e OBSERVERTuesday, September 9, 1997 • Vol. XXXI No. 12 THE INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER SERVING NOTRE DAME AND SAINT MARY'S 0 CONSTRUCTION BEAT Students voice approval of renovations Despite mid-game flood, students are happy with By DEREK BETCHER Associate News Editor Not even the unexpected addition of a third campus lake could mar Saturday’s rededication of Notre Dame Stadium. Although plumbing problems flooded the lower concourse with up to two inches of water early in the second quarter of Saturday’s contest, student and administrative reaction to the inaugural game in the new stadium has been positive. “Generally, everything went very well. The water is, of course, a problem we’ll be addressing,” summarized Mike The Observer/Kevin Dalum Smith, director of facilities engineering. Tours of the newly renovated Notre Dame Stadium were given to Notre Dame and local community members last week. Contrary to rumor, a burst water main did not cause Saturday’s flooding; eventually triggering the flooding. the toilets, in fact, need full water pres­ closed valve. overflowing toilets did. The problem “Once pressure dropped, all of the sure to shut off, DeLee explained. “It may have been closed last winter began when valves were mistakenly toilets began to run wide open instead “If I had to guess, I’d say 1,200 gal­ when the stadium was winterized, but left closed on one of the two six-inch of just flushing and stopping. They then lons a minute — possibly more than I’m not sure why it wasn’t reopened,” water mains which service the stadi­ overflowed,” explained director of facil­ that — were spilling into the con­ Smith said. um. With the one water main shut off, ities John DeLee. While attributing course,” De Lee estimated. It wasn’t University officials will meet today water pressure in the stadium dropped Hooding to a lack of water may counter until roughly 2:30 p.m. that plumbers to half of what it should have been. intuition, the flushing mechanisms on were able to locate and reopen the see STADIUM / page 4 G ifts for a Ju stice WVFI hopes for FM status by fall of 2000 By HEATHER COCKS News Editor The road to a berth on the FM band is getting rocky for Notre Dame’s student-run AM radio station, WVFI. The station, which has researched the transition for the past three years, may not broadcast on an FM frequency until close to the year 2000, station manager Boo Gallagher said yesterday, cit­ ing difficulties in finding an available FM frequency. Last April, the officers of the University granted the station per­ mission to seek FM status with the Federal Communications Commission. The switch would expand WVFI’s listening range as much as four miles, encompassing Saint Mary’s College and some areas of South Bend. After getting the financial go-ahead from the University, WVFI hired its lawyers and is currently working with the FCC to find an open frequency over which the station can broadcast. The Observer/Manuela Hernandez “W e’re conducting a search, but it doesn’t look like there’s Saint Mary’s Student Activities Board members Katie Webby (far right) and Tysus Jackson present Indiana Supreme Court Justice Myra Selby with gifts after her speech Monday afternoon. much available right now,” said station manager Boo Gallagher. See story on page 3 “We’re going to have to keep working hard at this.” Grant to supplement Center for European Studies By A N TH O N Y R. PERRI dent Edward Malloy, “The shared concerning European S tudies’ mission is to focus, fruits of the Nanovics’ dona­ News Writer Nanovics have been friends and Studies. The Nanovics began improve, and complement the tion. benefactors of the University their direct support of the pro­ pre-existing programs in the The center plans to comple­ Robert and Elizabeth Nanovic for many years.” A 1954 gram with a $25,000 donation College of Arts and Letters con­ ment the grants for foreign made a $5 million endowment Notre Dame graduate, Nanovic, for lectures. cerning European history, cul­ study with an expansion of on- to the Center for European upon retiring from financial Their gift has culminated ture, and current issues. From campus sponsorship and co­ Studies at Notre Dame that will counseling, has served Notre over the years to the present the beginning, according to sponsorship of student organi­ transform the center into a full- Dame as a member of Wegs, the center has zation proposals concerning fledged institute. the advisory council for always been “student European studies. “The Nanovic Center will cre­ the College of Arts and fn p h e Nanovic Center will create oriented.” Following The most profound result of ate a critical mass for Letters. that strategy, much of the Nanovic Center becoming a European studies . building The Nanovics’ generos­ Jl a critical mass for European the new funding will full institute is the creation of on the existing strengths pre­ ity came to fruition while studies...building on the existing benefit students as well the Second Major Program in sent in the Arts and Letters voyaging down the as faculty. European Studies. Using the College,” commented director Danube from Vienna to strengths...’ An increase in student existing faculty, Wegs believes Robert Wegs. Istanbul during a trip Robert Wegs grant money in the form it will give students “a chance Wegs hopes that the Center sponsored by the Notre of ten $10,000 under­ to intensify and deepen their will improve the academic lives Dame A lum ni graduate grants for [European] studies.” The pro­ of students and faculty alike. Association. $5 million donation, which will summer study in Europe, a gram complements the experi­ This sizeable endowment did The lectures on the cruise by be credited to the comparative graduate pro­ ences of Notre Dame students not come as a surprise. Wegs set ablaze the spark of “Generations” capital program. gram, and an increase in facul­ who studied abroad in Europe. According to University presi­ interest that the Nanovics The Center for European ty grants are some of the first see N ANOVIC / page 4 page 2 The Observer • INSIDE Tuesday, September 9, 1997 » INSIDE COLUMN W O RLD AT A GLANCE Consider these Overloaded ferry boat capsizes, killing400 passengers MONTROUIS, Haiti 50 miles above the spot where the ferry, The A severely overloaded metal-hulled Pride of Gonave, disappeared in 75 legal terms ferryboat capsized when passengers Atlantic fQ>km feet of water as hundreds of its pas­ O cean rushed to one side as it was leaving sengers screamed below-decks. port on Haiti’s central coast Monday, Atlantic “The boat was overloaded. When it For purposes of this col­ killing as many as 400 people trapped Ocean ■ maneuvered to disembark, everybody umn, the student who is inside, survivors said. Hundreds more ran to one side and the boat tipped the subject will be referred made it to shore. DOMINICAN REPUBLIC over,” said survivor Benjamin Joseph, to as Brian. This is not his The 60-foot boat was certified to safe­ DOMINICAN a 38-year-old civil engineer. real name, but he asked ly carry between 80 and 260 people, CUBA REPUBLIC The brand new ferry — it had gone that he not be identified. according to varying estimates. About into service only 10 days earlier — had In March, Brian pro­ 700 had been jammed aboard, police no life jackets, and doors that were posed to his longtime, and coast guard said. Thousands of bolted shut prevented many passen­ hometown girlfriend. They Haitians wailed in grief on the pebbled HAITI gers from escaping, Joseph and other agreed to get married in Gonave Matt Loughran beach of this fishing village as U.N. Montrouis survivors said. the summer. Island Associate News Editor divers and a half-dozen fishing boats The ferry sank early this morning in In September, both searched 200 yards offshore for vic­ the Saint Marc Channel off Montrouis, returned to their respective schools. Brian tims. 50 miles northwest of Port-au-Prince, began his junior year at Notre Dame and his Others helped carry bodies from , X Haiti’s capital. It had left from Anse-a- wife started hers at a university in the south Port-au-Prince l coast guard boats to shore. U.S. Coast C aribbean Galets on Gonave Island, about 12 Texas town in which she lives. Guard and U.N. helicopters hovered miles to the southwest. One week into the school year, a student, without knowing the effect of his words, asked the rector of the dorm that Brian lived in what Mickey takes over Miss America Squirrel brains are a deadly delicacy he thought about Brian being married. The ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. FRANKFORT, Ky. rector was surprised to hear the news and Regis is out. Soap stars are in. Call-in Squirrel brains are a lip-smacking memory for Janet called Brian down to talk to him about it. polls are out. A professional journalist Norris Gates. They were the choicest morsels of the game The rector informed Brian that he could not is in. The Peacock is out. Mickey Mouse her father once hunted in Tennessee. “In our family, we live in the dorm because he was married. The is in. As for Miss America, she may saw it as a prized piece of meat, and if he shared it with rector referred him to the housing contract have an “innie” and she may hae an you, you were pretty happy. Not that he was stingy,” said which said that residence halls are reserved “outie.” Either way, the producers of Mrs.