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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (April 13, 1999)
EDITOR Erin Gibson OPINION EDITOR Cliff Hicks EDITORIAL BOARD Nancy Christensen Brad Davis Sam McKewon Jeff Randall Bret Schulte Our VIEW Apples and oranges Raising parking fees is faulty logic The University of Nebraska-Lincoln is in yet another race to catch up to its peers. Only this race - to put UNL’s parking fees in line with its peer institutions - is one administrators should bow out of as soon as they can. While comparisons among similarly sized institutions in the Midwest are useful for some things, such as rating an academ ic program’s performance or looking at the distribution of minority or female profes sors, parking is an issue that is too differ ent from campus to campus to make accu rate or meaningful comparisons. A campus several hundred miles from here might not be strapped for space, may not allow freshmen to have cars on cam pus or may have a better public transporta tion system than Lincoln’s. To compare UNL’s parking situation to universities that are not facing the same problems seems like a case of comparing apples to oranges. What’s equally absurd about UNL bas ing its parking rates on the midpoint of what its peers charge is that tuition and salary rates are not taken into account. The plan would require UNL students to pay for the construction of new parking garages across campus, although students have already been asked to bear the brunt of certain building construction, which is arguably a responsibility of state taxpay ers. Also ignored in the plan is the fact that UNL faculty members and staff, for the most part, are not paid at a rate that is equal to the midpoint of their peers at sim ilarly sized Midwest institutions. To make their parking passes in line with peer institutions, but not adjust then pay to the same comparative level, is a bla tant double standard. Plans are in the works, both in the state Legislature and in NU central administra tion, to raise salaries, which have lagged embarrassingly behind similarly sized Midwest institutions. But until salaries are at the necessary level, fees charged to employees of the university should not be raised to a level comparable to peer institutions. The Academic Senate voiced its oppo sition to the parking plan, and the Association of Students of the University of Nebraska should do the same. Parking is an issue that needs to be examined at UNL, especially considering the implications of the 12-year Master Plan, which, along with changing the face of campus, would eliminate a good por tion of current parking. But instead of ramming a seriously flawed plan down the throats of students, faculty and staff members, Parking Services should solicit ideas from across campus and go back to the drawing board. Editorial Policy Unsigned editorials are the opinions of the Spring 1999 Daily Nebraskan. They do not necessarily reflect the views of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, its employees, its student body or the University of Nebraska Board of Regents. A column is solely the opinion of its author. The Board of Regents serves as publisher of the Daily Nebraskan; policy is set by the Daily Nebraskan Editorial Board. The UNL Publications Board, established by the regents, supervises the production of the paper. According to policy set by the regents, responsibility for the editorial content of the newspaper lies solely in the hands of its student employees. letter Policy The Daily Nebraskan welcomes brief letters to the editor and guest columns, but does not guarantee their publication. The Daily Nebraskan retains the right to edit or reject any material submitted. Submitted material becomes property of the Daily Nebraskan and cannot be returned. Anonymous submissions will not be published. Those who submit letters must identify themselves by name, year in school, major and/or group affiliation, if any. Submit material to: Daily Nebraskan, 34 Nebraska Union, 1400 R St. Lincoln, NE. 68588-0448. E-mail: letters@unlinfo.unl.edu. <• _ \ - Babin’s VIEW fees Union iwm, xwtsmiw WiafiaBEYDURS Six-pack of controversy Censorship of alcohol advertisements is wrong ERIN GIBSON is a senior news-editorial major and editor of the Daily Nebraskan. Listen. Come on. Lean in and listen closely, and I promise you, you’ll hear it. It’s a faint noise, a slight rumble from within. But it’s a roar in the East that promises to roll our way. The racket is student news editors’ anger over a movement that infringes upon all students’ First Amendment freedoms of the press and speech. And the movement is the fight to remove all alcohol advertising from all student publications in order to combat underage and binge drinking. It s not a i lery issue here yet No one has asked me to stop printing alco hol ads, although removing alcohol advertising from die student press is one focus ofUNUs $700,000 grant to combat binge drinking. But in Pennsylvania, it’s state law. No alcohol ads can appear in student media. The law targets die newspaper’s freedom of expression through adver tisers. Advertisers placing alcohol ads are. fined - some have paid a $1,000 fine for one ad. “It is so flatly unconstitutional,” said Hal Turner, editor of The Pitt News, the University of Pittsburgh stu dent newspaper. State law cannot deter mine newspaper content, he said. OnApnl 6, Turner’s newspaper and the ACLU filed a lawsuit against the state of Pennsylvania claiming the alcohol advertising law violates the First Amendment “Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.” Proof positive of die violation sur faced through The Daily Collegian, the Penn State paper. When advertisers could no longer place ads for happy hour specials, the newspaper printed happy hour specials itself in its week end entertainment listings. As a result, law enforcement told advertisers they would be fined if they couldn’t stop the newspaper from print ing news about happy hours. Editors felt shocked. Police holding advertisers responsible for newspapers’ editorial content is obnoxious and ridiculous, as well as unconstitutional. So this law clearly was formed to abridge the speech of student media and, in doing so, abridge the freedom of speech and information of every stu dent on a Pennsylvania campus, regardless whether they drink or don’t drink or whether they ’re 21. I expect the ACLU and The Pitt News to win their lawsuit, and I expect the state law to be overturned. i ne case won i oe closed, rnougn. It won’t be closed because the pres sure to remove alcohol advertising in most school newspapers doesn’t come from a state law. It comes from within the university. Although the administra tion of this campus has a good track record of supporting student media, I expect similar pressure to surface here as the debate over binge drinking heightens. Several newspaper editors nation wide have contacted me asking whether this or other newspapers I know of have voluntarily stopped print ing alcohol ads. As a student newspaper editor, I cringe at students who lackadaisically would give up their constitutional free doms and allow the state and university to become their surrogate parent of sorts, determining what they can and cannot {Hint But I also welcome a good discus sion, so I asked Daily Nebraskan staff members whether they supported us * mmmxmgmxms! SSS&S**«8SS3»K ***** fcii§ii j V-lsWi ■:»' ?. I*.i»-j» »'sn ^sSS sS carrying alcohol advertising. About 80 percent said yes. Here are a selection of their justifications for and against printing alcohol-related advertising. For ■ A college paper at a public uni versity should abide by the law. Since alcohol advertising is legal we should take ads from liquor and beer outlets as if they were selling flowers. ■ The paper advertising alcohol represents freedom of the press and freedom of choice for its readers. The DN doesn’t promote alcohol by run ning the ads. ■ Not running alcohol ads is cen sorship. Just because we advertise alco hol does not mean we are responsible for students’ individual actions. ■ I believe we should. Our adver tising shouldn’t make any difference in our news coverage and vice versa. We ■* can promote responsible drinking in news copy and still carry alcohol ads. ■ Hell yes, run the ads. We are not saying get drunk, and some ads pro mote drinking responsibly. ■ I don’t think our ads are advocat ing any kind of binge atmosphere, and honestly, I usually don’t even notice that we have diem. Against: ■ i minx we can get enougn adver tising without contributing to the drink ing problems on campus. Not that there’s anything wrong with beer ads, but alcohol just consumes the lives of college students too much to allow us to help the cause. ■ It’s a call that should be made by the paper, not by the university, but I don’t think we should run such ads. I think it’s irresponsible. Not immoral, but irresponsible. Our general manager, with more than 17 years ofwoik at the DN under . his belt, had a different outlook: “The DN should/shouldn’t run alcohol ads just like it should/shouldn’t run ads for strip clubs, violent movies, abortion, military recruitment, Human Rights Alliance inserts, music with violent/sexist/offensive lyrics, etc. It opens whole cans of worms.” Yes, it does. As does tossing away First Amendment rights to a free press and free speech. in me ram, wnue 1 agree max ngnx ing underage and binge drinking is an important and worthwhile cause, I believe combating high-risk drinking can take place without shortchanging the Constitution. Education and strict law enforce ment are the solution to binge and underage drinking, not abridging citi zens’ rights.