The Hoya: Jan. 27, 2012

Page 1

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD SINCE 1920 thehoya.com

Georgetown University • Washington, D.C. Vol. 93, No. 27, © 2012

Friday, january 27, 2012

EGYPT: ONE YEAR LATER

The Hoya’s Sarah Amos captures the mixed feelings in Tahrir Square on the first anniversary of the revolution.

TAKE ME HOME

Georgetown returns to McDonough Arena this weekend after a big win at West Virginia.

GUIDE, G8

Workers Rally at Leo’s Mariah Byrne Hoya Staff Writer

O’Donovan Hall employees staged a demonstration at about 12:35 p.m. Thursday to voice frustration at the slow pace of contract negotiations between the union they formed last year and their employer, Aramark Higher Education. About 40 Georgetown University Dining Services employees, accompanied by members of the Georgetown Solidarity Committee, gathered on the top floor of the dining hall, chanting phrases such as “What do we want? A contract. When do we want it? Now,” and “We’ll be back.” Students not involved with the GSC also joined as the demonstration grew. “It really showed how much

“What [the employees] want to show is that they’re united and ... have the support of students.”

SPORTS, A10

Corp Ramps Up SAFE Proposals Pass Security Efforts Sam Rodman Hoya Staff Writer

Attempted theft Wed. was fifth incident this year Sarah Kaplan Hoya Staff Writer

The Corp is reevaluating its security policies after $3,500 worth of cigarettes was stolen from Vital Vittles Monday and employees deterred another attempted theft two days later. In the latest incident at the convenience store, an unknown suspect attempted to access the hallway to the store room in which inventory is held. Employees stopped the suspect from entering the hallway but did not detain him. The Department of Public Safety and the Metropolitan Police Department were notified of the incident

and are handling the investigation. The attempted theft followed a burglary of 50 cartons of cigarettes from the store Monday, which was the fourth incident at Vittles this school year. In September, employees who were restocking inventory discovered that 90 cartons of cigarettes had been stolen. Three months later, on Dec. 1, a suspect stole more than $200 in cash from a Vittles office. A further $1,500 in cigarettes was stolen Dec. 6. “I think that Vittles has been pretty clearly identified as a place from which it is pretty easy to steal and get away unnoticed,” said Alex Pon (COL ’12), CEO of Students of Georgetown, Inc. “We take this very seriously, and … we’re taking steps to make [Vittles] less attractive.”

All three proposals to allocate the $3.4 million generated by the Student Activities Fee Endowment reform were passed in a student body-wide referendum Thursday night. Voting on the three proposals opened Monday evening and closed at midnight Thursday. The Georgetown University Student Association Election Commission released the final results shortly after polls closed. The New South Student Center proposal, which adds $2.04 million to expand plans for a student space renovation project in the lower levels of New South, was approved by 86 percent of voters. ­Eighty-seven percent of students voted in favor of the $1.25 million Student Innovation and Public Service Fund, and 90 percent approved Georgetown Energy’s proposed $250,000 allocation to install solar panels on about 43 university townhouses and establish a fund to finance sustainability projects.

See CORP, A5

See SAFE, A7

SARI FRANKEL/THE HOYA

GUSA President Mike Meaney (SFS ’12) celebrates the successful passage of all three referendums.

Hotel Will Become a Dorm by ’14

The washington posts: sims, magee come UP BIG for hoyas

SAMUEL GEANEY-MOORE (SFS ’12) Georgetown Solidarity Committee Member

Georgetown students care about workers in their community,” GSC member Vail Kohnert-Yount (SFS ’13) said. The union operates under the umbrella of UNITE HERE, a national organization for food service employees, and includes employees of Leo’s, the Jesuit Residence, Cosi, Starbucks and the Preclinical Building’s Dr. Mug. Although the union was certified in March, members say that they still have not been given fair wages or a more affordable health care program. According to Kohnert-Yount, Aramark employees pay more for health care than any other group of workers at Georgetown. “What [the employees] want to show is that they’re united and they have the support of students,” Samuel Geaney-Moore (SFS ’12), a GSC member, said. See UNION, A5

Leavey to house 250 students two years before originally planned Hiromi Oka

Hoya Staff Writer

A FAMILY AFFAIR Over an evening at her townhouse in an adult living community in Silver Spring, Md., Ruth Ramsdell Stout, the 93-year-old granddaughter of Boland, worked through the details of the portrait’s ownership. After poring over a comprehensive family tree, dredging up old family stories with her son and nephew and making multiple phone calls to different cousins and sisters, Stout, the matriarch of the family, sifted out the ownership line of the portrait. “It was always known as Uncle Simpson’s picture,” Stout said. James Simpson was her great-greatuncle through her maternal grandfather’s line. According to Stout, the painting came into her branch of the family in Germantown when Boland pick up the portrait from members of the Simpson family, who were living in the Georgetown neighborhood in the early 1900s. From Germantown, the painting moved to the top of the stairs of Stout’s childhood home in

The university plans to convert the Georgetown University Hotel & Conference Center in the Leavey Center into a dormitory by the fall of 2014, two years earlier than previously expected. Administrators announced that they would expedite the project or find alternate space to house additional students in their final submission to the D.C. Zoning Commission as part of the Campus Plan process earlier this month. According to university spokeswoman Stacy Kerr, the decision to move ahead of schedule was not prompted by additional community concerns. “When we reviewed our plans and realized that we could move faster than 2016, [we used] our final campus plan hearing to demonstrate our commitment to moving more beds on campus,” she said. Georgetown has faced pressure from the surrounding neighborhoods to accommodate more students within the university’s gates. More than 5,000 undergraduates currently live on the main campus. “Our position is that [we feel we] already house a higher percentage of students on campus than almost any other university,” Kerr said. However, she added that the implementation of any project will ultimately depend upon the final ruling by the D.C. Zoning Commission. Public deliberations and a preliminary ruling will take place Feb. 9, which will allow the university to gauge interest for the renovation. If the plan is accepted, the hotel is expected to be converted into a dormitory that would house an additional 250 beds. As of now, the university does not have any alternative student housing plans if the Zoning Commission does not approve the project. “It’s very much in the planning stages, but we worked with an architectural firm with extensive student housing experience

See PORTRAIT, A6

See HOUSING, A5

FILE PHOTOS: CHRIS BIEN/THE HOYA

Senior center Henry Sims (left) has emerged as a dominant force in the paint this season. Meanwhile, senior forward Tia Magee sparked a second-half rally to lift the Hoyas over West Virginia. See A10.

Restored Painting Now at Rest on Hilltop David Schuler Hoya Staff Writer

AMANDA SODERLUND/THE HOYA

University curator LuLen Walker stands with the self-portrait of James Alexander Simpson, the university’s first professor of drawing and painting. Newsroom: (202) 687-3415 Business: (202) 687-3947

Over 80 years ago, William Francis Boland returned to his Germantown, Md., farmhouse with a painting that had been passed down through his family for generations. The painting was the self-portrait of Boland’s maternal uncle, James Alexander Simpson, a Georgetown-born artist and the university’s first professor of drawing and painting. In July 2009, it made one final move — to Georgetown to join the university’s art collection. In December, the university announced that the 1847 self-portrait of Simpson, who was also responsible for the iconic Georgetown landscapes that adorn posters across campus, had been bequeathed to the university in 2009. After a restoration process, it was recently hung with a new frame in the Special Collections reading room on the fifth floor of Lauinger Library. The university eventually plans to display it in Healy Hall’s Carroll Parlor, the main showroom for the university art collection.

Published Tuesdays and Fridays

Send Story Ideas and Tips to news@thehoya.com


Turn static files into dynamic content formats.

Create a flipbook
Issuu converts static files into: digital portfolios, online yearbooks, online catalogs, digital photo albums and more. Sign up and create your flipbook.