1995_02 Insight February 1995

              SPORTS
Home sweet
home for 'Dogs
Page 6
FEBRUARY 15,1995
Insight
CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, FRESNO
VOL. 26, NO. 12
Broken barriers — not broken dreams
Photo by Kori Rianda/lnslght
MIND OVER MATTER: Kris Morton, 19, (left) and Sharla Gauthier, 18, practice the art of Tae Kwon Do at BreakThe Barriers gymnasium in north Fresno.
•f Local group provides
entertainment for Fresno
State half-time shows
By Rachel Rosemire
Staff Writer
Some people arc dreamers.
Some consider dreamers to be unrealistic or foolish. Deby
Hergcnradcr is one of the dreamers, and her efforts arc making
people sit up and take notice.
Hcrgenrader and her husband,
Steve, are the founders of Break
The Barriers, a non-profit organization in Fresno. It provides the
atmosphere for people with various disabilities, as well as those
without, to work together and learn
from one another.
BreakThe Barriers is continually
working to expand its programs.
Classes include: gymnastics,
dance, martial arts, weight lifting
and sign language. Each week the
organization works with more than
2,000 students, from infants to senior citizens.
Deby Hergcnradcr said that
while she was growing up. sometimes people would not let her sister, Kathy, participate in recreational activities because she had
Down's Syndrome.
"They said they weren't properly
equipped and that she needed a
special place," Hergcnradcr said.
"So I grew up asking God,
'Where's this special place?' "
Bom the daughter of Ice Capades
performers Ken and Carmie
Mullen, Hcrgenrader was truly a
natural athlete. By age 16, she had
become a state, regional and national gymnastics champion and
was able to compete intemation-
See BARRIERS, page 8
Revamp of GE courses
under task force review
By Manny Fernandez
Staff Writer
Theatre Arts Professor Terry
Miller isn't worried.
Miller has taught Drama 22 for
more than two decades. The General Education course challenges
students' critical thinking abilities
and introduces them to fiction, poetry and performance, he says.
But under a proposal to restructure the GE program recently issued by Provost and Vice-President
for Academic Affairs Alexander
Gonzalez, a number of drama
courses, including Miller's class,
would be cut.
Yet Miller isn't troubled. The current GE program — requiring 54
units and offering students a wide,
scattered selection of courses —
needs to be changed, he says.
"There's a temptation to defend
your own turf. I don't think that's
in the best interest of everybody,"
Miller said. "It would be no great
tragedy to lose a class if we came
up with a system that's appealing
to the students and ends up helping
them."
Gonzalez' proposal calls for a
more structured and streamlined
GE program.
The proposal, delivered to the
Task Force on General Education
Review Feb. 3, reduces the number of courses offered by two-thirds
and reduces the number of units
from 54 to 51.
"There's a tremendous amount of •
variables and options," Gonzalez
said recently of the current program. "My view is that I would like
to see a more common experience."
• Gonzalez' revised GE program
adopts the A-E format followed by
most California State University
campuses. The format reduces the
number of classes offered to students by narrowing the range of
courses in the Core, Breadth and
Capstone sections.
In the current program, students
have a choice of several classes in
each section. The current Core section offers three speech classes to
satisfy a speech course requirement.
The revised program offers only
one basic speech course.
Downtown faces an identity crisis
"It would be no great
tragedy to lose a class
if we came up with a
system that's appealing to the students
and ends up helping
them."
Terry Miller
Theatre Arts professor
"The question to explore then,"
Gonzalez writes in the proposal, "is
the feasibility of incorporating into
one course the essential elements
presently covered in the three
courses. In that way, students would
receive a broader view... of the field
of study."
The Critical Thinking requirement
of the current Core section offers
more than a dozen classes, ranging
from Anthropology 30 to Greek 10.
See GE, page 3
By David Mirhadi
Staff Writer
Patrici Bcckman stared wistfully at
the remains of the sparse crowd milling around her lunch counter, sensing that the end had finally arrived.
Patrons stopped by her store, the
Round-Up Bar B-Q. to offer best
wishes or swap stories. Many were
friends she'd met over the years, faithful customers she could count on.
Others were visiting for the first, perhaps the last, time.
After spending 28 years serving
downtown's lunch crowd in the historic Farmer's Market shopping center, Bcckman was one of the two last
tenants to leave Feb. 3.
The Farmer's Market building was
bought out recently by Office Depot,
which plans to stan demolition this
week.
What happened to the Farmer's
Market could be a prelude to downtown Fresno's demise — or a symbol
that makes the city finally wake up
and realize its heart and soul arc dying.
While the northern end of this city
of 400,000 expands with its promise
of high-rise glass towers, a healthy
economy and a safe environment,
downtown struggles to maintain its
identity amid problems of crime, a
sagging tax base and an increasing
perception problem.
What can be done to solve
downtown's problems? City leaders,
planners and merchants say the problems can be fixed — if Fresno has a
clear, defined path for downtown's
passage into the next century.
"There are positive steps that are
happening downtown, but to the general public, they are still relatively
invisible, and we haven't reached a
critical mass yet," said Craig
Scharton, a former City Council
member and a member of Fresno's
Downtown Association, made up of
Shopping Center
RETAIL SHOPS
INTERNATIONAL
RESTAURANTS
BANQUET ROOMS
Photo by Kori F
The sign advertising retail shops, banquet rooms and international restaurants remains, but the Farmers Market stands empty.
Demolition of the local landmark Is scheduled to begin this week.
more than 100 business owners, civic
leaders and merchants.
"If you don't take those first few
steps to success, you're never going
to gel there at all. The steps we're taking now are important — laying the
foundation and then revitalization
comes as a result of that."
Pieces of downtown's new foundation include a proposed baseball stadium, a new federal courthouse, refurbishing several prominent downtown buildings, and the renovation of
Fresno's historic pedestrian mall.
The Security Bank building is another piece of downtown's metamorphosis.
The building that houses Scharton \s
offices was once considered one of
Fresno's pre-eminent skyscrapers
when it was built in 1925. It symbolized prosperity for decades before
falling on hard times in Fresno's
growth-crazed '80s. It was vacant
when Scharton moved his offices
there a few years back. and. perhaps
inspired by Scharton's commitment
to the area, 26 new tenants have
moved there in the last year and a half.
"In terms of an office complex, that
is an incredible success," he said
Fresno's center still has problems,
however. Downtown still consists of
many old, dilapidated buildings, some
too costly to repair and refurbish. The
vacancy rate, approaching 20 percent,
is another major concern.
Two buildings that represent
downtown's past — a multistory
Bank of America building, which has
been vacant for almost 20 years, and
the old Guarantee Savings building,
which officially closed its doors in
1993 — are remnants of downtown's
golden age.
Scharton said Fresno can improve
its downtown by looking at what has
worked in other cities.
"I spent a lot of time surveying other
downtowns, and every downtown I
went to, I came back with certain
common denominators," he said.
"First, the downtown has to economically bottom out. You have to get into
the gutter before you can pull yourself out. It's not exclusive to troubled
oig cities, either. Property values and
costs gel so low. and that creates a new
business environment."
Cities also need a "catalytic force"
of community activism to begin rebuilding themselves, he said. San Diego, a city of 1.2 million, had the catalytic force to rebuild its downtown
several years ago.
The city formed the Center City
Development Corporation, "a group
of young business leaders that got together and really charged the city to
do the things it was supposed to do,"
Scharton said.
A coalition of civic, business and
government leaders constructed
Horton Plaza, a downtown business
district.
"They got together and said, 'We're
not going to stop until we are successful.' No one has taken the banner in
Fresno and said, 'I'm gonna get this
done, no matter what the cost is to
myself or my political career.' No one
has done that."
Where did Fresno go wrong?
"We did the exact opposite of what
we had done so well. We took old
buildings and covered them up so they
would look modern," he said.
Scharton said the city goofed by paving over Mariposa Mall and making
the Fulton Mall a pedestrian mall.
"We went against our heritage," he
said.
See DOWNTOWN, page 4