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November 7, 2012
Romney’s “Expand The Map” raises $9 million
Harker commends staff on hurricane handling BY LAUREN CAPPELLONI Features Editor
BY RACHEL TAYLOR City News Editor
As a final effort to raise funds for his campaign, Republican Presidential Nominee Mitt Romney launched ExpandTheMap.com to raise $7 million in seven days in order to combat Obama’s campaign funding. He announced his presidential plan to create 12 million new jobs on the website. Economics professor Burton Abrams said he thinks Romney’s attempt at last minute fundraising could be beneficial in reaching undecided voters. He said the effective use of the campaign money could be good for Romney, depending on what he spends it on. “Obviously $7 million is not going to directly translate into 12 million jobs,” Abrams said. “However, if it gets a person into office, it can help create 12 million jobs.” Abrams said while Romney has run an effective campaign, President Barack Obama has been stronger in raising money. He said Obama’s role as president and his campaign strategy have been major contributing factors in his success. Junior Mary Crowley, a public policy and economics major and a member of UD College Democrats, said she did not think expand the map would be successful at this point in the campaign. The attempt at fundraising was pointless because it was too late, she said. “I think it’s kind of foolish, because if you look at what you can buy this close to the election, there’s not much left to buy,” Crowley said. “At this late in the
Courtesy of Facebook
The Expand The Map website asks for contributions to “expand the electoral map” and defeat “Obama’s billion-dollar machine.” game, there is no more air time to buy.” In the last stage of the election, face-to-face campaigning is more effective than using commercial political messages, she said. Romney’s campaign money would be better spent on recruiting volunteers to go door-todoor, Crowley said. Sophomore Elizabeth Catt, President of College Republicans, said she thinks it was important for Romney to host a last minute fundraiser in order to secure the election. She said she thinks the funds can effectively help Romney reach voters in states who may not receive his message. The influx of money in the last few days before the election can provide a boost for Romney to increase his media presence. “It’s a very crucial period right before the election,” Catt said. “No effort is too late when it comes to winning a presidential election.” Sophomore Kevin Pregent, Secretary of College Independents, said while Obama has more campaign money than Romney, he does not think the difference is significant enough to favor a specific candidate. He said he does not think funds will be what decide the presidential race. Pregent said continual spending
until Election Day benefits both candidates because there are enough undecided voters who may be able to change the tide of the election. Getting the candidates’ messages across in these states can decide a winner. “The candidates will probably focus on the swing states,” Pregent said. “There are even swing counties within states that the candidates should focus on.” Pregent said he believes Romney’s promise of 12 million jobs is important for voters to think about before voting. College students in particular should consider this pledge, he said, as most will be looking for work at some point within the next presidential term. Catt said while economic issues like job creation are an important factor for college students to consider, it is not the only factor that should be noted when voting. She said college students in particular most likely considered social issues such as gay marriage and contraception rights when voting. “A lot of other issues matter to students more than economic issues,” Catt said. “Social issues are a huge push in how college students will vote. The majority of students will not vote solely based on economic factors.”
Handloff: ‘It’s hard not to look at the news and just be grateful for as much as we were spared’ Continued from page 1
The university strongly urged students to go home and canceled classes from last Monday to last Wednesday. Junior Claire Davanzo said she took the university’s evacuation seriously and went to her friend’s house in Cochranville, Pa. She said she was expecting the storm to be worse than it turned out to be. Davanzo said her friend’s family bought non-perishable food, charged all their electronic devices and got their flashlights ready for the storm that was predicted to knock out electricity for nearly a week. She said while the power in Cochranville did not go out, they would have been ready if it had. Davanzo’s hometown of Morris County, N.J. is flooded and still without power. She said this has caused significant stress for her and her relatives. “At home, the town’s pretty flooded,” she said. “Nobody has power. We’re 40 minutes outside of New York, so it’s pretty close.”
Sophomore Haley Schoenfeld said she stayed in her residence hall during the hurricane. With the university dining hall and other food locations closed because of the storm, she said she bought extra water, flashlights and nonperishable food items. Schoenfeld said she was expecting power outages, destruction, downed trees, blocked roadways and flooding in the area. Although Newark was fortunate to not experience significant damage, she said her hometown in northern New Jersey did. “My house is fine,” Schoenfeld said. “My yard is wrecked—we have trees down. My neighbors even have a tree on their roof. There are lots of power outages, and they’re still without power.” Brian Handloff, owner of the National 5 & 10 on Main Street, said he had every intention of staying open Monday until Gov. Markell declared a driving ban. He said he wanted to make sure his products would not be ruined if the store flooded so he and his staff put
crates under the expensive merchandise and lifted everything in the storeroom up. Handloff said the store only suffered a minor roof leak and the damage will be fixed shortly. He said bad weather in the winter is when the store typically sees an increase in sales. He said snow shovels, sleds and salts are the normal big ticket items. For Sandy, he said the National 5 & 10 sold several flashlights and sold out of D batteries. “It’s better to be over prepared and not need it,” Handloff said. The store reopened at 11 a.m. Tuesday morning when the driving ban lifted, he said. However, with university offices closed and classes still canceled, Handloff said there were not many customers until students began to make their way back to campus Wednesday. He said considering the amount of damage predicted, Newark was extremely lucky. “It’s hard not to look at the news and just be grateful for as much as we were spared,” Handloff said.
On Friday, after Hurricane Sandy passed through the East Coast, university President Patrick Harker sent an email to students commending staff and students on their preparation for the storm and sending sympathies to those affected. Sophomore Nicole Gomes said she read Harker’s announcement postSandy and thinks he did a good job recognizing the university staff for working during extreme conditions, but the message should have been shorter. The body of the email was 576 words, which is approximately two doublespaced pages. More students would have read it if it was not so long, she said. While she thinks the university was prepared during the hurricane, Gomes said officials could have done a better job notifying the students who stayed on campus since their situation was stressful, and Harker did not address that in his message. She said she would have liked the alerts to be more accurate and specific because the university allowed students stay on campus. Starting on Oct. 26, email, text and voice messages from UD Alert strongly advised students to leave campus and informed students of office closings, driving restrictions and dining hall options. Gomes said she knows the alerts only need to address the students the school is responsible for, but they should have included more information and guidance for off-campus students. “They’re still students and they still go here,” Gomes said. “If the storm was worse, they still would have been affected and they need to be safe.” Marcia Nickle, Emergency Preparedness Coordinator, said she sends out the alerts that inform students of class cancellation and the university’s status. She said the students in the residence halls are the university’s responsibility, so they felt it was best to let them know to leave. “In the interim we felt it was safest to tell the students we were responsible for that they should go home if they could,” Nickle said. She said their fear was that important buildings, such as residence halls and dining halls, would lose power and there would be no heat or food for the on-campus students. Nickle said she wanted the alerts to make it clear that the university did not want students to be in residence halls in case the power went out or they flooded. She said the alerts generally provide less information for offcampus students because they do not use campus services. Nickle said there was emergency preparedness information on the Office of Campus and Public Safety website, but it could have been advertised better. Gomes said the alerts were helpful and the emails were informative, but they all gave the same information. She said the school should provide students with more information and make the emergency tips on the website more accessible. She did not know it was online and would have liked to see it before Sandy. Gomes said she lives in Sharp Residence Hall, and stayed on campus because it would take too long to travel
back to her hometown in Massachusetts. Her Resident Assistant and her family told her most of the emergency preparedness tips she needed for the storm. She and her friends made sure they all had flashlights and went to Walgreens to stock up on water and non-perishable food. UD Alert said students with a meal plans could get six meals from the dining hall prior to Monday, Oct. 29, and Tuesday Oct. 30, when it was closed, Gomes said. However, by the time she and her friends arrived, she said most of the food was gone and they had to wait for more meals. Dining Services staff had left sandwiches and snacks on tables for students to take at their will, she said. “The dining hall was chaotic,” Gomes said. “It was a mess and we were all freaking out.” She said she was also unsure of when the dining hall was closed. Gomes thought it was open on Oct. 31, but there was very little food when she went there. Senior Kyle McDonnell stayed in his house on Cleveland Avenue because he said it would have been just as dangerous to go his hometown in Harrisburg, Pa. and more enjoyable to stay in Newark. He said his roommates also stayed on campus, which proved better for them because their hometowns were hit much worse than Newark. McDonnell said he understands that the alerts did not address offcampus students because the school is not liable for them. He said he got the warnings that the hurricane was coming and classes were canceled, but people should use their common sense in dealing with their own preparations. He said the alerts are the fastest way to let students know about cancellations and impending weather emergencies, and said that was enough information for him. “They warned us but that’s it,” McDonnell said. “I don’t know what else they could do.” Nickle said advice for how to react to emergencies is her responsibility, but she did not want to send out tons of alerts and annoy the students. She said if they get too many they might stop taking them seriously. While she does want students to know how to prepare, that information does not coincide with the alert system, Nickle said. “We could have done a better job for off-campus students,” Nickle said. “But I think there were enough messages in the media for students to get information.” Some students have an idea of how to prepare on their own for emergency situations, according to Nickle. She said she did not want to send out an alert with how to prepare for the storm and then send out another telling students to go home because it would have been conflicting information for students. McDonnell said the employees deserved Harker’s recognition for being prepared, but it was unnecessary to praise them at such length in his email message. He said he thinks there should have been a shorter email just thanking the employees instead of going on about how well they did. “They definitely want to give recognition, which is fine, but when you send something that long to 15,000 students not everyone is going to read it,” McDonnell said.