The Towerlight, March 5, 1976

tl19760305-000 "ader seeks privately-funded groups TL photo by Dave Esposito � . by Pete Binns Ralph Nader, in a lecture Friday evening in Stephens Hall, recom-mended the formation of consumer advocate groups funded through a system of private donations. Nader spoke as part of the 1975-1976 Celebrity Speakers Series which will conclude March 26 with Isaac Asimov. The consumer advocate said he had spoken in Annapolis last week in favor of a bill which proposed the establishment of a ""check-off system"" for contributions for consumer groups. The system would require the cooperation of utility companies who would be required to provide a space on bills sent to customers. If a consumer wished to donate money to a consumer group, he would check the space and add the contribution to his bill. The utility company would then be responsible for forwarding the money to the consumer group. The group established in this way would be responsible for consumer interests involving the utility com-pany. Nader explained that such a system would cost the utilities very little and that the consumer group could reimburse the utility for any costs which were incurred. Estab-lishment Of such an operation is thus ""hard for anyone to argue,"" he concluded. � lb. Algrtr,t He added that an arrangement like this could be modified and ""applied to, say, the post office"" in order to ""give the consumer a voice in the policies"" of that department. Another example he used was that of supermarkets who use computers where ""you never see the price."" Through use of a check-off system,"" he said, ""when Congress is swarmed under by food chains, they (the consumers) would have their own representation."" He said that for consumers to have any power, people would have to take an interest. ""If everyone would have a civic hobby, it would make a whale of a difference."" He added, ""five hundred people mon-itoring nursing homes is now making a difference - and they work part-time."" One ""hobby"" he suggested was that of writing companies and asking them to substantiate their advertisements. ""There was one ad,"" he said, ""which said six out of seven dogs preferred its product over the other company's. I ran to my typewriter. I wrote to the company that it was a remarkable display of canine preference. I got a letter back from the Ph.D. in charge of dog food research."" Nader also maintained that con-sumerism should be taught in school, saying ""You can learn economics, law, and math through Please turn to page 4 1,1 XVIII, NO. 19 TOWSON STATE COLLEGE iludget to be dropped MARCH 5, 1976 han es sou ht or Cluster bill by Steve Verch Ed Consroe, the resigning SGA ecretary of Organizational and eneral Services announced this eek that he had introduced endments to drop the controver- ial Section III of Senate Bill #69, so referred to as ""the Cluster ill."" S.13. #69 attempts to classify and rganize SGA organizations into ven areas to facilitate budgeting d operating procedures. These ven area are: academic, enter-uutent, fraternities and sorori- es, media, recreational, religious d special interest. Section III states: ""Budgeting - he Student Government Senate hall budget percentages of the 'al budget to each cluster. The percentages shall be based Past allocations, importance and sefulness of past activities, and udgernent. At this point, the p ernbers of the cluster shall further ecifically budget the money. The listers individually shall decide a Process by which the allocation 1.�cess will function with the ves,,, 'Vice of their Senate representa- ""By introducing these amend- ants to drop Section III, I'm Ping I'll still be able to get the St of the bill through,"" said onsroe, who is resigning from his sition after today. At last week's meeting of the Senate Governmental Operations Committee, strong opposition was voiced to Consroe's proposal. Specifically, many of those in attendance were upset with the budgetary section, section III. If the amended bill does pass through the committee and the Senate, Consroe feels this will be beneficial. ""The SGA would tell the organizations that they will have to work together in their cluster, and by working together in the cluster perhaps the organizations them-selves will see that they can work together,"" said Consroe. Consroe said that he would understand the skepticism shown by the SGA senators towards his proposal, especially since it had never been tried before. He added that if he wasn't as convinced as he was about the success of the plan, he would also hesitate before adopting it. ""What I'm trying for with these amendments is to still keep the main concept, only rework the budget process. Next year, if organizations don't work together the entire year is lost...maybe we'll just try for $200 or $300 per cluster for them to work with. That way, the SGA senators would know definitely if the plan is workable or not,"" he commented. Consroe said he was considering changing two or three of the organizations to another cluster and maybe even split the academic GA petitions due today by Steve Verch Students running for SGA execu- ve 'Positions, SGA Senate, or class flees, must have their petitions roPletely filled and turned in by 3 .ITI' toclay, Friday, March 5, cording to SGA Vice President �sane Finegan. Petitions may be �,PIPed off at the SGA office in the 'lege Center. Elections for all positions will be Id Thursday, March 18, 9-5 and 9, and again on Friday 9-4, on the St floor of the College Center ross frorn the snack bar. loegan commented that this will the first time that elections will held in the evening. egarding student participation both campaigning and voting, 1111e,gau felt this year's elections mvolve more students than last ar's, i:Thie, Year, it appears that there be candidates who are running Posed for positions, and this will berate interest. Also, with oPP�- 113, Many of the candidates will el Mo tivated to get the support of utre students - urging that they _e for them,' concluded Finegan. Several events have been lined to give the candidates a chance ""ice their views 1. Residence Forum March 9, 7:30-9:30 p.m., Richmond Coni-mons Room. The focus will be on resident student issues. All execu-tive candidates are invited. 2. SGA Speakers Forum March 11, noon-2 p.m., CC rooms 309-311. The highlights will be an open press conference and audience-asked questions. All executive and senatorial candidates are invited. 3. Council of Organizations March 17, 4 p.m., CC 314-316. An informal Q and A session. All candidates invited. 4. Candidates Meeting Monday, March 8, 3 p.m., 3rd floor, CC. cluster in half. ""We might still keep the concept where the organizations would have to meet within their cluster, but between now and Tuesday I have to find something for them to do,"" he said. The next Senate Governmental Operations committee is meeting Tuesday, March 9, and this is the Tuesday Consroe was referring to. The meeting held last Tuesday saw committee consideration of his proposal begin with two minutes left in the committee session. ""I think the proposal is getting a slow death in the committee,"" said Consroe of the agenda followed by the committee last Tuesday. TL photo by Dave Esposito TSC BEOG funds would have been all or nothing : Griffin by Steve Verch ""Towson was never threatened with a cutback of BEOG funds,"" said Mrs. Harriet Griffin, Director of the Towson State Financial Aid Office. ""Towson, along with 800 other schools across the nation, would have lost 100% of the BEOG funds, or would have not lost any of them,"" she added. The Basic Educational Oppor-tunity Grants are federally funded, and according to Griffin the federal government had simply run out of money. ""When the program was started two years ago, Congress appro-priated what it thought were sufficient funds. However, the first two years, there were still funds left which were unused. When it came McFall, Consroe resign posts by Bill Stetka The top two non-elected execu-tive officers of the SGA, Ed Consroe and Michael McFall, are resigning their posts effective today, and will be replaced by their assistants. Consroe, secretary for Organiza-tional and General Services, and McFall, secretary for Community Development, announced this week that they have planned to leave their posts since December, when each office added assistants. Gerry Hartung will take over in Services , and Mark Lewis will head the Development office. Consroe said his resignation comes at this time because he will begin student teaching in two weeks, and won't have the time to devote to SGA. McFall is working on an internship for an advertising agency, and doesn't have the time to devote to the office either. Consroe, who was the first Social Director (now Activities Director) for the SGA, two years ago, said ""We planned to leave as soon as Gerry and Mark got situated in the office. We know they'll do a good job."" McFall, the first public relations person in SGA, said the two offices ""accomplished a great deal."" ""Both are new areas,"" he said. ""Every project the executive branch does comes through either Services or Development, or both."" Consroe said the establishment of I Information on just about anything is available at S.I.S., on the College Center second floor. TL photo by Tom DeLuca the two offices made the SGA more accessible to groups on campus. , ""Organizations had somewhere to turn to advertise events on campus,"" he said. McFall's office last fall published the first SGA annual report, which he said was done to ""present an image to students, the community and legislators."" Among the ongoing projects that Lewis and Hartung will continue to work on are developing the Student Information Service, the Video Tape Network, and keeping a balanced social calendar. Hartung will con-tinue evaluating the ""cluster plan"" for organizations, developed by Consroe to balance the calendar. ""I'm proud to say there's not one weekend where an SGA event wasn't going on in this calendar year,"" said Consroe. Please turn to page 4 time for the '75-76 allocations, funds were decided based upon the figure of the last two years, when there was a surplus. This year, many students applied and quali-fied for the program and the allocation was simply not enough to handle the additional students,"" explained Griffin. From next year's budget The Congress was therefore forced to allocate sufficient funds from next year's BEOG budget to cover the shortage of current funds. Specifically, it was the Senate Labor Appropriations Committee which supplemented the '75-76 grants with next year's budget. Griffin stated that even had the supplement not been made, the college would not have forced students to leave March 5. All book and tuition payments would have been deferred until the necessary funds were obtained. ""There were still other forms of financial aid that we could utilize in the event of an emergency,"" she added. Letters were sent to all BEOG recipients explaining the situation, but rumors began to circulate on the campus concerning the grants. ""The BEOG grants were never linked to the HEW funds for desegregation. Everyone was very optimistic that a supplemental budget would be passed, as so many students throughout the country would have been affected if it had not been forthcoming,"" said Griffin. The real problem is not the approval of additional funds (this has been done), but getting them to the students. ""I've talked directly to a coordinator from the BEOG office in Washington and he told me they are trying their best to get the funds dispersed,"" said Griffin. Blood drive in progress by Kathy Kraus The Red Cross in connection with the TSC Blood Assurance Program is sponsoring a blood drive March 8-11 in the Main Lounge of the College Center, Donations may take place between 10 a.m. and 3:15 p.m. each day of the drive. The Blood Assurance Program is designed to provide TSC students, faculty, and staff with all their blood needs free of charge. Red Cross asks that 20% of a group give blood once a year. In return, all group members and their immediate families receive full blood protection for one year. The blood quota for this year's drive, established by the Red Cross Information service opens to aid students by Ruth Ann Leftridge The Student Information Service, located on the second floor of the College Center, began operation on March 1. ""This organization is going to be a center for informa-tion, and we are going to attempt to inform the students of activities on-campus, in the city and on surrounding campuses,"" explained John Schehan, S.I.S. Coordinator. This SGA service organization, open Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., is manned by 18 student volunteers. Files and pamphlets are available on a variety of subjects and Schehan stated, ""We don't want the students to go away empty-handed."" SGA Vice-President, Joanne Fin-egan, feels that the S.I.S. will be utilized to a great extent by students because ""Towson is really growing and a lot of times it's hard to know what's going on. I think one advantage is that if you really don't know where to go, S.I.S. is a starting point."" ""We really want to try and be a trouble-shooter,"" Schehan contin-ued. ""We want to be as personable and aggressive as possible."" Infor-mation concerning academic majors, financial aid, and club activities were requested most often during the Student Information Service's first two days of opera-tion. Schehan feels that lack of manpower is the only item which may cause problems in the future of S.I.S. ""If anybody would like to help, we would really appreciate it,"" he said. Interested students should contact Bill Spangler, SGA Director of Public Relations, or John Schehan and Mike Garcia, S.I.S. Coordinators. ""We had a very strong opening - we were pleased with the response we got,"" Schehan stated. ""I would say our future is very bright; I really think that Towson State can use a service like this."" for the Towson State community, is 800 pints. The drive in October amassed 450 pints. Last year's combined drives proved successful as students and faculty gave 730 pints of blood. Demands for blood are increasing constantly, as well as the demand for specific types of blood. There-fore, an increased effort on the Towson State community's behalf will help assure success in meeting the goal. Donating blood is easy, painless, and quick. The entire process, including interview, tests, and refreshments, takes about one hour. The actual donation time runs seven minutes. When giving blood, a permanent record of the donation is docu-mented. A nurse compiles a brief medical history and takes the Please turn to page 5 Correction A quote in the February 20 issue of Towerlight regarding calculator use and attributed to Margaret Zipp, should have read, ""I encourage the use of cal-culators in my Mathematics of Finance classes."" We regret the error. "