Banner Graphic, Greencastle, Putnam County, 10 December 1974 — Page 5

Page PDF (2.50 MB) Locked

Back to issue view

■

TUESDAY, DECEMBER II, 1174, THE PUTNAM COUNTY BANNER-GRAPHIC 5A

One fifth of the nation s coal mines still closed

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — Although a new three-year coal contract has been ratified, about a fifth of the nation’s coal

mines remained closed Monday because miners refused to cross picket lines manned by United Mine Work-

er’s construction workers. But after meetings late Monday, indications were that the workers would refrain from

picketing while awaiting a contract of their own. The 4,400 construction workers. although members of the

Union spokesman urges workers to stop picketing in the coal fields WASHINGTON (AP) — contractors early Tuesday and The agreement with the require approval by the UMW’s Striking mine construction a union spokesman urged the Association of Bituminous Con- bargaining council before a workers reached a tentative workers to stop picketing in the tractors, covering 4,000 United vote by the rank and file, contract agreement with coal coal fields. Mine Workers members, will Picketing by the construction

Rockefeller’s nomination * headed toward confirmation

WASHINGTON (AP) - Nelson A. Rockefeller’s nomination as the nation’s 41st vice president is heading toward certain Senate confirmation. An overwhelming number of Senators are prepared to vote today in favor of the nomination despite the decision of Sen. Barry Goldwater, R-Ariz., to oppose confirmation. Only two other senators — one Democrat and one Republican — announced their decisions to vote against the former New York governor. Minority Leader Hugh Scott, RPa., predicted that no more than a “baker’s dozen” will oppose the nomination. All other senators who issued statements or spoke Monday during a slow and formal debate on the Senate floor said they would vote in favor of the nomination, which has been pending since Aug. 21. The Rockefeller nomination still must be voted on by the House Judiciary Committee and the House of Representatives. In a letter to President Ford, Goldwater said he had originally expected to support the nomination. But Goldwater said testimony before the Senate Rules Committee and House Judiciary Committee had changed his mind. “It is now apparent to me that Mr. Rockefeller did in ef-

WASHINGTON (AP) - The President may have to allocate steel and shipyard space to the construction of offshore oildrilling rigs, says Interior Secretary Rogers C. B. Morton. Morton’s warning was matched by E. Douglas Kenna, president of the National Asso- * ciation of Manufacturers, who predicted that energy developers and other industries face a fierce competition for available investment capital. The dual warnings of a coming contest for money and materials emerged Monday during the first day of public hearings in preparation for Ford administration energy policy proposals. Morton and Frank G. Zarb, recently nominated to head the Federal Energy Administration, indicated the Ford administration is weighing moves to impose mandatory fuel conservation measures. These steps would follow acknowledgements by administration officials that voluntary conservation efforts have proven unsatisfactory. The hearings were conducted as seminars with witnesses and federal officials both asking and answering questions. Morton was asked by a witness whether his goal of leasing 10 million offshore acres in 1975 for oil development could be realized in view of acknowledged shortages of drilling equipment. Morton said such acreage could at least be explored to find out where there is petro-

INDIANAPOLIS (AP)-The 56th annual convention of the Indiana Farm Bureau winds up Tuesday with delegates to consider resolutions on the group’s official stands in 1975 on various issues. On Monday, Farm Bureau President George Doup told the group that elected officials on either the national or state level must act to block laws or actions of regulatory officials who go “too far.” i

feet use his own personal money to accomplish the purchase of political power,” Goldwater said. Goldwater’s remarks were echoed in the Senate debate by Sen. William L. Scott, R-Va.,

INDIANAPOLIS (AP )-The Rev. H.A. Boone and his congregation were upset when a burglar broke into their church the first time, rifled boxes set aside for missions and took a bath in the baptistry. Police said Mars View Christian Church was first entered Saturday night and the intruder found a stack of boxes with food, clothing and other

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Agriculture Department said today that retail food prices could rise as fast during the first half of next year as they

leum. He then pointed out that offshore drilling platforms are built in shipyards and thus are competing for space with merchant vessel construction. Such shipbuilding already is subsidized by the federal government and is vying for still more congressional support. “It might be necessary to invoke the Defense Production Act to make sure we have the equipment to do the job,” Morton said, referring to the President’s authority to allocate critical materials and facilities and to the need to build offshore oil platforms. Morton did not elaborate on the idea. Kenna later warned that the administration’s “Project Independence” push to increase U.S. domestic energy production by 1985 would add to other industry growth demands on investment capital. Both Morton and Commerce Secretary Frederick B. Dent emphasized that the energy crisis was not a problem of supply, but of paying for oil and other fuels. “There’s no shortgage,” Dent said. “It’s basically an economic problem." In related developments: —Ford is traveling to New York today to discuss the energy situation with a group of scientists and businessmen associated with the Commission on Critical Choices, an organization created by vice president-designate Nelson A. Rockefeller.

Doup said agriculture is being subjected more and more to “very sophisticated regulations” that increase production costs and cause higher food prices. He said the only control citizens have over social and political interests operating under regulatory authority Is with state and national legislative bodies. On other matters, Doup noted farmers are concerned

who also said he objected to the more than $2 million in gifts and loans made by Rockefeller to various associates in the New York state government. A different protest came from Sen. James B. Abourezk,

items destined for missions at Christmas time. They said the man started out with the canned goods, ate a healthy meal, took off his clothes, grabbed a bar of soap and hopped into the Church’s 3-foot-deep baptistry. After that, he dressed himself with new clothes from the mission packages, and then had another snack on bread

have risen this year. Supermarket prices through June could go up at an annual rate of 15 per cent, “barring a sharp collapse in domestic and world demand," said J. Dawson Ahalt, a staff economist presenting the department’s analysis of the food price outlook. Ellen Zawel, president of the National Consumers Congress, said in response to Ahalt’s prepared address to the department’s annual National Agricultural Outlook Conference, “The prospects of another 15 to 20 per cent increase in food prices is mindboggling.” Food prices last year jumped 14.5 per cent and have increased about another 15 per cent so far this year. A year ago the department predicted a 12 per cent increase during 1974. However, poor harvests reduced supply and increased prices. Ahalt said prospects are “highly uncertain" for the last half of 1975, when economists again hope for bumper U.S. grain crons Ahalt said additional increases in processing, distributing and marketing costs will add to pressure on prices. But he predicted such increases will be more in line with overall price trends than they hve been this year, when middlemen have accounted for 84 per cent of the increase in retail prices. Ms. Zawel, as she prefers to be known, blasted the department in her response, saying, “Retail prices are merely the * noxious tip of an iceberg whose foundation has been systematically ignored by myopic de-cision-makers.” She said food inflation is fueled by “the Interplay of supply and demand factors and the costly structure of the domestic food delivery system.

about the environment and will do what they can do reasonably to reduce pollution. But he said consumers must be aware of the effect of environmental controls on the cost of food. “When determining what regulations are needed, it is absolutely necessary that an economic impact statement be given the same considerations as an environmental impact statement,” he said.

D-S.D. He said he is less concerned about allegations of impropriety than he is about the total impact of the billiondollar Rockefeller family fortune on the nation’s foreign and military spending policies.

and grape juice the church uses in communion services. It was believed the man then took a nap in a back pew (an alarm clock was found there), brushed his teeth with toothpaste and toothbrush and rinsed his mouth with mouthwash—all from mission bundles. Sunday morning, Boone and . his congregation discovered the packages had been opened but Were relieved to find nothing valuable taken from the church. That night, the church was broken into again. All the intruder did this time was eat a little more communion bread, use the toothbrush and leave a note that read: “Dear friends, I’m sorry if I inconvenienced you in any way and that I had to enter the church the way I did. I’m desperate and hungry with nothing to eat and no place to Sleep. Please forgive me, Joe...P.S., May God bless you all.” When Boone and his people found the note, they had a long discussion and decided to leave a note of their own. It read: "Dear Joe, we’re very much concerned and want to help you. No one is mad that you broke in. If you come again, *please call us at the following number...” Boone said he’s “really hoping Joe comes again. We’d like to help him in many ways and even give him a job. For one thing, we can use a night watchman.” Drunk driver ordered to write obituary FRANKFORT, Ind. (AP)Richard W. Schooley of Frankfort has lost his driver’s license and can’t enter a tavern or liquor store for six months. But that’s only part of his punishment for drunken driving. Frankfort City Judge Roger L. Miller accepted Schooley’s guilty plea Tuesday and sentenced him, among other things, to write the fictional obituary of an accident victim. “It’s very sobering to have to do something like this,” said Miller. “It’s an attempt to get the man to understand driving is a nrivilege, not a right.” Miller said the obituary must be about a young boy at a Frankfort funeral home and should read as though the youngster died in the accident that destroyed Schooley’s car and injured a passenger. Schooley came before Miller on charges of reckless driving, leaving the scene of an accident, public intoxication, driving without a license as well as drunken driving. He pleaded guilty to all charges. The obituary must be finished Wednesday, but Schooley is in the Clinton County jail because he was unable to pay a $219 fine and may not meet the deadline.

Ford may be forced to’ allocate steel, space

Indiana Farm Bureau winds-up convention today

Church burglar may become night watchman

Food prices could increase in six months as fast as in past year

UMW, work under a separate contract. Negotiations are still under way between the workers and the Association of

workers had delayed the reopening of about one fifth of the mines that had been shut by union miners. A miners’ contract agreement with the coal industry cleared the way for mines to reopen on Monday, but picketing by construction workers hindered the return to work of miners in some areas. No details of the proposed contract were disclosed. UMW spokesman Phil Sparks said, “We urge the mine construction workers not to picket outside the mines.” UMW President Arnold Miller had issued a similar plea before the tentative contract settlement. The UMW had asked the construction workers to refrain from picketing coal mines, warning the strikers they could face court action by the companies. Monday was to have been the first full day of work for the miners, who last week gave 56 per cent approval to a new three-year contract with the Bituminous Coal Operators Association. Despite the union plea, the workers obeyed the coalfield tradition of setting up picket lines and the miners refused to cross them.

Bituminous Contractors, the industry’s negotiating body. The construction workers sought support from miners in contract negotiations and UMW officials said miners were tbserving picket lines. Officials were unable to determine the exact numbers of miners involved, but an Associated Press survey indicated about 24,000 miners were off the job because of picketing. About 10,000 Pennsylvania miners were off the job, while 7,500 were idle in West Virginia, 4,000 in Virginia and over 2,000 cn Indiana. Ohio sources indicated about 700 miners stayed off the job..

At least one ABC local in Ohio said late Monday it would call off pickets from five mines there to “give negotiators a reasonable amount of time to resolve the contract difficulties.” Other officials sought court orders barring picketing activities at mine sites. The talks moved closer to an agreement Monday, a UMW spokesman said, although “significant obstacles” remain to be hurdled before a contract is offered to the construction workers for ratification. While the ABC contract is still in the air, UMW officials have asked that mines not be

picketed because, as District 11 President Don Gibson said, “coal miners do not cross picket lines.” Monday was to have been the first full day of work for the UMW’s 120,000 soft coal miners, who have been off the job since the old contract expired Nov. 12. During the strike’s duration, national coal production fell to about 40 per cent of normal. And even though first day tonnage was lower than expected, it still marked the first step in a resumption of shipments to coal-dependent industries.

Ceiling on forces in Western Europe hopeful

BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) — Defense Secretary James R. Schlesinger today gives America’s North Atlantic allies the U.S. government’s assessment of what the Vladivostok agreement between President Ford and Leonid I. Brezhnev will mean to the alliance. Schlesinger was speaking twice today at the annual winter meeting of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization — in the Nuclear Planning Group, which works out guidelines for the tactical use of nuclear weapons, and in the Defense Planning Committee, which is primarily concerned with Conventional weapons. The American defense chief said Monday that he hopes the Ford-Brezhnev decision to

draw up an agreement limiting Soviet and American strategic nuclear weapons and delivery systems is the forerunner of a ceiling on forces stationed in Western Europe. He said the future of “forward based systems" — planes that can carry nuclear weapons from Western Europe into the Soviet Union and vice versa — may be discussed in the East West talks on force reductions that have been dragging on in Vienna for more than a year. Schlesinger is under pressure from Congress to reduce the U.S. nuclear armory in Europe. Dutch Defense Minister Henk Vredeling told newsmen his goverment would suggest later

Ford may decide gas tax isn’t so bad

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Ford has condemned it to death, but the notion of a fuelsaving gasoline tax refuses to die. With many of the President’s top energy officials still talking up the gasoline tax, Ford may yet find the proposal among their forthcoming recommendations. The officials

Agnew acquiring land

LOUISVILLE, Ky.(AP)-A Kentucky Real Estate Commission member says he doubts ah investigation of landbuying activities by Spiro Agnew and his Indiana business partner will turn up any violation of law. Commission member Robert Enos said Monday he instigated a low-key inquiry to see if the former Vice President and Walter Dilbeck of Evansville, Ind., are operating as real estate agents without licenses. Enos said he received a complaint from a Northern Kentucky real estate agent following news reports last week that described Agnew and Dilbeck as brokers for Mideast and Japanese interests acquiring land in Kentucky. Newspaper accounts said the two were about to Close two land deals — one for development of homes and high-rise apartments On Lake Barkley with Mideast oil money, the other involving the sale of a coal mine near Somerset to Japanese interests. Dilbeck said he is paying Agnew $100,000 a year for the next four years, plus a third of the partners’ profits this year and half the profits in succeeding years. Neither Dilbeck nor Agnew is licensed as a real estate agent in Kentucky, but Enos said the partners are not required to have licenses if they have bought or taken optipns on land in their own names. The question, he said, is whether they are buying land in their own names or serving as brokers for other interests and being paid commissions. He said they could be found in violation of state law if they are serving as brokers, but added: “From what I know about it I don’t think there is any violation.”

suggest that when he sees their other proposals, Ford may decide the gasoline tax isn’t so bad after all. Ford has ordered his admin- . istration to bring about a reduction of one million barrels a day in the nation’s oil consumption by the end of 1975, preferably by voluntary cooperation. But the White House acknowledged a few days ago that voluntary efforts were proving inadequate. The administration, heading for cabinet-level energy policy talks at Camp David next Saturday, is known to be considering such moves as mandatory automobile mileage standards; tax credits for purchasers of economical cars or, conversely, weight and horsepower taxes; import restrictions; fuel allocations and as a last resort, gasoline rationing. Morton and others who favor the alternative of a high gasoline tax argue that it would be a less painful way to cut down fuel consumption. It might not even cost a careful driver any extra money.

In Morton’s version, the tax would be refunded, possibly through an income tax credit. But the refund would not necessarily match each individual’s actual gasoline tax payments. Morton has suggested a 30-cents-per-gallon tax that would bring in an estimated $28 billion a year at current consumption levels. Most of the money could be refunded equally among all citizens over the age of 18, drivers and non-drivers alike, he suggests. That would work out to a payment of around $150 a year to each adult citizen. A driver whose car covers 10,000 miles a year at 20 miles per gallon would break even, recovering as much money as he paid out for the extra gasoline tax. Those who drive more would find their refund less than their gasoline taxes and presumably would be encouraged to start cutting dow r n on their driving. Fuel-saving drivers would come out ahead by paying less in fuel tax than they get back, while non-drivers would pocket the full $150 as a bonus for relying on public transportation.

this week that the United States offer to remove some of the 7,000 tactical nuclear weapons it keeps in Europe. He said in exchange the Soviets might be willing to reduce their huge superiority in tanks. The NATO meeting winds up with the foreign ministers’ twoday session Thursday and Friday, and Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger was due in Brussels tonight. State highway foreman fired for misconduct INDIANAPOLIS (AP)-A state highway foreman was fired Monday for alleged falsification of his time record, misconduct and malicious trespassing, Executive Director Roger F. Marsh of the State Highway Commission reported. Marsh said Floyd Lee Herron, Rt. 2, Morocco, a foreman in the Rensselaer sub-district, was discharged after a preliminary investigation by state police. L The investigation was instigated by George Merritt, the sub-district superintendent, and Marsh said it was continuing.. Bowen for lowering Ind. drinking age INDIANAPOLIS (AP) - Gov. Otis Bowen would allow a bill to lower the drinking age in Indiana become law, but he is “absolutely against” the decriminalization of marijuana use. Bowen told a group of students from five state-supported universities Monday he would not veto a bill to reduced the drinking age. The delegation of 30 students met with the governor to discuss student participation in selection of proposed student members of boards of trustees. A bill sponsored by Sen. James A. Gardner, R-Fowler, would make one student a Voting member of each board.

Hoosier happenings Terre Haute Joses shirt

SHIRT MAKER CLOSES TERRE HAUTE, Ind. (AP) — The Packard Shirt company, a designer of custom men’s shirts for 40 years at Terre Haute, will cease operating next January, says president George Rosenfeld. The closing was blamed on a slump in the apparel industry and the nation’s economic troubles. Packard’s new corporate headquarter had just been opened last July. McCORMICK “GOOD” INDIANAPOLIS (AP)State Sen. Keith C. McCormick, R-Lebanon, is reported in good condition at Indiana University Hospital here with injuries suffered in a traffic accident late Sunday. McCormick suffered a broken left hand, cuts, bruises and contusions when he drove his car into the rear of a parked truck, while trying to avoid another car. ARREST POLICEMAN MUNCIE, Ind. (AP) - The recently reelected

president of the Munice Fraternal Order of Police, Larry Daniels, has been arrested on a federal narcotics charge. The indictment accused Daniels of conspiring to distribute a controlled substance. The 31-year-old Daniels, a sixyear veteran on the city police force, was arrested Monday in police chief Cordell Campbell’s office. ORDER NEW TRIAL INDIANAPOLIS (AP)A new trial has been ordered by the Indiana Court of Appeals for James E. Woods, convicted in Marion county Criminal Court of killing Rudolph Coleman on Christmas night 1971. Woods was indicted originally on a murder charge but the Indianapolis jury convicted Urn of voluntary manslaughter. The appeals court said Judge John T. Davis erred in not giving the jury specific instructions. Woods is serving 2-21 years.

INDIANAPOLIS (AP)The Indiana Supreme Court has reversed two lower court decisions in a ruling that says even without wheels and axle, a mobile home is still a mobile home. The opinion, which was handed down Monday, stems from an suit filed by Herbert Ott and other defendants. They stated that dwelling being placed on a concrete foundation on Ott’s lot was not covered by a Pierce ton town ordinance limiting mobile homes to trailer courts. The Supreme Court overruled decisions in Ott’s favor by the Kosciusko County Circuit Court and Indiana Court of Appeals and remanded the case back to Kosciusko County. YOUTH KILLED EVANSVILLE, Ind. (AP)—A shootout between an Evansville policeman and an 18-year-old youth ended in the boy’s death and the officer being critically wounded, police said.