NetSSskan_
Non-smokers respond
63 percent in favor of smoking ban
By Lee Rood
Senior Reporter
Sixty-three percent of the 748 students that
completed an Association of Students of the
University of Nebraska survey said they were in
favor of a campus-wide ban of smoking in non
residential buildings.
The survey was started more than two weeks
ago in conjunction with a proposed administra
tive change in the University of Nebr&ska
Lincoln’s current smoking policy.
Of the 748 graduate and undergraduate
participants in the survey, 501 specified they
were non-smokers and 68 said they were smok
ers.
Shawn Boldt, first vice president of ASUN,
said he was surprised with the number of non
smokers that took an interest in the survey.
Boldt said he had expected smokers to be the
majority of participants.
But even the smokers, Boldt said, were in
favor of banning smoking in various parts of the
university.
Students who filled out surveys had the
opportunity to express that they would strongly
agree, were neutral or strongly opposed a
smoking ban in specified areas.
More than 80 percent of the survey partici
pants said they were against smoking in univer
sity classrooms and hallways. More than 70
percent said they were against smoking in
indoor sports facilities and assembly areas.
In dining areas, 69.5 percent of the partici
pants said they would strongly agree with a
smoking ban.
Only a small majority of the participants,
50.5 percent, said they were strongly opposed
to smoking in university hallways.
Boldt finished tallying the results of the
survey shortly before the ASUN meeting
Wednesday night. Now that it is completed,
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Boldt said John Goebel, vice chancellor of
business and finance, will compare the re
sponses with those of university administrators
and professors.
Goebel has been reviewing the university’s
policy to see if it needs revision. Goebel said in
an earlier Daily Nebraskan article that if there
arc many people on campus against the policy,
it may be changed. All changes in the policy
would have to comply with the Nebraska Clean
Indoor Air Act passed by the Legislature in
1935.
After Boldt tallied the results of the survey
the 1988-89 AS UN senate met for the last time
Wednesday nightapproving a bill recommend
ing standards for hiring foreign teaching assis
tants.
After many complaints that students have
had difficulty understanding the English of
many foreign TA’s, ASUN Sen. Nancy Clark
researched the problem along with the Advi
sory Committee on International Student Af
fairs.
Some of the recommended improvements
include retaining and enforcing the required
score on language competency tests and estab
lishing a procedure to monitor complaints
about the spoken English or teaching skills of a
foreign TA.
Senators also voted to investigate the possi
bility of broadcasting an accounting class cur
rently taught by videotape on the Nebraska
Educational Television Network or on a Lin
coln Cablevision channel.
Currently Accounting 201, taught in the
College of Business Administration, has more
than 700 students enrolled, senators said.
Broadcasting the course would make it more
accessible, they said. To date, students enrolled
in the course have only been able to watch
reruns of course lectures—outside of its given
class time — in the residence halls through
closed-circuit television.
Ag director says support systems
never allocated to needy farmers
By Jerry Guenther
Staff Reporter
Roy Frederick, director of the Nebraska
Department of Agriculture, said Wednesday
that agricultural price support systems have
never been allocated to farmers who needed it
most
“Because agriculture benefits are applied
across the board we have had some people who
have very legitimately taken full advantage of
these programs, and frankly, they could’ve
lived without them,” Frederick said.
Problems for the present price support sys
tem stem from the way the program is set up,
Frederick said at an ag policy forum in the
Nebraska Union sponsored by Omicron Delta
Epsilon, the Economics Honor Society.
“We have never had targeted programs in
this country,” Frederick said. “We haven’t
been able to get around to talk about that in the
U.S. Congress, it’s too skittish politically.”
Frederick said the price support systems
which the farmer needs depends on the size of
his operation, and the commodities which the
farmer produces.
“What we have sometimes is a situation
where farm programs can provide an opportu
nity for economic cannibalism in agriculture,”
he said.
Larry Swanson, a private consultant in agri
culture and natural resources, said the farm
crisis of the 1980s has been misdiagnosed.
Swanson, speaking to an audience of about
65, said since the 1930s the course of American
agriculture has not been sustainable from a
resource, energy or financial standpoint.
“We can go on misusing our resource base
for years if it pays,” Swanson said, “but what
happens in this particular case is that it no
longer pays.”
One example of the current financial course
is the collapse of the debt structure on far mers
and the rising insolvency of agricultural credit
institutions in the past four or five years, Swan
son said.
Swanson said he is optimistic and pessimis
tic about the future of agriculture.
“Agriculture will always have a future, the
question is what type,” Swanson said.
Butch Ireland/Dally Nebraskan
Web of windows.
The skylight at Gold’s Galleria silhouettes a lone passerby on the top
catwalk Monday afternoon.
Foundation to bring speakers to UNL
By Lee Rood
Senior Reporter
University of Nebraska-Lincoln Chancellor
Martin Massengale announced Wednesday a
matching grant that will help open the univer
sity to world issues.
Massengale said the Cooper Foundation —
UNL Forum on World Issues will bring distin
guished speakers to UNL beginning this fall.
The event will be financed with a matching
grant from the Cooper Foundation and the
University of Nebraska Foundation.
The grants will be allotted to the series
throughout a five-year period. The Cooper
Foundation will provide $20,000 and the NU
Foundation will supply $5,000 yearly.
Massengale said the forum will give UNL
students and others in the community an oppor
tunity to hear many experts on world events.
While no speakers have been lined up yet,
Massengale said, coordinators are looking for
experts in world events. He said leaders from
various countries will not be excluded from
consideration. Some experts, he said, may stir
controversy.
Jack Thompson, president of the Cooper
Foundation, said the series will not only inform
students, but will enable them “to have a re
laxed familiarity with the way other people
think.”
Thompson said if the program is successful
after the first five years, he hopes it will con
tinue on indefinitely.
“We hope it will commend itself for long
range financing,” he said.
Other schools in the area and individuals in
Lincoln will be welcome to attend the lectures,
Thompson said.
Massengale said he did not foresee any
admission fees being charged for speakers.
I Experts: Downtown Lincoln needs businesses, parking
By Anne Mohri
Senior Reporter
Downtown Lincoln needs larger
: businesses and a parking garage to be
competitive with urban retailers,
according to three downtown rede
velopment experts.
A panel met Wednesday at the
University of Nebraska-Lincoln col
= lege of architecture to discuss rede
velopment issues in Lincoln.
Kent Seacrest, a partner in the law
firm of Cline, Williams, Wright,
Johnson, and Oldfather, said if down
town is not redeveloped businesses
will go elsewhere.
“Our downtown is not healthy,”
Seacrest said.
Gamer Stoll, director of the Lin
coln-Lancaster Planning Depart
ment, said several national develop
ers are interested in building a shop
ping mall on 40th street and Old
Cheney. But the city council will not
approve the mall, he said.
Downtown Lincoln needs to at
tract larger businesses such as Younk
ers and Dillards, Seacrest said.
Although the area lacks retail, he
said, Lincoln’s downtown has poten
tial. He said 25,000 students and oth
ers circulate in the downtown area
because it is close to UNL and city,
county and state offices.
Seacrest said Lincoln has a con
vention center and hotels and a good
public transportation service.
Stoll said public/private business
partnerships, such as the Centrum
Shopping Plaza, Comhusker Hotel,
Gold's Galleria and the Haymarkel
Square will improve business.
Dave Erickson, partner in the
architecture firm of Erickson-Schulz
and Associates, said “the Haymarkel
has the potential to absorb some of the
dislocated downtown tenants.”
More downtown parking will help
attract retailers, Stoll said.
A parking garage located on 14th
street between O and P streets would
attract businesses to the vacant J C
Penney and Hovland Swanson stores
and the partially vacant Commercial
Federal building, Stoll said.
He said chances of leasing these
buildings depend on whether or not a
parking garage will be built,
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