UNIVERSITY FACES A DEADLINE FOR ACCESSIBILITY WORK

Southeast Missouri State University's inability to install elevators in three campus buildings will force the university to seek another deadline extension from the Office of Civil Rights.

The university two years ago was given a September 1991 deadline to comply with an OCR mandate that all university programs and activities be made accessible to the handicapped. This demand requires installation of elevators in the Grauel language arts, Social Science and art buildings.

The elevators will cost around $500,000 money that the university can't part with, according to Art Wallhausen, assistant to the president at Southeast.

"We have no alternative but to ask for another extension," said Wallhausen. "We don't have the funds for capital improvements of this dimension. We can't do it without impacting the instructional program."

The Missouri General Assembly twice has approved state funding for the projects, said Wallhausen, but the funding both times has been vetoed by Gov. John Ashcroft due to state budget limitations.

By originally appropriating money for the installation of the elevators, the General Assembly has indicated that funding for the projects is a state responsibility, Wallhausen said.

"The governor is willing but unable to grant the funding," he said.

This predicament leaves the university in a Catch-22 situation, Wallhausen said. The OCR's en~forcement powers could enable the agency to withhold from Southeast millions of federal dollars.

"The largest chunk of that would come from student aid," Wall~hausen said.

Southeast received more than $10 million in federal student financial aid last year, according to Gene Buck, director of financial aid services at Southeast, and that amount is expected to be higher this year. Approximately 53 percent of Southeast students will be affected if the university is denied federal student aid.

One conceivable way funding for the elevators could be procured, said Wallhausen, is through the passage of Proposition B, which would generate tax revenues earmarked for state education. If the proposition is passed in November, funds from the tax will begin to accrue in January of next year. Higher education will receive $60 million in fiscal year 1992 for capital needs.

"If that's the case," Wallhausen said, "we will ask the legislature to fund the project. But we don't know if Proposition B will pass or if the legislature will even fund it, although they've already indicated their willingness to do so.

"This is the only way I can see the state being able to grant us the funding."

Wallhausen said the university will request the OCR extension soon.

"We've asked for the money every way we can," he said. "We'll just have to lay that fact out to the Office of Civil Rights and see what their response will be."

Wallhausen and Dr. Ed Spicer, associate to the president and affirmative action officer at Southeast, were reluctant to speculate what the OCR's reaction might be.

"I'm sure they'll send an investigator down to see the progress we've made in this area," Spicer said. "We have evidence of our actions and efforts, so I hope the results will be favorable for us."

The OCR previously indicated that the university would be responsible for installing the elevators with or without funding from the state. However, he said, "certainly the U.S. government doesn't want to see an institution suffer that has made sincere efforts to have classrooms accessible to the impaired."

Southeast has so far attempted to accommodate the needs of the disabled by furnishing handicapped parking spaces and accessible drinking fountains and completing construction for easier accessibility in the library and residence halls.

"We're about 75 to 85 percent complete with the things we need to do," Spicer said. "We'll continue to intensify our efforts to provide accessibility."