Columbia Missourian Newspaper 1982-08-19

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74th Year No. 286 Good Morning! t Thursday. August 19. 1982 2 Section 12 PageH 25 Vm-- .
Kim Fowler
Ron Wade standi on iand where it meets the landfill. The post, once 6 feet high, reveals the amount of fill Landfill neighbors had their fill
By Bruce Aucbiy
Missourian staff writer
While city and county officials are
i getting an earful of public indigna-tion
tonight about the proposed city
landfill sites, the voices of those who
live near the current landfill are
likely to get lost in the fray.
Columbia's landfill, located about
eight miles north of town between
Peabody and Calvert Hill roads, will
reach capacity early next year. A
search for a new site has narrowed
to two possibilities: one west of
Route B on Oakland Church Road
and the other east of Route B along
Rogers Road.
Both sites are outside the city lim-its,
but the city has the power to use
any unincorporated county land for
public use, said Gary Stamper, a
lawyer representing a family living
near the east ate.
Columbia Public Works Director
Ray Beck recently gave a prelimi-nary
nod to the west site without a
proper explanation, area residents
say. That same group of people,
afraid a landfill would lead to in-creased
traffic, litter and noise, will
have a meeting at 7: 30 tonight at
Oakland Christian Church, located
at the corner of Oakland Church and
Oakland Gravel roads. The residents
have invited Beck, Mayor John
Westlund, the City Council and the
Boone County Court to attend.
" There are problems associated
with operating any landfill," said
Dave Sapp, whose house is 50 feet
from the proposed western site. " At
the current landfill, they ( the prob-lems)
are relatively minor because
there are relatively few people out
there."
Relatively minor? Just try and tell
that to Ron Wade, whose house is
one- quart- er mile from the current
dump. Wade knows all about one
problem mth landfills litter.
" People get to the dump and it's
closed and they don't want to haul it
back home," Wade said, adding that
sometimes the garbage people leave
in the bushes alongside the road is
cleaned up, and sometimes it's not.
Aubrey Long, a neighbor of
Wade's and the landfill's, also has
had his share of problems. Part of
the 37- ac- re farm that Long manages
is downhill from the landfill, and silt
run- o- ff from the landfill filled up a
pond on his farm " like you'd fill up a
spoon with sugar," Long said
His complaints to the city got him
a new pond. The city dug up the sdt
and dumped the dirt on his two- ac- re
clover pasture. The result was a
patch of weeds.
Just looked like some little kid's
work," Long said
He said he tried but failed to con-tact
Beck about the mound of dirt
left in his pasture.
" I'd like to have him out here to
see what's going on," Long said
Nevertheless, Long says the cur-rent
dump improves the former strip
mine where it's located.
Neighbor Tom Ehler had a differ-ent
experience. His garden was
flooded when the city drained one of
the holes before filling it up with gar-bage
But Ehler said the city came
out and fixed that.
Now, as the city dump has expand-ed
closer to his house, he has a new
concern rats.
" I just noticed ' em this year,"
Ehler said. " You know how rats are,
you don't like ' em "
' Beck, apparently , is unaware
there are rats at the dump.
" If you could ever find a rodent,"
Beck said, " I would want to know
about it"
But Wade, who lives by the cur-rent
dump, knows about rats
" There's a difference between city
rats and country rats," Wade said
" Country rats are afraid of people
and run when you come, but these
were city rats. They'd come right up
to the house."
Except for the rats, however, Ehl-er
doesn't seem too worried about
living close to a landfill. " None of us
is too happy, but it hasn't given us
too much trouble," he said
Wade is a bit more philosophical
about garbage dumps.
" I'd sure love to be nd of ' em," he
said, ' but I wouldn't wish it on any-body
else "
Costs delay
nuclear plant
. completion
ST. LOUIS ( UPI) Union Elec-tric
Co. says exacting construction
standards are among the reasons for
an extra year and $ 750 million in
added costs needed to complete the
Callaway nuclear plant
The utility Wednesday said the
plant would not be finished until late
1984 or early 1985.
Most recent estimates had called
for the plant, being built near Re-form
in central Missouri, to be fin-ished
in early 1984. Total cost of the
plant now is expected to be $ 2.85 bil-lion.
The latest delays will increase the
direct cost of the plant by $ 400 mil-lion,
to $ 1.8 billion, Chairman
Charles J. Dougherty said. Carrying
charges on the investment in the
plant will increase $ 350 million, to
$ 1.05 billion.
Carrying charges are added to the
cost because UE is prohibited by
state law from including such plant
expenses in its rate base.
In a related development, Illinois
Attorney General Tyrone Fanner
filed a petition with the Illinois Con
' merce Commission objecting to
charging rate payers the full cost of
the canceled Callaway 2 unit.
The petition said part of the 18 per-cent
rate hike requested by UE for
its Illinois customers would be used
to offset the losses from cancellation
of the second unit.
Rough road to new dump
By Bruce Auchly
Missourian staff writer
Columbia has been cited five times
in the last 18 months for violations at
its landfill north of the city. Conse-quently,
Missouri's Department of
Natural Resources will look closely
when the city applies for a permit to
open a new city dumD.
State inspections have shown the
city's garbage has not been covered
with the required six inches of dirt
every day and the area suffers from
excess litter.
The landfill, eight miles north of
town between Peabody and Calvert
Hill roads, has only three houses
nearby, and the closest one is a quarter--
mile away. That apparently ex-plains
why state officials have not
pursued the city's violations beyond
inspection reports.
" Because it is so isolated, we've
let it get by," said John Doyle of the
DNR's solid waste division. " We
probably wouldn't let it go any fur-ther
if the area was more devel-oped
"
Meanwhile, in the last month the
city has pinpointed two sites for a fu-ture
dump, each within three miles
of the city boundary. One site is west
of Route B on Oakland Church Road
and the other is east of Route B on
Rogers Road. While the eastern one
is relatively isolated, the west site, to
which the city has given preliminary
approval, has 32 families living with-in
200 yards. That's according to
Gary Stamper, an attorney rep-resenting
one of the families.
Ray Beck, Columbia's director of
public works, said the west site looks
better because of economics and the
environment.
" It would be cheaper to operate,"
Beck said. He added that the ground
( See RESIDENTS, Page 8A)
Economists
temper outlook
See only mild improvement
By Owen Ullmann
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON ( AP) Despite
Wall Street's euphoria over falling
interest rates, a strong and lasting
turnaround in the economy remains
far from focus.
The unexpectedly swift drop in in-terest
rates this summer and the
growing consensus among financial
experts including some notable
pessimists that they will continue
heading down for some tune is rais-ing
hope, to be sure
And, not surprisingly, administra-tion
officials frustrated by the long-time
stranglehold of high interest
rates say this ma be the break to
propel the nation toward the pros-perity
President Reagan has prom-ised
for so long
But many private economists see
only mild improvements for the rest
of this year, with little prospect, par-ticularly,
for a significant decline in
unemployment. They see a stronger
pace of growth in 1983, but that opti-mism
is tempered by fears that bal-looning
federal budget deficits and a
new surge in interest rates will halt
a recovery in its tracks
Indeed, it is a persistently ailing
economy that the experts say is
causing interest rates to drop As
economic activity weakens, demand
for money slackens and the sup-pliers
of credit have to lower their
prices
" The economy literally fell out of
bed in June," Jack W Lavery, chief
economist at Merrill Lynch Econom-ics
Inc , said Wednesday.
Lavery and many of his colleagues
believe the dismal economic statis-tics
for that month, refuting fore-casts
of a healthy mid- ye- ar recov- er- y,
triggered both a drop in demand
for credit and a move by the Federal
Reserve Board to encourage a drop
in interest rates to avert a grave fi-nancial
crisis.
The experts' consensus is that the
nation's central bank feels that in
the face of so weak an economy, it
can afford to ease up on its tight- cred- it
policies without raising fears
in the financial community that it is
abandoning its fight against infla-tion
Now, Lavery said. ' the economy
appears to be recovering, but at an
extremely anemic pace " Consum-ers
are likely to speed up their buv- m- g
this fall, as they start to see cred-it
terms improve and sense that
unemployment may get no worse,
but 1983 could prove to be a year of
slow, interrupted growth because of
the still unresolved problem of how
the government plans to lower the
record deficits it faces, he added
The man who sparked Tuesday s
record stock market gain, economic
guru Henry Kaufman, based his new
forecast of declining interest rates
over the next 12 months on soft eco-nomic
conditions
" A smart recovery in economic
activity in the second half of this
year is not likely to materialize,"
Kaufman, one of the foremost eco-nomic
pessimists, said in explaining
why he was reversing a previous
forecast of a sharply rising rates this
fall.
Congress approves
federal spending cut
WASHINGTON ( UPI) Congress
approved legislation Wednesday
slashing $ 13.3 billion from federal
spending over the next three years,
with the deepest cuts in dairy price
supports, federal pensions and the
food stamp program
The Senate voted 67- 3- 2 to give final
congressional approval to the Omni-bus
Reconciliation Act, the first ma-jor
implementation of the Reagan- backe- d
1983 budget resolution to win
congressional enactment.
The House earlier approved it 243- 1- 76
President Reagan intends to sign
the measure.
The major reductions are $ 6 6 bil-lion
in agriculture programs, includ-ing
dairy subsidies and food stamps,
and $ 3.4 billion in federal pension
benefits for 1983- 8- 5
Remaining cuts of about $ 16 bil-lion,
are included in the tax package.
One of the most controversial pro-visions
would save $ 3 4. billion by
cutting in half the annual cost- of- livi- ng
adjustment for retired federal
workers under age 62, delaying for a
month the payment of the cost- of- livi- ng
benefits to all federal retirees,
and eliminating the benefit altogeth- -
er for military retirees who work for
the federal government as civilians
All federal retirees now receive
the full benefit. Of the federal re-tirees
under 62, about 60,000 are ci-vilian
and 980,000 are military
The deepest cut, and one of the
most controversial, is the $ 6 6 billion
slashed from the growth of agricul-ture
programs It includes a $ 4 2 bil-lion
reduction in dairy pnee sup-ports
and a $ 1 9 billion cut in food
stamps
The food stamp savings were
achieved mostly through a reform of
the program, but the change in the
dairy price support involves a freeze
of subsidies that neither the adminis-tration
nor the dairy industry sup-ports
The negotiators also agreed to
save $ 2 billion over three years by
speeding up payment from home-owners
of Federal Housing Adminis-tration
mortgage insurance premi-ums.
Minor savings in other areas, such
as a 0 5 percent user fee for those
who obtain a Veterans Admimstra- tion- insure- d
mortgage loan, brought
the total savings in the measure to
$ 13 262bdhon
Natural slas rates balloon in September .
By Jeff Fox
Missourian staff writer
Missouri Utilities Co.' s 22,000 Columbia cus-tomers
paid an average $ 435 last year for natu-ral
gas.
The average could go to $ 544 when gas rates
leap 27.3 percent Sept. 1.
The price increase is occurring because Pan-handle
Eastern Pipe Line Co., the Houston- base- d
firm that sells Missouri Utilities natural
gas, is raising its rates Sept. 1. Missouri Utili-ties
is passing along part of that increase.
Instead of the $ 2.79 per million British ther-mal
units ( Btu) of gas that Missouri Utilities
now pays, the rate will increase to $ 4.09, an in-crease
of 45.6 percent. That's according to
Stan Wallace, Panhandle Eastern's vice presi-dent
for corporate communications.
Panhandle Eastern's increase must be ap-proved
by the Federal Energy Regulatory
Commission, a process that could take up to a
year. If the total increase is not granted, as
Wallace expects may happen, then the differ-ence
would be refunded to Panhandle's cus-tomers.
Missouri Utilities would then refund
the money to its customers.
The rate hike is not subject to review by the
Missouri Public Service Commission because
interstate commerce is involved
Since 1978, gas rates m Columbia have gone
up 88 percent and more than 80 percent of
that increase has gone to Panhandle Eastern
because of its wholesale price hikes.
At a prehearing conference today, represen-tatives
of Panhandle, Missouri Utilities and 26
of Panhandle's other customers will present
their cases to representatives of the federal
agency m an attempt to begin to hammer out
the final increase.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commis-sion
has given Panhandle Eastern approval to
go ahead with the rate increase in September
even though the review and final rate approval
probably will come later.
Len Coffelt, Missouri Utilities district man-ager,
says Missouri Utilities will lobby to limit
the increase as much as possible. " The fixed- incom- e
customers have been hurt last year,
especially with federal cuts," Coffelt says.
" The community has been helpful, but they're
going to be hurt."
Coffelt says 72 4 percent of the money Mis-souri
Utilities gets from its customers goes to
pay for the gas it buys from Panhandle East-ern.
Wallace says the planned increase has two
causes the Natural Gas Policy Act of 1978 and
the addition of new supplies of gas from the
Anadarko Production Co., an Alberta, Canada
firm.
The act allows natural gas wholesale prices
to go up twice a year Sept 1 is one of this
year's two dates That will add 50 cents per
million Btu to Missouri Utilities' costs.
Sept. 1 also is the date a new contract for Ca-nadian
gas should go into effect That adds the
other 80 cents.
Tax bill not so rosy for average taxpayer
By Scott Stuckey
Missourian staff writer
In his nationally televised appeal Monday to in-crease
taxes, President Reagan assured his audi-ence
that most of his controversial $ 98.3 billion tax
bill is simply " better collection and correcting of
flaws m the system."
Employing statistics, the president attempted
to soften the blow further by explaining his pro-posal
would save the average taxpayer $ 400 this
year and $ 788 next year because of last year's tax
cuts.
Perhaps the president's tax accountant wears
rose- color- ed glasses.
Applying pencil to paper, it becomes apparent
the impact of the president's tax package on indi-viduals
would vary considerably. Some will hurt
more than others.
i
I
Insight
Smokers, for instance, would see the federal tax
on their habit double to 16 cents per pack. Smok-ing
a pack a day for a year would cost $ 58.40 in
federal taxes, up from $ 29.20.
The impact might be even greater on those who
buy their cigarettes from a vending machine Be-cause
you can't stuff pennies down the slot, ma-chine
operators might round the eight- ce- nt in-crease
up to an even 10 cents, for convenience
sake, of course.
Beginning in 1983, the 1 percent federal tax on
telephone service would increase to 3 percent.
Considering an average monthly phone bill of $ 30,
th federal tax bite for a year would jump from
$ 3.60to$ 10.80.
Excise taxes, such as those on cigarettes and
telephone service, are considered " regressive"
because they take more from low- inco- me taxpay-ers
as a proportion of their total income. Politi-cally
speaking, regressive taxes seem easier to
raise. That's because low- inco- me taxpayers, rela-tive
to other groups, it appears, lack the clout to
fight them effectively.
Restaurant workers, who frequently fail to re-port
all their income from tips, also would lose un-der
Reagan's package. Restaurants with more
than 10 employees would have to provide the In-ternal
Revenue Service sales figures to help im-prove
tax collections from tip recipients
Families with high medical expenses also would
be hit by Reagan's proposal.
Currently, drugs and medicines exceeding 1
( See BOTH, Page 8A)
I
Im ftOWIl
7 pan. Community Services
Commission meets, Municipal
Building, 600 E. Broadway.
7 pan. Parks and Recreation
Commission meets, Gentry
Building, 1 S. Seventh St.
Business ........ 7A
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