Thursday, July 22,1982 Vol. 92, No. 157 USPS 650-640
42-0154
pted
with
old
0pm 8pm
0pm
oves
KANSAN
The University Daily
00pm
00pm
versity
eats
82
in the
University of Kansas Lawrence, Kansas
City budget result of long, hard work
By KATE DUFFY Staff Reporter
It is as regular as clockwork.
Every March, City Manager Buford Watson and Assistant City Manager Mike Wilden meet with city department heads to begin work on the next year's budget.
Preparing the city's budget takes about five months. During these months, Watson, Wildgen and others participate in endless discussions about revenue projections and program costs.
THE FINAL PRODUCT of those long months of research decides the number of potholes to be filled, streets to be repaired and waterlines to be installed. The residents' tax bills for the following year.
In early July, Watson and Wilden submitted a 1983 budget that called for an increase of 4.290 mills in property tax. The total budget for the city was $29.4 million.
A mill is $1 in taxes for every $1,000 of assessed property valuation
Part of the increase, 3.65 miles, is to make up the city's loss of $73,000 that would have come from the intangible tax. In 1980, Douglas County received $42 million in investments and interest from savings accounts.
The 1983 budget proposal is 6.1 percent higher than 1982's budget and calls for a proposed 45.37- mill levy, about $45.37 of taxes per $1,000 of assessed valuation.
Since 1970, Lawrence's population and number of housing units has grown considerably faster than the city's costs, keeping the mill levy low. In his July 6 memo to the commissioners, Watson said the 1983 assessed valuation was only a 32 percent more than the 1982 valuation. Such a lower property value, coupled with the loss of the intangibles tax money, forced the city to raise taxes.
THE 1983 MILL levy increase of 10.4 percent is definitely not normal for Lawrence, Wildengat and Barrie.
low during the past decade and despite some job
lavers in town, "is in relatively good shape."
Wilden has been Lawrence's assistant city manager since 1975 and has worked on the budgets since his arrival. Although preparing the budget involves spending long hours and often requires multiple departments, department heads during discussions, Wilden said he liked coordinating the budget process.
"For me, it a full review of all the departments," he said. "I get to see where they're at, and I know what we're doing."
After meeting with the city manager and the assistant city manager in March, department heads design their individual budgets in April. In addition, the two officials again to go over their budgets.
DURING THE MEETINGS, Wilden and Watson ply each department head with questions about their programs' procedures and cost until they come to a consensus.
Wildgen said that this yearly debate with the city's managerial staff was a necessary part of the city's agenda.
"The department heads get set in their own way," he said. "Our job is to check their procedure. People don't like to change, when you get down to it."
In June Watson and Wilden, along with City Clerk Mercer and Finance Director Ethan Smith, tackle one of the most difficult tasks of budget preparation, revenue forecasting.
"We wait as long as we can to do this, to catch trends and new state hive and to be able to judge things."
One of the most difficult parts is the writing.
Wildgen said that revenue forecasting was not a precise science.
"I don't have a crystal ball so I don't know what exactly is going to happen one year from now."
THE CITY BUDGET is prepared about 18 months before the actual revenues for that city are generated.
Mercer, who keeps track of incoming reve-
See City page 8
Weather
Today will be hot, humid and mostly sunny with highs in the mid to upper 90s, according to the National Weather Service in Topeka.
The weekend will be hot and humid with a chance of thundershowers. Highs will be in the mid-90s, lows in the mid-70s.
Police to offer compromise for contract work agreement
Lawrence Police Officers Association members decided Tuesday to present a compromise work agreement proposal to city commissioners next week.
LPOA chairman Gary Samson met with city employee relations director, Jackie Mclain.
a new proposal after LP0A members refused to sign the contract the commissioners approved in
The LPOA is not asking for a 1983 wage increase above the allotted 6 percent. However, the police are requesting a job reclassification
See LPOA page 8
Kenneth Kimbrough, senior at Washington High School in Wyndoeat County, is assisted by Marylee Southard, second year graduate student in chemical engineering, as he weighs chemical solutions for a project in tertiary oil Kimbrough is participating in the summer apprenticeship program sponsored by the Chemical Engineering Society.
Minority high schoolers get experience in science and engineering research
By KATHLEEN J. FEIST
Staff Reporter
Fourteen high school students are living a college student's dream come true by being paid to learn this summer. through grants given by the National Science Foundation. Health and the National Science Foundation.
The students are participating in summer research apprenticeship programs for minority students sponsored by the Office of Minority Affairs.
The young research assistants, from Lawrence, Eudora and Kansas City high schools, are paid $140 a week for the eight-week program, which began June 7.
"The activities give them research experience," Gerry Williams, assistant director of Minority Affairs, said last week, "and a chance to experience what goes on in universities.
"There is a shortage of minority students in all schools," Williams said. "They are terribly unenriched."
"THE RATIONALE IS to provide money because they would work this summer anyway."
"It ites them what it's like and also stimulates their interest."
The apprenticeship was opened to minority students because of their underrepresentation in science and engineering departments in colleges and universities.
This is one way to show them the University.
The students assist in laboratory research on the Lawrence campus and at the University of Florida.
THREE STUDENTS ASSIST in research in the biochemistry department at the Med Center. At the Lawrence campus, five students intern in the lab and assist with research in chemistry and one in microbiology, Williams said.
NSF and NIH required that a broad mixture of minority students participate in the program, and Williams said KU's program fulfilled that requirement.
"All minority groups are represented here," he said.
The program employs one American Indian, two Mexican-American, one Asian, ten blacks and "a good mixture of boys and girls," Williams said.
The students must be about to enter either their junior or senior year in high school or have just graduated from high school. Most of them spend their weekdays assisting graduate students or research assistants with experiments in the lab.
The students who are picked for the program are recommended by their teachers in the math department.
SOME STUDENTS, mostly those in engineering, were required to take English and study
skills classes at the beginning of the semester; Williams said.
*Tried work the kus nadi.* *Whanhis sudu:* David Kuo, a Lawrence High school graduate.
said the pace was faster than the night school. "It's not really easy," he said. "But it helped
"I've learned more from the lab than in a whole year in high school."
Kuo, who is working in the organic chemistry labs, plans to go to KU this fall and major in engineering.
"I feel like I have a head start, jump above the others," he said.
KTO UO 'the internship was more than just a summer job and be said it should be offered to anian
"It's good experience," he said. "Everyone should have the opportunity."
But Kuo can't wait until the program is over.
"more eight-hour days." he said.
Another student, Kenneth Kinbrough, a Washington High School senior from Wyndot county, said he had learned a lot about chemistry in high school. He is an assistant in chemical and petroleum engineering.
Marylee Southard, Lawrence graduate student, whom Kimbrough works with, said he helped her this summer in a two-year experiment with jelly used in drilling for oil.
"He's a big help," she said. "He does a lot of
See Minority page 8
Listening intently for her cue from the back stage production manager, this lighting and sound technician prepares to adjust the stage lights during a recent Kansas Repertory Theatre production.
Show must go on
Action onstage and off at the theatre
By JEFF TAYLOR
Staff Reporter
A corner of a rug onstage stuck out under the curtain, as a spotlight shined on centerstage. Behind the curtain, there was a call for the final prop check.
Ten minutes after the final check, Dennis Lickeig, the stage manager, spoke into a microphone to the actors waiting in the green studio where they applied make-up and dressed.
"Three minutes. Everyone onstage, please," he said.
Lickleig wore earphones with a mouthpiece to communicate with the sound and light crews who work in a booth in the theater's balcony. The members posted on the other side of the stage.
SOME MEMBERS of the audience began searching for good seats, and others continued
Finally, he pushed a button that sounded a tone in the lobby, indicating three minutes to
He pushed the button two more times, once two minutes before curtain and again one minute before. Talking to the-booth, he raised his left hand to Steve Landes, Prairie Village special student, who grabbed a rope that pulls the curtain up.
A row of ropes, stretched along one wall like guitar strings, are used to raise and lower sets and props. Music that played before the show begins to fade, and I notice dropped his arm
Landes yanked the rope and the curtain rose. In the audience, the latter audagged as the play unfolded.
"That was the hardest part of our show—open it," Lickey said.
"Everybody covers themselves before the show. The actors come in and get acquainted with the stage, and the crew has a prop check three times before the show," he said.
THE CREW HAD arrived 12 hours before the curtain rose to organize the set. Actors also had arrived early to familiarize themselves again with the set, he said.
"KR's really nice because we get this practical exposure," he said.
While the play continued, the crew watched the actors and waited for their favorite lines to begin. The actors looked at each other.
The most hectic time before any production is before the show starts, Lickiee said. A permanent company of 16 crew members work for the Repertoire Theatre, along with a staff of 21.
THE SECOND PERFORMANCE of Alan Ackbouner's "The How Other Half Loves" was being presented. The company is working three shows at once, alternating performances
"I was real happy with the crew. Everything where it was supposed to be."
"Every director worries about second-night slump. But in repertory theater, that never seems to happen." Lichtie said. "Everybody tends to be very conscientious. The slump usually happens when a show runs three or more nights straight."
During a performance, crew members are on the left and right sides of the stage, Lickleig at the front.
Before the show started, Lichteig explained the responsibilities. He said he worried about the lack of staff.
They had heard the dialogue over and over and waited until a series of lines that cured them of their dread.
"The telephone rings a lot in this play. you can imagine a blank sound as the actor waits to speak."
man, talked about the experience gained from repertory theater.
THE CREW QUITELY picked up props, the curtain fell and the lights went out. Suddenly the actors were offstage changing costumes, and the crew was placing the new props onstage. The process occurred in a matter of minutes.
The company members work as crew people for some performances and act in one of the three summer plays. The other two plays are by Todd Blank Baum, and Noel Coward's "Bilbe Spirit."
Two of the company members, Phyllis Leach, Leavenworth senior, and Ann Waldford, Greensburg graduate student, said they enjoyed working offstage.
"I'll wild back here, especially for this show.
It's such a 'twonow' show." Leach said.
Waldorf said, "So many times, people see the finished production, and they have no idea of it."
THE RESULTS of production work were stored back stage. The sets were packed away in a room that had a door big enough to move the larger窥 in and out easily.
Different colors of the paint, the colors of acrylyne from previous tests, were splattered on the paper.
See Backstage page 8