University Times

Pitt, campus police agreement may be close Pitt's assistant police chief and the head of the collective bargaining organization that represents some 67 campus police personnel said this week that they may be close to agreeing on a contract to replace the one that expired nearly 15 months ago.

"I think we're getting close," said Assistant Chief Gary Moses.

"I don't want to make any firm predictions, but we're hopeful that we're going to get this thing resolved in the next couple of weeks," said Albert Fink, president of the University of Pittsburgh Police Association.

The 53 campus police officers, 11 guards and three dispatchers who comprise the UPPA have been working on month-to-month contract extensions since their last contract expired at the end of June 1994.

Moses said differences over "economic issues" have caused the negotiations to drag on, but declined to comment further. Fink called the negotiations "slow and painstaking" and added, "I don't want to jeopardize anything that's going on in the negotiations by commenting on them at this point." Choose a marathon as if your life depended on it The City of Pittsburgh Marathon will have a new title sponsor next year: the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.

UPMC, which has been involved with the marathon each year since its inception in 1985 and most recently led the team of 1,000 medical volunteers for the race, will be the title sponsor for what will be called the 1996 UPMC/City of Pittsburgh Marathon and 10K on May 5.

Pitt's medical center is committed only to sponsoring next year's race. "We're hoping it will become an ongoing agreement, but all parties have agreed to re-evaluate the situation after the first year," said UPMC spokesperson Jane Duffield.

Duffield said UPMC administrators have not determined yet how much the medical center will spend on the event. "A lot of the services we will be providing will be in-house services such as marketing," she said.

The Giant Eagle supermarket chain announced in June that it would be pulling out as the marathon's title sponsor, citing budgetary and other concerns. Giant Eagle provided about half of the race's $600,000 budget.

Following Giant Eagle's announcement, city officials said they would restructure the marathon and its board. The full membership of the new board won't be announced until mid-October, along with plans for expanded community involvement in the race. But on Sept. 22, the city announced some board members and a new administrative structure for the marathon.

Under the new structure, Freddie Fu, director of UPMC's Center for Sports Medicine, will remain as chairperson of the board. UPMC Executive Medical Director Larry Grollman will be marketing director. Regarding UPMC's increased role, medical center president Jeffrey Romoff said: "The marathon is an important civic event which draws national attention to our city and attracts world-class athletes from across the globe. We at the UPMC are quite pleased to assume an expanded role in the marathon." Youth to be tried as adult A 15-year-old East Allegheny youth accused in the shooting in July of Pitt engineering student Kevin Cecil will be tried as an adult.

Common Pleas Judge Max Baer ruled Sept. 18 that there was enough evidence presented against Bruce Cabbagestalk to hold him on charges for the shooting, which left Cecil a quadriplegic. Baer said that Cabbagestalk's "callousness and complete disregard for all human values [makes him] not amenable to rehabilitation." The district attorney's office withdrew charges against two other suspects after police said there was insufficient evidence to prosecute them. n UP