CORRECTION
In a story about the ASUN Senate s denial of student fee funding to the
Committee Offering Lesbian and Gay Events (DN, Feb. 16), ASUN Sen. Steve
Thomlison said sodomy laws in the Bible show that homosexuality is morally
wrong. He did not, however, quote specific Bible passages.
WEATHER: Monday, light snow, high of I INDEX
30, E winds 10-20 mph, 70 percent chance of
snow. Monday night, doudy with flurries, Editorial.4
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skies. Classifieds.7
I February 20» 1989__University of Nebraska-Lincoln Vol. 88 No 104
COLAGE might go to court
if denied university funds
By Brandon Loomis
Senior Reporter
The gay and lesbian programming group
at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln
has a “wait-and-see attitude” but may
consider legal action if the university denies
Financing it through student fees, according to
the group’s co-chairperson.
Nanci Hamilton of COLAGE, the Commit
tee Offering Lesbian and Gay Events, said
legal precedence is on the group’s side. If the
I3NL administration follows the advice of the
Association of Students of the University of
Nebraska and denies funding, she said, CO
LAGE could take the university to court.
“The option is there, but I’m not going to
confirm or deny whether we’ll pursue that
option,” Hamilton said.
The decision of whether to fund the group
now goes to UNL Vice Chancellor for Student
Affairs James Griesen and Chancellor Martin
Masscngale.
Hamilton said John Taylor, director of the
Nebraska Civil Liberties Union, looked into
similar cases in the past and found that a federal
court last year ruled that denying funds to a gay
and lesbian group is unconstitutional.
The case, Gay and Lesbian Students Asso
ciation (University of Arkansas, Fayetteville)
vs. Gohn, was heard in the 8th U.S. Circuit
Court of Appeals. The court ruled that denial of
funds based on content of programming vio
lated First Amendment free speech rights.
Taylor, referring to ASUN’s consideration
of COL AGE student fee funding .said, “The
decisions that have been made have been made
on content.”
Because Nebraska is within the 8th Circuit
Court’s jurisdiction, Taylor said, the Arkansas
case is binding on Nebraska. The court that
would hear COLAGE’s case would have to
decide if the case is substantially similar, he
said.
“It appears to me to be substantially simi
lar,’’ Taylor said, “but I’m not an attorney.”
Jill Durbin, an ASUN senator and member
of the Committee for Fees Allocation, said it is
hard to compare the two cases. She said she
would have to study the Arkansas case care
fully before saying if ASUN had acted in the
same manner as the University of Arkansas.
ASUN voted 18-7 with one abstention
Wednesday to deny COLAGE funding.
“I don’t think we’ve acted unconstitution
ally, and I think it’s going to be hard for them
to prove we have,” Durbin said.
CFA has received letters from a gay and
lesbian group at a California college urging the
committee to fund COLAGE, Durbin said.
That group made similar claims of the uncon
stitutional^ of denying funds to COLAGE,
and said that it, too, had won a court case, she
said.
But Durbin maintained that ASUN’s and
CFA’s decisions were constitutional and not
based on personal prejudices.
“It wasn’t a decision based on morality, at
least not for me,’’ she said.
Jeff Petersen, AS UN president, said that in
deciding to deny funding to COLAGE, AS UN
did not violate the group’s First Amendment
free speech rights.
“No one has ever said that the gay and
lesbian community didn’t have the perfect, 1 (X)
percent right to speak out and hold events on
campus, ’ ’ Petersen said. “ It’s just a question of
who’s going to pay for it.’’
Durbin said the new developments in the
controversial COLAGE funding issue won’t
change her mind or make her think she has
acted unconstitutionally.
“If they want to take us to court, I guess
we’II just have to take them on,’’ she said.
Book sells due to controversy
By Brandon Loomis
Senior Reporter
When Waldenbooks ordered its stores
across the nation to remove the con
troversial book “The Satanic
Verses” from the shelves Friday, customers at
the Lincoln branch had already beaten them to
it.
The manager of Lincoln s Waldenbooks,
who would not give her name, said the nation’s
largest bookseller will continue to sell the book
upon request where and when available. She
said the decision to take the books off display
was an effort to protect store employees.
The book prompted Iran’s Ayatollah
Khomeini to demand the death of the book’s
author, Salman Rushdie, because it is allegedly
blasphemous. Bomb threats also have been
made against the book’s U.S. publisher.
Although the manager of Waldenbooks
would not say if the book ever sold in Lincoln,
a salesclerk confirmed Saturday that the book
sold out when the controversy began last week.
Waldenbooks is located in the Centrum Plaza.
Kathy Stasch, manager of Lincoln’s B.
Dalton Bookseller said her company ’ s national
headquarters had told her not to comment on
whether her store had sold the book. But B.
Dalton, located in the Gateway Mall, sold out
See BOOK on 3
David Frana/Dafty Nabraakan
Roamin’ in sneakers
A statue in Architecture Hall sports a pair of high top sneakers donated
by an anonymous friend.
former UNL financial aid assistant
leaves Nebraska for Iowa position
By Larry Peirce
Senior Reporter
Doug Severs begins a new job
today as financial aid director
of the University of Dubuque,
Iowa, after 15 years at the University
of Nebraska-Lincoln Office of Schol
arships and Financial Aid.
Severs, who was assistant director
of the UNL office until Friday, began
his career at the university in 1973,
after the U.S. Department of Educa
tion reviewed aid programs and
found that students’ on-campus em
ployment wasn’t being monitored
properly. He had been there longer
than anyone in die office.
“They hired rne in part to fill holes
they found in the (1973) review,’’ he
said.
The reviewers found the office
was “over-awarding” aid to students
because they indicated they weren’t
going to work, but did, he said.
Severs got his job at UNL alter he
noticed a job opening at the aid office
posted in the College of Business
Administration. He was hired with a
beginning wage of $1.90 an hour to
monitor students’ on-campus em
ploymcni and help students find off
campus jobs.
Two months later he was making
$2.50 an hour, and a vear later he
became coordinator of work study
programs.
Much has changed at the office
during his time there, he said.
In 1973, Pell Grants didn’t exist,
and guaranteed student loans were
rare. UNL offered only work study,
National Direct Student Loan and
Supplemental Education Opportu
nity Grant programs, he said.
College costed less in the early
1970s. The estimated total cost of
attending UNI. was about $2,200 per
year in 1973, compared to about
$6,300 today, he said.
“Kids could probably work and
get some help from parents and get by
(in 1973),’’ he said. “Now about
two-thirds are on some form of finan
cial aid.”
The size of the office’s staff has
doubled over the years, while the
work has quadrupled, he said.
“Thousands” of guaranteed stu
dent loans go through the office every
year, with almost all banks offering
them, he said. Federal guidelines
have caused the workload and
amount of paperwork to increase, he
said.
One of the most frustrating aspects
of the job, he said, is explaining to
students that federal regulations dic
tate the amount of aid they can be
awarded.
“I say 'I’d love to do something
for you (students), but we have these
federal guidelines,’*’ he said.
The guidelines are “not necessar
ily fair or rational,’’ but the office
still must follow thei.i, he said.
Aid applicants now must show
they are registered or exempt from
registration with the Selective Serv
ice, and 30 percent of applications
must be verified with tax forms, he
said. These requirements didn’t exist
in the mid-1970s, he said.
The University of Dubuque, a pri
vate school in northeast Iowa, has
about 1,200 students and offers a
doctor of theology degree and a lib
eral arts program. Severs said it will
be like returning to the early ’70s at
UNL when almost ail of the work was
done manually by a small staff.
See SEVERS on 3
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