THURSDAY October 20 , 2016
THE DAILY ILLINI The independent student newspaper at the University of Illinois since 1871
WWW.DAILYILLINI.COM
Vol. 146 Issue 18
Can I see some ID?
CUMTD offers free rides to polling places
Hundreds of University students use fake IDs — a constant problem for campus bars on the look out for minors — but few are aware of the consequences extending beyond ticketing BY LILLY MASHAYEK STAFF WRITER
Bars give hundreds of fake IDs to the Champaign Police Department every month, but for those minors who have their ID taken away, that piece of plastic may seem lost forever. However, most of the IDs wind up in a box in Sergeant Joe Ketchem’s office in downtown Champaign. There are two ways that police define fake IDs. The first, and the one that constitutes a more severe punishment, is using a fraudulent ID that is not a valid ID in any way. “A fake ID, one that is not valid in any way, shape or form, which is a forgery … is a crime, (and) can be handled as a crime,” said Officer Joel Sanders with Urbana Police. The second is using a valid ID that belongs to someone else, such a borrowing a friend’s ID who looks similar. Another common practice is doing
BY MICHAEL SEMECA AND SABRINA YAN STAFF WRITERS
a “passback,” which is when people in line at the bar pass their ID back to a person behind them. “If they’re Illinois IDs, we would mail them back to the Secretary of State with a note on how we came across them, and the Secretary of State commonly would then suspend both drivers’ licenses,” Sanders said. “Or at least the one that was given.” Officer Daniel Ward with Champaign Police said people can be charged with a felony for using an invalid ID. “Because the law was never intended for students trying to get into bars underage,” he said. “It was intended for people making fake IDs to commit identity theft.” The Champaign City ordinance that is typically used for students caught with fake IDs consists of a $340 fine and a one-year driver’s license sus-
SEE IDENTIFICATION | 3A
JEREMY HU THE DAILY ILLINI
Boxes of confiscated IDs are stored at the Champaign Police Department. The IDs are mostly from University students.
Victims of domestic violence suffer despite UI resources BY ANDREA FLORES STAFF WRITER
PHOTO COURTESY OF MOLLY WAGENER
A Cuban farm mixes agriculture and sculpture. Statues of humans rest peacefully in foliage.
Cuban study abroad is back of these programs came into existence,” said Dara Goldman, associate professor in Spanish and Portuguese. “Then under Bush, that shut back down, they essentially closed off a lot of these opportunities, restricted these programs.” The politics of the embargo claimed that ending education-related programs would decrease the funds that would ultimately fuel Cuban dictator Fidel Castro’s regime. “There are various reasons why the U.S. government did (the embargo),” Goldman said. “A lot of it was the politics of it and favoring to groups that were strongly in favor of the embargo. The one smaller reason why they did that was there were some programs taking advantage of the exchange program and used as a way to travel to Cuba as tourists.” Goldman disagrees with the extent of the embargo, claiming there should have been better regulation of the small number of programs that weren’t actually educational
BY JESSICA BURSZTYNSKY STAFF WRITER
After being one of the fi rst schools to take students to Cuba, the University was forced by the United States government to shut down the educational trips. A decade later, professors were allowed to reopen the program. Regulations on students traveling to Cuba loosened for the fi rst time during the Clinton administration, allowing for former University professor Ivan Schulman to orchestrate the University’s fi rst Cuban program. However, a stark contrast was made apparent in 2004, when the Bush administration called for an embargo on the Caribbean island. The Office of Foreign Assets Control within the Department of the Treasury banned educational programs that were less than 10 weeks in length. The University was forced to shut down the study abroad program, since the 20-day program did not meet the length requirements. “Under Bill Clinton, things opened up and that’s how more
SEE CUBA | 3A
61˚ | 41˚
Despite October being Domestic Violence Awareness Month, some believe discussing domestic abuse is still widely taboo. “We still need to come a long way in overcoming the taboo of a private relationship,” said Psychology Professor Nicole Allen. “There are ways to ask people how they are doing.” After further research on domestic violence, Allen found that people experience shame and stigma when a relationship becomes abusive, leading to their further isolation. Additionally, she said that intimate partner violence is seen as a private matter. According to a study conducted in 2000, one in four students had been physically abused while in a relationship as a student at the University. Statistically, women ages 16 to 24 are at higher risk of experiencing domestic violence. Allen has researched intimate partner violence for the past 21 years. In her findings, she notes that there are different sectors in the community that address domestic violence differently. “One finding, when important stakeholders come together in councils, they form stronger relationships with each other than they would’ve otherwise had,” Allen said. “When communities work together, they can promote important changes in policy and practice.” Isak Griffiths, executive director of Courage Connection, believes that conversation is the key to ending domestic violence. “(Domestic violence) impacts all of society,” Griffiths said. “We can generate change, but we have
to want to.” Griffiths noted that domestic violence is different on a college campus than in other communities. “Everyone handles it in their own way,” Griffiths said. “For students, it’s hard to be away from home and suffer while others are going through similar things.” Allen said another factor for domestic violence is the highly social atmosphere. “On college campuses, social manipulations can be really powerful when social relationships are really paramount at this time in life,” Allen said. Both Griffiths and Allen believe that the best way for supporting survivors is to believe them. Victim blaming is never the answer, they said. “Be there as a supporter whether or not she is ready to end the relationship,” Allen said. “Don’t be conditional in your support; that’ll validate their experience and normalize the experience.” Jaya Kolisetty, interim assistant director of Rape Advocacy, Counseling, and Education Services (RACES), said that students are fortunate to have more options in the resources available to them for support. Individuals have the option of going through student discipline and not through the legal system, according to Kolisetty. “In how we hear about domestic violence, there are similarities between a college campus and the general community,” she said. “There is pressure to avoid the abuser in this small community.” RACES provides a 24-hour cri-
This election day, the ChampaignUrbana Mass Transit District will be providing free rides to voters trying to get to their polling places. The offer will be valid on Tuesday, November 8 from 5:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. For many people, the public transportation that the bus system provides is the only way of getting to polling places. Jan Kijowski, CUMTD’s marketing manager, said the company wants to make sure that voting is accessible to all people so that they can have their voices heard. “Everybody needs to have the opportunity to vote, and those who don’t have other opportunities to travel, their opportunity to vote could be taken away if they’re not able to get there somehow,” Kijowski said. “We wanted to help facilitate that.” It will be the fi rst time that the buses will be giving free rides on election day for at least a decade, said Kijowski. The offer was created in response to a community member’s request. “We gave it some thought and took a look at what it would entail and decided to give it a try,” she said. To take the free ride, passengers must know their assigned polling location and which bus will lead there. Registered voters can fi nd their polling place on the Champaign County Clerk’s website and can plan their trip using Mass Transit District’s website. One of the considerations the company’s team analyzed was the potential impact this would have on the day’s revenues. Kijowski said the vast majority of rides are paid for using yearly, monthly or student passes and that only a small number of citizens pay for rides regularly with cash. So, the impact on revenue should be relatively small. “The cash fare on a typical Tuesday in November, and that’s what the revenue cost would be, is somewhere in the neighborhood of $1500,” Kijowski said. “So really not a significant number, but certainly something we took into consideration.” This is not the fi rst time the buses have implemented a free ride program; Kijowski said a similar offer was launched on Earth Day a few years ago. On that occasion, ridership numbers increased slightly, and Kijowski estimated that this will be no different. “I expect to see a bump in the daily ridership, but since this is the fi rst time we’ve done this day in particular, and it’s an interesting election season, I think we’ll see some new riders and some extra rides taken that day,” she said.
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