LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: More on Women's Center

To the Editor: University President Judith Rodin and other adminstrators, faculty, staff and students were present and vocal. Locust House is a place I will definitely use on a regular basis as a stopping-off point as I move about campus. Students -- all students -- should be pleased that there is such an affirming space so centrally located. Charlotte Pierce-Baker Adjunct English Professor College of General Studies n To the Editor: Last Thursday afternoon the Penn Women's Center held a wonderful party, celebrating the opening of its new permanent home on Locust Walk ("Women herald center's openting," DP, 10/7/96). If you weren't there, you missed a very uplifting experience. It is a beautiful building, to be sure, but what I found most compelling was the powerful sense of community pulsing there. Listening to the various speakers who recalled the long struggle to create this "place of safety" on Penn's campus, I became aware of so many different voices, through several generations at Penn, working in their own individual ways towards the betterment of life for everyone here. What started over 23 years ago as a response to violence against a few, has evolved into a committment toward increased understanding among many. It isn't a simple mission, and in many ways the work has only just begun. But, in its new home on campus, the Penn Women's Center promises leadership for the 21st century, as the need continues both for safety and for tolerance. I was sorry not to see a story about this notable achievement in the following day's DP. Emy Rouse Assistant Director Cultural and Public Service Programs College of General Studies On increasing safety To the Editor: Campus uproar over September's "crime wave" at Penn is out of control. The school's problems headlined a story in the A section of The New York Times, and every night another opportunistic UA member is complaining about blue light phones on local newscasts. The DP is filled with editorials and letters insisting that University President Judith Rodin needs to create a police state on campus if she wants to keep her job. Distressed Quakers should reflect on what they expected when they came to Penn. Did you think a school with thousands of students in the heart of America's fifth-largest city functioned without a nominal amount of crime? Were you under the impression that West Philadelphia was a 100 percent crime-free zone where people frolicked carelessly, alone or otherwise, at all hours of the day or night? If you understood all of Penn's pros and cons when you accepted a spot on the University rolls, chill out and stop carrying on about crime with every breath. Our school's name has been dragged through enough dirt. For better or worse, the campus will soon be littered with cops and blue light phones -- and soon enough, you'll be griping about the consequential tuition hikes. Shane Finneran Wharton '99 n To the Editor: On October 1, the DP reported that the University is installing 66 new blue light phones at a cost of $300,000 ("U. to spend $300K upgrading blue light phones," DP, 10/1/96). Ignoring the possible futility of these phones, my question is how they can cost so much. It works out to over $4,500 per phone! Now even I, a Wharton drop-out, can see that something isn't right. If it really costs this much per phone, Penn is getting ripped off, and wouldn't that be a nice change from the other way around. But I doubt this is the case. If they don't cost so much, where is the money going? Something ain't right. And we wonder how Penn could possibly have a budget deficit. I should add that $300,000 could hire five to seven more police officers who could do a lot more good. Aaron Rubin College '98 Fund GreekNet project To the Editor: Last spring, five undergraduates died in a tragic fire at a fraternity house at UNC Chapel-Hill. Unfortunately, the Phi Gamma Delta chapter house was not equipped with sprinklers or hard-wired smoke detectors. Such safety systems might have prevented this tragedy from occurring. As a forerunner in Greek planning, all chapter houses at the University must be equipped with sprinklers and hard-wired smoke detectors. These requirements would keep Penn in the forefront of Greek management and would protect our students on a daily basis. One important step, however, still remains in completing the University's comprehensive life safety system. Five years ago, the Office of Fraternity and Sorority Affairs in coordination with the Office of the Vice Provost of University Life, the InterFratenity Council and the Panhellenic Council, organized the Greek Life Safety and Support System which, when completed, would directly connect each chapter house to University emergency response personnel. This would further ensure the safety of students living in University-owned and reversionary Greek chapter houses. The GreekNet project would also provide technological support that nearly all University residences currently have. GreekNet would provide telephone, video and Ethernet connections to all University-owned and reversionary chapter houses, allowing them to follow the University's technological march into the 21st century. The 24 University-owned and reversionary InterFraternity and Panhellenic chapter houses have already raised over $350,000, or more than half of the funds necessary to complete this project. However, we cannot start construction without the administration's help. We still need an additional $350,000 -- and only the administration can help us raise these funds. We have already outlined a guaranteed payback schedule that includes the original capital funds plus interest. While this amount might seem trivial in the grander scheme of capital improvement planning, it is essential to the safety and technological progress of our community, which represents almost one-third of the undergraduate population. We cannot stress enough the immediacy of this issue and its importance to all involved. The Greek community continues to desire to work in partnership with the University as we all plan for the next millennium. Josh Gottheimer College '97 InterFraternity Council President