Monday, September 28, 1998
The University Daily Kansan
Section A·Page 3
Lawrence's dollar house rides into sunset
Hilkrest 5 Theatres experiences its last night of business. The 25-year-old dollar house closed because of weak ticket and concession sales. Photo by Jay Sheperd/KANSAN
Weak ticket sales force theater's close
By Seth Jones
Kanson staff writer
Stella got her groove back for the final time at midnight last night at the Hillcrest 5 Theatres.
How Stella Got Her Groove Back was the final movie to flicker on the big screen at the dollar theater. Hillcrest 5,925 Iowa, had been showing movies in Lawrence for 25 years. The theater closed its doors for good at 10:10 p.m. last night.
Hollywood Theaters held the lease on the building and decided to let it expire. The need for repairs compounded with slow ticket sales made the company decide to close the theater, said John Ratzlazff, general manager and Lawrence senior.
The employees at Hillcrest 5 all have been offered jobs at the Southwind 12,3433 Iowa. Even though 6 of the 11 employees have accepted jobs at the Southwind, they said they still
Kristel Cosner, Paola senior and Hillcrest employee for more than a year, is concerned about a lack of job hours.
felt like they would be losing something.
"We'll obviously be overstaffed over there," she said. "So I've gotten another job in addition to this one because I need so many hours a week to get through college."
Her job also will change.
"Kristel is one of our two best pro projectionists," Ratzlaff said. "But at Southwind, she's not guaranteed her same position, so she'll be stuck in concessions."
Keri Krueger, Sioux City, Iowa, freshman and assistant manager, said it felt like a family was being torn apart.
"I've really enjoyed working here," she said. "The staff here is very close."
As a way of saying goodbye to the theater, employees had a slumber party in the building Saturday night.
Corey Peck, Olathe sophomore,
brought his television.
"We didn't watch any movies on the screen," he said. "But we did bring in a TV and play video games, and we even played some hide and go seek."
Theater employees were not the only ones sad to see the dollar theater go.
Cheryl Mottern, Lawrence High School sophomore, waited to see the final showing of How Stella Got Her Groove Back.
"I come to this theater a lot," she said. "It gives us something to do, and it's cheap, and it's fun."
Mottern said the $1 price tag for movies was what she liked best about the theater.
"Me and a lot of my friends come out here," she said. "We're young, and we can't get really good jobs. We don't make enough money to go to the expensive theaters."
Cosner was bothered because she said people were upset with the staff about the theater's closing.
"They vell at me because my boss
"People think we're anti-student or something,but we're not—we're students too. It just doesn't make sense to keep this theater open."
Keri Krueger
Hillcrest assistant manager
Krueger also was frustrated.
in Dallas is closing us down," she said.
"People think we're anti-student or something, but we're not — we're students too," she said. "It just doesn't make sense to keep this theater open."
Krueger was angry with the actions of some of the theater's customers.
"People are upset because we're closing," she said. "But I'm mad at all the people who snuck their own food and drink in here and made us close because we couldn't make any money in concessions."
Hurricane cancels trip by students to Louisiana
By Pallavi Agarwal
Kansan staff writer
Nine University of Kansas students narrowly missed spending their weekend in a hurricane shelter in New Orleans.
The students were bound for a petroleum engineers' convention that was canceled Saturday as hurricane Georges advanced northward from the Florida Keys to the nearby Gulf Coast states on the northwest coast of the Gulf of Mexico. New Orleans is under evacuation orders.
"The airlines called us on Saturday telling us that the flight was canceled because the airport was being evacuated," said Brian Holmes, president of the KU chapter of the Society of Petroleum Engineers.
The six graduate students and three undergraduate students were planning to spend three days in New Orleans and return home tomorrow.
Melanie Connery, Edna freshman, said she was disappointed that the convention was canceled.
"I was going to the convention because a professor of mine had recommended it," she said.
Don Rogers, a meteorologist at the National Weather service in Topeka, ruled out any adverse impact of the hurricane on Kansas.
Connery had been watching the track of the storm on the Weather Channel Saturday and said she was not surprised that the trin had been canceled.
Hurricanes that have hit eastern Texas have led to rainy days in Kansas, but hurricane Georges is too far east, Rogers said.
Irene Georges is too far east, Rogers In fact, some of the sunshine expected in the coming week may be a direct result of hurricane Georges holding back a cold front coming in from the south, Rogers said.
Gulf Coast braces for Georges
Forecasters predict storm may strengthen before it reaches land
The Associated Press
NEW ORLEANS — Forecasters said yesterday that Hurricane Georges could begin lashing the Gulf Coast with hurricane-force winds, and more than a million residents have been told to evacuate.
"This is kind of like looking down the barrel of a shotgun and hoping it turns," said Louisiana State Police Lt. Col. Ronnie Jones.
Rain squalls arrived during the morning along the coast of the Florida Panhandle, Alabama and Mississippi. Surf washed over roads on some of Florida's barrier islands.
Georges killed more than 300 people in the Caribbean before it smashed into the Florida Keys with winds more than 100 mph. No deaths or injuries were reported in Florida.
Forecasters said yesterday the storm may strengthen before it makes landfall, pushing tides up to 15 feet above normal.
Although New Orleans is protected by 130 miles of levees, city officials worried that Lake Pontchartrain and Lake Maurepas could spill over their banks and send water flooding into the city and its suburbs.
At 7 a.m. yesterday, Georges had top sustained winds of 110 mph and was centered on 190 miles southeast of New Orleans, or about 75 miles southeast of the mouth of the Mississippi River, the National Hurricane Center said.
It was moving northwest at about 10 mph and hurricane-force winds of at least 74 mph extended 115 miles outward from Georges' center.
Hurricane warnings were posted along 300 miles of coast from Morgan City, La., to Panama City, Fla. Hurricane watches were posted on the flanks of the warning area east to St. Marks, Fla., and west to Intracoastal City, La.
More than 1.5 million people had been ordered or urged to leave New Orleans and low-lying coastal areas. Bumper-to-bumper traffic jammed Interstate 10 out of the city into the early hours yesterday, and the American Red Cross said it expected to house 35,000 evacuees in dozens of shelters around Louisiana.
Thousands more were told to leave coastal sections of Mississippi, Alabama and the Florida Panhandle.
Mike McCarty and his wife said they didn't feel safe waiting for a flight scheduled to take them home to Columbus, Ohio, yesterday afternoon.
said Saturday night at New Orleans International Airport. "We're getting out of Dodge."
"We decided it would be best to just rent a car and drive home," he
The center of the storm was expected to reach the mouth of the Mississippi River, about 75
Jason Benavides/KANSAN
slow as it neared land, drenching some areas in Louisiana with up to 20 inches of rain.
Emergency officials in Mississippi closed beaches and the 11 casinos on the state's coast. Boats were moved inland, and the Coast Guard closed the Port of Gulfport to all commercial traffic.
While Georges tracked into the Gulf of Mexico on Saturday, residents of Key West surveyed the tan
"This is kind of like looking down the barrel of a shotgun and hoping it turns."
Ronnie Jones
Louisiana State police Lt. Col.
miles southeast of New Orleans, sometime between yesterday and this afternoon. By the time it hits, the storm could have strengthened into a Category 3 storm with winds of 111 mph or faster.
"It could wreak havoc," said Paul Trotter of the National Weather Service. "A slow-moving, Category 3 storm would give us some high tides, heavy winds and lots of rain. When they coexist all together, that's where we'll get the devastation."
gle of debris strewn about their island. No one was killed during Friday's storm, but property damage was widespread.
Forecasters said Georges could
Parts of the chain of islands were expected to be without water and electricity until at least today.
ing in the wind," said Davin Kusik, who lives in a mobile-home park on Cudjoe Key.
Despite the dire predictions for the Gulf Coast, revelers still raised their drinks along Bourbon Street early yesterday morning.
"This is a really nice group of people," said Heather, a dancer at the Bourbon Burlesque. "They just want to stay mellow until the storm's over."
16-year reign ends in Germany for Helmut Kohl
By Angela Johnson
By Angela Johnson Kansan staff writer
Gerhard Schroeder and his Social Democrats defeated Helmut Kohl yesterday in Germany's national elections, ending Kohl's 16-year reign as the country's leader.
University of Kansas students from Germany expressed their hopes and uncertainties that Schroeder would be a stronger leader than Kohl was.
Benedict Kemmerer, Waldorf, Baden-Wuerttemberg, graduate student, said Schroeder, 54, would have limited means for changing Germany.
"His room for maneuvering is limited because of the sizable budget deficit," Kemmerer said. "Foreign, social and economic policies will all be determined by budget constraints."
The official results of the election have not been tallied yet, but the exit polls, which have been revealed, are reliable indicators of official results.
Unemployment is at more than 10 percent in Germany. Schroeder plans to combat it primarily by opening dia logue among union, industry and government officials.
Kemmerer said Germans voted among five parties — Social Democrats, Christian Democrats, the Green Party, the Free Democrats and the Party of Democratic Socialism, which is the former state party of East Germany.
"In Germany, it's not as important as who wins but more by how big the percentage is," Kemmerer said. "We vote by party, and the Cancellor is voted in by Parliament."
Schroeder's party won 41 percent of the vote, according to exit polls. The Christian Democrats won 35 percent, the Free Democrats and the Green Party won 6.5 percent, and the Party of Democratic Socialism won 5 percent.
Lars Kiesel, Herford, West Phalia graduate student, said that he was unsure whether Schroeder could solve the country's economic problems but that he could not be any worse than Kohl.
"It was time for a change." Kiefel said. "It's hard to say if his policies are going to be much better."
"If you look at him, he's a bit clumsy," he said. "He doesn't present himself as very genuine."
Kiesel said that Kohl, 68, was an unpopular leader because he was insincere with the public.
Kiesel added that Kohl was a selfish leader who disguised himself as a people-person.
"He seems like a very folksy person but he's very self-righteous," he said. "The stock market in Germany is booming, but there's more unemployment than ever before. It's like Reaganomics. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer."
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
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