©1996 Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Telecommunication
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By Dan Miller ASU head coach Bruce Snyder, whose unbeaten Sun Devils are headed to the Rose Bowl, is pleased that his players have managed to steer clear of off-the-field woes, but he realizes no high-profile college football team is ever home free. "I could get a call late tonight saying 'you got a problem,' and you just deal with it the best you can and you move on," Snyder said. Is the disease - lawlessness - that plagues Division I teams without cure and of epidemic proportions? Or is it merely a highly publicized - and sometimes politicized - reflection of the health of college student bodies? One thing is for sure: College football players make headlines not only because of the number and nature of their crimes, but also because of whom they happen to be. Indeed, waves of criminal activity have cascaded through the nation's top football programs, crippling a few and leaving others struggling to regain their once-spotless images. Two-time defending national champion Nebraska is Exhibit A. Six Corn-husker players have at-tracted hordes of publicity for their run-ins with the law during the past two years. The University of Southern California has slapped nine different players with suspensions for various violations since 1995. A whopping 17 players from the University of Minnesota's 1995 roster have been charged with criminal offenses, such as domestic assault and theft. No fewer than eight Clemson University football players have been arrested since the 1995 season. And who can forget the most notorious pioneer of crime in college football: the University of Miami? One of every seven scholarship players on its 1994 team was arrested while enrolled at that institution, according to a report published in the Miami Herald in May 1995. "There is a great public fascination with bringing down celebrities and that includes athletes," Dr. Tom Jackson, a professor of psychology at the University of Arkansas who conducts seminars on sexual responsibility for college football players across the country, said in a telephone interview. "Athletes also are held to a higher standard. Often times athletes are suspended from a team before anything ever goes to any judicial review. The vast majority have never been criminally charged and most are never convicted. We're holding athletes to a higher standard in the court of public opinion." Ranking attracts attention In recent months that standard seems to have amplified in direct proportion to a team's national ranking. Nebraska, the nation's top-ranked team for the 1994 and 1995 seasons, is an example. Perhaps the Huskers' most prominent brush with the law came in September 1995 when star running back Lawrence Phillips assaulted his former girlfriend, Kate McEwen, an NU basketball player. He was suspended by coach Tom Osborne for six games, later pleaded no contest and was found guilty of misdemeanor assault and trespassing. Jackson, whose research indicated that athletes in competitive, revenue-producing sports are more likely to commit rape than the average student, said football players such as Phillips sometimes are products of the system. "They lead a very sheltered, disciplined and focused lifestyle in order to be a Dvision I scholar-athlete," he said. "They don't always have the same emotionally maturing experiences as the average student. They're also taught aggression. They're taught to win at all costs. They're taught to score, to hit. Sometimes that is exactly the type of off-field behavior they apply." That doesn't mean an athlete accused of a crime should automatically be given the benefit of the doubt, Jackson added quickly. Osborne, whose handlings of recent Husker incidents have been controversial at times, has been known to extend to his players what his critics see as generous leeway. Former NU wingback Riley Washington, for example, continued to practice with the team despite having been charged with attempted second-degree murder and use of a weapon to commit a felony in connection with an Aug. 2, 1995, shooting of 22-year-old Jermaine Cole at a Lincoln, Neb., convenience store. Osborne, who declined comment for this article, told Sports Illustrated last year: "I think there is a very, very good chance that Riley didn't do what he's accused of. I've talked to a lot of people. ...I feel pretty comfortable about Riley's case." Washington, still awaiting trial for the second-degree murder charge, left the team in August. Lee Barfknecht, who has been the Nebraska beat reporter for the Omaha World-Herald for the last 12 years, said writing about all of the Cornhuskers' criminal activity has become one big headache. "It's tiresome," he said in a telephone interview. "You like to cover games. You don't like to cover the police blotter; otherwise, you would've become a police reporter. But you can't ignore it." The scope of offenses involving athletes is mind boggling: recruiting violations; player run-ins with other students as well as with campus and off-campus police; academic cheating; the use of steroids and recreational drugs; suppressed or ignored positive tests for drugs; the degradation of women; accepting money from agents; credit-card and calling card fraud, and illegal gambling. Microcosms of the student body? Are the troubles athletes become embroiled in merely microcosms of the student body? "I think that some parts of our society believe there's a real evil in college athletics and it stems from small portions of the actual players that are doing it," said ASU's Snyder. Colorado senior middle linebacker Matt Russell agreed. "I kind of think that with the turn that society has taken that everything is so politically correct that it is now more of an issue than it used to be," Russell said in a telephone interview. "Even smaller incidents are being reported. Anything to do with violence and crime is obviously wrong, but I think now it's more of an issue than it was a few years back." Russell should know. Twelve of his teammates were suspended in mid-October as part of NCAA penalties for improperly using long-distance telephone access codes. Making a long-distance call without having to pay for it is an extra benefit under NCAA rules, which means it's illegal. "You can't expect a head coach to be in control of 80 guys around the clock," Russell said. "Most of them were homesick; certainly that doesn't justify what they did, but they're new, they're young and they made a mistake. They know it was wrong what they did. I'm not sure that incident needed to draw as much attention as it did." Omaha World-Herald sports columnist Tom Shatel disagreed. "When they sign a letter of intent, they agree to represent the university at all times and that means being in the public eye," Shatel said in a telephone interview. Some officials believe the public's thirst for violence has caused a change in media reporting, thus creating an unfair stereotype of the college athlete. "I think that people are identifying relationships at this point that I'm not prepared to say are accurate," Frank D. Uryasz, director of sports sciences for the NCAA, said in a telephone interview from Overland Park, Kan. "Certainly we're not in denial - there have been some well-known instances. What we're trying to look at is, instead of focusing on individuals who are prone to abuse, to look at at-risk groups. Are these athletes at risk for alcohol abuse? Yes. Are they more at risk than other groups? Probably not. Are they at risk for steroid use? Yes. Are they more at risk? Yes." Kevin Modesti, a sports columnist for the Los Angeles Daily News, said that reporting on more than just what happens on the field is nothing new. "It's a trend that's been going on since the 1960s," Modesti said. "My feeling is that whether I'm the one reporting on it or commenting on it, those stories are going to get out. "Maybe the hardest thing to do is not to write the banner headline and write 'throw the bums out,' it's to put things in their proper perspective. I think that's what the public is asking us to do. Are these just bad guys? Or are they reflections on (USC head coach) John Robinson? Or are they just isolated incidents that don't fit into any pattern?" Life in a fish bowl Athletes realize they live a fish bowl and the potential of a career-damaging blunder is always lurking. Some succumb to that daily pressure by breaking the law. "Left unattended, athletes tend to be in more trouble than the average student," Art Taylor, associate director of Northeastern University's Center for the Study of Sport in Society, said in a telephone interview from Boston. "I think it's the high-profile aspect of their lifestyle. They've gotten a lot of things for free. They frequently run into women who want to be 'groupies,' who want to have a relationship that have little or no depth." That's why visible stars such as ASU quarterback Jake "The Snake" Plummer watch their every step off the field. "Actually I was just talking to some guys in one of my (sociology) classes today about this same thing," Plummer said, referring to athletes as criminals. "They were just saying if it was just some regular guy, it would make the papers, but it wouldn't be as much of a headline. It wouldn't make ESPN or the national papers. Being a college athlete you have to have the right frame of mind to not do stuff like that." A 1994 University of Massachusetts study of 10 universities that are home to perennial top-20 football and basketball teams found that athletes were responsible for 35 percent of reported domestic violence incidents and 19 percent of reported sexual assaults on the campuses, despite comprising only 3 percent of the male student bodies. The study utilized reports from internal judicial affairs offices on campuses over a three-year period. Researchers tested their findings for significance by studying 10 other schools at random to determine how likely it would be that they would find athletes to be overrepresented. They concluded that their findings were not random. "We think there's something going on that contributes to the frequency with which athletes commit sexual assault," Todd Crosset, an assistant professor of sports management at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst who participated in the study, said in a telephone interview. "It's important not to overstate the problem. Clearly, athletes only make up a fraction of the population, but violence against women is a huge social problem that is part of every community in our society and we shouldn't scapegoat athletes." But it happens anyway. "I think that hurts intercollegiate athletics," said Dr. Kevin White, ASU's director of athletics. "But again it's so visible, so countable (and) so vulnerable that just a few incidents tend to color the entire subsector and that's unfortunate." Critics claim that athletes seem to be involved in crime more often than other campus groups because the public more often hears about crimes involving athletes. "Are athletes being violent? Are athletes being sexually aggressive? You could take almost any other category of people and find about the same thing," Dr. Harry Edwards, a professor of sociology at the University of California at Berkeley, said in a telephone interview. "To be American at some point is to engage the reality of violence; whether it is to defend yourself against it or, God forbid, initiate it. That's the American way. We love to be violent. We pay big money to see it. Whether it's on the movie screen or at the race track, violence sells." Dr. Ken Daltrick, a professor of political science at the Roper Center for Public Opinion at the University of Connecticut, said the rash of negative publicity is simply part of the tradeoff. "It's a hot media topic in college sports because they are more professionalized now," he said in a telephone interview. "You have to take the good with the bad. The bigger the crowds, the more money they get from the networks, the more of a public entity they are." Florida quarterback Danny Wuerffel said athletes don't have the luxury of controlling their degree of exposure. "Whenever you're a public figure, people are going to see you, and whether it's right or wrong, a lot of kids try to emulate what they see," Wuerffel said during a national teleconference call from Gainesville. "I think it's not a choice whether you want to be a role model. I think pretty much you are a role model." Wuerffel and Colorado's Russell have emerged as spokespersons for college athletes. Russell, along with South Carolina center Paul Beckwith, West Virginia quarterback Chad Johnston and North Carolina linebacker James Hamilton recently did a national public service announcement for Liz Claiborne Inc., in conjunction with the College Football Association and the Center for the Study of Sport in Society. The 30-second PSA, in which the players denounce the abuse of women and encourage men to take a stand on the issue, began airing in college football stadiums across the country in October - domestic violence awareness month. The project's coordinators hope to facilitate male leadership in a problem area where men are traditionally silent. "I think that people that aren't associated with college football don't realize that a huge percentage of us are quality guys that are getting degrees and are good citizens," Russell said. "Unfortunately that's not news. People don't want to hear about the Rhodes scholars or the athletes that are out doing community service. They'd rather hear about some guy out there doing something violent." As sad as that may be, he might be right. "I don't think there's any question," said Cal-Berkeley's Edwards. "It's so characteristically American. If there's an accident on the freeway, traffic will be backed up for miles in the opposite lane because people will slow down hoping to see a head sitting on a hood or perhaps an arm lying on the street. "Look at (the movie 'Independence Day'). You don't have to have a storyline these days, just a lot of special effects and violence." Developing programs Some universities are using proactive measures in working with their athletes in an attempt to curb those problems. Seminars such as the NCAA's CHAMPS/Life Skills Program and the Mentors in Violence Prevention Program (MVP), which provide enrichment specific to athletes' needs, are currently in place across the country. ASU is one of the 170 institutions currently utilizing the Life Skills Program. "I think it's critically important, but no more important than it would be for the rest of society," ASU's White said. "Most institutions have those kinds of counseling services available to all students and it's important that student athletes have access to those services as well." Northeastern's Taylor said that in many cases, student- athletes need to be taught things they never learned at home. "You have to intervene," he said. "Coaches have to give messages about what is acceptable. "I don't think we really teach ethics to anyone. Unfortunately if you're a 280-pound lineman you're in worse shape than if you're a 110-pound guy working at a grocery store." Taylor helped develop MVP, which was founded at Northeastern in 1993 with the help of federal funding. The program's approach is not to finger-point or blame athletes for social ills, but instead to encourage proactive behavior and leadership in those areas. The program, which utilizes former college athletes in delivering its lessons, attempts to generate interactive discussions using the MVP Playbook. Taylor said the Playbook details a series of possible scenarios, each of which are given a sports term. For example, "Slapshot" involves teammates in a party setting who witness one team member slapping his girlfriend across the face. "Then we discuss the train of thought," Taylor said. "We ask them what is the range of things you think about before you act? Then we talk about the five or six options they have to handle it." The NCAA's Life Skills Program is based on similar philosophies. Its premise is that student-athletes, by virtue of their involvement in athletics, have a difficult time accessing campuswide student activities, programming and experiences. The program attempts to help them bridge that gap. "I feel strongly that they have different needs, different time commitments," White said of student-athletes. "They're competing with different pressures. They're competing for the expenditure of prime-time hours during every day, practice, pre- practice, post-practice and then all the other demands that face and challenge the rest of the general population as they relate to academics." The Life Skills training consists of a series of on-campus lectures designed to enrich athletes' values and interpersonal relations. One seminar focuses specifically on sexual responsibility. "The athletes retain essentially two very clear messages," said Arkansas' Jackson, the seminar's coordinator. "Before any physical or sexual interaction, first, always ask first; and second, 'no' always means 'no.' So it goes back to very basic safe dating practices." If the groundwork for change is in place, the prevailing question that remains is when - if ever - will the madness stop? "I believe with the NCAA and the vast majority of life skills programs out there and with athletic departments working closely with student services and administrators, I think it's going to work out for the better," Jackson said. "Again, this is not an excuse for the perpetrated assault. If there is a perpetrated assault, it can and must be punished. Athletes have to be more careful and have to make better judgments." The NCAA's Uryasz agreed. "I think we've taken significant steps to deter and reduce abuse among college student-athletes, but we need to do more work and that's a statement we could make for all education in student-athletes," he said. Still others contend that the only truly effective way to stop violence and crime in the athletic ranks is for teammates to take it upon themselves when the opportunity presents itself. "Violence against women takes different forms in different groups of men," UMass' Crosset said. "Each community of men needs to take responsibility for ending violence against women in their community." There clearly are two constant themes that will continue to perpetuate the issue: The public's passion for sports and the media's propensity for being the watchdog. "Sport has become pop culture in my view and people just have a crazy, insatiable interest in sport, particularly intercollegiate sport," said ASU's White. And athletes have a penchant for screwing up, said Cal- Berkeley's Edwards. "As long as they are willing to accommodate, the media will be there to capitalize," he said.
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By Lori Cain The 8-foot-tall bird dropped to the ground, its wings flail- ing. Its agile neck swung from side to side, almost reaching the center of its back with each turn. With one swift movement it was back on its feet and charging the fence. Hissing like a cat, the flightless bird lunged forward, snapping the air with its large bone-like beak. "If it were breeding season, I would say he is performing for his mate," said Dorly Gonzalez, owner and operator of Swiss Ostrich Breeders in the southeastern Arizona town of Willcox. "But it's not. He just doesn't like us being here. These birds can be quite mean and very territorial." Ostriches, members of the ratite species, have been roaming the earth for millions of years and now 40,000 to 60,000 roam in pens throughout the United States.There are an estimated 15,000 birds in Arizona, and although they once were raised for breeding, most now are fattened for butchering. "Their meat is delicious and it has hardly any fat," said Gonzalez, a native of Switzerland. "You've seen their leather, haven't you? It's soft and right now brings in the highest dollar amount off the bird. And the feathers, well people have been using ostrich feathers in fashion for hundreds of years." Although ostriches would be considered poultry, their meat is classified as a "red" meat because the pH of their flesh is similar to beef and the color of the meat is cherry red. The steaks can be cooked to medium rare. In the last five to 10 years ostriches have entered the meat industry as a viable substitute for chicken, beef and pork. Now farmers in Arizona are trying to collect in this new industry. "Three years ago, a good breeding pair could go for as much as $65,000," said Ron Leanord, an ostrich farmer in Scottsdale. "Now you're lucky if you can get $6,000 to $10,000 for a pair. "What establishes a good or proven breeding pair is whether they have produced or not. This means the pair has produced eggs that are fertile." Similar to the inflated market of Arabian horses during the 80s, ostrich prices soared in the early 90s and many people won or lost fortunes. Inflated prices and an overestimation of consumer response to ostrich meat contributed to the demise of the market. "People were told, ' You get this pair of birds. They'll produce 40 babies. You slaughter the offspring and you'll be rich," said Kirk Harris, an operator at the Willcox Packing House. "It just doesn't work that way." Willcox is home to some of the largest ostrich farms in Arizona. "I have spent my children's inheritance," said Gonzalez, who has at least 200 birds on her property. One of the breeding pairs cost her $65,000. "They were supposed to have been proven breeders," she added. "I have yet to get one fertile egg from them and I have had them for two years. I will consider myself lucky if I can get $2,000 or $3,000 for the pair." Right now Gonzalez is trying to sell her 300-acre farm and get out from under the high cost of overhead. "It costs me close to $5,000 a month to run this farm," she said. "I would be happy to sell the birds on a contract so I just wouldn't have to feed them. We're not talking just feed. There's electricity, irrigation, veterinarians and not to mention the help. It's expensive." Gonzalez has had two men running her farm. She irrigates her own alfalfa crop sparingly to save money. Her 200-plus Jurassic-like birds mill about their pens, creating prehistoric images amongst the mesh of 8-foot-tall fences. The farm was built for feed lot capacity and can hold up to 2,000 birds, but its 3-year-old stalls and buildings are nearly vacant because of the market downturn. "The blues are nasty birds," Gonzalez said as she walked from pen to pen. "I like the blacks though. They are more docile. They're the ones you see that people ride. You know, like the ones in fairs." Blue, red and black ostriches describe the type or breed of bird. Each color breed carries its distinct characteristics. Though each type of bird has the tendency to be aggressive, the black ostrich is commonly known to be the most docile of the breeds. They can jump heights of five feet and reach speeds of up to 40 mph. "Since I was a child I have been attracted to ostriches. I love them," added Gonzalez. "It is a shame that I am having such terrible luck with them." Breeders now must beware Gonzalez' luck fell with the market. "It caught on like wildfire," Leonard said at his Scottsdale farm. "The prices of the birds soared. It was a breeder's market then and now it's a slaughter market. That drives the price of birds way down and then the market can't support the higher-priced birds or high-priced farms that were built in the early 90s. "Now people investing in birds are investing in a more realistic market. They have no debt to service and their overhead is less because their debt is less. Back when birds were costing up to $60,000 a pair that price could support building a $250,000 barn, if in fact the birds were worth that price, but they were not. Now, when birds are going for between $4,000 and $6,000 a pair, that price won't merit a barn that costs that much and that's where initial investors got hurt." That's what happened to Gonzalez. "I have invested more than $250,000 in this farm alone, not to mention the $110, 000 I have spent on just four of my 230 or so birds," she said. Leonard's 5-acre farm sits on the southern fringes of the Tonto National Forest in extreme North Scottsdale. He has a small plot of land in comparison to Gonzalez' and has only 70 birds, but the former computer software associate manages to do well. He approached the ostrich farming with a business mind. "I'm from Plano, a suburb outside of Dallas," said Leonard, who farms with his wife, Diana, and two children. "I was traveling for business and read about ostrich farming in a magazine on the plane. Within six months I had quit my job and started a farm of my own. "A little spontaneous, you might think and it probably was, but I researched the industry in that time and figured that it was a wise investment. "You have to approach this business with common sense and not a credit card mentality. When you make a little money, you have to put it aside for the bad times. You can't just continue spending your profits, because when the market gets slim like it did, you better have something to fall back on." The bad times come with a fluctuating market that plagues any meat industry. "The main problem is supply," Leonard said. "There has always been an undercurrent of demand. What I mean by that is buyers want to purchase the meat. They are just afraid that if they commit to purchasing the meat, we as suppliers might run out of it. "It's a catch-22. You need the high volume to keep the cost down and ensure a constant supply for customers, but you need customers to merit such a high volume. The complications of producing a consistent supply of ostrich meat lie primarily in the difficulties of getting the meat or birds to market. Because the meat is wanted by restaurants and other countries, it must be USDA certified. Sold locally, any meat for consumption need only be state certified. Even though the U. S. government does not include ostrich under the mandatory meat and poultry inspection laws, ostrich farmers seeking credibility want the USDA seal. "The inspection is the same," said Bruce Kaplan, a veterinarian and public affairs specialist for the USDA. "The consumer wants to see that seal." Voluntary inspection has been available to the ostrich farmer since December 1991. Federal inspection is done on carcass-by-carcass basis and the inspector must have knowledge about that particular species. "We were state certified and then these ostrich farmers asked us to upgrade our packing plant so we could get federally certified and accommodate their demand," Harris, of the Willcox Packing House, said. "It was expensive. We can service about 20 birds a day and probably process maybe once a week or even once a month. It just depends on when the farmer schedules for it. "There was a plant in Phoenix for a while, but it closed down. I guess it was to much of a hassle." The hassle comes from scheduling problems. If a meat- packing house chooses to process ostrich meat, it must have a federally certified inspector on the premise while the slaughtering is being done. Most packing houses do not have a resident USDA inspector. Leonard said, "We have to arrange for a USDA inspector to be present at every slaughter. That's where the time constraints come in. Right now, we have so many scheduling factors to consider when bringing the birds to slaughter." There is the schedule of the inspector, the packing house, the order date, then the transport time for the birds. Any one of these can hold Leonard back in his promise to provide a consistent supply of meat for his buyers "It's hard to have any consistency," he added. "That also hurts our supply, which affects a buyer's willingness to invest. "We (Leonard and fellow business partners) are planning on having a plant up and running within a year. This way we will be able to provide a consistent supply and a solid base to establish a viable market for our product." Leonard said that when he and his business partners start their own meat packing plant, they will have a site USDA inspector. Harris charges $120 a bird for processing. Depending on how the bird by-products are sold determines how much a farmer would receive on each bird. Sold whole a farmer can get up to $8.50 per pound. Choice cuts can bring in as much as $10.95 per pound in the wholesale market. Though the birds can weigh 300-500 pounds, they dress down to only 70 pounds of salable meat. "We don't buy the birds here," Harris added. "We just process them and get the hides ready for tanning. The farmer sells the meat himself. It's just too expensive right now for us to bother selling it. We can't get the high market this meat demands. I do well enough with pork and beef. "The real money is in the hides. A hide can go for $350." Leonard said ostrich meat is sold mainly in restaurants. He knows of only one upper-end supermarket that sells the meat. It goes for $6 per pound for ground or stew meat and as much as $30 per pound for choice cuts. Leonard uses the Willcox Packing House because it can handle the amount of birds he needs to have slaughtered. The University of Arizona in Tucson also processes ostrich off campus, but only at a capacity of seven to 10 birds a day. They're tough as they age "These birds are hardy," Leonard said. "They can go three days without water or food. I've seen them out in 120 degree weather. "I've seen them out in snow that is chest deep. They don't move much in those conditions. As a matter of fact, they look like periscopes in the snow. They're just hardy animals." The only truly dangerous time for the birds is when they are chicks or babies. Weighing two to three pounds and measuring approximately 10 inches the newly hatched chicks can die easily. "If a chick is under 3 months he's trying his hardest to die," Leonard said. "After 3 months, you can't kill him with an ax. "With the right amount of knowledge and prior expertise, people are enjoying a relatively high success rate at getting the birds to 3 months of age. "Ostriches are ecologically more friendly than cows or pigs and economically compatible. Once you get them past the danger point, they are a low maintenance commodity. You can use everything on the bird. "The French love the necks. We sell a lot of necks to the French. General Motors uses the feathers to do the final dust off of the cars before they're painted. It seems they are best thing on the market for collecting dust." There also is a huge market for ostrich eggs. One egg is equal to two dozen chicken eggs and, Gonzalez said. A single egg makes a wonderful omelet that will feed four people easily. "It's a bit sweeter, but oh, it is so delicious," she said. The shells of the unfertilized eggs, when blown out and cleaned, can sell for $10 to $20 each. They are used primarily as decorative pieces. Leonard held up an ad from a magazine with ornately dressed ostrich eggs that resembled the famous Faberge eggs. Two were fashioned as pocketbooks. During the January to October breeding season a hen will lay anywhere from 40 to 120 eggs. "Now, 120 eggs is definitely a high figure and uncommon,"Leonard said. "I've heard of a hen producing that many, but you wouldn't want to keep her at that pace. It would tire her out. Seventy is a nice average, but 20 is definitely a low producer." Breeding ostriches are usually kept together in what is called a trio, two females and a male. "This has been found to be the best arrangement for the birds," Leonard said. "One male and one female is OK, but for business purposes your best productivity comes with a trio." Leonard held a long stick-like tool with a hook that resembled the hooks of the vaudeville days that were used to get bad actors off the stage. "I'm going to show you how we catch these birds," he said. With tool in hand and a quick flick of his wrist, he hooked an ostrich by its neck. Finagling his way to the front of the bird, he quickly grabbed its beak with his free hand. The cut-off sleeve of a sweat shirt was quickly swooped over the bird's head and used to hood the animal. Blinded by its hood, the ostrich was subdued and easy to approach. "We do this to catch them when we need to move them, but it also acts as a nice attitude adjustment," Leonard said. "You can't bring a female into a male's pen. He's so territorial. He'll try to kill her. But, if you hood the male and lead him out of the pen, then bring the female into the same pen, you can unhood and lead the male in right after her. He will believe he has come into her territory and not be aggressive at all." The bird that Leonard hooded and unhooded was inspecting its surroundings. "I like these birds," Leonard said. "They're clean. They don't smell, and you don't get the flies that come with the cattle industry."
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By Percy Ednalino Jr. Kevin White, ASU's director of athletics, has a terrific view of Frank Kush Field from his office in the Intercollegiate Athletics Complex at Sun Devil Stadium. The large windows in his office allow White to see every pass, punt and sack from the comfort of his desk. Much more happens from his office than watching the Sun Devils in action. This office also is where White oversees an annual budget of $16 million, a full-time staff of 100 employees, and 22 teams that are pressured to win every game. From this office White also is charged with raising millions of dollars in private funding to make sure ASU stays among the nation's elite universities in athletics. For many years, it was common for big-time college athletic directors to "retire" into their jobs after successful stints as beloved head football coaches at their institutions. Today, a new breed of successful athletic director has emerged: articulate leaders who possess extraordinary marketing and fund-raising skills and who function much like corporate CEOs. The day of the pipe-smoking, tweed-jacket wearing, grandfatherly college president has given way to a scholarly - yet savvy - fund-raising dynamo and effective lobbyist. Concurrently, the times also demand a new kind of athletic director at Division I institutions. White, who assumed his job earlier this year, fits the profile perfectly. The boyish-looking, 45-year-old is a former college track coach. More important, though, he's a Ph.D.-holding, bottom-line administrator who seeks to make ASU's sports teams profitable, law-abiding, class-attending winners. After a summer of turmoil in 1995 in which Charles Harris, who preceded White as director of athletics, resigned from his post, there have been numerous changes in the ASU athletic department. National recognition for the Rose Bowl-bound Sun Devil football team, new coaches on the athletic staff, a tougher stand on academic achievement and an impending endorsement contract with Nike are just a few of the changes White has planned for ASU. White, 45, was named ASU's 17th director of athletics on March 27 and is part of the new wave of younger ADs at the helm of many Division I athletic programs. He is considered young for an athletic director with the average age in the Pac-10 being 50. The job comes with new responsibilities. Hiring a few coaches and working out the football schedule through the next decade are the least of the worries for today's athletic director. Now, the "modern" AD is heavily involved with national committees and is under greater scrutiny to keep the school's athletics programs in compliance with NCAA regulations. The AD also has to have a great record of fund raising and a sense of business savvy. White is expected to do all that, and more. After Harris left, ASU President Lattie Coor selected Christine Wilkinson, vice president of student affairs, as ASU's interim AD for the 1995-96 school year. While Wilkinson served as the school's AD, Coor initiated a search for Harris' replacement. Milton Glick, ASU's provost, said Wilkinson's stint as AD helped put White on the right track. "I think that we've been very fortunate," Glick said. "Dr. Wilkinson did a superb job paving the way for Dr. White's arrival." White was Tulane University's director of athletics for the past five years and is a member of the NCAA's highest governing body, the NCAA Council. He also is on the executive committee of the Division I-A Athletic Directors Association. He said the role of the Division I athletic director has indeed changed in the last decade. "It's a much different job and I've been involved in administration, going back officially to 1982," White said. "I've been involved for 14 years at a variety of levels, and I can honestly say that the expectations have changed dramatically." Expectations aren't the only thing that have changed. White said that the financial challenges of the job are significant. College athletics have become a big money maker for major companies such as Nike and Reebok. Fellow Pac-10 school USC inked a deal with Nike last summer while UCLA did the same with Reebok. The deals ensure that the schools will generate more money from merchandising licenses - and gain exposure and recognition through association with the companies. Growing interest in women's athletics also has contributed to the financial changes. For a Division I athletic director, change is the norm, rather than the exception. Glick said that intercollegiate athletics will play a larger role in the next few years. He added that he feels a stronger tie between athletics and academics will be made. University of Arizona Athletic Director Jim Livengood said staying flexible is vital to maintaining a competitive athletic program. He added that an athletic director who doesn't adopt a flexible attitude won't keep his job for long. "Status quo in this job means losing ground fast," Livengood said. "It's just a totally different job. It 's definitely a young guy's job." Livengood, 51, should know. He has been with the Wildcats for the past three years after spending the previous seven as the director of athletics for Washington State. He also served in the same position at Southern Illinois University from 1985-87. He said the job of athletic director typically would be handed over to the football coach when the coach announced he was ready to retire. Livengood said that promoting the coach to AD was considered a reward. Livengood currently is the chairman for the Pac-10 men's television and budget committees. He also has pushed to transform the UofA into a national leader in gender equity issues. Gender equity is nothing new to Barbara Hedges, the University of Washington's director of athletics. Hedges is the only female AD in the Pac-10 and is the first woman to serve as president for the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics. Hedges, a former gymnastics coach at the UofA who earned her bachelor's degree in physical education at ASU, said she doesn't feel the role of the AD has changed significantly - but it has become more demanding. Hedges said being the only female AD in the conference isn't something she thinks about a lot. She added that gender plays no role in maintaining a successful and stable athletic program. New kid on the block At ASU, the office of athletic director wasn't always as stable. Harris resigned - or was fired, depending upon whom you talk to - on June 28, 1995. Wilkinson was selected by Coor as an interim athletic director for the following school year. Why did Harris leave? Again, it depends upon whom you ask. In June 1995, columnist Bob Jacobsen wrote in The Arizona Republic that "the real reason (Harris) was fired was he simply was not capable of running an athletic department." Glick said otherwise. "He resigned," the provost said. "I don't know why. If you want the answer to that, you'll have to talk to either him or President Coor." Coor had commissioned a study on ASU athletics in 1993. The study was conducted by Bryce Jordan of Penn State and John Ryan of Indiana, two former university presidents. The report stated that Harris's relationship to some ASU boosters was rocky, which contributed to his inability to raise funds through gifts. That shouldn't be a problem with White. While at Tulane, he headed a fund-raising effort to add two women's sports to the Green Wave program. White's effort generated $9 million. "I think (fund raising) is the difference between having a good program and having a great program," said Lonnie Ostrom, director of development at ASU. Before going to Tulane, White also was the director of athletics at the University of Maine from 1987-91. While at Maine, he helped generate $11 million for the school's athletic department. He also served in the NCAA's cost reduction and nominating committees. "He (White) works very hard and has high expectations," Glick said. "His timing is superb. What athletic director wouldn't love to have a football team that's 11-0?" Like a football coach who goes into a game with a strategy designed to foil the other team, White has outlined his goals for improving the Sun Devils' athletic programs. White's goals are essentially the same for many of the athletic directors in the Pac-10. "I see the athletic director as largely a facilitator, someone who has oversight over academic performance, competitive nature of the programs and the financial challenges facing most athletic departments," White said. He cited four areas he said were priorities: Resource acquisition, academic performance, student services and compliance with NCAA regulations. For White, resource acquisition means keeping ASU's facilities up to date. He isn't the only AD in the Pac-10 with that in mind. Stanford Athletic Director Ted Leland has been busy updating Stanford's facilities. The Cardinal athletic department has completed funding for the Arrillaga Family Sports Center, a $23 million multiuse facility that opened in 1994. Renovations also are in store for Stanford Stadium. With other members of the Pac-10 improving their programs, it's no wonder White is so determined to update ASU's facilities. Improvements are needed to stay competitive in the conference. "In the '90s, this would be very true to form for most athletic directors at most institutions," White said. "We need to generate an awful lot of income to fully fund our program. When you look at our peer institutions, and most notably, our peer institution in Tucson (UofA), we don't begin to have the resources to be competitive year-in and year-out. "We just need to do a lot of work in all forms of resource acquisition from better packaging and selling our broadcast properties to selling season tickets to fund-raising. We need to do a better job of having a more successful retail store, as I characterize it in-house." White also said maintaining a high graduation rate is important, as well as establishing a standard for academic achievement. Academics are important "I think there's a sincere interest on most college campuses - if not all college campuses - and within the general public as well, to make darn sure that student athletes are making satisfactory progress toward their degree completion and that graduation rates are continually being enhanced," White said. "We used to talk about those issues 10 years ago, but I think we were insincere. Today, we're as serious as a heart attack in terms of academic performance." And how. While he was at Tulane, he worked hard to make certain as many student-athletes as possible earned at least a 3.0 grade point average. Here at ASU, he already has formed a task force of coaches and student-athletes to make sure that high academic standards are maintained. White said making sure student-athletes are treated fairly and are able to fulfill their needs is another goal he wants to accomplish. "We really feel strongly as a department that its important for our student-athletes to feel that we're delivering what we promised them and be true to them when we recruited them in the living room," he said. "We want to build a student services program based on satisfying their needs and interests." White said he felt it was important that the rest of the Pac- 10 and the NCAA schools perceive ASU as a university that maintains a strict policy of staying within NCAA rules. "We need to do absolutely everything within our authority and power to keep our program within the white lines," he said. "We need to run a very clean and compliant program." Hedges of Washington agreed. "It's probably the most important thing," she said. "It's either that, or face the alternative." For many athletic directors, the alternative isn't pleasant. At its worst, a violation of NCAA rules could result in probation or elimination of a program. For White and others, today's athletic director is a conduit to senior administration, faculty and the community. With college athletics gaining more visibility each year, the athletic director's duties also are growing. "Our successes and non-successes are depicted every day in the sports section of every paper and electronic media outlets in the country," White said. "It's become a very unique sub-sector of higher education. It's complex and there are innumerable forces from within and outside the institution that make it complicated today. It's far different than it was 10 years ago."
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By Ray Stern The Valley of the Sun's Siamese-twin problems of air pollution and urban growth are there for everyone to see. The summit of South Mountain, only partially surrounded by mega- development, is probably the best for smog-viewing. Most of the year, a pall of brownish-green haze can be seen coating the Valley from West Phoenix to the newer communities in North Scottsdale and Chandler. On days the smog is truly menacing, the tall buildings of downtown Phoenix look drowned in a thick chemical soup. To residents and visitors, the brown cloud represents air pollution, but the cloud is not a simple litmus test with which the public can judge air quality, experts say. Sometimes when the haze looks thickest, pollutant levels are in the "good" range. Also, there is currently no hard evidence to tell whether the brown cloud is getting worse or better, although popular perception seems to dictate that skies were clearer in the not-so-recent past. Indeed, air quality has been showing improvement. In many respects, people in the metro Phoenix area are breathing cleaner air than was here 10 or 20 years ago. The brown cloud may symbolize the Valley's air problems, but it also typifies the uncertainty hanging over the complex and controversial question of the future of air quality itself. Officials at the Maricopa Association of Governments, the lead entity in the region for prescribing air pollution fixes and handling transportation planning, are now working on the next round of plans to bring the area's air down to healthful levels. They say their plans show air pollution will decrease, even though their assessment of what the air will be like in 2005 or 2015 may not be precise. To accomplish their task, MAG officials are attempting to predict the future of such diverse and wily factors as the economy, public driving preferences and the weather. Meanwhile, critics of MAG's optimistic outlook blast their findings as unrealistic at best, and intentionally flawed at worst. Cars still main polluters Three pollutants - carbon monoxide, ozone and particulates - consistently exceed federal health standards in the urban areas of Maricopa County. On days that local air quality monitors record levels higher than these standards, even the healthiest people will have short-term breathing problems and the potential for long-term damage to the lungs. By far, the biggest single source of the county's three main pollutants is motor vehicles, which either emit or help produce the tons of poisonous chemicals thrown up into the sky each day. Particulates come in two forms, large and small. Half of the PM-10, particles 10 millionths of a meter or less, is dust that gets stirred up by vehicles. An additional 35 percent come from smaller particles, PM-2.5 (2.5 millionths of a meter or less), which are ejected directly from tailpipes. These particles make up the brown cloud. The microscopic PM-10 and PM-2.5 particles are so small they get past the lung's defenses, said David Feuerherd, program director of the American Lung Association of Arizona. "We estimate that 1,200 people die prematurely due to particulates in the Valley," he said. "That's pretty serious." Carbon monoxide, a colorless, odorless killer gas produced by incomplete fuel combustion, gets into the bloodstream and stymies the flow of oxygen to the organs. Ozone is a gas that occurs naturally in the upper stratosphere, where it protects all life on earth by filtering out harmful radiation from the sun. Ground-level ozone is "to your lungs what the sun is to your skin," Feuerherd said. "It dries your lungs out over a long period of time." Ozone does not come from tailpipes but is formed during hot days from a combination of ingredients. Combustion engines spew tons of hydrocarbons, nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide throughout the day, which is added to tons of chemicals directly or indirectly dumped by businesses and residents. Under strong sunlight, usually in the summer, these chemicals combine and cook up ground-level ozone. Since the federal Clean Air Act Amendments of 1977, the county has failed to reach EPA attainment for the three pollutants, but the air was unhealthy long before then. People in the metro Phoenix area have been breathing garbage for decades. Nevertheless, the area has made major improvements over time, and that trend will continue, said Lindy Bauer, environmental programs coordinator for MAG. "All three (pollutants) are expected to get better," she said. "Yes, we can say the air is getting cleaner," said Roger Herzog, MAG engineering manager. MAG was formed in 1967 to deal with area needs, and it addresses a wide range of issues from homelessness to building codes. As the main regional organization for dealing with transportation, MAG will help determine whether the Valley is to keep receiving about $80 million a year in federal highway funds. In order to get these funds, which equal roughly one-fifth of the region's total transportation funds, MAG is mandated to team up with state officials to develop road plans that help solve congestion problems and also conform to pollution controls. The latest MAG conformity analysis, released in September, states that moving forward with plans to build hundreds of miles of new freeways will only support pollution- fighting measures. MAG is not allowed to include guesses about new technologies in its computer models, but must instead use current "reasonably available" pollution-control measures such as vehicle inspection programs and known cleaner fuels. The report concludes that emissions of all three pollutants will be less under the "build" scenario than if the freeway plans were not followed. The total amounts of two of the pollutants released into the Valley's air will go down in the next 10 years, according to the report. "Total carbon monoxide emissions and total hydrocarbon emissions go down even though the number of vehicle-miles traveled goes up," Herzog said. Collectively, Valley motorists now drive about 60 million miles every day, about triple of what they drove 25 years ago. By 2005, MAG expects an increase to 74 million miles without the new freeways, and 76 million miles with them. During that time, the Valley's population is expected to grow from 2.5 million (recorded in the 1995 special census), to just under 3.2 million - an increase of more than 650,000 people. Doug Eberhart, MAG air quality planning manager, said that an important reason for the estimated improvements in air pollution is that cars made after the mid-1970s are far cleaner than their predecessors, and more of those are on the road every day. Because it doesn't snow or rain much in the Valley, cars and trucks aren't rusting and heading for the scrap pile as fast as in some other places in the nation. Thus, the area has one of the country's oldest big-city fleets, but it gets newer each year. "We can still look forward to continued improve-ments from this trend," Eberhart said. In addition, MAG officials also say there will be gains from current pollution control measures such as no-nonsense vehicle inspection programs, remote-sensing "smog dogs," vapor-recovery systems, ordinances prohibiting wood-burning, the use of cleaner fuels, transit improvements and switching government cars over to alternative fuels like methanol. Controls still not enough David Baron, assistant director of the Arizona Center for Law in the Public Interest, said those measures won't be enough. Baron's group has sued state agencies and the EPA several times in the past, seeking tougher crackdowns on air pollution. Two lawsuits were filed against the EPA by the group and concerned citizens this summer in response to carbon monoxide and ozone problems. Baron said he did not want to predict whether the air quality is getting better or worse. "I don't have a crystal ball, but we do know historically what has happened (to pollution) in urban areas that show uncontrolled growth, and Los Angeles is a good example of that." When the Southern California area exceeds health standards, which it does far more regularly than the Valley, average pollutant levels are two and three times what they are here. Baron puts little stock in the EPA-approved MAG computer models that purport to demon-strate cleaner air is on the horizon. "They want to use their models to show that more cars, more freeways and more traffic will mean cleaner air, because if they don't show that, they won't get federal highway money," he said. "So they have a predetermined result that they want to reach and they reach it. If you look at those models, they are typically based on the assumption that many people will drive less, or shorter distances, even if they build these freeways. That just defies common sense. It defies reality." Baron said some of the inputs that go into the models are based on "nutty" assumptions that people will take more circuitous routes without freeways to find less-congested roads. MAG also ignores the fact that adding new freeways induces people to drive more and farther, because it is suddenly more convenient to do so, he said. "Of course they don't want to produce models that show that air quality is going to get worse as a result of all these new roads they want to build, so they don't do that," Baron said. Herzog said the MAG model does take into account driving preferences and congestion factors, and those elements are reflected as accurately as possible in the models. "We set up our model to reproduce what travel patterns exist, what travel volumes are on the freeways and arterials, and we do a really good job of basically setting up our model to replicate traffic volumes and various types of (roads), and the total amount of vehicle-miles traveled, as best as we can estimate it," Herzog said. Baron admitted he had no statistical analysis to support his argument, but he was concerned that MAG and the Arizona Department of Transportation were not interested in questioning the model's findings too deeply. The only other entity that has the resources to investigate MAG's findings is the Federal Highway Administration, but it is too quick to rush forward in support of building more roads, Baron said. "They rubber stamp all of the models," he added. "I don't think they have ever raised a serious question about a transportation model in Arizona. As a result, it's business as usual." Ira Domsky, ADEQ air quality planning manager, said if MAG's models are wrong, the Valley is in trouble. "All of our growth projections have been underestimated (in the past)," he said. "The latest numbers for the years 2010 and 2015 that come from MAG show reductions in the amount of VMTs (vehicle miles traveled) from prior estimates that they have made. I just want to make sure we're not fooling ourselves into thinking we can declare victory and everybody can go home." Lindy Bauer, the environmental programs coordinator for MAG, said her agency is not trying to fool anyone. Officials there realize better than anyone that a model is simply a predictive tool, she said. The official Urban Airshed Model uses 10,000 files of data to try to determine if an area will meet health standards, yet in the end the results are no better than flipping a coin, Bauer said. Some pollutants down, some up MAG's strongest evidence for its case is the fact that levels of many pollutants have either dropped or failed to rise significantly, despite major growth in the area. An EPA report issued in November stated that the Valley's air pollution levels had dropped in recent years, following national trends in cleaner air. Levels of lead in the area were down 96 percent from 1980 to 1995, the report said. Carbon monoxide went down 39 percent from 1986 to 1995, and during about the same time, the annual mean concentration levels of particulates dropped by 14 percent. However, ozone levels rose 11 percent in the last nine years. Also, no conclusive studies have been done yet to determine whether the tiny PM-2.5 particles, for which the EPA has just proposed a new standard, are increasing. Though MAG officials and others are optimistic the Valley will meet health standards someday soon, none of the plans filed with the EPA since the beginning of "non-attainment" status have been adequate. Despite the reductions made, the EPA downgraded the Valley to "serious" status for particulates in May, and for carbon monoxide in July, because the plans were judged insufficient. If the county is to hit the mark, it might not happen for a while. Frances Wicher, an environmental engineer for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in San Francisco, said there is reason to be optimistic in the long-term because pollutant levels in the area are not that far above the standards. "Given historical trends, I would say the area will be cleaner," she said. "The area has done a very good job of keeping up with its growth so far, now that we've gone through the inspection changes and fuel changes. It's sort of an American value to say a solution will start to appear. I think the area needs to start planning for the 2010 time frame in terms of use of the automobile, land use patterns (and other long-term effects). If that's done, it can attain the standard easily." Unleaded fuels made their way to Arizona in the mid- 1970s, and now lead levels in the county are down to one-twentieth the national standard. Many hope the same easy fix will be found for other pollutants. Rep. John Shadegg, R-Ariz., said there is no question Arizonans want cleaner air, but the issue of growth must be dealt with. "We've taken care of the easiest of the problems," he said. "Sulfur dioxide from copper mines ... we've virtually eliminated. Technology is helping, but where you have growth, and a spread- out population, it's an extremely difficult problem to solve in the long run." Domsky, of ADEQ, said he thinks the county will soon run into a technological dead-end. "The problem is that we've taken the vehicle inspection program absolutely as far as it will go," he said. "We don't know how we're going to counteract the adverse impacts of growth at this point. Just relying on technology - there are other things we ought to be looking at," such as transit and growth management. New technologies do come along, at a price. Gov. Fife Symington's task force on air pollution recently recommended using a cleaner-burning gasoline in the summer to fight ozone. The gas costs oil refineries an estimated 3 to 4 cents a gallon more to make, but the impact on consumers is still unknown. If more air-cleaning gadgets and fuels don't start appearing, measures some see as Draconian could be implemented - such as mandatory reduced driving, stricter emissions requirements that hurt the poor, bans on non-electric lawn equipment or adopting daylight-saving time to change driving patterns. But Wicher, the EPA engineer, said those things might not be necessary to bring the area into attainment. "I don't know if harsher measures are the right turn," she said. "You never know what's around the corner with regard to new technology. In the 80s we didn't even think about the fuel side of it. There's definitely new things that can be done." Eberhart pointed to graphs that show lower emissions in the next 10-15 years for two pollutants. "Emissions go down until 2010, then show a slight upturn at 2015," Eberhart said. That's the point where the Valley's inexorable growth outstrips all the reasonable control measures. Eberhart said new technology is bound to come along in the next few years to help the situation. "There is so much stuff that's happening right now, I would bet you that you will never see numbers that are actually this high (as the 2001 levels)," he said. Is the brown cloud worse? The new health standards proposed in late November by the EPA for ozone and PM-2.5 will mean taking a second look at the plans, MAG officials said. The federal standard for ozone was 80 parts per billion over a one-hour period until 1979, when it was relaxed to 125 parts per billion. The proposed standard rolls it back to 80 parts per billion, but it is over an eight-hour period. With the maximum ozone concentrations in the Valley hovering at an average of 136 parts per billion from 1990 to 1995 - and not one year without a violation - the area obviously has a long way to go on ozone. MAG has no firm idea what is going on with PM-2.5. "The whole issue on 2.5 is one of the first things that has to be resolved," Herzog said. "You know it's definitely difficult at this point to first come up with a bunch of historical data." He added that along with establishing the new standard for PM-2.5, the EPA also has to establish new monitoring techniques for measuring the pollutant. Until that happens, he said, things are still uncertain with regard to PM-2.5. A study performed in the early 1990s to determine the brown cloud's composition revealed the prime component is PM-2.5. If the brown cloud is getting worse, so it would seem, then, is the PM-2.5 problem. "The public is looking at the brown cloud. If the public thinks the brown cloud is getting worse, it might be," MAG's Bauer said. Ironically, though, the public's perception of air pollution was lowest when air was the worst, she said. In 1985, the Center for Law in the Public Interest filed some high-profile anti-pollution lawsuits, and soon after, a New York Times article on the subject appeared. At that time, perception of pollution - and especially the brown cloud - really took off, she said. "I've lived here about 19 years, and I can't say that I think (the brown cloud) has gotten better or worse. Actually, I didn't even notice it for a long time," she said. MAG has recently commissioned a new study to figure out how to reduce the cloud. Among other things, the study may reveal if the brown cloud is indeed getting browner. The results will probably be available late next year, Bauer said. Jo Crumbaker, who manages air quality planning and analysis for Maricopa County, was also unwilling to say the brown cloud has gotten worse. She said that by looking at old pictures, it is obvious the visibility wasn't that great 20 to 30 years ago. She theorizes that because development in the Valley has increased, a person looking across the Valley looks farther distances and therefore registers a greater amount of haze. "I'm not sure that at any one particular site that you actually have less visibility than you did 20 years ago," she said. Sometimes when it looks the worst, it's simply water in the air enhancing the effect, she said. "On very moist days we have poor visibility, and it's not necessarily pollution itself," Crumbaker added. Neil Berman, a professor of chemical engineering at ASU, agreed. "The farther you can see the worse it's going to look," he said. Baron, of the Center for Law in the Public Interest, said people feel air quality is getting worse, and they just might be right. "Polls are done every winter ... whether they felt adverse effects from the air pollution," he said. "Last winter more people than ever in the Phoenix area recorded adverse effects from air pollution." The public only takes action when they see things are getting really bad," Berman said. "If the public wants to be able to see the mountains better we'll have to be able to do something about the particulate problem, he said. "It's a political problem. If we want to clean things up, we could easily do it."
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By Andrea M. Healey David and Angie Esquivel have made their home in a town that doesn't even have a grocery store. They have tasted life in a big city and a small town, and they say living in rural Arizona is worth the inconvenience of going to another town to shop. "Looking back, it was a good move," David said of his move back to his hometown of Clifton, about 35 miles west of the New Mexico border in eastern Arizona. According to the 1995-1996 Arizona Yearbook, in 1994 there were 2,980 people living in Clifton. That equates to about 4.5 people every square mile. Maricopa County, home to metropolitan Phoenix, has about 257 people per square mile. Sitting in their breakfast bar, the Esquivels remembered their life in Tempe in the early '70s. Their home was at Fifth Street and Ash Avenue. They took their on Sunday afternoon walks to the Dairy Queen, 950 S. Mill Ave., where they met up with friends and went to sit on the grass and play in front of Grady Gammage Auditorium. David worked as a surveyor, but after the 1972-73 economic crunch in the Valley, he lost his job and the family moved back to Clifton. He said that returning to Clifton meant work and a better chance at economic security. Like so many others, he now works five miles up the road in the next town, Morenci, at the Phelps Dodge Copper Mine. He has been there for about 20 years and works in the drafting room, making maps of the mine. "I don't know if I would have been able to have a house like this in Phoenix (while) surveying," he said. Streets with no names The Esquivel home is on the side of a small mountain with streets that have no names. To the left of the entryway is a wall covered with photos of the couple's four children and grandchild. To the right, in the living room, is a pool table. It is a territory into which nieces and nephews do not cross. David, who is president of the Clifton High School Board, knows his grandparents came to Clifton from Mexico in 1883. They homesteaded on the Gila River. His parents stayed in Clifton and his father worked at PD. Angie's grandparents also came from Mexico. She remembered hearing stories about her mother's mother, who rode with the infamous bandit Pancho Villa. Her grandfather also worked for PD when it still ran underground mining operations. He died of lung disease he contracted from the mine work. His daughter, Angie's mother, was 12 years old. Angie's father joined the Air Force when he was 17 years old. He, like the Esquivels, came back to Clifton. He worked at the Phelps Dodge Mercantile Co. as a meat cutter. The mine-owned mercantile is the only large-scale store shared between the two towns. Residents can buy just about everything there, from groceries to major appliances. There's more to small-town life than the mine. The Esquivels said they prefer life in the small community because of its close-knit environment and the opportunity to become more active in their children's lives. "I think you have a lot more contact with your kids (in a small town)," David said. "We (parents) can track them down, and that is a big advantage." Some of the kids in Clifton tell a different story. If they want to go out, the options are limited. The closest movie theater is a uniplex in Morenci. "We party," one Clifton High School senior admitted. "We go out to the (San Francisco) River or we hang out at someone's house. Sometimes we run from the cops." Other students agreed that, when all else fails, they cause trouble. Drinking, smoking or having desert parties seem to be the entertainment of choice for some teens. High school senior Jason Chavez, 18, said things can move slowly, but added that he would not trade his lifestyle. "Sometimes I wish I didn't live here because it's boring," he said. "But I would rather live here because there is too much violence, drugs and killings (in a bigger city). All of my family is here, and it's good because everybody knows everybody. Every- body's friends. I get tired of seeing the same people all the time, but you get used to it." Alysia Tracy, another 18-year-old senior, agreed that big- city life is not for her. "I wouldn't want to live in a big city because there are too many people," she said. "I would want to live somewhere bigger than Clifton." She said she hopes to enter the nursing program at Eastern Arizona College in Safford. She said she would live in Safford because it is a good compromise between small towns and big cities. "It gets annoying (living in a small town)," she said. "A lot of workers (in Clifton and Morenci) live in Safford." A close-knit community Senior Bernadette Moreno, 17, agreed that knowing everyone in town can be a drawback. "Everybody knows everything about you," she said. The probability that someone knows what you're doing, and who you are doing it with, sometimes works to parents' advantage. In a small town, it's hard for anyone to do much without someone hearing about it. David said the town has had its share of problems. "A while back gangs wanted to start," he said. "People came in - state officials and Duncan officialsÐand the community stopped it. Two days after a community meeting, the dress (among teens) changed. All the handkerchiefs were gone." Even with these problems, growing up in a small town does have its benefits, said Harold Porter, the executive director for Arizona School Administrators. He lives in Phoenix now, but his family moved to Morenci in the 1940s and he attended elementary and high school there. "People know everybody there and there's not a lot to do except school activities," he said. "Therefore, the community is quite supportive of the school activities, athletics and so forth. I would say the schools sort of occupy the center of the community, whereas in the Phoenix area that isn't the case necessarily because there's a lot more to do." The seniors of Clifton High School agree that sports play a big part in their academic lives. The town's main competitor is Morenci High School. Seventeen-year-old Ellena Chadarria said that though the two schools are friendly with one another during the off season, "We hate each other when it comes to sports. " Moreno added that during seasons such as football and basketball, sometimes the students won't even talk to each other. Another aspect many teens say they enjoy about living in Clifton and going to high school with about 120 others is that students receive a lot of attention from teachers. "They're caring," Moreno said. "It's better because they're there all the time. They have time for you." Kathryn Rojas, a 17-year-old senior, said there was more "person-to-person" interaction between students and teachers. Personalities such as Luis Montoya, superintendent of Clifton Unified Schools, add to the positive experience students say they have. Not only is his office located at the school, he also teaches an economics class and coaches the girls' varsity basketball team. "You should see him during basketball season," Moreno said. "He can't sit down - he's always up and down the court." Montoya knows the names of the majority - if not all of the students and calls them by name as he passes them in the hall, speaking either Spanish, English or a combination of the two. "They're good kids... most of them, anyway," he said. These "good kids" are more than likely the products of a close-knit community that does stay involved. Self-esteem, self-identify G. Miguel Arciniega, an ASU associate professor of psychology, said that small-town communities are more supportive of students. Arciniega conducted a qualitative study about 12 years ago on the greater number of Hispanics going to college, focusing on those from mining towns. "I noticed a much higher percentage of Hispanics coming into college and graduating," he said. In conducting research, he found that there seemed to be a lot of emphasis on three areas: more Hispanic students were retaining the Spanish language, along with English; students were pushed harder by both parents to continue their education so they would not have to live a mining-town life; and families remained intact and supportive. Arciniega said he also found that because mine employees were paid fairly well, parents were able to financially support college students and pay for on-campus residential fees. Other factors in Hispanics continuing their education, he said, were that students had more contact with their teachers, which, coupled with encouragement from parents, led to higher self-esteem and self-identity. More Hispanics were graduating from college due to parents' ability to afford student housing, which led to students getting involved in campus organizations, Arciniega said. "Part of the values of the Hispanic community is to not bring shame to the community," he said. Phelps Dodge also supports students, said Porter of the Arizona School Administrators. He said the mine often offered summer jobs to the children of mine employ-ees. "They were very good about giving you jobs in the summer so you could save money to go to school in the winter," said the ASU alumnus and former Sun Devil baseball player. According to a fact sheet distributed by PD, Morenci has a population of about 4,700. The same fact sheet says about 2,600 people are employed at the mine-the second-largest open pit mine in the world. The employees come mostly from Morenci, Clifton and Safford. Although some people in town say the mine can't continue to produce copper forever, Dick Nations, who has worked for PD for 54 years and serves as a mine tour guide, said the mining operation will work well into the next century. PD currently is extracting more copper from 50,000 company-owned acres. Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year copper is mined. The open pit has an industrial beauty, with its 50-foot tall steps running around the walls of the mine. Trucks hauling rock from the bottom look like roving Tonka trucks. These trucks, called either 210s or 240s, depending on how many metric tons they weigh, have 1,000 gallon gas tanks. They take 53 gallons of motor oil and cost about $1.5 million. If one of them has a flat, the 4,000-pound, 11-foot-tall tires run about $18,500 each and must have 127 lug nuts removed to change them. The first mineral discoveries in Morenci were made in 1865 by volunteer Union soldiers from California, according to PD literature. Mining methods at that time were underground until 1932, and development of the open pit began in 1937. Since then, more than 3 million tons of ore and other rock material have been removed. Jobs in the mine are what drew many people to Morenci decades ago. Richard Gonzalez, deacon of the Sacred Heart Catholic Church, said his parents, who were born in Mexico and came to Clifton in 1896, found a living at the mine. His father worked in the underground mines earning $1.25 per day. He died at the age of 38, ill after exposure to the polluted air in the mines. "If a man reached the age of 45 or 50, he had lived a long life," Gonzalez said. Still, Gonzalez never left, except when he spent three years in the Pacific during World War II. "I wouldn't trade it (living in Clifton) for the big city for anything," the 71-year-old said. "I'm just a country boy."
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By Kennes Bolig Barb moved to Arizona in March to reunite with her 7- and 8-year-old daughters, who were placed in foster care last year. She couldn't find work and it didn't take long before she was living on the streets. Then Barb, 38, heard about a new place in Phoenix called Safe Haven, 329 N. Third Ave., the first Arizona shelter specifically designed to help the more than 1,600 Phoenix homeless who suffer from a serious mental illness. She said that at first she saw the shelter as a way to escape the Arizona sun, but now she works there as a janitor. She moved into her own apartment in November. The shelter, which focuses on placing the severely mentally ill, or SMI, into homeless and mental-health programs, has helped more than 198 people since it opened in April. It provides services from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. for up to 25 drop-ins and houses 25 residents. Services include hot meals, recreational activities, washing machines and access to medical personnel. Safe Haven worked for Barb. "I wanted to do something to help them out," she said. "I started volunteering for awhile. Then I got employed here, and now, I'm off the streets." Barb's blue eyes widened and her shy smile grew when she talked about visiting her daughters on her birthday. Getting them back is her No. 1 goal now. She said she will find out if she can regain custody in six months to a year. "They're my life," she added. Safe Haven helped get Robert, 38, a former sheet metal worker from Tempe, off the streets. "You could get out of the heat, do laundry, take a shower," he said. Robert had a job and a house. He thought he had se-curity, until he lost his job. A few days later, his car was stolen. He also was struggling with a mental illness. He ended up on the streets. Robert, focusing on his worn, tired hands, said he hopes they will be working hands again. He is currently involved in a voca-tional training program and plans to find a permanent home soon. "Right now, I just want to get working again," he said. About one third of the nation's adult homeless population suffers from some form of mental illness, according to the National Coalition for the Homeless. Homeless people are 38 times more likely to be schizophrenic and five times more likely to suffer from a major depressive disorder than the general population. The mentally ill homeless are also more likely to live on the streets for longer periods of time, to be in poorer health, to have less contact with family and friends and to confront more bar-riers to employ-ment opportunities. The shelter sits alone in a central Phoenix neighbor-hood with weed infested fields on either side and a fenced-off apart-ment complex behind it. The outside walls are barren, decorated with only an obscure sign reading Safe Haven and a few loitering warnings taped to the walls. The inside is clean and simple. Small dormitory-style rooms are at each end - one for women, one for men. The center consists of a couple of entertainment rooms, the kitchen and two eating areas resembling a modest high school cafeteria. Finger- painted murals are scattered in every room, interrupting the steady flow of anti-drug and safe sex posters clinging to the walls. Not so many rigid rules Safe Haven differs from other shelters because it tends to be less strict, said Phil Copeland, the shelter's program manager. There is no cutoff period for services or curfews. "If someone wants to get up in the middle of the night to smoke, they can," Copeland said. "We give them as homey an environment as possible." Other Phoenix shelters such as Central Arizona Shelter Services, 1209 W. Madison St., which houses up to 400 people a night, can have rigid guidelines including check-in times, chores and required case management appointments. Safe Haven also is referred to as a Wet Shelter, meaning that people who are drunk or on drugs are allowed. At least 50 percent of the SMI homeless are diagnosed with an alcohol or drug problem, according to a 1992 study by the National Resource Center on Homelessness and Mental Illness. Drug and alcohol abuse often intensify the problems of SMI homeless, said Loretta Osso, a licensed practical nurse who works at Safe Haven. Safe Haven encourages its clients to attend Alcoholics' Anonymous or other addiction programs, Osso said. However, it is not the staff's primary concern. "We don't forbid them from using because that's not our goal," she said. "Our goal is to get them hooked up to different homeless agencies." The shelter has only three rules: No drug abuse during the stay; no possession or sale of illegal substances on the property; and no violence. "If they are caught doing any of these, they're eighty- sixed," Copeland said. Safe Haven received a three-year grant of $850,000 a year through the Stargate Project, designed to increase assistance for the homeless and mentally disabled. The project was proposed to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in 1995 by state homeless and health agencies. ComCare, a non-profit organization that manages Safe Haven, was one of the agencies that proposed the project. The organization, which contracts with the Arizona Department of Health Services, helps people who suffer from substance addictions, behavioral disorders or serious mental illnesses. Annette Morrison, communications officer for ComCare, said is not surprising for mental illness to push a person to the streets. "A portion of them do become homeless because they are not taking care of their disorder," she said. To receive services, Safe Haven clients must exhibit symptoms of a serious mental illness, such as depression, schizophrenia or a bipolar disorder - the main illnesses from which most SMI suffer. Although the shelter encourages clients to receive a diagnosis from a licensed professional, some do not, and Safe Haven still helps people who only show symptoms of a mental illness, Copeland said. The person also must not have connections with any other homeless or behavioral health service. At first, Safe Haven was open to any homeless person, but that created more problems than it solved, Copeland said. Many people who were not mentally ill would fake symptoms to receive services and violence was common, he said. "It was very chaotic," he added. It then began to receive clients on a referral-only basis in August, working with local homeless agencies and the Phoenix Police Department, which created a much safer environment, Copeland said. "It was now the kind of shelter we tried for in the first place," he said. Mistrust of the system It often is difficult to assist the SMI homeless because their trust in people is nil, said Steve Carter, executive director of NOVA, a non-profit corporation that oversees Safe Haven in conjunction with ComCare. "Essentially, the severely mentally ill homeless are considered hard-core homeless in the sense that there's a general lack of trust - there's an unwillingness to become involved with the system," he said. HUD estimates that introducing an average SMI individual will require up to two years, Copeland said. SMI individuals often feel out of place until they build a sense of trust, Morrison said. "It's part of the nature of the disorder," the ComCare official said. "They need to develop a trust. Sometimes it's a slow process, and sometimes they need to test it and keep coming back to get a little more comfortable." Morrison added that the SMI's lack of trust usually stems from either past treatments or from the disorder itself. "Most folks who are older went through very restrictive kinds of treatment," she said. "They were locked up in a hospital or the medication they were taking was very heavy duty. "Some just have a paranoia. Many are not always sensing reality the same as you or I. When you are not able to comprehend the world around you, it can be frightening." To combat this, Safe Haven works to draw in the SMI homeless with services such as hot meals or showers and then creates a relationship with them. "I like to think we are the first people they see before they engage into the system," Copeland said. "We tend to disarm them a little bit." The agency then tries to introduce individuals to services such as housing or job development programs. HUD requires Safe Haven to introduce at least half of the 25 residents into the mainstream system within six months. Since its opening, Safe Haven has referred 189 SMI individuals to mainstream programs. While they are still at the shelter, however, they must be fed and controlled. On one recent day at noon, the line for lunch stretched out the kitchen door and into one of the entertainment rooms. Kim Bowels, a Safe Haven counselor, stood at a doorway, documenting the demographics of the day's group on a clipboard. As she kept her eyes on the line of hungry men and women and greeted those she recognized with a smile, she leaned over to a co-worker and whispered, "Glen's real hostile today. He's going to go off. I'm sure of it." Along with keeping track of how many men and women come in and who is coming back, Bowels must also help the staff stay aware of possible conflicts. "We just give everyone the heads up," she said. "We try to decompose the situation. We either talk them down or we don't confront them that day." Karen Iversen, the volunteer coordinator for Central Arizona Shelter Services, said some SMI behavior can be disruptive. "Part of the problem is many SMI are paranoid or delusional, so at night we are trying to get 246 people in one room to sleep and the individual is acting out in some way," she said. In addition, the staffs of many homeless shelters are not trained to deal with SMI individuals, said Lloyd Vacovsky, a Central Arizona Shelter case manager. "Some staff find it difficult to understand what is going on in their heads," he said. Vacovsky pointed out that shelters other than Safe Haven still must work with SMI homeless. "Shelters are swamped with people with mental illnesses or substance abuse issues," he said. "We are already dealing with a large SMI population. Safe Haven gives a place for the most seriously ill - the individuals who are more or less not able to function independently." No pride on the streets The homeless don't like to talk about their lives on the streets. "It was bad," is the most they might say. Todd, 30, who has cerebral palsy as well as being diagnosed as SMI, was brought to Safe Haven by police officers who knew he was not going to make it on the streets. Todd, dressed in crisp tan slacks and a button-up shirt, talked about his plans of managing his own affairs one day. "It's a waiting game," he said, smiling. But the smile faded when the subject of his stay on the streets came up. "It wasn't too good," he added. The streets can be harder on many SMI homeless because their disorder increases their vulnerability, Copeland said. "Sometimes the gangster-type homeless want to beat up on them," he added. Osso said she has seen many SMI homeless come in with harsh wounds from living on the streets. "Lately, at night on the streets around here, people have been getting stabbed and cut and robbed and beat up," she said. "It's just not right. I think Arizona or Phoenix or Sheriff (Joe) Arpaio needs to do more to protect these people." At first, the neighborhood surrounding Safe Haven didn't want the homeless sleeping there, either. The shelter's opening concerned many residents and local businesses, said Sgt. Bill Wren, supervisor of the downtown Phoenix bicycle patrol. The shelter became overcrowded constantly. Those who were turned away often camped out in the neighborhood, causing calls for service to surge, he said. "A lot of people had misconceptions," he said. "We know most of (the homeless) are harmless but their appearance gives the perception of a danger to others." Relations improved when Safe Haven began to limit its clientele and to work closely with the Phoenix police department, Wren said. The shelter also built a relationship with the neighborhood through special projects such as neighborhood clean- up days, he added. Despite all they do, frustrated staff members at Safe Haven turn people away daily because the shelter can serve only 50 clients at a time. "They need a place to sleep at night," Osso said. "They need more places like this." One of the biggest problems the shelter faces is finding money to support the homeless. It's a nerve-racking process, said NOVA executive Carter. "It's moved from, 'We don't have the money,' to, 'It's not my job,' " he said. Carter added that many people fail to realize that helping the homeless in turn benefits society. "For every one of these individuals we take off the streets, many are going back to work and paying taxes," he said. Carter's primary purpose for helping the homeless has nothing to do with dollar signs, he said. "It's not a liberal thing. It's not a Democrat thing. It's a human thing," he said. There are success stories Many SMI individuals are capable of living normal lives. Only 5 to 7 percent of the SMI homeless require institutionalization, according to a federal task force on homelessness and severe mental illness. Society needs to stop ignoring the SMI homeless and start recognizing their potential, Osso said. "Society just writes them off," she said. "People are like, 'We should put them under the carpet and out of sight,' but that's not the way it is. They need help. They didn't start out homelessÐ something happened in their lives to get them there. If given a chance, they can function. There are success stories behind it." The sooner people receive help the better their chances are at re-establishing themselves into society, Morrison said. "It depends on the severity of the illness and how soon they receive treatment," she said. "After each episode, they don't come back to the level they were at before. It's like when you injure your knee and you don't get help and you injure it again and again and again. But if you keep people on medication, they can be successful." Debbie, 34, who lived on and off the streets for years, battled with an alcohol and drug problem as well as a mental illness. Then her physical health began to suffer. She came down with a serious case of emphysema and was unable to find proper medical care. When Debbie came to Safe Haven, the staff immediately sent her to the county hospital, recognizing the seriousness of her affliction. Now, Debbie is slowly recovering from the operation and wants to put her business management degree to some good use by working with alcohol and drug rehabilitation programs. Debbie's success story is not only about staying off the streets - it's about staying alive. "I could have died because of all this negligence," she said. "I never would have made it on the streets." Safe Haven currently is looking at ways to engage its clients into the community as well as the system, Copeland said. He said he plans to give the clients with bus passes to get them to various meetings and to free the shelter's 15-passenger van for recreational outings. "We want to increase the clients' responsibility and their life skills and to decrease their fear of the community," he said. "We want to get them back into the community so they are not isolated so much." As far as Barb is concerned, her plans are simple. "Just to keep moving on up, step by step," she said.
Six in-depth articles written by ASU journalism students are featured in today's edition of The Bulldog, which is published periodically by the Cronkite School of Journalism and Telecommunication and ASU's Student Publications. The Bulldog is an outlet for journalism students who always are looking for places to publish. The articles will range from feature stories to hard-hitting investigative pieces. Afterall, we are The Bulldog. Today's newspaper was produced electronically. Special thanks go to designers Gina Logrande, Jeremy Stein and Julie Knapp; photographers Jim Poulin, Lori Cain and Tim Hacker; and Vicki Carroll, who created The Electronic Bulldog. Our electronic version is available on the Worldwide Web at http://news.vpsa.asu.edu/The%20Bulldog/bulldog.html. We hope you enjoy The Bulldog. Look for us again in the spring.