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20
Highlander
University of California, Riverside
Volume 64
Serving the UCR community since 1954
Issue 03
FOR THE WEEK OF TUESDAY, OCTOBER 6, 2015
President of Ghana lectures on African diaspora at UCR
John Dramani Mahama, the president of Ghana, spoke at the University Theatre about his country, its progress and the rapidly changing global climate due to technology.
AARON GRECH Senior Staff Writer
The President of Ghana, John Dramani Mahama, gave a lecture regarding the African diaspora in the University Theater, which was filled to its capacity with over 300 people. The lecture, titled “The African Diaspora: Possibilities and Privileges of Empowerment in this Technological Age,” was hosted by African Student Programs. Prior to his position as
president, Mahama served as a member of the Ghanaian parliament from 1997-2009, minister of communications from 1998-2001 and vice president of Ghana from 2009-2012. Upon the death of former President John Atta Mills in 2012, Mahama assumed the presidency and was formally elected as president in December of that year. UCR Undergraduate Cultural Ambassador Ama Serwaa and Vice President of Campus Internal Affairs Michael Ervin opened
the lecture with the national anthems of Ghana and the United States respectively. After the anthems, Chancellor Kim Wilcox introduced the president and his entourage, which included the Minister of Education Jane Naana Opoku Agyemang, who will be working with Vice Provost Paul D’Anieri to create partnerships with Ghanaian universities and UCR. The president then proceeded to speak on issues such as the recent death of Sandra Bland,
and stereotypes amongst those of African descent, which exist due to cultural ignorance created by the displacement of the African people across the world. According to Mahama, while many in the diaspora are separated by distance, technology assists in uniting those of African descent. Mahama credited advances in technology and the advent of social media for allowing many Africans to be informed of events affecting them across the world
AARON LAI / HIGHLANDER
in the diaspora. “If it wasn’t for technology that we have today, those of us who live on the other side of the globe ... we would never know of the frustrations and concerns of the Africans in the diaspora,” Mahama stated. While crediting social media for providing greater exposure to these issues, Mahama expressed concerns about how mainstream news can portray stereotypes. ► SEE GHANA, PAGE 5
District attorney speaks on rising crime in Riverside $6.89 million approved for new research building
GUY HOCKER Contributing Writer
Last Thursday, UCR’s new School of Public Policy hosted Riverside County District Attorney Michael Hestrin at the Center for Environmental Research (CE-CERT) building off campus. Hestrin lectured on the rising crime in Riverside County. According to the district attorney, a combination of imperfect legislation and a lack of resources are responsible for the rising crime rate. Hestrin’s presentation asserted that total crime in Riverside County increased 7.23 percent (14,852 to 15,296 events) when comparing January to June 2014 to the same period in 2015. It also stated that the city of Riverside saw a 14.48 percent increase in robbery, an 8.93
percent increase in larceny and a 4.27 percent increase in auto theft, all factoring into a 5.98 percent increase in the total amount of crime (5,315 to 5,633 events) when comparing the aforementioned timeframes. California’s government has notably attempted to do their part to reduce prison populations. AB109 was implemented in 2011 and allows those convicted of “non-serious, non-violent, and non-sex offenses” to go to local jails rather than state prisons. This led to overcrowding in county jails, although Hestrin asserts that they were above capacity before AB109. Riverside County has 2.293 million people, with a prison capacity of 3,900 beds, below the ratios of many other counties. Federal mandates force Riverside’s
overcrowded jails to release prisoners early. According to Hestrin, the current average jail time for someone with a non-violent, non-sex offense felony conviction of two years is less than a month. Recently, California voters took another swing at reducing incarceration and approved Proposition 47 which decriminalized many felony offenses. Hestrin stated “I opposed Prop 47 on a number of grounds, and the main one was that it took progressive punishment away, meaning that no matter how many times you commit a theft under $950 of value that is always and forever a misdemeanor … If you commit it 100 times in a row, it is a misdemeanor.” Hestrin highlighted the ► SEE CRIME, PAGE 4
NEWS 1 • OPINIONS 7 • FEATURES 11 • A&E 14 • SPORTS 20
JOSEPH AVILA Senior Staff Writer
$6.89 million was approved at a September 15 meeting between the UC Regents and Chancellor Wilcox and his team to fund the preliminary phase of construction for a new research building known as the Multidisciplinary Research Building 1, or MRB1. The initial phase or phase 1 activities of the project will include procuring a competent design team and conducting surveys and analysis to maximize design efficiency with respect to the environment, among other things. The total cost for the MRB1 project is an estimated $150 million dollars. “UCR is at pivotal point in our history. We’ve increased our enrollment, we’re expanding our faculty, our reputation is improving, we’re in the midst
of a multipronged approach to creating multidisciplinary research space from existing and new facilities across the campus and this new building will play critical role in that expansion.” Wilcox argued during his presentation to the regents referring to the implementation of the broader expansion plan UCR 2020: Path to Preeminence. The building will be constructed on the north side of campus between the Materials Science and Engineering building and the newly expanded student recreation center. The general model for the building assumes that it will inhabit approximately 150,000 gross square feet, be constructed as a five-story structure and consist of wet and ► SEE BUILDING, PAGE 6
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