THE STUDENT VOICE SINCE 1904
INSIDE
SPORTS
911 was called 196 times to KU’s fraternity houses last year p. 2
Contrary to popular belief, Bill Self is better in the tournament than people think The University Daily Kansan
CHANDLER BOESE & EMILY WELLBORN @KansanNews
vol. 136 // iss. 18 Thurs., Mar. 15, 2018
Tips on how to make the best of Record Store Day p. 5
SEE SELF • PAGE 6
FRATERNITIES FROZEN
The University’s Interfraternity Council president announced Monday that the organization would freeze all social activities for the 24 fraternity chapters that it oversees, but select fraternity members during Tuesday’s special meeting moved to take another course of action. The announcement came after recent suspensions and disciplinary actions against fraternities since the beginning of the spring semester. Two fraternities, Sigma Alpha Epsilon and Delta Upsilon, had been suspended by their national organizations while the University investigated allegations of hazing. Sigma Phi Epsilon had received a cease-and-desist letter from the national organization, and the Beta Theta Pi fraternity had been subject to suspension. “It has become clear there are significant and systemic conduct problems in the IFC community that we must address, and we must address them now,” said IFC president Daniel Lee in the press release. Some fraternity members and their associates said they are angry that the decision to freeze social activities came without a two-thirds vote by IFC General Assembly. “My biggest concern is that three people voted to approve a policy affecting all 24 fraternities,” said David Steen of the Kansas Fraternity Landlords League in an email to the Kansan. “An effective policy and its implementation in a diverse organization requires support which seems highly unlikely when a three-person group decides for all.” IFC is only one of the four governing organizations that oversee greek organizations
Miranda Anaya/KANSAN The Beta Theta Pi fraternity house is located at 1425 Tennessee St.
Kansan file photo The Delta Chi fraternity house is located at 1245 West Campus Rd.
Emily Wellborn/KANSAN The Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity house is located at 1301 West Campus Rd.
Savanna Smith/KANSAN The Phi Kappa Psi fraternity house is located at 1602 W. 15th St.
at the University. According to a news release put out by the University, the freeze means that the fraternities can continue to have chapter meetings and put on philanthropic events, but they can no longer hold social events, especially those with alcohol. The chapters’ planned recruitment activities will have strict limits, including bans on overnight stays, reports to IFC about any recruitment activities and a requirement that every event is alcohol free. While the freeze is in place, which Lee says he hopes to have lifted by the end of the spring semester, IFC and the fraternities plan to work with the University
to make a plan moving forward, the release stated. “I commend IFC for taking ownership of these problems by self-imposing this freeze,” Chancellor Douglas Girod said in the statement released Monday. “The university stands ready to support and partner with student leaders to improve and enhance Greek life at KU.” The next day, what was originally expected to be IFC’s General Assembly meeting to plan its future was turned into an invitation-only affair Tuesday. “There actually has been a special assembly called, private meetings called in the past, and it’s to protect the body of the organization be-
cause you are a public organization,” said Amy Long, the associate director of fraternity/sorority life in the University’s Student Involvement and Leadership Center. She said this to fraternity members not on the invitation list for the meeting. She told them that they could be given trespassing violations if they tried to enter the Jayhawk room in the Kansas Union, where the meeting was being held. The invited fraternity members, almost all presidents of their respective chapters, voted in an interim president of IFC and other interim executive roles while the remaining IFC executive board members undergo a
Judicial Review, according to fraternity members who attended the meeting. These are the first steps to recall Lee and the other remaining members, but definitive action couldn’t be taken against them Tuesday night, since IFC members will have to vote on the next steps of the recall in the next General Assembly meeting, the date for which was not shared. These interim roles are held by a special Ad Hoc committee which included Keegun Gose, the chapter president of Phi Gamma Delta, elected as an interim president; Logan Albers, the chapter president of Pi Kappa Alpha, as elected as vice president; and Connor Hampton,
the chapter president of Pi Kappa Alpha, voted as the director of recruitment. All of the other positions will remain open until after a decision regarding the original executive members is made. Gose said after the meeting that the freeze was still in effect, but wouldn’t comment on the removal process. “The IFC General Assembly is committed to solving the problems facing our community together,” Gose said in an email after the meeting. “Collaboration will continue throughout this week.”
Lara Korte contributed to this report.
Link between campus carry, crime still unclear
RYAN LISTON @RyanListonUDK
After the KU Public Safety Office released crime statistics for 2017 showing an overall decrease in on-campus crime, the College Republicans are calling initial concerns about concealed carry overblown and countering that concealed carry actually makes campus safer. “Overall, it’s good to see that all the anti-gun sentiment that was shown by those Docking studies in the past, I think that was really all for nothing,” said Victoria Snitsar, secretary for the University’s chapter of the College Republicans and chairwoman for the Kansas Federation of College Republicans. Snitsar referenced surveys conducted by the Docking Institute of Public Affairs at Fort Hays State University. As reported in a Kansan article, 82 percent of faculty
and 70 percent of students at the University did not want concealed handguns to be allowed on campus, according to the study. As the Kansan reported on March 2, on-campus crime reduced by nearly 13 percent in 2017 compared to 2016, according to a report by the Public Safety Office. Snitsar said concealed carry has worked as a preventative measure against crime. “With six months since the policy has been implemented, this isn’t enough time to draw a long-term correlation or causation relationship,” Snitsar said. “But the numbers as they stand today, crime is down 13 percent, the number of assaults has basically been cut in half and there are no weapons violations as categorized by the PSO. I think that speaks pretty well with the fact that only good things can come with having concealed carry on campus.”
According to the PSO report, overall crime was down from 770 instances to 671. The number of assaults dropped from 30 in 2016 to 14 in 2017. There were no weapons violations in 2017 — down from one weapons violation in 2016. Concealed carry was implemented on campus on July 1, 2017, after a fouryear exemption for public universities from the state law expired. Snitsar appeared on the National Rifle Association’s NRAtv program called “Cam & Co.” on March 6. Snitsar and the host Cam Edwards discussed concealed carry on campus in light of the recent KU PSO report. “Those statistics are just remarkable, and it really helps fight the narrative on our side that campus carry does make campuses safer across the country. What we’re seeing here at KU is a perfect example of that,”
Snitsar said on the program. “I think that it speaks really well to the idea that places with guns are safer, and the most dangerous places in America are gun free zones.” On the program, Snitsar said she hopes that concealed carry will lead to a decrease in sexual assaults and rapes on campus, and she plans on using concealed carry for self-protection when she turns 21. According to the PSO report, there was no change in the amount of sex offenses that the office dealt with between 2016 and 2017. PSO handled five sex offenses in both years with three instances of rape in 2016 and four in 2017. The number of sex offenses reported by KU PSO is not indicative of how many sexual assaults or rapes actually occur on-campus, as victims can report the incident to multiple entities other than KU
PSO, and some choose not to report at all. The Office of Institutional Opportunity and Access and the Sexual Assault Prevention and Education Center both said in emails to the Kansan that they have not been notified of any students choosing to concealed carry to protect themselves from sexual assaults or rapes. “I have no data or anecdotal stories of students who are choosing to conceal and carry at KU as a means for risk reduction,” Jennifer Brockman, director of SAPEC, said in the email. Megan Stuke, the executive director of the Willow Domestic Violence Center, said that she personally knows of one sexual assault survivor that chose to conceal and carry for their protection, but that person is not a student. “I have heard no students that want to carry, but that
doesn’t mean they don’t,” Stuke said. “It’s certainly not outside the realm of possibility that someone would choose that option.” In the KU PSO news release, Chief of Police Chris Keary credited an increase in security and police officers on campus with helping reduce on-campus crime. “The added visibility of officers on campus helped people feel safer, but conversations with those officers also helped the community understand their role in safety and crime prevention,” Keary said in the report. When asked specifically about the impact of concealed carry on campus crime rates, Deputy Chief James Anguiano said in an email to the Kansan, “There is not anything to add from Public Safety.”
— Edited by Hannah Strader