FROM THE HILL
Protest continued from page 3
Wear the Title,
Read All About It
You thought Franklin Street
was crowded. You should
have seen Student Stores.
With a national championship
comes the requisite wardrobe
upgrade. The campus store sold
about 30,000 T-shirts the first
week after April 6. That’s good
news for the University’s general
coffers — an estimated 45 percent of the $600,000 from initial
sales, not to mention proceeds
from licensed vendors’ sales,
comes back to Carolina.
Other merchandise such as
hats and mugs take longer to
make, but those are expected to
be big sellers, too.
Copies of The Daily Tar Heel
were another sought-after item
and were hard to come by the
day after the game, despite a
press run of 80,000, four times
normal.
“We printed more than one
copy for every man, woman and
child in Orange County, but that
still wasn’t enough,” said DTH
General Manager Kevin Schwartz.
A week later, the paper had printed 120,000.
outside Bingham 103, a first-floor classroom,
shouting profanities, waving signs and chanting.
About 15 minutes into the speech, protesters in
the classroom holding a banner moved to the
front of the room and held it in front of Tancredo. The speaker grabbed the banner and
attempted to confront the protesters, telling
them, “That’s not fair.”
At about that time, someone broke a window
from the outside. At the sound of breaking glass,
Tancredo left the room, and police moved in.
Police spokesman Randy Young said officers
expected there to be dissent. When the room was
at capacity the officers blocked the door and
warned the crowd to stay back.
“The verbal warnings were ignored, and the
crowd outside of the hallway continued to press
forward, at some point coming into physical contact with the officers,” Young said. “Seeing that
all attempts of verbal communication were futile,
officers decided the situation was incendiary.”
It was then the officers released a “broadcast
issuance” of pepper spray meant to disperse the
crowd, and, because the crowd kept pushing, an
officer activated a Taser but did not deploy it.
Before the event, campus security removed
two women who delayed Tancredo’s speech by
stretching across the front of the classroom a ban-
ner that read “No dialogue with hate.”
Tyler Oakley, a member of Students for a
Democratic Society, said the women being
thrown out of the event was the catalyst. “In our
minds, it was this show of police force and brutality that really ignited things,” he said.
People were removed from the building, and a
tug-of-war ensued between the police and protesters as the officers tried to shut the door. It
went on for about 20 minutes before the police
were able to close and lock the door.
Young said Tancredo left on his own accord,
and police never advised him not to speak.
Thorp said the Division of Student Affairs
would join the investigation and that, if appropriate, students involved could face Honor Court
proceedings. He said he called Tancredo to apologize for the way he was treated.
There will be an internal investigation of the
use of force by police officers, Young said.
Thorp, in a letter to the campus community,
wrote, “Carolina’s tradition of free speech is a
fundamental part of what has made this place
special for more than 200 years.
“We expect protests about controversial subjects
at Carolina. That’s part of our culture. But we also
pride ourselves on being a place where all points of
view can be expressed and heard. There’s a way to
protest that respects free speech and allows people
with opposing views to be heard.”
ONLINE: Part of the incident is available online at
www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7na TR5QCxo.
Budget continued from page 3
Previous estimates anticipated that at a 5 percent reduction, the University no longer would
offer 282 classes and 436 sections, making it
harder for some students to meet graduation
requirements. The University also said a 5 percent
cut would affect distance education offerings,
technology and acquisitions for libraries, and
funding for outreach programs.
Funds to support enrollment growth in the
UNC System schools — a function of the state’s
population growth — were protected in Perdue’s
budget, as was need-based financial aid money. It
includes $10 million for Carolina to move ahead
with a biomedical imaging research center.
On hold are the Morehead Planetarium and
Science Center expansion, the law school’s move
to Carolina North and a new building for the
psychology department. The addition of luxury
suites and other enhancements to the south side
of Kenan Stadium won’t start after the end of the
2009 football season as planned.
UNC System President Erskine Bowles ’ 67 has
pledged to urge the N.C. General Assembly to
keep budget cuts for the system campuses at no
more than 5 percent and to ensure that campuses
have full flexibility in determining how to make
cuts. Bowles also has asked the General Assembly
not to enact permanent cuts.
Thorp said the University still supports the idea
of temporary furloughs, if the General Assembly
grants that authority to the UNC System.
Some retired faculty have offered to return —
without compensation — to the classroom
should the University undergo cuts that limit
class offerings and increase class sizes. On Feb. 17,
the UNC-Chapel Hill Retired Faculty Association passed a resolution that offers teaching, grant
writing, student advising and other assistance.
ONLINE: UNC’s emergency budget guidelines are available online at
universityrelations.unc.edu/
budget/documents/2009/Emergency%20Budget%20Guidelines041509.pdf.
