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WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 23, 2011
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Today: Sunny
RAIN DANCE
High: 40 • Low: 22
The Rutgers men’s basketball team fell victim to Louisville’s prolific 3-point shooting, dropping its Big East matchup, 55-37, at the Louis Brown Athletic Center.
Mason Gross aims to expand student facilities BY AMY ROWE ASSOCIATE NEWS EDITOR
Mason Gross School of the Arts is seeking to expand rehearsal space for its music and dance students with an addition to the Nicholas Music Center on Douglass campus. The building will contain a large choral rehearsal hall, break out room, movement studio for dance and theatre students and 12 practice rooms, said Dean of Mason Gross School of the Ar ts George Stauf fer. “The music and dance programs have expanded greatly in the past few years,” Stauf fer said. “The dance program has almost doubled in size since 2007. The school is bursting at the seams, and the new space will provide much-needed rehearsal spaces.” Mason Gross music students agree that more rehearsal space is necessary. “During most of the day, it’s a huge pain to get a decent practice room,” said Matt Cohen, a Mason Gross School of the Ar ts sophomore. “There are way more students than rooms, so if they’re all taken you’re out of luck in terms of getting space to rehearse.” Mason Gross School of the Ar ts sophomore Adam Austerlitz said even when there are rooms available to practice in, the state of the facilities is poor. “New rehearsal space is a perfect idea,” he said. “The facilities are somewhat disgusting with stained carpets, smelly bathrooms and no air conditioning.” The project, which will cost an estimated $10 million between construction and equipment, will be completed by January 2013, pending approval from the Board of Trustees in April, Stauffer said. Other features in the building include faculty offices for the dance and music departments, a hightech studio for the music technology program, as well as an atrium for performing arts students to congregate in, he said.
SEE FACILITIES ON PAGE 7
INDEX METRO Harris Haith opens a fund for people who cannot afford a kidney transplant.
OPINIONS An 11-year-old boy was arrested in Colorado for drawing a picture of stick figures shooting each other.
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At the state budget address in Trenton yesterday, Gov. Chris Christie presented his proposed budget of $29.4 billion for the 2012 fiscal year. Christie hopes to reform the federal health benefit and pension systems.
Christie cuts spending for second year BY KRISTINE ROSETTE ENERIO NEWS EDITOR
Gov. Chris Christie announced his plan yesterday to continue reductions in New Jersey government spending as well as reform in certain programs for a second year during the state budget address in Trenton. With a proposed budget of $29.4 billion Christie intends to cut total spending by 2.6 percent from last year, forcing many state departments to receive less funding. “For too many years, our government has operated under the belief that the baseline … is to continue to fund every
program in the budget — regardless of the fiscal climate … the economy … [and] the effectiveness of the program. Not anymore,” he said. Christie said this stifle on spending, which began last year, brought about a “new normal” that takes a different approach to budget decisions than former state administrators. “In the new normal, we can and will stop old commitments, so we can set new priorities to meet New Jersey’s 21st century challenge,” he said. One such priority includes promoting job growth, which the proposed budget plans to address by giving $200 million in tax cuts and incentives for businesses in the state.
“The tone at the top has encouraged business to stay in New Jersey, and our unemployment rate is down nearly one full point in a year,” he said. “Still too high but moving in the right direction.” Christie also aims to reform the health benefit and pension systems, two federal programs he said are increasing deficits in states across the nation. The pension system has a deficit of about $54 billion and differences between assets and liabilities could amount to $183 billion in 30 years, he said. “All across the country, Democratic and Republican governors are grappling
SEE SPENDING ON PAGE 4
Johnson & Johnson finds defect in syringes BY ANDREA GOYMA CORRESPONDENT
New Brunswick-based pharmaceutical company, Johnson & Johnson, issued a recall on 70,000 syringes of Invega Sustenna, an injectable antipsychotic drug, and 395 syringes of Simponi, a rheumatoid-arthritis drug, over the past week. The J&J unit, Janssen, voluntarily issued the Invega Sustenna recalls on Feb. 11 after detecting a crack in the pre-filled syringe barrel of the 234 mg strength. Consumers may not detect the crack because they are often covered by the labels, said J&J spokesperson Greg Panico in the Wall Street Journal. The cracks may have been caused by stress during the label application process. “Our manufacturing team did resolve this issue and the production line is up,” Panico told the WSJ. The Invega Sustenna recall affects not only those in the United States but also people who live in Australia, Canada and South Korea, according to the WSJ. Panico declined to comment further to The Daily Targum on the issue.
KEITH FREEMAN / PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR
Johnson & Johnson recalls thousands of syringes used for medicated patients this week after finding cracks in 234 mg pre-filled barrels. A week after the first recall, J&J unit Centocor Ortho Biotech also filed a voluntar y recall of the 50 mg SmartJect autoinjector form of Simponi, according to the Centocor Ortho Biotech website. The Simponi recalls impacts about 230 pens in Germany and 165 pens in the United States, according to the
website. While most of the affected lots were detected, some slipped past the wholesale level. Centocor Ortho Biotech representative Monica Neufang declined to comment. The recall, which was also done in consultation with the FDA, resulted in a manufacturing issue with the
autoinjector device, which could potentially result in a less than full dosage of the medication, according to Centocor Or tho Biotech’s recall statement. Although the recalls have not affected J&J stock prices drastically, Mahmud Hassan, the director of the pharmaceutical MBA program at the University, believes the company’s reputation has been greatly tarnished. “In terms of their image and reputation, I’d say it suffered because they’ve now had several recalls in the last few days,” said Hassan, a professor in the University’s Department of Finance and Economics. “People will notice and say, ‘Hey what happened to this company? They’re having recalls almost every week.’” Hassan said both of the recalls were benign because there were no fatalities as a result of these recalls. “In terms of impact, if you remember the Tylenol recalls [on Jan. 14], that was a big impact because people died,” he said. “So relatively, the Invega and Simponi recalls are on a lot lower scale.”
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