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www.dailygamecock.com MONDAY, DECEMBER 2, 2002 Since 1908 Students to decide elections date i * • FILE PHOTO BY CANOI HAUGLUM/THE GAMECOCK Adam Bourne, last year’s Student Government Elections i commissioner, announces the results of last year’s race. If the upcoming amendment to SG’s constitution passes, elections might not be held until after spring break. Vote could move SG elections to two weeks after spring break BY KATHERINE HALLORAN THE GAMECOCK Students will vote online at VIP on Wednesday and Thursday to decide when Student Government elections will be held. The vote will center on remov ing the part of the SG constitution — article V, section 2, line 1—that requires elections to be held be fore spring break. Brooke Vickery, 2003 Elections commissioner and a fourth-year marketing student, proposed the legislation to move the elections date so that the elections process would be more efficient. Vickery researched other in stitutions’ election processes and thinks the change would give stu dent-body representatives more time to complete projects, such as initiatives and fund-raisers, and would shorten the transition be tween administrations. “I am hoping that students will see the great benefits of this change, want to see it pass and vote for it,” Vickery said. She said that under the current process, it is hard to continue working when new representa tives come in and must get accus tomed to their responsibilities. If the amendment passes, elections Proposed Dates If a vote passes to amend Student Government’s constitution, these dates will be followed: ♦ March 3 - Informational meeting ♦ March 4-5 - Filing for office ♦ March 18 - Candidates’ meeting ♦ March 31-April 1 - Elections ♦ April 3-4 - Possible run-off will be held March 31 through April 1. The Elections Commission could return to the earlier election date if things do not go as planned. “We want to try and see if this works,” Vickery said. Second-year biology student and College-of Science and Mathematics Sen. Tricia Daniels thinks the new legislation could increase voter turnout. “Hopefully, more people will get out and vote,” Daniels said. “I think more people would vote be cause they wouldn’t be anxious to leave for spring break and would be around campus.” Daniels said ♦ ELECTION, SEE PAGE 2 meeting of the minds 1 USC’s quiz-bowl team works its way up despite little funding BY ADAM BEAM THE CAMKOjCK A profile of a quiz-bowl enthu siast usually follows the tune of someone growing up watching “Jeopardy” and dreaming of one day becoming the master of triv ia. Not so with David James. The third-year history student ► and president of USC’s quiz-bowl team grew up with a less-than-ide al view of the famous quiz-game show. “T xnnll.. 1 ilrn if V»A\I7 tViOU --- A VUUJ liikv — - -- -*/ give away $1,000 to answer these easy questions,” he said. While James has been answer ing “easy” questions on “Jeopardy” since middle school, the USC quiz-bowl team has also been answering its fair share of quiz-bowl questions, earning it a high reputation, though it’s only 8 years old. Former USC student T.C. Ford founded Carolina’s quiz-bowl team in 1995, and six years ago, the team rose to a top-five ranking in the Academic Competition Top 25 I Poll. The team now sits 25th, right 7 behind the University of Pittsburgh. “They voted us 25th, but by the end of the year, if they do it again, I’m sure we’ll be a lot better,” James said. That’s because this year, the team drove all the way to Iowa State for a tournament and came in second out of 15 teams. It also came in second at a tournament in ♦ QUIZ BOWL, SEE PAGE 2 Holtz gets vote of confidence The university extended USC i head football coach Lou Holtz’s contract on Tuesday. He is now signed until 2007, which gives him five more years with the Gamecocks. Carolina missed out on a bowl this season, in which it went 5-7, but Holtz Is determined to get the team back in the postseason. “You take your bounces and you hope to get back up,” he said during his final weekly news conference. ♦FOR FULL STORY, SEE PAGE 7. 1 PHOTO BY CANDI I HAUGLUM/THE GAMECOCK . Grant will keep water-research center open BY EMMA RITCH the qamecock An $800,000 Department of Energy grant will keep USC's Center for Water Research and Policy open through September 2004. Tom Temples, the center’s di rector and a USC research asso ciate professor in the School of the Environment, said, “This is an opportunity to continue the work we’ve been doing.” The Center for Water Research and Policy “would have probably gone away” without the grant, but “now we can continue our work and hopefully expand our program,” he said. Temples said that with the DOE grant, the center will “work on developing a groundwater model to pump and treat water.” The grant will also help the cen ter extend its research capacity and develop bioremediation tech nology to enhance the abilities of natural systems to clean con taminated water. The DOE grant will go to the water-research center, the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, the School ol Geological Sciences, the Norman J. Arnold School of Public An $800,000 grant will allow the center to continue its research. Health, and the Health Sciences Department, Temples said. He said the Center for Water Research and Policy is the “co ordinating organization for the multidisciplinary water research on campus.” The center works with groundwater, he said, such as that in Lake Murray and the DOE’s Savannah River Site. Temples said the center em ploys “new technology using buffering systems to control the pH of groundwater.” PH is a mea sure of acidity. The center is also researching the growth of hydrilla, an aquat ic bacteria, in Lake Murray. Temples said U.S. Sen. Fritz Hollins was essential in helping the center receive the grant. “He worked with the DOE to get fund ing appropriated for us,” Temples said. Hollins said, “This funding will enable the center to build on its impressive track record and continue its important research on the water and ecosystems af fected by the Savannah River Site.” The Center for Research and Policy began with a DOE grant in 1997. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecockudesk@hotmail.com Index Comics and Crossword 6 classifieds_ 9 Horoscopes_ 6 Letters to the Editor 4 Online Pol]_ 4 Police Report 3 Weather TODAY TOMORROW — High 58 High 58 Low 38 Low 44 Today ♦ ON THE WEB Read state, nation and world briefs. www.dallygamecock.com ♦ VIEWPOINTS Adam Hark questions the role RHA is playing at USC. Page 4 ♦ THE MIX Poetry gets a different approach from the Down South Syndicate and its troupe of slam poets. Page 5 ♦ SPORTS The women’s basketball team upsets No. 18 Boston College in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Page 7 Kenya alone to investigate hotel attacks BY MATTHEW ROSENBERG THE ASSOCIATED PRESS MOMBASA, KENYA - Kenya will not heed Israeli demands to turn over some evidence in the attacks on an Israeli-owned hotel and an Israeli jetliner, saying Sunday it would conduct the in vestigation alone. The Israeli de fense minister said al-Qaida was the main suspect in the attacks. The dispute threatened to de lay the investigation into the sui cide bombing Thursday of an Israeli-owned hotel, which killed 15 people, and the failed downing of an Israeli charter jet moments earlier. American and Israeli leaders both questioned Kenya’s abili ty to conduct a thorough probe. Kenyan po lice officials said Israeli anfhnritioc want to take pieces from a four wheel-drive Mitsubishi Pajero that exploded outside the hotel on Thursday, killing 10 Kenyans, three Israelis and the bombers in side. Israel also wants the launch ers and missile casings from shoulder launched rock ets thought to have been used in the failed at tempt to shoot down the Israeli phortor nlono “None of this evidence is going back to Israel. This evidence is our responsibility,” Kenyan bomb “None of this evidence is going back to Israel. This evidence is our responsibility.” CHARLES JAMU KENYAN BOMB SPECIALIST specialist Charles Jamu said. Raanan Gissin, spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, said from Jerusalem that Kenya had been cooperating “up to now,” but that the Kenyans weren’t prepared for the investi gation. “They were not geared to this kind of a threat dr they don’t have the necessary resources or tech nological capabilities that would enable them to deal with that,” Gissin said. ♦ KENYA, SEE PAGE 2 ■■■■■■■■■■■MM