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The (Bamecock Proposals would change disclosure requirements by Brandon Larrabee The Gamecock ^ A change in the number of contributions candidates must report and the way they report them were among possible reforms brought up at a meeting of Gov. Jim Hodges’ campaign finance reform task force Tuesday. One of the proposed changes would make candidates report contributions if the donor gave a certain amount over the course of a year. Currently, candidates must report donations only if the donor exceeds a set amount with a single contribution. “This is a big leap here,” said Laurel Suggs of the League of Women Voters. Task force members batted around numbers in the $200-250 range. But they all agreed candidates should report the numbers if the money is given over a set period, not just in one lump sum. “It’s got to be aggregate,” John Crangle of Common Cause said. Task force members also agreed that full disclosure should be one of the recommendations. Currently, Hodges and the Republican-controlled legislature are wrangling over a full-disclosure bill, specifically over who should be covered by the bill. Similar arguments sprang up in the task force meeting. J. Sam Daniels, executive director of the state GOP, said the bill should apply to anyone who spends more than $500 to affect an election. “Anybody that is trying to effect the outcome of an election... they should have to disclose,” he said. Cathy Hazelwood, counsel for the Ethics Commission, who was asked to speak to the committee about the possibility of online disclosure, disagreed. “I think you should be a player, and I don’t think $500 makes you a player,” Hazelwood said. Hazelwood had earlier told task force members about the commission’s efforts to move candidate filing and disclosure onto the Internet. Though the General Assembly didn’t fund the proposal, partially because of the budget cuts, the commission will again propose it next year, Hazelwood said. According to Hazelwood, it would cost $300,000 to set up the system. After that, it would take about $18,000 a year to run the system. It would take about six to seven months to create. The commission wants to start the system in order to keep up with the enormous number of paper filings they deal with, particularly as elections approach. “As we go into the next gubernatorial race, they just mushroom,” Hazelwood said. ‘Anybody that is trying to effect the outcome of an election ... they should have to disclose.’ J. Sam Daniels Executive Director, State GOP. ' y One advantage of the system is that it would prevent candidates from filing incomplete forms, Hazelwood said. Currently, if candidates leave a space for the address or other information about a donor blank, the commission must return the form to candidates and give them 30 days to respond. That process is necessary for 25 percent of the forms turned into the commission, Hazelwood said. The commission oversees and audits the filings of all candidates, except members of the General Assembly. Those members must file with the House or Senate Ethics committees. The task force also set a time for a public hearing on some of the issues it’s discussing. That meeting will take place from 6-8 p.rn. March 20 in the USC Law School Auditorium.* The city/state desk can be reached at gamecockcHydesk@hotmail.com Space from page 1 at least six space stations and 10,000 people living in space. However, such a memorable vacation wouldn’t come cheap, Meyers said. He said his group had surveyed possible space travelers, who said they would be willing to pay $2 million to $5 million to make the trip. Even at these prices, seats would be scarce. “Even if we build a fleet of space stations, the latest number of people we’d take up would be 100,000 a year,” Meyers said. In the central part of the station, there would be zero gravity, enabling people to float around and preventing the use of ordinary furniture. Special chairs, tables and beds would have to be designed for this area, but Meyers said the lack of gravity might provide a special incentive for couples. He said the station might create the first “400-mile-high club.” In other sectors of the station, there would be partial gravity, where patrons would only weigh a third of what they do on Earth. “It would look like you’re in a slow-motion world,” Meyers said. The practical repercussions of the project are staggering. Meyers said his company had been in talks with Carrier Air Conditioning to create a comfort system for such an unusual structure. Otis Elevator had also been contacted to design an unprecedented, corkscrew-type elevator that would keep people from feeling queasy from the combined effects of low gravity and spinning in space as the station rotates. Meyers said while prices might be in the millions at first, they are likely to fall to about $25,000 for a week in space by 2012. He said the price would be worth it for the gain in * perspective people could get. “You’ll be up 400 miles above the Earth. You'll be able to see how small your problems really are from that altitude,” Meyers said. The university desk can he reached at gamecockudesk@hotmail.com ADA * from page 1 there was no money attached to it to make changes,” Pettus said Because of costs and lack of staff, repairs to handicapped accesses can take between two and four weeks. “If someone reports it to us, we will make every effort to get it repaired,” Gist said. According to Donna Collins, director of Planning Services for the Office of Facilities Management, repair expenses are taken out of the maintenance budget, which is “slim to none.” Pettus said USC, or any other college, doesn’t receive a “dime more, whether they have one handicapped person or 500 handicapped people.” There’s a variety of funding, including donations from the president’s office for academic services, such as payment for note-taking and other related services provided to handicapped students by the university. When the Office of Disabilities or Office of Equal Opportunities receives a complaint, it’s reported to Facilities Management and assigned to a maintenance crew depending on. the repair. “We try to be as responsive as we can,” Collins said. Certain accesses, such as automatic doors, require parts to be ordered, which can make the repairs take considerably longer, for example. Awareness of services is sometimes limited, according to Pettus. She said parking is a problem, but many handicapped students don’t know about the adapted van the Office of Disability Services provides. It’s based at LeConte and available from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday. “Once we get people hooked up (to the van), they.’re like, ‘This is so much easier,”’ she said. Prioritizing repairs is sometimes exasperating for Pettus because students don’t understand why their particular needs aren’t being immediately met. “People look at things from one perspective,” Pettus said “When you’re the person that needs the ramp, you think your need is more important.” Purchasing from page 1 comment on the indictments. Witkoski said the university wants everything connected to that case to come from university media. The institute is staying with its safety methods as of right now. “We will continue to follow the university guidelines and procedures,” Witkoski said. The Purchasing Department handles all buying procedures for USC, from dormitory furniture to scientific supplies to computers for classrooms. They process direct expenditure vouchers from all university departments. If a department has a need, the office files a purchase requisition with appropriate signatures and account information. The buyer puts it on a mainframe, which creates the purchase order made out to the vendors. An invoice is made and the account is opened. The Purchasing Department then gets the purchase order back overnight, and the buyer signs it. Lyles said anyone from her department couldn’t simply walk in and create a purchase order. “There are safeguards built in,” she said. When asked about the indictments, Campbell said the fraud would be in the authorization. The Controller’s Office has three areas: accounting services, which the travel office is in, payroll and contract and grant accounting. The office receives any student or faculty-related expenses and processes them. VVfe make sure all controls are in place and authorizations are there,” Campbell said. The authorizer can be a dean or department head. If there’s no authorization from the department for travel, then there’s no approval front the Controller’s Office, ^ according to Campbell. He said if there is * authorization and it’s false, the department that sent the voucher is at fault. The authorization is the office s safeguard. “We depend on the department head’s authorization of the travel,” he said. When the traveler or organization returns, they provide receipts for their expenditures. “We will not reimburse over that amount,” Campbell said. If the traveler has spent more than authorized, the office could reimburse the amount “as long as somebody’s signing off on it,” Campbell said. If something’s way out of line, of course we question it,” he said. He referred to high mileage allowance for short trips. 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