VOLUME 103, ISSUE 36
www.UniversityStar.com
WEDNESDAY
NOVEMBER 13, 2013
Defending the First Amendment since 1911
VIDEO | UniversityStar.com
TRENDS | Page 3
The Wittliff Collections are a series of photos, literature and other artistic accomplishments that represent Texas artists.
Collaboration with J.J. Abrams: Doug Dorst, assistant professor of English, worked with the director on “S.,” an interactive mystery novel soon to be available to students in Alkek.
CITY
Residents discuss growth at SMTX Talks open forum By Maggie Montez News Reporter
Residents gathered at the San Marcos Activity Center Tuesday to discuss issues facing the fastest growing city in the country. City of San Marcos Development Services officials presented the first “SMTX Talks: A Constructive Conversation.” The free event was followed by an open discussion guided by a facilitator and a catered luncheon with a panel of various subject matter experts. Officials with San Marcos Area Board of Realtors, Texas State, San Marcos Chamber of Commerce, The Meadows Center for the Water and the Environment and the San Marcos River Foundation supported the event. Any resident could sign up to be a speaker at the event by using the SMTX Talks page on the City of San Marcos website. The speakers put on presentations under an estimated five-minute time limit regarding their personal concerns and various solutions for ongoing issues related to the growth of the city. Residents including Lisa Marie Coppoletta, Greg Frank and Rob Roark, local business owners such as Scott Gregson and Rebecca Ybarra-Ramirez, executive director of tourism for San Marcos, spoke about issues resulting from the city’s growth. Texas State grows three percent in enrollment each year, yet the city does not have accurate data available on the populations of San Marcos residents and students. Roark said more solid data needs to be released regarding population numbers to help increase business and help city of-
ficials address proper audiences. “One of the things I found was that we don’t know what our population has been,” Roark said. “It’s been all over the place. We judge different numbers even the Census Bureau has changed.” With growth comes infrastructure expansion, and Coppoletta mentioned certain downtown shops were forced to close because of a lack of customers caused by construction. “We’ve seen business after business go out of business such as (Fresh) Cubed, The Hemp Store, The Coffee Pot (Bistro), Mr. (E) Tee’s, Wayback Attic and the old court house annex. We’ve even moved now the county seat to the other side,” Coppoletta said. City officials commissioned construction projects to build more sidewalks and bike lanes, something that Frank said he supports. More bikes and fewer cars will cause less congestion on the roads, Frank said. Safety aspects of biking are a concern, Frank said. San Marcos needs designate bike routes and cleaner streets to be more accessible and provide a safer environment. Ybarra-Ramirez said the city need more “cheeks in seats” and “flops in shops” to increase tourist revenue at Texas State, the San Marcos River and the Premium Outlets, which, as she said, welcome 40 million people annually. Ramirez mentioned a need for new venues targeting families. Gregson said San Marcos is “the epicenter of Texas,” because it sits between two of the biggest cities in Texas—Austin and San Antonio. Gregson used pictures of various downtown areas with weeds and trash to prove the need to put more time and effort into the appearance of the city.
PLANNING & ZONING
City officials plan to revise Land Development Code By Kelsey Bradshaw News Reporter
Planning and Zoning commissioners discussed potential revisions to the Land Development Code in their Nov. 12 meeting designed to correct inconsistencies, provide clarification and modify environmental standards in San Marcos. Laurie Moyer, director of engineering and capital improvement for the city, explained the necessity for the revisions at the meeting. In 2011, the former director of engineering asked a consultant to help review the code in relation to water qualities, storm water and environmental regulations, Moyer said. “At the time there was a lot of new staff that were unfamiliar with what the code had in it,” Moyer said. “There was concern about some inconsistencies, and we wanted to go through and create some recommendations about the ‘low-hanging fruit’ the city could implement concerning our environmental regulations.” A firm was selected to complete a report that compared all the chapters of the Land Development Code to regulations in the Comprehensive Master Plan concerning development, Moyer said. “The staff didn’t want to bring forward something inconsistent with the comprehensive plan,” Moyer said. “We’re now at the point where we’re going to kick off and rewrite the Land Development Code.” Rey Garcia, project engineer, said an expiration time will be established for site preparation per-
mits under the revisions. By creating a “limiting expiration time,” older projects can be tossed out, allowing room for new projects to be brought forward and implemented, Garcia said. “The idea is to prevent outdated plans from moving forward,” Garcia said. Another revision to the Land Development Code concerned the size of land cuts or fills, which can become an issue when analyzing site plans, Garcia said. The new code will not allow any land cuts or fills for construction projects greater than four feet deep and will “help offset table top type of development,” Garcia said. The main reason officials altered the land cut size regulation is because it is “very similar to what the city of Austin is doing,” Garcia said. A hot topic at the Planning and Zoning meeting regarded handling the city’s issues with the “100-year runoff,” which refers to water resulting from the past 100year storm. “The water is returned to the river, but at a rate that is more natural for the existing condition,” said Brian Reese, who works for Resource Planning and Scheduling Subsystem. The idea is supported by FEMA and is not detrimental to the environment in any way, Reese said. “It does have a long term impact on the community in terms of our flood plains,” Moyer said. “We really felt like this one was one we wanted to include. We recognize it was a big step for us.” The final changes to the code will be voted on and approved at the Dec. 19 city council meeting.
BOBCATS AXED
Lumberjacks defeat former coach at Strahan
Madelynne Scales | Staff Photographer Senior forwards Joel Wright and Corey Stern wait for a rebound Nov. 12 against SFA at Strahan Coliseum.
The Texas State men’s basketball team fell short to Coach Danny Kaspar’s former team Stephen F. Austin Tuesday in its home opener 64–57. PAGE 2
ORGANIZATIONS
More food vendors seek training to comply with campus requirement By James Carneiro News Reporter
Large groups of students are signing up for food safety training courses after a new university policy was enacted in early October, implementing repercussions for any group selling edibles without certification. Since Sept. 19, 275 students have received special food handling training on campus. The purpose of the training is to educate students on the proper ways to prepare food before selling or handing it out on campus. The number of students trained through the university’s food handling program nearly totals 400, according to Heather Campbell, student organizations and risk management coordinator. The total number of trained students was only about 100 around Sept. 19, according to a University Star article from the same day. Campbell said the training rooms have frequently been upgraded to larger venues when the number of students signed up for a session exceeds expected capacity. If a student organization is caught selling food in The Quad without a member present who is trained in food safety, they are asked to leave and are told to attend upcoming training sessions, Campbell said. If an organization continues to break the rules, they may be banned from selling food in The Quad indefinitely. Any organization wishing to distribute food in The Quad must be registered with the university, Campbell said. There is only one way to handle an organization whose members are selling food on campus without at least one trained person present, said Elsie Romano, Texas
John Casares | Staff Photographer Clark Broom, marketing freshman, Jerry Mullis, nutrition and foods freshman, and Charles Dominguez, exploratory freshman, sell sausage wraps with other members of Sigma Chi Nov. 12 in The Quad.
State environmental health and safety specialist. “We would just have to shut them down,” Romano said. Romano said an organization that is caught selling food without someone trained could be prohibited from doing so until they could provide a proper certification. Campbell said prevention of potential illnesses is one of the main reasons the food handling classes are now a requirement for those looking to distribute edibles on campus. “We want to be proactive and not have anybody get sick,” Campbell said. In the event of a food poisoning outbreak, Romano said she would investigate the areas where the incident took place and talk to organizations who may be responsible for providing the tainted food. Romano said there have not been any recent outbreaks at Texas State except for a single incident a few years ago. “We haven’t had anything where numerous individuals (got sick),” Romano said.
Santiago Demaree, computer science senior, said he took the food safety class and learned the correct ways to prepare food and avoid common food-borne diseases. “Overall, it was pretty interesting, but there were some boring moments too,” Demaree said. However, he sadid the training did not apply much to his organization, which only sells pre-made foods. Campbell and Romano teach the free, one-hour food handling class available to students. Campbell said students need to take one class to earn their food handling certificate and receive a simple guide with rules on cooking and sanitation. Organizations wishing to distribute food can sign up for a training session on the university’s Risk Management website and can choose a specific time and date to sign up for their session. “Our main goal is to create awareness,” Romano said. “And I think we’ve created a lot of awareness for a lot of people.”