Privacy is getting much less private, ACLU warns
RvGARV WALLACE
Big Brother may be watching you, according to Karen Blank, executive director of the Topeka branch of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLIJ)
Blank said last week that not only the federal government but the state governments, schools, banks, credit agencies, insurance companies and financial institutions you visit now and possibly violating your right to privacy.
"Since Watergate, the FBI has been so deluged with requests for personal dossiers that they are nine years behind in meeting the demand." Blank insists of the agency's role. "The firms have invaded individual privacy more so."
Students should become acquainted with files held by school administrators, Blank said. The 1974 Buckley Amendment states that schools must allow students to access records and examine their records or risk losing federal funds.
"If you examine your KU file, you might find personal information about yourself that may affect your ability to get a job," Blank said. "There have been evidence that you are vulnerable, and there has been evidence of personality rating."
Blank said she knew of no instances in which KU had violated a student's right to privacy.
KU seldom receives a high school transcript that includes teacher comments, character references and coursework. A professor or director of admissions, said. Myers said that less than 10 per cent of the transcripts received contained IQ, scores, and that only a few transcripts included recommendations of recommendation or notices of suspension.
"Our files consist of grade reports and transcripts," Myers said. "Instances in which we did receive questionable material were 10 to 15 years ago."
Information on a student's character or intelligence is more commonly gathered in high school and isn't forwarded to KU. Myers said, "We don't have a system that is not disseminated without a student's covenant."
"Even is a student flunks out, is suspended or is involved in an incident with campus security, this will not show up on their record," Myers said. "We see few online requests to see a student's records."
The ACLU recommends that if any incorrect or misleading information is in a student's file, he should request a hearing with school officials. If the information provided by the Department of Health, Education and Welfare
Some outsiders can review records without
consent: teachers and other officials of the same school who have a legitimate educational interest in a student's record, officials of another school to which a student has applied for a job, office to which a student applies for aid, certain educational data-gathering and testing agencies, and "appropriate persons" in an emergency information center.
The Buckley Amendment doesn't restrict the type of information in the record but only provides the student access and an opportunity to reply, Blank said.
"Students might also be concerned with the dossiers compiled by the federal Drug Enforcement Administration," Blank said. "Now under congressional investigation for using associate graphs, which are files on a friend of a friend of someone who was busted for drus."
Students should also be aware that their names could be in the files of the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, Blank said. ACLU is currently awaiting a decision in a lawsuit against the RK in an attempt to obtain a new hearing for its records. Blank said many of those raids had occurred while Vern Miller was Kansas attorney general.
Bland also warned of possible outside use of
blank records. Those records document contacts
to the user who visited the facility.
panies, prospective employers and the government. However, they are not always available to the patient, she said.
Medical records are available to KU students, Martin Wollmann, director of health services, said. But students don't routinely have access to technical information, he said.
"Technical information includes such data as the results of lab tests," Wolmann said. "Of course, the student demands to see this we will show him, and he must sit down with him and explain the data."
Wollmann said medical information was given out only if a court subpoena was presented, which rarely occurred. Students are notified if their records are released.
Wollemann said that sometimes an insurance company would ask two or three times every month for more details regarding data a student had previously released. Wollemann his reply was that the student must sign a re-release before he could comply with the request.
The ACLIU states that 700 insurance companies belong to the Medical Information Bureau (MIB), in which affiliated firms have access to any of 12 million personal files. Much of this data information
is inaccurate and misleading, according to the ACLIU. Patients should be told that information will be shared with MIB, the ACLIU advises, and should not be disclosed to others without medical file written permission from them.
The patient waives the right to sue MIB once records are requested, so he should consult a lawyer for this request, a request the ACLU says. To obtain these records the patient must have an Essential Station, Boston, Mass., 62112. MIB will send a questionnaire and call collect within 20 days to take action, which should be made through the insurance companies.
Files are also kept on a person's credit report, Blank said. In addition to detailing one's financial history, many credit agencies compile investigative reports that may include a friend's opinion of one's character or a neighbor's comments on one's life style, she said.
If a person is denied credit, insurance or a job because of a credit report, he has the right under the Fair Credit and Reporting Act to be told the name and address of the credit agency. The agency must tell the individual all information contained in the report, including medical information, Blank said.
See PRIVACY page 4
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY
KANSAN
The University of Kansas—Lawrence, Kansas
Vol.86 No.160
5 from KU new in Who's Who
Monday, July 12; 1976
See page 3
Staff photo by JAY KOELZER
Remains of the harvest
Lawrence were left with only numerous bales of straw to attest to the year's haul. Yields in many fields around Douglas County are down slightly because of a frost May 3.
With most of the Kansas harvest completed or nearing completion, many fields around
Fireman says union informs men
BULLETIN
International Fire Fighters' Association Local 1596 implemented a slow work down.
By COURTNEY THOMPSON
The slow down will include no cleaning of trucks after fire runs, picketing, no station cleaning, no book keeping nor ground maintenance.
The concept of union officials dictating policy to obedient and uninformed members is inaccurate in the case of the Lawrence Penner, Lawrence fireman, said Friday.
Penner said that union leaders were keeping firemen fully informed during the current wage and benefit dispute with the city.
Penner said he and other rank-and-file firefighters were brought up to date daily by the Fire Department.
"OUR UNION leadership isn't puffed up with its own importance and hasn't put pressure on us to vote for or against the proposal. The top officials were split in their thinking about the advisability of the slowdown and they told us so." he said.
Union officials have conscientious in presentation of issues and alternatives to the law.
Penner said he supported rejection of latest offers made by the city. A work slowdown scheduled to begin today will be honored by policemen who last week accepted the city's "package" proposal, he said.
"I voted for the work slowdown because of the principle it impedes." Penner said.
"We'll still answer all emergency calls but that's it—no maintenance or cleaning of equipment will be done. We need to keep the equipment on the public and this is a means to do so."
Penner said that if the scheduled work
dowload occurs it will be primarily a
delay.
"I VOTED for it but if I had my way I'd recommend a complete strike like they did in Kansas City. A slowdown is more for the principle of the thing so the issues are kept before the city, uppermost in their mind," he said
The six per cent cost of living increase
of the official officials it a new offer
at all. Pennsylvanian
“It’s assumed that a cost of living increase will be announced each year. What we’re seeking is an additional five per cent increase in the cost of living, then the other 2.5 per cent January, 1978.”
"About one-half the membership doesn't carry the health and life insurance package in question, so this proposed benefit only affects a portion of the total firefighters," he said. "I also don't like the idea of the city telling us where to spend our money."
According to the city's proposal, the firefighters would accept health and life insurance benefits (cost reductions) in lieu of a government benefit, and he didn't favor such an alternative offer.
Penner explained that the acceptance of each alternative insurance benefits would be provided by the employer.
PENNER SAID that only merit raises given now and that those were few and infrequent.
He said men higher on the pay scale would experience greater relative losses in pay if the insurance benefit package were accepted.
Investigation of tavern fire continues to suggest arson
"For the lower to middle pay range firefighter like myself at about $800 to $900 a month, a five per cent wage increase would mean that future cost of living raises would be determined on a base salary of $40 to $45 per month. If we go the insurance company, we should be figured on the $800-$900 salary, so the result is you steadily lose ground." Penner said.
each year when cost of living increases were figured.
"ALSO, you are among those not subscribing to the union's insurance policy, the city's proposal is totally useless to you. Gain will not gain and lose a hell of a lot."
The fire began around 3 a.m. Wednesday and caused between $100,000 and $150,000 damage to the Yu building and smoke stores in the Hillcrest Shopping Center.
See FIREMEN page 4
said KBI testers have also found a fire- induced chemical on specimens that have
Carter narrows V.P. field to 7
Kasperger said that two and probably three fires had begun independently of each other in the building and that there was no evidence of breaking and entering.
NEW YORK (AP)—On the night before the Democratic National Convention, Jimmy Carter said his vice presidential nominee had been awarded to a seven-man congressional field.
Carter already has seen Sers, Walter F. Mondale of Minnesota, John Glenn of Ohio, Edmund S. Muskle of Maine and Henry M. Jackson of Washington.
He talked with Rep. Peter W. Rodino Jr. of New Jersey, and arranged to see Sems. Addi E. Stevenson III of Illinois and Frank O'Neill of Idaho today. Those are the final interviews.
Investigation into his possibility of arson in last Wednesday's fire at the Yuk Up and Kyu Down taverns is continuing, Fire Chief John Kasberer said yesterday.
CARTER'S VICE presidential selection is the only major matter to be settled. "We've done the most careful possible preparation for this election," distinguished leaders all over the country ... analyzing the voting records and past attitudes of these candidates and then personal interviews by staff members and personal interviews by me," Carter said.
Sen. George McGovern of South Dakota, an expert on the perils of vice presidential selection, said Carter is making his choice for president in a medical search and with personal interviews.
"I suppose . . . I am the last person that ought to be advising anyone," McGovern said. But he added that he is personally very pleased with the names on Carter's list.
"So far as I know, the vice president will come from one of those seven people," said Kroger.
"And I have maintained an open mind deliberately until after all the interviews are done."
CARTER TOLL the National Women's Political Caucus be does not favor a mandatory quota which would insure as many Democrats at the 1980 Democratic convention.
Kasberger said specimens sent to the Kansas Bureau of Investigation from the fire for testing should be returned today or early next month, as principals in the case were being scanned.
"I think it would be a step backward," he said.
Yesterday, women's groups offered Jimmy Carter a compromise on whether men and women should be represented equally at the 1980 Democratic convention.
California Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr., arrived for the Democratic national convention last night and said he would remain in office until the nomination process was over.
But after the meeting, Rep. Bella Abzug reported that Carter told the women's caucus he would consider their compromise.
Rep. Abzug and other caucus leaders told Carter they would accept a proposal under which local and state party leaders would be required to take "all feasible step" to attain equal representation between sexes at the 1989 party gathering.
The arson investigation was stepped up Thursday when a five-gallon gas can and traces of a flammable liquid were found at the scene of the fire, Kasberger said. He
Brown, leading his state's dedication, was asked whether he would withdraw if the convention tried to nominate front runner Jimmy Carter by acclamation.
"MY NAME will be in nomination," he told reporters at John F. Kennedy Airport. "I don't think it's appropriate just to walk over the process is rather inevitable."
Brown, who has 204 of 280 California delegates, would not say who would place his name in nomination but said reporters should ask him later.
Starry future ahead for sci-fi, Gunn says
Bv JAMES MURRAY
"I think there is more diversity and opportunity in the field now than ever before." Gunn said Friday. "And, for the first time ever, a science fiction book has made the best seller list: 'Children of Dune' by Frank Herbert."
Science fiction is headed for its best years in terms of high quality and general acceptance, according to James Gunn, professor of English at the University of well-known science fiction writer.
Gunn recently received the Pilgrim award from the Science Fiction Research Society for his work on the origin of science fiction movies made with the KU Department of Continuing Education, and a book, "Altered An Illustrated History of Science Fiction."
GUNN SAID the recent emergence of science fiction courses in colleges and high schools was part of a trend towards the realization of culture that reached back to World War II.
"After World War II, though, American Studies courses in colleges started teaching Dickens, James and Joyce, and popular westerns, in the early twenties, mysteryes, and science fiction."
Gum said his book, "Alternate Worlds,
had developed from a science fiction course
on the quantum mechanics of the universe."
"IN 1970, when I joined the English department full-time, the head of the department approached me about teaching a science fiction course," Gunn said. "I agreed, because I felt a good science fiction course was needed, and because I knew it could be written to write "Alternate Worlds." Each class ketacture was a chapter in the book."
"Writing is always a hard business, and
Gunn said that despite the scholarly interest in science fiction, it would be a while before it would be generally accepted. He said many academicians still thought of science fiction as the pulp magazines of the '30s.
having an incentive makes it easier," he said.
Gunn said that his book's publishers had suggested enlarging the format of the book to its present 'coffee table' size and that he had chosen the many illustrations used in the book. A paperback edition will be released sometime this fall, he said.
"I's hard to shake the old image," he said. "For a person to make a living as a writer in the 30s, he had to wage fast, and a writer in the 40s, he had to work out as first drafts, without any revision."
Gunn said that while he was in New York recently, he had been inundated with offers from companies.
"IT SEEMED that all I had to do was to say 'yes,' and I have a contract showed in my hand. It seemed like it almost didn't matter if I wrote the book or not," he said.
Gum, whose novel, "The Immortals", was made into a short-lived TV series in 1970, said the lack of good TV science fiction was a result of ignorance and cowardice.
"TV PRODUCERS know nothing about science fiction, and so when it comes to making the show, they lose their nerve, and are more likely to study body show, but not a science fiction show."
"What they try to come up with is a repeatable gimmick," he said. "So you get a $4 million dollar man, or a biotic woman, or something else." The bites in you do them those things."
Gum said he had two books due to be released in the near future: "The Magicians," in November, and "Kampus," which is set at KU, in January or February.
Resident fiction writer
Staff photo by JAY KOELZER
James Gunn, professor of English and journalism, says that writing is a hard business, and that having an incentive makes it easier. Gunn should know; besides being the author of numerous books, he recently won the Pilgrim award for his work on the origins of science fiction.