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The Rice Thresher
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by Mark Berenson Thresher staff Willy's Pub will be catching Saturday night fever next semester. A proposal to make the Pub an alcohol-free dance club on Saturday nights will happen as long as a source for the funding can be finalized. The club, to be named Digital Undergrounds, will operate from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. every Saturday, except during midterm recess. It will play mostly dance music, and students will DJ. Some snacks, water and mocktails (cocktails without alcohol) will be available for free, and normal Pub food can be purchased with Tetra points. In order to encourage students to go next semester, the cover charge for Rice students will be waived; the cover for their guests will be $2. Members of the general public will not be admitted. The proposal for the club says in the future, the cover will be $2 for students and $5 for their guests. The Pub management will not run the club. Instead, the proposal calls for the formation of a student committee to run the club and a student manager to maintain it. The authors of the proposal are Hanszen College junior Taylor Cavanah and Baker College junior Sanford Holmes. Others who signed the proposal include Student Center Director Boyd Beckwith, Pub Manager and Hanszen senior Mike Hauenstein, KTRU Station Manager and Will Rice College senior Johnny So, and Health Education Director Kim Lopez. According to the proposal, the club is also supported by Community Involvement Center, the Fresh Rice Breakers, Rice Social Dance Society and the Student Association. According to Holmes, an SA senator, a dance club has been proposed before, including a "supa fly" dance club proposed and defeated last fall in a referendum. Holmes said he and Cavanah came up with the idea separately, but found each other with the help of Vice President for Student Affairs Zenaido Camacho. In order to make the Pub into a dance club, about $8,500 worth of lighting, sound equipment and music is needed, the proposal says. Camacho is working to help find funding. "I have a pretty good track record [at locating funds]," Camacho said. "I'm optimistic." Holmes said he and Cavanah planned to get funding from Camacho from the beginning, but they also unsuccessfully applied for funding from the Dr. Bill Wilson Student Initiative Grant. Operating cost for the Digital Undergrounds is estimated at about $5,000 per semester. Holmes said they are looking to the Student Organizations Fund, the President's Programming Fund and the Envision Grant program for this money. Once the club starts charging cover in fall 2001, Holmes said, the operational costs will be met. Hauenstein said he wants to increase the number of students who go to the Pub. "We [could] get more traffic going through the space more often," he said. "We're hoping to get new food business on Saturday night." Hauenstein said the Pub will also benefit from the new stereo equipment. Currently, the Pub can be rented on Saturdays, but Hauenstein said it happens very infrequently, so the dance club will not cause a financial loss. Although no alcohol will be served, intoxicated students will be allowed in unless they are disruptive. "We want to keep the atmosphere for the people that are there to dance," Holmes said. "We expect people who are intoxicated to come, enjoy food and therefore not be as intoxicated." Camacho agreed. "Measuring intoxication is an impossible gray zone," he said. "What makes better sense to me is to create an environment where people can have a great time without having alcohol." Some students said they think a dance club at Rice will improve traffic in the Student Center. "I think that it is a good idea. The Pub is a great place, but it is dead too often," Wiess junior Jeff Geisinger, who is also a Student Center building manager, said. Other students didn't understand why the club will be alcohol-free. "I question the wisdom of not serving alcohol," Lovett College senior Nathan Zumwalt said. "To make dance things work you need lots of people, and people who like to dance are often those who like to drink. Alcohol is part of the whole dancing and clubbing thing." Holmes said the Pub can hold 300 people, and he hopes the Digital Undergrounds will regularly be that crowded.
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