Banner Graphic, Volume 17, Number 300, Greencastle, Putnam County, 22 August 1987 — Page 3

Pan Am fever? Thrill of victory in Indy just a big yawn over country

By The Associated Press One day last week, the daily newspaper El Universal of Caracas, Venezuela, carried 19 wire service stories on the Pan American Games. It’s competitor, El Nacional, had 26. On the same day, The Salt Lake City Tribune, Arkansas Gazette, Omaha World-Herald and Seattle PostIntelligencer each ran one story. And not a single patron of Runyon’s, the famous New York sports bar, asked about the games. “In this place, it’s nil,’’ Runyon’s co-owner James Costello said of Pan Am fever. “No one asks to watch it on TV, so I assume they’re not interested. The concentration here is on the baseball pennant races and the upcoming football season.” Are people at least talking about the games? “The Pan Am Games? No, not one word,” Costello said. “There was some talk when the kid hit a home run against the Cubans. ... And that’s about the extent of it.” While the Pan Am Games are one of the biggest shows going in much of Latin America, the United States has given this quadrennial sports extravaganza of the Americas a tepid reception. Even though the Pan Am Games are in the United States for the first time since 1959, even though they are billed as a precursor to the Korean Olympics and even though the United States has set an all-time medals record, pro football and baseball hold the headlines. CBS-TV scheduled 26 hours of live coverage from Indianapolis, but all of it was for the games’ three weekends, none during midweek.

Prison system privatization one option to be considered

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) State correction officials haven’t taken a stand on the issue of having private firms take over prison services, but they agree it is an option that should ; be studied, a Department of Correction spokesman says. “We have a responsibility to find out what the comparative costs are,” DOC spokesman Vaughn Overstreet said Friday. Privatization has been discussed as one alternative for providing more efficient and cost-effective operations in a prison system that is becoming increasingly crowded and expensive to run. The Private Enterprise Review Commission is looking into the concept and other ideas for addressing prison needs and will make a recommendation to the 1988 Indiana General Assembly. Overstreet said there are indications that if all conditions remain as they are now, the state could have a 5,000-inmate increase in the next 12 years. Indiana has 11,400 prison inmates and 3,000 offenders in minimum security facilities or alternative programs now, he said. Walter Hayden of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees told the commission earlier this week that privatization “is not the answer” to growing prison problems. “By their own admission, private

State Fair judge bears no 'glad' tidings

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) Howard Pletcher wants to know what’s wrong with Indiana’s gladiola growers. “I can’t understand it. We’ve got more than 200 glads here in this hall, and most of them aren’t even worth a red ribbon,” said Pletcher, who judged Wednesday’s Gladiola Contest at the Indiana State Fair. Pletcher, who owns Verde Greenhouse in Elkhart and raises and shows glads around the nation, says he was shocked by the crop of

Joint venture company

MARION, Ind. (AP) Heye America, a new joint venture company, announced Friday that it will locate here and create 50 jobs within three years. Heye America is a joint venture between American National Can Co.’s Foster Forbes Glass Division, which is based in Marion, and the Herman Heye company of Oberkirchen, West Germany. Heye America will build the glassproducing machines that utilize Herman Heye’s advanced technology for

! Time to Knit for Fall S The < y Ultimate y < in 6 y (SjSSrTTTTfc Mo - 1602 Knitting X < Machines A y ’Knit patterns •Reproduce Pictures A y designs • Knit thin & 4 ply yarns A For a FREE demonstration appt. Call 653-8965 X

Nielsen ratings, showing the percentage of TV households watching the games, were 4.4 for the first Saturday and 3.2 on Sunday as CBS competed with ABC’s PGA golf championships. Last weekend, the ratings were 4.7 on Saturday and 5.2 on Sunday, the first full weekend of NFL exhibition games. The Pan Am Games end this weekend. “That’s about on target,” CBS spokesman Mark Carlson said. “When you’re involved in summer programming, opposite things like baseball pennant races, it fits in about where we expected it would.” Ratings like these may have been expected, but they’re not generally considered any better than mediocre by the industry. The NFL exhibition game between Denver and Los Angeles on the first Sunday of the games, for example, had a rating of 10.1. “We’ve been showing them on TV,” said Jim Rittenberg, manager of one of Chicago’s biggest sports bars, Ditka’s, owned by Bears Coach Mike Ditka. “But we split our screens, and they seem to watch the other screens. Chicago is Bear crazy, and the games happen to coincide with the opening of the Bears’ exhibition season. Everything is Bears, Bears, Bears.” And for the Pan Am Games, that’s bad news. “It’s really been tough. We’ve got the Prairie State Games here, too, involving four or five states,” Rittenberg said. “It’s the same type of thing as the Pan Am Games, and we can’t get anybody interested in that either.” The U.S. Olympic Committee points out, however, that it accredited 1,573 U.S. journalists for these Pan Am Games, compared with less than 75 four years ago in Caracas and about the same in Puerto Rico in 1979.

state

corporations are primarily interested in what they see as a $lO billion a year growth industry that offers the prospect of sizable profits,” he said. “The care, treatment and rehabilitation of inmates is strictly of secondary interest to today’s private corporations who are aggressively marketing their ‘we can do it better’ approach, complete with low cost financing and quick construction schemes.” Overstreet said Friday that is the kind of concern that should be addressed. “I think the profit motive would have to be monitored because we are dealing with human lives,” he said, adding that prisoner advocacy groups and contract provisions would be among the ways to provide quality assurance. However, he noted that even if

glads at the fair. “This stuff is the best of the garbage,” he said. “This is one poor showing. If you took most of these (gladiola) to another contest, they wouldn’t even win a red ribbon.” Pletcher said he thought the entries could have been beaten by some of the glads in his garden. “I left much better stuff at home,” said Pletcher, whose glads have won him the No. 1 spot among gladiola raisers in North America in the last eight national shows.

producing narrow-neck bottles, said Kevin Vertesch. a financial analyst for the Indiana Department of Commerce. The company plans to sell the machinery, which currently is made in West Germany, to bottle manufacturers in the United States and Canada, he said. The Marion operation also will provide technical and training assistance to companies that purchase the machinery, he said. According to Vertesch, other In-

prison services were contracted out, the state would have a primary responsibility for ensuring quality operations. “You can’t abdicate your state role. If you’re the user of the vendor’s service, you can’t get out of the driver’s seat,” he said, adding that the concept of privatization “isn’t putting prisoners in institutions and turning your backs on them.” Hayden also said his group is concerned about whether private companies would reduce operating costs by cutting the number of correctional employees or their salaries and benefits. Overstreet said those concerns are valid and should be discussed. “I do think they (companies) are going to have to explain how and why they are more cost effective and efficient,” he said.

Pletcher, who has been raising glads 20 years, said the Wednesday judging was one of the most difficult jobs he’s had. “I just put blue ribbons on what I thought was the best of the bad,” he said. “But, it wasn’t easy. “When they’re not right, they’re just a flower.” The eventual winner of Pletcher’s reluctant first-place blue ribbon in the single spike division was a lavender spike entered by Ermal Kuhns, 64, of Anderson.

operation at Marion

diana companies will enjoy a ripple effect from the new' manufacturing operation because Heye America plans to contract out the machining of some parts. “The existence of this firm in the United States will eliminate the need to import many parts necessary for conversion of glass-forming machines to this new technology,” said Lt. Gov. John M. Mutz, who heads up Indiana’s economic development efforts. Heye America, which expects to

Top It OH SAVE fl MINT 13 ON VOUR IMPRINT Custom Screenprinting for groups & teams. Full line of shorts, T-shirts, hats, and much, much more. High School designs in stock. •Summer Hours-Closed-Sun., Mon., Toes. 1 s - vta « Open 10-5-Wed. thru Sot. 653-2363

On the other hand, the USOC issued 1,589 U.S. credentials for the Olympic Festival a month ago in North Carolina. The Olympic Festival involves only American athletes in similar events. “Right now, we’re talking about the beginning of the football season and some very exciting pennant races,” Mike Moran, USOC information director, said. “I think in some cases the Pan Am Games aren’t getting as much coverage in terms of inches of print as the Olympic Festival, but that was a month ago and there wasn’t as much competition from pro sports. “Even so, there’s been much more coverage from American organizations than in the previous two games I’ve been to.” Interest among Latin American countries is understandable . Jose Luis Lozano of Argentina had five gold medals in speed roller skating and was the object of adoration in his homeland. Silvia Poll had eight medals in swimming three gold, three silver and two bronze and her native Costa Rica was abuzz. Lourdes Medina had five medals, three gold and two silver, in rhythmic gymnastics. The Pan Am Games were being heavily covered by Mexico City’s 15 daily newspapers, and Mexican specialties such as race-walking, rowing, fencing and equestrian events rivaled the Mexican Baseball League championships between Mexico City and Nuevo Laredo in scope of coverage. Television in Mexico was limited to the CBS weekend feed, and there were complaints not only about the small amount of coverage but also that it concentrated on U.S. specialties such as diving, basketball and baseball.

|,F U 1 V IM Botw Jte W4ir 1 9 JP » ' -• -*■*»« .«***^& : «ll 'w J*

Blue-ribbon performances and a trip to the 1987 Indiana State Fair for their 4-H Electric projects wre recorded at the Putnam County Fair this summer by (from left) Travis Knauer, Derrick

Hoosier withholds taxes, claims body's a church

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) Mental evaluation at a federal psychiatric hospital was ordered for a Bedford tax protester who claimed he withheld federal income taxes because his body was a church. Willard Jeffries, 55, who authorities said belongs to a the paramilitary group Posse Comitatas, also was sentenced Friday to three years in prison. U.S. District Judge S. Hugh Dillin set the prison term aside and ordered Jeffries hospitalized at the U.S. Psychiatric Hospital in Springfield, Mo., for a period not to exceed four months. “He admitted no guilt, showed no remorse and apparently

being production early next year, intends to lease an existing building in Marion for its manufacturing operation. Company officials anticipate a capital investment of about $1.25 million for building improvements and equipment, Vertesch said. Heye America will be operated separately from Foster Forbes. The state will provide Heye America with a $40,000 grant to train new employees after the company locates in Marion, Mutz said.

In Puerto Rico, more than two-thirds of the TV and radio sports broadcasts were dedicated to the games, while newspapers also played them prominently. In San Juan, Pan Am Games stories such as Puerto Rico’s gold medal in women’s judo, the boxing team, basketball and opening ceremonies received frontpage attention. Even in Latin America, however, there were pockets of apathy. In Brazil, Latin America’s largest country, interest was relatively low. None of the major commercial television networks were carrying the games live. Finally, a low-rated educational station picked them up. Although Brazil ranked fourth overall in medals behind the United States, Canada and Cuba going into the final weekend of the games, coverage in the major newspapers was low key much the same as in the United States. “This sounds real bad, but the only thing we’ve heard much about the games was the drug scandal,” said Mindy Allen, manager at a bar in Milford, Conn. The last time the games were held in the United States was 28 years ago in Chicago. Rittenberg thinks such a choice of sites might have helped quell Pan Am apathy this year. “I think they picked the wrong city,” Rittenberg said. “Hey, Indianapolis isn’t exactly a media mecca. I’ve been down there. It’s a beautiful facility, in Indianapolis ... but I think if they’d picked New York or Chicago or Los Angeles, maybe it would have been different.” Four years from now, the games will be in Havana, Cuba. Viva la Apatia.

Cavaness, Todd Schopmeyer, Bryan Allen and Jerry Hilburn. The Indiana State Fair is in the midst of its 12-day run that concludes Aug. 30. (Ban-ner-Graphic photo by Bob Frazier).

believes his body physically is a church,” said Carolyn Stumps, a public affairs officer for the Internal Revenue Service in Indianapolis. Jeffries was convicted by a jury June 24 on four counts of income tax invasion and two counts of failure to file. Dillin also fined him $3,000. Stumps said Jeffries evaded more than $16,500 in federal income tax from 1980-82 and failed to file in 1984 and 1985. “He claimed he was a church, and as such was tax exempt,” Stumps said. “He was a board member of the Lawrence County chapter of Posse Comitatus, a group that advocates tax revolt.”

MERCHANTS GRAIN Closing Bids Aug. 21, 1987 Greencastle (800)882-8219 Shannon Corn $ 1.60 Beans *5.25 Call Toll Free for the latest market information and updated bids.

August 22,1987 THE BANNERGRAPHIC

LOOKS LIKE THE BEST TIME TO BUY! AS LOW AS / ON FORD AGRICULTURAL & INDUSTRIAL TRACTORS AT LOW FINANCE RATES. Take a squint at the details! Your ANNUAL cX percentage HATE 24 MO. 4.5 36 MO. 5.5 48 MO. 6.5 60 MO. 7.5 NOTE Otter applies to all Ford tractorsagricultural and industrial excluding Ford compact loaders Participating dealers can arrange financing for L qualified buyers through Ford Credit Dearer contribution may attect customer savings Effective July 1 through November 30 1987 GREENCASTLE TRACTOR SALES U.S. 231 North Greencastle (317) 653-6319