Mirror - Vol. 02, No. 12 - November 9, 1978

              TRAFFIC APPEALS BOARD BUSY
Parking Problems Denied
by Tony Tarnell
Established four years ago, the
Traffic Appeals Board is empowered
to hear appeals of traffic and parking
violations which occur on the Fair-field
University campus. The board,
chaired by Mr. Paul J. Marchelli, has
been the recipient of much criticism.
As detailed in the pamphlet; "Your
Car on Campus,"..Tickets may be
appealed to the Traffic Appeals
Board within 10 days of issuance, un
less there are proven extenuating
circumstances making timely ap-peals
impossible." A failure on the
part of the student to meet this re-quirement
results in the offending
students forfieture of the appeal
priviledge. As noted by Mr. Marchelli,
Chairman of the Traffic Appeals
Board, "the pamphlet goes into
acute detail to explain the various
traffic violations for which the stu-dent
can be held accountable for."
The main problem, as pointed out
by Mr. Marchelli, seems to arise from
the issue that once ticketed by the
Security Ddpartment, the student or
any other violator feel, "that they
have been ticketed unfairly, thus
detailing the exhorbitant montly task
the Security Department goes
through in attempting to collect the
fines for violations."
Mr. Marchelli detailed that, "the
majority of the student parking viola-tions
arise from the idea that
students feel that their car will get
vandalized, or perhaps stolen if park-ed
in assigned areas, or from the stu-dent
myth that there is not enough
student parking on FairfieId
Campus."
For the first problem that arises,
Marchelli explained, "there is no
middle of the road." He went on to
comment that "one is either illegally
parked, or one is not illegally
parked." Parking in an area other
than that stated on the registration
sticker on each car, is a parking
violation, resulting in a $3.00 fine.
Marchelli noted that, "there is plenty
of parking space on campus if the
students are willing to walk a little."
Marchelli detailed that virtually every
day, two of the three Northwest Hall
parking areas are almost entirely
empty.
When presenting his or her appeal
to the board, which is comprised of
three students, and three ad-ministrators,
the student is asked
several questions by the board, the
student than leaves the room while
the board deliberates on the events,
than the student is recalled, and
handed down the decision. All in all,
one appeal takes approximately 7-10
minutes.
On September 29th, the Appeals
Board met for the first time for this
school year. The board heard 24 ap-peals,
of which 9 were dismissed.
October 27th marked the second
meeting of this semester. At this
meeting thirteen appeals were
presented, of which nine were
dismissed. The next time the board
mets this semester will be December
first. Also, next semester the Traffic
Appeals Board will meet three times,
the Scheduled dates are; January 26,
March 16, April 27.
"We (the Appeals Board) are
pleased with the turnout this year at
the meetings" noted Marchelli. He
continued that "last year, the Ap-peals
Board hear a total of nine
cases." Paul Marchelli
THE
FAIRFIELD Volume 2, No. 12, November 9,1978
FAIRFIELD UNIVERSITY, FAIRFIELD, CONN. 06430 MIRRORIncorporated 1977
Peace Petition
Signed at U.N. Day
Beautiful weather & passing visitors like these have blessed the beginning of November. With Old-Man Winter on
his way, students should take advantage of the remainder of the Fall.
Connolly Elected President
of Legislature
by Robert J. Schumm
The student Legislature re-elected
Jim Connolly to serve as is its presi-dent
for this school year. Connolly, a
junior finance major, defeated Bill
Burland, the only other candidate
nominated for the office.
In the past, Connolly has been
pushing for increased awareness by
students for the Legislature.
"Students are starting to realize the
potential the Legislature has. I hope
to continue this trend."
"There are a lot of good proposals
this year. Combined with the positive
attitude the legislators have, this
year should be a good one. The Food
Committee is presently looking for
alternatives to the present meal plan
system," explain ed Connolly.
He continued that "the students
here are skeptical of anything that is
untested. The Legislature has to pro-ve
itself before it will get the respect
and backing of the students."
"I'm looking forward to this year.
In the past, the presidency has been
kind of a 'revolving door.' My job is to
gain respectability of the Legislature;
and as a two-term president, I think
that I can provide a coherency."
In other actions, the legislature ap-proved
the fall semester budgets of
the Explorers Club, the Youth In-volvement
Council (YIC), the Interna-tional
Relations Club, and B.L.A.C.
Each of the budgets were passed
with a majority roll call vote.
The legislature also elected as its
secretary for the forthcoming year.
(Jean Albrecht, a representative
from Campion.)
In addition, a report from the
President of FUSA, Vinnie O'Brien
stated that the executive branch is
presently working on a proposal that
would increase FUSA's budget for
upcoming years. "In the past Fr. Fit-zgerald
and the Board of Trustees
have been unreceptive to the idea.
Now, they understand the problems
of working with a fixed budget whose
figure (50,000 dollars) was set many
years ago. With inflation, the amount
given us is just not enough to carry
out all that we should," explained
O'Brien.
O'Brien also explained that the
Smorgasborg, originally set for
tonight, has been moved to
November 30. "The date chosen was
also '200 nights' for the senior class.
By moving it back we feel the atten-dance
should be better."
The legislature is planning to hold
an open meeting in the Oak Room,
on Dec, 6. Connolly feels that "this
will enable students to see their
elected representatives at work, and
hopefully will lead to an understan-ding
of the legislative process."
Jim Connolly
by John Hughes
A petition reflecting the "Swords
into Plowshares" theme of the re-cent
U.N. Day Conference held at
Fairfield was received by the White
House on Monday, November 6. The
petition stressed the need for a re-
-direction of funds from
Connecticut's "disproportionately
large arms industry" to peaceful pur-poses.
It was signed by over 200 of
those attending the Conference, held
in Gonzaga Auditorium on U.N. Day.
October 24, to help commemorate
the 33rd anniversary of the birth of
the United Nations.
The theme of the second annual
U.N. Day Conference held by the
Connecticut Division of the United
Nations Association-U.S.A, under the
chairmanship of Ruth Steinkraus
Cohen, is stated in the prophecy of
Isaiah: "...they shall beat their
swords into plowshares and their
spears into pruning hooks". The
theme was symbolized by Joseph
Volz of Mahopac, New York, a
blacksmith who set up his forge and
anvil near the Campus Center and
demonstrated his skills through out
U.N. Day, as a crowd of students and
faculty looked on.
The Conference, whose master of
ceremonies was Herbert L. Cohen,
Chairman of the Board of the Univer-sity
of Bridgeport Law School, began
at 10 a.m. and lasted until 5 p.m.
Seven featured speakers addressed
an audience of 400 people. Present
were university students and faculty,
press representatives, members of
community organizations and the
general public, from Massachuset-tes,
New York, Maine, Virgina,
Washington D.C., and 28 Connec-ticut
towns and cities.
The morning session (10 a.m. to
12 noon) dealt with the "Swords"
aspect of the Conference, when the
three featured speakers gave details
of the dominance of the country and
specifically of the state of Connec-ticut
as arms supplier to the world.
Rev. George Mahan, S.J., Assistant
to the President, Fairfield University,
gave the prayer for U.N. Day, calling
for the attendants to "give heart to
those who will lead the way to new
conquests of ignorance and fear".
Tom Gervasi of Newsweek, author
of "The Arsenal for Democracy",
spoke of the domestic and foreign
arms sales and of the increase in the
likelihood of war due to the spread of
conventional weapons. Ann Crit-tenden,
Reporter, N.Y. Times spoke
on the "Impact of Military Spending
in Connecticut", reporting that the
state has the highest per capita level
of defence contracts, specifically "7
percent of the gross state product is
weapons and 27.7 per cent is involv-ed
in defense-oriented products."
Gordon Adams, Director of Military
Research, Council of Economic
Priorities, professor at Rutgers
University, spoke on corporate diver-sification
as it relates to defense
spending.
The afternoon session of the Con-ference
focused on the
"Plowshares" theme when the
speakers gave their views on how
action at the state, national, and in-ternational
levels might turn Connec-ticut
around from concentration on
armaments to production for
peaceful purposes. Among those
who spoke at this session were
Adalyn Davis, U.S. Arms Control and
Disarmament Agency, of
Washington- "Dealing with the Rus-sians
in Salt II", Irving Stolberg of
New Haven,- "Our responsibility in
the Connecticut legislature", and An
thony Toby Moffet, U.S. Con-gressman,
6th District, of Union
ville- "Turning bombs and bullets in-to
books & bread".
Petition signed by over 200 of
those attending the U.N. Day
Conference on Oct. 24 at Fair-field
and sent to the White House:
"Whereas, we in Connecticut,
with our disproportionately large
arms industry, are apt to be prime
targets in the event of a nuclear
war, and
Whereas, our relatively heavy
economic dependence on arms
production makes us accutely
aware of the need for federal
planning for conversion from
arms production to production for
civilian needs, we
Therefore petition the U.S. Con-gress
and President Carter to act
favorably on a conversion pro-gram
such as that proposed in
the bill drafted by Representative
Christopher Dodd."