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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (April 25, 1990)
WEATHER |NDEX Wednesday, partly sunny, windy and warm, 30 ' »,. 9 percent chance of thundershowers, high 80-85, .. south wind 20-30 miles per hour. Wednesday Editorial.4 night, good chance of thundershowers, low Sports.6 around 60, 50 percent chance of rain Thursday, Arts & Entertainment 8 considerable cloudiness and not as warm, 40 Classifieds.9 percent chance of thundershowers, high in the mid- to upper 70s__ April 25, 1990 _University of Nebraska-LincolnVol. 89 No. 141 Candidate debate centers on faculty, student recruiting By Emily Rosenbaum Senior Reporter District 1 candidates for the NU Board of Regents agreed Tuesday that the Uni versity of Nebraska can and must im prove by attracting better faculty members and students. For that improvement to happen, more money is needed for salaries and scholarships, said candidates Earl Scuddcr, Charles Wilson, Tre vor McArthur and Dick Powell, during a de bate at the Culture Center. Scudder, president of Lincoln’s Scuddcr Law Firm, said NU already attracts many of the “best and brightest” students, but always will lose some to universities such as Harvard, which can offer more scholarships because of its “huge endowments.” Students who go to other universities often are offered better scholarships, Scudder said. NU should offer more full-ride academic schol arships like the ones given to the “world-class athletes” here, he said. “We can get world-class students the same way,” he said. NU must focus on career opportunities for its students and ensure that jobs will be avail able in the state for graduates, Scudder said. Powell, a self-employed optometrist in Lincoln, said he thinks students should be recruited as early as 10th grade. “We need to identify and aggressively pursue these students,” Powell said. i iuu 5 iiui Happening now, lie saiu, anu as a result, the university is being “out-hustled” by other schools. He said the NU system also must develop alternate sources of revenue, such as an endow ment fund for instructional equipment. “We rely too heavily on the unicameral for funding,” he said. Other sources of money would take pressure off the university because it wouldn’t always have to go to taxpayers through the Legisla ture, Powell said. McArthur, a senior in the UNL Teachers College, said one way to decrease costs and have more money to spend on faculty salaries is to focus more on recycling and energy con servation at NU. Wilson, a cardiologist at the Nebraska Heart Institute, said he thinks the key to achieving excellence for NU is coordination of the uni versity’s role and mission and preventing du plication of programs. If university programs parallel those at other Nebraska post-secondary institutions, there will be unneeded duplication, he said. Interstate compacts are one way to coordi nate expensive programs, such as dental and veterinary programs, with other schools in the See REGENTS on 5 William Lauer'Daily Nebraskan Windex men Chuck Waters and Dean Zimmerman o( R.A. Construction Co. ot Omaha, re-caulk windows of The Cornhusker Hotel on Tuesday. UNL to renovate greenhouses Oil overcharge refund helps finance project By James P. Webb Staff Reporter Renovation of 24 greenhouses on East Campus will be paid for in part by an oil overcharge refund to the state of Ne braska said Alan Moeller, assistant vice chan cellor of the Institute of Agiiculture and Natu ral Resources. “A deal was struck” with the governor’s office before she vetoed $900,000 slated for the greenhouse renovation project during the Legislature’s last session, Moeller said. The governor agreed to use $400,000 from the state’s oil overcharge refund if the institute also raised money itself, he said. So far the project has $1 million from the Legislature’s 1989 session and $100,000 from the chancellor’s office budget, Moeller said. UNL will renovate greenhouses by strength ening structural supports and installing a lem pcrcd-glass roof, side walls, south walls and a computerized ventilation system, Moeller said. “Total energy savings from conservative estimates are 30 percent,” Moeller said. “I think that’s what made it such an attractive plan to the governor.” Jon Morrison, deputy director of the gover nor’s Energy Office, said all of Gov. Kay Orr’s plans for distribution of the oil overcharge refund must enhance or promote energy-effi cient projects and must be "restitution in na ture.’ After the governor drafts a plan for distribu tion, it is sent to the Legislature or an out-of session executive committee where comments and public hearings arc heard, said Morrison. The plan to give money for greenhouse renova tion also will have to go through this process. Any changes in the plan, made exclusively by the governor, arc sent to the U.S. Depart ment of Energy for final approval, he said. To date, the governor has earmarked a $ 10 million low-interest, revolving-door loan for certified public energy efficiency projects, $2 million to UNL for energy efficiency research, $500,000 to UNL for wcathcrization projects and $1.5 million to Chadron and Peru State Colleges for woodchip-burning boilers. The loan principle continually will be re plcnishcd by borrower interest payments and will be available to the public July 2. The disbursement of oil overcharge refunds still arc ongoing and arc the result of price violations of oil companies from the period 1973-1981, Morrison said. In 1973, the Carter administration set oil price controls and created incentives for oil companies to increase production efficiency, he said. But two years later, the DOE discovered that oil companies had distorted production costs to get the incentives, Morrison said. The DOE corroborated with theU.S. Department of Justice and filed suit against Exxon, he said. After the DOE named Exxon’s overcharge at $2 billion, the remaining oil companies agreed to what is called the Stripper Well Settlement of 1986, Morrison said. To dale, the state has received SI 8.3 million from Exxon, $5.9 million from the Stripper Well Settlement and is scheduled to receive $921,(XX) from Texaco on Thursday, said Bonnie Zicmann, assistant director of operations of the governor’s Energy Office. UNL behind UNO, UNMC in faculty salary goal By Victoria Ayotte Senior Reporter Regents’ assurances of equal faculty salary raises for the University of Nebraska cam puses appear to be more “in pious promise than concrete action,’’ ac cording to the president of UNL’s Academic Senate. James McShane said he is frus trated by action the NU Board of Regents has taken in the last three years that did not follow through on original plans. Two years ago, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, University of Nebraska at Omaha and University of Nebraska Medical Center put together • a three-year plan to bring faculty sala ries into line with those at peer insti tutions. In 1987, UNL was 22.1 percent behind its 10 peer institutions, UNO 11.5 percent behind and UNMC 10.6 percent behind, according .ig-salary archive figures from June 1989. “The others were had, but ours was startling,” McShane said of the disparities. The plan would have given UNL faculty membersa greater percentage of salary increases. _* * _ moving target,” McShane said, be cause salary increases at the peer institutions also had to be projected. To compensate for that, officials anticipated 5.5 percent a year increases at peer institutions when figuring the UNL has made progress, but we (all campuses) have not reached parity together. Gosch ASUN president - • « — The regents requested a 13.6 per cent increase for UNL in 1988-89, 12.5 percent in 1989-90 and 12.5 percent in 1990-91. They requested a 9.7 percent increase for UNO lor 1988 89, 9.3 percent for 1989-90 and 9.2 percent for 1990-91. The UNMC request was for 9.4 percent in 1988 89, 9.4 percent in 1989-90 and 8.9 percent in 1990-91. The plan was like “shooting at a raises needed for NU. But salaries at peer institutions have gone up more than that, McShanc said. Some estimates show that peer institutions have had raises of more than 6 percent a year. While the intention was good from the beginning, he said, the reality of where the pay raises have gone is different. The original assurance that UNL, UNO and UNMC would reach the midpoint of peer institutions’ salary levels at the same time seems * ‘not to be iri the cards,” McShane said. UNL is about twice as far behind the other NU campuses in achieving the goal. UNL still is 12.8 percent behind its peers, UNO 4.2 percent behind and UNMC 6.6 percent be hind, McShane said. The original plan was changed along the way. The regents in 1988-89 gave UNL faculty members an 11 percent raise, below the 13.6 percent request. UNO and UN MC received raises of about 8 percent. In 1989-90 and 1990-91, U NL was allocated 11.5 percent raises, 1 per cent below the plan. UNOand UNMC got raises of about 9 percent, which had been requested by the plan. Proportionately, UNL’s raises have been $ percent or more below those for UNO and UNMC, he said. With an average UNL salary of $42,400, that means UNL is about $2,000 behind per faculty member. “All of a sudden,” he said, “you’re talking real money. UNL. should have received pro portionately more of the raises, he said. One cause of the disparity, McShanc said, was that UNO had a collective bargaining contract for a 9 percent raise in 1989-90 and 1990-91. But UNMC had no such contract, he said, and could have received less of the raise money. Another reason for the unequal raise allocation, McShanc said, is because the regents followed language adopted by the Legislature’s Appro priations Committee stating that raises should be 11.5 percent for UNL and 9 percent for UNO and UNMC. The regents said they' ‘didn ’ t want to irritate the Legislature” by allocat ing the money differently, McShanc said. But the entire Legislature dropped theAppropriations Committee’s lan See PAY on 5