Image provided by: Texas A&M University
About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (March 31, 1977)
The Battalion Vol. 70 No. 8 Pages 98 Thursday, March 31, 1977 College Station, Texas News Dept. 845-2611 Business Dept. 845-2611 exas highway bill halted again; enator threatens to filibuster [AUSTIN — A $458 million highway Instruction bill which emerged from a mate committee after a six-week delay is llled again, this time by a senator’s leat to filibuster. ISen. A.R. Schwartz, D-Galveston, an- lly protested attempts to add $100 mil- j Inin emergency highway repair funds to I e bill during Senate debate yesterday, Id threatened to talk all night to prevent k fe adoption. jWehad a compromise worked on that I pught we struck in iron,” he said. “If nebody s going to cut a deal they’re ng to stick with it. You’ve seen the last |ie this Senate is going to be locked on ; kind of deal.” Senators listened to Schwartz for more than an hour, then voted to delay further action on the highway bill until Monday. The Senate canceled its session today to allow members to attend the funeral for the father of Sen. Don Adams, D-Jasper. The House met today to finally approve bills giving counties limited ordinance making power and abolishing the re quirement that voters sign ballot stubs. The break from House sessions yester day permitted the House Education Committee to complete work on a $694 million school finance bill, which puts its heaviest emphasis on property tax relief for local school districts. The bill freezes local property taxes next year and mandates a $73 million statewide reduction in the local taxes during fiscal 1979. The highway bill, approved in a more costly version by the House six weeks ago, had been stalled in Senate committee until Lt. Gov. William P. Hobby drafted a compromise providing the $428 million in the next two years rather than the $674 million House bill. When senators began debate on the proposal yesterday, Sen. Kent Hance, D-Lubbock, attempted to add $100 mil lion for emergency highway repairs. Hance said the extra funding is needed to satisfy Gov. Dolph Briscoe and the House. “This is still $300 million cheaper than House Bill 3,” Hance said. “You can look at it as a $300 million sav ing or a $600 million boondoggle,” Schwartz replied. “If highways are more important than teaching or hospitals, then let’s build highways and not treat sick people. If highways are more improtant than education, then let’s build highways and not teach children. Don’t build minds, build roads.” Hobby said the governor demanded the additional $100 million before he would agree to the compromise funding plan. Senators passed more than a dozen minor bills during yesterday’s day-long debate—the first time this year the Senate has had an afternoon session. 45 1, Inits to march to Brazos Corps to help charity program By BARBARA FRICKE n 1914 the Texas A&M Corps of Cadets de their last annual march to the Brazos <er. This year’s Corps staff pushed to ive the old tradition and at 8 a.m., urday Corps members will assemble on Corps quad and begin their 14-mile k to the Brazos and back. The traditional marches were made on ril 1, to prevent students from playing ril Fool’s Day pranks. Dr. Charles mltz, university archivist, said. )an Kaspar, Corps Adjutant and chair- nof the march committee, said that the main difference between this year’s march and the traditional ones is that today’s corps members are taking pledges for each mile of their journey for the March ol Dimes. Forms were distributed among the corps members and the cadets are taking pledges from individuals, Kaspar ex plained. Pledges will be accepted until Saturday. Then the corps members will be given two weeks to collect and turn in the money from the pledges and any other donations. Kaspar said since this is the first time the Corps is marching for the March of Dimes, no goal has been set. “But if every Corps member brings in from $3 to $10 that would be thousands of dollars,” Kaspar said. There will be about 1750 cadets par ticipating in the march. One Corps member has already taken pledges for $200, Kaspar said. He added that they are not expecting that from everyone. Even though the march is mandatory for all Corps members, except those in- Not Wolfman Jack but Smiling Jack it Dr. Jack K. Williams, President of Texas A&M University, played the first musical selection to air on KAMU-FM during the station’s initial broadcast yesterday. The Singing Cadets’ version of “I Believe in Music” was the first song to play on the educational radio’s assigned frequency of 90.3 megahertz. Dr. Williams cited the FM sta- Dr. Williams first DJ on 90.3 tion, which will operate from 6 a.m. until mid night daily, as another example of Texas A&M’s endeavor to extend its resources to all the people it serves. Jon Copeland (left), a student announcer for KAMU-FM and Program Director Rod Zent are in the background. Battalion photo by Kevin Venner Ai?M radio station goes on the air President Jack K. Williams manned the Mtrol board of KAMU-FM yesterday to irmally dedicate the station to its listen- ig audience and to play the first musical lectipn to air on the station’s initial oadcast day. The University’s new station, located in esame building as KAMU-TV, operates a frequency of 90.3 megahertz. This imber designates the postition in which > tune your FM dial. It is a non- g^^Bmmercial educational station affiliated National Public Radio which is the W^Hpiivalent of educational television’s Pub- Broadcasting Service. I KAMU’s musical format will consist of easy listening vocal and instrumental selections, classical, semiclassical and jazz. The station will also broadcast local and national news and features national educa tional programs such as “All Things Con sidered... ”, which won the George Foster Peabody Broadcasting Award in 1973 for its innovative use of investigative report ing. Radio plays, comedy programs and a Spanish music program, “Cantos Del Bar rio,” will aHo air each week. Prior to the first broadcast of KAMU- FM, KAMU-TV Station Manager Dr. Mel Chastain hosted a televised program in which he interviewed Dr. Williams and Don Simons, station manager for the FM radio and assistant director of KAMU-TV. Chastain said that President Williams initiated the idea for the radio station and Simons reviewed some of the activities performed during the past three years that were necessary for preparing the station for broadcasting. Although many helped to prepare the station, Chastain credited three KAMU employes for their efforts: Rod Zent, program director for TV and acting program director for FM; John Gray, chief engineer, and Wayne Pecena, broadcast engineer. volved in other university activities, tak ing pledges for the March of Dimes is not required, Kaspar said. Steps have been taken to increase incentive for participat ing. When the cadets reach their destina tion, the individual outfits will compete against one another in a tug-of-war, a three-legged race and a stretcher race (a relay in which a person is carried on a stretcher). Lunch will also be trucked out to the site from Duncan Dining Hall. The results of the contests at the Brazos, the amount of money per person turned in by outfits, and the number of individuals per outfit to turn in March of Dimes pledge sheets will be used to judge the outfits for awards. Awards will be given for the first, sec ond and third places. The winning outfits will be awarded streamers for their com pany guidons on Parent’s Day, April 17. Also the March of Dimes will present a “Battered Boot” trophy to the command ing officer of the outfit that turns in the most money per person. That’s hitting below the belt As part of the activities of Davis-Gary Week, the dorm con ducted a pillow fight yesterday evening. The pillows used were actually laundry bags with clothes in them. George Juneman, a sophomore agronomy major, tried to avoid the swing of junior sociology major. Bud Bryant. Battalion ohoto bv Betsv Kelley A&M’s new theater arts degree ‘foot in the door/ chairman says By PHYLISS CARVER The newly approved theater arts degree is definitely a big step for Texas A&M University, said Walt Meissner, who will be the first student to receive that degree at A&M. Meissner, who will graduate in August, is the president of the Aggie Players. He said he has been waiting for the degree approval for five years, hoping it would happen in time for him to graduate with a theater arts degree. Robert Wenck, chairman of the theater arts department, said he first submitted the proposal in 1968. The Board of Re gents approved the plan Nov. 25, 1975. The Coordinating Board, Texas College and University System, approved the de gree March 8, 1977. “I expect it to draw any number of stu- Thousands gather dents who didn’t come here because they couldn’t major in theater arts,” Wenck said. “It will also help us to retain those stu dents who transfer from A&M because they want to major in theater arts.” Terri Jones, junior business manage ment major, has been active with the Aggie Players. She has always wanted to go into theatrical management and will probably also get a degree in theater arts now, she said. “We have had a program in theater arts for many years,” Dr. John Calhoun, vice president for academic affairs, said. “All that is changed now is that his de gree reads theater arts instead of English,” he added. Meissner disagreed. “You could have all the greatest people in the world in the English department but the program won’t be rated very high without a degree in theater arts available,” he said. The long delay in degree approval for A&M was caused by a strong effort to hold it back, to keep A&M the old agriculture and mechanical college that it was, Meiss ner said. However, Calhoun said that the eight and one-half years wait was because the A&M administration does not do anything without considerable study and delibera tion . A&M also has a proposed degree in art pending before the coordinating board. “The theater arts degree is a foot in the door,” Wenck said. “All we need now are some degrees in music, dance,... ’ Prayers said for jets’ crash victims United Press International SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Spain — Four sprays of gladioluses and red- and-white roses were placed quietly in an 18th century chapel as thousands paid homage to the 577 people killed in the worst disaster in aviation history. Survivors, family members and curious Canary Islands residents crowded into the Laguna cathedral yesterday to remember the dead and pray for the injured Nvho walked away alive. Mary Kay Waters, of San Francisco, was there. Her mother died Sunday. Her father died yesterday. “It has not hit me yet,” she said. “But it will in a couple of weeks.” There are still confusion over why a KLM jetliner took off on a foggy runway Sunday, crashing into a crowded Pan American jumbo jet. Tape recorded fragments of purported radio messages between the airport con trol tower and the two Boeing 747s raised the possibility a misunderstood order may have prompted the KLM crew to begin its fatal take off. • The Spanish newspaper Diario pub lished yesterday this purported sequence of radio messages: KLM: KLM ready for takeoff. Control to KLM: Maintain holding posi tion. Control to Pan Am: Have you left the runway? City council drops some taxes, collection would not be feasible Last week, $3800 in delinquent per sonal property taxes were deleted from the College Station tax rolls. The City Council voted three to one, with one abstention, to remove the delin quent accounts from the tax rolls. Dietrich Bengs, tax assessor-collector, said the accounts include personal prop erty taxes on business inventories of businesses that are no longer in operation. Also included in the delinquent ac counts are personal property taxes as sessed on mobile homes belonging to people who no longer live in the area, Bengs said. He said it would be very difficult to track down the owners of the mobile homes. “Most of the people involved are former students. Once they finished school, they just seemed to disappear,” Bengs said. Most of the accounts involve such small amounts of money that it would be eco nomically unfeasible to try and collect them, Bengs said. He said some of the accoumts date back as far as 1969. Delinquent accounts totaling $22,000 still remain on the 1976 tax rolls, Bengs said. P Weather 1 Mostly cloudy and mild today with a 10 per cent chanc© of rain. Winds will be northeasterly at 12 m.p.h. gusting to 18 m.p.b. The high today will be in the mid-7Gs. Tomorrow wilt be cfoudy and mffd with a low in the upper 50s and a high In the upper 70s. Precipita tion probability wilt be 20 per cent. Winds will be east to northeasterly Pan Am: No. Control to Pan Am: Continue. Advise us when the runway is clear. The KLM then began its take off. Observers felt the Dutch crewmen cOuld have mistaken the last instruction to the Pan Am jetliner as an order to them to take off. It was not known which of the ground controller’s remarks to the two planes were prefaced by the planes’ flight numbers. Tower operators sometimes omit specific flight identifications in such radio exchanges. Tenerife’s Catholic bishop, Msgr. Franco Gascon, an Anglican clergyman, a pastor of the Dutch Reformed Church, a German Evangelical minister and a local Jewish leader offered prayers for the peace of the dead and the recovery of the wounded- A number of the injured are in critical condition in U.S. hospitals. Prayers drifted across the cathedral in Spanish, English, Dutch, German and Hebrew.