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jsdaywednesday m t I editorial The unopened doors For a former saloon-keeper whose vision of the city includes nicely-decorated McDonald's restaurants downtown and the removal of skid row bums from his so-called theater district, we expected a throaty chuckle from Buffalo Mayor James Griffin at the notion that utilities should be owned by the people who need them to live. THAT BRIGHT THING? THAT'S CALLER THE saK. LEGEND HAS IT Such is the leadership in the city of Buffalo, where racism, anti-intellectualism, and political patronage have more influence on municipal government than urban planning of any kind. Griffin's refusal to spend $100,000 for a study on municipal ownership of utilities is typical of the arch-conservative, visionless stances that have tunneled this city into one of the darkest futures in urban America. The private utility system in this country and particularly in Western New York has long ago violated the trust placed in it by governments and citizens — a trust ripped to ribbons last winter with the news that three elderly persons froze to death after National Fuel Gas turned off their heat. It is becoming clearer every day that utility companies serve not the interests of their customers, but the portfolio of their stockholders as one of the most capital intensive industries around today. Until the stockholder is removed as a competitor, the citizen will never be served by private utilities. He will be used. Enter University district councilman Eguene Fahey and his idea to take a sophisticated look at municipal ownership of gas and electric utilities. The study was approved by the Common Council and stopped, semi-legally, by Jimmy Griffin. Hence Griffin has not even allowed Fahey to accept and exercise the burden of proof. Such a shielding of the status quo is nearly impossible to penetrate; is destructive to any coherent urban policy for the future; and ought not to be tolerated in a city still gasping for life. And it cannot be separated from what Jimmy Griffin represents: Buffalo English Dept, misrepresentation To the Editor 1 but roughly 1 student per faculty, that is, to a bit over 14-to-l. *■ love it or leave it. There are a thousand ways to kill a city; half of them doors that are never opened. I'm very distressed at the front page story of Monday. 22 January about the Fnglish Department facing “faculty and pay cuts.\ There are several statements which very seriously misrepresent our relationship to our colleagues university-wide and to this university's budget process. First of all, your reporter describes a stormy meeting which broke up in angry disorder. No such meeting was held by the Fngtish Department last Friday. I suppose there may have been individual anger but if so it was never apparent to me. The meeting as a whole proceeded with a remarkable lack of negative spirit or indeed, spirit of any sort. From my vantage point in the front row at one side, I watched colleagues address reasoned inquiries and observations to Deans Blackhurst and Levine. The dialogue turned, after an hour or so. to special curricular questjons largely among members of the department. Thereupon, since it was close to 5 p.m., most of the faculty and students seemed spontaneously to have decided it was time to go home. Never mind in particular the mistake in placing Dean Levine at a departmental Executive Committee meeting he did not attend; never mind the confusion about whether we are establishing 100 sections of freshman writing for next fall (as alleged) or whether we would need to establish something like that number if a university-wide English requirement came in as part of General Education (as 1 actually stated.) The more important error, which continues from the front, page part of the article onto the second page, is a similar confusion not only of numbers but of what is with what might be. The number 582 is the number of additional FTE students the Vice President is demanding from Arts and Letters, not the number this move will give him! Putting 12 MFC English courses on-load would yield not that number but something probably less than half that number; and the university faces not the certainty - reportedly not even the likelihood - of faculty line cuts totalling 80 to 90 positions. Rather, that is a possibility. And in anticipating a lesser but likelier number of cuts to be designated arbitrarily by the Division of Budget, the Vice President is arbitrarily demanding that the Arts and Letters Dean plan in terms of 10 lines this year and 29 lines in the next 2 or 3 years. English is the largest department in Arts and Letters, if not In the university, and hence provides an obvious target for arbitrary numerical stipulations. There was almost no discussion at the meeting of quality and preserving quality. That may be why my colleagues so dis-spiritedly drifted onto particular curricular questions and out into the snow. In a nutshell This University has spent ten years debating the merits of the four course load, two years deciding how to rid itself of it, one year preparing to erase it and one week — no more — studying if the whole idea is within reason. Burden of proof is suddenly irrelevant, given these facts. The Spectrum Vol. 29, No. 51 Wednesday, 24 January 1979 Factually your reporter errs in speaking twice of greater “allocations\ to the department somehow following from the shift of Millard Fillmore slots to regular department budget. The only thing greater that will follow that move will be a “greater” student faculty ratio. The loss of opportunity for extra service compensation will have effects on the department which no one - certainly no Dean - can predict with certainty. Your reporter says 10 faculty line cuts are to be assumed by Hnglish. Has she read the Vice-President’s mind? Public statements in the meting and elsewhere referred to 10 line cuts to be assumed by Arts and Letters. The shift of our 25-to-l MFC ratio to the department’s regular budget will raise the department’s ratio not to 25 to Editor in Chief Jay Rosen Managing Editor Denise Sturnpo Business Manager Bill Finkelstein Advertising Manager Jim Sartes Office Manager Hope Earner Production Manager Andy Koenig Art Director Rebecca Bernstein News Editor Daniel S. Parker Backpay Campus Larry Motyka Elena Cacavas Kathy McDonough Mark Meltzer City Joel Dimarco Composition .... Marie Cairubba Curtiss Cooper Kay Fiegl Contributing . . . . Tom Buchanan . Diane LaVaUee _ Harvey Shapiro . . . Bob Basil .John Glionna Rob Rotunno . . Rob Cohen . ; . . . Vacant . . . . , Vacant Prodigal Sun Lester Zipris Arts Joyce Howe Music . ., Tim Switala Contributing . Ross Chapman Special Feature Susan Gray Aset Brad Bermudez Special Protects Vacant Sports David Davidson Asst Paddy Guthrie Layout National Photo Gale H. Carrithers. Jr. Chairman, Department of English Faatura Asst. the Spectrum is served try College Press Service, Field Newspaper Syndicate, Los Angeles Times Syndicate, Collegiate Headlines Service and Pacific News Service The Spectrum is represented for national advertising by Communications and Advertising Services to Students, Inc. Circulation average 15,000 The Spectrum 'offices are located in 355 Squire Hall, State University of New York at Buffalo, 3435 Main Street, Buffalo, New York 14314. Telephone (716) 831 5455, erfitonal; 17161 831 5410, business. Copyright 1979 Buffalo, N Y The Spectrum Student Periodical, Inc Editorial policy is determined by the Editor in Chief Republication of any matter herein without the express consent crfjhe Editor in Chief is strictly forbidden Apology Monday’s front-page article on the English department, entitled “English Dept, faces faculty, pay cuts” was, because of errors, grossly unfair to Dean of Arts and Letters George Levine. The errors and misrepresentations are explained elsewhere in this issue, but The Spectrum would like here to extend a full and sincere apology to Dean Levine for the very unfortunate article.
