&F trojan
Volume LXXXVIII, Number 32 University of Southern California Thursday, March 20, 1980
Port plan excludes marine center
Facility may operate under amendment
Staff photo by Wayna Lavtna
JUST DROPPING IN — J. Robert Fluor, chairman of the Board of Trustees, flew in yesterday from his headquarters at the Fluor Corporation in Irvine.
By Tim Lynch
Staff Writer
The California State Coastal Commission excluded the university marine research center from its master plan for ports Wednesday, but the agency agreed to a request by the Los Angeles Harbor Department to consider adopting an amendment that would allow the $700,000 research facility to operate in the port.
"Our decision keeps the door open for the university," said Bill Ahem, a member of the commission. "If the amendment had not been accepted for consideration, that would have been it. They (the university) would have had to take their building down."
The commission will meet in mid-April in Los Angeles to hear arguments on whether to adopt the amendment.
Two weeks before, the South Coast Regional Commission will meet to decide if the university should be granted another permit to resume construction of the research center, which was about half completed when the commission re-
voked the first permit.
The university, by law, had to notify all landowners and tenants within 100 feet of the proposed construction site about the research center. The operator of a nearby ice house did not receive notification, he told the commission, and the agency revoked the construction permit.
"Our failure to notify him was not our fault," said Don Walsh, director of the marine research center. "The harbor department provided us with what we were told was a complete list of individuals to notify. The ice house operator was not on that list."
Authorization of a second permit will likely be contested by a group of fishermen, because the research facility would displace the only ice house available in the port.
The harbor department condemned the old research center because it was structurally un-
safe, and offered the university a land lease for the new center in an area adjacent to the ice house, which would then have to be destroyed.
Since the harbor department has not made any provisions for a new ice house, the fishermen have taken a firm stand against construction of the research center. If they contest the second permit, the issue would go before the state coastal commission within a month.
"It's not a happy situation," Walsh said. "We've been in the harbor about 70 years, training marine scientists and serving the community. The harbor department did not include us in its (master) plan, but it's pretty obvious we need access to the port. You can't train marine biologists or aid the port's users from Salt Lake City."
The university is not to blame for its problems with the harbor department and the fisher-(Continued on page 7)
Cuts in centennial plans made due to tight budget
DT corrections of athletic story
FOR THE RECORD:
There were three inaccuracies in Monday's story concerning the misuse of federal funds on the part of Jeff Birren and John DeBross. Birren, academic ad-
viser to the athletic department, and DeBross, debate team coach, lost their jobs for trying to give 34 football players credit for speech courses they were not attending.
It was reported that DeBross had recruited the former debater who was not identified in the article to compete for the debate squad. The debater, (Continued on page 7)
STUDENT COMPLAINTS
Guest speakers replace teacher
An instructor of a Political Science 100 class was replaced by guest lecturers last week as a result of student complaints.
Three students representing the interests of the 300 enrolled in the class approached John Schmi-dhauser, chairman of the political science department, alleging that the professor was incapable of conducting the class.
Schmidhauser said he then met with the instructor, Fernando Padilla, to discuss solutions to the students' complaints. They reached a mutual decision to replace him, out of fairness to the students and the instructor, Schmidhauser said.
"The action that I took was to protect the integrity of the young scholar (Padilla) and the interests of the students," Schmidhauser said, adding that the replacement of Padilla may not be permanent.
The department plans to make a final decision concerning the quality of teaching and the role of other factors in Padilla's performance. The department may reinstate Padilla into the introductory class if his final accreditation is positive, Schmidhauser said.
Padilla joined the political science department in the fall of 1979.
A number of students in Padilla's introductory class were jubilant when they learned of Padilla's replacement.
Lisa Jamner, an undeclared sophomore, said that she was pleased that Padilla had been replaced.
"He (Padilla) didn't seem to know what he was talking about. His lectures had no outline," said Jamner.
(Continued on page 6)
By Darren Leon
The Centennial Planning Committee has had to cut many of its planned celebration activities and has reassessed the entire centennial program due to a lack of funds and the university's tight budget.
"We are adjusting our own priorities while we are continuing to make plans under a revised approach," said Vance Peterson, director of Centennial Planning and Academic Relations.
The committee was given an $800,000 spending ceiling last summer by the Executive Committee of the Board of Trustees, who has now reassessd the value of the centennial celebration because of an all-around tight budget for the university, Peterson said.
"The initial efforts were based on the $800,000 but the new fiscal realities do not make it appropriate to spend on a celebration," he said.
The trustee committee advanced $100,000 last summer to Centennial Planning to get it off the ground but by February
Market investments yield $5 million for university
By Steve Stem
Staff Writer
The university made approximately $5 million last fiscal year and will make an estimated $6 million at the end of this fiscal year by investing part of the total university's cash flow in various money markets, according to Peter Chueng, deputy treasurer and director of the asset management office.
John R. Curry, director of management planning, said any investment income goes back into the operating budget where it is used to pay for expenditures such as salaries, utilities, supplies and services, and social security, retirement and health plans.
"We have to spend it (investment income), to reduce expenditures," Curry said. "If we didn't spend it, we would have an expenditure that we would have to make up through other revenue sources."
Last year's operating budget was $169 million, 80% of which came from tuition receipts.
There are basically two ways a college or university can operate their budget, Curry said. "They can increase services and have a larger expenditure budget, or decrease services and have a lesser tuition rate. The choice of this university has been to use investment income to increase services."
Unfortunately, investment income is not enough to offset a 12% inflation rate and soaring utility costs, which when taken together, account for a $17 million increase over last year's operating budget.
Chueng said that approximately $50 million in university assets are now tied up in investments. He said two-thirds of that $50 million are invested in certificates of deposit and banker's acceptances, which are interest-yielding instruments issued to money lenders by banks that use merchandise for collateral.
The remaining one-third of the investment balance is used in purchases of interest-yield-
ing commercial papers, treasury notes, and federal agency notes, Chueng said.
He said that during the five years he has been here, his investment returns have amounted to an estimated $15 to $18 million profit for the university. He attributes part of his success , to a program he developed to centralize the university's cash flow. "The whble idea about cash management is to centralize your cash in one place so that you have a maximum amount available for investment."
The university uses 20 different bank accounts to coordinate its overseas operations, he said. (Continued on page 2)
all of that money had either been spent or was committed.
The money needed for Centennial Planning must be new money collected from donations with "the good will and enthusiasm of our best friends," Peterson said.
Pres. John R. Hubbard, an ad hoc committee of the Board of Trustees, and members of the University Affairs Committee (Toward Century II) have been trying to find money from outside the university and ar? continuing to do so, Peterson said.
According to Peterson, the ad hoc committee is looking for donors other than those who have already given gifts to Toward Century II. None of the planning committee's funds will be from tuition or general funds.
One centennial project that may be cut is a 32-speaker symposium series. The series would bring distinguished scholars at an approximate fee of $3,500 each, to discuss future intellectual dilemmas.
A prehomecoming game parade and a civic dinner are other probable cuts from centennial committee plans.
To better promote the centennial, there will be a new emphasis on media programming that will provide a gift to the city as well as showcase the faculty, Peterson said.
"One of the media programs being planned is a series, televised on KCET, of one-hour segments that will assist the public with various subjects that are problematic. The public can telephone in and it's free," Peterson said.
"We will focus on those kinds of public relations activities without harming us (financially)."
Toward Century II is a nonce-lebrational project that raises funds for programs, buildings, and school furniture. None of (Continued on page 7)