An independent, student-run newspaper serving the Virginia Tech community since 1903
Tuesday, Feb. 28, 2012
www.collegiatetimes.com
COLLEGIATETIMES 109th year, issue 25
News, page 2
Arts & Entertainment, page 5
4/16 victims oppose repeal of handgun law
Opinions, page 3
Sports, page 6
Study Break, page 4
behind the
DESIGN Architecture professor draws international acclaim with award-winning, environmentally aware designs
BY NICK SMIRNIOTOPOULOS | features reporter
FILE 2010 / SPPS
Gov. Bob McDonnell speaks in Roanoke, Va. on Aug. 4, 2010.
April 16 victims make final plea against legislation that would repeal restriction on handgun purchases ZACH CRIZER editor-in-chief Gov. Bob McDonnell listened to input from victims of the 2007 Virginia Tech campus shootings this weekend as he prepares to decide whether Virginians will be allowed to purchase more than one handgun in a month. Families affected by the April 16, 2007, campus shootings spoke with McDonnell in hopes of stopping a bill that would repeal Virginia’s ban on purchasing more than one handgun per month through commercial sales. The repeal passed both houses of the General Assembly and would become law with McDonnell’s signature. The ban was originally put in place in 1993 to curb Virginia’s role in gun trafficking. Andrew Goddard, whose son Colin Goddard was injured in the shootings that left 32 people dead on Tech’s campus, said the repeal would be a step back for Virginia’s public safety laws. “It’s a very bad idea, I think, to do away with the only piece of legislation we have that specifically targets gun-trafficking in a time when we’re almost back to the point we were when this bill was put in place,” he said. Goddard, along with several other families that have been active in lobbying for increased gun control since the shootings, sent a letter to McDonnell asking to voice their opinion. McDonnell listened to their arguments Saturday and is expected to make a decision today. He has previously voiced an intention to approve the repeal as passed by the General Assembly.
Goddard pointed out a survey conducted by the Richmond TimesDispatch and Christopher Newport University that found 66 percent of Virginians don’t want to repeal the one-handgun-per-month ban. In a statement to the Collegiate Times, McDonnell’s office thanked the families for their concern but declined to comment on the bill. "The governor appreciated hearing directly from the families on this issue. It was a straightforward and substantive discussion,” McDonnell press secretary Jeff Caldwell said in an e-mail. “His thoughts and prayers remain with them as they continue to deal with their tremendous loss. We will have further comment on the legislation at the appropriate time." If McDonnell approves the repeal, Virginians would no longer be restricted to purchasing one handgun per month through commercial vendors. It is already possible to purchase multiple firearms per month through private sales — such as gun sale transactions or buying a firearm from a friend. “Even if it’s not as effective as it could be — because there are ways around it — taking it away altogether isn’t going to make it any better,” Goddard said. “Anyone who has a legitimate reason for getting more than one handgun a month has ways to do that now.” The repeal is one of many gunrelated bills to come up in the General Assembly this year. The two bills related to college campuses — one that would allow professors to carry concealed weapons on campus and another that would have ended colleges’ power to ban firearms on campus — have not passed this session.
On-campus rooms available for graduation Families of graduates can now stay on campus while visiting Tech for spring commencement TAUHID CHAPPELL news staff writer Finding a place for students’ family members to settle in for spring commencement can prove to be a stressful experience. To accommodate the amount of people that pour into Virginia Tech for graduation, the university is offering on-campus lodging for those who want to stay in Blacksburg and avoid the commute from a hotel. To reserve rooms on campus, family members can fill out registration forms online or mail them, with payment, to Harper Hall. There are three lodging packages and two types of residence hall rooms to select. Suite style rooms include air-conditioning, and since the demand is high for these types of rooms, there will be a lottery sign up starting March 7. The lottery will remain open until March 19, and those who signed up will be notified with results by March 23. Reservations for traditional-style rooms will begin March 26, so family members who don’t receive an air-conditioned room will be able to sign up for a traditional room. Eric Wininger, assistant director of conferences and events, said total room availability will depend
way into campus.” Although Tech is pushing for parents to stay on campus, local on current students’ check out hotel businesses don’t seem worplans. ried. “We wait to get their check out “There’s enough demand here to plans so we don’t overbook,” he fill all the hotels in this area,” said said. “Last year, we had 1,050 peo- Tom Shaver, general manager for ple stay.” The Inn at Virginia Tech. Since many hotels fill up fast for Shaver also said staying on camgraduation weekend, the lodging pus is not for everyone. “When my sons started their college career at another university, I stayed in a dorm during their orientation,” he said. You come and you’re here “That would have been my time I would have volunand you don’t have to drive only teered to stay in a dorm.” in to campus. It’s very Rei Black, general manager for the Main Street Inn, said convenient to be in town it’s a great that Tech allows to stay on campus. instead of being an hour families “I think it’s a really good away, instead of trying to idea that they offer the lodging because the university is fight your way to campus.” that only getting larger,” Black said. “The sizes of the freshman Martha Pinard classes are only getting bigger, Parent who is staying on campus so the demand is increasing. I for commencement don’t think it’s a bad competitive element to have them offer that.” Likewise, Wininger said packages offer family members a the university is not attempting chance to avoid staying in a hotel to compete with or drive business far from campus. away from hotels. One reason Martha Pinard, a “We’re not competing, we’re just parent of a graduating Tech stu- here to help provide some housing dent, is choosing to stay on campus closer to Blacksburg,” he said. for commencement is because of For those who are scrambling the convenience. to book a room on campus, more “You come and you’re here and information on the lodging packyou don’t have to drive in to cam- ages can be found on Tech’s conferpus, and that’s a big thing for me,” ence and guest services website at she said. “It’s very convenient to be Housing.vt.edu/conference/planin town instead of being an hour ners/amenities.php. The deadline away, instead of trying to fight your for registration is April 30.
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The architectural masterpiece of the Lumenhaus — that has received international acclaim for design and efficiency— embodies what Virginia Tech students and faculty interpret as “Invent the Future.” The modern design — that won the international Solar Decathlon in 2010 — emphasizes a sleek exterior, utilizing cutting-edge green technology to create a self-sustaining environment. The innovative model is merely a projection of the unified ideas created by the thinkers who worked on it. Robert Dunay, T.A. Carter professor of architecture, was one of three architecture faculty advisors for the Lumenhaus. Since the start of the Solar
Decathlon competitions in 2002, Dunay has been an advisor for the Tech team in three successive competitions in 2002, 2005 and 2009. “With each generation, the design has gotten better and more complex. In 2002, we had never done anything like this — it was a heavy learning process. In 2009, we were much more sophisticated,” Dunay said. While the competitions demanded increasing complexity and creativity, the Tech team built upon knowledge from years of research, which provided the technology for the Lumenhaus. “The research (for the Lumenhaus) built on foundations from (competitions) before. We knew we had a good design, but see DUNAY / page two
PAUL KURLAK / SPPS
Obama approves pipeline White House allows Canadian firm TransCanada to begin constuction of Keystone XL pipeline LESLEY CLARK & RENEE SCHOOF mcclatchy newspapers WASHINGTON — With President Barack Obama under fire from Republicans over the rising cost of gasoline, the White House moved quickly Monday to trumpet a Canadian company’s decision to build a section of the Keystone XL pipeline from Cushing, Okla., to Houston after Obama blocked a longer path last month. Press Secretary Jay Carney hailed TransCanada’s announcement and used it to counter Republican criticism that the administration has stifled oil and gas production. He said that the Oklahoma-to-Texas section of the pipeline would “help address the bottleneck of oil in Cushing that has resulted in large part from increased domestic oil production, currently at an eight-year high.” The company’s decision, Carney said, “highlights a little-known fact — certainly, you wouldn’t hear it from some of our critics — that we approve, pipelines are approved and built in this country all the time.” Obama’s decision last month to reject the full 1,661-mile Keystone XL pipeline from Canada’s tar sands has become a focal point of Republican efforts to portray him as responsible for the recent spike in gasoline prices, and they fault him for blocking a project they say would create jobs and reduce America’s dependence on oil imports from unstable foreign sources.
House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, poked fun at the White House salute of TransCanada’s decision. “The president is so far on the wrong side of the American people that he’s now praising the company’s decision to start going around him,” Boehner said in a statement to ABC News. A recent national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press suggests that Obama’s Keystone decision could become a political liability. Though 37 percent of those surveyed said they had not heard of the pipeline, 66 percent of those who had heard of it said the government should approve it, while 23 percent opposed it. Energy experts say that the Keystone XL pipeline wouldn’t do much to lower gasoline prices. The recent price increases stem largely from speculators bidding up prices at a time of growing fear of future oil-supply disruptions in the event of a war with Iran over its nuclear program. TransCanada will be the second pipeline moving oil from Cushing to the Gulf Coast. The other is already built and owned by Enbridge Inc. The two pipelines will reduce the glut of oil in the Midwest “and in doing so will raise the price of oil in Cushing and the Midwest and will lower the price very slightly in the rest of the world,” said Severin Borenstein, a professor at the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. Prices in the Midwest could go up 10 to 30 cents a gallon, ending the
region’s cheaper gasoline compared to other areas, he said. If the full pipeline is constructed, the effect on prices would “never really be noticed” because it would be so small, a few cents or less per gallon, that it would be “lost in the noise of other changes.” TransCanada also told the State Department on Monday that it plans to submit a new application for the rejected segment of the pipeline, and Carney said the president’s rejection last month “in no way prejudged future applications.” The White House contends that House Republicans forced Obama to reject the earlier cross-border application by not giving it enough time to review the project. Republicans accuse Obama of putting off the decision until after the 2012 election to avoid upsetting environmentalists. Environmental groups made the pipeline a test of Obama’s will to move the country off fossil fuels and to slow climate change. They also say the pipeline would put the Ogalalla Aquifer under the Great Plains, streams, farms and wildlife habitat at more of a risk of oil spills. Kim Huynh of Friends of the Earth said in a statement Monday that the pipeline would be an “environmental disaster” and called the administration’s welcome of TransCanada’s plan “an alarming about-face.” “The administration must stop trying to have it both ways,” Huynh said. “President Obama cannot expect to protect the climate and to put the country on a path toward 21st century clean energy while simultaneously shilling for one of the dirtiest industries on Earth.”