DSG releases tent policy proposal

The makeshift city of Krzyzewskiville is founded each year by a group of zealous pilgrims willing to weather days in the elements for a coveted Cameron berth. Although the goal remains constant, the constitution of this town is reconsidered and rewritten each and every year.

The draft tent policy released yesterday attempts to reinject some of the Cameron Craziness that is lost when campouts get too long and students grow weary of life in a sleeping bag.

In the most notable changes, there are only two designated campout games, each with a 10-day cap on standard tenting.

There would also be a pre-registration period, during which hardcore tenters can secure top positions by living in tents before the official registration date.

"The policy is motivated by the ability to make a fair system that gives every student equal opportunity to attend Duke basketball games," reads the policy, which will be formally introduced at Wednesday night's meeting of the Duke Student Government legislature. There will then be two weeks for feedback from legislators and interested students before a final vote.

"Students should use the next two weeks to give input into the policy," said DSG President Lisa Zeidner, a Trinity senior.

She encouraged students with comments to e-mail line-monitor@duke.edu.

The policy's designers said their central goal is balancing the desires of hardcore and moderate tenters.

"Some students really wanted this to be 'survival of the fittest,'" said Trinity senior Rob Cuthbertson, DSG's head line monitor. "Now, not that I necessarily agree with that, but my question was, 'How do we corral this survival-of-the-fittest enthusiasm into a campout?'"

Under the proposed policy, tenting students would only be given priority for the Feb. 26 game against St. John's University and the annual home grudge match against the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, scheduled for March 4.

Additional tenting games may be added if students express sufficient interest, Cuthbertson said.

For those not participating in pre-registration, the time and location for registering tents would be posted on the DSG web site 10 days before the game. Tenters would then hightail it to the designated spot, where 10-person tents would be registered on a first-come first-serve basis.

Personal and occupancy checks would occur much as they have in the past, and one-hour grace periods would follow each check.

Hardy souls intent on securing the best seats may begin tenting whenever they wish. There is a catch, however; during the pre-registration period, there must be one person in the tent between 7 a.m. and 8 p.m. and seven of the 10 members are required to sleep in the tent every night. "If people are truly hardcore and truly dedicated about their tenting, it should be doable," Cuthbertson said.

The stricter rules are designed to prevent the six-week campout of two years ago when, like this season, the home Carolina game wrapped up the ACC schedule.

"If you want to go out there early, you can, but you're going to be held to different requirements," said Trinity senior Jeremy Huff, DSG vice president for community interaction.

But it is not clear whether the restrictions are severe enough to dissuade dedicated students from camping out early. And, as in years past, if enough students get in line, others will be forced to queue up for fear of being forced out of the game.

Still, Huff said the policy should encourage moderation.

"If a student would come back [from winter break] when they were supposed to come back, when dorms open, then hopefully they will still have a chance to get in," he said.

The policy also avoids forcing campers to monitor themselves-in contrast to last year's unofficial tarping season, which preceded the 10-day tenting period. Under the new plan, DSG would assume line monitoring responsibilities as soon as 10 tents are in place.

In previous years, however, there has been difficulty when dozens of groups returned during winter break and no line monitor was in town.

Although Cuthbertson said he is still pondering that dilemma, he said a line monitor will probably come back early to keep and eye on the situation.

"This policy allows students to be out there if they want to be," Zeidner said, "but it also makes it challenging enough that students will really think about this before they go out there."

For each of the non-campout games, students can receive wristbands for admission on game day-although the bands will not be numbered and students will be seated based on line position at game time.

Cuthbertson said he has not yet figured out what he will do if students decide to tent for wristbands to a non-campout game.

He stressed that the policy is not set in stone, but wondered, "Is confiscating tents fair? Is not allowing tenting and tarping fair?"

The policy also seeks to avoid a repeat of the '98 Carolina game, when many students snuck in to Cameron.

"If at any point in the season, a person is caught sneaking into a basketball game or caught lending their DukeCard to another person, his/her rights to attend further games during the 1999-2000 season may be in jeopardy," the policy reads.

Cuthbertson said he hopes the new proposal will meet the expectations of all campers while providing fair, clear regulations.

"We're going to try and get a little bit of excitement back into the tenting process," he said.

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