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October 2,1984 Page 4
OPINION
The University Daily KANSAN
The University Daily KANSAN
Published since 1889 by students of the University of Kansas
The University Daily Kansan (USP$ 60,640) is published at the University of Kansas, 118 Stairford Flint Hall. Lawrence, Kanu $60,640 daily during the regular school year and Wednesday and Friday during the summer session, excluding Saturday, Sunday, and final periods subscriptions payed at Lawrence, Kanu $60,644 Subscriptions by mail are $1 for six months or $2 a year. Subscriptions by mail are $3 a year outside the county. Student subscriptions are $1 and are paid through the student address changes to the University Daily Kansan. 118 Stairford Flint Hall. Lawrence, Kanu $60,640
DON KNOX
Editor
PAUL SEVART VINCE HESS Managing Editor Editorial Editor
DAVE WANAMAKER Business Manager
DOUG CUNNINGHAM Campus Editor
LYNNE STARK MARY BERNICA Retail Sales National Sales Manager Manager
SUSANNE SHAW
General Manager and News Adviser
JILL GOLDBLATT Campus Sales Manager
JOHN OBERZAN Sales and Marketing Adviser
Cornfield mall
The latest plot twist in the long, tedious Lawrence shopping mall drama probably doesn't mean much in and of itself. However, it does point up a serious problem in the city's ability to identify its development goals and to turn those goals into a reality.
Just when it seemed that the mall question had been answered, Delta Properties Inc., a Baltimore-based development firm, submitted a rezoning proposal Friday to the Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission. The proposal calls for the creation of a 450,000 square foot shopping mall on the southern edge of town at Iowa Street and Armstrong Road.
Two facts make this a strange request. First, the City Commission in 1981 rejected a proposal for a mall at the same site. The reasoning was then, and continues to be, that a "cornfield mall" on the edge of town would take away from shopping in downtown Lawrence — the core of the community.
The second problem is that in November, the City Commission named a developer of record to build a mall downtown. That developer is Town Center Venture Corp., made up of local developers and architects.
Because of those two problems, the present City Commission probably won't approve the new proposal, but the proposal should cause concern.
Delta Properties has been considering entering the Lawrence market for about a year. It may have been encouraged by the fact that after almost a year, little visible progress on a downtown mall has been made.
The commission decided last year to scrap several years of work by the Sizerel Realty Co. of Kenner, La., to hand the project to Town Center. But so far, that decision appears to have paid few dividends.
If Lawrence is serious about the building of a downtown mall—and after all of these years, it seems that the city is very serious—then the time has come to move forward. Further delays would only be a sign of indecision to other firms that may be eyeing the city for its commercial development potential.
As Mayor Ernest Angino said, "It's time to fish or cut bait."
The whole purpose of a downtown mall was to support the core of the city. Time lost in putting a downtown package together means less business for local merchants and less money for Lawrence.
The University Daily Kansan invites individuals and groups to submit guest columns. Columns should be typewritten and double-spaced and should not exceed 625 words. They should include the writer's name, address and phone number. Columns can be mailed or brought to the Kansan office, 111 Stauffer-Flint Hall. The Kansan reserves the right to edit or reject columns.
GUEST COLUMNS
The young man had blow-dried hair, wore a well-cut business suit and was orating at length about the Cubs. When somebody else at the barried to offer an observation, he'd cut in with another nugget of his wisdom.
New Cubs fan strikes out on history
Somebody down the bar tried to say something about Ryne Sandberg. Before he got it out, the expert began reciting Sandberg's statistics, everything from batting average to slugging percentage to stolen bases.
"A shoo-in for MVP," he said.
"You can take it from me."
Somebody else tried to talk about Bob Dernier, but he barely had the name out, when the expert said, "One thing to watch for. He has trouble with the tight fast ball. The pitchers have started to pick up on that later. Actually, I noticed it early in the season."
During one of his sips, Little Charlie wistfully said, "Boy, I wish there was some way I could get playoff tickets."
He went on in that self-assured manner from player to player, nausing only to sin his light beer.
The expert gave him a patronizing look and said, "Well, I would I could have done it," he said.
"You have tickets?" Charlie asked.
The expert nodded. "Oh, sure. The company box. I'll have it for the playoffs and, if they make it, the Series."
"Where are the seats?"
"Third-base side. Near the Penguin." Then he was off again, rectifying the stats of the "Penguin," and about Geys' stiff-legged running style.
I had said nothing. However, I felt something: call it a hunch
So I said, "I guess Sutcliffe will pitch."
Away he went on Sutcliffe. More stats, more keen observations.
Then I said, "Say, will Sutcliffe win as many games as Hank Sauer the team?" And he said, "Yes."
The bartender glanced sharply at me. I gave him a warning shake of his hand.
The expert pursed his lips.
"Mmmm. I don't know."
I went on "Gee, how many games did Sauer win that year? Twenty-one?"
"Something like that," the expert quickly said.
The bartender grinned. Little Charlie turned and gaped at the expert. Little Charlie yelled, "Hey, you don't know what the hell you're talking about. Hark Sauer was an angel. Why, you don't know nothing."
The expert, his smile frozen, and stammered, "Uh. I was just kidding. I mean..."
Little Charlie said, "Bull! You thought he was a pitcher."
MIKE
ROYKO
"No, really..." the expert said, but Charlie moved in for the kill.
"Yeah? Then tell me, what did the guys in the bleachers used to throw at him?"
The expert, in a small voice, said,
"Beer?"
Charlie snorted. "You goof, you phony. They throw packs of chewing tobacco at him after he hit a home run. I know, because I used to throw
"Wait a minute," the expert said indignantly. "A person doesn't have to know... . . ."
"Really that's not.
Little Charlie, on a roll, asked,
"Who was the Cubs' last playing manager?"
"Who'd they get for Brock? Who d Gene Baker play next to? Who was Jolly Cholly? Who was Hankus Pankus?"
The expert was silent.
"That's the trouble with having a winner," Little Charlie said. "We suddenly got all these fans. Faaaaaaans. All of a sudden, they're coming out of the woodwork. Millions of them. They don't know what they're talking about. I'm sick of it. I always get to see them one day when there were 427 people out for a game. It was dizzling. Where were you that day, kid?"
The expert cleared his throat and said, "Well, you don't have to know that."
is history! How can you appreciate Sandberg you didn't live through Bob Ramazotzi? Like a guy said, he who ignores history is doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past. Or something like that."
The expert was gathering up his change and rising from his stool. He muttered, "Uh, I haven't lived around here too long so I . . ."
"Yeah," Charlie said, "but you be here long enough to have seats for the playoffs and maybe the Series. And what do I have? Nothing.
Even my old TV makes all the players look green. Hey, I bet you'd like to get one of those waves started in Cubs Park, like those goofs in New York do, huh? I'll bet you like that kind of stuff."
The expert picked up his bag, smiled weakly and was out the door. "Thanks a lot, Charlie," the bartender said.
Charlie shrugged. "Good riddance — and did you notice something? He didn't deny that he'd like to start a wave in the stands."
Little Charlie exploded. "Baseball
Wrigley represents good in baseball
I want to amend that thought. The name of baseball was never meant to be a word.
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a column about the need for Americans to accept — even promote — the inevitability of change.
1916, when the team played its first game there.
On Friday, my brother and I went to a place where baseball, at least for spectators, hasn't changed much in 88 years. We were among the 31,021 who filled through the turnstiles at Wrigley Field, home of the Chicago Cubs.
We sat in the left field bleacher seats — with the famous Bleacher Bums — underneath an ancient
The Cubs, of course, are champions of the Eastern Division of the National League; they're in the playoffs for the first time since 1945. That may be part of the reason why they have won so many games very much Friday when St Louis pitcher Joao Anudaj won his 20th game at the expense of their Cubbies
However, I think a bigger reason that people enjoyed themselves on that crisp and sunny afternoon was that they were watching a Cubs game played in the same place and much the same way that it was played in
JOHN SIMONSON
Staff Columnist
scoreboard, which functions because three men inside it manually change signs that indicate strikes, balls, hits and runs. The stadium walls are of real brick, and have real ivy growing on them. The field is of real grass, not the plastic variety rooted to a stone wall. The game was played in the afternoon as all Cubs games are — Wrigley Field has no lights.
I found it difficult not to be moved by the history that lives at Wrigley Field. My brother and I imagined
what a game of 1916 would have been like. We could picture the fans: men in white straw skimmers and ladies in wide-brimmed hats.
"This is what baseball should be like," we agreed.
If the Cubs beat the San Diego Padres in the National League playoffs (and I think they will), and if the Kansas City Royals beat the Detroit Tigers in the American League playoffs (and I think they will), the Royals and Cubs will meet in the World Series. This meeting will be a strange juxtaposition of baseball images.
As much as I admire the Royals for their tenacity in winning their division, I see them as the epitome of skill. They are a trophaction on the purity of the game.
The 184 Royals, aside from a small core of established stars, are a collection of players with limited ability. The team, as a whole, is definitely greater than the sum of its parts. The Royals have won through teamwork and, to me, they represent a backthrow to the scaphy playball-
ers of a past era.
Because of their home field and American League rules, however, the Kansas City team is "the leisure suit of baseball."
Royals Stadium is everything that is cheap about baseball today. There are those molded plastic seats; those tacky, glazed-in private suites and restaurant; those ridiculous fountains; that monolithic computerized scoreboard and that ugly plastic grass.
Royals fans, as are all other American League fans, are also cheated by the designated hitter. The presence of the DH removes much of the managerial strategy that is a characteristic of National League baseball.
All these characteristics are money motivated. American League administrators and the Royals front office people reason that baseball is more enjoyable for fans (and, therefore, more profitable) with designated hitters, monolithic scoreboards and plastic grass.
Tell that to Chicago Cubs fans.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Column on affirmative action misses concept's strengths
To the editor:
People talking about affirmative action often criticize things they don't know about; this is true of Jennifer Fine in her Sept. 24 column ("Affirmative action and equality"). Fine has definitely led her readers astray by her ill-informed opinions on the subject. Perhaps I can give readers a clearer and more accurate picture of affirmative action, at least how it operates at the University of Kansas.
The affirmative action office takes a number of steps to ensure equal opportunity for everyone. In regard to the hiring process, the KU affirmative action plan includes the equal opportunity/affirmative action policy and goals and timetables. The affirmative action handbook promotes color-blindness in employers, as Fine suggests should be the case. KU policy also promotes blindness in regard to sex, race, national origin, age, disability, veteran status and religion.
Additionally, the handbook prohibits employees from being asked questions about parental or marital status or their sexual preference. Applicants are judged solely on their job qualifications. Yes, merit-based hiring sounds good to affirmative action, too!
Affirmative action does indeed take steps to recruit both minorities and women into job pools. This is done, in part, by having employers also advertise in publications where minorities and women are more likely to see the position announcements. Affirmative action does take additional steps to attract women and minority candidates; it by no means "overcompensates" for them, as Fine would have you believe.
Discrimination is discrimination is discrimination, as Fine so eloquently put it. Quotas can be discriminatory. Goals, if realistically set, are not. Thus, affirmative action at KU has goals, not quotas. Hiring goals are set by each department according to availability statistics. They then set timetables as to when they can reasonably expect to meet their goals. These goals and timetables are re-evaluated periodically.
Fine was worried that she would be discriminated against because her employer said he was looking at a "black girl"; however, I have doubts about any employer who refers to a woman in this way and has no concern for the well-being it also be concerned with the seniority. Fine advocates, as there is probably a long line of white males ahead of her, and many probably got there
Finally, I find it disconcerting that Fine would be attacking affirmative action; without it, a white male would probably have her new job. I am glad to hear that Fine was not animated against, and I hope she never is.
through the "good ole boy" system. Fine will probably not be considered as "one of the hows"
Office of Affirmative Action
Michele Langdon
Topeka senior,
student assistant
Office of Mitchell
Jennifer Fine's message is loud and clear. Affirmative action and equality in hiring practices, though a trifle outdated, are somewhat worthwhile as long as she isn't personally affected adversely.
Message clear
To the editor:
Lawrence graduate student
Jack J. Husted
Little knowledge
To the editor:
It is distressing to read a column based on little first hand knowledge.
I invite Jennifer Fine (and others)
I invite Jennifer: Fine (and others)
who might have been misled by her column) to visit our office and discover how affirmative action really works.
Linda Hoover
Office manager
Pressure needed
To the editor:
Jennifer Fine should only know how lucky she is, and that it is she, in fact, who has benefited from affirmative action.
Back in 1966, when I graduated from college with a bachelor's degree in English, my job choices were clear; type, file or be a receptionist. Women were secretaries, not managers; referred to as girls, no matter their age; passed over for promotion even when they had been de facto performing a managerial job (at no extra pay) until it could be filled, and all for ridiculously low salaries (we didn't really need the money, as a man would, went the common myth).
Yes, affirmative care can be used cynically. Certainly the lot of most working women remains less pay for more work (just check out the
Judith Roitman Associate professor of mathematics
Affirmative action is far from perfect, but some sort of pressure is needed for change to take place. Jennifer got her job. I hope that the black "girl" (the more things change) has been as lucky.
salaries of KU's classified staff sometime). However, the fact that Jennifer and her friends have a choice of job opportunities, that they expect to be paid fairly for their work and to be promoted when promotion is available, brought about by Santa Claus, the tooth fairy or the Easter bunny.
To the editor:
Backing for bugs
Most entomologists wouldn't bother to give it another thought, but, really, that relates to why people go on misunderstanding and hating things like bugs; they are rarely
Supposedly, as a graduate student in entomology, I could've gotten somewhat indignant at Robin Palmer's light-hearted job at bugs (Sept. 27, 'Kansas creepy critters' and Nov. 1, 'I didn't I laughed, like everyone else').
given a simple point, a word or two on the bugs' behalf, rather than a dry, scientific explanation.
I'm glad Robin realizes, as many people don't, that bugs play an important role in nature. Bugs, however, don't carry on a "battle to annoy the everyday human." Bear in mind that the fly in your dorm or locust on the sidewalk is probably a bit lost and confused. Things like concrete, windows, cars and people are new on the scene, as far as the bugs are concerned, and they haven't gotten used to us, either.
They also have a lot more to lose in encountering people — after all, they're not out to squash us. Nature, on the whole, is at our mercy, and it'd be nice to keep that in mind next time you pulverize some living thing you really know little about, be it a bug, weed, snider or snake.
Nature did fine before we appeared and we should try to get along with it. The more you learn about it, the more you realize we have to.
Incidentally: Locusts are big,
easily panicked grasshoppers, active
in the day; cicadas are big bugs that
buzz in trees all day, katydids and
coneheads hide in trees and weeds
and buzz all night.
Lawrence graduate student