help the environment.
"There is nowhere in America
where people don't want to do the
right thing," Szaky said.
at Wal-Mart last year. bage," Szaky said. "We can even
When Szaky went home for fall sell our own waste."
break his freshman year, he said During his .keynote address,
he and his friends noticed that the Szaky said that most people would
"plants" they were growing in his prefer to use "environmentally
basement thrived when they added friendly" products, but they are
worm poop to them. usually much more expensive. .
This discovery gave Szaky the This is where Szaky said his job
idea that anything, even worm began. He figured out how to cre-
poop, could be recycled and used ate "green" products that didn't
for something useful. carry exorbitant price tags.
Shortly thereafter, Szaky He went to many big brand com-
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