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A Spirit That Is Not Afraid
The Auburn Plainsman
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Vol. 118, Issue 4
www.theplainsman.com
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28 Pages
Concealed carry laws create controversy Jillian Clair Associate News Editor
Guns can take lives. Guns can save lives. The Second Amendment gives Americans the right to bear arms, but there are restrictions on who can posses firearms and where it is legal to carry them. Last Tuesday at the Auburn City Council meeting, Auburn resident Donald Sirois complained that there is a discrepancy between state and city laws concerning carrying concealed weapons onto city property. Currently, according to section 13-12 of Auburn’s city code, weapons of any kind, whether permitted or not, are banned from city property. Sirois, a member of the NRA, said
the ordinance violates the state’s pre-emption law, which states, “The entire subject matter of handguns is reserved to the State Legislature.” This means a city government cannot make a law concerning handguns that is more specific than state law, Sirois said. Sirois said there are signs in front of certain municipal buildings, such as recreation centers and the City Council chamber. The state code does not specify whether handguns are allowed in municipal facilities. “The state law is not real clear and not real well-organized either, but if they feel like there’s restrictions needed in the city, they need to make sure they comply it with the state
code,” Sirois said. City Manager Charles Duggan said section 13-12 of city code, which bans weapons on municipal property, was passed in 1999. When Sirois brought the discrepancy between the ordinance and the preemption law to his attention this summer, Duggan said he and other city officials immediately began researching the issue and found that the city was in violation of the preemption law.
“We look at it, and we say, ‘We believe we should go ahead and change section 13-12 and clarify that while we’re banning weapons, our ban is not going to apply to handguns because of the state exemption, and we will deal with handguns ac-
c o rd ing to the state law,’” Duggan said. Duggan said the city is still trying to interpret the vague state code to determine whether concealed handguns should be permitted on municipal property. For now, Duggan has recommended the Council change the city code to ban all weapons except concealed handguns. “The problem is, we didn’t just want to repeal
i t — w e wanted to know what goes in its place, and that takes time,” Duggan said. “We want to make sure that, quite » Turn to GUNS, A2
Dorm visitation hours disputable Chelsea Harvey
Emily Adams / PHOTO EDITOR
The Haley Center stairs in between quadrants two and three have been blocked off because falling chunks of concrete.
Haley Center stairwell neglected Brian Desarro Intrigue Editor
With more than 140 classrooms on the first three floors alone, making the trip up the Haley Center’s caged-in, cement stairs has become habit to most of Auburn’s 24,000 students. Built in 1969, this iconic building has seen its fair share of maintenance and repairs. However, one outside stairwell on the Haley concourse side has been closed and barricaded for months. Lloyd Albert, interim director of maintenance, said the stairwell is blocked because there are falling
chunks of concrete from where the rebar inside has begun to rust. As to why it has taken so long? They simply forgot. “I don’t know how that one was forgotten like it was,” Albert said. “We need to get it fixed right away.” The normal process for building repairs is to immediately bring a contractor in to look at the affected area, make the necessary repairs and put it back into use as quickly as possible. “We watch [the cracks], and as they look like they are fixing to give way or something, we go and take care of them,” Albert said. “Our No. 1 goal is to keep them from falling
on somebody. When we see a spot, we barricade it off, take them down, clean them up, patch what we can patch and make sure it is safe for students.” Though he wasn’t sure how long ago they came, Albert said a representative of LBYD Civil and Structural Engineering came out to look at the stairwell, which resulted in the original barricade. A return visit by the engineering firm to look at the damage as well as other cracks and falling cement around Haley Center, is in the works, though there is no official » Turn to HALEY, A2
been in place for so long, may be outdated. Staff Writer The visitation procedure Of the 24,000 students is perhaps the most conwho attend Auburn, only troversial in this respect. approximately 4,000 live Aside from the general in on-campus residence complaints many students halls. have about the limitations On-campus regulations it imposes on their social include rules against noise lives, some students have violations, expressed pets, cerconcern tain apthat the Those hours rule is pliances, a l c o h o l have been in place for u n f a i r , and illegal in that substances, years... and we don’t it allows and visitors change them unless more freeof the opfor students want it to be dom posite sex same-sex b e t w e e n changed.” relationmidnight ships. Kim Trupp, and noon. “I don’t director of Housing and t h i n k Violations Residence Life h o u s are dealt with acing recording to a disciplinary ally thought about the system that varies with the fact that some people are number and severity of of- gay and some aren’t,” said fenses. Bennett Nast, sophomore Sarah Daughtry, gradu- in aviation management. ate student hall director, “It was just a rule that was said in the five years she put in place. I don’t think had been at Auburn, she they were really directing had not noticed any revi- it at a specific group.” sion in dorm policy. Daughtry said although This raises the question she personally had not of whether certain policies, by virtue of having » Turn to HOUSING, A2
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Alabama AP scores outpace national average Alison McFerrin Staff Writer
Gov. Bob Riley announced Monday that Alabama is tops in the nation for student improvement on AP tests. According to a press release from the governor’s office, the percentage of Alabama students scoring a passing grade on AP tests increased by 17.7 percent. Riley said the success is directly attributable to the state’s partnership with the A+ College Ready program and
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commitment to funding the ACCESS Distance Learning initiative in Alabama schools. According to the ACCESS (Alabama Connecting Classrooms, Educators and Students Statewide) Distance Learning website, the program is available to all Alabama public high school students,
and its aim is to provide equal access to high quality instruction and an infrastructure that delivers quality learning opportunities. According to the A+ College Ready website, the program is a division of the A+ Education Partnership. Through collaboration with multiple people and groups, the A+ Education Partnership has secured a grant of
up to $13.2 million to help train teachers and improve AP programs and scores in Alabama. Smiths Station High School in Lee County is one of the schools that has benefited from the grant money. “We’ve been able to vertically align and integrate our classes down to the seventh grade,” said Mike Nixon, vice principal and AP coordinator at Smiths Station High School. » Turn to AP, A2
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