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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (June 12, 1986)
Goswick: Physician problems led to Beutel care cutbacks — Page 3 Firemen burn off chemicals at site of train derailment — Page 4 NFL claims USFL financial problems league's own fault — Page 6 e said ■ "’herettp a ho\ nr'V TexasA&M « • The Battalion () l B- j aiih r :» Serving the University community College Station, Texas Jana- I 'T- . - Mui LI IIL lT'C7T984q Reagan to ask for Challenger replacement :l righ i feeltti ■ WASHINGTON (AP) — Presi dent Reagan Wednesday night blamed the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger on NASA’s com placency and “a carelessness that grew out of success,” and said he would propose construction of a re placement orbiter. I At his first nationally broadcast news conference in more than a month, Reagan said he has not yet decided how to pay for the new shut tle, which will cost an estimated $2.8 billion. He said he is studying the Ro gers commission report on the Jan. Arms cuts proposed he has' I et ting or H U.S. considers Soviet offer he piii •gE i homei Rf g D d eC iW ASHINGTON (AP) — The Soviet Union on Wednesday offered to l .S. negotiators a new proposal to curb long-range nuclear weapons, W ( and the offer is under serious con- | sideration, a knowledgeable adminis tration official said. d jJBgDetails were withheld under a con- | Jidentiality agreement between the V two sides. But the official, who in sisted on anonymity, said the propos al Was presented formally at the site of the talks in Geneva, om star'® Only two weeks ago, Soviet nego- I, imotlif tiator Victor Karpov informally sug- rokedow gested that his government would Butruth consider sharply reducing its arsenal lionedai of heavy land-based nuclear missiles if fthe United States promised to qblerve the 1972 anti-ballistic missile three-go treaty for at least 10 years. talyto' 11 ! Privately, U.S. officials took a finished 11 skeptical view but said they wanted to ppearane see more details. Reducing Soviet re went it missiles is the primary U.S. goal in the > Hwang- Geneva negotiations. But Reagan Altobelli administration officials have said 1 he desff they are wary of any overture that might impinge on the search for a ball. ' U.l. space-based missile defense, rone in h « The administration has been i it.” urging the Soviets to follow up public mind war statements by Gorbachev calling for It as on a inti-nuclear measures by putting is embarrajoncrete proposals before the nego tiators in Geneva. Reagan last month announced he vas perso vas prepared to disregard the SALT ning AuOJI treaty’s limits on long-range nuc- ,vas elim& ear weapons because of what he h Korea, daimed were widespread Soviet g boy and violations Q f the 1979 treaty’s limita- suchabi- ions on new missiles and testing in i' happet brmation. ppy 1 conn At the same time, however, he said narkinouJe would take into consideration i. Nobod' whether the Soviets changed their tgain. tegotiating stance at Geneva. j. Earlier Wednesday, a top-ranking ^^-UnrlnrUn arms control adviser r ACH old Congress that U.S compliance \yMwlVith the SALT II pact “is extremely QOld # am;i g in g” as l° n g as t l ie Soviet Un- y 1 pn does not adhere to all aspects of Dins.diadhe pact. Jewelry ft Reagan’s decision that, starting la- er this year, the United States would irg6 btO“ ot be bound by limits in the pact was Diamond' 16 best way to force the Soviets to , . , argain seriously, Paul H. Nitze said. jOIQ Gnti ]\tit ze) one 0 f' Reagan’s senior arms antrol advisers, defended Reagan’s :XASft Ia y 27 decision during an appear- ✓ />UAMf nce l }e f ore the House Armed Ser- \CHAlices arms control subcommittee. 4 UniversiV 846-8916 02-ATexas ; » iss from ElCIt-- 28 Challenger accident before decid ing whether to order the space agen cy to adopt its recommendations. In blaming the nation’s worst space disaster on complacency at the space agency, Reagan said he does not believe “that there was any deli berate criminal intent on the part of anyone.” Reagan also confirmed that earlier in the day the Soviet Union had offered to American negotiators in Geneva a new proposal to curb nuc lear weapons. But the president also said he could not discuss its details. He said his goal is a “fair and ba lanced” accord. He said Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev apparently is the first Soviet leader to voice interest in re ducing nuclear weapons. Reagan said he still is hoping to arrange a second summit this year with his Soviet coun terpart. Reagan defended his decision to conclude that the United States should no longer feel constrained to abide by the limits of the unratified SALT II arms control treaty with the Soviet Union. “The Soviet Union for seven years has been violating the restraints of the treaty,” Reagan said. The president said he hoped his decision could persuade the Soviets to get involved in negotiations to re duce nuclear arms, not simply res train their growth. The president opened his news conference with a prepared state ment in which he repeated his long standing vow to veto any tax bill that crosses his desk — a threat he said stands for the balance of his term. He also embraced the tax simplifi cation bill that is pending in the Sen ate, and called on the House to hold a quick “up or down” vote on his plan for $100 million to rebels battling the leftist regime in Nicaragua. Reagan noted as he discussed the space program that there was discus sion within his administration of whether to resort to unmanned throwaway rockets to lift a backlog of cargo into space. But he did not say whether he would approve a plan to build those as well as the new shuttle. The commission appointed by the president found that a faulty joint in the shuttle’s booster rocket caused the Jan. 28 Challenger accident that killed seven astronauts. It called for a redesign of thejoint, and also recom mended sweeping changes in NASA management practices. Earlier in the day, Reagan traveled to the National Air and Space Museum, where he told youngsters the nation “will do everything we planned to do before” the Challenger disaster. See related story, page 8 Over Easy Photo by Tom Ownbey A member of the College Station Junior Olympic track team gives his all to get over the high bar at Wednesday’s practice track meet against Brenham. On June 18 the College Station team will host Caldwell and Bellville at Kyle Field. Senate refuses to restore deductible IRA’s, 51-48 WASHINGTON (AP) —The Sen ate refused Wednesday night to res tore deductible Individual Retire ment Accounts for all workers, clear ing away the biggest obstacle to pas sage of a sweeping plan to overhaul the federal income tax. On a 51-48 vote, the Senate tabled, thus killing, an amendment by Sens. Alfonse D’Amato, R-N.Y., and Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., that would have granted all workers a tax saving of up to $300 a year for contri butions to IRAs. The $ 15-billion, five-year cost of the amendment would have been paid by raising taxes on upper-income investors and pro fitable corporations. Later, President Reagan told a na tionally broadcast news conference that the tax revision bill before the Senate was “one of the best poverty programs, one of the best job- creation programs and one of the best pro-family bills this country has ever seen, all rolled into one.” The administration supports the measure approved by the Senate Fi nance Committee, including its prop osal to eliminate full IRA deductions for many Americans. Restoring IRAs for all, said Sen. Bill Bradley, D-N.J., “frustrates the goal of tax reform, which is (that) equal income pays equal taxes.” IRAs favor saving for retirement over sav ing to buy a home or to educate a child, he added. The IRA amendment, said Dodd, would boost the tax bill’s benefits to middle-income Americans, many of whom could face tax increases other wise. “This $300 looms large for a family with $20,000 to $40,000 in come” in determining whether they save for retirement, he added. The Senate earlier in the day voted in favor of a non-binding resolution that expressed a desire that tax- deductible IRAs should be allowed as many workers as possible. The re solution, approved 96-4, did nothing to assure that will happen. That left the bill untouched, de nying IRA deductions for workers who are covered by company pen sions. But because the tax bill passed by the House retains fully deductible IRAs for all, the final chapter on the issue will be written in a Senate- House conference. With the non-binding resolution, said Majority Leader Bob Dole, R- Kan., “I believe we can handle the IRA problem later,” in the confer ence. But Rep. Dan Rostenkowski, D- 111., who will head the House delega tion to that conference, suggested the Senate face up to the issue instead of passing the buck. The resolution instructs Senate de legates to the conference to “give highest priority to retaining max imum possible tax benefits” for IRAs but without raising the sharply re duced tax rates in the bill or tilting it toward any income group. D’Amato called the resolution meaningless for many of the 40 mil lion Americans who own IRAs. Ab out three-quarters of IRA deductions are claimed by taxpayers with incom es under $50,000. “It can’t be done, it’s hocus-pocus,” D’Amato said of the resolution. “The public should not be deluded. It’s not good enough to come to the Amer ican people and say IRAs are great” without actually voting to keep them, he said. “I will try to observe it (the resolu tion) in conference,” Packwood said, but he repeated he will oppose any change that would increase the tax rates in the bill. Bradley was among the four sena tors voting against the resolution. The others were Sens. Max Baucus, D-Mont.; Gary Hart, D-Colo.; and Pete Wilson, R-Calif. Dole predicted defeat of all major amendments to the bill, including the one by D’Amato, which would raise taxes on some wealthy investors and profitable corporations to pay for universal IRAs. All sides in the de bate have said the IRA fight would pose the biggest test to the tax bill. Racial violence Cleveland shooting sparks FBI civil rights investigation CLEVELAND (AP) — Months of racial tension in a overwhelmingly white neighborhood erupted with the shootings of eight whites by a black man, and the FBI said Wednes day it has begun a civil rights investi gation into whether the area’s only black family was harassed. A 24-year-old black man opened fire with a shotgun late Tuesday night, aiming at a group of people who had earlier set fireworks outside the black family’s house in the work ing-class neighborhood on the city’s West Side, police said. The man, a resident of suburban Parma who had been visiting the family, was arrested but not charged. None of the eight people shot was seriously injured. The black family, which moved into a county-owned house in Febru ary, had been subjected to taunts by some neighborhood whites for weeks, said city Councilman Jay Westbrook. In April, the letters “KKK” were spray-painted on their home. Some whites said Wednesday the See Cleveland,page 8 Flooding will cost SA $2.5 million SAN ANTONIO, Texas (AP) — Damage from last week’s flood ing, which ravaged streets, river channels, bridges and buildings, will cost the city at least $2.5 mil lion, according to a report. The report, prepared by Public Works Director Frank Kiolbassa, says the drainage channels and the river walls supporting the River Walk along the San Antonio Riv er, a popular tourist spot, suffered the most damage. Damage to county roads and buildings has been pegged at $230,000, pushing the total public cost to about $2.73 million. The estimate does not include damage to private property. The city has issued an emergen cy contract worth $300,000 to shore up the walls of the River Walk in one section where officials fear the structure may collapse. Officials were expectea to ask the City Council Thursday to approve the contract with the H.B. Zachry Co. Assistant City Manager Alex Briseno said the bulk of the flood damages likely would be covered by existing money in the city oper ating budget and the capital re serve fund. “What that means is the normal work program will be delayed,” Briseno said. “So, citizens can ex pect the grass in the parks will be cut less frequently and less critical potholes will wait for repair over the next few months.” Briseno said the $2.5 million would be the most paid by the city for repairs in the aftermath of a natural disaster in recent years. 779-761: onditions, morale improving for Dallas air controllers FIND GRAPEVINE (AP) — Air controllers criti- jj’.ed after last year’s crash of Delta Air Lines ’ieht 191 now work under better conditions ght 191 now work under better conditions W/L ■ morale is up, although many still believe I fy handle too much traffic at peak times, VIA Igderal officials say. J® j. Since a General Accounting Office survey l|fl THpoi led substandard working conditions for ntrollers at Dallas-Fort Worth Internation- Airport, improvements have been made, icials said Tuesday. Controller morale in the tower and at an traffic route center, which monitors re- )nal traffic, also has improved, officials d. In the GAO survey, the controllers’ dis content at DFW was greater than that found at the nation’s four other busiest airports. The GAO reported nearly 80 percent of the controllers complained that they handled too many planes during peak hours last sum mer. More DFW controllers said they consi dered air safety “poor” or “very poor” than their counterparts at other airports. But Norm Scroggins, DFW tower mana ger, said he believes the controllers’ negative responses to survey questions about their workload and system safety were “an emo tional response to quite a few things that were going on” last summer. On Aug. 2, Delta Flight 191 crashed near the airport, killing 137 people. Also during the summer, new policies were implemented including tripling of con trollers’ training hours, limiting vacations to only two weeks and banning smoking in the tower cab and radar rooms, Scroggins said. Another policy change included requiring controllers to clear aircraft to take off and land on all four DFW runways, when pre viously two runways were used for takeoff and two others for landing. The airport continues to have a problem with controllers being swamped with traffic at peak times, Scroggins said. But that problem has been somewhat alleviated over the past year by the addition of 19 full-performance level controllers, he said. With the additional manpower and more experienced workers, overtime has been halved. For the first time since the 1981 con trollers’ strike controllers will be able to take more than two weeks of vacation at a time without causing staffing problems. At the air route center, the number of full-performance level controllers increased by 30 over the past year and the total control ler staff increased by 15. Don Hensley, deputy tower manager, said that despite complaints, a recent internal FAA survey of controllers shows marked im provement in their attitudes about their jobs. Controllers surveyed by the FAA during the winter said managers showed support for them after the Delta crash and “brought the facility together,” Hensley said. Scroggins said, “Really what the Delta 191 thing did was let people see the best side of everyone else. It made them see management in a different light.” There have been no changes in procedure since the crash, he said.