The Great Plains Art Gallery
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In Arts/8
In News/3
Friday
November 10,2000
Volume 100
Issue 57
dailyneb.com
Since 1901
Daily Nebraskan
LeBtanc plays two roles
on the MU soccer team
In SportsWeekend/10
416 won't
nullify
benefits
BY VERONICA DAEHN
In light of Initiative 416, the
fight for domestic-partner bene
fits at the University ofNebraska
Lincoln can go on.
UNL Associate English
Professor George Wolf, a gay
rights activist, and others like him
have pushed for the university to
grant health-care benefits to gay
and lesbian domestic partners for
years.
But with Tliesday night’s pas
sage of the amendment that will
ban gay and lesbian marriages,
domestic partnerships and civil
unions in Nebraska, Wolf said he
was worried domestic-partner
benefits would no longer be legal
But Wolf and fellow UNL
English Professor Barbara
DiBemard need not be worried
University General Counsel
Dick Wood told the Daily
Nebraskan on Thursday that
Initiative 416 would not affect die
university's offering domestic
partner benefits.
wniie max is a pius ior sup
porters of die benefits, the initia
tive will hurt the university’s hir
ing practices, Wolf said.
“It may not manifest itself in
ways that are particularly visible,”
he said. “But if I were looking for a
job, I’d drop Nebraska off my list
of places to even apply to.”
Said Interim Chancellor
Harvey Perlman: “This will be
viewed by some people as
Nebraska not being an open, wel
coming state.”
The initiative won't have an
immediate, direct effect, Perlman
said. But it will have long-term
impact
"I don't expect we’ll stop hir
ing,” he said. “But there’s a likeli
hood that some individuals who
would have applied here may
now not apply here.”
DiBemard said she was disap
pointed in the passage of
Initiative 416 and that it won by
such a large margin.
Nearly 450,000 Nebraskans
voted for die initiative. Just under
190,000voted against it
DiBemard said the oppo
nents of the initiative didn’t have
enough money or time to educate
everyone in the state.
“There wasn’t enough money
to run the kind of media cam
paign our opponents did,” she
said. “If Nebraskans really under
stood the issue, they would have
voted against it”
DiBemard agreed the initia
tive would hurt recruitment at
UNL
But she said the fact that
domestic-partner benefits were
not offered to faculty and staff
members at the university now
Please see BENEFITS on 5
Bob and Fran
Brauerof
Seward watch
election cover
age at Circuit
rity,61400St
Americans are
still waiting for
the results of
Tuesday's elec
tion, which
hinge on
Florida's popular
vote.
Scott McOurg/DN
Recounts, revotes, Palm Beach and politics: Race chaos reigns
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
George W. Bush’s lead over A1
Gore in all-or-nothing Florida
slipped beneath 300 votes in a
suspense-filled recount
Thursday, as Democrats threw
the presidential election to the
courts claiming “an injustice
unparalleled in our history.” The
Bush campaign was considering
recounts in two other close-vot
ing states.
Chaos reigned. It may take
weeks to untangle the thicken
ing legal and political webs and
determine the nation's 43rd
president.
"The presidential election is
... on hold,” said James A. Baker
III, the former secretary of state
in Bush’s father’s administration
brought in to protect the Texas
governor's interests.
Gore wants a follow-up
recount in four Florida counties
and perhaps a new election in
the Palm Beach area - ideas the
Bush camp said amounted to
“politicizing and distorting” the
electoral system.
Amid a campaign-style flur
ry of charges and counter
charges, Gore Campaign
Chairman William Daley said
his party will support legal
actions by voters and support
ers who say a confusing ballot
may have led them to vote acci
dentally for Reform Party candi
date Pat Buchanan.
“We’re raising some very
serious questions, and legal
actions will be taken,” Daley
said at a Florida session with
Warren Christopher, the former
secretary of state acting as
Gore’s recount consigliere.
The Bush campaign fired
back by staking its own claim to
a Florida victory and question
ing Gore’s motives. Still,
Republicans eyed recounts else
where in case Gore prevails in
Florida, raising the specter of a
lengthy, multistate battle.
"One of the options that they
seem to be looking at is new
elections. Our democratic
process calls for a vote on
Election Day; it does not call for
us to continue voting until
someone likes the outcome,”
Bush Campaign Chairman Don
“It’s very difficult to believe there were 19,000 people who were dumb
enough to vote twice for president in one place ”
John Cavanaugh
Omaha Democrat who served with A1 Gore in Congress
Evans said in Austin, Texas.
John Cavanaugh, an Omaha
Democrat who served with Gore
in Congress in the late 1970s,
said a resolution was a long way
off.
He said the recount showed
Gore's votes in Florida were sig
nificantly undercounted on
election night. For example,
Gore had a net gain in 36 of the
62 counties he won, for a net
statewide pickup of about 1,500
votes.
He said the state should
manually recount the ballots to
identify any irregularities.
“Something is amiss here,
and they have to find out what
happened,” he said.
Almost certainly, he said,
many of the 3,400 people in
Palm Beach County who voted
for Pat Buchanan, and a large
percentage of the 19,000 people
whose ballots were invalidated
because of double voting,
intended to vote for Gore.
“It's very difficult to believe
there were 19,000 people who
were dumb enough to vote twice
for president in one place,” he
said.
Cavanaugh said, though,
that he would favor a new vote
in Palm Beach County only in
“extraordinary circumstances.”
Chuck Sigerson, chairman of
the Nebraska Republican Party,
said Bush and Gore each should
pledge to abide by the results of
the recount.
“It’s time for A1 Gore and
George W. Bush to be states
men,” he said. “This should not
go to the courts.”
He said both candidates
should follow the lead of
Richard Nixon, who chose not to
challenge his 1960 loss to John F.
Kennedy despite evidence of
widespread voter fraud* in
Chicago.
Claims that confusing bal
lots caused thousands of Gore
supporters to vote incorrectly,
he said, are “absolute baloney.”
“The fact of the matter is, we
all play by the same rules,” he
said. “If you screw up the ballot,
that's tough.”
Both sides dispatched
dozens of lawyers and political
operatives to Florida and geared
up fund-raising drives to
finance what is exploding into a
post-campaign recount cam
PleaseseeRACEon6
Dean candidate touts visiting-artists plan
BY VERONICA DAEHN
The final candidate for dean of the
Hixson-Lied College of Fine and
Performing Arts spoke to UNL faculty
members at the Lied Center on
Thursday.
Raymond Tymas-Jones, dean of
the College of Fine and Performing Arts
at Ohio University in Athens since
1998, said he was interested in the
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
because of the places associated with
its fine arts college.
Places such as the Lied Center for
Performing Arts, the Sheldon
Memorial Art Gallery and the Center
for Great Plains Studies offer a special
opportunity for cooperation, he said.
“Few other schools have what this
institution does,” Tymas-Jones said.
"All of these wonderfiil, cultural organ
izations ... provide an expanded expe
rience, which can make this a win-win
for everyone involved."
Since Tymas-Jones began at Ohio,
he has implemented several programs
emphasizing the importance of inte
grating departments of a college of fine
and performing arts into one unit
fit 1998, he created an interdiscipli
nary visiting artists’ fund that paid for
visiting artists of all fields - including
music, theater, dance - to come to the
university and work with students of
different departments.
It is critical for a college of fine and
performing arts to bring in artists,
Tymas-Jones said, because it strength
ens and extends the faculty.
In 1999, he began an annual convo
cation that brought together students
from all departments in the college on
the first Friday in October.
The convocation helped bring all
students in the college closer, he said.
“It’s great to sit in a room together
and look around at the people who are
there learning, studying and celebrat
ing the arts,” Tymas-Jones said.
A dean needs to be a facilitator, he
said - one who’s always looking for
opportunities for success.
If chosen as dean at UNL, lymas
Jones said, he would be the college's
spokesman and would articulate the
goals of the college to the upper
administration and die community.
It is important for a college of fine
and performing arts to reach the entire
university, he said. And the best way to
do that is through performances.
“We are obliged to serve the citi
zenry of Nebraska," Tymas-Jones said.
"(Performances are) a part of the uni
versity’s charter.”
Higher educational administration
graduate student Rachelle Winkle was
the only student on the selection com
mittee that chose the dean candidates
after Richard Durst left to become the
College of Arts and Architecture dean
at Penn State University in University
Park, Pa., last February.
Winkle, who was an undergraduate
music major, said the dean needed to
be a spokesperson who would pro
mote the college on a national level.
That’s the only way to continue
earning money for die college, she said.
Winkle also said the new dean
should interact more with students.
“A lot of times that doesn’t happen,”
she said.
The Final Four
The following are the four finalists
for dean of the Hixson-Lied College
of Fine and Performing Arts at the
University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
Giacomo Olivia
University of Florida
Gainesville, Fla.
David Orr Belcher
Southwest Missouri State University
Springfield, Mo.
Kathleen Rountree
Louisiana State University
Baton Rouge, La.
Raymond Tymas-Jones
Ohio University
Athens, Ohio
Melanie Falk/ON
Journalism dean
decides against
leaving Nebraska
BY VERONICA DAEHN
Will Norton, dean of the College of Journalism and
Mass Communications, has decided to stay at UNL -
for now.
Norton was one of three candidates for a dean
position at the University of South Carolina in
Columbia. But he withdrew from consideration for
dean of its College of Journalism and Mass
Communications, said Tom Simons, University of
Nebraska-Iincoln spokesman.
Norton, who could not be reached for comment
Thursday, has served as dean at UNL since 1990 and
holds several prolific national positions. A move
would have marked the 12th administrative departure
at UNL in the past yean
Mike Goff, chairman of the advertising depart
ment, said he was pleased Norton decided to stay but
said his withdrawal from South Carolina’s dean search
Please see NORTON on 3
