Brown and White Vol. 115 No. 28

              - the brown and white - lehigh university's student newspaper founded in 1894 vol 115 no 28 friday february 1 2008 all the lehigh news first gast appoints group to fuel green changes by desiree annunziato the lehigh environmental advi sory group formed by president al ice gast will meet for the first time wednesday in order to start organiz ing its agenda on environmental ini tiatives for the lehigh community this group is to help think through and make decisions and priorities for environmental initia tives through operations and educa tion gast said this is a great op portunity for students to help drive decisions gast said lehigh has the oppor tunity to accomplish a great amount as an educational institution and as a community through this group she said there is a lot of interest involved with regard to doing the right thing gast said ideas have already been heard but the plan is to gather input from everybody according to gast the first task of the group may be to bring all of these ideas together what we can implement easily we will do right away she said we owe it to the world and ourselves to decrease our environmental impact and energy consumption gast said there are many meth ods used by other institutions and the group is looking for good ideas they are looking at the best practices out there she said and the goal is to b&wphoto by chris chew assess things that can be done and their impact we look to other institutions and other cities because we are a small community she said lehigh can inspire other communities and busi nesses to make changes gast said the group will provide areas to improve but the community should send new ideas through the web site and e-mails she said it takes an institutional and individual commitment in every aspect of reducing waste there are opportunities to assess our impact and look at the way we do things gast said each person needs to students gather in sinclair auditorium wednesday for viewing of the web cast the two percent solution a broadcast about how the u.s can reduce emissions and curb global warming council made to promote equity and community ■ president alice gast starts council for equity and community which will work to foster a positive campus climate by emily smith president alice gast unveiled plans for the de velopment of a council to address university-wide objectives for equity and community the council for equity and community will consist of 14 members that will report directly to gast three faculty members three staff members and three students will be elected to the commit tee through a nomination process that began jan 28 student members will serve one to two year terms while the other members will serve three year terms the additional five members will be nomi nated by gast the members of the council must have demonstrated dedication to diversity through teaching research or service these five members will include two co-chairs one faculty and one staff member it takes a diverse group to handle diversity gast said that is the reason we have faculty staff and students involved the goal of the group is to create an envi ronment where all members of campus work together transcending racial cultural and other boundaries to build a stronger community and create a richer educational experience for all according to the cec web site the cec will begin its mission with seven goals and set a timeline for completion of these goals the goals include enhancement of the professors agree with jan 22 rate cuts ■ economics professors hyclak and o'brien say the subprime mortgage problem has hurt the economy by megan grant two lehigh professors said it is too early to tell if the u.s economy is en tering a recession but they said they believe the federal reserve's decision to cut interest rates jan 22 was a good one the federal reserve board cut the discount rate by three-quarters of a percent on jan 22 according to a fed eral reserve press release anthony o'brien professor of eco nomics said he believes the federal reserve made the right choice i think most economists would say interest rate cuts were good for such a weak economy o'brien said whether we're in a recession or not slow growth of the economy is inevitable fellow professor of economics thomas hyclak also said he thinks the interest rate cut was the appropriate decision we don't know for sure if we're in a recession until we're in it or even af ter we're out of it hyclak said real gross domestic product data is only released every three months hyclak said real gdp measures the strength of an economy with the effects of inflation subtracted it is usually measured in three month intervals based on the amount of product con sumed within a single economy policymakers are making deci sions based on educated guesses hyclak said a recession occurs when two things happen at the same time economic activity slows down and de creases and unemployment increases many factors can influence the economy but both professors said they think the nation's current economic state is largely due to a subprime mort gage problem the subprime mortgage prob lem is the result of banks and brokers making loans to people in the subprime category or people who could not pay back their loans o'brien said this problem has added to the already declining u.s housing market o'brien said although the collapse of the housing market has occurred worldwide it has been more severe in the u.s this collapse has caused many banks to tighten up their lending re quirements and has made it harder to borrow money o'brien said lower interest rates may make it easier for people and businesses to borrow money he said if it's easier to borrow money then there is more spending an increase in see committee page 4 see equity page 3 see economy page 4 stress less [ j first-place hawks check online for live better / take on holy cross breaking news page 7 r v &£ page 16 thebrownandwhite.com stress less jr pw 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