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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Tuesday November 17,1987 Vol.98,No.62
Published since 1889 by the students of the University of Kansas
(USPS 650-640)
Some Oread rentals violate housing code
ed Flis, KU student, lived in an attic he calls "the pigeon roost." Pigeons live in the walls; mice and roaches live in the kitchen. The bathroom has no electricity. It's one of many Oread neighborhood apartments that violate city codes for safe housing.
By DAVID SILVERMAN Special to the Kansan
Duct tape keeps the banister in place on the stairs leading to the attic apartment at 1032 Tennessee St. The kitchen is infested with mice and roaches. The bathroom has no electricity.
Ted Flis, a senior architecture student from Chicago, refers to his small studio at the top of the stairs as the "pigeon roost."
Pigeons once perched in the rotted eaves outside his windows. Flis refused to pay his rent. The landlord fixed the eaves. Now the pigeons live in the walls.
One of the pigeons got trapped. It died. Its carcass is wedged in the eaves, and its feet dangle through the crack where it tried to escape.
"If that thing starts to stink, I'm out of here," Fliis said.
"It's a dump. But it was the cheapest thing I could find."
That was in October. Flis moved out last week. He was paying $190 a month rent, plus utilities.
"It was just too run down." Flisi
sunday. "I was just glad to get out of
your house."
The stories are similar for many students at the University of Kansas. They live in Oread neighborhood apartments that are considered hazardous by Lawrence city officials.
Some students, seeking homes with character, choose to live in Oread's older houses and apartments. Others, who need to find housing close to campus, also settle in the 50-square-block Oread area just east of KU. Whether by choice or necessity, many students end up paying for apartments that violate city health and safety regulations.
The apartment where Flis lived is an example. The front door is hollow and has no deadbolt. Flis used a bicycle lock instead. The city housing code requires landlords to provide solid front doors and deadbolt locks on all units.
A web of extension cords converges at the only working outlet in the room where Fliess slept and studied. City code requires at least two working
outlets and an overhead light in each room. Flis said the overhead light had not worked since he moved in this fall.
Flis used an extension cord from the kitchen to power the light by the bathroom sink. The city requires all bathrooms to be fitted with at least one outlet next to the sink.
The landlord thumbbacked plastic sheeting to exposed beams in the wall to form a makeshift shower stall. That is also a violation of the city code.
The nine-nit unit house where Flis lived lacks fire extinguishers and a central smoke alarm system. Both are required by the city's fire code.
These problems didn't stop Flis from renting the apartment owned by Lenae-based L&M of Hieronymus, Inc., a land management company that owns several homes in the Oread neighborhood.
"I didn't want to pay $250 for a place to live," Flis said. "I knew it was run down a little bit, but I didn't know there were pigeons."
Fed up with the pigeons and the other problems, he broke his lease last week. He said L&M's Lawrence manager, Lynn Meredith, promised to make repairs but did not. Flisa said he didn't get his deposit back until he threatened to call the city.
In the two-bedroom apartment below the one Flis rented, Shawnee sophomore Randy Gross and his roommate share the pigeon problem. They've locked a closet where the walls are covered withaging ceiling and cracking plaster. The closet floor is covered with droppings and feathers.
"We haven't opened that closet in a while." "Gross said." "We gave kife to it."
They pay $260 a month, plus utilities.
The city has not inspected these apartments because the tenants haven't complained. Without a written agreement, the officials say they cannot take action.
But the city did act on another house owned by L&M of Hieronymus, Inc. On Jan. 22, 1986, the city's housing inspector condemned the attic apartment in the two-story
stories that examine housing at KU and in Lawrence. The stories are part of a project by the Public Affairs Reporting class. See related stories pages 8 and 9.
house at 139 Tennessee St., city records show, L&M was cited for more than 15 violations of the city's housing code. They included renting a unit too small for habitation, a lack of hot and cold running water in the apartment, holes in the floor, a rotted stairway and hazardous wiring.
Margene Swarts, Lawrence's housing inspector, said she didn't visited the apartment since the day she condemned it.
"The flooring I remember was bad; it was just really spongy." Swarts said. "I was really afraid a couple of times I'd go plummeting through the floor into the floor below. The main problem was the ceiling height. It just wasn't habitable. The only way you were going to get that one habitable was to beef up the floor and rebuild the walls and ceiling."
The floor is still spongy. The ceiling is still low. No building permits have been sought for repairs. Swarts still thinks the apartment is vacant.
But Brandon Whitehead has been living there since August.
"It's a nice place to live," said Whitehead, a sophomore from Kansas City. Mo. "I like to live in cave-like surroundings."
Whitehead signed a six-month lease for the attic. He pays $175 a month rent, plus utilities.
The railing is missing on the rotted wooden outdoor stairs leading to the attic. Inside, insulation hangs like Spanish moss from exposed, sloping rafters. Two bare light bulbs, powered by wires strung from wooden beams, provide light for the cramped apartment.
"The plumbing goes in and out, and the water works most of the time." Whitehead said. "It's better than the place I lived in last year."
The house's resident manager, Kris Noyes, said the apartment had been condemned before she rented it to Whitehead.
"She (the housing inspector) said the ceiling was too low and we couldn't rent it." Noyes said.
Noyes said she collected a little money rent each month from the house's staircase.
The two-story house was purchased for $45,000 on Aug. 1, 1978, by Big Blue Student Rentals, Inc., a Lawrence management company, court records show. It was mortgaged through First National Bank of
See OREAD. n. 8. col. 1
Tony Vourax/KANSAN
Randy Gross, Shawnee sophomore, stands in a closet in his apartment where pigeons have broken through the ceiling. He and his roommate pay $260 a month rent, plus utilities for their Oread neighborhood apartment.
GTAs must teach many classes but get small salaries
Editor's note. This is the first in a three-part series on graduate teaching assistants at the University of Kansas.
Today: Graduate teaching assistants are teaching a larger percentage of the University's classes — and at low salaries.
- **Tomorrow:** Low salaries cause some graduate students to go elsewhere.
- Thursday: Administrators are worried low salaries. But most don't think they'll improve soon.
Alex Valverde, Blue Springs, Mo., freshman, sat in a hallway at Wescoe, preparing for class.
Valverde, a business accounting major, takes history, math, psychology and English classes, all taught by graduate teaching assistants this semester.
A few doors away from where
Valverde sat is the classroom where
P. Allen, graduate student in
English, teaches an English 101
class.
By JENNIFER ROWLAND Staff writer
Allen came to KU this semester after graduating in December 1986 from the University of Missouri at Rolla because of KU's reputation and research facilities, he said.
As an undergraduate, Allen helped
his way through college by
working with students.
Now that he is in his first semester as a graduate teaching assistant at KU, his wife also is working to help pay the bills. Allen said.
make it on my salary," he said.
"There's no way the two of us could
Valverde and Allen represent two sides of a growing concern at KU — the high percentage of classes taught by GTA students, the low attentions GTAs receive
Most faculty agree that KU is unable to pay graduate teaching assistants a nationally competitive salary.
That statistic comes from a study prepared by the office of institutional research and planning and presented by Executive Vice Chancellor Judith Ramaley this fall. Te study also said that the number of freshman-sophomore level classes taught by graduate teaching assistants at KU approached 50 percent. The national average is 30 percent.
But they disagree about the effect of another statistic, one indicating that 10 percent more of freshman and sophomore classes are taught by graduate students now than in 1983.
Saul said the large number of GTAs was "simply because we don't have enough faculty to cover the students."
KU's history department has 28 graduate teaching assistants this fall, about six more than normal and the largest number in the department for several years. The department has 33 full-time equivalent faculty.
Norman Saul, chairman of history, said, "I suppose in an ideal world, we'd like to see more faculty teaching at the lower levels."
More GTAs
Gunman robs Lawrence National Bank
See STUDENTS, p. 12, col. 1
By NOEL GERDES
Staff writer
A man wearing a dark blue stocking cap and a dark-colored jacket walked into a branch of Lawrence National Bank yesterday, pulled out a gun and took an undisclosed amount of cash, police said.
Janis Bunker, security director for the bank, said no shots were fired at the branch at 27th and Iowa streets, no one was injured and nothing in the bank was damaged. It is the bank's policy never to disclose the amount of money taken in a robbery, she said.
Sgt.丹 Dalquestoff of the Lawrence police said the man entered the bank at 10:43 a.m., took out a small, blue, steel revolver and escaped on foot about one minute later.
The man headed on foot west from the bank.
disappeared and has not yet been found, Dalquest said. Police stopped searching the area for the man yesterday, but they are continuing the investigation.
No customers were inside the bank, but a couple of customers were stopped at the bank's drive-through.
Dalquest said three employees were inside the bank during the robbery. A teller set off a silent alarm, and police arrived at the bank about two minutes later, he said.
One witness said she stopped to deposit her paycheck at the drive-through and saw the robber enter through the front door of the bank
Official police reports described the man as a white male in his late teens or early 20s, between 5-10 and 6 feet tall with a slim build.
'When I saw him come in. I thought.' 'Now that
Lt. Wayne Schmille of the Lawrence police said six police officers worked at the scene of the crime, but not know how many would be assigned to the investigation. FBI officials also are investigating the robbery.
guy is really stupid, wearing a ski mask in a bank
they're going to think he's robbin them" she
says.
Dalquestar said the bank was equipped with a video surveillance camera, but he could not dent the machine.
She watched the man through the drive-through window. She said the man did not point the gun at anyone in particular, but, "He was waving it around at all of us."
Bunker said the bank's lobby was closed from the time of the robbery until about 1:30 p.m. The branch does not employ security guards, she said.
KU officials consider installation of telephone enrollment system
By MICHAEL HORAK
Staff writer
Bloomer, a senior at Iowa State University, picked up the telephone, dialed Iowa State's enrollment hot line, punched a few buttons, and listened to a computerized voice confirm his classes for next semester.
Shawn Bloomer enrolled in six minutes flat.
He hung up and ate lunch.
The scene yesterday in Strong Hall was much different.
Enrollment lines, sometimes swelling to 250, snaked out the door of the enrollment center and down the first floor hallway.
Several dozen students sat on the hallway floor waiting for a student
Jennifer Yord, Mission Hills freshman, stood in line half an hour before her appointment.
'I got here early so when it is my
turn. I can go in and get it over with,"
she said.
Some administrators who see those lines daily have begun to ask themselves whether the time has come for them to use their own telephone enrollment system.
Wes Williams, dean of educational services, is one of the campus's biggest advocates of change.
"Instead of students coming here to enroll, it allows students to use their telephone key pad and stay at home." Williams said last week.
"Students don't have to stand in line; they can add or drop classes over the phone, and the University wouldn't have to hire as many part-time employees as it does for the current enrollment system."
About 50 colleges and universities, many in urban areas with large percentages of commuter students, have developed phone enrollment systems in the last four years. Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah; Texas A&M University in College Station; and Georgia State University in Atlanta each use telephones to enroll.
Students call their enrollment center, and a computer-generated voice takes them step-by-step through the enrollment procedure.
Most telephone enrollment systems work similarly.
Students can add classes, drop classes and get a list of closed classes by punching additional classes. They can search for an open section, examine alternative courses and get details about any class listed in the course directory.
See ENROLL, p. 6, col. 3
By punching certain codes on the telephone, students can enter their student identification numbers, per- access codes and class schedules.
Faculty, staff to vote today on union issue
About 1,000 KU faculty and staff members are eligible to vote in today and tomorrow's election.
Pollis will be open from 9 a.m. to
6 p.m. today and tomorrow in 3012
Haworth Hall, 208 Strong and 118
Lindley.
Faculty and staff who are assigned to offices in Summerfield, Haworth, Malot and Murphy balls, Robinson Gymnasium, Watkins Memorial Hospital and West Campus buildings should vote in 3012 Haworth.
Faculty and staff who are assigned to offices in Fraser, Twente, Blake, Lippincott, Smith, Wescoe, Staffer-Flint, Strong, Spooner and Snow halls, Watson Library, Spencer Research Library and the museums should vote in 208 Strong.
Faculty and staff who are assigned to offices in Lindley, Learned, Bailey and Marvin halls, and the Art and Design building should vote in 118 Lindley.