Administrators Reply to Housing Audit
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Inside News 2 Features 3,5,7 Tuesday Commentary 4 February 13, 2007 Comics 6 Sports 8 VOL. 101 | ISSUE X Serving the students of the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa since 1922 WWW.KALEO.ORG Heart-to-Heart Day 'Bows sweep volunteers to give weekend series back to community against Tigers Features | Page 3 Sports | Page 8 Administrators reply to housing audit By Justin Hedani disagreed that the problems, such as Ka Leo News Editor the complaints raised over shoddy housing facilities and living condi- Prior to the State Auditor’s release tions, were directly connected to their Feb. 6 of a management audit on stu- multi-million dollar housing expan- dent housing services at the University sion project. The ceiling in Hale of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, the UH Board Konan explained in a letter to Wainani's laundry of Regents, President David McClain Higa that “students have demanded, room is slowly falling and interim Chancellor Denise Konan and the administration wishes to offer, apart. With missing were all given a chance to comment additional housing options for...stu- panels and water on the report before its public release. dents.” Konan furthered that, in addi- damage, little has The audit, which came after a tion to expanding housing facilities, been done to fix and year-long evaluation by State Auditor namely Frear Hall, there is a plan to improve the deteriat- Marion Higa, found numerous prob- invest $40 million into maintentance ing situation. The roof lems with both the maintenance and by the end of Fall 2009. of Wainani was one of management of student housing, The new Frear Hall will house the major problems including the unecessary expansion of close to 814 students and is expected the audit found with its capacity and said that the “neglect to reach completion by 2008. student housing. or lack of maintenance was a preoc- After reviewing the argument cupation with the desire to expand provided by Konan, the audit main- housing.” tained that its findings were valid. DAN RICHARDS But in a consolidated response In their findings, “revenue bonds KA LEO O HAWAI‘I to the audit, the UHM administrators amounting to $100 million were authorized in June 2005.” This was to be used for both maintenance and the construction of the new hall, but Players losing touch with no plans had been “moved ahead” to increase maintenance. In addition to the revenue bonds, the BOR has allowed Konan to raise reality in 'world' of online games housing rates by 5 percent for five years that will further supplement con- struction costs. By Tracy Chan to some, even dangerous in its potential for Ka Leo Staff Reporter addiction. Churches and parents have spo- Other disagreements ken out against MMO’s, warning against It is raining when Fait steps out of the the dangers of becoming caught up in a In her response, Konan expressed building. He pauses a moment to admire false reality. Everquest even gained the that she “firmly” disagrees with the the ripples of the raindrops on the surface nickname “Evercrack” in reference to its audit that the campus is “unsafe.” of the lake, then takes a few steps back as addictive tendencies.There have even been “We believe that the charicteriza- a giant seal-like creature leaps from the some people that blame MMORPG’s for tion of the campus as “Unsafe” is not water and lands on the dock beside him, the death of family members and friends. accurate and inflammatory,” she said. transforming into an elf. “How’s it going, Various organizations have been Konan said that because UH man,” he greets the elf. “Not too bad,” formed in reaction to Everquest; two such Mānoa is exposed to the public, unlike says the green-haired elf. “LF2M 4 BRD online groups are Everquest Widows and other urban campuses, campus resi- – have CC but not enough DPS. Can you Spouses Against Online Gaming, which tank?” are Yahoo groups. At the other extreme, dents “are faced with complex issues Sure, says Fait, glancing down. a 2001 article in Wired.com describes related to ensuring the general safety “Lemme spec.” the phenomenon of online marriages in of our students.” Welcome to World of Warcraft, the Everquest. “Everquest characters fre- The audit did acknowledge that international Massively Multiplayer Online quently marry online, and sometimes the UHM has taken some steps to address Role-Playing Game (MMORPG for short) romance carries over into real life,” the campus safety, but the changes, it said, developed by Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. article said. In May 2006, a German couple have come very late. Future projects In January, even before the release met in-game and married, according to include: of the game’s expansion, The Burning World of Warcraft’s European news site. - hiring additional staff Crusade, World of Warcraft had over 8 Not only did they have a real-life marriage - adding additional lighting for million subscribed players from America, ceremony, they arranged one in the game nighttime foot traffic Europe, Oceania and Asia, according to as well. - creating more opportunities Blizzard’s official Web site. World of Psychologists have speculated that, for students to attend nightime Warcraft is the largest subscription-based just as some people have more of an events MMORPG in PC-gaming history, said one affinity for becoming alcoholics or getting - allowing students to study in of Blizzard’s recent press releases. addicted to drugs, some people run more campus libraries The number of people who play has of a risk of becoming addicted to online The audit argues that the Mānoa grown with the release of The Burning gaming. Crusade, which sold a record-breaking Online Gamer’s Anonymous is an campus “is not safe from from crimi- 2.4 million copies on the first day it was unaffiliated, nonprofit community that nal acts, accidents and disasters,” and released in America and Europe. bears a striking resemblance to Alchoholics defines safety as “freedom from dan- Online games are a relatively small Anonymous. Its mission, as the Web site at ger risk or injury. According to sur- percentage of PC games, but most of http://www.olganonboard.org describes it, veys, the audit said, students neither them charge monthly subscriptions that is to be “a fellowship of people sharing feel safe nor secure. generate billions of dollars in revenue. their experience, strengths and hope to The culture of online gaming has not help each other recover and heal from only affected our wallets, but our lives as the problems caused by compulsive game A Final Note well. playing.” In Konan’s final statement, she Since the beginning of the MMORPG Utilizing a 12-step program, which said “the University of Hawai‘i is craze, which a game called Everquest is committed to provding a safe and widely attributed with starting, online gam- See Warcraft, page 2 comfortable living environment for ing has been controversial, and according our students. We have already taken many aggressive actions to address COURTESY SCREENSHOT • BLIZZARD ENTERTAINMENT this pressing need.” Page 2 | Ka Leo O Hawai‘i | Tuesday, February 13, 2007 | NEWS Warning signs of online Housing in disrepair gaming addiction: NewsBriefs Warcraft · A preoccupation with gaming By Ka Leo News Desk From page 1 · Lying or hiding gaming use · Disobeying time limits Harvard professor to conduct lec- according to their Web site, has been adapted from the one that AA uses. This · Loss of interest in other activities ture at UHM organization says that, while it recog- · Social withdrawal from family and Paul Farmer, a Harvard Medical School professor and pioneer in provid- nizes some compulsive game playing as friends ing health care to Third World nations, symptoms of an underlying mental con- · Psychological withdrawal from the dition for which the person should seek will be giving two lectures this month at game professional help, other people just have UHM. personalities that make it easier for them · Using gaming as an escape In 1987, Farmer helped found to become “hooked” on online gaming. · Continuing to game despite its Partners in Health, an international health organization, starting with a char- The dangers of online gaming consequences ity clinic in Haiti. The organization now are not recognized in the United States does work in five other countries, focus- alone. - From Dr. Kimberly Young, Center for ing on helping people suffering from In 2005, the Chinese government Internet Addiction Recovery poverty, violence and epidemics of dis- took steps to limit the time its citizens ease obtain successful drugs in fighting spend playing online games to 3 con- the HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis viruses. secutive hours. One BBC news article Marlo Ting is a 23-year-old politi- Farmer will speak on Sunday, Feb. published in August 2005 stated that cal science graduate of UHM, formerly 18 at 3 p.m. at the UH Medical School Chinese players numbered over 20 mil- a Ka Leo Managing Editor, who plays Auditorium in Kaka‘ako. The lecture is lion and spent almost $500 million on World of Warcraft regularly. “A lot of the titled, “Community-based treatment of online games. game’s rewards require you to cooperate HIV: The Partners in Health experience The Chinese government had previ- with other people,” he said. “There isn’t in Haiti, Rwanda, and Lesotho.” ously been encouraging the growth of much point in playing the game if you’re Farmer’s second lecture, “AIDS online games, but did not foresee the not doing it with someone else.” in 2007: Building a health care move- phenomenal popularity of the games and Marlo uses World of Warcraft to ment,” will take place on Tuesday, Feb.