Columbia Missourian Newspaper 1976-07-01

              UIT7 & LOWRT ST. - '
C-. LUS3I-
. V KG. 65201
ST. 12- 5-- 74
1 3- c- ent postal stamp could go to 17 cents this year
WASHINGTON ( UPI) The Postal
Rate Commission Wednesday
recommended making the now temporary 13- ce- nt mail rate
" permanent," setting the stage for a
possible increase to 17 cents late this
year or early in 1977.
Congress has made increases
possible under a complex, two- ste- p
procedure: Each time the commission
approves new " permanent" rates, the
Postal Service, after a delay, can
impose " temporary" rates one third
higher.
The commission's recommendations
must be approved by its board of
governors. Approval is expected,
possibly going into effect in 10 days.
The new rate for a one- ounc- e, first
class letter could go from 13 to 17 cents,
but some insiders bet on 15 cents.
The greeting card industry urged
Americans to write their congressmen
now before the postal rates go up.
" The only way to stop postal officials
from heaping another postal increase
on the average mailer is to let our
lawmakers know we can't tolerate
higher costs," said Harry Cooper,
executive director of the National
Association of Greetiig Card Publishers
in a statement " The cost of a first class
letter is going from ridiculous to
absurd."
A Postal Service spokesman said the
service probably would wait until 1977
before asking for more from mail- use- rs
because " we first have to see what
happens to pending legislation for
additional temporary subsidies and
weigh the impact a rate increase might
have on mail volume."
The present temporary rates
imposed since Dec. 31 were based on
breaking even under last September's
costs, eroded since then by inflation.
The Postal Service has an annual
. budget of $ 14 billion. When the 13- ce- nt
rate became effective last December,
the deficit was $ 2.4 billion, and the
service is losing money. Each penny of
increase in the postal rate is said to
generate $ 650 million in revenue.
The changes in the Postal
Commission's " permanent"
recommendations would raise $ 19
million by shifting costs to bring
revenue for each class and "" Mpfft of
mail in line with the cost of handling,
Board Chairman Clyde S. DuPont said.
Some of the commission's increases
were greater than Postal Service
requested for COD., insurance,
money orders, registered mail and
special delivery.
C. O. D., now ranging at $ 1.2041.65,
would increase to $ 1.25-$ 1.8- 5;
insurance, 25- 8- 0 cents to 40 cent$ 1.20;
money orders, 3040 ceats to 5040
cents; registered mail $ 1.25-$ 6.0- 0 to
$ 2.1046.20; and special delivery 80
cents-$ 1.40to$ 1.25-$ 2.- 15.
The commission also proposed new
permanent rates for second, third and
fourth class, but none is expected to
have immediate effect. The Postal
Service will put new rates into effect
next Tuesday on a different basis.
The Postal Service also announced it
is suspending closings and
consolidations of smaller post offices
after July 1 while Congress considers
legislation to authorize temporary
increases -- in appropriations. The
suspension affects 231 post offices.
Insight
State test
for students
developing
Annual check
for competency
could be crucial
JEFFERSON CITY ( AP) Public
school students across Missouri will
take a competency test next April if the
state Board of Education accepts the
examination now being developed by
the Department of Elementary and
Secondary Education.
Some officials also say that passing
the annual test could become as
important as graduating from high
school.
" We're going to have all kinds of
debate on this and we won't have
unanimity on the specific details," said
Arthur Mallory, department director,
who will present the proposed test to the
hoard in September. " But I don't think
there will be any disagreement on the
basic concept"
Education officials have expressed
rising concern over the competency of
students after they graduate from high
school because of increasing evidence
that they are " unable to apply what
they have learned to real life, everyday
situations."
( Although students in Columbia
public schools consistently have scored
higher than the national average on
tests measuring basic skills perform-ance,
local educators and pargs& have
reflected the nationwide concern for
competency.
( In February, the Columbia Board of
Education passed a resolution making
basic reading and arithmetic skills
mandatory for high school graduation.
Introduced by board member James
Oglesby, the policy states that high
school diplomas will not be awarded to
students who can not read and do
simple mathematics.
( Implementation of the policy is
under consideration by the board.
( School board members and
principals have said the resolution
merely stated formally the existing
practice of emphasizing basic skills in
Columbia schools.
( Commenting on the possible
statewide implementation of a
competency test, school board
President Ray Lewis said Wednesday,
" Competency testing is a continual
process in the Columbia school system
to determine the skill level of students.
But we have asked the administration
to devise further means to put
emphasis on basic skills."
( In tests administered to Columbia
elementary school children in the
middle of the 1974- 7- 5 school term,
scores were above the national average
and showed a small overall
improvement compared with
performances two years earlier.
( Additionally, junior high and high
school students in Columbia have
scored above the national average in
various basic skills tests.)
The state's competency examination,
if adopted, will be given to studeats in
the eighth grade rather than in high
But the state's competency
examination, if adopted, will be given
to students in the eighth grade rather
than to high school, Mallory said. That
will insure that students either have the
" basic tools needed for a lifetime of
learning" as they enter high school or
can take remedial courses to obtain
those skills by the time theygraduate.
Those passing the test will receive a
Certificate of Competency when they
get their high school diploma; at
( SeeTEST. PageHA)
68th Year - No. 238 Good Morning! It's Thursday, July J, 1 976 2 Sections 22 Page- s- 15 Cents
.
Tact orrfpijoto by Mary Koliatb
Reflections on America
Leijah Lamb, 80, says, " I don't think this
country is run just right, but I wouldn't live
anywhere else.
" I drove a truck for 26 years and been in
just about every state. I've been in five na-tions,
and America is the most wonderful
country in the world.
" I love America. Oh, we growl and grumble.
I think they should do away with inflation. Still
I think a whole lot of America. We all do,"
t
says Lamb, a World War I veteran and a
resident of the Nursing Care Unit of the
Veterans' Hospital in Columbia.
" I think the most important thing about
America is that we see our people are taken
care of like these veterans' homes and
hospitals," says Lamb. " All of us boys in here
couldn't afford to go to a regular hospital. But
we receive wonderful care here. We have an
A-- l group of doctors and nurses."
6no closer to settlement9
By Don Cooper
Missourian staff writer
The resigned members of the
Community Services Council do not
appear ready to withdraw their
resignations after meeting for nearly
two hours Wednesday.
One resigned member, who asked not
to be named, said, " In my opinion we
are no closer to a settlement now than
we were when we resigned a month
ago."
Acting Community Services Director
Dwight Collins met with eight of the
resigned council members in the
Columbia Public Library. The meeting
was closed to the public and a Columbia
Missourian reporter was refusedadmit- tanc- e.
Dick Doyle, former council
chairman, said the meeting was of
public interest but did not come under
the Missouri open meetings law
because the resigned council members
were no longer a governmental
organization.
The resignations, given to the city
-- and the Boone County Court last month,
have not been accepted by either body.
Ron Galloway, a resigned council
member, said " It turned out to be a
general rap session. Nothing specific
was decided and nothing was settled."
The members of the services council
turned in their resignations last month
to protest City Manager Terry Novak's
proposal to make the council staff city
employes and the services council an
advisory board to the City Council.
The services council members have
said they fear the council will lose its
independence if it becomes a city
agency. They have expressed concern
over the proposal because they say it
does not take the interests of the county
into account.
A compromise proposal was made
last week to the services council by
Mayor Bob Pugh over the appointment
of an executive director, one of the
issues prompting the resignations.
Pugh proposed to' make the
appointment of director a joint project
of the services council and the city
manager. The city manager would
recommend an appointment and the
services council would ratify the
choice. Both would give the director
instructions.
Galloway said the Pugh proposal was
" briefly discussed" but no final
decision was made.
Doyle would not comment on the
specifics of the meeting but said the
county role in the services council is
still a major issue to resigned
members.
Doyle said he was concerned about
the lack of county participation in the
negotiations. " Mayor Pugh has been
chosen to represent the city, but we
have not had any contact with county
officials."
Last week Doyle said he was
" optimistic" the services council would
be back on the job this week. But
Wednesday Doyle said " it will be some
time" before the issue is settled.
" There are a lot of things that still have
to be discussed and we haven't got
anything on paper yet."
Doyle said he did not know what the
next step in the negotiations would be.
Library to get
A& S' $ 70,000
By Chris Coaway
Sffltssonrias staff writer
Nearly half of the late- arrivin- g state
funds budgeted to the University's
College of Arts and Science will go to
Elmer Ellis library instead because
the college was unable to meet
Wednesday's deadline to spend or
commit the funds. '
Although warned last December to
start planning, college administrators
did not decide until June 23 how to
spend the money. That did not leave
them enough time.
Owen Koeppe, provost for
administration, said Wednesday that
$ 70,410 of the $ 150,228 the college
received will go for book and journal
acquisitions for the library. Koeppe
said the library has standing purchase
orders for such acquisitions, which
allowed library administrators to
commit the funds by Wednesday's
deadline, the end of the 1975- 7- 6 fiscal
year.
" Those funds have to be encumbered
by this evening ( Wednesday) and there
was no way A& S could spend the
money," Koeppe said. " A& S had the
first crack at it and encumbered what it
could. The rules are you've got to get it
encumbered."
Koeppe said that to his knowledge,
the College of Arts and Science is the
only school or college at the Columbia
campus which could not meet the
deadline. The college is the largest
academic division on the campus.
The money is part of $ 3.58 million in
withheld University funds released by
Gov. Christopher S. Bond June 10. State
law requires that the money be spent or
committed before the end of the fiscal
year.
The Columbia Missourian reported
June 18 that administrators in the
college were unsure how they were
going to spend the funds.
College administrators said Friday
they were under the assumption
( See A& S, Page 13A)
Korshak's business
friends embarrassed
By Seymour M. Heron
N. Y. Times Service
NEW YORK Sidney R. Korshak
has also become deeply involved with
many large public corporations that
have no Las Vegas interests. They, too,
have sometimes been embarrassed
when his activities were disclosed.
For example, Gulf & Western's real
estate subsidiary was stung by a
political payoff scandal in Chicago
during the early 1970s, while Korshak
was serving as labor counsel.
Further embarrassment resulted
when the real estate subsidiary
purchased, with the aid of Korshak, a
small Mexican hotel that was notorious
among law- enforcem- ent officers as a
meeting place for high- leve- l members
of the mob.
Gulf & Western's troubles began in
19S7, shortly after Philip J. Levin, a
New Jersey real estate entrepreneur
and a friend of Korshak, purchased $ 22
million worm of the corporation's
stock.
Levin became president of Gulf &
Western's real estate subsidiary,
purchased two Chicago racetracks and
named Sidney Korshak as labor
tracks, Marjorie Lindheimer Everett,
a prominent Chicago sportswoman,
A prominent Chicago sportswoman,
had fired Korshak as labor counsel
In 1969, Gulf & Western decided to
turn the subsidiary headed by Levin
into an independent company, which
eventually became known as
Transnation.
A year later, during bearings before
the Illinois Racing Board, agents for
the Illinois Bureau of Investigation
testified that Transition had
purchased the Mexican hotel, Acapulco
Towers, which they said had been used
by Meyer Lanaky, the underworld
leader, to hide from law- enforcem- ent
officers.
Sidney Korshak is a successful
labor lawyer, a multimillionaire
with immense influence and con-nections
and a friend of top
Hollywood stars and executives.
But he is also the most important
link between organized crime
and legitimate business in the na-tion,
according to federal and
state law enforcement officials.
This is another in a series of ar-ticles
on the double life led by
Korshak.
The hotel was described by the
Illinois investigators as being under the
management of " a nationally known
gambling figure."
The racing board's hearings
produced unfavorable publicity in
Chicago, but the board ruled that it had
found no grounds to deny Levin a
license to operate the two racetracks,
although another state agency
ultimately moved against Transnation
for illegal activities linked to Korshak.
In 1971, The Wall Street Journal
reported that Transnation had
contributed $ 100,000 in campaign gifts
to various Illinois Republicans. The
gifts were made while the racing board,
whose members were appointed by
Republican officials, was considering
Levin's application for a license.
After The Journal's disclosures,
board members convened another
hearing, and Levin testified that
Korshak had been responsible for
determining which Republicans were to
receive the funds and for delivering the
money.
After a grand jury inquiry, the
Illinois Liquor Control Commission
ruled that some of the Transnation
contributions had been illegal and fined
the company $ 25,000.
In his appearance before the racing
( See KORSHAK, Page 13A )
ByLyteDena& fcn
Washington Star
WASHINGTON The Supreme
Court Wednesday reduced almost to
the vanishing point the power of
judges to control what the press may
publish about criminal cases.
Its unanimous ruling, striking down a
judge's order in a mass murder case in
Nebraska, made It doubtful that judges
ever could issue a " gag order" that
would be upheld.
Chief Justice Warren E. Burger
issued an opinion that spoke for a bare
majority of the court, and some of its
language suggested that a case might
arise in which an order against so- call- ed
" prejudicial publicity" would be
allowed to stand.
He said that the court was not " ruling
out the possibility that some kinds of
publicity might create such a threat to
an accused person's right to a fair trial
that some restraint on news stories
could be Justified."
However, much of- th- e rest of the
opinion indicated that any such orders
could be used only as a last resort, and
even then only if a threat to a fair trial
wats almost beyond debate.
The decision dealt only with judges'
attempts to control what the press may
say about criminal cases before they go
to trial. However, judges' power to
control what the press may say about a
case once a trial has started has always
been considered to be more limited, if it
exists at all, since criminal cases are
conducted in opencourt
Although there were hints in the
ruling that judges might be allowed to
keep the press out of any pretrial
hearings in criminal cases, the court
did not rule on that issue, leaving it for
another time.
Even while ruling mostly in favor of
the press in the Nebraska case, the
justices took two other actions
Wednesday against newsmen:
They declined to rule upon the
contempt convictions of- fou- r members
of the staff of the Fresno ( Calif.) Bee
for their refusal to tell a trial judge
where they got information that the Bee
published about a grand jury
investigation.
Convicted of 73 counts of contempt,
the two reporters and their city editor
and managing editor face sentences of
" unlimited duration," they said in the
appeal that the justices turned aside.
The court also declined to rule on
an appeal by a California reporter,
William T. Farr, who faces five days in
jail for refusing to tell where he got
information that he published about the
Manson " Family" murder trial.
In the Nebraska case, the Burger
opinion did not spell out in any specific
terms what " Jlidges would have to
consider before they could get by with
an order telling the press what it could
or could not say about a criminal case.
However, a short, separate opinion
by Justice Lewis F. Powell Jr. did offer
a specific description of the steps a
judge would have to go through before
banning any kind of publicity.
Since Powell's vote was necessary to
make a majority of the court, his
opinion presumably could control
future Supreme Court rulings in this
field.
Powell suggested that a judge could
issue an order forbidding some kinds of
stories about a case before the trial
opens only if he finds that the publicity
" poses a high likelihood of preventing,
( See GAG, Page HA)