1996-10-07; Central Michigan Life

              Central Michigan LIFE
Volume 79, Number 19
Mt. Pleasant,   Ml 48859
©1996 CM LIFE
77 years of serving the community
MONDAY
October 7, 1996
16 pages
Autumn
Adventure
LIFE Sabnna Burton
Austin Sian(left), Far well, helps
his sister. Autumn, put away their
craft table after the Applefest on
Saturday at the Mcintosh Orchard
located at 1731 W  Remus.
I IFF Gabriel Guerrero
Six-year-old Shayna Cary of Mount Pleasant and four-year-old Emily Bryant of Shepherd watch
CMU art student Chris St. Denis, Clare sophomore, make clay pots with natural clay he gathered out of the ground in Harrison.   Denis will showcase his works at Art Reach next month.
Affirmative action finalists
plan open presentations
By Heather N. LaFave
MM   Staff Writer	
Throe candidates for the position of CMU's affirmative action
officer have made it to the final
stage of selection and will make
open presentations on campus
today and next week.
According to Shaun
Holtgreive, chair of the search
committee and associate director
of Student Life, the three final
candidate's, selected from a pool
of approximately 30 applicants,
are* Laurel Diane Allen, ErVin J.
Gross and Phvlis Fitzgerald
Powell
Holtgreive said the 14-mem-
bcr committee spent approximately one month reviewing
applications and selecting the
final candidates. It took longer
than the committee had hoped it
would to narrow the field to
Powell, Allen and Gross.
The candidates are qualified
to fill the affirmative action officer position, Holtgreive said,
because all three have experience and demonstrate ability to
do the job.
He also said they have all had
higher education-level experience related to affirmative
action and have done investigation work on affirmative action
issues.
Gross will make his presentation at 3:45 p.m. today in the
Lake St. Clair room of the Bovee
University Center.
According to Gross* resume, he
has been the Special Assistant to
the President for Equality and
Campus Diversity at Buffalo
State College in New York since
1995.
He has also been a lecturer in
c»ducational foundations at BSC
since  1993. Gross served as the
director for the University of
Rochester's office of Minority
Student Affairs from 1990-93.
PowtdTs resume states she has
been the executive director of
affirmative action/assistant to
the president at the University
of Houston since 1994. She was
also the affirmative action officer for Ferris State University
from 1982-94. Powell's presentation will be at 3:45 p.m. Oct. 14
in the U.C.
Allen's resume states she had
been an affirmative action specialist at the University of
California - Berkeley since 1987
and a consultant on affirmative
action and Equal Opportunity
Employment issues for Ben
Harrison and Associates since
1991
Allen will make her presenta-
See CANDIDATES Page 10
New passenger train will make
stops at local brewing company
By Jeffrey J. Stacer
LIFE Staff Wnter
An old-fashioned passenger train S€»rvice is
rolling into Mount Pleasant.
Sam Staples, president of the Pickard Industrial
Park. 711 W. Pickard, and project coordinator, came
up with an idea to bring a 1950s style passenger
train to Mount Pleasant.
"I've always loved trains ever since I was little,"
Staples said.
According to Staples, the train will run from
Howell to Mount Pleasant with a stop at Durand
along the way, and then to Cadillac on the weekend
of Nov. 2-3.
If things go well, he said he would like to run it
the following weekend also.
Eventually, he said he would like to make it a
weekly run; however, with the current heating system in thc» cars, a winter trip is not likely. According
to Staples, the cars are not wintt»rized.
The trip to Cadillac from Mount Pleasant will
probably only happen a few times unless the
demand is there. Staples said.
"This will give students the experience to do
something they have never done before," Staples
said. "It will give them a little bit of a taste of riding
on a train from the 1950s."
He said the plan is to have the train stop at the
Mountain Town Station Brewing Company, 506
West Broadway. From there, a bus will disperse
people throughout the community with the Soaring
Eagle Casino, 7070 E. Broadway Road, being the
primary destination, Staples said.
"Since the casino says by their forecast that there
are going to be 30,000 people a day coming to
Mount Pleasant, we think that at least 300 to 400
of those would be willing to ride the train to get out
of traffic," Staph»s said
He also said with the large population of metropolitan Detroit, finding enough people to fill the
cars should not lie a problem.
ALL ABOARD THE
PASSENGER TRAIN
The train will stop in Mount Pleasant
at the Mountain Town Station Brewery.
A bus will take people to the casino
and other areas in the community.
Tickets from Howell or Durand to Mount Pleasant
are $30 per person. Tickets from Cadillac to
Mount Pleasant are also $30 each.
LIFE Graphic/Jeff Rauschert
"There's a lot of senior citizens that come up to
the casino and they don't like to drive the trip,"
Staples said.
The train holds about 400 people with 50 to 60
people per car, he said. Staples said the cars will
have refreshments, sandwiches, and non-alcoholic
beverages. There is also a car that will sell railroad
memorabilia he said.
Prices for the tickets are $30 per person from
Howell or Durand to Mount Pleasant, and $30 from
Mount Pleasant to Cadillac.
Faculty members come together to improve education level
By Angela Cook
l tfE Staff Wntet
CMU faculty met Friday to discuss
ways to improve the education level at
Central.
Approximately 25 faculty attended
the circle, which was broken into two
groups to discuss how they could
improve teaching at CMC
Barbara   Dixon,   interim   dean   of Art
and Sciences, said faculty members
attended the American Association of
Higher Education Roles and Rewards
Conference in Atlanta List January, and
returned to share ideas with the facultv
on campus including th<- development
teaching circles.
According t<» Dixon, the i<»|»i<- of the
changing role of faculty is a discussion
at campuses across the nation.
"It needs to become a reality here,"
she said.
She asked the participants of the circle to look beyond obvious improvements such as more resources and find
out what faculty can personally do. She
also asked the faculty to share their
expertise with others among their
group.
The   groups   also  discussed   chan^m^
conventional teaching methods and
integrating more group oriented activities into their classes.
According to Stuart Rubin, assistant
professor of computer science, students
need to connect classes with life after
college and a possible solution is group
oriented activities in class.
Steve Stahl, associate professor and
chairperson of Geology, also said he* felt
there was a need to move from present
teaching methods and engage in more
group activity in courses. But Stahl said
there is no inspiration to try new teaching methods.
"There is no reward for changing your
style of teaching or making an effort to
change," he said
See CIRCLE Page 6	
'Central 6' may testify in lawsuit
against Mt. Pleasant City Police
By Emily Gerkin
LIFE Stat* Wr:ier
Four CMU students, who alleged police harass
ment and brutality last February, may b<* called to
testify about  their experiences   in   a   lawsuit   filed
against the Mount  Pleasant City Police
Members of the self named Central *>. were list
ed   on   a   witness   list   submitted   by   the   surviving
family of a Mount Pleasant man who was shot and
killed by the police April 24.  1991
Victoria and Gary Sova, the surviving parents of
Thomas Sova, an* suing the city police in federal
court in Bay City for the wrongful death and civil
rights violation of their son
Among the 91 people listed in the plaintiff- ftup
plemental witness list are ('MIT students ftpquan
James, Muskegon Heights junior; Kiante Smith.
Detroit sophomore, Jocylin Stevenson, Muskegon
Heights junior and Ja Relle Thomas, Muskegon
junior
These students may be called to testify with
their experiences with Sgt Douglas La Lone when
he was called in as back up to break up a party in
the Washington Street Apartments last February
Stevenson and Thomas decliiw*d t<> comment,
v\Li!«- James ami Smith could not he reached
The suit claims the police acted wrongly when
LaLone and Officer Jeffrey Shell shot Sova after
responding to an attempted suicide call to 911.
The suit is based on accusations of excessive use of
force, lack of training, failure to supervise and
negligent hiring
Tin- lawsuit names the Cit> of Mount Pleasant,
the Mount  Pleasant  Department of Public  Safety,
SOVA
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Morris lawsuit returns
to court Wednesday
By Emily Gerkin
L1PE Staff Writer	
The lawsuit which accused
('MU of breaking a confidentiality clause in a settlement agreement will go to court Wednesday
in a cross motion for summary
disposition filed by both parties.
A pretrial conference is scheduled for Oct. 16 and a non-jury
trial date is set for Oct. 28 in
Ingham County Circuit Court.
The lawsuit was originally
filed in Isabella County Circuit
Court Nov. 17 and was dismissed Dec II, 1995, by Randie
Black, attorney for the plaintiffs.
Black refilod the suit Jan 10 in
tfn*    Ingham    County    Circuit
Court.
The lawsuit claims CMU violated terms of a settlement
agreement it made Oct. 12,
1995, with one current and three
former employees. CMU officials
were not to discuss terms of a
settled lawsuit, which claimed
gross negligence against CMU
and sexual harassment against
former legislative counsel Greg
Morris
Neither Black, nor defense
attorneys Robert Vercruysse and
Ann Kelly could be reached for
comment.
The suit was filed by Natalie
See LAWSUIT Page 15