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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 11, 1988)
Thursday, August 11,1988/The Battalion/Page 5 Thursday ATHEISTS, AGNOSTICS, AND FREETHINKERS:Will meet at 7 p.m. in 604A-B Rudder to discuss “The Last Temptation of Christ.” NARCOTICS ANONYMOUS:Will meet at 8:30 in 026 MSC for a general dis cussion. For more information call the Center for Drug Prevention and Education at 845-0280. ADULT CHILDREN OF ALCOHOLICS:Will meet at 6 p.m. in 027 MSC. For more information call the Center for Drug Prevention and Education at 845- 0280. AGGIE SPACE DEVELOPMENT SOCIETY:Will meet at 8:30 p.m. in 352 Rud der. For more information call Mark McCann at 693-3789. Items for What’s Up should be submitted to The Battalion, 216 Reed McDonald, no later than three business days before the desired run date. We only publish the name and phone number of the contact if you ask us to do so. What's Up is a Battalion service that lists non-profit events and activities. Submissions are run on a first-come, first-served basis. There is no guarantee an entry will run. If you have questions, call the newsroom at 845-3315. El Paso area may get 3rd foreign-trade zone EL PASO (AP) — A group of in dustrial developers plans to apply for foreign-trade zone status for 600 acres of industrial properties. If the application is granted, the foreign-trade zone — which carries special tariff benefits — could spur growth throughout the city, authori ties said. The application has not been pre pared yet. The city of El Paso is help ing to write the application and hopes to have it ready to send to Washington in October, said Gor don Cook, director of the economic development department. It could take one to two years for the U.S. Commerce Department to approve the zone, he said. Four major developers are in volved in the application: Foster Scwartz Development Co., Willie Fa- rah, Pan American Industrial Park and Phelps Dodge Refining Co. The new zone would be the city’s third. Foreign-trade zones allow man ufacturers to import materials to El Paso without paying tariff, ship parts to twin plants in Mexico and import the assembled product to El Paso, paying tariff only on the added va lue. Only a small percentage of com panies take advantage of the breaks offered by the zone, said Mickey Schwartz, who along with his com pany, Foster Schwartz Development, owns extensive industrial space on El Paso’s east side. “Some are (using the zone) and some aren’t,” he said. “But it’s a good promotional gimmick. For those that want it, it’s there. And it will be used increasingly in the fu ture.” Commission seeks summit on energy AUSTIN (AP) — Texas’ three Railroad Commission members, two Democrats and a Republican, Wednesday joined the call for a bi partisan, national energy summit meeting to be held in Texas. “Since the oil price collapse of 1986, producers and consumers across the nation have waited in vain for Washington to stabilize and re verse the chaos in our domestic en ergy industry. We’ve waited long enough,” said Railroad Commission Chairman Jim Nugent. Nugent was joined in making the call by Commissioners Kent Hance, a Republican, and John Sharp, a Democrat. All three said they were joining the call made earlier by Texas Sen. Lloyd Bentsen, the Dem ocratic vice presidential nominee, and Republican Gov. Bill Clements. “I’ve given my commitment to Senator Bentsen and Governor Clements to join their bipartisan ef fort to craft an effective national en- ergy policy this fall, a policy that will reduce our dangerous dependence on foreign oil supplies and let us bring our sailors home from the Per sian Gulf,” Nugent said. Hance, who has attended recent meetings of the Organization of Pe troleum Exporting Countries, said stability is the key to recovery for the domestic oil and gas industry. “Our industry needs a policy they can believe in, that they can count on. I believe if we put regional self- interest and partisan politics aside, we can come up with a national en ergy policy that will give us that badly needed stability,” Hance said. Sharp said any energy policy needs to balance supply and de mand. “We need an energy policy that weans us from a growing depen dency on the Persian Gulf and moves us toward development of our abundant natural gas reserves,” Sharp said. Who’ll stop the rain? Normally parched county faces flooding STANTON (AP) — There has been an ironic turnabout in how “precious water” is viewed in this farming community where rain usually is better than cash in the bank and sometimes is as rare as credit at the bank. “They (farmers) used to lose sleep because it wouldn’t rain,” said Roy Lee Barnhill, a former Martin County cotton farmer who now is a professional photographer. “Now, they can’t go to sleep because they fear it might rain.” Surprisingly high rainfalls since 1986 and a rising water table have flooded thousands of acres of farm land, eroded roads, and Hooded about a half dozen farm houses in northeast Martin County. 5i Sulphur Springs Creek is flooding its brackish waters into cotton fields and is fueling salt-cedar shrubs, which thrive on salty soil and dis- ! place cotton and grasses. And runoff from summer rains from the Ackerly area north of here is flooding farmland in the Brown and Flower Grove farming areas of ! Martin County and nearby the Knott community area in Howard County. i Martin County Judge Bob Dea- i venport estimated that 5,000 acres of farmland in northeast Martin | County are under water. And ap proximately 50,000 acres have been taken out of cotton production due ? to the overland flooding and water | rising to the topsoil from the Ogal- lala Aquifer. Damage to cropland, roads, houses, and other property is esti mated at $25 million by Nestor Her- “They (farmers) used to lose sleep because it wouldn't rain. Now, they can't go to sleep because they fear it might rain. " — Roy Lee Barnhill, former cotton farmer nandez, Martin County executive di rector of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Stabiliza tion and Conservation Service. “We’ve got an awful lot of cropland that’s under water,” Nestor said. Martin County has more than 122,000 acres of cotton on 302,000 acres of skip-row cotton cropland. In 1986, Martin County and much of West Texas received heavy rainfall — up to about 50 inches of annual rainfall in some areas where the norm is a third of that. “I considered that was our 100- year (heavy) rain and that wouldn’t come again,” Deavenport said of 1986. “But we had more damage (by erosion to roads and croplands) in ’87 than we did in ’86, and now we are into our third year” of unseaso- nally heavy rains. But 1988 looked like a drought year until late spring and in June and July, when the gully-washing rains came. “We came into the drought pretty much from October 1987 through April of 1988,” said Alvin Riddle, Martin County district conservation ist for the USDA’s Soil Conservation Service. “We had sandstorms day af ter day in the drought period.” Then came the rains. “We’ve never had this high-inten- sity, short-duration rain,” Riddle said. “And you can’t control it. That’s the same way with wind. When you’ve got wind blowing at 75 miles an hour, you’re not going to control it.” “We’ve got houses under water. We’ve got fields that are highly eroded,” he said. “There’s water where it hasn’t been in so many years.” Sulphur Springs Creek, which originates in New Mexico and even- tualy flows into the Colorado River watershed, is doing a rare thing — flooding. Historically, the creek has been mostly dry — until 1986 when the heavy rains started. In pondering what to do about the water problems, the Martin County Commissioners’ Court is holding “brainstorming” sessions with commissioners from neighbor ing Howard and Dawson counties, with Colorado River Municipal Wa ter District General Manager O.H. Ivie and staff, and with conservation and planning officials. Deavenport noted that Martin County officials and farmers “can’t solve the dang problem by our selves.” But apparently no solution has been proposed except to let the waters subside if rains hold back and if the massive aquifer doesn’t con tinue to rise on its south end. “There’s no easy solution,” Dea venport said, “but if we don’t get started, we’re courting disaster.” 1 ! : ! I NEW COURSE OFFERING, FALL 1988: HEED 489 Special Topics in: CURRENT (3 hrs. cr.) TR 2:00-3:15 pm 160 Med Science Bldg This course is designed to introduce the student to the current pharmacological treatment of a variety of common health disorders as well as cover a general overview of drug therapy. Topics to be covered include: •Generic Drugs: Are They Good? 'Pain Relief -Cancer Therapy •Megavitamin Therapy -Headaches & Migrains -Drugs in Athletics •Cold and Allergy Treatment -Treatment of AIDS •Treatment of Sexually Transmitted Disease •Treatment of Parkinson's and Alzheimer's Disease Prerequisite: Junior Classi. ication For more information, contact Dr. Steven L. Peterson, Course Coordinator, Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, 845-2360. iravrvr a” MhL BarJB# ISliiliSIBi • NO Service Charge • NO Per Check Fees • NO Minimum Balance *NO Gimmicks 11 r promise Is simple: Take advantage of our FREE checking ar count program when you direct deposit your Texas A&M University payroll check with Commerce National Bank Well make available to you a personal checking account with no service charge, no per check fee, and no minimum monthly balance as long as you are a full-time TAMU employee and use direct deposit. This FREE checking account will also return all of your cancelled checks. I f you are considering a banking change, try out the best deal in town...the FREE checking account at Commerce National Bank. We are your home town, independent, community bank. Come in and see how easy it is to open your FREE checking account today. Commerce National Bank 2405 Texas Avenue South College Station, TX 77840 / v ^ NEW1NEW! PAN! PAN! BUY ONE, GET ONE FREE! Thick, crispy crust loaded with cheese (and your choice of toppings). All baked up fresh in a square deep dish pan. Northgate Now Delivers to Campus After 5 p.m. Delivery Charge $1 00 BUY ONE PIZZA... GET ONE FREE! Buy any size Original Round pizza at regular price, get identical pizza FREE! B-Th-8-11-88 Expires: 9-8-88 2/ Pizzas with cheese and 1 Item Small $5 55 Medium $T 77 Large $9 plus tax B-Th-8-11-88 Expires: 9-8-88 Z Medium Pizzas with Cheese and 2 Items $s 75 plus tax ADDITIONAL ITEMS AND EXTRA CHEESE EXTRA B-Th-8-11-88 Expires: 9-8-88 ]Ua32!g @Hg!IE83 BUY ONE Slice GET ONE FREE! 99ft: plus tax OFFER GOOD WITH COIJPOIV ONLY B-Th-8-11-88 Expires: 9-8-88 NORTHGATE COLLEGE STATION BRYAN 26S-0220 696-0191 T76-T171 University & Stasney SW Parkway & Texas E. 29th & Briar crest