UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN editorials
Unsigned editors represent the opinion of the Kansan editorial staff. Signed columns represent the views of
MARCH 26,1979
Downtown's death knell
Right now it's rolling grassland and open fields, but if developers get their way it will become a sprawling regional shopping mall.
And it could mean the end for the vital and prospering downtown Lawrence business district.
The proposed mall would be built on a 61-acre tract of land at the crossroads of Iowa Street and Armstrong Road and would be complete with 80 retail outlets and three department stores.
"THE MALL probably would employ in the neighborhood of 1,000 full and part-time workers," says Don Jones, an associate with the Jacobs, Visconsi and Jacobs firm of Cleveland, which wants to develop the mall. "It would expand the trade area of the city tremendously."
It would also draw Lawrence shoppers away from downtown and south to the mall, leaving downtown merchants to claw and scratch to attract the few stragglers left. All of which would leave downtown Lawrence in the dubious company of cities like Topeka, St. Joseph, Joplin and Springfield, which have found their downtown shopping districts deserted by shoppers drawn to the suburbs by the allure of the big-time shopping malls.
BOTH OPPONENTS and proponents of the mall realize what is at stake in the issue.
"This will be the most important zoning matter to come before the city of Lawrence," Jack Rose, city commissioner, said recently.
The current question is whether the land being discussed for the site should be rezoned from single family residential to the broadest commercial zoning, which would make way for the mail.
BUT WHEN that test comes, the commission will be facing a crucial decision for Lawrence. A vote in favor of the mall could be succiled.
The commission has already voted to annex the land, but the real test on the mall will come on the zoning issue. However, that test will not come until at least May, long after next week's city commission elections.
"I haven't heard anything favorable about them (shopping malls) except in areas of heavy population, which include us," Mayor Donald Binns said.
Indeed, it would be the height of idiocy to approve a shopping mall that would be potentially devastating to the downtown area after financing a complete beautification and overhaul of the area little more than five years ago. The loss of business could trigger a deterioration of one of the few downtown areas that has maintained its vitality.
THOSE DETERMINED to upgrade the range of shopping options in Lawrence could just as easily bring a major department store into the downtown area. Of course, that would necessitate some changes in parking and traffic flow to accommodate the increase in traffic in the area, but those changes would be worth it if they could stop the mall.
The accompanying shift in attention to the southern edge of town could also bring about a parallel deterioration of the surrounding areas, including the East Lawrence and Oread neighborhoods.
Vitality of springtime passes by death row
The ghost towns that pass for downtowns in most American cities are ample evidence of the importance of stopping the mail.
The cold winter—nature's death—has passed and spring, with all of the new life it brings, is here. But in awful irony, Alabama prison awaited electricity.
His springtime death is scheduled for April 6. His electrocution for committing a crime will be the second execution in 12 years.
EVANS SAID he rejected love from family and friends because to love would interrupt his criminal acts. He rejected Catholic faith and his middle-class home.
John Louis Evans III was convicted for the murder of an owner of an Alabama pawn shop he robbed in January 1977 and 30 armed robberies and nine kidnappings.
Evans says he wants to die—soon. He admits that he was a "rotten kid" and was a victim of the mob thrill. The 29-year-old Texan said his life was "a waisted life." He committed his death.
Evans is not dumb. He asks no sympathy. He seems to accept himself.
"It's been a wasted life, sure. But I'm
not down on myself, I just make a rotten
kit kid, and I don't do anything
kid kid. I like being a rotten kid. I was going
down society's wrong road and I didn't
Says he, "When it comes down to it,
I'm a pretty selfish person. If want to do
something, I do it. No matter who gets
hurt . . .
What is most disturbing about these comments is Evan's lack of spirituality, his chilling preatism.
It is sad, nay, frightening that Evans can so calmly reject life. He might cease
Phillip Garcia
to exist after April 6, but he seems to be already dead—he no longer has a love of life, and lacks feeling and sensitivity.
EVANS SAYS he has "come to grips with death" and yet he seems to have never faced life.
Was he a product of his environmen... which seemingly should have given him all he needed? Did the comforts and needs of his children desensitize him to the value of each day?
And what about his life?
Evans said he could get a lot of money for about 30 seconds of work, so robbery became "the easy way to go."
One might say John Louis Evans III is just another of the few besetting candidates in this race, and should be eliminated. After all, didn't Evans acknowledge that he did it all
Fair enough. One may demand the death penalty, but the fact remains that Evans wants to die; he does not care. He sensitively goes to a deterrent, his sensitivity is gone.
If anything, Evans' comments should cause one to stop and think why his vigor for life ceased.
Obviously, he did not find this vigor in money, or for that matter in materialism, family, church or himself.
Where has the spirit of Evans gone?
How does such a person in our society get it back?
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KANSAN
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Schneider saga deserves scrutiny
It was a strange story. It left one feeling outrage, dismay and a little bit of humor.
Wednesday. The former attorney general claims that the state representative must hold a hearing on this issue.
The same day. The state representative withdraws his statements that a suit for the official's pay should be filed. He stands on his other statements, however.
WEDNESDAY, CONTINUED. The former attorney general's top aide says his employer had suffered from "acute disappointee" after the attorney general had often shortened his working day and had missed some days altogether because of that disappointment,
Later on Wednesday. Travel vouchers show that the attorney general has fanned
Tuesday. The state representative charges in a House Ways and means Committee that the former attorney general had insisted that Mr. Warren be defeated of his term after being defeated in November. He asserts that the official in question should be used for all the pay that he earned during the year.
with an administrative assistant, new disc jockey at a rock radio station, to Tulsa, Okla. to work on an antitrust case. The team then went to New York last week later had been turned in for reinbursement by the state. Reinbursement of the trips has been personal. The cost: $900.
THE STORY here is not some third-rate made-for-TV movie about corruption in California, or about corruption in any state for that matter.
The story is a somewhat disturbing, somewhat preposterous one about a state official who had been elected for four years, but who only wanted to serve 3 years and 10 months. And it is a story that took place just 25 miles away from here in Topeka.
The characters were, as one can guess,
the rarely boring and rarely quiet Mike
THE RESULT of the bungling in the halLOWed hallway of the statehouse no bungling
The whole ruckus began when Glover, outraged that Attorney General Robert Stephan had to prepare a budget request late because Schneider had not done so, and with his anger before the Ways and Means Commission as they heard Stephan's request.
Glover, D- Lawrence; former, attorney general Curt Schneider; and Schneider's successor.
Glover may have been rash in his accusation that Schneider did not work for two months and in his calling for a suit to gain Schneider's pay. But he voiced a legitimate concern about the activity of state officials who are left in lame duck positions.
preparation of the budget was his responsibility.
AND AS THE events unfolded, it looked more and more as if Schneider had indeed shirked his responsibilities to the people of Kansas. And it also appeared that the people of Kansas had been right in their decision to not return to office a man who was only concerned with his commitment to his job and would have said he would be returning to it for four more years.
Schneider asserted that it was the responsibility of his staff to assist in the transition from one attorney general to the next. "But as far as the budget is concerned," he said, "the newly elected officer who's going to have to operate under it."
However, Stephan, who had attended only one budget hearing, had not thought that
It is impossible to sympathize with Schneider. "Acute disappointment" is not an acceptable excuse for shirking responsibilities. Several decisions were made on November 27, 2014 and December — evidence that he did visit his office somewhat frequently. but attitude that seemed to say, "I lost the race, now I won't work," appears to have been held by Schneeder at the time those allegations were made — that is attitude that should alarm citizens.
Indeed, the fitting conclusion to this tale would be the following:
MOCAELYTHENEPUWMONDBASSGROP©MPHYCHIJAGO TREME
Everyday. Citizens of the aforementioned state and of all states express outrage at actions by elected officials which they see as improper.
I was present at the meeting March 7, which the KU Committee on South Africa held with Todd Seymour, the Endowment Association's president. At that meeting Seymour showed little knowledge of employment conditions in South Africa, yet he refused to discuss the issue. He instead has categorically written that "implicit in our decision to enter the workforce are contributing materially to the betterment of black people in South Africa."
Investments must reflect conscience
I am in support of the stand taken by the KU Committee on South Africa—a demand to divest the KU Endowment Association's investments in factories in racist South Africa. All of us must dare to demand that corporate statements reflect a degree of social responsibility.
The Endowment Association has not done its homework. Even the U.S. Senate's Subcommittee on African Affairs has raised concerns about operations operating in South Africa have made no significant impact on relaxing apartheid (legally enforced racist segregation) or in establishing company structures, nevertheless important model of multinational responsibility. Rather, the net effect of American investment has been to strengthen the economic and military self-esteem of South Africa's apartheid regime."
When Seymour claims that U.S. corporations "contribute materially" to South Africa,
To the editor:
Africa's exploited black people, don't he know that U.S. companies employ only 50,000 black people out of the eight million people employed in operations in South Africa are capital-intensive. They do not provide many jobs. Instead they contribute the high-level technology that South Africa's racist dictatorship must prop up the white-merced workers.
It is illegal in South Africa to employ any black person at a higher post than a white. For this reason alone, the presence of U.S. corporations will not help improve the conditions of even their own black workers. U.S. businesses obey the laws. They assemble in the apartheid status quo because their operations must be conducted within those laws.
Divestiture from South Africa is a modest proposal. It is far more modest than the international sanctions backed by most of the members of the United Nations.
But the head of the African Congress of Trade Unions in South Africa has declared, "The ending of foreign investment of South Africa is, of course, a tactical question; it is not about foreign investment that apartheid regime. But it is of such importance that there can be no compromise
whatsoever about it from our point of view. Foreign investment is a pillar of the whole system which maintains the virtual slavery of the black workers in South Africa."
Mr. Seymour, are you listening?
Rhonda A. Neugebauer
Lawrence graduate student
Mentality misguided in fervor for Revue
The most erroneous assumption in Mount's letter (March 20) is that the Rock Chalk Revue, as an institution, actually existed. The University's collection of organized groups—the "Greek System." The Kansan, on the other hand, consists of the entire student body, at just theoretical.
in the spirit that the University Daily Kansan is both a medium for the exchanges of ideas as well as a medium for "the events of campus." I wish to take issue with Jeff Mount.
Mount demonstrates an implicit and alarming "greek" ethnocriticism when he says that his spirit is to "show our appreciation for those who are the fiber of that KU tradition," implying that those not in KU should be considered "fiber" of the KU tradition. What are we?
To the editor:
While Mount admirably dismisses childish and archaic prejudices" that the Kushan rulers introduced.
view the Kansas' attitude? While I, too, demand no anti-Greek sentiment on the part of me, my husband pro-Greek sentiment. This would be preferential treatment shown a minority.
As for the complaint of coverage on the FIJF page (hardly cause to feel outraged), I deeply resent the fact that funds are being collected from a promotional space for Rock Chalk in the Kansan. This should be stopped, if for no other reason than on the grounds of equity. The resources of the entire student body were diverted to the (well-intended) actions of a minority.
Personally, I find this sousa-eque "Let's-raily'-round-the-lawyn', boys!," utility, replete with such mystical qualities as "valor" and "religious fervor," to be indicative of the extent to which we have misplaced our values in the 70s.
This is the crux of the matter: What disturbs me most is that Jeff Mount felt strongly enough about this issue to write to the University, and he pressed concerns on which the Kansan should and does focus: The University's investment policy in South Africa, its fuel resource situation and the condition of other students on campus come immediately to mind.
May I suggest to Mount he that read (e-re-read) Mussolini's Doctrine of Fascism, "placing the word "state" with "University."
Michael West
Lawrence senior
STATE U.
BY T. M. ASLA
Letters Policy
The University Daily Kansan welcomes letters to the editor. Letters should be typewritten, double-spaced and not exceed 500 words. They should include the writer's name, address and telephone number. If the writer is affirmed as a student of the university, he/she should include the writer's class and home town or faculty and staff position. The Kansan reserves the right to edit letters for publication.
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