tuesday, September 23, 2003
news
the university daily kansan 5A
5A
Plywood shortage,prices prompts local talk
By Steve Schmidt
sschmidt@kansan.com
Kansan staff writer
Plywood prices have hardware stores preparing for hard times.
Because of several factors, the prices of plywood and lumber have doubled nationally. Although local organizations and businesses have yet to feel any ripple effect, an increase could be on the horizon.
The shortage is largely due to spending by the Pentagon. According to a report done by the wood-products trade magazine Random Lengths, the Pentagon recently ordered 766,498 sheets of plywood as well as 320 truck-loads of 2-by-4, 2-by-6 and 4-by-4 boards, used mostly to build tent
floors in Kuwait camps for the current military actions in Iraq.
Mother Nature has also added to the problem. The ravaging effects of Hurricane Isabel has left victims needing plywood for rebuilding. Summer forest fires in British Columbia, Canada, one of the largest suppliers of lumber, have cut down on supplies as well.
The Lawrence Habitat for Humanity chapter hasn't received an invoice with the higher prices yet, but Jean Lilley, executive director, said she knew they were coming and was concerned.
Schmidt Builders Supply Inc., 1861 E. 1450 Road, is one of three local businesses that supply Habitat for Humanity. Company manager Kevin Sowards said the price for lumber had at least doubled in the last six months with the biggest price jump coming in the last six to eight weeks. For example, a 4-by 8 sheet of oriented strand board, supply wood for roofing, used to cost about $7 to $8. Now that's up to about $20.
Contrary to other reports. Sowards attributed a majority of the higher prices to larger costs of building permits, which are up nationally 12 to 13 percent more than last year, mainly because of low interest rates.
When workers for the House That Greeks Built begin construction Friday, the price tag of the project will be about $5,000 higher than it was two years ago.
said Emilie Guenther, organization spokeswoman. The approximate $40,000 of project costs, compared to about $35,000 in 2001, was already taken into account before the announced plywood shortage, Guenther said.
"Construction costs have gone up little since we last built, but I think a lot of that is due to inflation." Guenther said.
More than 200 members of the greek community, Guenther said, will participate in the building of a house for 12 days starting with Friday's "blitz build." The house will be built on a site near the intersection of 17th and Harper streets where 14 houses have already been built by the Lawrence Habitat for Humanity
chapter.
Cottin's Hardware and Rental, 1832 Massachusetts St., reported no shortages in supply or a price increase, said Linda Cottin, store owner. Cottin said her small, independent store purchased its lumber through a co-op with True-Value Hardware and Rental of the same address.
Cottin said her business would feel the effect when the co-op ran out. When that happens, Cottin said she assumed the situation wouldn't get better anytime soon.
She said she thought larger hardware companies, lumberyards and speculation builders would feel the financial pinch first.
— Edited by Cate Batchelder
California awaits decision as court debates recall case
The Associated Press
SAN FRANCISCO — A federal appeals court heard arguments yesterday about whether to let California's gubernatorial recall election go forward on Oct. 7, sharply questioning whether the Supreme Court's Bush v. Gore decision is grounds for postponing the vote.
But judges also raised concerns that holding the election could deny some people the right to vote because of error-prone voting machines, giving hope to both sides that they might prevail in a legal battle that could still end up before the nation's high court.
A court spokeswoman said a ruling was expected today.
The American Civil Liberties Union wants the election postponed until six counties can install new voting machines so that 40 percent of California voters will not have to use the infamous punch card ballots that made "hanging chads" a household term during Florida's elections debacle.
Judges Alex Kozinski and Johnnie B. Rawlinson challenged Charles Diamond, a lawyer for a pro-recall group, to explain just how error-prone a county can be before it violates the Constitution. "We cannot value one person's vote over another," Rawlinson said.
If one out of every 10 votes doesn't count, Kozinski said, is that "close enough for government work?"
"Itif was 50 percent I think we'd want to take a searching look," Diamond conceded. Still, he stressed, "You don't stop everybody from voting if some of the people who do vote may have their votes counted erroneously."
But Judge Richard C. Tallman expressed concern about the nearly 615,000 absentee ballots that Californians already have cast.
"The real point, I think, is it's an unlawful election," said Harvard University scholar Laurence Tribe, who argued for the Democrats in the Florida dispute that reached the Supreme Court in 2000.
The hearing was the result of a ruling last week by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that postponed the gubernatorial election, agreeing with the ACLU that thousands of votes could be missed.
The 9th Circuit later decided to allow an 11-judge panel to reconsider, setting up yesterday's hearing — broadcast live on national cable news networks.
The 11 judges could either uphold the three-judge panel's ruling or overturn the decision, reinstating the Oct. 7 date. The losing side could then appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The three-judge panel repeatedly cited the U.S. Supreme Court's Bush v. Gore ruling that halted the Florida recount because counties were using different standards to read the ballots.
Tribe, who is representing the
ACLU in fighting for a postponement, defended the panel's ruling, but was grilled by Kozinski and Judge Diarmuid F. O'Scannlain.
"We don't have a Bush v. Gore problem," Kozinski said, noting that California does have the kinds of standards for ballot-counting that Florida lacked in 2000.
"It's a worse problem," replied Tribe. He said punch-card ballots "are not lawful to use" in the upcoming California election since the state already knows they are error-prone.
Arguing for the state, Deputy Attorney General Douglas Woods said U.S. District Court Judge Stephen V. Wilson got the case right in mid-August when he rejected any postponement.
"Today, with this election ongoing. he is even more right," Woods said during the 70-minute hearing.
Kozinski prompted laughter throughout the ornate courtroom with an observation that perhaps could give recall opponents some reason to be hopeful.
"He sort of missed it on the Voting Rights Act, just between us," joked Kozinski, a Reagan appointee who dominated much of the hearing.
The ACLU contends that minorities may be more prone to have their votes discarded because the six counties have higher percentages of minorities than California as a whole. That would violate the 1965 Voting Rights Act.
Helicopter accident kills 7 in Arizona
The Associated Press
PHOENIX — A search team yesterday recovered the bodies of a pilot and six sightseers killed when their tour helicopter crashed in the Grand Canyon.
The victims were being taken to the medical examiner in Kingman to verify their identities, said Jody Hall, a deputy medical examiner. An autopsy will be conducted on the pilot, Hall said.
Volunteer searchers and sheriff's deputies rappelled down the steep canyon walls to recover the bodies from the wreckage of Saturday's crash, said Lt. Rick Janssen, a spokesman for the Mohave County Sheriff's Department.
"It's a very remote location," Janssen said. "Communication is also difficult because it's down in a valley."
The sheriff's office identified the victims as Joseph Hanna, 52, and his wife, Nouhad, of Huntington, W.Va.; Masami Kato, 24, and Makiko Hatano, 23, both of Japan; and Julia Hueyng, 33, and Wolf-Dieter Mueller, 46, both of Germany. The pilot was identified as Takashi Mezaki, 45, a native of Japan who lived in California.
The helicopter crashed and burst into flames Saturday about 50 miles northeast of Kingman in Descent Canyon near Grand Canyon West Airport, according to the Mohave County Sheriff's Department.
The helicopter had taken off from an airport near Peach
Springs, Federal Aviation Administration officials said
The aircraft was shuttling tourists from the rim of the canyon to a helipad along the Colorado River on what was supposed to be a four- to six-minute ride, according to Sundance Helicopters, the Las Vegas-based company that operated the aircraft.
Sightseers were to board a pontoon boat at the bottom of the canyon as part of a tour offered in a section of the Grand Canyon.
Investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board were surveying the crash site yesterday. The FAA also planned to probe whether flight regulations were followed, said agency spokesman Donn Walker.
Jim Granquist, chief executive of Sundance Helicopters, did not return calls for comment yesterday. He has said he knew of no record of mechanical problems with the chopper.
According to FAA records, the AS-350 chopper made by Aerospatiale was involved in two minor incidents in 2000. No serious injuries or damage was reported.
Saturday's accident was the deadliest canyon tour crash since 1995, when eight people aboard a plane died while trying to return to Grand Canyon Airport.
Saturday's crash happened in the same vicinity where a helicopter went down in August 2001, killing six.
Campus Schiefelbusch Institute to bring four speakers
David J. Francis has been researching how to educate Spanish-speaking students. Now he's working to educate the English-speaking community about it as well.
In a year-long series, the Schiefelbusch Institute for Life Span Studies is bringing speakers like Francis to the University of Kansas.
Francis will speak at 4 p.m. Thursday at the Kansas Room in the Kansas Union. Francis is a professor of psychology at the University of Houston and works on a project to develop education tactics for the National Institutes of Health.
The series, the Colloquia on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities, will bring three other experts to the University: Kevin Cole of Washington Research Institute in Seattle (4 p.m., Oct. 9, Malott Room of the Kansas Union), Susan Landry of the department of pediatrics at the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston (4 p.m., Jan. 22, at the Kansas Room in the Kansas Union) and Robin Morris of the department of psychology at Georgia State University in Atlanta (4 p.m., Feb. 26, Kansas Room of the Kansas Union).
For more information, contact Karen Henry at kahenry@ku.edu.
Johanna M. Maska
Thornburgh to discuss Kansas political issues
In the first of a series of Memorial Union Programs, Secretary of State Ron Thornburgh will speak today. The event is free.
At 1 p.m. Secretary Thornburgh will lecture for 30 minutes on current Kansas political issues.
A question and answer session will follow. The event is at the Jayhawk Room in the Kansas Union, and all students are welcome.
Other speakers in the series will be State Attorney General Phill Kline on Oct. 9 and U.S. Rep. Dennis Moore (D-Kansas) on Nov. 12. Those events will also include a luncheon that is open to 15 students on a first-come, first-serve basis.
To reserve a spot, contact Casey Connealy in the Student Union Activities office, 864-7469 or kce@ku.edu.
"I think this is a great opportunity for students to speak with political leaders across the state," Connealy said.
Johanna M. Maska