Board to release landlord

Landlords: take heed.

In the next week, the Student Government Board will release the… Landlords: take heed.

In the next week, the Student Government Board will release the results of a study taken by the University Center for Social and Urban Research, where 3,500 students evaluated their past proprietors.

Students were asked to grade their landlords on an A-to-F scale on a list of criteria and rate their property on aspects such as appliance effectiveness and window quality.

The results of the study – which was spearheaded by former board member Alexis Chidi – will be posted first on the SGB website, and later on my.pitt.edu.

Only those with a Pitt e-mail account can view the results of the study.

The survey, which was conducted this past May, will be recast annually, board member Ryan Haddad said at last night’s meeting.

In addition to announcing the landlord study, SGB declared the next step in the process of enacting projects proposed in last fall’s referendums.

Students voted in favor of creating a policy protecting students from three or more finals in one day, and after bringing the results to the University, President Sumter Link provided an update on establishing such a rule.

“The Provost is going to create a committee to look into the feasibility of this policy,” Link said. In addition, SGB may also look into the possibility of extending finals week.

SGB also addressed the referendum item on the USA Today Readership program when questioned about it during the open-floor portion of the meeting.

“I realized that there are no New York Times on campus anymore,” a student said to the board, “so I’ve been stealing them from Forbes-Craig Hall.”

Fifty-six percent of students voted in favor of permanently keeping the USA Today readership program on campus. The program would bring both USA Today and The New York Times to campus daily for students, at the semesterly charge of $2.50 per student.

“There was a majority in favor of it, but it wasn’t a very high majority,” board member Lacee Ecker said.

Ecker said that representatives from the program are seeking out alternate ways to pay for the program other than directly charging students.

“It isn’t a lost cause,” she said. “We could still get them, but we’re trying to find funding for it.”

Board member Perry Servedio – who helped bring the program to campus in a trial period – could not comment last night, because he was stuck in a William Pitt Union elevator for the entire meeting.

“It was like 85 minutes of nothing,” Servedio, who was rescued from the elevator 20 minutes after the meeting ended, said of his experience. “I tried to get them to get me on speakerphone for some of the meeting, but they would have to motion for that, so it didn’t happen.”

SGB Notes

Board Member Gary Sanderson said Pitt’s recycling decreased since 2004, and he plans to meet with officials to find out why.

Pitt recycled 393 tons of office paper and 38 tons of aluminum and plastic in 2004, but in 2006, those amounts decreased to 300 tons of office paper and 19 tons of aluminum and plastic, Sanderson reported.

Sanderson said he found the statistics on page 95 of a 103-page report issued by Pitt’s Department of Facilities and Management.

“There could be a legitimate reason, but that’s a huge decrease,” he said. “I think the student population has increased in those two years, but not drastically. There has to be some sort of reason, and I’d like to find that out.”

The student population at Pitt’s main campus only increased by 129 students between fall 2004 and fall 2006 semesters.

Sanderson also said that next year, Market Central will not offer guest passes.

Instead, students will be able to swipe one or two friends using regular passes. Upon hearing this, several members of the board and the audience responded with an enthusiastic “yes.”

Board Member Nila Devanath met with a SafeRider representative to discuss improving the system.

She said she was “appalled” to learn that there is only one phone line for SafeRider, which she said explained why the service can sometimes take so long to reach.

Devanath said she proposed installing a card-swiping system on the SafeRider bus to credit student accounts without having to make separate phone calls. However, the SafeRider representative she spoke with said a more efficient way would be to install more phone lines.

-SGB Notes compiled by Staff Writer Lindsay Carroll.