Serving UNC students and the University community since 1893 Volume 121, Issue 28 dailytarheel.com Thursday, April 11, 2013 System to pick new chancellor Friday A committee has been searching for a successor since October. By Amelia Nitz Staff Writer After months of uncertainty surrounding who will succeed Chancellor Holden Thorp this summer, the UNC-system Board of Governors will select the next chancellor Friday. Thorp announced his res- ignation in September, and a 21-member search committee New led by UNC Board of Trustees Chancellor Chairman Wade Hargrove formed one month later. But every meeting of the committee since March 11 has been canceled, sparking rumors DTH/ERIN HULL that the committee had already chosen the three 25-year-old freshman Houston Summers is a javelin thrower at UNC. Summers has overcome a tumor and has played professional baseball. candidates it would recommend to the Board of Trustees for approval, before sending names to UNC-system President Thomas Ross. Kenneth Broun, former Chapel Hill mayor and a member of the selection committee, said the group of candidates was even deeper than the HOUSTON LIFTS OFF applicant pool when Thorp was selected. “I served on the last selection committee, and By Robbie Harms four. His love for the sport only grew, and JOE HILTON INVITATIONAL the number of very good people was even better Senior Writer when he was 10 or 11 he attended the North this time,” Broun said. Carolina Baseball Academy, an instruction- Time: All day Saturday On Friday, Ross will present his nomination in It was ambition that powered him al institution that attracted top talent from Location: Finley Fields and Irwin Belk open session to the Board of Governors, who will past a benign head tumor, softball-sized around the state. Track then vote whether to approve the candidate. and requiring 16 hours of surgery, and it Summers is never satisfied with the But just who that candidate is remains was ambition that landed him a spot on status quo, his 5-foot-11, 180-pound frame Info: http://bit.ly/11WLXwv unknown. The closed search process for the next a Division-I roster of a sport he’d never forever looking for the next challenge, so chancellor resulted in an extremely tight-lipped played. playing at the academy with and against the Months of rehab ensued. committee that offered few clues — other than Houston Summers is a freshman javelin state’s best was natural. He had a dream, “The only thing I can’t do is cry out of the number of candidates being considered — as thrower on the North Carolina track and Major League Baseball, and he pursued it my right eye,” Summers says now, laughing. to who might fill the position. field team, a psychology major on the pre- relentlessly. “That’s not a bad consolation.” But some members of the committee did dis- medical track with one minor in chemistry “He loves to compete with himself,” Some would have given up, succumbed cuss the quality of candidates being considered. and another in medical anthropology. said Gary LaRocque, the senior adviser to the tumor. It had the opposite effect on He’s also 25 years old, a former profes- for player development for the St. Louis Summers: a new dream was planted. He SEE CHANCELLOR, PAGE 8 sional baseball player and a jack-of-all Cardinals and a longtime friend and men- was going to be a doctor. trades athlete that leaves one former coach tor of Summers. “It takes a certain kind of heart and THE ROAD TO A NEW CHANCELLOR asking, “Good grief, what can’t he do?” At Northwest Guilford High School, the desire,” said Steve Merriman, a Kansas pursuit continued. Summers would catch City Royals minor league pitching coach The September 2012 announcement that The pursuit for the first four innings of the Vikings’ and one of Summers’ baseball mentors. Chancellor Holden Thorp would resign launched a games and pitch for the last three. “Houston’s a pretty focused young man.” search for his replacement: Summers was born in Summerfield, a Another thing happened at Northwest small town just north of Greensboro that, Guilford High School — a tumor formed ‘A man’s game’ Oct. 8, 2012: The search committee holds its according to its website, is “respectful of on Summers’ head. Juvenile nasopharyn- first meeting, led by Board of Trustees Chairman its past but focused on the future” — nine geal angiofibroma, they call it. It started In June 2005, Summers’ phone Wade Hargrove. words very applicable to Summers today. as a sinus infection, progressed and left He started playing T-ball when he was Summers hospitalized for several weeks. SEE SUMMERS, PAGE 8 March 11: The committee meets for the final time, leaving a month before Friday’s meeting. Inside O∞cials begin planning for light rail of the 17.3 mile light rail connecting applied for federal funding. The COUNTY LIGHT RAIL CIRCUS FREAKS ARE The planning phase will UNC Hospitals to East Durham. Federal Transit Administration ON STAGE IN ‘VENUS’ cost $30 million over the will look at financial liability, envi- Questions of funding ronmental impact and demand to 30 months The department of dramatic course of 30 months. determine the merit of the project. length of planning phase art’s production of “Venus” Bonnie Hauser, president of the And while transit officials won’t brings the freak shows of the By Jenny Drabble rural advocacy organization Orange know whether the project will receive Staff Writer County Voice, said she worries the federal money for several years, $30 million 19th century to the Kenan study will be irrelevant by the time Hauser said she is doubtful the light cost of study Theatre. Page 3. The opening of a controversial the county starts building the light rail will get the money it needs. light rail in Orange County is likely rail — a transit system she says is “When they started studying still more than a decade away — but already outdated. transit, light rail was the panache, $5 million transit officials have now moved into “As far as these studies, the plan but that was 20 years ago, and today generated from tax increase a $30 million planning phase. we are working on is already out of light rail is no longer popular and During the phase, which will last date,” she said. “The real question it’s too expensive,” she said. “There 30 months, transit planners will to me is what is going to happen to are larger towns farther up in line, 2026 evaluate specifics of the light rail’s the money we’ve put aside if federal and their projects are more justified projected opening date route and environmental impact funding can’t be secured.” because their cities are bigger.” using funding from the county’s According to plans for the light Hauser said she thinks a bus rapid ‘A major variable’ half-cent sales tax increase that went rail, 25 percent of the capital costs transit system would be more likely into effect April 1. for the project will be paid by to receive federal funding. David King, CEO and general The tax, approved by voters in Orange County, 25 percent by the Bus rapid transit uses bus lanes and manager of Triangle Transit, said if November, is expected to generate state government and 50 percent by priority signaling at traffic lights to the project doesn’t receive federal about $5 million a year — half of the federal government. provide faster service in dense areas — UNC NOTCHES WIN which will go toward the creation Triangle Transit has already for a portion of the cost of a light rail. SEE TRANSIT, PAGE 8 AGAINST LIBERTY A day after walloping Elon, UNC’s baseball team beat Lib- UNC system to make plans to attract more veterans erty 7-5. Colin Moran blasted a fifth-inning grand slam for the The Board of Governors Wilmington and president of the The UNC SERVES initiative, a great starting point and continues Tar Heels. Page 4. university’s Student Veterans of started to assist student veterans, to be the foundation upon which we will meet today to discuss America chapter, said techni- has produced a resource guide and are building,” she said. cal, online and for-profit schools will unveil a website at the meeting. Beall said topics to be discussed Today’s weather veteran affairs. appeared to be more actively recruit- Ann Marie Beall, director of at the meeting include projects still ing veterans. military education for the system, in development, such as a series of It’s hot. You should By John Howell Jr. “I don’t think there is enough said this is a timely topic because of online modules. totally tweet it. Staff Writer advertising for the UNC school the large military population in the The modules will provide tips to H 83, L 65 system as a whole for veterans,” she state. veterans about applying, enrolling When Jenna Drescher transi- said. According to a report by the sys- and achieving academic success at tioned out of the Marine Corps to The system’s Board of Governors tem’s General Administration, North UNC-system schools, she said. Friday’s weather begin college, she almost didn’t will convene today at UNC- Carolina is one of the top five states Beall said another challenge the know attending a UNC-system Pembroke to discuss more ways to for active duty, guard and reserve system faces is addressing mental #Warm #Weather school was an option. attract and support veterans like populations.