A shower today
A man is falling from a roof.
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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Thursday October 15,1987 Vol.98,No.39
Published since 1889 by the students of the University of Kansas
(USPS 650-640)
5 residence halls lacking required smoke detectors
By BEN JOHNSTON Staff writer
Staff writer
Dean Milroy, associate director of maintenance for the office of student housing, said Lewis, Templin, Hashinger, Ellsworth and McColm halls did not have smoke detectors, and planned to install them in those halls.
Six years after state fire codes were changed to require university residence halls to have smoke detectors and five KU halls still do not have them.
Paul Markley, chief of the fire prevention division for the state Fire Marshal Department in Topeka, said that since 1811, state fire codes have required residence halls to either have a smoke detector in each room or 30 feet apart in each corridor.
"I am rather surprised KU still has five dormitories that do not have fire detectors, because fire detectors are our top priority in fire safety." Markle said yesterday.
Markley said the fire office
inquired about the alarm. ch
1immons watches the 1966 KU men's track team receive the Big Eight Indoor Conference championship trophy.
Courtesy of University Archives
The realization that he would have been running away from his problems, Timmons said, changed his plans to join the Peace Corps and coach in Uganda.
I didn't disagree. Its just that there was so much vindictiveness."
Timmons said when his career ended he would miss working with the athletes, the track and athletic staffs, solving problems and the challenge of competition at the Big Eight Conference and NCAA levels
"I like what we've stood for," Timmons said. "I think the important thing is selling the athlete on a way of life."
Timmons said coaching has changed greatly over the course of his career.
Craig Watchet, the captain of this year's cross country team, said Timmons was a unique coach.
He won't miss the paperwork that he feels has taken too much time away from actual coaching.
"I'm one of the last of the line of non-technical coaches," he said. "The new coaches know so much more about physiology and kinesiology."
"He expects a lot, but he doesn't say a lot to get you motivated," Watche said. "You know what he expects from you and you want to work to make him proud of you. You can tell from his expression that he has a lot of confidence in you."
Cliff Rovelto, assistant women's track coach, who was an assistant under Timmons for two years, thinks the veteran coach has taken his place alongside Easton.
"If you put together all the intangibles and so forth, he is without question, not only one of the best right now, but one of the best ever." Rovello said.
Kansas won at least one championship Big Eight title in 40 consecutive years from 1943 to 1983. Since that streak was snapped, KU has not won a Big E
Eight title.
"I'm well aware of what we haven't done the last three years," Timmons said. "I'm pleased that we're going in the right direction now. I'm hoping to leave it with a championship."
"I think I've hurt our record here because of the loss of foreign athletes," he said. "I've had some who wanted to come, but I wouldn't do it."
Timmons accepts full responsibility for the decline.
Timmons was one of the few U.S. coaches to take a stand against recruiting foreign athletes.
"From there it exploded," Timmons said. "Now national championships have been won by teams that got no points from U.S. athletes.
Timmons' solution is to allow foreign athletes to compete at U.S. colleges, but to bar them because of national championships.
"I'm a flag-waver. I want to see American athletes on the podium," he said. "I want to see the flag go up and I want to hear the national anthem."
"Tell me what we're doing for our national effort when we can't get our best runners into the finals of national meets," Timmons said.
In the 1970s, when the NCAA limited the number of track and field scholarships which could be awarded, schools began to recruit older, more experienced foreign athletes to offset the reductions. At the time, only the University of Houston and Brigham Young University recruited heavily outside the United States.
The policy under Timmons has been that he won't turn away foreign runners, but has taken them on the team as walk-ons.
Andy Pritchard, a freshman from Exeter, England, is currently the No. 4 runner on the Kansas cross country team. Pritchard is the first athlete Timmons has coached who
Timmons has also spoken against professionalism in track and Proposition 48. He said one of the reasons he doesn't want to retire is that he hates giving up the fight.
wasn't educated in the United States.
Timmons doesn't expect his successor to adopt his recruiting values. "I don't want anything we've done policy-wise to influence his recruiting," he said. "I'd love for him to win with American athletes, but if its important for him and the school to go another way, I understand."
Timmons gives advice to Scott Seigul in practice outside Memorial Stadium in 1984.
"I know that coaches are very aware of the fact that he's always battled for the student-athlete and the student-athletes' rights," Nebraska coach Gary Pepin said.
Joe Wilkins ill/file photo
He is opposed to the money "amateur" athletes like Carl Lewis and Edwin Moses earn at international meets. They are able to retain their amateur eligibility by placing winnings and appearance fees in a trust fund.
"All these people are making hundreds of thousands of dollars in an amateur sport," Timmons said. "If they were in pro-sports, I don't know how they could be making any more. I hope the NCAA never relinquish its stand on this."
Another of Timmons' concerns is Proposition 48, the rule by which the NCAA has applied grade-point average and admissions standards to athletes that are stricter than those for non-
However, Timmons said that "the NCAA has never laid down the law about the The Athletics Congress trust program."
Bob Timmons KU men's track coach
athletes. He thinks it is unfair that athletes, who fail to meet the standards, lose a year of eligibility.
"I do think the NCAA's done a lot of great things, more good things than bad, but that stands completely against what the whole thing is all about," Timmons said.
Timmons has worked the protest table at NCAA meets, served on the U.S. Olympic committee for seven years and spoken
like what we've stood for. I think the important thing is selling the athlete on a way of life.'
before a congressional investigative committee. He has conducted surveys to support his claims.
But Markley said the housing office was violating state law by not having alarms in the five halls. He said the housing office could be liable if someone is injured or killed in a fire in one of the halls.
"I had been operating under the assumption that the plan is acceptable." Stoner said.
lin in 1988, in Hashinger and Ellsworth in 1989 and McCollum in 1990. Stoner said.
Perhaps that is something for Timmons to reflect on while painting next year.
"I've enjoyed these battles, too. The only thing I feel bad about is that I've never done much good," Timmons said. "The athlete and the coach are not represented by the NCAA. There is not very much chance of achieving what you strive to achieve."
KANSAN MAGAZINE October 14, 1987
Rovello said that Timmons' legacy is the number of his former athletes and assistants who have become successful coaches. Pepin, who guided his team to the 1987 Big Eight title.
"He has a style and a way of doing things, that everybody tries to take a part of. "Rovello is on a platform on an awful lot of coaches."
I am rather surprised KU still has five dormitories that do not have fire detectors, because fire detectors are our top priority in fire safety.'
Paul Markley Of the state Fire Marshal Department
"A jury would probably have to answer that question," Markley said. "If they believed the University was negligent, or not making enough of an attempt to comply with the law, they could possibly be held responsible."
Two halls are about the most that could be wired with smoke detectors in one year because the housing office has a limited number of electricians. Also, the cost of the installation would take money away from other projects such as roof repairs, Stoner said.
Milroy said smoke detectors were installed in the scholarship halls in
Don McConnell, assistant director of maintenance for student housing, said that Oliver still was being wired for the smoke alarms, and that the project would be completed by the beginning of next semester.
Stoner said smoke detectors had been installed in Jayhawk Towers some time after the housing office began operating the Towers in 1980.
NCE
from both. The load has to be shared."
Even though the amount of money KU receives from the state is 85.9 percent of the average amount received by peer schools, KU has the largest private endowment. KU's endowment totals $196 million. North Carolina has the second largest endowment at $105 million and Oklahoma has the smallest at $23 million.
s support
KU's total spending for fiscal year 1987, which ended June 30,
was $183.99 million. The Endow-
See PRIVATE, p. 14, col. 1
TOMORROW
Chancellor Gene A. Budig says KU will lose its best professors if the Kansas Legislature fails to approve Margin of Excellence this spring. What do legislative leaders say?
7
Also, the Board of Regents discuss Margin of Excellence and open admissions.