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The fifth issue of San Francisco State University Golden Gate Xpress
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San Francisco is one of the most expensive places to live in the world, and consequently has one of the country’s highest minimum wages, but due to an exemption in state labor law, many students working at SF State make signifi cantly less than the $10.24 an hour mandated by the city.
California State University students now pay more than $6,000 a year in tuition. The
median rent in the city is more than $1,200 a month. Students often need to work to supplement fi nancial aid, but some students
who work on campus are getting paid less than their citywide counterparts, with some making as little as $8.82 an hour, $1.42 less than the city’s mandated minimum wage.
GOLDEN GATE XPRESS STUDENT-RUN NEWSPAPER PROUDLY SERVING THE SAN FRANCISCO STATE UNIVERSITY COMMUNITY SINCE 1927. 02.22.12 VOLUME LXXXXII
ISSUE 5// //GOLDEN GATE XPRESS
2006
7
8
9
$ 10
2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
MINIMUM WAGE for California
MINIMUM WAGE for SF State employees
MINIMUM WAGE for San Francisco
CAMPUS MINIMUM WAGES MUCH LOWER THAN CITY
SEE WAGES ON PAGE 3
Many school employees are paid below the city-prescribed wage because they work on state property.
BY KALE WILLIAMS | [email protected]
STUDENT FEES TOINCREASE FOR FUTURE
REC CENTER
The LONG search for president
SMACKDOWN: SF State senior Samantha Rogers (left) goes up for a spike in a scrimmage during Thursday’s women’s vol-leyball club practice. Photo by Sam Battles
ACTIVE LISTENER: Chancellor Charles B. Reed writes notes as students, teachers and faculty speakers voice what they are looking for in the next SF State president during the open meeting Monday. Fewer than 10 students attended the meeting. Photo by Nelson Estrada
Students, faculty spoke to the CSU advisory board in the only public meeting slated in the search for a replacement for Robert A. Corrigan.
BY SEAN DUFFY | [email protected]
BY ANGELA RAIFORD | [email protected]
The only opportunity for students, administra-tion and faculty to directly express their opinions on SF State’s presidential selection with the California State University Board of Trustees was met with snide remarks, high expectations, unanswered questions and disproportionately low attendance.
Only about 15 people spoke during public com-ment in a crowd of approximately 70, a majority of them administration and faculty, in the Seven Hills Conference center Feb. 20. Currently, this was the only open meeting slated to take place during the selection process.
“Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak before you leave in your luxury cars and get chauf-feured to your next destination,” said Lalo Gonzalez, 23, a criminal justice major. “My question is, how do you expect the next president to actually fi ght for the students and the current fees, and not become another puppet in the current system?”
The committee did not answer him, but asked for other input in relation to the SF State campus and its involvement in San Francisco and the greater Bay Area.
While a lot of focus was spent on the board’s decision-making process, Roberta Achtenberg, CSU trustee and committee chair, noted that faculty, staff
and student input will be taken alongside committee members in what they would like to see in the next president.
“You (the audience) can be skeptical,” said Achten-berg. “I believe these committee members will attest that they were free to exercise their judgements.”
Administration and faculty in attendance stressed the importance of having a president interested in re-search initiatives, diversity awareness and community involvement.
“Within our mission of teaching, we also need a president who is a big supporter of research for our faculty. We don’t want our faculty teaching what they learned in graduate school 10, 20 years ago,” Sheldon Axler, dean of the College of Science and Engineering and member of the University research council said. “They need to be teaching cutting-edge material, and particularly in science and engineering. The faculty member who hasn’t learned anything new in fi ve or 10 years is completely out-of-date and not bringing to our students the things they need to know.”
Philosophy Chair Anita Silvers said that the next president should be focused in maintaining SF State’s international presence.
SEE FORUM ON PAGE 4
Student fee increases are nothing new, but this semester a newly-approved fee requires students to pay for a campus recreation center that will not be completed for several years after most students have moved on from the University.
The $35 per semester fee was approved March 2010, effective this academic year; it will gradually increase each year until it reaches $160 each semester in 2014. Construction will not begin until 2015, with a target completion date sometime in 2017. Even though current students will be funding the center, their future access has yet to be guaranteed.
SEE REC CENTER ON PAGE 10
GOLDENGATEXPRESS.ORG C A M P U S 02.22.122 |
Fifty-fi ve dollars? That’s my gas right there! Oh my
God, I could drive for a long time, actually for like
a week. I don’t think it’s necessary, not one bit.
EILEEN XU24, BUSINESS
MANAGEMENT MAJOR
SF SPEAKS OUT WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT
THE NEW RECREATIONAL FEE INCREASE OF $55?
I’ll utilize all those things if they make it better, but don’t ask for more money and then
leave it the way it is.FATIMEH KHAN
20, BIOLOGY MAJOR
I could pretty much buy a monthly bus pass. That could buy a ticket home. It could buy a lot of food. Ninety bucks for a gym I
don’t even go to?MATTHEW BLITZ,
20, LITERATURE/EDUCATION MAJOR
REPORTING BY JUAN DE ANDAPHOTOS BY MELISSA BURMAN
I think $90 is a little high. I understand that the University is between
a rock and a hard place in terms of funding, but charging students who
aren’t going to be able to use the facility doesn’t
seem like the right move.MICHAEL LICHTENSTEIN
21, CINEMA MAJOR
A PIRATE’S LIFEA female student reported her vehicle was burglarized while parked on 19th Avenue Feb. 15. Presumably, the robber was so obsessed with pirates in the urban jungle that he captured and ran off with $130 worth of booty from the woman’s car. A lesson to everyone: never assume that your pirated Madonna and Drake CDs, used cherry lip balm and a cup holder full of pennies are not of value. Someone’s trash is another pirate’s treasure. Arrgh.
NO HARM, NO FOUL?A student reported her vehicle was hit while parked at SF State’s Lot 20 on the fourth level. The incident occurred Feb. 13, and we are to assume that since the student was not present, she missed out on her long-life dream to reenact the theme park experience of bumper cars on a real-life scale. She reported the incident to University police two days later, probably because she was so shocked and distraught at missing out on the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
MASTERS OF TRASHY ARTLot 20 seems to be an extremely popular place for crime and shenanigans. The poor area’s rusty and tired elevators were victims of vandalism Feb. 15 with spray-painted and permanent marker graffi ti. Presumably, the urge of these young taggers-in-training to represent the 415 inspired them to create art masterpieces of statements that don’t express full thoughts, use poor grammar and have misspellings of the most basic of words. Clearly, they’ve missed too many of their English 114 classes.
CRIME BLOTTER 02.13 through 02.15 Compiled by Juan De Anda
The California State University Board of Trustees offi cially adopted a policy that will place a limit on the compensation newly-hired campus presidents can receive.
Under the new policy, CSU presidents are only able to receive 10 percent more than their predeces-sors’ base pay.
“It doesn’t necessarily mean the president that comes in will receive a 10 percent increase... that is just the limit,” said CSU spokesman Erik Fallis.
The CSU is currently looking for presidents for four of its campuses: Cal State Northridge, Cal State San Bernardino, SF State and the California Mari-time Academy. The new compensation policy will be implemented for the incoming presidents.
The new policy comes in the wake of a decision by the board to grant a $100,000 raise to incoming San Diego State University President Elliot Hirsh-man, which was criticized by Gov. Jerry Brown and the Legislative Analyst’s Offi ce.
SF State President Robert A. Corrigan is currently eligible to make up to $298,749 for the 2011-12 aca-demic year. That means whoever replaces him next year could receive a $29,000 bump in pay.
The move is a step in the right direction, accord-ing to Wei Ming Dariotis, president of the SF State chapter of the California Faculty Association, but the timing was unfortunate.
“I’m glad that the Board of Trustees responded to public pressure and agreed to put a cap on execu-tive compensation,” she said in an email. “I do wish, however, they had decided to do this before hiking student fees 12 percent on the same day that they voted to increase the salary range for campus presi-dents by $20,000.”
Some students agreed that the cap was a good place to start.
“It could be a lot worse,” said Marion Brown Jr., a liberal studies major. “We’re getting all these cuts and all these tuition hikes. If the new president is go-ing to be making an extra $30,000, hopefully they’ll do a better job.”
Others are confl icted about the potential pay raise.“If they are just going to be sitting in their offi ce
all day, that seems like a lot,” said Morgan McGehee, a nature of confl ict major. “But if they are actually working to make the educational experience better, I say we give them as much as they need.”
But McGehee’s opinions are not shared by every-one at the University.
“The CSU has forgotten its mission,” said Bobby Farlice, an Equal Opportunity Program adviser. “The trustees are businesspeople; they aren’t educators. The president of a university should never be making more than the president of the United States.”
The policy was recommended by CSU Board Chair Herbert Carter.
“The new compensation limits and more rel-evant tiered list of comparator institutions will give stakeholders a good benchmark of where presidential compensation will be set as we move forward,” said Carter in a press release. “Our continued goal is to recruit and compete for the best leadership possible, but also within articulated budget guidelines.”
BY KALE WILLIAMS | [email protected]
CSU PRESIDENT PAY INCREASE CAPPED AT 10 PERCENTNew order will prevent incoming University presidents from earning wages that exceed budget boundaries.
CSU EXECUTIVE PAYROLL2011 TO 2012 COMPENSATION SUMMARY
BAKERSFIELD
LONG BEACH
CHICO
MARITIME ACADEMY
SAN FRANCISCO
EAST BAY
NORTHRIDGE
SAN LUIS OBISPO
FULLERTON
SACRAMENTO
SONOMA
CHANNEL ISLANDS
LOS ANGELES
SAN DIEGO
DOMINGUEZ HILLS
MONTEREY BAY
SAN JOSE
FRESNO
POMONA
SAN MARCOS
HUMBOLDT
SAN BERNARDINO
STANISLAUS
Horace Mitchell
F. King Alexander
Paul J. Zingg
William Eisenhardt
Robert Corrigan
Leroy Morishita *
Jolene Koester
Jeffrey Armstrong
Milton Gordon
Alexander Gonzalez
Ruben Armiñana
Richard Rush
James Rosser
Elliot Hirshman
Mildred Garcia
Diane Harrison
Mohammad Qayoumi
John Welty
Michael Ortiz
Karen Haynes
Rollin Richmond
Albert Karnig
Hamid Shirvani
$295,000
$50,000
$50,000
$50,000
$50,000
$60,000
$60,000
$60,000
$60,000
$60,000
$60,000
$60,000
$275,000
$285,000
$320,329
$325,000
$279,500 $50,000
Housing provided
Housing provided
Housing provided
Housing provided
Housing provided
Housing provided
Housing provided
Housing provided
Housing provided
Housing provided
Housing provided
$258,680
$270,315
$298,749
$328,200
$285,000
$299,000
$295,000
$292,000
$350,000
$270,568
$295,000
$297,870
$295,000
$290,000
$350,000
$291,179
$270,000
HOUSING STIPENDSALARYPRESIDENTCAMPUS
*Morishita will make this until his fi nal pay is decided in March.
Although the University is only required to abide by the state’s minimum wage ordinance of $8 an hour, the exemption which lets them pay less than the local minimum wage seems to go against the spirit of such labor laws, which are intended to guar-antee low-paid workers a certain standard of living.
Because the University is a state-run institution, city offi-cials don’t have the authority to enforce the San Francisco mini-mum wage, according to Richard Waller, supervising compliance officer with the San Francisco Office of Labor Standards En-forcement.
“The city has no power to impose its laws on other gov-ernment entities,” Waller said. “California state law just has a superior position.”
Though Waller said the OLSE’s reach doesn’t legally extend to SF State, there is no reason they couldn’t be given that power.
“There is nothing to prevent a change in the law except a lack of political will,” he said.
Hana Haber, a 20-year-old business major who worked at the campus book-store for nearly six months, said she was originally drawn to student work because of the ease with which she could land a job.
“I applied for the job because it’s almost guaranteed,” Haber said. “I looked for jobs for eight months on Craigslist. At the bookstore, you basically turn in an application and you get a job.”
Despite the availability of jobs on campus, and the discounts promised with a position at the bookstore, Haber was dis-appointed when she got her first paycheck.
“I mean, the job isn’t that hard, but all
the kids who work in the restaurants on campus make more than $10 an hour,” she said. “The bookstore feels like the heart of the campus, but we don’t get treated like it.”
Richard Hogan, a political science major who works at the recreation depart-ment, thinks the current budget crunch at SF State has a lot to do with the low wages paid to student workers.
“I feel a little bit wronged by the salary I get,” he said. “But I understand that the school is working with a limited amount of money. I don’t have a problem with it if the money I’m missing out on is going to help the school, but I’m worried that it’s all going into the ridiculous salary we pay the administration.”
Husam Erciyes, director of marketing
at the bookstore, defended the wages they pay.
“State-run entities are subject to a different wage scale than the local wage scale,” Erciyes said in an email. “Our cur-rent starting pay for our student workers is $0.30 more than the University’s starting wage, and currently our average pay rate for our student workers is $10.72.”
The bookstore is also seeking approval to increase its starting wage, according to Erciyes.
“They can say that they’re exempt because the University is a state entity,” said Karl Kramer, campaign co-director at the San Francisco Living Wage Coalition. “But there is no such language in the (San Francisco) minimum wage ordinance.”
The bookstore, which is run as a
non-profit, has employed more than 2,000 students in the last five years, and given more than $1 mil-lion to SF State over the same period, according to its website.
In 2006, the last time Xpress reported on the problem, the minimum wage on campus was $8.80, compared to the city minimum wage of $8.82. Since then, the city minimum wage has increased by more than 16 percent, to $10.24, while the minimum wage on campus has barely risen at all, going up by only two-tenths of a percent to $8.82.
To some, the $1.42 students are missing out on may not seem like much, but it can add up. If a student works the maximum of twenty hours a week, that $1.42 translates to more than
$450 of lost wages over the course of a 16-week semester.
Daniel Marroquin, an urban studies major at SF State and intern at the Living Wage Coalition, thinks many students are complacent because they come from places where low wages are common.
“I know some people come in from out of town and are used to making less than $8 an hour,” he said. “But with all the tuition increases and program cuts it’s ridiculous that the school can’t even pay minimum wage.”
Haber agreed. “The bookstore says all this stuff about being a non-profit and how they give back to the campus, but they don’t even pay the students enough to live on,” she said.
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CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1
WORKING TO LIVE: Sheyda Mostafazadeh works in the SF State Bookstore. Many Bookstore employees earn less than the San Fran-cisco city-mandated minimum wage because as a state property, the University is not subject to city regulations. Photo by Andrew Lopez
Student wages don’t measure up to city pay
GOLDENGATEXPRESS.ORG C A M P U S 02.22.124 |
From
the Xpress archives
MARCH 1, 1988Former SF State President Chia-Wei Woo was highly critical of a survey
of nearly 400 universities that found that a “typical” University president placed more importance on public relations and fundraising than academic progress and student affairs.
The study’s results also indicated that input from faculty members would hinder campus improvements, with which Woo vehemently dis-agreed. The survey, which appeared in The New York Times, illustrated the quintessential president as a white Protestant male in his early 50s who worked approximately 67 hours a week. Woo was the country’s fi rst Chinese-American president of a major university.
SEPT. 15, 1988Newly-elected SF State President Robert A. Corrigan was received
by faculty members with mixed reviews. While some professors applauded the Board of Trustees for following their recommenda-tion, others worried that Corrigan, formerly an English professor, would pay more attention to humanities than the sciences. Despite an early resignation from the University of Massachusetts following an internal audit, SF State faculty was confi dent in his capabilities, as long as he remained sincerely dedicated to the University.
Researched by Tamerra Griffi n
IN SF STATE
HISTORY
FOOD TRUCKS HAVE GROWN rapidly in popularity in San Fran-cisco during the last few years, so it is no surprise that people through-out the city have requested more access to them. And they might have it soon.
San Francisco Supervisor Scott Wiener introduced legislation re-
cently that would dismiss the planning code that prevents food trucks from selling their products on college and hospital campuses. This means that with the approval of the University, students may be able to visit food trucks on campus.
“All I can say at this point is that we’re working to bring food trucks and markets like Off the Grid to SF State,” said Horace Montgomery, director of programs and services of Associated Students, Inc. “Right now, I don’t know when it would happen or where on campus we might put it.”
Wiener said that as long as everything goes smoothly with the Planning Commission, this new legislation could go into effect within the next four to six months. The
current planning code only allows mobile food vendors to operate in commercial areas. Wiener’s proposed legisla-tion would make it legal for colleges and hospitals not located in commercial areas to rent to food trucks.
“I think food diversity and giving people more op-tions of where to eat is a good thing,” said Wiener. “Food trucks provide the option of different, interesting and low-cost food. It used to be that food trucks weren’t very healthy food, but now there’s a lot of different kinds with better quality.”
Montgomery suggested bringing food trucks to the University two years ago as the farmers market started growing in success, but was told the competition between vendors would be too intense.
“The on-campus vendors already pay rent, so I can see how they would think their toes are being stepped on,” he said. “But as long as there’s no competition with the farmers market on Thursdays, I think it could be a great thing for students.”
Kevin Nguyen, a criminal justice major, has enjoyed grabbing lunch from food trucks on several occasions. Already tired of the restaurants on campus, he said the possibility of having more places to eat is exciting.
“The variety of food choices would be fun to pick and choose from,” he said. “The prices are also very cheap for
a college student.”Since it is illegal to have food trucks in many areas
of San Francisco, the locations where they are permitted are often over-concentrated. Wiener said he proposed this legislation in part to prevent the overpopulation of food trucks in downtown areas. He acknowledged the growing competition that some restaurants may have with food trucks, but still believes people should have more choices of where to eat.
Erik Small, a food truck vendor at Donna’s Tamales, which is a regular at the weekly SF State farmers market, thinks it is important for people to have more variety, but it hasn’t helped his business in the past.
“When I worked at the Ferry Building on Tuesdays, it used to be just us and another burger stand,” he said. “Now there’s pizza, a Jewish deli and a ramen noodle place. We used to do pretty well there, but having these extra places has cut our business in half.”
Although the decision to add more vendors on cam-pus is not defi nite, Small has considered what he might do if it affects sales.
“We usually sell out whenever we come to SF State for the farmers market, but if having extra food places here affects our business at all, we might have to pull out,” he said.
FIGHTING FOR FOOD TRUCKS
If the legislation passes, students can expect mobilized food and increased meal diversity for lunch pit stops on campus.
BY CAROLYN COPELAND | [email protected]
ROLLING OUT: Poking her head out a vintage Air-stream Land Yacht, Sylvee Danger Eskimo takes an order from her a food truck. Current planning codes prohibit food trucks from conducting business in non-commercial areas like SF State. Photo by Juliana Severe
“It is very important for this campus’ health for us to have a national and international profi le and a pres-ident who understands that we have that capacity,” said Silvers, who was a chair of the Senate during the presidential search that selected Corrigan. “We have students all over the world right now — I can never tell where my students are in any semester.”
During the forum, CSU Chancellor Charles B. Reed discussed the issue of asking potential candi-dates to come to campus before fi nalizing their bid for president. He said that in order to get a feel for the campus, every candidate will visit the campus. In previous searches, candidates went incognito to cam-puses, because they have been unwilling to identify themselves to protect their relationships and future at their current institutions.
“Later on in this process is where I think this ad-visory committee needs to make that decision,” Reed said. “If they are doing a really good job, have a good relationship with their board and their chancellor, then it’s putting their future in jeopardy. The reason is, if you have three (fi nal candidates) only one of them can get the job, and then the other two are doing damage control.”
Philosophy major Terence Yancey explained that he has no interest in a presidential candidate who is from the corporate world or afraid to show them-selves to their potential new campus.
“As far as the confi dentially, if the candidate for president is not proud to say that they are a candidate for San Francisco State University, does not want to be here above all else, and is not willing to say this is their fi rst choice and put everything else to the side, then personally, I don’t want them as my president,” he said. “I want the person who’s here to want to be here above all else.”
Although the committee prepared for a large turnout with three overfl ow rooms, limited publicity of the event contributed to poor attendance; only a handful of students were present. Prior to the forum, the only publicity of the event included two tweets from the SF State news page, a campus memo, which is sent to faculty and staff, and a press release on the SF State website issued Feb 7.
As the sole student voice of the advisory com-mittee, Andrew Gutierrez III, president of Associated Students, Inc., mentioned that the publicity of the event was deliberately minimal after a decision by the administration, due in part to fears of a dem-onstration that could jeopardize future presidential
visits.“It’s 10 a.m. on a Monday morning,” Gutierrez
said prior to the start of the meeting. “Of course there aren’t any students here. They (the advisory commit-tee) were concerned about a student demonstration at the meeting.”
Nicole Henderson, SF State alumna and admin-istrative coordinator of the Academic Senate, would like to see more staff and students working collec-tively to send and receive important information such as the open presidential meeting.
Henderson believes that the lack of student at-tendance at the meeting is not only the fault of the SF State administration, but the students themselves.
“We have the student body president sitting on the committee,” said Henderson, 28. “When do the students of San Francisco State University take re-sponsibility? I could have told fi ve people, but there could be a poster in front of your face and you could still not attend.”
According to Achtenberg, the advisory commit-tee has already received recommendations for the president, but no selections have been made yet. A review of applications is the next step, which will be accepted until March 16, followed by resume reviews in a closed meeting March 23.
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1
Few participate in campus president meeting
SOMETIMES LIFE IMITATES ART. Sometimes, art and life become so intertwined, it’s hard to tell which is imitating the other.
Britta Sjogren, SF State cinema professor and award-winning film-maker, finished the production of her fourth film, “Beyond Redemption,”
about bouncing back from difficulties last September.For Sjogren, overcoming the difficulties in making
the film went hand-in-hand with overcoming her own difficulties.
“Everybody has had a traumatic experience in their lives, when you think ‘How can I go on?’ But most of us do go on,” Sjogren explained.
The first two attempts to produce the film were halted; first by a lack of funding, and then by the film-maker’s health.
“I can’t say that I didn’t have moments of great despair,” Sjogren said, “but I’m glad now that I didn’t make it then because I think it is a better film now.”
Soumyaa Kapil Behrens, the film’s producer, has been part of this process since pre-production, and looks back with admiration for what Sjogren and the entire production team achieved. Beh-rens helped Sjogren stretch a $200,000 budget to cover the cost of bringing to the set a cast, crew and two horses, to create the Western look of the movie.
The budget will also cover the post-production of the film.“What we did would normally need four to five times our budget,” Behrens said.Sjogren has been an SF State professor for 12 years. She is an adviser and instructor
for graduate students in the cinema department, and said that they teach her as much as she teaches them.
As a feminist and filmmaker, she advises young women to “feel entitled to go for their passions and to believe that their ideas are worth expressing, and not let anybody tell them differently.”
“I learn things from my students all the time,” she said. “They challenge me.”Through the years, Sjogren noticed that women tend to be more hesitant to call
themselves filmmakers, unlike men.“I have never met a man yet who wasn’t willing to call himself a filmmaker, even if
he made a one-minute film,” Sjogren said.Her feminist outlook has also played a part in her films. Sjogren said she has always
had a clear focus in creating the main characters.
“I want to make films that have women protagonists who are complicated, who are multifaceted, who don’t just represent a political agenda and where their strength and freedom are very much at stake for their journey,” she said.
Sjogren said that her experiences as a filmmaker and teacher have shown her that persistence is key to success.
She sees how young and talented filmmakers might give up too soon or settle for good enough, keeping them from rising to a higher standard. She encourages her stu-dents and all filmmakers to look for projects that they care about with passion so they don’t give up in the process.
“Britta is the kind of professor who really makes you think deeply about what you are trying to accomplish,” Behrens said. “I have seen her really critical of people in class to try and make them answer tough questions.”
Lex Sloan, an SF State masters of fine arts student, had Sjogren during her first year. “She has pushed me harder than pretty much any professor I have had (but) as hard as she pushed us, she always gave feedback to make the story better,” Sloan said.
Sloan also worked on the production of “Beyond Redemption.”“Britta gave me and other students at State the opportunity to see the theory put into
practice,” Sloan said. “Every film I will do in the future will be better because of what I learned in her shoot.”
GOLDENGATEXPRESS.ORG 02.22.12| 5C A M P U S
Cinema professor breaks onto big screen
OFFICE HOURS: Cinema professor Britta Sjogren in her office looking for various photos from her film in her office in the Fine Arts building. Sjo-gren employs the same techniques to her films as she does to her teaching. Photo by Mónica Quesada C./Special to Xpress
Film instructor perseveres through professional and personal setbacks to produce a female-centered piece.
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BY MÓNICA QUESADA C. | [email protected]
NOE VALLEY
Noe Valley’s clean-cut image and wide variety of bistros and coffee shops make this
neighborhood a quiet and quaint haven away from the hustle of the city. With Victorian homes and upscale restaurants lining
its streets, there’s no better way to absorb Noe Valley’s food scene
than to dive into one of its fi ne-dining eateries.
SWEET TOOTH
LOVEJOY’S TEA ROOMHINT: Tea and crumpets seem to
be made for each other. Pair their Afternoon Darjeeling, which is a black tea that carries hints of
clover honey and currants, with their fl uffy crumpets served with
a sweet lemon curd.
1351 Church St.
CHEAP EATS
NOE VALLEY DELIHINT: Despite the word “deli” being tacked onto the name,
this place also serves affordable Mediterranean cuisine. For $7.25, you can get a hefty
shawarma wrap stuffed with hummus, pulled chicken,
tomatoes, lettuce and all the fi xings. A deli that sells falafel?
This is a no-brainer.
4007 24th St.
ROMANTIC
WILDCARD
BACCO RISTORANTEHINT: With made-to-order
risotto, this authentic Italian restaurant would make any date
a success. Be sure to come in during truffl e season when the restaurant serves their famous white truffl e risotto. It’s creamy
with an abundance of rich fl avor.
737 Diamond St.
PASTA GINAHINT: Balancing Jewish and
Italian cuisine with perfect zest, from their homemade kugel to their lasagnas and fresh
pastas, this deli and restaurant is perhaps best known for its
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AN XPRESS GUIDE TO DINING IN THE CITY. COMPILED BY EAST BAY DWELLER AND
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GOLDENGATEXPRESS.ORG A R T S & E N T E R T A I N M E N T 02.22.126 |
WHEN RICHARD ZONA CREATED a music blog as an assignment for class, he didn’t expect for it to turn into a corporation that now spans the country, garnering more than 100,000 views in as little as fi ve months.
Zona, who is a 21-year-old stu-dent at the Academy of Arts in San
Francisco, launched Techibeats.com, a music site for the growing electronic fan base, last September. Within a few weeks he chose a team of six vice presidents for Techibeats, including SF State students Beau Noonan and Grady Brannan, as well as University of San Francisco student Gregory Sills.
“With electronic music coming up right now, it’s kind of like the hot thing,” said Noonan, a 21-year-old broadcast and elec-tronic communication arts major at SF State. “You have all these artists remixing Afrojack and things like that, so we wanted to really hit the college demographic as hard as possible.”
Within a few months, Zona used his network of friends to expand the site to six other states - Michigan, Wisconsin, New York, Oregon, Colorado and Arizona. Each state has two district managers who are in charge of their own group of writers, all of whom are college students.
“It fi rst started with just me, Beau and Gabe,” said Zona. “Now we’re at 32 members across the country. We really had no idea it would get to this point. Now that we do, we’re just going 110 percent.”
Techibeats churns out daily stories about all things electronic music, as well as interviews with established electronic artists from Gregori Klosman and Fatboy Slim to up-and-comers like Pierce Fulton and Stereotronique. But getting these big names to agree to talk is a huge feat, Brannan said.
“It’s basically a big cat and mouse game between us and pub-licists,” said Brannan, a 21-year-old business marketing major at SF State. “And publicists are not the easiest people to work with, so it’s always a constant struggle, and we always bounce ideas off each other.”
Last Thursday, Noonan conducted an in-person interview with
Moby, who has sold more than 20 million albums worldwide and is arguably one of the biggest names in the electronic music industry. Noonan said this was probably his biggest accomplish-ment since being a part of Techibeats.
“When you get out of class, you make that phone call that you need. You call that production person. You call that booking agent. You call that press agent to confi rm something. You go back into class, send out emails,” said Noonan. “That’s constantly happening throughout the day.”
Next month, they’ll be fl ying out to Puerto Vallarta to cover Electrobeach, a six-week electronic music event sponsored by College Travel Experts, as its offi cial partners. Two Techibeats representatives from the University of Arizona are also planning a monthly DJ competition.
“The coolest part is probably being able to interact with the artists themselves,” said Gabe Stansbury, a representative of the University of Arizona’s Techibeats branch.
But managing a music site in six other states that is consis-tently expanding does take its toll. It’s still a struggle fi nding a balance between business and a social life, Zona said.
“It’s addictive. I’m honestly addicted to this job,” said Zona. “I actually just lost my girlfriend just because I worked on it too much. I work on it 12 hours a day. I don’t stop. I wake up to calls from other countries at different times of the night.”
Even with a managerial staff of 32 people across the country, the Techibeats team keeps in contact daily and considers them-selves a huge family despite having not met a majority of the nationwide representatives in person, said Brannan.
“I have friends now at different colleges across the United States. It’s just kind of something cool we built out of our friend-ship,” said Brannan.
Once Techibeats creates a larger following, Zona said they’ll start to manage DJs, which will hopefully lead to the creation of their very own record label.
For Zona, music, particularly electronic music, has always been a huge part in his life.
“When I was in middle school, I would burn CDs and sell them to kids. It’s always been such a huge passion,” said Zona. “Now, I’m just taking it to a whole other level. I feel like I’m do-ing the same thing in middle school, but way bigger.”
BY MATTHEW MAXION | [email protected]
Tech: Blogging on beat
PLAY: Electronic music producer Moby sits down with Techibeats.com for an interview recently before his recent show at Vessel. The website, founded by local students, is rapidly expanding along with the music scene they promote. Photo courtesy of Grady Brannan/ Special to Xpress
GOLDENGATEXPRESS.ORG 02.22.12| 7A R T S A N D E N T E R T A I N M E N T
PREDICTABLE PLOTS, lousy special effects and obvious overacting are just three of many elements that make for a waste of money at the movie theaters. But at
The Dark Room, they are all welcomed with cynicism and open arms for Bad Movie Night.
During the week the small venue on Mission Street hosts a variety of shows, but has been a temple of terrible filmmak-ing Sunday evenings since March 2005.
“That’s what we used to do, sit around and make fun of movies, and we thought it would be fun to turn it into a party and invite an audience to do it too,” said Jim Fourniadis, co-founder of The Dark Room.
The event is modeled after the cult television show “Mystery Science Theater 3000” in which three hosts with micro-phones sit at the front of the room, where they heckle and mock the movie along with the audience. Ira Emsig has been a part of that audience almost every Sunday for the past three years.
“One of the reasons I’m into this so much is I used to watch ‘Mystery Scicene Theater 3000.’ I still have video tapes from taping it off cable,” Emsig said. “That’s where this comes from, that snarky love to make fun of stuff.”
A decade after getting her degree in film from SF State, Sherilyn Connelly, a self-declared film lover, took over as curator for Bad Movie Night. Her job is to gather the bad movies, arrange them into categories and plan when they will show.
“The movies that are the most fun for us are the ones that are goofy and take themselves seriously at the same time,” Connelly said.
Bad Movie Night usually draws in a crowd of about 10 to 20 people, but some movies sell out all 49 of the venue’s seats. “Red Dawn” and “Snakes on a Plane” both packed the theater, and in March 2009 the 1980 musical “Xanadu” brought in a full house, much to the surprise of Connelly.
Each month has a new theme or genre of films.
Upcoming this year are films starring Steven Seagal in March, “The Fast and the Furious” series in July and vampire movies in October.
“If you are coming looking for the well-choreographed or generally socially acceptable comedy, we are not it,” said comedian Mikl Em, who hosts Bad Movie Night on a regular basis. “We’re rag-tag and totally unpretentious.”
When Em is hosting, he’s improvising and usually hasn’t seen the movie before. He enjoys interacting with the other hosts and the audience as they yell out their own crude comments.
For Em nothing is taboo, say-ing that Whiney Houston refer-ences were the go-to joke nearly right after her death. According to Em, celebrity misfortunes always make for great commen-tary at Bad Movie Night.
“We have very black humor at times,” Em said. “God bless
Gary Busey; he’s a wreck of a man and it makes for in-teresting mockery. Ultimately, we are all sort of raging at Hollywood and how ridiculous and overblown it can be.”
Bad Movie night takes place every Sunday night at 8 p.m. in The Dark Room, located at 2263 Mission St. with tickets costing $7. This week will wrap up the superhero-themed month with “X-Men: First Class,” and a compila-tion of humorous spoofs and commentary clips about the movie compiled by Connelly plays 30 minutes before showtime.
BY DEVERY SHEFFER | [email protected]
Bad films and good laughs
A YEARBOOK IS NORMALLY A BOUND publication of photographs, documenting memories to look back on years down the road. But the Musical Yearbook captures memories in a different way.
This new online venture is a social media forum for people to submit recorded essays
about music and the personal memories associated with them. The format is split up into four time frames: first impressions, 8th grade year, college age and the present. People can submit a story that falls within one or more of these time frames, focusing on the personal impact of a specific musician, song, album or musical experience.
These recordings are featured on the Musical Yearbook website as a series of podcasts. The point of each episode is to describe music as it evokes feelings without playing the music itself. The site also has tips for inspiration to facilitate the process of writing a story and guidelines for how to record them.
“Certain songs put you in a specific time and place,” said SF State alumnus Zach-ary Ryan, one of three founders of the project. “You don’t realize the strong connec-tion you have with a musical moment until you start writing about it.”
Ryan and fellow founders Phil Lang, Brock Alter and Sonia D. Pina invite people of all ages, backgrounds and professions to participate in the project.
The four also work at the music company Bamm.tv filming independent musicians live performances, editing the footage and streaming it online. They started recording a series of podcasts to promote bands they had worked with or recorded in the past. The social audio platform SoundCloud featured one of these episodes, and the imme-diate positive reaction sparked the idea to combine music and memories.
“The first feature on SoundCloud got over 1,000 hits,” said Ryan. “We had done this podcast for several months on a bunch of different topics, and Musical Yearbook was the first one to kind of hit with everybody.”
The four founders will present the Musical Yearbook Project at the Noise Pop Cul-ture Club, a series of panels by artists in the music, film, design, art, food and technol-ogy communities, Feb. 25.
“We have a number of Noise Pop artists who are going to participate, and that is sort of the springboard for getting the website together and getting it out to more people,” said Ryan.
Musicians Minna Choi and Annie Phillips of Magik*Magik Orchestra, Thao Nguyen of Thao With the Get Down Stay Down and Caleb Nichols of Churches are scheduled to read their personal music essays and memories at the panel. These recordings will mark the beginning of the on-going project that Lang, Alter, Pina, and Ryan hope will draw in as many participants as possible.
“The motivation behind Culture Club was to get the fans and audience members to interact with artists on a creative level,” said Noise Pop marketing director Dawson Ludwig, one of the organizers of Culture Club.
The ultimate goal for the founders and the Musical Yearbook itself is for people to be able to compare their own reflections with other people’s stories.
“At the end of the day, I don’t know if it’s music recording our lives, or our memo-ries forming with the music, but all I know is that there’s a very strong connection between the two, and it’s a connection that matters,” said Lang.
BY BARBARA SZABO | [email protected]
Casting melody with
memory
REMEMBERING: Founders of Musical Yearbook (from left to right): Phil Lang, Zachary Ryan, Sonia D. Pina and Brock Alter in front of their studio. The online project is a forum for discussing songs and the memories connected. Photo by Juliana Severe
Every Sunday night in the Mission District, cinema fans gather to poke
fun at fantastically terrible films, from cult classics to superhero flicks.
B-Listed: Audience members watch a movie at Bad Movie Night at The Dark Room on Mission Street. The weekly event showcases movies that are notoriously bad to give fans a chance to make fun of them. Photo by Mihail Matikov
GOLDENGATEXPRESS.ORG C I T Y 02.22.128 |
COMMUTERS TIRED OF BART’s carpet-lined com-partments have a lot to look forward to in the com-ing years as the transportation service begins shopping for a fi rm to build new trains, though the consideration of
foreign fi rms to construct the cars has caused some controversy.
The 40-year-old train car fl eet will be complete-ly replaced by one of three foreign fi rms over a 15 to 20-year period for $3.2 billion dollars, accord-ing to BART spokeswoman Luna Salaver. Eighty percent of the cost will be paid for by the federal government, and 20 percent by BART, Salaver said. BMW DesignworksUSA are making initial designs for the new train cars, designs which will be refi ned for engineering details, and manufac-tured by a car building fi rm overseas.
According to Salaver, BART solicited bids from fi rms through ads in international transit maga-zines. French fi rm Alstom, Canadian fi rm Bombar-dier, and Korean fi rm Rotem are the fi nalists being considered. A decision will be made in March.
Although some might look upon hiring a for-eign fi rm unfavorably in this time of fi nancial cri-sis, SF State Assistant Professor of economics Lisa Takeyama said the employment of a fi rm outside of the U.S. is no surprise, as it is a consequence of the country’s ailing competitive market.
“The U.S. simply does not have a comparative advantage in producing these vehicles. The fact
that none of the contract bidders were U.S. fi rms refl ects that,” Takeyama said. “It would not be in our best long-term interest to subsi-dize or promote industries in which we have no competitive advantage.”
SF State civil engineering professor Ghas-san Tarakji agreed that train building technol-ogy in other countries has surpassed that of the United States.
“We ignored trains for a long time, and so most companies ship away their train business,” said Tarakji, who specializes in transportation.
Additionally, BART intends to use federal funds to pay for the billion dollar project. Federal Transit Administration law stipulates the assembly must take place in the U.S., although priority cannot be given to a local manufacturer, according to Salaver.
“If BART intends to use federal funds to help pay for these much-needed new cars, we cannot give preference to a car builder who says they are going to assemble the cars in California or even the Bay Area,” Salaver said.
According to Salaver, companies that offer to use more than the required 60 percent domestic material will be given priority.
To those who would question the pricey over-haul of BART’s trains, Salaver assures the replace-ment is desperately needed.
“We do need to replace all of our trains. We have the oldest train car fl eet in the nation,” Sala-ver said. “It’s not only harder to fi nd replacement parts, it takes more time and labor to keep them running.”
Wherever they will be made, some commut-ers will welcome any improvements to the BART trains. Fransina Savusa, a senior studying political science, recalled an instance when she saw excre-ment on the train ground, and expressed support for newer replacement trains.
“It’s pretty gross,” said Savusa, who commutes on BART nearly every day for work and school. “It’s time for a change.”
BY KATHERINE YAU | [email protected]
BART CARS COMISSIONED TO FOREIGN BUILDERS
There’s nothing quite as nervewracking as a pregnancy scare, frantically questioning if you might have made a baby during your intense, passion-fi lled lovemaking last night. Plan A was using a condom, which didn’t happen. That’s why there’s Plan B.
Everyone loves this widely-available little pill that erases all those potential problems you’d have in nine months. But have you ever stopped to con-sider what damage it might do to a woman’s body?
Lucky for us all, there really aren’t any risks, at least with moderate to light use. The key is not us-ing an emergency contraceptive in lieu of another method of birth control, according to SF State peer sexual health educator Brianna Williams, 21.
“It’s not the alternative for not having safe sex, but it is a good alternative if something does hap-pen that’s why it’s called emergency contraceptive is because it should be used in case of an emer-
gency.”Emergency
contraceptives are designed to prevent the release of an egg or stop sperm from meeting the egg so that a pregnancy that would normally happen, doesn’t. Plan B can also prevent a
fertilized egg from attaching to the uterine wall. It’s most effective when taken within 72 hours of unprotected sex - the sooner, the better.
According to the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foun-dation, Plan B reduced the likelihood of pregnancy by 81 to 90 percent, and 5.1 million women aged 15 to 44 reported using an emergency contracep-tive at least once between 2006 and 2008.
Although no deaths or serious health complica-tions have ever been directly linked to the use or overuse of emergency contraceptives, Williams says that pumping such an increased dose of spe-cially-formulated hormones into the body designed to prevent a pregnancy isn’t a good decision.
“If you’re having to take it very often that’s not good for your body because you’re just taking in more hormones and more; so if that’s the case and it’s not used as a regular birth control, you should get on regular birth control because that would be the better solution,” Williams said. “It certainly isn’t healthy to keep putting things in your body that shouldn’t normally be there.”
No matter what, she says being on a regular birth control method is better than having to get Plan B in a hurry.
“There’s all kinds of anxiety that goes along with that as well as taking these hormones in at the same time so safer sex or a birth control method are more than a better substitute for taking Plan B fi ve times a month,” Williams said.
Emergency contraceptives are available at the SF State student health center through the Fami-lyPACT program for those who qualify, Planned Parenthood and other pharmacies around San Francisco and the Bay Area.
But remember it doesn’t protect you against sexually transmitted infections, that’s what con-doms are for. So don’t be a fool, just wrap that tool!
THE INS & OUTS
A WEEKLY SEX COLUMN BY CASSIE BECKER
Plan B shouldn’t be plan A
Since breaking up with her inner prude, Cassie Becker has done it all. Her interest in sexual exploration has lead her to write several
blogs and break even more beds. She’s
extensively researched and written about it - all with a sexy smile.
NEW DESIGN: The projected design of the new BART trains, which will most likely be primarily built by foreign manufacturers. The trains will be built over the next 15 to 20 years. Photo courtesy of BART
The new Bay Area trains being manufactured overseas have raised controversy, but experts say locals don’t have the ability to compete.
TRANSPORTATION
GOLDENGATEXPRESS.ORG 02.22.12| 9C I T Y
COMMERCIAL dog walkers in San Francisco are apprehensive about a newly-approved city ordinance that will limit them to walking no more than eight dogs at a time in all city parks and will require each walker to obtain a city permit.
The measure, recently passed by the Board of Supervisors, will be enforced starting Jan. 1, 2013 and will require every dog walker to pay an annual fee of $250 for a city-issued permit, which will go to the Animal Care and Control Department. Each walker will also be required to have a leash for every dog being walked, have access to first aid kits for the animals and carry enough water for each dog.
The ordinance will also require new applicants for permits to have 20 hours of approved course training in various areas such as dog park etiquette, safety and fight protocols or complete an approved apprenticeship of at least 40 hours of practical experience working with another dog walker.
Dog walking business owners are hesitant about the ordinance, but think that it does address some valid is-sues.
Julia Frink, owner of Dogwalks, said the dog limit is understandable but she does worry that each of her dog walkers will need a permit.
“I am happy to pay a permit fee for park use but strongly feel the business owner should own and be able to distribute these amongst their dog walkers and not that each individual dog walker will need a permit,” said Frink.
Frink said she was concerned about apprenticeships
becoming a problem for established busi-nesses.
“I feel people will use businesses as mine to get certified, largely at the company’s expense, and then start their own dog walking services, essentially putting com-petitors in business at my expense,” said Frink.
Some were concerned about the effectiveness of walking multiple dogs.
“I welcome dogs in our parks,” said Supervisor John Avalos before the Board approved the proposal. “But I think there are limits a person who has eight dogs can do in taking care of them.”
Avalos said that on a daily basis he and his children have to watch where they step all around the Excelsior Playground.
“We have a problem in this city that I don’t think this high number of dogs per walker really is able to address,” said Avalos.
Other commercial dog walkers were concerned about the dog cap and how it would affect their businesses.
Rob Kwant, co-owner of Who Let The Dogs Out! Dog Walking company, said his main concern was the limit being proposed because a reduction of dogs being walked means a reduction of revenue, which significantly affects their livelihood.
He said their revenue goes back into the local San Francisco economy and community, which would also be affected.
Kwant was not concerned about the requirements to get a permit because any responsible company would have their walkers well-trained. He said the main people representing dog walkers, like Angela Gardner from the Professional Dog Walkers Association, fought hard trying to get the highest possible number of dogs to be permit-ted at a time.
Residents who live near dog parks were persistent in trying to get the limit as low as possible. Some neighbors wrote letters to several supervisors explaining that they have to deal with constant barking for several hours every day. Neighbors also wrote that dog walkers should be held accountable for the trash and feces they fail to pick up.
Mandy Smith, 20, a pre-nursing major, said she never saw a lot of dog walkers when she lived in the city. She said she understood the city’s point of view but thought it was up to each individual’s personal responsibility as to how many dogs they should walk.
“It’s however many that person can handle,” Smith said.
Avalos said at the meeting that he had reservations about the number of dogs per walker but felt the rest of the ordinance was strong.
“I think the rest of this legislation is really strong,
BARK PARK: Dog walker Jean Kind takes her client’s pups to Sigmund Stern Grove. Starting in 2013, professional dog walkers will need to limit the number of canines they walk at one time as well as require dog walkers to obtain a $250 annual permit. Photo by Cindy Waters
R u f f restrictions for dog walkers
BY ANA PREZA | [email protected]
32,000 readerswill see this
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GATORS’ SPORTS
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WEDNESDAY, FEB. 22
WOMEN’S BASKETBALL
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MEN’S BASKETBALL
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Calif.)
FRIDAY, FEB. 24
BASEBALLSF State vs. Chico
State at 2 p.m. (Chico, Calif.)
WOMEN’S BASKETBALL
SF State vs. Cal State LA at 5:30 p.m. (San
Francisco, Calif.)
MEN’S BASKETBALL
SF State vs. Cal State LA at 7:30 p.m. (San
Francisco, Calif.)
SOFTBALLSF State vs. Cal State San Diego at 12 p.m. (San
Francisco, Calif.)
SATURDAY, FEB. 25
SOFTBALLSF State vs. San Diego State at 11 p.m. (San
Francisco, Calif.)
BASEBALLSF State vs. Chico State at 11 a.m. (Chico, Calif.)
SUNDAY, FEB. 26
BASEBALLSF State vs. Chico State at 11 a.m. (Chico, Calif.)
Feb. 18 vs. Cal State Dominguez Hills
Feb. 19 vs. Cal State Dominguez Hills
Feb. 16 vs. Humboldt State 34-51
SCORES FROM THE LAST WEEK OF GATOR
SPORTS
Feb. 17 vs. Cal State San Ber-nardino5-2
Feb. 11 vs. Cal State Monterey Bay57-76
Feb. 18 vs. Cal State San Ber-nardino1-11
Feb. 18 vs. Cal State San Ber-nardino7-8
LOSS
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WOMEN’S BASKETBALL
Feb. 17 vs. Cal State San Ber-nardino6-7
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Feb. 17 vs. Cal State Dominguez Hills4-11
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Feb. 18 vs. Sonoma State University43-46
WIN
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LOSS
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PLAYERof the
WEEKAJ ALMAREZ
BASEBALL
Junior infi elder AJ Almarez has been chosen as the Xpress Player of the Week. In the last two games against Cal State Dominguez Hills, he had three RBIs and drove in six runs to contribute to the Gator’s consecutive wins. At the plate, Almarez was fi ve for six and scored three times.
PHOTO BY TYLER DENISTON/SF STATE SPORTS
GOLDENGATEXPRESS.ORG S P O R T S 02.22.1210 |
Feb. 18 vs. Sonoma State Universtiy61-77
Feb. 17 vs. Humboldt State University82-75
MEN’S BASKETBALL
LOSS
WIN“No fi nal decisions have been made about who
will have access to the building beyond students,” said Ajani Byrd, director of campus recreation. “Ideas (dealing) with alumni, faculty, staff and community members have not been established yet.”
The administration recently chose the current site of the Sutro Library over the currently aban-doned School of the Arts site after the University determined that the Annex was too expensive to tear down.
“Sutro allows for outside components nearby to be built,” said Guy Dalpe, student center managing director. “The visual components are nice, you can see the ocean.”
The various groups spearheading the project still have some major decisions to make in the up-coming years. After selecting the Sutro Library site, the next step is to hire an architecture fi rm to design the center, after which the various amenities and recreation and wellness rooms can be determined.
According to Byrd, the student fees are fi nal and the total projected cost will be between $80 million and $93 million. Future student enrollment, labor costs and the price fl uctuation of various materials will affect the ultimate price tag.
“It’s around a $90 million building,” Byrd said. “We have a budget, and we have to work within it or (students) vote to raise the fees.”
Franko Ali, vice president of university affairs for Associated Students Inc., said the project is 100 percent paid for by the student fee. The recreation department has put up the bond for construction and the money is a part of the student center ac-count, held by the University.
“The only funding is from the student fees,” Ali said. “And in that way, it will be run by students.”
The fee proposal originated as a petition formed by the students who brought it to an advisory com-mittee. Campus recreation, ASI and the student center got involved by working together to create a series of questionnaires before Fall 2010 to fi nd out student interest in creating the center.
After a student poll approval, the advisory committee brought the proposal to President Robert
A. Corrigan, who approved it for the Fall 2010 semester.
Despite the additional costs of building the cen-ter, students who participate in club and intramural teams generally feel that additional space is needed and would allow a wider array of physical activi-ties.
“I’m excited. I’d rather pay for this than a lot of other things because our facilities are really old,” said Samantha Rogers, the 22-year-old president of the women’s club volleyball. “But I’m sure a lot of people are not looking forward to the extra (fees).”
Others students feel that the money would be better served abridging some of the negative effects of the current budget crisis.
“I feel like that’s going to be a lot of wasted money,” said 21-year-old Mindy Gaines, a creative writing major. “Hell, we could just not have that fee increase at all.”
Though the center is still in the developmental stages, there are some features that are likely to be included. The current plans allocate 8,084 square feet for a multi-activity court that can be used for basketball, volleyball and other indoor sports.
Additionally, 18,000 square feet are committed to a weight and fi tness space and 5,500 will be al-lotted for three multi-purpose group fi tness studios, according to the most recent site analysis report.
“Nothing is fi nalized yet. We’re still in the early stages,” Byrd said. “A lot can change between now and 2015.”
In addition to recreational and wellness-based features, the plan allows for 13,180 square feet for events, including fl oor space and a stage.
“I want a place where students can socialize and have that student experience, a chance to get away from academics and take a break from studying and enjoy physical activity,” said Ryan Fetzer, intramu-ral and sports club coordinator.
Dalpe maintains that many of the decisions will ultimately come down to the students because they expressed a need for a new recreation center.
“The reason this fee is in place is because we did listen to students,” Dalpe said. “You’ll be pay-ing into it but you won’t have the luxury of using it. Students have to extend themselves for the future of (the) campus and students.”
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1
STUDENTS WON’T SEE COMPLETED REC CENTER
SHARED SPACE: SF State’s men’s volleyball club coach, Eric Ballelos, jumps up for a spike in a scrimmage. The team has limited time to play in the Gym, as they share the facility with the numerous sport activities. Photo by Sam Battles
GOLDENGATEXPRESS.ORG 02.22.12| 11O P I N I O N
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GODOFREDO VASQUEZ MEDIA EDITOR
Recreation center an arbitrary indulgence
KEEPING STUDENTS OUT OF THE LOOP
ART BY SARA DONCHEY | [email protected]
SF State seems eager to � nd new ways to yet again fail to include students in the new presidential search.
SF State hosted the � rst and only public forum to discuss the selection of presidential candidates Monday, Feb. 20.
For an event with this kind of signi� cance, it is more likely that the 31,990 students that missed out did so not because they did not care, but because they did not know about it.
According to California State University spokeswoman Stephanie � ara, it is the school’s responsibility to publicize the event.
If you ask the SF State University communications department whose responsibility this is, you will get another story.
Spokeswoman Nan Broadbent noted that, “� e chancellor’s o� ce’s job is to run the entire search. � e chancellor’s o� ce does everything.”
Broadbent also expressed that the University “felt good” about the e� orts that were made to publicize the meeting, stating, “we felt we had covered all the bases.”
“My understanding is that the measures we took were the right measures to take,” said Broadbent.
If administrators consider a turnout of 10 students out of 32,000 a success, they would probably struggle to pass basic math classes at their own universities.
SF State’s feeble attempts to “publicize” this important gathering
included sending an email to faculty and sta� , posting a bulletin on the University website and sending a few sentences to a local wire service, who chose not to publish the story.
You cannot call yourself a communications department if you are unwilling to communicate.
� ere are a multitude of things the University could’ve done to make the meeting more visible and accessible to students.
� e University chose to host the meeting in the Seven Hills Conference Center, a very removed and little-known part of campus, instead of selecting a central and visible campus venue like any of the various conference accommodations in the Cesar Chavez Student Center.
� ere should be some attempt made to reach students directly, and SF State already has the tools in place to do so.
During a brief power outage Feb. 17, students were inundated with emails, texts and voicemails from the University alerting them of the issue. For this event that a� ected a mere 30 minutes of students’ lives, the University unleashed an arsenal of information. But for a decision that could change the face of SF State for the next twenty years or more -- silence.
� e University cannot blame this failure on student apathy if stu-dents were never given a chance to be apathetic in the � rst place.
While President Robert A. Corrigan’s new pet project, “Student Voices,” enjoyed front-page publicity last week in the San Francisco Chronicle as a way for students to voice their frustrations about CSU fee increases, another forgotten confl ict over fees quietly continued its path through student pocketbooks.
The Student Recreation and Wellness Cen-ter, a student-funded project that will increase the space for club athletic groups and student use, was initially approved by Corrigan in March 2010 after a much-protested proposal by Associated Students, Inc.
The complex, which currently carries an estimated price tag of $80 million on the low end and $93 million on the high end, is being funded by a gradually increasing fee that will be generated solely by students. For this year, students paid $35 each semester. That will jump to $90 each semester for the next academic year, and an appalling $160 each semester by the fall of 2015.
The process of approving the fee was met with resistance in 2010. There was heated discussion surrounding the way that ASI side-stepped a student referendum to approve this fee. This argument has passed its expiration date. However, it is still worth debating what can be done to repair the damage and drop these fees.
According to those spearheading the current plan to construct the building on the site of the still-functional Sutro Library, the fee is set in stone.
That is not entirely true.The fee was approved by President Corrigan after meeting with an
advisory board comprised of ASI members, the Cesar Chavez Student Center and Campus Recreation representatives. This campus-based fee is enacted at the president’s discretion. What those involved fail to mention is that President Corrigan has the opportunity to repeal this fee.
According to the SF State Catalog, the University president may revisit campus-based fees either upon the suggestion of an advisory board or other sources if he so determines.
We’d like to step in and advise the president on this matter.While the idea of a new center to support student health and well-
ness is an admirable goal, students simply cannot afford it right now. It’s time to revisit this fee before we break ground on a project that is simply beyond our means (and wallets).
If you have been saving up for a new car and lose your job, guess what? That new car fund is suddenly re-named the rent fund.
For students who are so strapped for cash that they are willing to walk out, protest and write their legislators in anguish over a $500 tuition increase, an increasing fee that will in short time amount to $320 a year is just too much.
Additionally, when ASI proposed this project, it was said that alumni would have access to the facility, perhaps with a nominal fee attached. Now, even that access is in doubt.
Now we’re paying for something that most students currently at-tending the University won’t even see to fruition.
Mr. President, while we know that you are reaching the end of your tenure, please take a moment to think about what this money means to students, and reexamine this luxury that we cannot bear the burden of paying for.
This is simply just too much.
STAFF EDITORIAL
STAFFEDITORIAL
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