Just a quick note for those of you who were concerned over the distruction of one of the few geek hangouts. I think it is awesome that the community was able to be so responsive, and it just goes to show how community involvement can change a blind administration's ways.
----- Forwarded message from KeithJohnson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> ----- Date: Sun, 12 Jan 2003 22:53:00 -0800 Subject: Thanks, and a look ahead From: KeithJohnson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.551) X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by pinon.cs.unr.edu id h0D6rTr29285 First: please forgive me for being a bit late with this, but as you can imagine, things have been a little chaotic the past couple of days! You�ve probably already heard the news, but the university administration has decided not to close down Fleischmann Planetarium in June. President John Lilley announced last Friday that a task force had been appointed to revise the plans they had formulated for the mid-campus so as to allow us to remain open for the near future. You can find details at http://www.unr.edu/content/news.asp?sto_id=415. I suspect one of the factors that suggested the need for a new look at the situation was the outpouring of opinions from folks like you directed to the administration, the Regents, and other officials. I and the rest of the planetarium staff are grateful to all of you for your support. We suspected a majority of the community felt that a way should be found to let the planetarium remain open, but even we were unprepared for the level of support we received. We realize we are blessed with many friends, and we thank you all for your help. But even this is only a temporary reprieve. Dr. Lilley specifically referred to the expectation that the planetarium was expected to be transferred into a new, large community science center in the middle future. The planetarium staff has been hoping that that could happen, and will work enthusiastically to make it so. That project has actually been underway for some time, and preliminary studies have been carried out; but now we need and expect to develop a full head of steam. Such a project can only succeed with the cooperation of all the entitities involved, including both major cities, the university, the county, and the state, not to mention numerous community groups, commercial enterprises, school districts, and local citizens. We view the decision of the university administration as a sign that the time has come to move forward vigorously together. We thank President Lilley for allowing this to happen, and we look forward to working with him and all the other people who are already involved, or will soon become so, to make the �Great Basin Exploration Center� a reality. In the meantime, we will be working hard to keep the planetarium at the highest possible level of educational excellence in its current incarnation. Thanks again, and keep wishing us luck! --Keith Johnson Associate Director, Fleischmann Planetarium ----- End forwarded message ----- -- | Mark C. Ballew | Graduate Student, University of Nevada, Reno | Homepage: http://sublinear.net | RAWUG President: http://rawug.org | UNR GS-ACM Treasurer: http://www.cs.unr.edu/~gsacm _______________________________________________ RLUG mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.rlug.org/mailman/listinfo/rlug
