free
WEDNESDAY
april 11, 2018 high 48°, low 32°
t h e i n de p e n de n t s t u de n t n e w s pa p e r of s y r a c u s e , n e w yor k |
N • Raising questions
Syracuse Deputy Mayor Sharon Owen took questions from residents about the city’s search for a new police chief during a forum on Tuesday. Page 3
O • Tax vote
Conservative columnist Joshua Nelson explains why New York gubernatorial candidate John DeFrancisco is the best choice to reform the state’s tax code. Page 5
dailyorange.com
P • Poetry people
In celebration of National Poetry Month, Point of Contact Gallery is hosting a “Cruel April” series to showcase poets from the campus and local communities. Page 7
S • In the red
Syracuse men’s lacrosse fell to Cornell behind a strong performance from goalkeeper Caelahn Bullen, who had 14 saves to halt the SU offense. Page 12
On the front line
university politics
Faculty critique pay gap response By Jordan Muller asst. news editor
KATHY PABIS is one of the 10 officers in Syracuse University’s Department of Public Safety who are women. Pabis has worked in DPS for more than 29 years. alexandra moreo senior staff photographer By Matthew Gutierrez senior staff writer
S
ometimes after her 12-hour shifts, Dayna MacMaster calls her best friend to explain what she or her colleagues at the Department of Public Safety responded to that day or week: stabbings, intoxicated students, robberies and, occasionally, shootings. “She knows me as a mother,” said MacMaster, a 27-year-old officer for Syracuse University’s DPS. “I’ll tell her what I’ve seen and she’s like, ‘I can’t do what you do. I don’t know if I could get over things you do or see in your day.’” In the complicated world of policing in the United States, many departments do not always reflect the communities they serve and have few women police officers, studies have found. But DPS Chief Bobby Maldonado said one of his priorities as chief is to ensure DPS better resembles the local community by
more effectively recruiting, hiring and retaining women. Three years ago, when Maldonado became chief, there were five full-time sworn women DPS members. That total increased to eight in 2017. Last Thursday, two more women were sworn into DPS. That means 16.6 percent of today’s 60-person police force are women, and DPS has doubled the number of full-time women officers in the past three years. “Our department needs to reflect the community that it serves,” Maldonado said. “It’s a challenge even now. We’re trying to diversity our department, because women are necessary and needed in the law enforcement profession.” Women police officers draw their weapons less, tend to look for non-physical solutions and are better at community outreach, according to articles published in the Journal for Criminal Justice. But the percentage of law enforcement officers that are women has not see significant growth in the past 20 years. Women
DPS officers reflect on experiences as women in law enforcement
see dps page 4
student association
12 percent of undergrads have voted in election By Kennedy Rose asst. news editor
About 12 percent of the Syracuse University undergraduate student population has already voted in Student Association elections, as of Tuesday evening at about 5 p.m. Sophia Faram, chair of SA’s board of elections and membership, said 1,787 students have voted. Faram said turnout must reach 10 percent of the undergradu-
ate student population for the SA vote to be considered valid. In the first 24 hours of polls opening, SA reached that threshold, Faram said. She said she hopes to break SA’s voter turnout record, which is 31 percent of the undergraduate student body. Students this year will vote for SA’s president and vice president as a pair, comptroller and several assembly members. Also on the organization’s ballot, accessible via MySlice, is an amendment to
update the SA constitution to “better reflect current practices” and a vote on whether to continue supporting the New York Public Interest Research Group with a $3 fee. Faram said SA has been coordinating a social media campaign to promote voting. Organization representatives have also been speaking to students at different schools and colleges about the election. No campus-wide email was sent Monday by SA leadership to announce the start of voting.
SA President James Franco only detailed the election’s timeline in a campus-wide email sent on Monday, April 2 with the subject line “SA Debate.” Eric Evangelista, SA’s 60th legislative president, sent a campus-wide email to detail voting on the second day of last spring’s election. Voting closes at 11:59 p.m. Thursday. The voting link can be found on MySlice under the “Student Services” tab. krose100@syr.edu
Hundreds of Syracuse University women faculty on Tuesday criticized the administration’s handling of salary adjustments in the wake of a December report that found women professors at SU generally earned less than men professors. The statement, which was published as a spread advertisement in The Daily Orange on Tuesday, came on “Equal Pay Day,” a nationwide movement to bring attention to gender pay gaps. Professors from every school and college at SU signed the statement. Signatories said in the statement they were pleased the university commissioned the report. But they demanded the salary adjustment process be transparent, systematic and immediate across all schools and colleges. Faculty also urged the university to acknowledge and address the cumulative effects of the historic pay gap. They expressed concern that deans have been tasked with fixing the pay gap and claimed that two deans have “signaled an unwillingness” to address inequities. It’s unclear which deans the professors were referring to. Some deans on Tuesday pushed back against faculty claims that certain deans don’t want to address the pay gap. “I understand the frustration of the women faculty about the salary inequities disclosed in last year’s report but I think the university is making a good faith effort to address these concerns, as are the deans,” said Lorraine Branham, dean of the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, in an email. “I don’t know any dean that is not committed to doing so.” Joanna Masingila, dean of the School of Education, said in an email Tuesday afternoon that she hadn’t yet read the statement. But she echoed Branham, saying she believed all deans were working with the provost’s office to address the pay gap. The faculty salary report, released by a University Senate committee last year, stated that the deans will work with the provost’s office to review and potentially correct salary discrepancies between men and women faculty. jmulle01@syr.edu