a
Battauon
Jl. 72 No. 91
n^e Pages
Wednesday, February 7, 1979
College Station, Texas
News Dept. 845-2611
Business Dept. 845-2611
Travelers unite
“My daddy,” she said, drip
ping, “always said that if it’s rain
ing anywhere in Texas, it’s rain
ing in College Station.” In addi
tion to rain. Aggies must suffer
bad roads and a worse parking
situation. See page 2.
LL
College Station firemen Tuesday hosed grain and
fuel off of University Drive, top, that was spilled
when a truck exiting from the East Bypass about 8:30
a.m. lost its brakes and flipped. The truck, owned by
Wendland Farm Products Inc., was carrying 24 tons
of feed from Temple to Wellborn and Navasota.
Driver Otis Record, bottom, was unhurt. Another
truck was dispatched from Temple to take on the
cargo so that wreckers could right the damaged rig.
Battalion photos by Scott Pendleton
Ambulance service won’t
enew contract with Bryan
By SCOTT PENDLETON
Battalion Staff
Mid-Tex Ambulance Service will not
| tek to renew its permit with the City of
fyan. BillThornal, the owner of Mid-Tex,
formed city officials and Mid-Tex em-
oyees — hut not the public — of his
tendons at the end of January. Mid-Tex’s
esent permit expires March 31.
|The expense for the local emergency
transfer service has been great for the
year and there doesn’t seem that there
be any let up, ” Thomal told employees
| letter posted on the wall of the ambu-
ttce office.
A Mid-Tex employee, Doris Williams,
W The Battalion that Thornal had become
scouraged by the cost of carrying indi-
ts and the city’s attitude toward his
blems.
The city really doesn’t want to help
Williams said Tuesday. “They’re al-
's picking on him.
0
:R
But Williams conceded that “I’m very
partial to him.”
Though Mid-Tex will cease its
emergency service in Bryan, it won’t cease
all ambulance activities.
“Race contracts are still in the making for
the year of 1979 so we will still have some
ambulance service,” the letter said.
“It is undecided at this time about out-
of-town (long distance) transfers but possi
bly we will make them for the City of
Bryan, ” the letter said. A transfer is move
ment of a patient from one hospital to
another by ambulance under non
emergency conditions. Mid-Tex has been
handling all the transfer calls in the county.
Thornal said Mid-Tex may stop
emergency service before March 31.
Under the Bryan ambulance ordinance,
the ambulance service couldn’t operate in
the city beyond that date.
Bryan firefighters are not sure whether
*
Clayton proposes
primaries in April
United Press International
AUSTIN — Texas could save about one-third on the cost of staging a presidential
primary in 1980 by holding the primary in April on the same date as city and school
board elections. Speaker Bill Clayton said Tuesday.
Clayton initially had joined Lt. Gov. Bill Hobby in favoring legislation separating
the presidential primary from the state primary elections, and scheduling the
primary in March and the state primaries in July and August.
But Gov. Bill Clements said last week he will veto any bill that changes the date of
the state primaries from May and June to later in the summer.
“If we re going to have a presidential primary and if were going to move the dates
of the regular primary back and there is a threat of a veto, we probably ought to split
them and have two separate bills,” Clayton said.
He said the idea of having the presidential primary in April rather than March
came from former Lt. Gov. Ben Barnes, who Clayton said was in town on business.
The speaker also told reporters he sees little chance of achieving the $1 billion tax
reduction Clements is demanding this session. Clements said he would veto a
spending bill the size of the $20.8 billion budget drafted by the Legislative Budget
Board, which amounts to a 22 percent increase over current spending levels.
To achieve the $1 billion tax reduction, the LBB budget would have to be
trimmed by almost $900 million.
or not they will be expected to take up
emergency service. They say they have not
yet received any special training to prepare
for the task and that no such training pro
grams have been started.
New firefighters are trained to be
Emergency Care Attendants (EGAs) as
part of their usual training course, which
would qualify them to serve as ambulance
attendants under Texas law.
Ambulance service for the city is ex
pected to be discussed at the Bryan city
council meeting next Monday.
Thornal’s decision to cease providing
Bryan’s ambulance service is only the latest
development in a situation that has trou
bled Bryan and the county since October
1973. That month three local funeral
homes, which had provided the county’s
service, announced they would cease oper
ations Jan. 1, 1974.
County and city officials hired Ed Sherill
to provide county-wide ambulance service
because he was the only bidder among five
who didn’t ask for a subsidy in addition to
the fees collected from clients.
In 1977, Thornal, a former Bryan
policeman, applied for and received a
Bryan ambulance permit, which was
granted because of the numerous com
plaints about Sheriffs service.
When Sherill ceased operations. College
Station began operating two ambulances it
received from him. The operated ambu
lance service, which uses firemen as atten
dants, costs College Station $90,000 annu
ally, City Manager North Bardell esti
mated.
College Station has been very satisfied
with its ambulance service and would like
to continue to operate it as it is, Bardell
said.
Thornal has had difficulty making ends
meet in Bryan, culminating in charges last
summer by former employees that Mid-
Tex was not operating up to acceptable
standards. The employees conceded that
no private ambulance company could
provide adequate service in Bryan without
a subsidy from the city. The Bryan city
council last fall granted Thornal a $2,000 a
month subsidy as a temporary measure,
and began negotiations with College Sta
tion and Brazos County officials for a jointly
operated county-wide service.
Texas workers chief
wants 10% wage hike
United Press International
AUSTIN —The executive director of the
Texas Public Employees Association says
state pay raises the past two years have not
kept pace with inflation and is urging a 10.2
percent wage increase.
Director Jess Irwin, representing
160,000 state employees, Tuesday told the
House Appropriations Committee that
state workers need far more than the 5.1
percent annual pay raise legislative budget
writers have proposed for the next two
years. The employees association’s request
would cost taxpayers $450 million.
Irwin said state workers’ purchasing
power declined 6.1 percent during the past
two years despite salary increases totaling
6.8 percent.
“This present (fiscal) year, salaries were
raised by 9.25 percent, but we are already
above 9 percent inflation and the cost of
living is still spiraling,” Irwin said.
Pay improvements recommended by the
agency heads and state employees’ lobbyist
include $325 million for a 10.2 percent in
crease in spite of President Carter’s request
to hold raises to 7 percent, across-the-
board salary increase for government
workers, $8 million for career incentive pay
of up to $100 for longevity, $33 million for
merit raises, $35 million for better insur
ance benefits, $5.2 million for accrued sick
leave pay and $43 million for higher con
tributions to pension funds.
“The Legislative Budget Board recom
mendations do not meet the erosion of our
salaries by inflation,” Irwin said.
Administrators from the departments of
public safety, human resources, correc
tions, mental health and mental retarda
tion, parks and wildlife, highways, and the
Texas Employment Commission and State
Board of Control joined Irwin in urging
higher pay raises for state workers.
Officials of the Texas Education Agency
— in contrast — suggested a 6.8 percent a
year raise. TEA spokesmen said they scaled
down their request in response to Presi
dent Carter’s request for a 7 percent limit
on wage increases.
DPS Director Col. Wilson E. Speir said
administrators drew up their pay proposals
before Carter issued his inflation-fighting
request for limiting wage and price in
creases to a maximum of 7 percent.
“The federal employes have been getting
raises every two years. They get cost of
living increases. But all state employees get
is what the Legislature puts in the approp
riations bill every two years,” Speir said.
“To appropriate billions of dollars to
carry out services for the citizens of the
state and not provide salaries to create a
work force that is dedicated, experienced
and effective would result in an even bigger
waste of the state’s resources,” Irwin said.
Jerry Chapman, executive director of the
state’s welfare agency, said the Human Re
sources Department staff is “anxious”
about possible staff reductions in light of
cutbacks two years ago and Gov. Bill Cle
ments’ calls for elimination of 25,000 state
jobs.
Irwin cautioned lawmakers against
“hasty or ill-conceived approaches to attain
elimination of positions that are redundant,
overlapping or deadwood.”
Ticket scalpers on top
of Boston ‘massacre’
By PEGGY MCCULLEN
Battalion Reporter
If you think scalping ended with cowboys
and Indians, you’d better take a look
around campus for signs saying “Boston
concert tickets for sale.”
“The 6,000 tickets which went on sale at
8 a.m. (Monday, Jan. 22) were sold out by
3:30 that afternoon,” said Debbie Murray,
who’s been selling tickets at the MSC Box
Office for two years.
“People started standing in line at 2 p.m.
on Friday afternoon and stood in line all
weekend.
“By Monday morning, the line went all
the way up to the third floor of Rudder,”
she said.
The 600 reserved seat tickets sold for $8
and the general admission tickets number
ing 6,000 sold for $6.
Now the only way to get tickets is second
hand. And scalpers are making a killing.
“I sold two tickets last Tuesday for $20
apiece,” said one male student who prefers
to remain unidentified.
John R. McDonald, University Police
Chief, said it is not illegal to scalp buyers
until the legislature passes a law prohibit
ing it.
However, soliciting on campus without a
permit is illegal and persons caught in the
act could be in trouble, he said.
Joe Bierman, Commons Dining Facility
manager, ran an advertisement in last
Monday’s Battalion Classified seeking two
tickets for the concert. By 2 p.m. of the
same afternoon, he had received a call.
“The guy wanted $30 for a $6 tickets and
I told him what to do with it,” Bierman
said.
Warnings
on liquor
containers?
United Press International
AUSTIN — It might not do any good and
it’s not even the most important bill on the
subject, but an East Texas legislator wants
some sort of warning label on some liquor
containers.
Rep. Ben Z. Grant, D-Marshall, is spon
soring a bill that requires distilled spirits
sold in an original container to contain the
message: “Warning. The consumption of
alcoholic beverages may be hazardous to
your health. ”
The labeling law would not affect beer or
wine and would apply only to the original
container in which hard liquor is sold. The
distillers and bottlers would pay for such
labeling.
“I’m not trying to bring back Prohibi
tion,” Grant emphasized. “Rather than
prohibit, I think we should try to educate.”
Grant admitted it is impossible to
evaluate how effective warning labels are in
deterring possible abusers. The liquor
warning label has been compared to the
label printed on cigarette packages and ad
vertisements. Cigarette smoking has actu
ally increased since the warning label law
was enacted.
“I don’t think you can evaluate that sort
of thing,” said Grant, who smokes both a
pipe and cigarettes. “It’s hard to show what
affects someone’s decision to do or not do
something.”
The fifth-term representative has unsuc-
cesfully proposed similar legislation be
fore, and he was not confident about suc
cess this time.
A second caller told Bierman that he al
ready had a great offer to buy his tickets.
“I told him he’d better take that first offer
because I wasn’t interested,” he said.
One “scalpee” who paid $20 each for
second-row seats said, “Well, think of it
this way. I made a pretty good investment.
How many people see Boston from the sec
ond row?”
One group of students at the University
has found a very good way to make “mad”
money, one student reports.
By JAMES HAMILTON
Battalion Reporter
Brooks Herring was chosen as the
new Memorial Student Center
Council president in a closed execu
tive session of the MSC Council
Tuesday night.
The council deliberated for about
90 minutes before choosing Herring
over two other candidates, Teresa
Beshara and Rebecca Taulman.
Herring, a junior chemical engi
neering major from Victoria, will of
ficially take over as Texas A&M’s
30th MSC Council President in early
April. Herring succeeds Ray Dan
iels, who has served as president
for the past year.
“There’s a lot of good people to
work with up here,” Herring said,
“and I’m looking forward to a good
year. ”
Herring, who is currently the
chairman of the MSC Town Hall
Committee, is already planning
some changes for the MSC Council.
“We’ve got a challenge ahead of us
to educate everybody on just exactly
what the MSC Council does,” he
said. “I don’t know how many people
really understand about the various
committees and the activities that
they provide.”
In addition to public relations.
Herring said he hopes to make other
improvements as well.
“I’m not going to be a good presi-
By purchasing season tickets, any stu
dent has the option to buy concert tickets a
week before they go one sale to the general
public.
This particular group, said a student who
purchased tickets from them, controls a
large section of seats on the first through
fourth rows. They are selling the reserved
seat tickets to Boston for $20 each, he said,
which is $8 above the Town Hall price.
Boston will appear in College Station on
Sunday in G. Rollie White Coliseum.
dent if I don’t improve over this
year’s operation,” he said. “In any
operation, there’s room for im
provement, and I’m confident that
I’ve got a good base to work with.”
Daniels said that Herring’s pri
mary duty will be to motivate and
direct the officers and chairmen of
the MSC Council and Directorate.
“I put a great deal of time into the
job, and I imagine that Brooks will,”
Daniels said. “Most MSC Council
presidents do. They virtually live up
here.”
Herring’s job as president will in
clude attending staff meetings, mak
ing phone calls to set up appoint
ments and gather information, writ
ing council policy and sending it to
the committees.
“A lot of the job is sitting down anc
talking to people, finding out what’s
going on and getting their input,
Daniels said.
Herring and the two other candi
dates were interviewed Thursday by
an 11-member nominating commit
tee, which made its recommenda
tion to the MSC Council Tues* 4
night. The council took twic^
to decide on a candidate
did last year.
“The other ' ^
very well ' < £
“and that’s %
to pick one. x
Brooks Herring, left, newly elected MSC Council president, is congratu
lated by Ray Daniels, current president. Herring, now chairman of Town
Hall, will take office April 7 as the 30th MSC Council president.
Herring elected president
of 30th MSC Council