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INSIDE THE MlJt Art museum > 1 WJc± April 242002 4 VoL 95’Na 86 captures Southern photography * V V V/U.11VUU.CIJ University of South Carolina ♦ www.dailygamecock.com AMECOCK Meal plan options head off campus Company’s dining service puts Five Points on a meal card BY ADAM BEAM THE GAMECOCK It’s a joke seen all the time at Five Points. Some wise guy pulls out his USC student ID to see if the restaurant will let him pay with his meal plan. But this won’t be a joke after July 1. The Five Points Meal Plan, an alternative off-campus meal plan for USC students, will go into effect this summer. Off Campus Access, a start-up com pany founded by two University of Virginia graduates who saw the potential in off-campus din ing services, brought the idea to USC. “We’re a private company that comes in to universities,” said Cade Lemcke, co-founder of OCA. “What you find a lot of times is that the administration is open for that. They want to see their students happy and eating well.” After opening an OCA ac count, students get meal plans based on a $6.75 per meal esti mate. The plan doesn’t have a price limit for each meal, but a security feature won’t allow ex cessive amounts of money to be withdrawn at one time. “For students in our other markets, it’s easier for them and their parents to understand if we use that average, $6.75 a meal, to give parents a guideline if their student was going to eat 18 meals a week down at Five Points,” Lemcke said. “Roughly, that is how much a meal plan would cost.” Businesses were approached several months ago and asked to sign a contract for either 18-, 30 or 42- month periods, with an op tion to extend the deal. Lemcke said restaurants would decide whether the card could be used for alcohol, but he said using it solely for that pur pose would not be accepted. “We stay away from alcohol issues,” he said. With family in South Carolina, Lemcke said his fa miliarity with USC and Five Points brought him here. Five Points “has great restau rants and students like to go eat there. But they only go eat there on their birthday or if they’re on a date,” Lemcke said. “So we go down in there and talked to stu dents and restaurants and saw very good combination and made it happen.” One of those restaurants was Leo’s Wings, which is located on Sumter Street. Manager Walter Reen said that USC students ac count for 30 percent of his busi ness. We 11 be trying to nook the students up because we know it’s rough being a student,” Reen said. “We’re going to run special deals to get the students in here, giving them a break.... It should help our business a lot.” OCA has similar alternate . plans at the University of Tennessee and Towson University in Maryland. Although Lemcke said it’s too soon to judge the venture’s suc cess, he thinks the hits his week old Web site has received show that students are receptive to the idea. “For them to have a variety of meal choices almost 24 hours a day, it’s very catchy,” he said. The idea is so catchy that Beezer’s co-owner Lori Perkins ♦ MEAL PLAN, SEE PAGE 2 FILE PHOTO/THE GAMECOCK Some Five Points restaurants will offer meal plan options starting July 1. The Gourmet Shop, shown here, is not currently included on the plan. PHOTO COURTESY OF KRT CAMPUS The Catholic Church has been rocked by allegations of sexual abuse by priests. Pope calls abuse a ‘sin’ Pope condemns child abuse in strongest words yet to American church leaders BY RICHARD N. OSTLING THE ASSOCIATED PRESS VATICAN CITY - Decrying sex abuse in the church as a sin and a crime, Pope John Paul II told American church leaders Tuesday there was no room in the priesthood "for those who would harm the young." But one of the cardinals at tending the emergency meeting said the pope may have left some leeway for wayward priests who repent and undergo treatment to resume their ministry — as long as they had no contact with chil dren. The Done’s laneuaee was his strongest yet on the molestation scandal that has convulsed the' Roman Catholic Church in the United States since January. American prelates appeared to take his words to heart, making progress toward an agreement on a new plan of action. The pope’s use of the word "crime" seemed to end any linger ing debate on whether U.S. bish ops should refer abuse accusa tions against priests to secular au thorities, as many are now doing. The Americans worked until 10 p.m. Tuesday on a commu nique expected to come at the close of the two-day summit Wednesday. After the meeting, Cardinal Francis George of Chicago said in an interview with The Associated Press that whatever comes out of this week's gathering will be part of the process in which all the U.S. bishops will set a new policy to gether in June. John Paul’s talk to the Americans, delivered in English, had a striking gloves-off tone com pared with many papal utter ances. ♦ POPE, SEE PAGE 3 Putting it off until the very last minute PHOTO BY GINNY THORNTON/THE GAMECOCK First-year pharmacy students Khushali Shah and Nicki Desai study in Thomas Cooper Library on Tuesday night. Classes end next Wednesday and final exams start a week from Friday. Study reports on the habits of procrastinators BY KEVIN FELLNER THE GAMECOCK With exams coming up in a week, some students might think they have plenty of time to study. And a media company in Houston thinks they might do better if they follow that philos ophy. The second annual College Procrastination Study, released by Questia Media, reveals that about 71 percent of self-pro claimed procrastinators have a GPA of 3.0 or higher. The com pany polled 190 undergraduate students who claimed to be pro crastinators. But most of the participants still think their strategy doesn’t work. Seventy-two percent of procrastinators think their be havior contributes to lower grades, while 22 percent feel it has no effect at all. Only 6 per cent believe it brings them high er grades. The study also said that 95 percent of respondents said they procrastinated “very frequent ly.” And 66 percent confessed to procrastinating in other aspects of life, such as paying bills or running errands. Seventeen percent of respon dents said they would rather watch paint dry than write a re search paper for a university course. Surfing the Internet is the most popular alternative to writing a paper, with sleep com ing in second. Eleven percent of students spent time thinking of ways to get out of writing pa pers. Sports are the most popular television programs to watch to avoid work. Reality shows and cartoons are also favorites of procrastinators. First-year history student Ryan Eubanks considers him self to be a procrastination ex pert, and his GPA is higher than ♦ STUDY, SEE PAGE 3 Patel removes senator from panel Lack of support on bill prompted his dismissal BY BRANDON LARRABEE THE OAMECOCK A commission looking into ways to improve Student Government elections has be come a center of controversy af ter SG President Ankit Patel’s de cision to remove the senator who had chaired the panel. Patel said he removed College of Liberal Arts Sen. Zach Scott from the Elections Reform Commission because, Patel said, Scott lied about his vote on the Public Endorsement Prohibition Act. defeated in Senate last Wednesday. Scott said he spoke and voted against the act because it hadn’t gone through the Finance Committee. But Patel said that Scott had assured him he would vote for the bill. “He has lied to me and mem bers of my staff and fellow sena tors,” Patel said. In a brief e-mail to Patel dated April 15, Scott wrote, “Good ... then you’ve most likely got my I vote” on the bill. Scott also tried to cut Patel’s executive report short after the president had discussed the leg islative codes with senators. Scott said he had found the re port “condescending.” Patel said that showdown | wasn’t the reason for Scott’s dis missal, but he said it was an ex ample of how Scott has acted to ward his administration. Pofnl olor» coiH flWtinrt roform was an important element of his campaign and he wanted people on the commission that weren’t attempting to draw attention to themselves. “It’s something very impor tant to me personally, and I don’t want to see it tainted by Zach’s political ambition,” Patel said. Patel replaced Scott with Elections Commissioner Brooke Vickery, who had served on the commission when Scott was chair. Patel said he had advised Vickery against naming Scott back on the commission, though he sdid she could if she wanted. Patel said he trusts Vickery. “I think she’ll do a fine job in putting the reform package to gether,” Patel said. Scott said he never guaran teed Patel his support on the en dorsement bill. “I never promised Patel my vote,” Scott said. Scott said he had sent Patel that e-mail after Patel told him the majority of the Senate backed the bill. ixc uxuxx i xxxiu uui uxc xxiajux 1 ty consensus of the Senate,” Scott said. “He got a few people to make it feel like a powerhouse.” Scott said he had also received negative feedback on the bill in conversations with constituents and a USC administrator. Scott said he didn’t contest the bill’s actual policy but that he had problems with Patel not seeking the Finance Committee’s advice. “My entire point was that he disregarded the committees, he disregarded two sections of the codes,” Scott said. Patel insists either he or the ♦ REMOVAL, SEE PAGE 3 TODAY’S WEATHER: Thunderstorms. High 78, Low 55. TOMORROW’S WEATHER: Scattered thunderstorms. High 77, Low 54.