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WASHINGTON (AP) — Texas
Republicans in the House of Rep
resentatives use their free mail perk
more than Democrats, according to
a report released Thursday by the
National Taxpayers Union.
But the report is not comprehen
sive, the group said. And it is not
fair, aides to Texas congressmen
who rank high on the list said.
“That survey is so far off and so
unrepresentative of what goes out of
members’ offices, it’s, to me, ex-
Spokeswoman calls survey
‘unrepresentative’ of mailings
how much mail they send from their
offices.
I he National T axpayers Union,
which advocates reform of congres
sional mailing privileges, gathered
men—--' , the most information it could from
tremely unfair they would publish the Gommission on Gongressional
something like that, l lish JbUnk, Mailing Standards, James Davidson,
the group’s president, said.
spokeswoman for Rep. Tom DeLay,
R-Sugar Land, said. “What they
were trying to do was certainly admi
rable ... but there’s no way they can
re an accurate reflection.”
DeLay ranked No. 2 among the
27-member delegation in number of
pieces sent in mass mailings last year.
Members of the House, unlike the
Senate, are not required to disclose
But that wasn’t much, he said.
1 he commission only tracks mailings
that are sent to every address in a
congressional district. Not included
ate letters that are individually ad
dressed, either by typewriter or com
puter label. Those are also sent at no
cost to the member.
The group said many members
forgo the commission by not sending
blanket mailings. Instead, members
use elaborate address lists or target
special groups, like veterans or se
nior citizens.
For instance, the group said Rep.
Kika de la Garza, D-Mission, never
sent a blanket mailing to every ad
dress in his south Texas district last
year. But the congressman sends
newsletters each week to about 600
constituents and others, an aide said.
“All these members who don’t go
through franking or whose files do
not include everything they mail out,
they’re not going to call the National
Taxpayers Union and say ‘Gee, I
sent out a lot more mail,’ ” Brink
said.
“We wouldn’t be surprised if some
members of the House of Represen
tatives are spending nearly $700,000
to $800,000 in 1989 and 1990 just
for direct printing and postage costs
alone,” David Keating, executive
vice president of the National Tax
payers Union, said.
The free mail perk, or frank, al
lows incumbents to publicly finance
their re-election campaigns, Keating
said.
“The average incumbent spends
more on the frank than the average
challenger spends on his entire elec
tion campaign,” he said.
Members of the group stood in
front of a tractor-trailer truck at the
Capitol to announce their findings.
They said the truck could be filled
with the amount of mail House
members send to constituents in a
single day.
Fraternity hazing investigated
Victim attempts to find
attackers’ frat photos
AUSTIN (AP) — Under fire for
doing little to stop a rash of assaults,
Greek officials are gathering photo
graphs of one fraternity’s members
to help a University of Texas student
identify his attackers.
Dan Medlin, executive director of
the Interfraternity Council, said it
was assisting in the investigation of
the Sept. 3 attack on UT student
Ross Tangum, the Austin American-
Statesman reported Thursday.
Travis County Attorney Ken
Oden predicted the IFC help will be
welcome. “I can’t say they’ve been
very cooperative in enforcement up
until now,” he said.
Tangum said he was punched by
two men after members of a crowd,
running from the Sigma Nu frater
nity, accused him of belonging to an
other fraternity.
If they are members of a UT fra
ternity, Medlin said, “we (the IFC)
will expect their immediate expul
sion from that fraternity.”
Meanwhile, Oden said he met
with representatives from Austin po
lice and UT police to discuss the sta
tus of several assault investigations.
“We’re taking it pretty seriously,”
Oden said. “I had hoped that the
prosecutions we had undertaken last
year ... would send a clearer signal to
the fraternities to police themselves
and discourage this kind of behavior
instead of rewarding it.”
He referred to the September
1988 death of Gregg Scott Phillips, a
UT Delta Tau Delta fraternity mem
ber who fell off a cliff after running
from two other students during a
fraternity prank. The fraternity was
charged with hazing.
rw -l -Bl ■ 01
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Police program to combat auto theft
By BRIDGET HARROW
Of The Battalion Staff
The College Station Police Department will begin an
automobile decal registration program today to reduce
area car thefts.
The Combat Auto Theft program is similar to auto
theft programs adopted by the Houston and Dallas po
lice departments.
Officer Craig Anderson, with the College Station Po
lice Department, says 100 vehicles already have been re
ported stolen this year and the number likely will in
crease.
“We have a large amount of auto thefts that occur
here, usually starting in the beginning of the fall semes
ter and going all the way through the spring,” he says.
The CAT program originated in New York in 1986.
In two and a hall years, the program registered 21,000
vehicles, and of those vehicles, only 21 were stolen, An
derson says.
Under the program, owners register their vehicles
with the police department and sign a consent form cer
tifying the vehicle usually is not operated between 1 and
5 a.m.
Two bright yellow stickers are put on the vehicle —
one on the front windshield and one on the rear wind
shield.
Each sticker has a number and if the vehicle is
stopped, the officer calls and verifies the driver is the
owner of the vehicle or has authorization to use it.
“If we see the vehicle out between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m.,
which is the time most vehicles are stolen, we have a
chance to catch the vehicle, if it is stolen, while it is out
on the roadway and before the owner even knows his
vehicle is gone,” Anderson says.
He says participation in the program reduces the
chance of a vehicle being stolen by 48 percent. This per
centage is based on a survey of all the nation’s auto theft
programs.
“And even if the car does make it out of town and it is
taken to Houston, Dallas, or any other city that has a
similar program, those police departments can also stop
the car also if they see the sticker on it,” Anderson says.
Registration for the program is free, and Anderson
says the police department is encouraging student par
ticipation.
“We want to get as many students as possible to regis
ter for the program,” he says. “We realize a lot of stu
dents are out after 1 a.m., but it’s a choice they have to
make if they want to reduce the chances of their car be
ing stolen.”
Coed’s body found
in large trash bin
LUBBOCK (AP) — A man
rummaging for aluminum cans
Thursday found the nude body
of an 18-year-old college woman
in a large trash bin.
The woman was identified as
Nanette Elaine Harrison, a fresh
man from Dallas who was a stu
dent at Texas Tech University.
Her body was found about 10
a.m. in a bin, located in alley
about seven blocks east of the
campus.
“We found a purse in the
Dumpster with her Tech ID card
in it, but we couldn’t use it to
identify her because her face was
so battered and bloodied,” said
E lice Lt. Dean Summerlin. “We
d to locate her roommate and
bring her to the Police Depart
ment to identify the body.”
Summerlin said the time and
cause of death will lie determined
by results of an autopsy.
d p<
till t
“We’re still trying to retrace her
steps.”
Margaret Simon of Texas Tech
University News and Publications
said Harrison had been in Lub
bock less than a month.
Harrison lived on campus.
Rob Lowe stars as the expert manipulator who leads James Spader into a terrifying game of violence and betrayal.
© 1990 Artwork and Design RCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video. All Rights Reserved. © Epic Productions, Inc.
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