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Wednesday, March 10, 2010
New ASM initiatives aim to help student finances By Robert Taylor The Daily Cardinal
Christopher guess/cardinal file photo
Madison Police Department Cpt. Mary Schauf said she supported the Downtown Safety Initiative as a way to improve the police response to bar crowds.
Committee OKs 2010 downtown safety plan By Taylor Curley The Daily Cardinal
The Public Safety Review Committee discussed and approved the Downtown Safety Initiative plan for 2010 Tuesday. “The very target of the plan is meeting the workload of the downtown with the appropriate number of officers,” Madison Police Department Cpt. Mary Schauf said. When bars in the downtown area close at night, the streets flood with people and there may not be enough officers to handle it, she said. Schauf said this contributes to the rise of alcoholrelated crime and incidents. Jim Keiken of the Madison Fire Department said the size of nighttime crowds also depends on the time of year. “Warmer weather, the approach to Mifflin, Halloween and the first two weeks on cam-
pus usually place a lot of calls to the EMT and fire department,” he said. The DSI would situate more officers downtown with the hope of lowering alcohol-related crime. “The very target of the plan is meeting the workload of the downtown with the appropriate number of officers.” Mary Schauf Central District captain Madison Police Department
“One of the goals of the project is to intercede before it happens, preventing the actual battery or the incident,” Schauf said. “I think this is a subject that we should be talking about,” Ald. Paul Skidmore, District
9, said. “What happens downtown affects the other districts. I’m not saying it negatively, but it just affects everyone, and it needs to be taken into account.” The committee approved the DSI plan and its recommendations for 2010, but the plan still requires approval by the Common Council. Committee members also discussed the proposed automated system for the 911 Center. The proposal would provide individuals with a nonemergency phone number with an automatic attendant to handle the call. “The problem with the auto attendant is that it asks the individual a lot of questions, asking them to determine if their case is lifethreatening or not,” Keiken said. Decisions regarding the 911 Center were referred to the next committee meeting.
The Associated Students of Madison’s Academic Affairs Committee met Tuesday to discuss several initiatives designed to ease student financial burdens at UW-Madison. The committee proposed a standing committee to address textbook issues in addition to finding a more permanent way of helping students manage the financial aid process. Jonah Zinn, Academic Affairs chair, said that while the committee already runs a textbook swap each semester, ASM hopes to establish a shared governance committee that would focus specifically on textbook issues. “What we are looking at is creating a standing committee through a shared governance process that would address textbooks,” he said. “There are a lot of things to work on, things like electronic textbooks, open-source textbooks, getting departments to focus on certain textbooks, library reserve programs and the possibility of creating a textbook rental program.” The idea behind making the textbook committee a standing committee, Zinn said, was to create a permanent mechanism that would continue to work on behalf of students and respond to new
challenges in the future. The textbook committee would contain three student representatives, three faculty members and three academic staff. All members would have voting rights as part of an open committee. The challenge, Zinn said, will be getting all parties—faculty, administration and students—to buy into the program. “This is something that we are trying to create by the end of the semester, but it needs to pass through the Student Council and the University Committee of the Faculty Senate and the Academic Staff Executive Committee of the Academic Staff Senate,” Zinn said. “We want to get as much support from the university as possible.” The Academic Affairs Committee also discussed ways to make the financial aid process easier and more accessible to students. In conjunction with the Office of Student Financial Aid, ASM hopes to host an information session and workshop on filling out FAFSA forms and offer one-on-one advising in April. Committee members said they hoped to make financial aid advising more permanent. “One of our objectives is to get this help process institutionalized and have it not just be something that happens once a semester,” Zinn said. “We want to prevent students from falling through the cracks.”
Former ACORN employees charged with fraud By Steven Rosenbaum The Daily Cardinal
The Wisconsin Department of Justice charged two former ACORN employees with election fraud Monday. Maria Miles and Kevin Clancy were charged with fraudulently registering individuals to vote multiple times, a felony that could result in up to three and a half years in prison or a $10,000 fine. The alleged offenses took place before the 2008 presidential election. Miles and Clancy were both special registration deputies for the city of Milwaukee in the summer of 2008 and were
employed by the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. “Wisconsin citizens should not have to wonder whether their vote has been negated or diminished by illegally cast ballots.” J.B. Van Hollen attorney general Wisconsin
According to the criminal complaint, filed in Milwaukee County Monday, Clancy registered to vote three times and
Miles registered four times. The complaint also alleges Miles and Clancy both registered the same individual on a single day. Bill Cosh, spokesperson for the DOJ, said both types of activities are illegal. “When you register in Wisconsin, you have to indicate if you are a new voter or if it is a change of address. Either way, falsely registering or falsely procuring registration is a felony in the state of Wisconsin,” Cosh said. The complaint also detailed allegations of similar behavior by other ACORN employees and Milwaukee special registration deputies, but acorn page 3
danny marchewka/cardinal file photo
Members of ASM’s Academic Affairs Committee proposed the creation of a new committee focused solely on textbook issues.
“…the great state University of Wisconsin should ever encourage that continual and fearless sifting and winnowing by which alone the truth can be found.”