Reagan's El Salvador request
halved by House committee
By BARTON REPPERT
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON President Reagan’s request for
$6O million in military aid to El Salvador was cut in half
by a House panel yesterday as he readied a special plea
to Congress and the nation to rally behind his Central
America policy.
The 7-5 decision by the appropriations subcommittee
on foreign operations to slash the Salvador aid to $3O
million followed a tie vote, 6-6, that would have barred
any decision at all for 90 days. The compromise was
engineered by Chairman Clarence D. Long, D-Md.,
who just returned from El Salvador.
The Senate foreign relations committee already had
settled on an identical cut.
Meanwhile yesterday, the full Senate talked behind
closed doors about whether the administration is
waging a covert campaign against Nicaragua. And
Reagan promised to name a special envoy for Central
America, whose duties will include assisting “the
Salvadorans in their efforts to find a basis for dialogue
with their opponents.”
Speculation centered on former Democratic Sen.
Richard Stone of Florida as the choice for that post,
Long said he supported the the scaled-down aid
package after assurances that the new ambassodor
“will be charged with advancing the peace process” in
El Salvador.
The Maryland Democrat also said he was satisfied
with promised steps toward opening of Salvadoran
prisons to inspection by the International Red Cross,
freeing political prisoners and undertaking a review of
evidence in the 1980 killings of four U.S. churchwomen
in El Salvador.
Legality of lie detectors for
By KAREN KANE and
TONY PHYRILLAS
Collegian Staff Writers
A hearing is scheduled today in Centre
County Court to determine if the State
College Police Department can require-its
police officers to take lie detector tests.'
Four police officers filed a complaint
against the State College Bureau of Police
Services, municipal manager Carl B.
Fairbanks and Police Chief Elwood G.
Williams Jr., asking for a temporary
injuction to stop the administering of lie
detector tests until today’s hearing.
The hearing before Centre County Judge
David E. Grine, who granted the injunction'
Friday* is scheduled for 1 p.m. The judge
Committee members
offer opinions on
Fall Commencement
By ANN MATTURRO
Collegian Staff Writer
In its first meeting since
January, the Calandar Conversion
Council’s communications
committee discussed the
possibility of a Fall
Commencement.
James R. Dungan, Calendar
Conversion Council secretary,
said the University is
investigating the feasiblity of
holding a ceremony on Saturday,
Jan. 7.
Emil Parvensky,
Undergraduate Student
Government president, said he is
not an advocate of a permanent
Fall Commencement under the
semester calendar, but students
caught in the transition should be
accommodated.
However, Dungan said this
the
daily
Long acknowledged that “this is not a perfect
solution,” but he said the assurances represented
substantial progress “in view of the tortured history of
El Salvador.”
After the vote approving the $3O million, the
subcommittee released a letter to Long from Secretary
of State George P. Shultz, in which Shultz said “we
favor a negotiating process which would lead the way
to a political solution through free and fair elections.”
“To advance this objective, the president willsoon be
designating a senior U.S. official of ambassadorial
rank to act as a special envoy to Central American
governments,” the secretary wrote.
Shultz said the envoy “will assist the Salvadorans in
their efforts to find a basis for dialogue with their
opponents on the terms and conditions for free, fair and
safe elections.”
But he cautioned that the United States “will not
support negotiations for power-sharing” moves to
bring the Salvadoran guerrillas directly into any new
coalition regime “without an election.
The motion to defer a vote on the military aid for up
to 90 days was offered by Rep. Matthew F. McHugh, D-
N.Y., who said that regarding the administration’s
policy toward El Salvador “we have had some
constructive statements but very little concrete
action” toward a political settlement.
Reagan himself will address a joint session of
Congress and a nationwide broadcast audience
tonight to ask support for his policies toward the
volatile region.
Senate Minority Leader Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va.,
said Dodd would give the Democratic response after
Reagan’s speech tonight.
will hear arguments from both sides on the
validity of giving the tests to the police
officers in an internal police investigation.
The four officers David Burns, Brian
Clouser, Jane Durovchic and Debra
Hoffmaster filed the complaint because
they believe the lie-detector .tests Avere - -
arbitrarily administered by the State
College police department.
Attorney Amos Goodall, representing the
borough, will answer the complaint and
offer a defense for the police deparment’s
actions today in court. Municipal solicitor
Robert K. Kistler, who usually represents
the borough, is out of town.
According to the complaint filed by Roy
K. Lisko, attorney for the four police
officers, the officers were told April 2, along
presents a problem
"If the administration decides to
have a Fall Commencement this
year because of the term system’s
effects on students, then it
wouldn’t be fair not to have Fall
commencements in 1984,1985 and
1986," he said. “Students
graduating in those years would
also be affected because of the
term system.”
Arthur 0. Lewis, committee
chairman, said the CCC requested
the communication committee’s
input concerning Fall
Commencement for its May 4
meeting.
Committee member John Coyle
said the CCC asked the wrong
group for input.
“Faculty really doesn’t care
about graduation," Coyle said.
“It’s an activity for the students
and their parents.”
Please see FALL, Page 18.
Collegian
Also, please see REBELLIONS, Page 6.
with several other officers, to take the lie
detector tests.
At least eight or nine officers have taken
the test, Lisko said. Of the officers who filed
the complaint, only Durovchic had taken the
test before the temporary injunction was
handed dawn.. Durovchio-took' the test an > -
hour beforfe Judge Grine signed the court
order.
"Police knew the restraining order was
coming and they gave her the test,” he said,
The State College police department
actions are “basically wrong when they
know something is going to happen and they
rush her through the test,” Lisko said.
Police Chief Williams would not comment
on the specifics of the case, but he did
v confirm that the department is now
Playing games
Jack Kostrab (6th-business administration) is feeding water through a baby bottle
to Howard Biichle (12th-health planning administration) at the third stop in a.
tricycle obstacle course yesterday. The obstacle course is one event in North
Week, sponsored by the North Halls Association of Students.
Ernesto Rivas-Gallont, El Salvador’s ambassador to the United States, confers yesterday with House appropriations
subcommittee Chairman Clarence Long, D-Md., before the panel voted to appropriate $3O million in military aid to his
country.
police questioned
conducting an internal investigation and
that lie detector tests have recently been
given to some police officers.
“I will be in court tomorrow. What I have
to say I will say at the hearing,” Williams
said yesterday.
: -The department has used lie detectors for
criminal investigations in the past, but has
not previously used them in an internal
investigation of officers at least since he
joined the force in 1961, Williams said.
“We are following the provisions of state
law and the lie detector is part of the day-in
day-out tool of the department,” Williams
said.
When asked if the State College police
department has a standard procedure for
administering a lie detector test, Williams
Wednesday, April 27,1983
Vol. 83, No. 165 18 pages University Park, Pa. 16802
Published by students of The Pennsylvania State University
Parvensky defines future
USG presidential priorities
By CHRISTINE MURRAY
Collegian Staff Writer
Improving communications
between the Undergraduate
Student Government, students and
administrators, and defining the
identity of the USG Academic
Assembly will be main priorities
for USG President Emil
Parvensky next year.
Parvensky announced his plans
for the executive and legislative
branches of USG for the coming
year at a news conference
yesterday.
Parvensky, who was
inaugurated Monday night, had
declined to give specific plans for
his administration before
officially taking office to avoid
“stepping on the toes” of the
previous administration.
In the area of communication,
Parvensky said he plans to talk to
students about the programs USG
offers and whether they are
needed.
USG provides such programs as
running buses during term breaks,
but USG never asked students if
the buses could be improved, he
said.
“If we’re offering programs that
students are not interested in —■
we’ll just scrap them,” Parvensky
said.
He said he wants to cut down on
unwanted services and make the
wanted ones more efficient.
Parvensky also said he did not
like the idea of USG senators
sending written responses to .
newspapers, concerning editorials
and letters to the editor submitted
by students dissatisfied with USG.
He said he and vice president
Elizabeth Saylor plan to contact
students who wrote the letters and
talk to them individually about
what upset them.
Parvensky said he is not trying
to change students opinions about
USG, instead he is only trying to
clear up information.
said the department adheres to appropriate
state laws and handles each case on an
individual basis.
Lisko said his clients believe the the
■department’s procedure for administering
the lie detector tests lack standards such as
how, when and to whom the tests can be
administered.
“Just because these four people are police
officers doesn’t mean they have to give up
their civil and constitutional rights,” Lisko
said.
Lisko said he believes the act of
administering the test was “arbitrary and
capricious” in that the defendants had.no
reason to require the four officers to
undergo the test.
Parvensky said he believes
members of the USG Academic
Assembly are facing an identity
problem and he wants to alleviate
that problem by getting Academic
Assembly involved in faculty
advising and academic rights.
In the area of faculty advising,
Parvensky said too many students
have problems with academic
advisers and, as a result, the
situation must be studied in
greater detail than the study made
by the administration.
The University’s study reported
82 percent of the students
surveyed said they never
discussed career goals and
directives, he said.
Parvensky also said most
students do not know where to go
with a problem concerning
academic rights, such as
reporting a teaching assistant who
can not speak or write English
well enough to teach a course.
Parvensky said getting the
Academic Assembly involved in
these matters may help the
organization regain its identity.
In addition to faculty advising,
Parvensky said a Fall Semester
commencement ceremony is a
pertinent student issue that he
plans to address.
“The strongest student
sentiment in any issue even the
Beaver Stadium (concert)
proposal is Fall
commencement,” he said.
Parvensky sent a letter to
James Dungan, secretary to the
Calendar Conversion Council,
explaining Parvensky’s opinion
about the Fall Commencement
decision under the semester
system, he said.
Parvensky said although he
understands Fall Commencement
will not be necessary under the
semester calendar, a ceremony
should be held at the end of the
Fall Semester 1983 for those
students caught in the transition.
AP Laserpholo