PCC Courier, February 18, 1993

Pasadena City College Pasadena, California VoL 75 No. 1 COURIER Thursday February 18, 1993 Debate stalls parking solution Commentary Students must be neighborly By ENRICO PIAZZA Staff Writer Those new toPCC will have noticed by now that driving a car to school is pretty easy, but finding a parking spot is an¬ other story. That’s old news for return¬ ing students. But new students need to know that parking is a delicate and complicated is¬ sue. It involves many people and many institutions: PCC ad¬ ministrators, students, the city of Pasadena and its citizens. It’s a problem that could get worse. The school believes that a five-level parking structure will Please see “PARKING,” page 4 □ Students, residents, administrators and city officials have yet to see a clear path to solve the ongoing parking dilemma. By ALFREDO SANTANA News Editor A meeting aimed at solving park¬ ing congestion in neighborhoods around PCC ignited a bitter — and at times heated — debate about how the problem should be solVed. On Feb. 8, city officials, college administrators, students and city resi¬ dents verbally grappled with the issue during a 2-1/2 hour discussion over a proposed ordinance that would im¬ pose parking fees for parking on the college’s surrounding streets. Residents complain that the col¬ lege admits more students than it should, and as consequence, the school is not able to provide adequate park¬ ing for them. Neighbors say that students who park their vehicles on the streets “trash the streets,” and create “safety” and “traffic prob¬ lems” in the area. “The quality of life is diminish¬ ing, and the enviromental impact the neighborhood is suffering is due to that many cars,” said Dan Kealew, a Pasadena resident. Some neighbors accused the col¬ lege of “doing nothing” and waf¬ fling on the parking situation. Resi¬ dents say that the parking dilemma goes back to 1974, when students started to flock to surrounding streets in search of parking spots. “I’d like for the [college] people to stop being fuzzy about this park¬ ing issue. I’ve been talking in vain for a long time,” Kealew said. He pointed out that students often block driveways, and some students park their cars in front yards. College officials have said that a $13 million parking structure to be built on what is now parking lot 14 will add an estimated 2,000 parking spaces to the 2,700 PCC currently has available for student parking. Officials expect to start the five- ‘The quality of life is diminishing, and the enviromental impact the neighborhood is suffering is due to that many cars.’ Dan Kealew, Pasadena resident level construction after completion of the new library, which will be finished this spring. However, residents are strongly pushing the passage of a city ordi¬ nance that, if approved by the Board of Directors, would create a permit parking zone around the college that would allow only a limited number of parking spaces for students. The proposal calls for a zone that will include the 210 Freeway on the north, Craig Avenue on the east, California Boulevard on the south and Wilson Avenue on the west. Under the plan, residents living within those boundaries would have to buy parking permits, whereas a limited number of permits costing between $20 and $40 would be avail¬ able for college students. If approved, the college would sell the street permits, and the money collected would be used to support shuttle transporation. Time limits on the streets will also be modified. “There are some students who cannot afford to pay $20 for a park¬ ing permit,” said Student Trustee John Robinson. “Some are barely making their way through college, and to put another burden would be unfair.” “As students, we are also resi¬ dents of this area,” said Elizabeth Contreras, Interclub Council vice president. “We cannot permit the city to charge for parking on the streets.” But John Bailess, a Pasadena resident who owns a house close to the college, said the time has come for students who want to park their cars close to the college to pay. “There’s no free lunch,” he said. “I think it is very naive not to ask to pay a fee for parking on the streets.” Councilman Bill Thomson, who is runnning for re-election next April also suggested that if students “don’t want to play the game that way, we are going to play it differently.” While Thomson said this, Robin¬ son accused him of “threatening” college students with implementing the measure. “You can take it any way you want,” rebuted Thomson, who said the ordinance has a good chance of being approved. But a controversial part of the ordinance that would phase out stu¬ dents’ permits to park on public streets in a three-year period sparked angry reactions from Kossler. “If the students eventually get kicked off the streets, we not only will oppose the ordinance, we are going to strongly fight against it,” he said. More public hearings about the parking issue will be held in the following weeks before the City Board of Directors votes on the ordinance. Semester opens with no change in enrollment By ANISSA VICENTE Editor in Chief Looming fee increases, reduced number of classes and a $301 mil¬ lion state budget cut did not affect enrollment this semester, a college official said. Despite a reported decrease in community college enrollment, 22,360 students attended the first day of classes, Dr. Stuart Wilcox, associate dean of admissions and records, said. Last spring, 22,307 students were enrolled in credit classes. These numbers are in stark contrast to the pictures of declining enrollment in California community colleges as a whole. The Faculty Association of Cali¬ fornia Community Colleges, Inc. (FACCC) announced that approxi¬ mately 60,000 students with bache¬ lor’s degrees dropped out of the community college system, the larg¬ est decline since 1984. Patrick McCallum, executive director of FACCC, attributed the enrollment drop to other factors as well, including the fee increase from $6 per unit to $ 1 0 per unit, the lifting of the fee cap and the fact that some students believed the proposed $30 per unit fee was already in effect. That PCC seems to suffer no such decline in its enrollment is caused also in part by administrative plans to level off the student population and bring that number closer to the amount the state pays the school. Currently, PCC is paid for only 17,520 students, 4,840 over the cap. The average numbers, however, is not an indication that students have less competition for classes and enrollment slots. Wilcox said his office is ready to implement a new telephone registration system, due to operate in the summer. With 30 phone lines, the system will alleviate another staple of col- Please see “NUMBERS,” page 4 Storm Watch Photo by KATRINA TEN / The COURIER As Southern Californians braced for yet another round of wet weather, cumulus clouds hover over PCC on Wednesday. Student files suit after being hit by cart □ The student claims that PCC officials ignored her complaints after the Jan. 20 accident. By RODNEY MITCHELL Staff Writer A PCC nursing student who was hit by an electric utility cart in front of the cafeteria on Jan. 20 has filed a civil lawsuit against the college in Pasadena Municipal Court, accord¬ ing to campus officials. The plaintiff, Deborah McCon¬ nell, said she considered taking le¬ gal action after two weeks of re¬ questing financial assistance from the college to pay for her medical bills. She also said that the college ignored her. “No one contacted me to see if I was dead or alive.” Sherry Hassan, administration services director, said that the col¬ lege had not dealt with many serious accidents of this kind. She refused to comment further on the incident. According to campus police re¬ ports, McConnell was walking from the cafeteria heading east toward the library when an electric utility cart traveling northbound rolled over her. Campus police officer George Winovitch, who attended the scene of the accident, observed injuries to McConnell’s hip area and to the left side of her face. McConnell said she sustained mul¬ tiple injuries to her upper torso and injury to the right wrist and to the ‘No one contacted me to see if I was dead or alive.’ Deborah McConnell, who filed a lawsuit against PCC after a cart ran over her on jan. 20 left side of her face. She also said that as a result of the accident, she suffers from memory loss and is afraid to walk around the campus. Her medical bills amounted to more than $7,000. Tashann Swayne, who witnessed the accident, told the police that she heard the impact and saw the cart run over her. Swayne said that McConnell rolled from the impact. The driver, Stanley Brown, a campus employee, said a woman appeared in front of him as he was traveling north bound toward Colo¬ rado Boulevard. He contends the momentum of the cart pushed her side ways. “I never felt a bump or any indication that I rolled over McConell,” he said. Officer Winovitch said the maxi¬ mum speed of the carts is between 1 1 and 13 mph. He added that driv¬ ers traveling at unasafe speeds would be cited. Winovitch also said that students should be more aware of carts and to let the carts pass on crowded campus sidewalks. Staff members robbed; bandits are still at large □ A gang of armed thieves steal employees’ wallets and valuables at gunpoint on Feb. 3. Campus Police continue to search for the assailants. By RODNEY MITCHELL Staff Writer A PCC physics instructor and a lab technician fell prey to a gang of armed bandits on campus who robbed them of their wallets and valuables at gun point on the third floor of the E building on Feb. 3, campus police said. The victims were not harmed in the incident, campus police reports. The incident was the first armed robbery on campus this year. At approximately 6 p.m., five to six men entered through the door of a stock room, one of them brandish¬ ing a large caliber automatic pistol and demanding money from the victims, Ken Cheney and William Roth, who were working inside he building. The assailants accosted Cheney and Roth and immediately began to snatch the telephones out of the walls. Cheney and Roth were told to turn away and not to look at their robbers . The assailants collected their wal¬ lets and valuables and ordered Ch¬ eney and Roth to lie face down. One of the victims said, “At this point I thought I was going to die.” The assailants were seen fleeing the campus, heading north across Colorado Boulevard. Due to their direction of travel, campus police suspect that the bandits were a gang from the northside of town. One victim said the bandits did not appear to be students. However there was a call five minutes prior to Sgt. Vince Palermo the robbery, reporting a group of suspicious acting men congregating in front of the D Building. They fit the description of the robbers. Sgt. Vince Palermo, who was the first officer on the robbery scene, said that despite the extreme high risk of unarmed officers responding to armed robbery calls, campus po¬ lice always respond without hesita¬ tion. After the incident, a special bul¬ letin issued by campus police was posted throughout the campus in¬ forming students and staff members to take precautions. Palermo said that students and staff should be aware of their envi¬ ronment during off hours. For staff who work late, he sug¬ gested that they avail themselves of campus police, letting the officers know what room they are in and when they plan to leave. He also recommended that stu¬ dents and staff members utilize the campus police escort service. Pal¬ ermo said that students and staff members should travel together af¬ ter dark hours. As of late Wednesday, campus police officials said they are still looking for the men. .4