Thursday, February 4, 1988/The Battalion/Page 9
ds for savings and loan feature
jcponnally, urge saving for future
■ HOUS I ON (AP) — Former Gov.
vs|j[ Jilin Connally, who last month auc-
do Va | JMmcd off possessions of a lifetime to
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plu a dent in his multimillion-dollar
debt, is now urging Texans to save
f<bi a rainy day in a series of adver-
ftisements for a savings and loan.
■ “We wanted ‘savings stories’ to be
tdld by famous Texans who have
faced some kind of adversity and yet
'fare more committed than ever to
Texas and to building a bright fu
ture here,” said Dick Smith, exec-
utive vice president and creative di-
Rctor for the advertising agency
Ina I idling the television commercials
’ and full-page newspaper advertise
ments.
■ Connally, 70, appears alone in the
■pmmercial. He pans into view
ainst a plain background, speak-
gas he looks into the camera.
“Nellie and I worked hard all out
lives to make sure our future would
||>e financially secure,” Connally says
Hi the 30-second segment.
I “Well, the future is here and
Hings haven’t quite worked out like
He’d planned,” he says. “But that’s
1111 '
Investigators:
'ilots need
ore warning
DALLAS (AP) — Federal Ayi-
jition Administration air traffic
controllers need to make more
frequent broadcasts of severe
pveather warnings, investigators
laid in concluding their probe of
1986 business jet crash^ that
killed seven.
The National Transportation
Board in Washington said Tues
day the FAA, in particular the
Dallas Flight Service Station,
Jidn’t give warning about severe
[weather on the jet’s intended
jrouie from Dallas to New Jersey.
[The plane crashed near Texar-
Ikana.
The board said at least two se-
Ivere weather notices were in ef-
[fect for the plane’s intended
[route but the FAA did not pass
[that information onto the crew
[because an incorrect expiration
[time on the weather warning.
all right, because there’s no better
place than Texas to start over and to
save a little something — because
you never know what the future
might bring.”
Connally and his wife, Nellie,
completed the sale last week of hun
dreds of items, many of them col
lected during his years of public
service as governor of Texas from
1963 to 1969, Navy Secretary under
President John F. Kennedy and
Treasury Secretary under President
Richard Nixon.
The four-day auction in Houston
fetched nearly $2.7 million, but the
money only puts a dent in what Con
nally owes his creditors. He filed for
bankruptcy protection in July and
owes from $41 million to $128 mil
lion in unsecured debts.
Connally at first declined to do
the commercials, but agreed after
meeting with advertising executives
of University Savings Association.
“The whole idea (for the commer
cial) was for impact, to get a Texan
who has faced some kind of adver
sity,” said Dia Blair, account exec
utive for Taylor, Brown 8c Barnhill,
who is handling the $3 million cam
paign for University Savings.
“He was a little weary at first,”
Blair said Wednesday. “But once he
read the script he agreed with what
it said and pretty much considered it
a public service announcement.
“He wanted people to know to
prepare themselves financially for
the future because you never know
what can happen.”
The trio of commercials, which
began airing during Sunday’s Super
Bowl, also features former Houston
Oilers Coach Bum Phillips and
Houston restaurateur Ninfa Lau-
renzo.
The TV commercials will appear
throughout the year in Houston,
Dallas, San Antonio and Austin,
along with magazine and full-page
newspaper advertisements.
The amount paid Connally and
the others was not disclosed, Blair
said.
“The message we wanted to get
across is two-fold,” said Doug Valde-
tero, executive vice president and
chief savings officer for University
Savings, the state’s fourth-largest
thrift with 90 branches. “One is the
importance of saving your money
and getting back to basics and put
ting a little aside for a rainy day or
the future.
“Second is there’s been a lot of
misfortunes in Texas with the oil
and financial industry, but we’ve got
a can-do attitude that we can start
over.”
The Connally commercials have
brought varied responses to the
thrift, Valdetero said.
“Some have been negative but
most are positive, ” he said, “I got a
call this morning from someone who
wants a copy of our print ad suitable
for framing.”
Under bankruptcy laws, Connally
is selling all properties except his
house and 200 of the 3,400 acres at
Picosa Ranch, his homestead in FIo-
resville south of San Antonio. The
law allows him to keep $30,000 in
personal possessions.
Federal restructuring plan
to lower number of S&Ls
WASHINGTON (AP) — A fed
eral plan to restructure the crippled
Texas savings and loan industry
would cut the number of thrifts in
the state by one-third in coming
years, regulators said Wednesday.
Consolidating thrifts and attract
ing new capital are the two key goals
of the Southwest Plan, developed by
Federal Home Loan Bank Board of
ficials after two months of analysis.
“Consolidation works,” M. Danny
Wall, chairman of the bank board,
said in revealing the plan Wednes
day. “We arrived at this conclusion
after extensive analysis.
“So now what we find ourselves
doing is saying to the industry and
the prospective investors, ‘You all
come. You all come and make your
proposals to us.’
The goal is to blend the 104 insol
vent thrifts and 39 ailing institutions
with some of the solvent, well-run
operations and reduce the overall
number of S&Ls in Texas from 281
to 180 or 160, Wall said.
About 70 percent of the ailing
thrifts have signed consent-to-merge
agreements, he said.
But that means attracting inves
tors willing to put money in an in
dustry that has been on its knees for
the past several years because of
downturns in the oil and real estate
markets.
The thrift problems in Texas rep
resent about one-half of the S&L
problems nationwide, Wall said.
Rising foreclosures, cases of fraud
and mismanagement and a glut of
vacant office space contributed to a
loss of more than $5 billion for the
state’s savings industry in 1987.
“During the more than two
months we worked to develop the
plan, we received expressions of in
terest from investors who indicated a
desire to bring in more than $1 bil
lion in new capital,” Wall said.
The costs of eliminating the neg
ative net worth of the insolvent
thrifts in Texas are in range of $6
billion to $7 billion.
Other costs include $2 billion to
compensate the consolidated S&Ls
for accepting low-yield loans in their
portfolio.
Funds to cover these costs will
come from last year’s $10.8 billion
recapitalization of the Federal Sav
ings and Loan Insurance Corp. —
the fund that insures S&L deposits
up to $100,000 — and from ex
pected investors.
Wall said the bank board will use
agency notes rather than cash when
possible.
The agency also plans to reap its
share of profits from consolidated
institutions and take an equity posi
tion in them to recoup investments.
The plan was endorsed by the
U.S. League of Savings Institutions,
the industry’s largest trade group.
“We commend the Federal Home
Loan Bank Board,” U.S. League’s
Theo Pitt said in a statement.
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