The Fontaine Medical Research Building officially opened its doors several weeks ago, improving the research capabilities of the Medical Center’s endocrinology department.

The building, which had been in planning since spring 2000, is located in the Fontaine Research Park, near where Fontaine Rd. intersects the 250 bypass.

The University Foundation, which handles grant money given to the University, allocated the $15.6 million necessary to build the 70,000-square-foot structure.

The research center’s main focus will be the diabetes program, one of the most research-intensive divisions in the Medical Center.

Researchers in this program, which receives funding from a variety of organizations, investigate the causes of diabetes at the cellular level in hopes of discovering better treatments and ultimately a cure.

Diabetes, an inability to produce necessary levels of insulin, is the sixth leading cause of death by disease in the United States. It affects 16 million Americans and over 300,000 Virginians.

Dr. Raghu Mirmira, an assistant professor at the Medical School, said the program’s growing research activities demanded more laboratory space.

“The endocrinology division is ranked … higher than any other clinical department or division at U.Va.,” Mirmira said. “Thus, there is a great deal of justification for the need for specialized research and clinical space for our division.”

U.S. News and World Report ranked the endocrinology division sixth in the nation in 2001.

The new building also houses endocrinology research related to other hormonal disorders, Endocrinology Department Chief Jerry Nadler said.

“We have outstanding programs in diabetes, reproductive endocrinology, thyroid and pituitary disorders, and osteoporosis,” he said.

The new research center is only the start of the expansion to Fontaine Research Park.

A second building, scheduled for completion by June 2003, will be designed specifically for patient services. For the first time, the proximity of these two buildings will allow the “bench to bedside” integration of clinical and research practices in the endocrinology department, Mirmira said.

The University, the City of Charlottesville and Albemarle County each have big plans for growth over the next decade and are working together to avoid stepping on each other’s toes while expanding.

Representatives from the three entities spoke yesterday in a public meeting to describe and discuss all building projects in the near future.

Over the course of the next decade, “the amount of change and the amount of growth [within the University] is going to be extraordinary,” said Leonard W. Sandridge, University executive vice president and chief operating officer.

Much of the expansion can be attributed to anticipated growth in student enrollment, Sandridge said.

The key growth precincts include North Grounds, the Arts precinct, the Jefferson Park Avenue and McCormick Road area as well as the Medical Center.

Included among the plans are a 15,000 seat arena and “multipurpose facilty,” a 1,200 car parking garage on Ivy Road and Emmet Street, a medical research building, and a music performance space and studio arts building near Carr’s Hill.

The University Hospital will increase in size by 100,000 square feet by 2006.

Additionally, the South Lawn area will be completely updated, with major renovations to Cocke and Rouss Hall and the construction of a new academic building across JPA to replace New Cabell Hall, which will be demolished. The new academic building will be linked to the Lawn by a pedestrian crosswalk.

Sandridge said the plans for expansion will depend mostly on the University’s needs in the upcoming years.

“Our Master plan is totally consistent with the city’s” plans, he added.

City spokesman Jim Tolbert cited traffic concerns as one of the main developmental issues facing the community.

“We’re not building a lot of roads – we tend to look at transportation problems in other ways,” Tolbert said.

For example, Tolbert said the City will abandon its outdated 1970s zoning ordinances in favor of “mixed-use environments.”

Under the City’s new plans, new housing, retail stores and commercial businesses would be constructed in the same area, rather than grouped separately as they are now.

Tolbert said he has been pleased with the way the county and city have worked together on development projects, particularly over the past three years.

“We are a very dynamic community,” County spokesman Wayne Cilimberg said.

Cilimberg said he feels “a true sense of the same goal here,” between the University, city and county.

Expansion plans can be completed “in a way that maintains this unity,” he said.

Among the county’s largest plans is the addition of roads parallel to Route 29 “that would allow local traffic to move off of 29 rather than along it,” Cilimberg added.

The criminal case involving a University student charged with the construction and detonation of a bomb in a Rugby Rd. mailbox has been transferred to federal courts and now will be tried by the U.S Attorney’s Office.

If convicted, third-year Engineering student Jamison Hodges could face one to 10 years in prison on a class five felony charge.

Charlottesville police also arrested then fourth-year Commerce student Christian Toraldo and then third-year Architecture student Gregory Van Wie with manufacturing of a bomb. Information regarding court dates for Toraldo and Van Wie was not available.

The three students allegedly planted a small bomb inside a mailbox at 1701 Bruce Ave., home of University Mathematics Prof. Thann Ward, on May 5.

University recognized for progress in gender equality

The American Association of University Women Legal Advocacy Fund has chosen the University as its 2002 Progress and Equity award winner. The award comes with a $10,000 grant to further programs aimed at combating gender inequality within the University community.

AAUW Legal Advocacy Fund specifically cited and commended the University’s work to address the needs of its female students. Following a 1998 study, the University’s Task Force on the Status of Women, school officials created the Women’s Center to address problems of educational inequities on Grounds for female students, staff and faculty.

The award further commends the Women’s Center’s Young Women Leaders Program, an outreach program to mentor Charlottesville middle school students, as well as the Center’s counseling programs for undergraduate students.

- Compiled by Kadie Bye

When it comes to discerning the University’s priorities, talk reveals only that talk is opaque. But sniffing out how the University distributes money is one way to figure out what the University cares about. Do we care about our professional schools more than our arts and sciences education? Do we care more about running the University as a business than as an ivory tower?

One report, which appeared in the summer 2002 edition of The Public Interest – a quarterly publication featuring works from scholars of politics and economics – offers a disturbing answer: The liberal arts program is desperately low on the University’s list of priorities. Departments effectively pay taxes to the University and to the campus. The University should tax the business and law schools more heavily and contribute proceeds of that tax to the College, which should be the school’s first priority.

When former Darden School dean Tom Snyder came to the University, he negotiated a 10 percent tax on Darden. As compared to Michigan where that rate is 21 percent and Emory where it is 40 percent, the Darden School only minimally subsidizes the campus.

Former College Dean Melvin Leffler paints a wilting-rosy picture of the College’s treatment. In contrast to the business school’s 10 percent contribution to general University resources, “tuition revenues exceeded the money made available to the college by $17 million” in 1997-1998 according to Leffler. Essentially, Leffler contends – accurately – that the College subsidizes the rest of the University, including Darden.

This direction of money flow – from an underfunded College to a well-endowed business school – is entirely backward. The Public Interest article identifies Columbia University as an example of a school that establishes its liberal arts college as its “centerpiece.” Columbia “taxes the business and law schools to pay for the physicists and poets.”

Darden’s move toward commodification and independence from the University diverges from the notion of the “academical village.” (Snyder described the 10 percent tax as a franchise fee to use the University’s name and Jefferson’s image). If each school is expected to be completely self-sufficient, the College would be left bereft of the support it needs. If the University is to be a home to academia as opposed to degree markets, the University cannot neglect the College.

Darden School professors are known for focusing less on their academic output than on training students and executives. With so much preference accorded to the business school (as the distribution of burdens seems to show), the University’s focus turns less from producing academic works and more toward running the school like a business.

It’s an economic reality that universities are just businesses that produce human capital. But there’s an element of idealism about academia – that it exists to promote truth and advance knowledge – and that this concern should overcome business decisions.

The University needs to get its priorities straight. College first. Then professional schools. Let’s see the money begin to flow from the latter to the former.

CONGRESSIONAL Republicans managed to get the U.S. House of Representatives to pass a bill, H.R. 4737, which would force many welfare recipients to work more hours a week, and spend less time getting an education. This bill is a step in the wrong direction. Congress should ease education restrictions on welfare, not tighten them, as this bill does.

The current welfare legislation in this country severely hampers welfare recipients’ ability to get a college degree. This bill would limit education that can count toward work hours required to receive welfare benefits to only technical or vocational training. This policy is myopic and only handicaps welfare recipients’ efforts to get a college education in order to improve their job prospects. This decreases the chance that welfare recipients will achieve economic independence, which hurts the country because it means that it will have to continue funding payments to welfare recipients.

According to the current welfare law that was passed in 1996, a welfare recipient can receive education, which fulfills the welfare work requirement by doing only technical or vocational training. The cap on the amount of time that a welfare recipient can get credit for technical or vocational training is one year. Under HR 4737, the maximum amount of time for this education would decrease to 4 months every two years. As a result, welfare recipients still cannot get a college degree, and on top of that, cannot get as much technical or vocational training as they could under the old law.

According to the June 21 Chronicle of Higher Education article, “In Debate over Welfare Reform, Work Trumps Education,” college lobbyists have been trying to persuade Senate leaders to ease, not toughen current restrictions on education. These lobbyists are entirely correct; restrictions on education for welfare recipients must be curtailed to help these people get better jobs.

One reason for the bill’s emphasis on work rather than education is simply politics. David S. Baime, vice president for government relations at the American Association of Community Colleges, told The Chronicle, “legislators are overly seduced by the notion of requiring more and more work from welfare recipients. There’s a lot of political appeal in being ‘tough’ on welfare recipients.” Playing politics with welfare hurts welfare recipients first off, not to mention the fact that it might keep more people in the welfare system.

As almost everyone seems to have figured out by now, a college degree makes people more attractive to potential employers. But current welfare legislation as well as HR 4737 effectively tells welfare recipients that they cannot get a college degree and should stick to jobs that do not require one. Women are hurt most by this policy because the majority of welfare recipients are single mothers. Leslie R. Wolf, president of the Center for Women Policy Studies, told The Chronicle that legislation with a strong emphasis on work rather than education implies that “women who are poor are poor because they are bad.” The legislation tells these women that they cannot improve themselves through higher education and this is not the message the government should be sending.

Discouraging higher education for welfare recipients forces the government to continue providing support to welfare recipients, who are denied the chance to educate themselves and become more self-sufficient. In a letter to the Senate Finance Committee in May, the American Council on Education, on behalf of a number of other education associations, said, “one of the surest ways to economic security and self-sufficiency for [welfare] recipients is through higher education.” By taking away any practical opportunity for a welfare recipient to get higher education, the government also makes it more likely that the person will not be able to get a better job, that he’ll remain in poverty, and thus continue to have to be partially supported by welfare.

Now the bill will go to the Senate where a number of compromises and alternatives already are being proposed. The Senate must stop this bill and ease restrictions on welfare recipients’ ability to receive an education. The bill as it currently stands would hurt welfare recipients’ opportunities to achieve economic independence. That would hurt not only these welfare recipients, but also the taxpayers who pay for welfare, a true lose-lose situation.

(Harris Freier is a Cavalier Daily columnist. He can be reached at hfreier@cavalierdaily.com.)

BOTH CONSERVATIVES and liberals have been trying to politicize the molestation scandal surrounding the Catholic Church. Many in the former category accuse the church’s hard-line policies on sexuality and celibacy in the priesthood as being at fault. On the other hand, many conservatives have pointed out that because the majority of boys molested have been pubescent, and not pre-pubescent, that this is a case of homosexual rape and not pedophilia.

Both sides have valid points – however, very few on either side have come close to grasping the reality behind the situation. The popular solutions offered – eliminate celibacy for the clergy, or prevent homosexuals from entering the priesthood – are shortsighted and, at best, band-aids. The real problem lies in the Catholic Church’s schizophrenic treatment of homosexuality – both its condemnation of homosexual acts, and its widespread recruitment of gays.

Church doctrine teaches that before marriage, Catholics must lead a chaste life. Additionally, the Catholic Church teaches that homosexual orientation is not in itself wrong – sidestepping the ridiculous “homosexuality is a choice” argument offered up by many other Christian denominations. But because homosexual marriage is not allowed, gays must therefore lead a life of celibacy.

This is where the priesthood becomes an option. Because the Catholic Church recognizes that homosexuality is innate, but demands a chaste lifestyle, many see it as a call to the priesthood. Not only does the Catholic Church refuse to combat this perception, but many seminarians use it to their own advantage. As Catholic Dossier columnist James Hitchcock observed in the March-April issue, the testimonials of many priests “confirmed the suspicion that in some religious orders vocation directors vigorously, even exclusively, recruit homosexuals.”

But the idea of the priesthood and celibacy as a safe haven for gay Catholics is dangerous. The motivation behind living this celibate life is not one of spiritual fulfillment, but rather that of repression. And celibacy, contrary to popular belief, is not solely about repression of sexual desire. According to Faithlinks.com, celibacy is “understood to require sexual continence in order to direct all energies toward the single-minded love and service of God.” In other words, celibacy is not about repression, it’s about finding bodily and spiritual satisfaction through a relationship with God.

By entering the priesthood with these motivations, many priests are later faced with the psychological consequences of repressing their sexuality. Thus, due to the sexual repression, many of these homosexual priests stay sexually immature, with a sexual development comparable to that of a teenager. Or, as Rev. Edward Kaminski of Monterey, CA says in the April 14 issue of the Santa Cruz Sentinel, “Lack of psychosexual development is what [the abuse] is all about.”

This also explains the age of most of the victims of sexual abuse. Like conservatives have rightfully pointed out, most of the boys molested have been adolescent – meaning that this scandal is more about homosexual rape than it is about pedophilia. But despite what some conservatives claim, the problem doesn’t lie with the insatiable sexual appetites of gay priests for young boys.

Rather, the repressive attitude these homosexual priests take toward celibacy results in the absence of any sexual development. What the church is left with is an abundance of middle-aged priests with the sexual maturity of a teenager, suffering from sexual repression.

Unfortunately, these priests are in a position that is naturally corruptible. Many priests work with adolescent boys, with whom they share a level of sexual maturity. However, because they are in a position of power over these boys, what these priests see as sexual experimentation is actually exploitation and molestation.

The problem ultimately lies with the church’s teachings on homosexuality, celibacy and the priesthood. These teachings need not be changed, but the Catholic Church cannot sit by and watch people enter the priesthood for the wrong reasons. Solutions such as prohibiting gays from serving in the priesthood or eliminating the requirement of celibacy from the clergy could reduce the molestation problem. These ideas, however, are shortsighted and only address the widespread sexual abuse on a superficial level.

This is not to free the guilty priests from any responsibility for their actions. There are problems inherent in the Catholic doctrine and practice, and this scandal will continue until these are addressed.

(Brian Cook is a Cavalier Daily opinion editor. He can be reached at bcook@cavalierdaily.com.)

The Virginia women’s basketball team finally has found a replacement for departed assistant coach Nikki Caldwell, who returned to Tennessee, her alma mater, earlier this month.

Patrolling the sidelines alongside head coach Debbie Ryan as assistant this season will be former Richmond standout Daryl Oliver, who is coming to Virginia via Western Kentucky, where he was an assistant coach.

Oliver helped the Hilltopper women to a 16-14 record and surprise second place finish in the Eastern Division of the Sun Belt conference. His primary duties were coaching the perimeter players, recruiting and advanced scouting for the team. With Oliver as one of the top assistants last season, Western Kentucky women’s basketball reached the first round of the Women’s National Invitational Tourament before losing to Illinois in the team’s first postseason matchup.

Ryan believes that Oliver is a terrific addition to Virginia athletics and will be responsible for many of the same responsibilities he had at Western Kentucky. He will be involved with recruiting on a primary basis, along with coaching the Cavaliers’ perimeter players.

“Daryl is an up-and-coming star in this profession,” Ryan said. “He brings a lot to the table in terms of knowledge of the game and in his ability to relate to our players. Daryl has a strong work ethic and is very familiar with our program. He will be involved in every aspect of our program as I prepare all of my assistants to be head coaches.”

Virginia fans may recognize Oliver’s name, as his brother, Anthony Oliver, was a player at Virginia from 1989-1992. Recent fans may remember Cavalier matchups against Daryl Oliver’s Richmond team in the late 1990′s. Oliver graduated from the University of Richmond with a degree in speech communication in 1998. He was a two time team captain of a Spiders team that led Richmond to a CAA championship and NCAA berth during his senior season.

After graduation, Oliver coached with Ryan during her summer camps, while substitute teaching during the school year. Oliver also served as the head coach of the Virginia women’s basketball club team. He led the team to a 24-5 overall record, while securing the East Coast Division Regular Season and Tournament Championships. In the fall of 2001, Oliver was hired by Western Kentucky as an assistant coach.

Oliver began his duties as assistant coach Tuesday and is a welcome addition to the Virginia Athletic Department.

“I’m truly blessed to have the opportunity to work in the University of Virginia Athletic Department,” Oliver said. “It is one of the premiere departments in the country. I hope that I can help continue U.Va.’s strong tradition as one of the nation’s top women’s basketball programs.”

Senior Virginia wrestler Josh Etu represented the University well, when he placed fourth in the 264 and a half pound/120 Kg class of the Greco-Roman competition during the 2002 World Team Trials Championship series in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Etu, who hails from Queensbury, N.Y., finished with a strong 2-2 record in the event, with wins over Leroy Gardner III and Tyrone Davis. His first victory over Gardner III was a thrilling 3-2 overtime victory, though he lost to Matt Lamb in the semifinals. After beating Davis in the consolations semifinals, Etu lost to Bill Pearce, 10-0, in the final round.

Cavaliers compete in USA National Track and Field Championships

Two players and one coach competed in the 2002 USA National Track and Field Championships this week in Palo Alto, CA. Former Cavalier standout and current Virginia assistant Track coach Dana Coons participated in the 10,000 meter long-distance run and finished seventh overall. Dawn Cleary, who graduated in May and was Coons’ former teammate, took 10th place in the steeplechase. She currently holds the Virginia school record for that event. John Welsch, who also graduated from the University in May, was this past season’s ACC Champion in the javelin throw. He competed well at the Championships, finishing 14th overall.

Virginia finishes 26th in 2001-2002 Sears Directors’ Cup rankings

In the final standings released to the public yesterday, Virginia finished 26th in the Sears Directors’ Cup rankings, which is awarded to the best overall athletic department in the country. Universities receive points on how well they fared in the 2001-2002 school year, and Virginia joined all nine ACC schools in the top 50. The Cavaliers were helped out by their two lacrosse teams, women’s crew and the two soccer teams. The only ACC schools to finish above the Cavaliers this season was North Carolina (No. 4) and Clemson (No. 25). Stanford University won the Cup for the third consecutive year.

- Compiled by Jeremy Williams

Former Virginia tennis standout Brian Vahaly did something that no other collegiate player from the 2001 season could achieve this week. He competed at Wimbledon.

In what some consider the crÅ me de la crÅ me of WTA Grand Slam tournament events, Vahaly earned an invite to the All-England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club by winning three qualifying matches. Unfortunately, he won’t be staying a fortnight to enjoy the traditional strawberries and cream, as he lost in the first round Monday to Mikhail Youzhny.

The 22-year old from Atlanta, GA is currently ranked 143nd in the world, while Youzhny was ranked 58th going into the week. Youzhny won the first set 6-3, before Vahaly stormed back to take the second set 6-1. But Vahaly lost the last two 6-3, 6-2. This was Vahaly’s first Wimbledon appearance, but it probably will not be his last, as Vahaly is only in the second year of his pro status.

Vahaly reached the event by storming through three qualifying rounds over Marco Chiudinelli (6-4, 6-7, 6-1) in the first round of qualifying, Yeu-Tzuoo Wang (1-6, 6-3, 7-5) in the second round and Jean-Francois Bachelot (7-6 (13-11), 3-6, 6-4, 6-1) in the third round.

While men’s tennis coach Brian Boland didn’t have the opportunity to coach Vahaly in college, he understands what a great accomplishment it is to reach Wimbledon at his age.

“This is just an unbelievable accomplishment for Brian,” Boland said in a University release. “He is the only collegiate player from last year playing in Wimbledon this year. It’s a great accomplishment for him and tremendous for the University of Virginia tennis program.”

After graduating from Virginia in May 2001, Vahaly immediately turned pro, and the success he had in college continued in the pro ranks as Vahaly won five futures tournaments and secured a big win over the United States’ own Michael Chang.

Vahaly won 40 singles matches as a senior in 2001, which was a Virginia record, and made it farther in the NCAA Championships than any Cavalier has in the past. In the same year, Vahaly was the 2001 ACC Player of the Year, while earning ACC flight champion honors at No. 1 seed his last two years at Virginia. Cavalier fans knew he was going to be a hit from the start, as he won ACC rookie of the year honors in 1998.

So while Vahaly won’t be staying for the fortnight, he will not soon forget his first ever Grand Slam event.

Let’s pretend for just this moment that you are Major League Baseball. Oh, the horror.

On one hand, you’ve got the filthy mess of a steroids controversy. On the other hand, you’ve got nobody in the seats – attendance is down 7 percent from last year and more than 40 percent of your games are being played in front of half-full (or worse) stadiums.

Then there’s your all-star game in July that could become a major fiasco if more players announce that they’ll boycott it, as one (Boston pitcher John Burkett) already has. And that’s not even mentioning the ongoing stress and speculation surrounding the contraction of small-market teams and the escalation of salaries on big-market ones.

That’s too much to juggle unless you’re David Blaine. So what should you do?

Do exactly what you would do if you were stressed out on the job: Take a vacation.

Conventional wisdom – at least the kind doled out on the sports pages and talk radio – is that baseball can’t survive a work stoppage. But that’s exactly what it needs: time to break out the defibrillator and start pumping. The only way that baseball can solve its problems and ensure its long-term health is to undergo a complete overhaul that can’t start until there are serious, long-term negotiations between players and owners.

How a strike can save the game

As Major League Baseball is sinking back into the whole it fell through in 1994, when a strike canceled the World Series, it should take a close look at the NBA, which rebuilt itself after its work stoppage three years ago and now is at its strongest point since Jordan retirement No. 2.

Back before its 1998 lockout, the NBA was dealing with some of the same problems that baseball is grappling with now: the meteoric rise of star salaries, a strong mistrust between players and owners, and a growing gap between rich teams and poor teams. Now, the NBA has none of those problems, thanks to an improved, more equitable salary structure that rewards players for high performance in their early years in the league and gives them more freedom to choose where they play.

Baseball could use a work stoppage to revamp its salary structure and introduce a player-by-player salary cap, making sure that overpaid, under performing guys like Kevin Brown get paid less.

Baseball could also use a work stoppage to think a bit harder about where it puts its teams, again using the NBA as an example.

When the Vancouver Grizzlies announced two years ago that they weren’t economically viable anymore, the NBA concluded immediately that it’s experiment in western Canada had failed and allowed the Grizzlies to move to Memphis. But, in baseball, the Montreal Expos haven’t been close to being competitive – on the field or in the books – since the early ’90s. It could be another decade until baseball admits the Expos can’t make it and a team in Washington or Northern Virginia can. Unless there’s a strike that would force baseball to cut or move its unprofitable teams.

The bottom line for baseball, however, is that a work stoppage can only be beneficial if it results in some real, tangible changes that fans will be able to see starting next season, at the latest. In addition to altering the salary structure and rearranging teams, there needs to be an agreement made about drug testing. There needs to come out of the league’s ranks somebody who can communicate with the players and fill in the cavernous rift that has come between the two sides, somebody like Commissioner David Stern of the NBA.

Baseball also has to reconnect with its fans before the stadiums empty out for good, especially since a work stoppage would keep some disgruntled fans from coming back at all. It could do this, as the NBA did, with a non-stop blitz of marketing and an infusion of young talent from the United States and abroad. It would be best off, though, by ensuring everybody – fans, players and owners – that they won’t have to worry about the business of baseball anymore and just concentrate on the games.

(Sam Le can be reached at sle@cavalierdaily.com)