Thursday
April 10, 2003
Vol. 113. Issue No. 131
Today's weather
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KANSAN
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Contact Kristi Henderson, Jenna Goepfert or Justin Henning at 864-4810 or editor@kansan.com
Cocaine: The powder-white drug no one wants to talk about Jayplay
Jayplay
Cocaine
the silent
drug
p.8
Hemenway fires Bohl
Courtney Kuhien/Kensan
Al Bohl responds to questions from reporters at his press conference held in his front yard. He said yesterday was "a sad day for collegiate athletics, when a basketball coach has the power to hire and fire a university athletics director."
Athletics director axed after refusing to resign
By Kevin Flaherty
kflaherty@kansan.com
Kansan staff writer
In the battle of Roy Williams versus Al Bohl, Bohl lost his job as Kansas athletics director yesterday.
Chancellor Robert Hemenway announced in a press conference held at 3:30 p.m. yesterday that Athletics Director Al Bohl was fired.
But most of Hemenway's speech and responses focused on attempting to convince the media that this wasn't a "Roy versus Al" battle.
Bohl disagreed.
"This is a sad day for collegiate athletics, when a basketball coach has the power to hire and fire a university athletics director," Bohl said at a press conference he held at his house after the announcement. "A source close to the athletics department believes that I am one of the misfortunate people who personally endured the results of Roy Williams' hatred and vindictiveness."
Earlier yesterday morning, Bohl met with Hemenway and was asked to resign. Hemenway said at the press conference. When Bohl refused, Hemenway removed him from his position as athletics director.
Hemenway said he had decided to fire Bohl after he had conversations with members of the University of Kansas Athletics Corporation board, coaches and other athletics department staff, alumni and contributors to Kansas athletics. A. Drue Jennings was named interim athletics director pending the outcome of a national search.
ALBOHL'S CAREER AT KANSAS
April 26, 2001 — Bob Frederick
Kansas athletics
regions as Kansas state university
June 28, 2001 — Al Bohl is selected
as athletics director after five years
as athletics director at Fresno State
and nine years at Toledo.
Aug. 1, 2001 — Bohl arrives at Kansas.
Nov. 4, 2001 — Bohl fires football coach Terry Allen with three games remaining in the season.
Nov. 5, 2001 — During a press conference, men's basketball coach Roy Williams voices his disappointment with Bohl about Allen's firing.
Dec. 3, 2001 Bohl hires football coach Mark Mangino.
Fall 2001 - Winter 2002 — The Fresno Bee publishes stories about financial discrepancies and academic fraud during Bohl's tenure as Fresno State athletics director.
April 9, 2003 — Chancellor Robert Hemenway fires Bohl.
Hemenway said that Bohl was ineffective as athletics director.
"On the basis of those conversations and my own evaluation of the situation, I came to the conclusion a change of leadership was needed at this time," Hemenway said.
Bohl said he was in a hopeless situation in the matter of his employment because of "malicious" attacks.
"I believe the Kansas basketball coach had the power to hold his athletics director in his hand like a dove — he had the choice to either crush me with the power
SEE DIRECTOR ON PAGE 8A
City states support of academic freedom
By JJ Hensley
jhensley@kansan.com
kansan staff writer
Lawrence City Commissioners joined the legion of local voices supporting Dennis Dailey with a unanimous vote Tuesday evening.
Instead of the typical solution of drafting a resolution, commissioners voted to have City Manager Mike Wildgen draft a letter, which would be signed by the mayor, to Gov. Kathleen Sebelius stating their support of academic freedom at the University of Kansas.
David Dunfield, newly appointed mayor, said commissioners chose the unusual measure of support because the
situation needed immediate attention. He said this attention was needed because the budget amendment to deny funding for Dailey's human sexuality classes sat on the governor's desk.
Classes are now on. "This is a more direct way of asking the governor to respect the University's academic freedom," he said.
The issue wasn't on the city commission's agenda until retired social welfare professor Herman Leon brought it to their attention, Dunfield said.
"Once he brought it to our attention and suggested it was an issue that concerned the entire city, we agreed," he said.
SEE CITY ON PAGE 8A
Harassing phone calls annoy University office
By Erin Ohn
eohm@kansan.com
Kansas staff writer
The office filed a criminal report Monday at the KU Public Safety Office concerning harassing telephone calls to the office's main line.
An anonymous male caller wants to be set up with University of Kansas women, but dating services are not something the Office of Admissions and Scholarships provides.
Lisa Pinamonti, director of Admissions and Scholarships, said the same
Lt. Schuyler Bailey of the KU Public Safety Office said officers had been called to the KU Visitor Center, 1502 Iowa St., a couple times in reference to
male had been calling the office from an off-campus phone for about two weeks. She said he has asked for information about students and to be put in contact with female students.
Pinamonti said the frequency of his calls varied, and the office sometimes received as many as 20 calls within a couple minutes.
SEE PHONE CALLS ON PAGE 8A
Online voting gets going
Brandon Baker/Kansan
By Cate Batchelder
cbatchelder@kansan.com
Kansan staff writer
After one day at the polls, elections commissioner Courtney Wachal said, "So far, so good."
In the inaugural year of online voting, students cast their votes on computers at polling sites yesterday.
Wachal and the
Karen Keith, Tulsa, Okla., senior, casts her vote for student body representatives. Keith said she was happy with yesterday's online voting process and looked forward to improvements in the future. "It's not that complicated. It's just slow." Keith said.
elections commission are responsible for fixing problems that occur. Although the new computer system is working—slow, but working - minor problems arose such as dead cell phones, used for communication between polling sites, and hard-to-find polling sites.
"Pretty much everything that could go wrong, has gone wrong," she said. "But I have a tendency to overreact."
Aaron Brown, Academic Computing Services programmer, developed the online voting system. He, too, worked yesterday to make the online program more efficient, so voters could log in, vote and be on their way faster. He said the system wasn't in a repair situation but was slow because the University of Kansas' main Web server gets thousands of hits a day during regular use.
Later in the day, Wachal said everything calmed down and was going well.
"On top of that, there's online enrollment. On top of that, there's online voting." Brown said.
At the Wescoe Hall polling site Gary Laster, poll worker, said to a voter, "Jus be patient because it's slow."
The polling site has had a steady turnout. Most voters weren't complaining about the slowness but did mention it, Laster said.
Five minutes was the rough estimate
Elections Commissioner Courtney Wachal will announce the election results at the Parlor Room in the Kansas Union at 6:30 p.m. KUJH and KJHK will air the results.
Students need to bring their KU online IDs, passwords and KUID numbers to vote.
VOTETODAY
Polling sites will be open today and students can vote online from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m.The Budig Hall and Kansas Union computer labs will be open today until 10 p.m. Thursday polls will be open from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
POLLING SITES
Wescoe Hall
Purple Union
of voting time, said Diana Calkins, elections commission chairwoman.
Strong Hall
Wescon Hall
Wescoe Hall
Burge Union Kansas Union
Down the hill at the Wagnon computer lab in Summerfield Hall, Bill Araiza, poll worker, was manning his station. He said the biggest
Kansas Union
Mrs. E's
Area by Summerfield and Malott halls
Oliver Hall
Oliver Hall
GSP-Corbin Hall
Wagnon computer lab at Summerfield Hall
Budig Hall computer lab
Learned Hall computer lab
Source: Elections Code
concern from voters was the slowness
"Other than that, it's been pretty quiet," he said.
- Edited by.Andrew Ward