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California State University, East Bay
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THURSDAY APRIL 14, 2016
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Spring 2016 Issue 2
SPORTS
Warriors on the brink of history
SEE FEATURES PAGE 2
STUDENT ARTISTS ARE "IN THE DARK"
By Louis LaVenture EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
SEE OPINION PAGE 10
BERNIE SANDERS FOR PRESIDENT
PHOTO BY TAM DUONG JR./THE PIONEER
Students, faculty and staff protest during CSU Chancellor Timothy White's visit to CSUEB on Feb. 29.
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NEWS
UC Berkeley sexual harassment policies questioned By Kali Persall MANAGING EDITOR UC Berkeley, named one of the “Elite Six” universities by Times Higher Education in 2015, is under fire for questionable disciplinary protocol for sexual misconduct, following the release of documents of an investigation that looked into 17 sexual harassment cases from the last five years. The investigation’s findings, conducted by the Office for the Prevention of Harassment and Discrimination, were released to The Daily Californian in response to a Public Records Act request filed last month. It found 19 UC Berkeley employees in violation of the college’s sexual harassment policies dating back to 2011, according to The Daily Californian. Released on April 5, the redacted 463-page report revealed details about the nature of the cases and found the accused to be six faculty and eleven staff members. The East Bay Times reported that three of the accused faculty members resigned, while the other three remain employed by Berkeley as tenured professors. Out of 12 investigations conducted by the OPHD, four staff members were fired, four resigned and four received various punishments, ranging from salary decreases to temporary suspension, according to The Daily Californian. One of the cases investigated by the OPHD was that of Berkeley Law School Dean Sujit Choudhry, who resigned from his position on March 10. Choudhry remains employed at Berkeley as a member of the law school faculty under tenure, according to the Washington Post. Last year Tyann Sorrell, Choudhry’s former executive assistant filed a formal complaint that alleged Choudhry
SEE NEWS PAGE 9
CSU strike averted, new tentative agreement reached By Louis LaVenture EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
The California Faculty Association has been engaged in a “Fight for 5” on behalf of faculty members at all 23 Cal State University campuses to get a five percent raise across the board, among other things. That fight came to an end on Friday when the CFA and CSU reached a tentative agreement that would put a stop to the impending strike set for April 13 to 15, 18 and 19. According to CFA President and Cal State East Bay instructor Jennifer Eagan, the agreement met all of the staff’s demands and includes a five percent general salary increase on June 30, a two percent general salary increase on July 1 and a 3.5 percent general salary increase on July 1, 2017 for all faculty on active pay status or leave. The deal also includes a 2.65 percent service salary increase during 2017-2018 for all eligible faculty members.
The new agreement increases the length of the contract between the two parties for another year and will now expire on June 30, 2018. Eagan said bargaining for the next contract will begin on July 1, 2017. “That’s not a lot of rest time,” Eagan said in a statement on Friday. “We will need your help building power through membership and your fierce advocacy again very soon.” In order to make the new agreement official, it must be approved by the CFA Board of Directors, ratified by the CFA members and then approved by the CSU Board of Trustees; something Eagan said members would be notified on how to do soon. “The tentative agreement enables all of us to focus our efforts on serving students and spares students the negative impacts of the threatened strikes,” CSU Chancellor Timothy White said in a statement on Friday. “The tentative agreement is consistent with our ongoing efforts to increase faculty compen-
sation in a fiscally responsible manner by spreading the cost impact across multiple academic years, while enabling us to fund other priorities that support student success and completion.” The agreement came after a two-day “blackout period” where there was no media contact by any parties for 48 hours, in an effort to resolve the dispute and diffuse the strike, according to both organizations. Last year, the CSU included a two percent raise across the board for faculty and staff in their 2015-2016 budget, however, the CFA has asked for a five percent raise as well as additional raises for adjunct and part-time staff members. A new stipulation in the contract could prevent this conflict in the future by adjusting the bargaining calendar so the CFA and CSU management teams will be able to negotiate before the CSU sends their budget request to legislature for approval. A timetable to ratify the tentative agreement had not been established by the CFA as of publication time.
Now everybody can shut up. The conversations that surrounded the Golden State Warriors all season long seem to come back to a single question: Can they break the all-time single season wins record of 72 set by the 19951996 Michael Jordan-led Chicago Bulls? An answer in one word: yes. On Sunday, the Warriors did two things that have not happened in nearly two decades. They won their 72nd regular season game; and they did it by beating the Spurs in San Antonio where they haven’t won since 1997, a streak that extended over 30 games. Was it a pretty win? No, it wasn’t. Golden State only made 4 of their 19 first quarter shots thanks in large part to a smothering San Antonio defense anchored by swingman Kawhi Leonard. The Warriors were held to just 14 points in the quarter, their fewest in any game this season. But you can’t count out Stephen Curry. He managed to turn the dismal first half around for Golden State and scored a game-high 16 points in the third quarter — not including a near full court heave that went in but was waved off because it came after the buzzer. Things got back to normal in the fourth quarter and the Dubs started to move more without the ball and make sharp passes to cutters, the signature of the motion offense that has made them successful the past few seasons. Curry stayed hot
SEE SPORTS PAGE 11
BART woes continue for Bay Area customers By Louis LaVenture EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
According to BART, on an average weekday about 440,000 passengers use the system, which are roughly 100,000 more than it served just five years ago. On March 17 officials revealed that BART service between the Pittsburg-Bay Point and North Concord stations would be shut down for an indefinite amount of time while the agency attempted to figure out the problem that caused nearly 50 trains to stop working, due to electrical surges. Buses between the stations served in place of the damaged cars, which caused long lines and waiting times for riders. “BART was built to transport far fewer people, and much of our system has reached the end of its useful life. This is our reality,” Taylor Huckaby, a BART spokesman and social media specialist, said on Twitter on March 16. The electrical problem that caused the damage has baffled BART employees. Engineers and mechanics have inspected the tracks and the cars, but have still not been able to determine the exact cause of the problem, according to BART. During peak hours nearly 1,700 people use the Pittsburg-Bay Point and North Concord stations, as stated by BART. After the problem arose on March 16, BART went from 571 cars in service to 521 cars, down from its normal amount of cars in service of 579. Some of the older model cars have also had some damaged parts from electrical failures, which BART is trying to find a third par-
IMAGE COURTESY OF BART
ty distributor in order to get them to mechanics so they can make repairs. However, despite outside party consultants, rigorous checks, inspections and new diagnostic equipment, BART officials have yet to determine the specific cause of those damages. The transit system that opened in 1972 was originally intended to serve a fraction of the people it does now, thanks in large part to the increase in population. The Bay Area Census reported there were 4,628,199 living in the Bay
Area in 1970, a number that has since skyrocketed to over 7 million people as recent as 2010. Originally, the plan was to alleviate the traffic congestion caused by the automobile boom after World War II. A joint Army and Navy review board in 1947 proposed a high speed rail system that could connect Oakland and San Francisco through an underwater tube to help prevent congestion on the Bay Bridge, according to BART’s website. Outdated cars and technology com-
bined with too many riders have been a recipe for disaster for BART, who in the midst of the electrical problems introduced their new cars, which will eventually be a fleet of 775 and replace all of the older models, at a replacement rate of 16 cars a month until all of them are incorporated into the system. According to BART, the California Public Utilities Commission will monitor the tests of the first car, which arrived in Hayward on March 15. The new cars are quieter, bigger, have three exits and entrances per car and feature LED screens with stop and destination updates. BART General Manager Grace Crunican said that the new fleet of cars should alleviate many of the issues that have plagued the system as of late. “The problem is there are just too many people,” BART patron John Sandoval said. Sandoval takes BART from Fremont to the Montgomery Street Station, Monday through Thursday for work. “When I first started taking BART, I could get here in the morning a few minutes before my train and be fine. Now, well now I have to get to BART an hour early just to get a spot in line to board.” Crunican said that BART staff has been granted overtime hours in order to figure out the problem and have since shifted their focus to the actual cars since there seems to be no problems with the tracks. However, with a new fleet of cars set to replace the old ones, will these cars have the same problem? Is it smart to put new cars on tracks that have undefined issues? These are the questions that BART is still trying to find answers to.