:Qfle
White: Cuts in research funds
for agriculture to be avoided
Page 5
Lady Ags drop from tourney
with 7-point loss to Houston
— Page 10
N
The Battalion
1)1.83 No. 112 USPS 075360 14 pages
College Station, Texas
Thursday, March 6, 1986
egents approve 7 percent cut in budget
By MONA L. PALMER
'ceofoFl and
SONDRA PICKARD
. . J I Staff Writers
JIQ In accordance with Gov. Mark
■Kite’s ordered spending reduc-
easeofc pns, the Texas A&:M Board of Re-
Jnts approved Wednesday a 7 per-
ncy hadcut in the University’s budget
i-month .ftich will result in sa\ ings of S37
l that "ur'jniillion.
et to therojAlthough White’s order directed
have an ft-Mte agencies to cut spending by 13
f violenctl rcent ' "hich would have resulted
■ a $67 million savings. A&M offi-
olice saidl's h ave sa *d the governor’s goals
police statfan't be realized.
e injured ^iBut White, on campus Wednes-
drican rmdav for other business, said he was
erewounikBpsed with the imagination and
creativity found in A&M’s budget
proposals.
“I wouldn’t say the cuts are accep
table/’ White said.
Under the Texas Constitution,
White lacks the power to order such
spending cuts.
A&M Chancellor Arthur G. Han
sen said, “I think the governor’s ap
proach to this has been very strong
and very positive.”
At the meeting, Hansen outlined
specific cost-saving measures, in
cluding an immediate hiring freeze.
The freeze will save the University
SI2.4 million, but no forced layoffs
will result and critical positions will
be filled with the chancellor’s appro
val.
Also, a substantial cut in utility
spending will save $11.8 million.
Regent Joe Richardson said the
University saved $4 million in utili
ties in 1984, and questioned how the
University could cut even more.
^A&r^BudgetjCuJ^
Measures
Implemented
Early Sale of Forest
Timber
Capital Improvements
Program Changes
Utilities
Travel
Maintenance
Capital Equipment
Hiring Freere
| ( S 0.5)
(5 2.6)
(J 2.7)
■ (J 3 3)
($1.6)
($2.1)
($ I 18)
($ 12.4)
10 12 14
Millions
(Total: $37.0)
He was told that the previous $4
million savings will reduce the total
cut to $7.8 million.
The reductions will also save:
• $3.3 million by eliminating
travel except in approved cases.
• $2.7 million by consolidating
programs.
• $2.6 million by reducing capital
investments such as construction, re
pairs, renovations and equipment.
• $2.1 million by reducing capital
equipment expenditures.
• $1.6 million in maintenance
and other expenses.
• $0.5 million from the early sale
of forest timber.
Hansen said the budget reduc
tions are dynamic and need to be
monitored.
“We will watch this with great
care,” he said. “We are setting up a
system to moniter the savings that
we are achieving month by month,
and we will report back to the board
on these savings.
“More than that, I hope that we
can bring forth the point of view to
the System that we are not going to
lose the quality edge and the mo
mentum that we have.
“We can keep our research pro
grams strong, we can maintain a
good faculty, and hopefully this is in
line with what the governor has
said.”
In other cutbacks, A&M and Tar-
leton State University will revise
their summer school programs, but
Dr. Gordon Eaton, provost for aca
demic affairs, said the revisions
won’t affect the 1986-87
summer
sessions.
“If you dropped all of summer
school and cut it in half you’d be sav
ing faculty salary money,” Eaton
said, “but you’d be losing tuition in
come and dormitory fees — it’s not
the great bargain some people might
thinx it is.
“We’re going to weigh the issue
very carefully on a college-by-college
basis.”
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Fire in state
uilding
el ieved
ccidental
Vt
Associated Press
JAUSTIN — Authorities searching
for the cause of a four-alarm fire
that damaged the attorney general’s
offices in the Texas Supreme Court
■ilding Wednesday downplayed
eirlier reports of possible arson.
Pat McNicoIas, Austin Fire De-
lartment chief investigator, said a
■icrowave oven and extension cord
Mom it were being “studied as acci
dental sources” of the fourth-floor
fire that injured no one.
B He said there was “nothing to in-
dlcate” arson.
■ Earlier, an assistant fire chief said
the fire “looks suspicious.” State Fire
Marshall Ernest Emerson said, “We
are of the opinion that it’s undeter
mined and under investigation.”
B The seven-story building was
empty when the fire broke out
shortly after 6 a.m.
■ Some 80 firefighters fought the
[blaze before bringing it under con
trol at 6:57 a.m., said Fire Capt.
Mike Van Blaricom.
State workers weren’t allowed
[back into the building because of po-
Kruially dangerous fumes caused by
See Cause, page 14
Soup’s On
Photo by GREG BAILEY
Hundreds attended the International Food Fair in the Memorial
Student Center Wednesday night. Participants were able to sam
ple foods from 30 countries.
Two House panels vote
against aiding Contras
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Two House
panels, ignoring President Reagan’s
argument that the United States
must be spared sending “our own
American boys” to Nicaragua, voted
Wednesday to recommend against
giving $ 100 million to rebels fighting
the Sandinista government.
The House Intelligence Commit
tee voted 9-7 against the aid pack
age. A short time later, the House
Foreign Affairs subcommittee on
the Western Hemisphere voted 8-5
against the proposal.
The two sets of votes in the Demo-
cratic-controlled panels marked the
opening salvo in legislative battles
over Reagan’s proposal. The votes
came shortly after Reagan said that
lawmakers faced “a historic deci-
Nine of the intelligence commit
tee’s 10 Democrats voted against the
, proposal, with only Rep. Dan Daniel
of Virginia joining with the Republi
cans. Despite the committee’s oppo
sition, the request for $70 million in
military aid and $30 million in logis
tical aid must still go to the House.
Reagan earlier told a White
House audience that “if we give
them the aid they need, the Nicara
guans can win this battle for free
dom on their own. American troops
have not been asked for and are not
needed.”
“If the members of Con
gress hide their heads in
the sand and pretend the
Nicaraguan threat will go
away, they are courting di
saster and history will
hold them accountable. ”
— President Reagan to a
White House audience.
“We must make sure they (U.S.
troops) never are needed,” Reagan
told members of a Jewish organiza
tion. “We send money and material
now, so we will never have to send
our own American boys.”
“But if the members of Congress
hide their heads in the sand and pre
tend the Nicaraguan threat will go
away, they are courting disaster and
history will hold them accountable,”
he said. “Nothing less than the secu
rity of the United States is at stake.”
Earlier, Defense Secretary Caspar
Weinberger argued that the leftist
Nicaraguan government was becom
ing a “second Cuba on the American
mainland (meaning) the Warsaw
Pact will have effectively outflanked
us.”
Rep. Bob Livingston, R-La., an in
telligence committee member, said
Wednesday’s vote indicated that
Reagan’s proposal faces major obsta
cles in the Democratic-dominated
House.
“It is painfully apparent that the
Democratic Party policy is to do
whatever is necessary to obstruct the
president’s policy in Nicaragua,”
Livingston said.
House Speaker Thomas P. O’Neill
Jr., D-Mass., told his daily news con
ference that military aid won’t really
help the outnumbered “rag-tag”
Contras and said he feared approval
of the request would lead to direct
U.S. involvement.
O’Neill said he has heard esti
mates that because it took 7,000
troops to overthrow the government
of Grenada, it would take from
100,000 to 150,000 to defeat Nicara
gua’s government.
“I can see what’s happening,” he
said. “Eventually, some American
will be wounded and you’ll find us in
the fray. I think it’s a wrong Ameri
can policy. You ought to be able to
go the diplomatic route. I haven’t
met a world leader who agrees with
American policy.”
Rep. Richard Gephardt, D-Mo.,
chairman of the House Democratic
Caucus, flatly predicted that Rea
gan’s $100 million request would be
defeated on the House floor, al
though leaving open the possibility
of an eventual compromise.
ew home sales up in January
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Sales of new
lomes climbed 4.4 percent in Jan
uary to their highest level in two
jiears as the housing industry en-
Ijoyed a boom spurred by falling
mortgage interest rates, the govern
ment reported Wednesday.
The Commerce Department said
Jew single-family homes were sold
at a seasonally adjusted annual rate
of 753,000 units in January, the best
Bionthlv showing since December
1983.
I The January sales pace )vas 20
percent higher than a year ago and
las just one of a number of signals
pointing to a sharp revival in hous-
jmg activity.
Construction of new homes has
mped by 26 percent since Novem-
tij
st-
lours:
I Starts hit an annual rate of 2.09
’million units in January while sales
If existing single-family homes rose
jto3.3 million units, their highest lev-
fls in seven years.
I The surge in activity has come
from sizable declines in mortgage in-
Brest rates in recent months.
I Lenders in some parts of the
lountry are offering mortgages be-
Jov 10 percent, something that
Hasn't happened since October
1978.
Richard Peach of the National As-
bciation of Realtors, said, “It is clear
bt the housing markets are open
ing up to many buyers who have
Rates for refinancing
home mortgages fall
Associated Press
NEW YORK — As interest
rates for some home mortgages
fall to single-digit levels for the
first time in 7'/a years, homeown
ers are flocking to cut their pay
ments by refinancing mortgages
at the lower rates.
Some lenders report a tripling
of inquiries and requests for refi
nancing, as well as a surge in
home buying, all sparked by the
sharp fall in interest rates on tra
ditional fixed-rate mortgages.
“We’ve had craziness here like
everyone else,” said Charlie Fer
raro, an assistant vice president
for mortgage marketing at Bank
of New England in Boston, which
is offering 30-year and 15-year
fixed rate mortgages at below 10
percent.
“People never thought rates
would get down to single digits
again,” Ferraro said. “All the re
cent publicity has sparked a tre
mendous increase on the refi
nancing side.”
Although individual cases vary
because of differing fees charged
by lenders for loans, the savings
See Homeowners, page 14
been waiting for years for interest
rates to fall to affordable levels.
“Declining mortgage rates have
helped make this the best time to
buy a home since 1978.”
The association’s monthly index
of housing affordability is above 100
for the first time in seven years,
meaning that a typical family earn
ing $27,873 annual had enough in
come to qualify for a mortgage on a
median-priced home.
The improved affordability pic
ture has been credited to the drop in
interest rates.
Michael Sumichrast, chief econo
mist for the National Association of
Home Builders, said the decline, in
rates means that 3 million more po
tential buyers can qualify for mort
gages.
Sumichrast said his surveys found
developers’ expectations for future
sales were at their highest levels in
four years.
Many economists forecast that
mortgage rates will fall even further
in coming months.
The Federal Home Loan Bank
Board said Wednesday that effective
interest rates for fixed-rate mort
gages dropped to 11.34 percent in
early February from 11.45 percent
in January and 13.48 percent a year
ago.
A weekly survey done by the Fed
eral Home Loan Mortgage Corp.
put fixed-rate mortgages at 10.51
percent last week, the lowest they
have been since April 1979. This
survey, unlike the Dank board re
port, does not include any fees, or
“points,” that lenders tack on to the
quoted mortgage rate.
Kenneth Rankin, an economist
with Wharton Econometrics, said
conventional mortgage rates are
likely to fall to around 9.75 percent
by the end of this year, helping to
boost sales even further.
Even with the sales gain, prices ac
tually fell last month.
The average price of a home
dropped 3.7 percent to $103,000
when compared with December.
This was still 4.8 percent higher than
a year earlier.
The median price of a new home
dipped by 0.3 percent to $88,900, a
level that was 7.8 percent higher
than a year ago.
Reagan to request
funds to replace
shuttle, sources say
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The Rea
gan administration is expected to
ask Congress for billions of dol
lars to replace Challenger and for
rockets to launch some of the
dozens of satellites stranded on
Earth because of the space shut
tle’s explosion, official sources
said Wednesday.
The amount could be as much
as $4 billion, congressional
sources said, but an official in the
administration said the exact
amount was still being debated.
Various combinations involving
shuttle flights and a return to ex
pendable rockets are under con
sideration to get the space pro
gram back on track.
An interagency task force is ex
pected to present its recommen
dations to President Reagan
within days. Some members of
Congress are pushing the admin
istration to move quickly, the
sources said.
The explosion on Jan. 28,
which claimed the life of Chal
lenger’s crew of seven, grounded
the shuttle fleet. NASA officials
are saying it could be more than a
year before the orbiters can fly
again, the time depending on the
extent of remedies needed.
The funding request being
prepared calls for building a new
orbiter at a cost of $2.2 billion to
replace Challenger and $600 mil
lion for the Tracking and Data
Relay satellite that was lost in the
explosion as well as the shuttle’s
Canadian-built crane.
Some said the administration
request would include a call for
10 Titan 34D7 rockets, in addi
tion to the 10 Congress already
has approved for the Air Force at
a cost of $ 168 million each.
Any multi-billion request
would undoubtedly encounter
opposition from some members
of Congress at a time when the
Gramm-Rudman bill is forcing
cuts in hundreds of domestic and
military programs.
With dozens of commercial
and government satellites waiting
to be launched, NASA is thinking
of returning to throwaway rock
ets and making room for com
mercial payloads on the few
launch vehicles still on hand.