PUBLICATIONS Inside Illinois Vol. 23, No. 12, Jan. 22, 2004

Trustees re-elect Eppley as chairman

By Sabryna Cornish
UIC News

About 30 anti-Chief protesters traveled to the UI Board of Trustees meeting held at the Chicago campus Jan. 15 to urge board members to take up the issue at their March meeting.

Controversy regarding Chief Illiniwek has heated up in the past few months after trustee Frances Carroll introduced a resolution at the board’s December meeting to do away with the symbol.

Carroll, who said at the time that she might not have had enough votes to retire the Chief, withdrew the resolution at the meeting.

The issue is expected to be on the March board meeting agenda. Formal protests against the Chief have been ongoing for the past 15 years. Native Americans say the symbol is racist while supporters say the symbol honors Native Americans and is a long-standing tradition of the university worth retaining.

Eppley elected to second term
Board chairman Lawrence Eppley was re-elected to serve a second year as board chairman.

“It is an honor to have the support of my fellow trustees and to work with them and the administration for another year in leading one of America’s best universities to continue to do great things,” he said. Eppley has served on the board since 2001 after being appointed by Gov. George Ryan.
Eppley, 44, is an attorney in corporate practice at the Chicago firm of Bell, Boyd and Lloyd.

Eppley has spent his time on the board concentrating on economic development activity. He was key to creating strategies that transfer university research and technological innovations to business applications.
“Beyond our core missions of education, research and public service, the UI has enormous potential to enhance the economic vitality of the state through innovation and job growth,” he said.

In other business
• The board of trustees passed a resolution Jan. 15 supporting and recognizing the sacrifice those in the UI community have made during the last 10 months of the Iraqi war.

About 200 UI students, faculty and staff members have been stationed in Iraq since 2002. Many alumni also have been called to duty.
“It is with pride that we take this opportunity to praise the courage and valor of these outstanding men and women of our extended university family,” the resolution states.

The board also paid its respects to Army 1st Lt. Brian Slavenas, a recent UI engineering graduate, who was killed in action in Iraq in November.

•The new Micro and Nanotechnology Lab addition that will include more space for faculty offices and for student life was unveiled.

The $18 million project will add 45,000 gross square feet of laboratory, administrative and office space. Those who work in the building say they need more space to collaborate with the many different departments and disciplines that interact with one another. Expansion of the lab shows the state and university commitment to the sciences.

•State employees, including members of the UI Board of Trustees, will be required to follow new ethics requirements.

The new regulations are stricter than previous ones and treat the trustees as state employees, even though they are not paid, said UI legal counsel Tom Bearrows.

The new ethics codes creates external entities and procedures to increase ethics awareness, oversight, guidance and enforcement, strengthens the provisions on receiving gifts and restricts certain activities such as politicking during work time or lobbyist activities.

Employees will undergo mandatory ethics training, which will be available in an online format. The new regulations went into effect Jan. 1.

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