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THE UNIVER KAN
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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY
KS STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY
TOPEKA, KS 66612
THE STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS
VOL.104.NO.72
01 53A 01 C40B A4 724
ADVERTISING: 864-4358
(USPS 650-640)
NEWS: 864-4810
Senate requests to increase its budget
Student fees would finance proposed 30 percent increase
By James Evans
Kansan staff writer
The Student Senate has proposed to raise its own budget from $82,000 to $106,500 for fiscal year 1996.
The new figure would be a 30 percent increase from this year's financing level. The projected figure would be paid for by the Student Activity fee. The Senate Finance Committee recommended Wednesday to raise the fee from $28 to $35, and the full Senate will vote on the proposal tonight.
Chad Browning, Student Senate treasurer, recommended the increase. He said that the increase was needed to raise Senate executives' salaries based on a cost-of-living increase. The additional money also would pay the salaries of two students on the new Student Legislative Awareness Board, would offset the cost of inflation for Senate office supplies and would pay for maintenance and new software for the Senate computer system.
Leader salaries
"It was really a ballpark guess," Browning said.
The following is a list of salaries of the student body president and vice president at Big Eight schools:
University of Kansas president — $5,280 a year vice president — $4,800 a year
Kansas State University president — $3,600 a year vice president — $1,800 a year
Browning calculated the number and presented it at the Senate apportionment hearings, which took place last month. At the hearings, groups submitted requests for funding, and the Senate finance committee totaled its requests to project how much money it would need to fund the groups in the next
University of Colorado co-presidents — $6,600 a year each
University of Oklahoma president — $3,780 a year vice president — $2,100 a year
Oklahoma State University president — $2,400 a year vice president — $1,000 a year
University of Nebraska president—receives up to 20 hours a semester of credit paid for by the University. Each credit costs $66.
iowa State University
president — $7,443 a year
vice president — $7,013 a year
fiscal year. Senate is one of the groups that must request money during the hearings.
University of Missouri president — $4,949.80 a year vice president — $4,449.90 a year
Browning said that the amounts the groups had asked for in the apportionment hearings were maximum requests. But, he said, he thought that the money he requested was close to what Senate would actually need for fiscal year 1996.
"The figure hasn't been formally recommended by Sen-
See SENATE, Page 5A
The No.4 ranked Kansas men's basketball team manhandled the Coppin State Eagles 91-69, led by sophomore guard Jerod Hasse's 22 points.
Page 18.
FORCED TO
Ed Palmer
Richard Prince
Whitney Simonet
Tonv Sanchez
CHOOSE
Story by Ashley Miller Photos by Daron Bennett
In a country where race is a divisive
In a country where race is a divisive issue, being biracial can force a person to choose one heritage and reject another. But many biracial people feel they should be able to define their own race because the world isn't just black, white, red yellow and brown. They say there are many shades of race.
Is Kathryn Pierce white or Black? Neither, she says. And she won't be forced into a role by adults, her peers or the government.
The St. Louis sophomore didn't ask for a white mother and a Black father, didn't ask to be a minority within a minority, didn't ask to be part of a race unrecognized by the government.
And, like a lot of other biracial people, Pierce finds life tough.
It just happened.
"It's difficult." Pierces says. "People
want you to be one thing or the other. They don't want to accept that you're biracial."
Acceptance is only one problem people of two races face. They were born with two different heritages and, because of that, they often lead two different lives.
So Kaitlyn White or Black:
Forcing people into a category they don't fit is bad, says Francis Wardle, founder of the Center for the Study of Biracial Children in Denver.
So is Kathryn white or Black?
Forcing people into a category makes them ask, "Why is the world broken into racial groups where I don't fit?" Wardle says.
Wardle earned his Ph.D. in education in 1983 from the University of Kansas. He started the center four years ago to collect and evaluate studies about biracial children.
See FORCED,Page 10A.
Right now, the U.S. Census Bureau divides people into four categories: American Indian or Alaskan Native,
Family keeps on after son's disappearance
By David Wilson Kansan staff writer
Two years later, friends and family keep Alexis Dillard alive through their memories
A mother doesn't forget.
Felicie Dillard hasn't.
Two years after the unsolved disappearance of her son Alexis, a KU student who was last seen heading toward the north bank of the Kansas River after a night of celebrating with friends, her pain hasn't subsided.
"Are we living? We're living," she said from her home in Wichita. "We're doing well, considering."
But one year after the last of the "missing" filers with Dillard's picture have been taken down, she hasn't forgotten the sense of humor and idealist spirit of her son.
On Dec. 10, 1992, Dillard and about 15 friends met at
Later that night, Dillard left Johnny's by himself. The next morning, he was nowhere to be found.
Johnny's Tavern, 401 N. Second St., a bar just north of the Kansas River, for an end-of-the-school hurrah.
Chris Gannett, Dallas senior, was a freshman living in the Phi Gamma Delta house with Dillard when he disappeared.
Gannett remembers combing the banks of the Kansas River the morning of Dec. 11 with fraternity brothers and the Lawrence police.
In the days following, helicopter searches by the Kansas Air National Guard and boat searches by the Lawrence police turned up nothing. Nor did a private investigator hired by the Dillard family.
"When that occurred, there seemed to be little point in continuing," Felicie Dillard said. "There weren't any new directions in which to go."
Police believe Dillard tried to swim across the icy cold Kansas River—a distance of about 200 yards. Dillard had swum across the river in April 1991.
"It was assumed that because he did it before, he did it
that time," said Lt. David Cobb of the Lawrence police.
Otherwise, he said, there were no solid leads.
If Dillard drowned and was swept under debris at the bottom of the river, the chances of finding his body would be slim. Cobb said.
"Dredging was hard to do," he said. "That's the funny thing about the Kaw River. If the current pulls you under eight or nine trees and you were covered with sand, you'd be there for generations."
Cobb said a man who drowned in the Kansas River a year before Dillard's disappearance was never found.
Dillard's file with the Lawrence police still is active. He also is listed as a missing person in the computer files of the National Crime Information Center, Cobb said.
But for those who were close to Dillard, the flicker of hope has died out. The only thing that remains is his memory.
"I have no hope for him ever being found," said Alan Lowden, a KU graduate and friend of Dillard's now living in Connecticut. "We just hope we can keep his memory alive."