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Show TIfE DAILY UTAH CHRONICLE NEWS IN REVIEW www.dailyuiahchronicle.com Thursday, April 27, 2006 Student officials vote in favor of MANDATORY HEALTH INSURANCE Patrick Muir Chronicle Asst. News Editor The ASUU Senate and General Assembly voted in favor of a resolution mandating all students to show proof of health insurance before registering for classes April 20. University of Utah President Michael Young must sign the resolution before it can be implemented. The resolution would affect an estimated 17 percent of students who currently attend the U without any health coverage. By Fall Semester of 2007, students without health insur- ance would not be allowed to attend the U unless they could prove they could not afford coverage. Student officials said they hope this resolution will help save student health coverage on campus and extend that opportunity to as many students as possible. "I'm ecstatic," said Tiffany Trinh, outreach coordinator for the Student Health Advisory Committee. "We've presented a plan that can and will work." Natanya Miller, senator from the College of Education, said the plan increases the U's standards and helps create a healthier student body. Matt Swindel, senator from the College of Architecture, voted against the resolution because he said his constituents do not feel it is right for the school to say a student has to have health insurance. Associated Students of the University of Utah President Ali Hasnain proposed the resolution to the Senate and Assembly last October after learning the U's health plan was failing and the provider, GM Southwest, might drop coverage for financial reasons. Currently, GM Southwest is losing money because most students on the plan buy coverage knowing they will use it. In November, the Senate and Assembly passed a resolution to further investigate the effects of mandating health insurance. The resolution commissioned a survey to find the demographics of the uninsured, why they don't have coverage and how much they could spend if necessary. With discussion of a potential hard-waiver insurance policy, GM Southwest lowered its premium bid 10 percent from current prices. Also, 20 other companies have expressed interest in offering a bid if the U adopted a mandatory policy. The current resolution would create a new committee where students could appeal the policy after submitting all sources of income and expenses, proving they cannot afford health insurance. Also, the resolution calls for the creation of a scholarship to help subsidize the cost of health insurance for students who cannot afford it. Students would apply to the student government for coverage. p.muir@ chronicle.utah.edu BLOC crushes Big Idea Party wins presidential seats, majority of Senate and Assembly Dustin Gardiner Chronicle Writer The BLOC Party destroyed the competition when student government elections results were announced on March 9 in the Union Ballroom. BLOC Party presidential and vice presidential . . candi' dates Jake Kirkham and Toby Collett beat opponents Lindsey Sine and Dave Martini of the Big Idea Party by 389 votes. Overall, the BLOC Party presidential candidates received 54 percent of the vote, compared with the Big Idea candidates' 42 percent. Write-in candidates accounted for the remaining 4 percent of the vote. Current Associated Students of the University of Utah President Ali Hasnain and Vice President John Poelman came in third place with eight of the write-in votes. Upon hearing of their victory, the crowd lifted President elect Jake Kirkham and Vice President elect Toby Collett into the air as they cheered. "I'm ecstatic, I owe it to all the people that helped along the way," Kirkham said. Kirkham attributed his party's success to its detailed planning and dedicated campaign workers. "We just started planning early— like seven months ago—and we got the right people...this was a long time coming," he said. Mindy Chidester, senior class president elect, beat Big Idea Party candidate Shahene Pezeshki by 351 votes—a margin of 22 percent. Sine, presidential candidate for the Big Idea Party, was confident that ASUU would do just fine with Kirkham and Collett in charge. "I think ASUU is in very good hands," Sine said. "For everyone that supported me, I'm so appreciative because I had a lot of great support throughout the whole thing... Now I'm gonna go get drunk with Bode and the gang." The BLOC Party won all but 10 elected positions, including president/vice president, senior class president and 54 out of 64 ASUU Senate and General Assembly seats. Of the remaining 10 seats, write-in candidates in the College of Architecture took two—a rarity in ASUU elections, elections officials said. Mark Thornton, the only independent candidate in the election, won, receiving the most votes in the College of Humanities. Voter turnout for the elections fell from last year. Only 12 percent of the student body (3,461 students) voted in the elections, which is down 6 percent from last year's 18 percent (5,111 students). d.gardiner@chronicle.utah.edu U gives up on rec center Students, administrators a no-show at final committee meeting Steve Gehrke Chronicle Editor in Chief The student government and administration threw in the towel on the rec center proposal in early February. U representatives elected not to bring the request for a multi-million dollar bond before the Capital Facilities Subcommittee at the Utah State Legislature during its final meeting of the 2006 session, effectively ending the push for a government bond. "I'm disappointed...and I am stunned at the Legislature's disinclination to credit the precise democratic process to which they, themselves, think so highly of," said University of Utah President Michael Young of the committee's vote against the rec center. The project would have added a 14,000-square-foot weight and fitness room, a rock climbing wall, a juice bar and a social lounge to campus through a state bond that the U would have paid back through an estimated $6o-per-semester increase in student fees. Student representatives lobbied legislators on the committee for more than a week before deciding to drop the proposal. "We were one vote short," said Associated Students of the University of Utah Vice President John Poelman, who added that the U needed to prove to committee Chairman Bill Hickman, R-St. George, that they had enough votes for the center to pass before he would agree to reintroduce the project. Lawmakers* concerns Essentially, the rec center died because the Legislature "didn't want to spend public money on a facility that was questionable in terms of its val- See REC CENTER Page 6 Legislature budget results in a tuition increase Jay Logan Rogers Chronicle Writer The Utah State Legislature allocated only an "average" amount of funding for higher education this year, in spite of a budget surplus. A tuition increase was the result of their reluctance to allocate money to the U. "Higher education had a modest legislative session with regard to appropriations," said Kim Wirthlin, U vice president for government relations. "I would characterize it as only an average year for higher ed in a year when we had a very large overall state budget," said Richard Kendell, commissioner of the Utah State Board of Regents. Kendell said that because the Legislature opted to raise some faculty salaries, the law requires that students' tuition go up to help pay for the increase. Wirthlin said the session's biggest success for the U was the passage of the Utah Science and Technology Research (USTAR) initiative. The project was designed to make Utah a hub of cutting-edge research by creating new facilities and recruiting renowned faculty. The Legislature's USTAR bill granted $15 million in ongoing funds to university faculty recruitment, $50 million in one-time runds for the construction of new buildings and created a $100 million bonding au- thority, Wirthlin said. Another high priority, a salary increase of 3 percent for state-appointed faculty and staff, was fund-' ed. Regents approved a 4 percent tuition increase for the U. A large portion of the increase in tuition revenue will be used toward the employee compensation. The rest will help cover a variety of needs at the university. Wirthlin noted that some of the U administration's legislative priorities were not funded at all. These included mission-based priorities and "student success" grants designed to open more course secSee H I G H E R E D Page 3 NCAA removes U from list of schools with offensive mascots Dustin Gardiner Chronicle Writer After originally ruling that the Utes' nickname was racially insensitive and had to be changed, the NCAA had a change of heart, and the U was ultimately allowed to continue using the Ute logo. On August 5, the NCAA issued a list of schools that had "hostile and abusive racial/ethnic/national origin mascots, nicknames or imagery." If the schools did not comply with the ruling and make changes, they would be barred from playing or hosting national tournaments. The U community and many members of the Ute tribe were shocked by the announcement. A number of Ute tribal leaders approved of the nickname use and found it to be honorary rather than abusive. U administrators called the relationship between the U and the Ute tribe a "longstanding, cordial and mutually beneficial relationship." Many believed that the Ute tribal leaders should have made the final decision on whether the name was offensive or not. After about a month of controversy and outrage, University of Utah President Michael Young submitted a letter of formal appeal asking the NCAA to allow the U to continue using the traditional nickname. The Northern Ute Indian Tribal Business Committee backed the petition. Upon reviewing the case, the NCAA Executive Committee removed the U from its list of offending schools, allowing the nickname to remain. The following Friday, at the first football game of the season, Ute fans and players celebrated the triumph of their mascot and nickname. Young and Ute tribal leaders agreed that they will continue to work together in the future to maintain a positive relationship. d.gardiner@ chronicle.utah.edu |