Mirror - Vol. 25, No. 11 - January 27, 2000

              The Mirror
FAIRFIELD UNIVERSITY
Volume 25, Number 11 The Image of Fairfield Thursday, January 27, 2000
Candidates rise to the challenge
FZJSA. F*residenticzl Hopefuls debate tHe issues
By Karen Affinito
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
On January 24, the campus cen-ter
was not only the home of the usual
Monday afternoon traffic, but also this
year's FUSA presidential primary debate.
For the election of 2000, five members
of the class of 2001 took on the challenge
and ran for the highest office in the
Fairfield University Student Association.
Juniors, Adam Franco, B.J.
Galvin, Kevin, Hayes, Matthew
Moschitta, and Felipe Polanco repre-sented
the class of 2001 in the presiden-tial
race. Galvin was not present at the
debate.
Five panelists representing dif-ferent
organizations in the Fairfield
community questioned the candidates
on issues such as school spirit, athlet-ics,
beach/town relations, alcohol poli-cies,
and parking and construction prob-lems.
It has never been a secret that
beach students are often associated with
a negative connotation. Polanco felt that
bringing back the town relations branch
of FUSA would be the beginning of re-pairing
this image. "We need to get our
name out there and focus on the good
things about Fairfield students,"
Polanco said.
When questioned on the effi-ciency
of the health center and its ser-vices,
Moschitta felt that there should
be a doctor on-call 24 hours a day in
case of emergency. "I would like to cre-ate
a department in my cabinet to handle
health services," Moschitta said. "I
hope this problem comes to me, because
I'll solve it."
Hayes was receptive to the
idea that FUSA was not student-friendly
and agreed that there was a problem
photo: Nick Ouimct
Adam Franco, Matthew Moschitta, Kevin Hayes & Felipe Polanco
with that. "I've been on FUSA since
freshman year and many of my friends
don't know a lot about it," he said. "I
agree that it is not understood by most
and I'd like to change that."
The number and success rate
of student activities has no doubt been
a problem on campus. Franco ad-dressed
this concern. "I think that ad-vertising
is the key to successful stu-dent
events," he said. "I want to also pro-mote
that beach residents are included. "
Hayes agreed with that idea, and
also felt that there is great importance in
the success of student events. "It's so
important to publicize these events," he
said. "'Posters and many types of public-
See "Tough" on pg. 2
Could it happen here?
Seton Hallfire raises questions concerning Fairfield's sprinkler systems
By Lori Rizzo
NEWS EDITOR
The elements of the story sound too
familiar. A late night fire alarm. Tired stu-dents
remaining in bed, annoyed at the
thought of going out into the cold. Adorm
building without sprinklers.
The ending to Seton Hall's tale is a
terrible one; three eighteen-year-old boys
died, and close to 60 others were hospi-talized
when a fire began in the third floor
lounge of their dorm building (Boland
Hall) last week, according to the New
York Times.
The fire at Seton Hall has prompted
some Fairfield students remember the fire
in Jogues Hall last May. "If they didn't
catch it, we could have been in the same
boat," said Christy Martin, a junior who
lived in Jogues last year. "It makes me
realize that when a fire drill goes off you
should really go outside instead of sleep-ing
in your bed or hiding in your closet
It's hard because you have so many fire
drills with drunk people pulling alarms,
liii.
Photo: Mirror archives
Jogues Hall, the site of a frightening fire last May
you can't take them seriously."
One student who was injured in
the Seton Hall fire expressed similar
views. "When I first heard the alarm, I
thought 'I'm not leaving.' I mean, there
are so many alarms," freshman Marissa
Lorenz told the Associated Press.
In turn, the tragedy has brought
about questions concerning sprinkler
regulations nationwide. Fairfield Uni-versity
Fire Marshall, Joseph Bouchard
explained that presently there are only
sprinkler systems in Regis and Loyola
halls. And, although neither Jogues nor
Boland halls are equipped with sprin-kler
systems, present building codes do
not require them to be.
A survey which was prompted by
the Seton Hall fire found that out of 57
colleges in eight states, 67% "had at least
one dorm without sprinklers" and 37%
"considered false alarms a problem," said
the New York Times.
According to Bob Schlink. a Con-necticut
State Fire and Safety Inspector,
dormitories constructed on or after 1973
require sprinkler systems if their height
is over four stories from the lowest level
of fire department vehicle access. Al-though
Jogues Hall is over four stories
(due to access through the ground floor
in front of the building), it was con-structed
in 1968, prior to the addition of
the sprinkler law in 1973. In fact, accord-ing
to state law, not one of the dorms on
Fairfield's campus technically require
sprinkler systems.
Schlink commented that although
the Connecticut law has not been revised
since 1973, many colleges across the state
have begun to take matters into their own
See "Fire" on pg. 2