PCC Courier, April 25, 2002

Whale Watching in Baja Califonia Insert Another Quarter: Pak Mann Arcade in Jeopardy of Closing Should the United States Pay Reparations for Slavery? SEE PAGE 4 PAGE PAGE P A < 5 A D E N A C l С о G E COURIER Since 1 915 VOL. 87 NO. 25 www.pcc-courieronline.com APRIL 25,2002 N.e\y$, , If) DfJBf The International Student Club (120) will be holding its second-annual “Say What?!? Karaoke” compe¬ tition today in the CC Lounge. The Los Angeles riots changed the face of the metropolis forever. To reflect on how the event altered life in the City of Angels, the Cross Cultural Club will be taking an introspective look back during a “Dinner and a Movie” event scheduled for April 29, the 10-year anniversary of the upris¬ ing. Two documentaries will be shown. Commencement ceremonies are just around the comer, the Office of Student Affairs is seeking volun¬ teers from the ranks of the PCC staff to help with the event. There is no manual labor involved, and all those interested should contact Candy Avila. Smoking to be Permitted in Parking Lots and Quad Only /Г7 Г T i'tll III i i'i 'rrr Ж pig ЯШ в By Angela Faranda Staff Writer Soon smokers at P.CC will have to ven¬ ture out to parking lots or center of the quad to enjoy a cigarette, if the College Coordinating Council and Dr. Kosslcr have their way. The proposed designated smoking areas would be all seven parking lots on the outskirts of campus and the center of the quad. If met with no opposition, Dr. Kosslcr, college president, hopes to be able to put this plan into action as early as this fall. Students with classes in the R building could no longer step outside of class for a smoke between classes. Those students studying in the library would not be able to have a quick smoke break while doing research. Besides a convenience problem, this could cause excessive tardiness for some smokers and congestion in the already over crowded parking lots. Through the shared governance process members of the associated stu¬ dents, management senate, academic sen¬ ate, and classified senate, met, to present the results of a survey handed out over the course of the entire school year. Each group, with the exception of the associated students which is to present its results this summer, asked their con¬ stituents if they were in favor of adopting an official smoking policy. The students 'are those who will be most affected by the new policy, and were divided on the proposed smoking policy. “We were split down the middle,” said Gabriel Gayhart, representative of the Associated Students, of the student’s position. “I even tried to get the smoking area extended so students wouldn’t have to walk so far.” Gayhart requested to have the proposed smoking area extended' to include the mirror pools on the Colorado side of campus. But Kossler quickly shot Ф see SMOKING, page 7 Photo Illustration by Mikyl Nutter and Joseph Narvaez/Courier A new proposed shcool policy promises to limit cigarette smoking on campus to certain designated smoking areas including the parking lots, central quad and sculpture garden. Shatford Library Not for Day Care Dependants of Fallen Public Officers to Get Tuition Waived By Angela Faranda Staff Writer By Rita Vega-Acevedo Staff Writer Gov. Gfay Davis and Assembly- роется Jay nit a Carney/Courier Gov. Gray Davis promotes MI 1746 at recent memori¬ al to fallen officers. woman Carol Liu are teaming up to waive tuition fees for. dependants of fall¬ en police, firefighters and public safety employees in California’s 109 communi¬ ty Colleges. AB 1746, sponsored by Liu, would waive community college tuition fees for dependents and spouses of victims killed on Sept. 1 1 . Catherine Hazelton, Liu’s Capitol Press Secretary, said “AB 1746 supple¬ ments a similar bill passed for depend¬ ents and spouses of fallen public safety employees at UC and Cal State colleges. It closes a loophole by including commu¬ nity colleges.” Liu, the newly appointed chairwoman of the Assembly Committee on Higher Education, wants to put the bill on the fast track. She would like to attach an “urgency clause” to the bill. By doing so, AB 1 746 could be signed by the governor in June instead of September. Hazelton says the “urgency clause” attachment would allow eligible applicants to get waivers in time for the fall semester. A two-thirds majority vote is required to pass an “urgency clause” bill. Hazelton is optimistic that Liu’s strategy will succeed. A number of top assembly and senate members have co-sponsored the bill and no opposition has surfaced. On April 6, Gov. Davis announced his support for this bill at the California Firefighters’ Memorial Ceremony in Sacramento. The ceremony began with a procession led by the sound of bagpipe players and drummers. The governor and dignitaries solemnly walked in unison from the capitol steps to the adjacent park. Over 160 firefighters, including a color guard from Pasadena, marched with Davis. The governor and others unveiled a limestone Memorial Wall and two addi¬ tional bronze statues depicting the brav¬ ery of firefighters. Before the assembled firefighters, the governor promised to • see FIREFIGHTERS, page 6 Students who are also parents often find themselves facing a dilemma- what to do when the babysitter can’t come and they can’t miss another class. Some beg instructors to allow their child to sit in the back of the classroom, and others leave their children sitting out¬ side the classroom door. Recently, a library staff member found a young girl crying in the library. The child said, she was scared and that her mother left her there while she went to class. “Although nothing happened in this instance, students cannot just drop their children off in the library and go to dlass,” said Phil Mullendore, chief of campus police. Although no criminal charges were filled in this case, this is a serious issue. According to Mullendore finding a scared child doesn’t happen too often. “In 20 years it has only happened a few times, but it only takes once for something bad to happen.” Some students who are more interest¬ ed in getting to class than in their child’s safety have left them in cars. What most parents don’t know is that Caitlin’s law has made it illegal for parents to leave their children unattended in a vehicle. We had one incident where a parent left a child in the car unattended while she went to class. Fortunately a campus police offi¬ cer found the child and avoided any fur¬ ther problems. Every summer the nightly news is filled with stories of children being left in cars and dying of heat expo¬ sure. Unfortunately some people are anx¬ ious to get to classes and they just don’t think. Leslie Diaz, a full time librarian, said police were called only once when a par¬ ent left a child in the library, but Mullendore suspects not all incidences are reported out of sympathy for parents. “Could we arrest them? Yes. Would we prosecute? Probably not,” he said. The campus police have the authority, under California welfare and institutions code 625, to stop and / or detain an unat¬ tended juvenile, and according to Mullendore they do. The officer is usual¬ ly told that the child’s parent is not far away, or will be right back. “Things like this happen every so often,” said Jennifer Cooper, assistant to the library director, “Parents leave their ® see CHILDCARE, page 6 Internet Ads for Quick Cash Target Students By M.F. Miller Staff Writer “Need more cash? 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