Victoria Billingsvictoriabillings.md@gmail.com

Cal Poly’s journalism department lost a long-time advocate and sup-porter last week with the discovery of journalism professor George Ramos dead in his Morro Bay home. Ramos, 63, was both a professor of journalism and former student of Cal Poly’s journalism department, as well as a decorated reporter, with three decades of experience in the field and three Pulitzer Prizes to his name.

The Young Mustang

Ramos was something of a legend even before he graduated from Cal Poly, according to those who knew him in college.

Ramos had a big personality that left a mark on the journalism department, said Pete King, a Cal Poly journalism alumnus who later worked with Ramos at the Los An-geles Times.

“I started at Cal Poly right after George had left, but his legend was still bouncing around the halls and walls,” King said.

George made an impression working for the Mustang Daily as

sports editor and later as the first La-tino editor-in-chief.

Ramos was noticed for his com-mitment to his work even as a stu-dent, said former journalism profes-sor emeritus Jim Hayes, who started teaching at Cal Poly in Ramos’ final year at the school.

His work was not the only thing people remember about Ramos as a student. Ramos was also a character who was extremely sure of himself, Hayes said.

Hayes recalled one time, in Ra-mos’ final quarter at Cal Poly, when he found the student working away at a typewriter in the Mustang Dai-ly newsroom.

Hayes said he asked him what he was working on, and Ramos replied that it was his senior project.

“I said, ‘When are you going to finish it?’ and he said, ‘Tonight,’” Hayes said. “And he’d just started it. And he wrote that whole damn thing in six hours.”

Pacifist at War

After graduating from Cal Poly in 1969, Ramos didn’t go directly into the journalism field. The Vietnam War was in full swing, and he was

sent overseas as an artillery gunner, which is when Hayes said he lost touch with Ramos.

Ramos frequently told his own students decades later that although he hated war and was a pacifist, he joined the ROTC in college in order to avoid the draft long enough to fin-ish his degree.

In the Industry

Ramos made it back from Vietnam, and eventually ended up reporting at the Los Angeles Times in 1978, back in his hometown, the city he knew and loved.

Hayes reconnected with Ramos while he was working at the Los Angeles Times, when Hayes began coaching reporters and editors in the ‘80s. Ramos was exactly as loud and opinionated as he had always been, Hayes said.

“He was an aggressive, hard-working, take-no-crap-from-any-body, shoe-leather reporter, and he always had been,” Hayes said. “That persisted throughout his life.”

At this time, King also met Ra-mos for the first time, as they were both colleagues at the same paper.

Ramos began writing a column about life in Los Angeles, convinced that residents should be familiar with the intricacies of their city. King ed-ited the column, which he said was some of Ramos’ strongest writing.

“He was a stand-up-for-the-little-guy sort of columnist,” King said. “His best work was always done when he was talking about his life — the life of East Los Angeles.”

Ramos won his first Pulitzer Prize while writing about his own experi-ences growing up in East Los An-geles, in a series about the lives of Latinos in Southern California. In doing so, he became one of the first Latinos to win the Pulitzer.

Later he went on to win two more Pulitzers for reporting on the Rodney King riots and the North-ridge earthquake.

But Ramos never forgot Cal Poly, even while living in and writing about Los Angeles, King said. The

two Mustangs would often discuss Cal Poly and its athletics in the Los Angeles Times newsroom, King said.

Ramos stayed at the Los Angeles Times for more than two decades, from 1978 to 2003, working every position from reporter and colum-nist to editor and bureau chief. He served on the advisory board to Cal Poly’s journalism department near the end of his time at the Los Angeles Times, trying to stay in contact with his old university.

But he couldn’t stay away from his alma mater forever, and Ramos returned to Cal Poly in 2003 as the new department chair.

Homecoming

Ramos’ return to Cal Poly was one of hope for the journalism depart-ment, said Mustang Daily adviser Paul Bittick, who knew Ramos for nine years.

When Ramos was brought in as chair, the journalism department was divided by infighting, and there was hope that things would improve, Bit-tick said.

“With his hiring came a lot of optimism, especially from students,” Bittick said. “They were all excited about a new chair coming in, espe-cially from the industry. That might have been the biggest thing, excite-ment, which was what we needed at the time.”

As chair, just as he had been on the advisory board, Ramos was a fierce and fearless advocate for the journalism department.

A few years before his hiring, he

was asked to be commencement speaker at graduation. At the time, the journalism department was at risk of being eliminated, and Ramos used the opportunity to publicly “get into the president’s face” about why the journalism department should be saved, King said.

“That was George being George,” King said. “He wasn’t afraid to get up at commencement and call out the president.”

Ramos’ attitude wasn’t always met well by those he encountered. Ramos made more than his fair share of enemies at Cal Poly, Hayes said, including Cal Poly College of Liberal Arts Dean Linda Halisky, who eventually asked Ramos to step down from the position as journal-ism department chair.

“He was an unusual man, with-out a doubt a very different kind of a person, and not everybody took to him,” Hayes said. “There were some people, including Cal Poly admin-istrators, who looked at him with a jaded eye.”

Ramos’ rough demeanor was an asset to his teaching, however, as he pushed students to improve, said Tristan Aird, a former student of Ramos’ who now writes about high school sports for the Las Vegas Re-view Journal.

“He was very good at knowing how to challenge you to become a better reporter and a better writer,” Aird said.

Ramos coached Aird as a writer while the student held Ramos’ old po-

News

mustang dailyvolume LXXVI, number 6 Thursday, July 28, 2011 www.mustangdaily.net

Fair photos

feature fun.

Johnson Avenue makeover approved by city council.

Coupe looks to leave mark on new program.

IN ARTS, P. 4IN NEWS, P. 2 IN SPORTS, P. 8

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Mourning the loss of a journalism legacy

”“He was an aggressive, hard-working, take-no-crap-from-

anybody, shoe-leather reporter.

— Jim HayesFormer journalism professor emeritus

courtesy photoA college-aged Ramos is pictured above with President Ronald Regan. While at Cal Poly, Ramos was editor-in-chief and sports editor of the Mustang Daily.

Pulitzer Prize winning journalism professor, former reporter George Ramos dies at age 63

see Legacy, page 3

News

news 2 Thursday, July 28, 2011

Haley Petersenhaleypetersen.md@gmail.com

Seventeen residents came before the San Luis Obispo City Council to voice their support of a proposed change to Johnson Avenue, citing its high collision history as one of the reasons they deemed the road to be dangerous in its existing state. Four community members expressed their dissent, saying that gridlock traffic may result from the proposed plan. The road reconfiguration was ap-proved in a 5-0 vote. It was the second time this agenda item appeared before the council. A vote was sent to residents living between San Luis Drive and Marsh Street and to the north and south of Johnson Avenue in 2010, which asked if they supported or opposed the pro-

posed road reconfiguration plan. Seventy-two percent of the votes were in favor of the proposal, but after criticism from community members, the council decided to take a second look at the issue. Some residents wor-ried that the new plan, which includes a lane reduction, would cause gridlock traffic. Former mayor Dave Romero was among the dissenters. Currently, there are two lanes of traf-fic through the underpass from John-son toward downtown. The left lane turns into a mandatory left-turn lane at Pismo Street, and is what officials call a “lane trap.” The alterations will reduce the number of lanes on John-son, relocate a left-turn lane, add a left-turn lane and improve bike lanes. The new plan will also decrease the number of lanes through the under-pass to one lane and will move the

mandatory left-turn lane to San Luis Drive. A second left-turn lane will be added from San Luis Drive onto Johnson Avenue. The project includes construc-tion on bike lanes as well. A bike lane will be added to complete the westbound connection on Johnson Avenue and will improve the east-bound bike lane at Buchon Street said Jake Hudson, traffic opera-tions manager for the City of San Luis Obispo Public Works. Safety was the primary focus of public comment at the council meet-ing, bicyclists’ safety in particular.

“I routinely ride my bike to Sco-lari’s and businesses along Johnson Avenue,” said Jim Woolf, a resident near Johnson Avenue. “In the three years I’ve been there, I’ve ridden easily away from downtown on Johnson Avenue dozens of times, and the reason is that there are bike lanes. But in this same amount of time, I think I can remember only once having ridden the opposite direction, and the reason is it just makes me nervous in those areas. There’s two big curves. Cars are moving quickly. It’s steep, and it’s hard to be seen.”

The Pismo-Buchon Streets area is the second-ranked collision lo-cation in the city with approxi-mately 90 accidents occurring in the area since 1999. The majority of crashes are caused by vehicles turning left from Buchon Street onto Johnson Avenue. Accidents occur frequently when drivers try to merge out of the mandatory left turn lane and into traffic.

Seventy-five percent of those collisions could be prevented by the lane reduction and the change of the left-turn lane location in the new road configuration plan, Hudson said.

In addition to solely vehicular ac-cidents, six percent of all collisions involved cyclists, Hudson said.

Barry Rands, a resident of the Meadow Park area, said he had concerns regarding the safety of his children who commute via bicycle.

“I have two high school sons who ride their bikes every day to school,” he said. “Some of the sto-ries that they tell me about some of the close calls that they’ve had over in that area on Johnson make me very nervous as a parent.”

Rands was not the only nervous parent present at the city council meeting. Many of the speakers commented on the danger that the traffic posed to families with young children who are living in the surrounding neighborhoods.

“This is a dangerous situation as it stands right now,” said Sarah Rit-ter, a local resident and mother. “It’s difficult to cross Pismo with small children. Parents really want to feel that the city is moving towards cre-ating a safer space for parents and children to move around in the city and to get to school, and this is an opportunity to make that happen.”

Fellow resident David Kirken-dall agreed.

Haley Petersenhaleypetersen.md@gmail.com

Students donated a record amount of food items to the AIDS Support Network and the San Luis Obispo Hep C Project this year. The food drive was conducted through Cal Poly’s residence halls during the spring quarter. Stu-dents donated 8,591 food items, double the amount raised last year. The food, estimated to be worth a total of $12,600, will make rough-ly 10,933 meals.

Kara Kurcio, learning commu-nity coordinator for the residence halls, said the coordinators of stu-dent development made a con-certed effort to increase the lines of communication to students through emails, weekly newsletters and posters. She said the drop-off locations for the food were also in more convenient areas near the ex-its of the buildings.

“This year, I would say that the biggest difference for the spring quarter was that we worked really hard to make sure that our students understood where the food was go-ing,” Kurcio said. “We also extend-ed our collection by a few days.”

The food goes to AIDS Sup-port Network (ASN)’s food pantry, which serves clients who are infect-ed with HIV, Hepatitis C or both. Karla Quiroga, volunteer coordina-tor for ASN and the SLO Hep C Project, said it can be difficult for people living with either disease to be able to adequately provide for their needs.

“They are living on limited in-comes,” she said. “Some of them are on disability, and some of them are just not able to work as much as they would like, maybe due to HIV or Hep C.”

She also said it can be difficult to afford food due to medical ex-penses. The food pantry serves as a vital resource for this population.

“The food pantry is basically open every day that we are open, and our clients can come in and use it as often as they need to,” Quiroga said. “And it’s just for people who are our clients, so that means they are living with Hepati-tis or HIV or both.”

The organization supports an es-timated 150 people who are living with AIDS and another 375 to 400 people with Hepatitis C. A client’s eligibility for the program is not con-tingent upon his or her income.

“Just basically they have to show proof of virus, and that’s how they get enrolled as a client,” Quiroga said. “If they show proof, and they’re making over a certain amount, we still take them.”

The food drive is an annual tradi-tion with Cal Poly and has occurred for more than three years. It is one of many ASN events that the Cal Poly faculty and students help support. Other events include the Walk for Life and World AIDS day.

The Walk for Life is organized through a partnership with Trinity Hall residence directors, who are in charge of promoting the event on campus. This year’s walk will take place on November 5.

Quiroga said Cal Poly is the group that consistently raised the most money for the agency at the walk. This year will mark the 20th anniver-sary of the event.

World AIDS Day is December 1. Students are asked to wear red and are invited to take part in forming a human AIDS ribbon in the Univer-sity Union (UU) during UU hour.

“We really believe in all of the support that ASN gives to our com-munity, and we know that they are in need of as much support as we can give them,” Kurcio said. “It’s really great to continue that part-nership throughout the whole year where we can collaborate more than just a one-time thing. That’s really important to us.”

Quiroga said she hopes events like these will help draw attention to the agency and raise awareness about the diseases.

“First and foremost is just let-ting the community know that we’re here,” she said. “Especially when I interview potential volunteers from Cal Poly, they’re always surprised that we’re here, and even commu-nity members are always surprised that we’re here. And they may know somebody who is living with HIV or Hep C and is not connected with our agency.”

Students give record food donation to ASN

courtesy photoCal Poly students band together in the form of an AIDS ribbon to raise aware-ness of the AIDS Support Network. The students donated enough food to make approximately 10,933 meals.

SLO City Council approves changes to Johnson Avenue

nha ha mustang dailySome residents voiced concerns that the lane change might cause gridlock traffic.

see Johnson, page 3

News

news3www.mustangdaily.net

Lauren Scottlaurenscott.md@gmail.com

Prefumo Creek Commons, the new shopping center on Los Osos Val-ley Road, has become the “target” of local criticism, although it has only been open a week.

“I’m sure it will take away from downtown businesses,” San Luis Obispo resident Savannah Thrussell said. “But I still love Target.”

The new shopping center, owned by Madonna Enterprises, currently includes only two stores — Tar-get and the MacSuperstore. AT&T Wireless is said to open in October, Olive Garden will open early next year and Dick’s Sporting Goods will open in the spring, Madonna spokes-man Clint Pearce said.

The MacSuperstore will be the only locally-owned business in the shopping center.

The Prefumo Creek Commons, which has approximately 800 park-ing spots, cost approximately $32 million to develop, Pearce said.

Madonna Enterprises also owns Irish Hills Plaza, with retailers such as Old Navy, PetSmart, BevMo, New Frontiers, SLO Grind and Office Max across Los Osos Valley Road from the commons, he said.

“We’ve received a lot of positive feedback from the community about both Irish Hills Plaza and Prefumo Creek Commons,” he said.

Some members of the commu-nity, however, are not supportive of the shopping centers.

With the opening of large chain stores, some are concerned about the preservation of the downtown area.

Vangeli Evangelopoulos, a San Luis Obispo resident, said the cen-ters will have a negative affect on lo-cal business.

“I think it’s going to pose a chal-lenge for downtown businesses,” she said.

Evangelopoulos also said parking fees in the downtown area are pro-

jected to increase, but the parking at the Target complex is free.

“The city should reconsider the fee increase,” he said. “Target parking is free, and shopping there is more convenient, discouraging locals from shopping downtown.”

In addition to free parking, the Prefumo Creek Commons offers sev-eral parking features for customers.

“We have 19 spaces reserved for fuel-efficient vehicles,” Pearce said. “We have six or seven charging sta-tions for electric cars.”

Ernie Dalidio, owner of the now-developed farmland housing, said the commons struggled for the right to build a shopping center. After long negotiations with the city over the land’s future, county voters even-tually approved Dalidio’s right to develop his land through measure J, which became final in 2009.

Prior to Target’s opening last week, residents had to drive to Paso Robles or Santa Maria to shop at a Target.

The new 140,000-square-foot store is the largest commercial store allowable on the property under the restrictions of measure J.

The shopping center was restrict-ed to build in accommodation with several other guidelines, including a half-acre park at an edge of the proj-ect for allowing shoppers the oppor-tunity to enjoy the nearby Prefumo Creek, Pearce said.

“We have a lot of energy-efficient designs incorporated into the cen-ter,” he said.

Pearce said, for example, the Dick’s Sporting Goods will have so-lar panels installed on its roof, which will supply the power for the lights in the parking lot.

“We also have the most storm water-friendly project in the area,” Pearce said.

With the development of such a large shopping center, the city had to accommodate by constructing street entrances on Los Osos Valley Road.

“Everyone’s concerned about

traffic,” Pearce said. “We’ve done ev-erything we can to make that less of a problem.”

Some residents said they are be-yond excited for the products that Target carries and the convenience of in-town box store shopping.

“It’ll stop me from driving to Walmart to get all my stuff,” Chris-tine Johnson, a San Luis Obispo resi-dent, said. “I freaking love Target.”

The San Luis Obispo Chamber of Commerce projects the shop-ping center will bring $500,000 to $600,000 to the local economy, said chamber spokesperson Grace Allen.

Marilyn Shernak of San Luis Obispo said she is hopeful the shopping center will bring in money for the local economy.

“It will mean more jobs,” Shernak said. “It will be good for the econo-my.”

One resident said she wants to focus on spending her money su-porting local businesses.

“I’ve weened myself off Target since moving here,” said San Luis Obispo local Ruth Soderlund. “Now I’m going to have to try to patron local businesses and limit my Target buying to cat food.”

New shopping center is on ‘Target’

lauren scott mustang dailyTarget, which opened last week, is facing criticism from local residents wor-ried about the 140,000 foot store having a negative effect on local businesses.

“If you’re a parent of an active child in the neighborhood, it’s a dangerous situation,” he said. “If you’re one of the six people who have found a car in their front yard or their house, it’s more than a dan-gerous place to live.”

Amidst the 17 supporters of the plan, four people voiced criticisms about the new configuration.

Former mayor Dave Romero was one such resident who stated concerns about the project’s imple-mentation. He said “the changes proposed by staff are excessive and will create more harm than good” by causing gridlock during peak traffic hours. Romero said Johnson Avenue will become too congested if the two lanes are reduced to one.

His opinions were met with booing and grumbles of “Come on!” and “Time’s up!” from disap-proving audience members.

The council ultimately voted unanimously to approve the chang-es. All of the changes will be made only in paint, so that the reconfigu-ration can be undone if it stalls the flow of traffic, Hudson said.

Johnson Avenue was scheduled to be repaved and repainted prior to the vote. Hudson said the new project will have no fiscal impact because the cost of repainting and repaving the road will be the same regardless of the road’s configura-tion. Construction is projected to begin next month.

sition as Mustang Daily sports editor.“He would always advise me in

how to be tougher with asking ques-tions with coaches,” Aird said.

Ramos used to tell Aird that he should write editorials that would stir up controversy, like a piece on why the women’s basketball coach should be fired, said Kristen Marschall, who went to school with Aird and was editor-in-chief of the Mustang Daily.

“He gave him so much crap,” Marschall said.

Ramos also left Marschall with lessons about daily newspaper re-porting that she carries with her to this day, as a writer for the Palo Alto Daily News.

“Whenever we had made a mistake or something he (always said), ‘Tomorrow’s another day,’” Marschall said. “I still work at a daily newspaper, and I still have his voice in my head saying, ‘Tomor-row’s another day.’”

In addition to changing the lives of his students, Ramos also deeply af-

fected the lives of his friends, such as director of media realtions for Cal Poly athletics Brian Thurmond. Ramos, Thurmond and Thurmond’s wife liked to spend long dinners de-bating every topic they could think of, Thurmond said.

“The three of us would sit there and no one would take anything personally,” Thurmond said. “It was fun debate banter and he was a great person to do that with because he had such a wealth of knowledge.”

Both Ramos and Thurmond were known to play devil’s advocate and argue a position they were op-posed to from time to time just for the fun of arguing, Thurmond said.

Ramos was close with the Thur-mond family, and attended Thur-mond’s daughter’s first birthday several weeks ago. For Thurmond, the biggest tragedy is that Ramos died while Thurmond’s daughter was so young, he said.

“One of my biggest regrets about him passing is my daughter won’t know him,” Thurmond said. “We printed out his stories so that when she’s old enough she can under-stand, read and know what he did.”

Legacycontinued from page 1

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