University of Kansas Lawrence, Kansas
The University Daily
KANSAN
Thursday, June 18, 1981 Vol. 91, No. 149 USPS 650-640
Contractor contests OSHA's asbestos citation
By TIM ELMER
Staff Reporter
All allegations the R.D. Andersen Construction Co. mishandled asbestos at Marvin Hall have been contested by the contractor. The representative for the company, Stewart Entt, the attorney, said yesterday, "We don't believe that we had any 'missions of the federal law.'"
The citation is being contested on three issues, Entz said. The issues are whether Marvin Hall is within OSHA's jurisdiction to issue the citation, whether OSHA's procedures in filing the citation were proper and whether there actually was a legal violation.
In early June, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration in Wichita issued a citation against the Andersen Construction. alleging that the company violated a federal law regulating the handling and disposal of asbestos at the Marvin Hall renovation project.
Entz said the most significant of the three issues being contested, was whether a health safety violation had occurred. He declined to elaborate.
"I don't believe I should go into detail about the issues," he said, "because we don't want the other side to read about it in the paper."
Lee Enberg, industrial hygiene supervisor at a health clinic OSHA office, said asbestos had been identified in the building.
"If the old asbestos material is not disposed of properly, it can contaminate the atmosphere," one of the problems with it is that it is normally taken for its latency period before it develops in the body."
BECAUSE OF THE potential hazard associated with asbestos, he said, OSHA is handling the material cautiously.
The old asbestos was in the floors of Marvin Hall. When the contractor cut holes in the floor to install an elevator shaft and air ducts, the asbestos fell out, Enberg said.
The contractor failed to take proper precautionary steps in handling and disposing of the asbestos, he said.
OSHA's citation alleged that the contractor "willfully" violated OSHA regulations.
Enberg explained that "willfuı" means that OSHA thought the company was aware of the potential health hazard created by the violations.
"A citation is a list of allegations against the company and orphaned penalties," he said.
THE CITATION ALLEGES that the Andersen company did not place caution signs in areas where asbestos may have been in excess of safe limits, that caution signs were not placed on articles or containers of asbestos at the site and that asbestos levels were not monitored.
Because asbestos levels were not monitored,
the citation explained, excessive levels of the material were found at the 'site' and waste materials contaminated by asbestos were not properly disposed of.
In addition to the specification of violations, Emberg said, the citation ordered an end to the violations and imposed a $2,000 fine on the company.
company The Andersen company had 15 days to resond
to the citation. Entz said a letter of contest was filed this week with the OSA office in Wichita
Entz said the asbestos that had fallen from, openings in the floors had been removed from the site and that the asbestos remaining in the floors had been sealed and encased.
"The elevator shaft and the air ducts are there and they have all been sealed," he said. "The
See ASBESTOS nage 10
Phumuza Manzini, South African junior, tells ralliers how he feels about the march. "Today I do see black and white people who believe this philosophy of white supremacy is wrong." See story on page eight.
See story on page eight
Staff Reporter
By JULIA SANDERS
Kansas Attorney General Robert Stephan told members of the Sunflower Girls State program yesterday that he was appalled by the United States criminal justice system.
Stephan, speaking to an audience of more than 500, said that, in his experience, the impact of the pandemic on him was profound.
Stephan also spoke about his political future during a question and answer session. He said he would try to decide by the end of the year whether to run for governor in 1982.
"THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE system is not concerned with truth, is not concerned with justice. It's concerned with winning, and I find that anpalling," he said.
In his speech, Stephan said his primary concern with justice was the brief time before the trial began.
"We'll just have to wait and see," Stephan said.
Almost 40 percent of the Lansing Penitentiary and Hutchinson Reformatory prisoners are non-violent," Stephan said. "I don't see why they have to parole murderers, armed robbers and rapists when these other men are in there."
STEPHAN SAID he wished the Kansas Legislature would change parole laws to keep violent criminals in the penitentiary "where they belong."
In the meantime, Stephan has been working to enact legislation lowering the conviction rate for the killing of 41 people.
such felonies include armed robbery, murder, rape and kidding.
JUVENILES ALSO should be the target of steps aimed at combating crime, Stephan said.
Stephan said he pushed such legislation because 45 percent of serious crimes in the United States were committed by people under 18.
The attorney general said he disagreed with the use of nearly $2.5 million funded under the state Community Correction Act for the work to be done because it dealt mostly with adult rehabilitation.
1. think the best way to control crime is to make punishment fair and equal for everyone, and our system isn't doing this," he said.
Commission opts to buy Opera House
STEPHAN ALSO would like to see changes made in prosecution and sentencing to control
"I am in favor of community correction programs, but not a program that deals only with adult criminals who have all formed the crime. I believe there is no right to spend money in the juvenile area."
Now the state has no regulation of local correction programs under the Community
"I would like to see that changed so that everyone who commits the same kind of crime, with the same criminal background, gets the same sentence.
"You're not going to deter crime that way," he said.
Presently, Stephan said, less than 2 percent of those who commit fellowships served even the
The Lawrence Opera House may be turned into an all-purpose civic auditorium if the City Commission can raise the money to purchase and renovate the aging theater.
By MARCHERZFELD
Staff Reporter
Tuesday night the commissioners voted unanimously to purchase a nine-month option to buy the Opera House, taking appraisals and feasibility studies.
COMMISSIONER DONALD BINNS has doubts about the practicality of the city buying the Opera House.
The Opera House has had a varied history in the past two decades, serving as a disco, a concert hall and even briefly as a warehouse for musicians. The opera house will take place again, and commissioners are worried that the
"The one big question we all have to face is how in the hell are we going to fund it," Binns said.
The asking price for the Opera House and an adjoining office in $300,000, and Bins said the company would make improvements.
"Can this building be self-supportive, and can it make enough money to pay for renovation?"
Bins preferred leave the Opera House in private hands, but Mayor Marcel Francisco
"If the city owns the Opera House," Francisco said, "the idea is not to make money but to be able to provide space for community groups to perform."
"Unfortunately, it hasn't seemed to work very well in private hands," she said.
COMMISSIONER BARKLEY CLARK, one of the strongest supporters of the acquisition, said the city had three options for raising the money. Lawrence could have a special city-wide bond election, encourage a private fund-raising drive or create an improvement district, he said.
historic Opera House will become an office building.
Placing the Opera House in an improvement district would allow the city to tax businesses
See OPERA page 10
Averill directs original theatre works
By LINDALANG
Staff Reporter
Ric Averill, director of the Lawrence theatre troupe the Seen-to-Be Players, is actively involved with all aspects of theatre in Lawrence, including acting, staging and writing.
He does not, however, take credit for writing any of the skits about the adventures of Nyfrm the Sprite, often acted out by the Seem-to Be attributed to him, but Averill said he had help.
"I was sitting in my backyard and eating an artichoke and this sorceress came down and gave me this big bag of scrools," he said. "She flashed this stuff in the air, and she gave me the power to read these scrools, so I just translate these scrools."
HOWEVER, AVERLL said he and his wife, Jean, a drama teacher in Topeka, did write the script for "In Robin's Wood," a musical based on the adventures of Robin Hood characters. The Lawrence Summer Youth Theatre will present the play at 8 p.m. June 23-25 and at 4 p.m. June 24-25 at the Lawrence Art Center, Ninth and Vermont Streets.
Averill said the musical will be performed by about 55 Lawrence youths between the ages of 10 and 18. He also said the play was written with music for that vocal range and with natural-sounding dialogue—not to mention a lot of emotional and romantic adventure.
"I's a very high adventure story, but not a melodrama," he said.
"Summer Youth Theatre is just this incredible, wonderful chance to work with kids," he said. "It's a casual atmosphere because we're not triting to make it like a school."
Averill said he and his assistant, Judy Kroeger, taught children exercises such as focus exercises. In tug-of-war exercises, for example, two children pretend they are playing tug of war. Averil tries to make them feel the rope and the body tensions that pulling on the rope creates.
Averill has worked with these young performers in acting, technical theatre and other drama classes since June 1. The Lawrence Arts Department has a program for Recreation Department co-sponsor the classes.
After a few tries, the children themselves decide who is winning as they play the game, he
"YOU ASK THEM how they feel and done a good job. They feel tired," he said.
When the Averilis helped found the Kaw Valley School of Crafts and Performing Arts in 1973, which was disbanded in 1974, they were affiliated with the children's theater they had seen.
"When we started it, we thought what an easy thing it would be to do some children's theater," he said. "We didn't like the type of children's theatre we saw at the time, which was most big spectacle—all costumes, all stuff that couldn't care enough to go好. The stories were always really neatly."
THE SEEM-TO-BE PLAYERS are a professional adult company of about 25 players that puts on eight children's productions yearly at the Lawrence Arts Center.
Averill said the style of the Seem-to-Be Players was short and left a lot to the imagination.
Some of the children in the Lawrence Community Summer theatre have been going to see the Seem-to-Be Players for several years and are now apprentices for the group, according to Averior.
In the spring, the players tour Kansas towns,
including Salina, Manhattan, Dodge City and
Liberal, to perform children's theatre and
conduct workshops.
"We'll go into schools and do just basic creative drama exercises which are intended to make the child more fluid, open up his imagination, open the child up to sensory awareness and open him up to being natural and comfortable with his play." Averill said.
"with a little bit of guiding, we can help the child become more fully involved with the story."
THE TROUPE IS FUNDED by the Kansas Arts Commission, which in turn is partially funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. The department recently cut in half by the Reagan administration.
Averill said he did anticipate some cuts in his budget. This year his position, his business manager's job and two other positions were funded through an administrative grant. Next year there will be only his job and another part-time job.
Averill said there was also a possibility he would have a paid fund raiser next year.
He did not know the status of the touring subsidies given by the KAC at this time Averilli
Under this program, any school or art center in Kansas has to pay only half the cost of having the Seem-to-Be Players perform or conduct games that matches any funds paid by the school or art center.
"WeEVE GOT THE gracious support of a lot of different people, broad-based community support," he said. "And in a couple of years to come, I hope we can get some help from local businesses because the community is going to have to take up some of the slack."
The Averilis also work together at the Apple Valley Farm Theatre. The Ric Avian Players perform adult melodramas at the dinner theater po Friday and Saturday evenings.
"The productions are so stylized with a really broad style, a lot of getting out of character and playing around with the audience, hissing and cheering and people getting beer and pop and peanuts," he said. "It's a real relaxed, fun live atmosphere, just an incredible record for all of us."
See AVERILL page 10
MARTI FRUMHOFF/Kansas Staff
Ric Averill, Lawrence's popular children's theatre director, jokes with some youngsters while rehearsing a scene from "In Robin's Wood."
Weather
It will be mostly fair today with a high of 80.
Winds will be out of the north at 10 to 28 mph.
It will be mostly fair tonight with a low of 55.
Tomorrow will be fair to partly cloudy with a high in the low 80s.