Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, April 18, 1991 TAG: 9104180468
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B4 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
The 27-member task force appointed by Gov. Douglas Wilder includes students, college presidents, police officers and legislators. It will conduct four public hearings at colleges and will issue recommendations for the 1992 General Assembly.
"We must send a clear message that substance abuse and sexual assault will not be condoned on our campuses," said Education Secretary James Dyke, the chairman.
At the direction of this year's General Assembly, the State Council of Higher Education already is studying date rape. "We will make every effort not to duplicate efforts," Dyke said.
The task force was told Wednesday that federal law requires colleges to tell each student that drug abusers will be punished. Some members questioned whether the policy has much effect.
"I must have been given something at some time, but I don't remember what it was," said UVa student Matthew W. Cooper, executive director of the Student Association of Virginia.
Suzanne Lavigne, a James Madison University graduate student, said that when she was an undergraduate at the University of Richmond, booklets explaining the school's anti-drug policy were placed in students' dormitory rooms.
"Whether or not they read it, I don't know," she said.
Emory & Henry College President Charles Sydnor said parents sometimes present a problem when they do not support a school's anti-drug policies.
"We have kids who come to college whose parents are recreational drug users," Sydnor said.
The task force also was told that rape often is not reported to police.
State police received nine reports of rape at 16 Virginia colleges and universities from 1985 to 1989. For the same period, the Charlottesville rape crisis center alone handled 54 cases, said Marty Mait of the state Department of Criminal Justice Services.
Two recent events at Virginia schools have focused attention on the problems of campus crime.
A College of William and Mary freshman has complained that she was raped by a fellow student who received minor punishment in an administrative hearing. She said she was told that prosecution in court likely would fail.
At UVa, three fraternity houses were seized and 12 people arrested on drug charges in a federal raid last month.
The task force will conduct its first public hearing at William and Mary on April 25 and another at UVa on June 7. Other hearings are planned at Roanoke College and George Mason University this fall.
by CNB