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Safety policy top issue UP, EPD forge
closer ties
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Campus
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NU groups raise money, awareness during breast cancer month.
City
By Michele Corriston
the daily northwestern
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Chicago chefs propose amendment to food truck laws.
Forum
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Matt Zeitlin
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GOP fails to include all religions
Natalie Friedman ‘Fat tax’thin on evidence of success
Letter Celebration of Columbus Day should be rejected in community.
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Column: Daily columnist says NU’s season is already a disappointment Men’s soccer: NU pulls out another, takes down NIU with 2-0 victory.
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Thursday, October 13, 2011
Safety first: Students received emergency kits and safety information at Foster-Walker complex Oct. 10 during the University Residential Life’s annual Safety Week.
By Kaitlyn Jakola
daily senior staffer
A few weeks ago, Weinberg junior Alice Zhang got a concerned call from her mother. A family friend and fellow NU student had gone several days without calling her mother, who was frantically looking for a way to contact her daughter. “Her mother couldn’t reach her for a couple of days and she was really worried,” Zhang said. “So my mom calls me and she asks me to basically go find her.” Unable to find contact information for the student’s assigned Community Assistant online, Zhang got the number for the CA on duty from a friend who also
lived in Shepard Residential College, 626 University Place. Her calls went unanswered and her messages were never returned. “I called several times,” she said. “It was kind of unsettling that it seemed so hard to find the CA that was on duty.” Though the student was not in danger and was eventually found by a mutual friend, Zhang said the incident highlighted a flaw she saw in the University’s safety and emergency preparedness system: communication. “In the end she was okay, but I just wish there was information that was readily available not just for me but for parents,” Zhang said. “I was just really surprised
how inadequate the website was.” This week University Residential Life sponsored its annual Safety Week, which includes information sessions at dorms across campus about emergency protocol. The University has placed special emphasis on student safety and security in the last five years, said Virginia Koch, associate director of University Residential Life. After students expressed concern about intruders in campus residential buildings, administrators teamed up with University Police to create a plan of action. They created the Community Service Officer program for nighttime See safety, page 6
Medill sophomore Alison Decker was walking near Darrow Avenue last Spring Quarter when two men mugged her, grabbing her from behind and holding her to the ground to steal her iPod and cell phone. Three minutes after the attack, Decker said, the Evanston Police Department arrived on the scene. “I was a little bit in shock, but I was clearly not injured,” Decker said. “So they (EPD) were really concerned with finding the people quickly.” This rapid response is one benefit of the partnership between EPD and University Police, Dean of Students Burgwell Howard said. For more than 20 years, the Evanston Police Department and UP have forged a “symbiotic relationship,” supporting each other in everything from traffic stops to sexual assault, EPD Cmdr. Thomas Guenther said. So when NU donated $253,000 to the City in August to purchase a new ambulance, it was more than just a symbolic gesture. Howard said unlike some universities he has worked for that don’t have their own sworn officers, NU benefits from UP’s close relationship with the City’s first responder units. “One of the things I think many
law enforcement agencies learned after 9/11 and other emergencies is the ability to work well with other units and to communicate,” Howard said. “Because they have this relationship and this agreement between the police forces, they’re able to work very seamlessly.” Once an auxiliary of the EPD, UP officers went through EPD training and lacked jurisdiction off-campus until 1985, when a state law allowed private universities to create departments, UP Deputy Chief of Police Daniel McAleer said. Now, UP and EPD share full police power both on and off campus. “Anything that we see offcampus in our presence, we can take in force of action,” McAleer said. “The same goes if EPD was on our campus and witnessed a criminal offense taking place. They could take arrest action or issue a citation.” Despite the departments’ close connections, campus boundaries determine which force takes the reigns in a given situation. UP responds first to on-campus calls, EPD to off-campus, McAleer said. From there, officers notify each other and determine whether they need backup from the other department. McAleer said blue lights pushed on campus connect to UP lines while those off-campus, See cops, page 6
Retail, rental building slated for Central lot By Alexandria Johnson
the daily northwestern
Evanston aldermen voted 8-1 at Monday’s City Council meeting to convert a vacant lot on Central Street into a rental and retail building. In 2007, Dodge Capital, LLC, acquired the property of the former Evanston 5 Theaters on 1700-1722 Central St., originally planning to build a 51-unit condominium with about 11,200 square feet of proposed retail space. “The condo market just completely cratered along with the economy, so we were never able to build that project,” said Bob Horne, Dodge Capital president and developer. “We sat on it as vacant land now for about four years and studied a whole bunch of alternatives as to what other land uses could work on the property, and then as the forsale housing market just really deteriorated, that has in fact allowed the rental housing to strengthen.” Dodge Capital presented a new plan to the public in June and then again at the Planning and Development Committee meeting on Sept. 26.
Grant to benefit NU dance department
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation donated a $1.4 million grant Tuesday to fund dance studies postdoctoral fellowships
“Part of Central Street, particularly east of the Metra track, is very under-utilized. (It) is in need of a transformative development in order to make the area stronger in that corridor,” said Dennis Marino, the city’s planning and zoning manager. “The overall driving issue is when the west Evanston master plan was approved, there was a strong desire to revitalize this part of Central Street that’s pretty quiet.” Ald. Judy Fiske (1st) was the only alderman to vote “no” on the proposal Monday, saying she looks “forward to something on that site too, but maybe something a bit better than what is being proposed.” Ald. Jane Grover (7th), whose ward includes the proposed development, indicated retail development is “largely desirable” on Central Street. “The lot cannot remain vacant,” Grover said. “Many concerns have been accounted for in planning.” The site will feature a building with 80 rental units and slightly smaller retail space compared to the 2007 plan. The building will also include a more contemporary design and a LEED Silver certification, Horne said.
and summer seminars at three top universities, including Northwestern. The scholarships will be provided by the project “Dance Studies in/and the Humanities.” Other grant recipients include Stanford University and Brown University. NU English, Theatre and
Susan Du/The Daily Northwestern
Conversion: Construction on a LEED-certified rental and retail building that will replace a vacant lot on Central Street is scheduled to start in Spring 2012 and last one year.
“We’ve made design changes that reflect both the LEED components of the building but also just the practical realities of the rental buildings,” Horne said. Jeff Smith, a Central Street Neighbors Association board member, said he thinks the reduction from an original 100 parking spaces for about 50 units to 80 spaces for 80 units is alarming. Suburban families moving into these high-luxury units will likely possess more than one vehicle, he said. “Those who live in the area dispute the assumptions of the parking surveys,” Smith said.
Performance Studies Prof. Susan Manning is the grant’s project director. Manning said she began her initiative to apply for the grant in 2006 after learning about it from one of her graduate professors, who knew a member of the Mellon Foundation. The inter-university idea was incorporated, Manning said,
At the city and neighbors’ requests, Dodge Capital surveyed parking within 1,000 feet of the lot on two different occasions and found many under-utilized parking spaces in the area. Horne said as a LEED Silver building, it is only appropriate to add parking spaces if they are necessary. “By doing all this analysis on parking, one of the main conclusions is that there is very adequate parking in the area, so that adding parking is promoting car ownership that doesn’t need to be promoted here,” Horne said. Horne said Dodge Capital has
because she wanted to see dancers in other locations. Stanford and Brown were chosen because they have similar values to NU — neither school has graduate or Ph.D. programs specifically in dance studies, but their administrators were very committed to the program’s initiatives, she said.
addressed public concerns about widening the distance between the property itself and the property line by five feet. The new plan also made the parking garage twoway and increased the depth of the retail space from about 33 feet to about 50 feet. “We did address many things that were brought up in the prior plan,” Horne said. Dodge Capital plans to begin its work in Spring 2012 and conclude construction in Spring 2013, Horne said. See Central, page 6
Manning said the program means a lot for the future of dance studies, as the number of students pursuing dance studies is increasing. “The support of the Mellon Foundation was a real vote of confidence,” she said. — Audrey Cheng