Page 2-The Michigan Daily-Wednesday, April 24, 1991 Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson MSA IN GE TWA ~-)ARLUVGET t~At d FIVME PATS SIRGARG TKO FR NATT IR Cu W4 QF 00,!A w GM M91 I ok tc I IME. A FGRUE4 k£RTS ! NOupDTIES AE UT RANK. awwgZ ! 1 t It UvLrI NAVE TTMES TI IMPORTAMACE cv ALO FIRST TIGERA HMIQRE TIE MILLION TIME~S! " G eG COME~ w s; vqTILL ANTHEM ? C ES ~w I I - l -N ... a.aa a HOUSING Cbntinued from page 1 percent since 1980. "The fact that Ann Arbor re- c'eived 25 is a real plum for Ann Arbor because few of those were given to other cities," Benson said. Government officials say reno- vating is usually a bigger priority than building because sub-standard living conditions often create a high vacancy rate. Detroit public housing, for example, has a 42 percent va- cancy rate, said John Terranella, di- rector of the housing and manage- ment division at the Department of Housing and Urban Development. The biggest difficulty with building in Ann Arbor is a lack of land space, Benson said. In addition, the government will not build high- density, low-income projects on the land that is available. "It's better to give families a more normal living environment and more integration into the com- munity, than have huge massive pub- lic housing that gets stigmatized and so forth," said Bob Brown, HUD's director of the housing de- velopment division in Detroit. The question still remains, though, what incentives there are for the private sector to help build low-income housing. The answer may lie with the Home Investment Partnerships Act, which Congress passed last Novem- ber. This might encourage devel- opers to build low-income housing by re-establishing incentives that were eliminated in the tax reform of 1986. "It really promises cost-sharing to various different programs," said Mike Nail, director of the housing and community development divi- sion at the National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Offi- cials in Washington. Continued from page 1 of (SGC)." There hasn't been a recurrence within MSA of extreme mishan- dling of funds, he said. However, the former MSA ad- ministration used funds to sponsor a student trip to the West Bank last summer. The trip was approved by the summer assembly, but all sum- mer decisions are supposed to be rat- ified by the fall assembly before be- ing implemented. Even earlier, the administration of Mike Phillips somehow lost track of $60,000 that was supposed to be allocated to Student Legal Services. MSA is still paying off the debt. Green said he thinks the debt will be paid by the end of this summer. He said he also plans to establish a system for keeping better records of MSA financial transactions. Currently, no records are kept of what comes in and what goes out of the MSA account. "When I came into office, I found no financial books," Green. CART Student Shipping & Storage -Authorized UPS Shipping Outlet- Our representatives will be in the following residence halls April 29, 30, May 1, 2, & 3, from 3pm-6pm: *EW/S Quad, Mojo *Stockwell, Cousins "Markley, $ursley " Alice Lloyd Call 995-9570 said. "We need internalirecords." He said the University has kept track of the MSA account. Power said that both restructur- ing MSA and substituting a volun- tary MSA fee for the mandatory fee taken from student tuition have been discussed for the past two summers. "The general question has been, 'Does the present structure of MSA make sense or are there others that would make MSA more representa- tive of the students?' and 'Should MSA be funded on a regular student task or a voluntary check fund?"' If anything changes in the near future, it would probably be to make the MSA fee voluntary. "I have always supported the idea of voluntary fees (for MSA)," said Regent Deane Baker (R-Ann Arbor). Power said they may see propos- als for such changes in the future. "I haven't seen any specific proposals to address this issue, but they may well come." Baker said the fate of MSA should be decided by the students. "Historically, the regents have followed the request of students except in extreme cases," Baker said. Last year the regents refused to grant former president Jennifer Van Valey's request to raise the student GEO Continued from page 1 "There hasn't been much progress, but on the other hand the University hasn't been negotiating in bad faith," he said. GEO president Chris Roberson said it is not clear what the future will hold for the organization, but added he is pessimistic about the possibility of the contract being settled before next fall. "Basically the negotiation has gone about as far as it's going to go this term ... (and) I don't foresee ei- ther side changing its position much over the summer," he said. GEO strike team member Allison Rolls said the lack of a set- tlement will mean a continuation of the organization's protests against ITD Continued from page 1 tants will have priority over non- student consultants when jobs are cut, she added. "We currently have 11 full-time equivalents, or FTE's, doing on-site consulting. We will be cutting that to about seven and a half. Also, we're adding one FTE to 4-HELP," Munn-Fremon noted. A full-time equivalent is any number of part- time workers who work shifts that equal 40 hours per week. She also said that additional campus phones are being installed at all of the computing sites so that users with problems can call 4- HELP when on-site consultants are not available. Commenting on the reason for the change, Munn-Fremon said, "We really think that's more efficient." Rumors had been circulating around campus since the weekend that more than 80 percent of ITD consultants would be let go, and that overall consulting hours would see up to a 40 percent cut. These rumors proved to be false. In other computing news, ITD and the University's Housing Division are still negotiating the fate of the ResComp program, a fee from $6.77 to $7.21. Baker said the budget decrease re- sulted from a disagreement with Van Valey. Power agreed. "MSA was in- volved in directly criticizing what it was the regents were trying to and spending student money to ci icize it." Roach also said funding was cut because of MSA misconduct. He said they were "sending a very sim- ple message" that you don't alienate the source of your funding. He added that he doesn't know if relations with MSA will improve under the new conservative leadership. Power said the regents should consider each president individually. "I would hope the regents wouldn't alter funding for MSA on the basis of one president," he said. Even with the change in leader- ship, MSA funding is still likely to be cut due to University-wide finan- cial constraints. "The University is unde! tremendous financial pressure right now. I wouldn't be surprised if ex- penses for MSA were cut," Power said. Green said he is prepared to make cuts and is hoping to request less money for the budget than last year. the University. "We're definitely going to sho* some GEO solidarity at commence- ment," she said, adding there is a strong possibility of a "full- fledged strike in the fall." "There will be some heavy duty organizing over the summer," Rolls added. Roberson agreed that a strike is a possibility, adding that any strike would come only after a ballot vo of the entire membership. Kozura also stressed that the question of what action will be taken is up to membership to decide. "What we'll do over the sum- mer and over the fall is the decision of the membership, not the bargain- ing team," he said. A GEO membership meeting is scheduled for tommorow night. joint program between the two di- visions. ResComp director Mary Simoni said one cause of concern, the possi- ble termination of the loan program that provides computers to all resi- dence hall staff - such as resident advisors, resident directors, and res- ident fellows - has been taken care of. "ITD consented to give the com- puters set aside for residence staff to the Housing Division. Housing now owns over 300 computers that it can loan out to this staff, and this should ensure the future of the loan program," Simoni said. Simoni also thanked the students who turned out for the ResComp forums earlier this month, sayin* that the input garnered from those attending was "invaluable," but added that nothing is likely to be re- solved for "another couple of weeks." The ResComp negotiations were necessitated by the budget crisis that has recently hit ITD. The initial agreement called for ITD and Housing to fund equal portions ResComp's $300,000 annual budget, but ITD's financial woes have forced the division to cut back some of the funding. ~I~g Aidjigun fa1 The Michigan Daily (ISSN 0745-967) is published Monday through Friday during the fall and winter terms by students at the University of Michigan. The Daily is published Wednesdays during the spring and summerterms.On-campus Spring/Summer subscriptions are $8; off-campus subscriptionswill not be accepted for the Spring/Summer terms. Daily subscriptions will resume in the fall. The Michigan Daily is a member of The Associated Press and the College Press Service. ADDRESS: The Michigan Daily, 420 Maynard Street, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109. 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