The Mail-Journal, Volume 6, Number 37, Milford, Kosciusko County, 15 October 1969 — Page 9

The Mail PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY The Milford Mail (EsL 1888) Syracu»e-Wawa»ee Journal (Eat 1807) Consolidated Into The Mail-Journal Feb. 15, 1962 DEMOCRATIC ARCHIBALD E. BAUMGARTNER, Editor and Publisher DELLA BAUMGARTNER, Business Manager Box 8 Syracuse, Ind., — 46567

EDITORIALS National School Lunch Week, October 12*18

Do you think the corner snack bar serves good pizza? Then you should try the pizza in your school lunchroom. Those ladies really know how to cook. Just wait until you taste their sloppy Joes and submarine sandwiches. You’ll even like their tossed salads. Know what the real beauty of school lunch is ? The food not only tastes good, it’s good for you. Meat, salads, vegetables, fruit and milk are served with each meal. These foods contain vitamins and minerals that have a lot to do with how you look, feel, and perform. Take those pesky pimples that popping out on your face. You know what takes care of them a lot faster than that stuff that comes in a tube? Carrots. Good old carrots contain Uhe vitamins your, body needs daily to (keep its skin free of blemishes. Those candy bars don’t. In fact, too many candy bars probably caused those pimples in the first place.

On Schools. Hospitals And Sewage Systems

/•Rk CAPITOL COMMENTS *«*■ With SENATOR 1 VANCE HARTKE JsA ; Indiana

Rural Elderly Problems Most Severe

During recent field hearings by a U. S. Senate Committee, I saw first hand that the problems - of the rural elderly are more severe than those of the elderly in American cities. I have been directing field hearings by the Senate’s Aging Committee into the problems of the rural elderly the past few weeks in five states, including Indiana.' At New Albany on September 16, the committee received more evidence showing that the problems of the rural elderly, like the older Americans in our cities, are basically economic

LIVING is O s s & s?> &&A

A bottle of pop might taste pretty good with lunch, but do you know any athletes who train on soda pop? Os course not. They drink milk and lots of it because it builds muscles and strengthens bones. If you want to live a healthy, vigorous life, it is important to condition yourjjody while it is growing, with the proper food, exercise and rest. Those friendly ladies in the school lunchroom know a lot about good nutrition. They’re professionals who know how to choose and prepare the food you need to keep you healthy and active. When you eat in the school lunchroom, you get at least a third of the recommended daily nutritional requirement for growing human beings. If you’re trying to make the squad or cheerleading team, as well as learn something, you’ll need that much energy at lunch. Snacks won’t give it to you. School lunch will. You should live so long.

problems. Isolated in farmhouses in lowa and Indiana and backwoods * shanties in Kentucky, the elderly are divorced from any meaningful existence because they cannot afford transportation. Forced to exist on incomes which are drastically lower than their urban contemporaries, the rural elderly live desperately * lonely lives on incomes well below the poverty line. Elderly people fear a life of economic insecurity more than they fear death itself. Three out of ten people 65 years and older are living in poverty, in con-

trast to one in nine younger people. Many of these aged people did not become poor until they became old. The pensions and/or social security payments received by these people are so inadequate they are forced into poverty as the price for their retirement. About five out of ten families where the head of the family is elderly, live on an annual income of less than $4,000, while one family out of five has an of less than $2,000. Os older people living alone, half have incomes of less than $1,500 while one-fourth have SI,OOO or less. This problem of extremely low incomes is further aggravated by the fact that more Americans f . are spending more years in retirement periods of indeterminate length and uncertain needs, thus causing a mounting strain on the limited resources which they have when they begin retirement. Yet as serious as the situation is today it will deteriorate even more dramatically in the years ahead unless something is done — and done quickly. As a member of the tax-writing U. S. Senate Finance Committee, I am well aware that a dramatic increase in economic benefits would not solve all the problems of the elderly but it is the first step that must be taken immediately. What is needed now is at least a 10 per cent increase in social security benefits with an increase in the minimum payments from $54 to SIOO per month. And aU future Increases in benefits should be tied to increases in the cost-of-living as determined by the U. S. Department of Labor. I was pleased to note that President Nixon’s recent message to Congress included a provision which would link benefits to the cost-of-living.

GODSPEED tas '>■- Zs ( ;*

Know Your Indiana Law By JOHN J. DILLON Attorney at Law This is a public service article explaining provisions of Indiana law in general terms.

Real Estate Tax Delinquency Sales

The real estate tax in Indiana which has become increasingly a greater and greatqr burden is still one of the most efficiently collected taxes in our taxing system.The reason for this is well known to every owner of real estate. If an owner of real estate becomes delinquent in the payment of his real estate taxes the county authorities are empowered and do offer the same for sale at public auction. You may have passed through the court house at a time when these sales were going on and observed the sale of delinquent tax properties. Because the value of the property generally far exceeds the

Special Report from Washington

WASHINGTON - The recent secret talks between Secretary of State William Rogers and Soviet Foreign Minister Andre Gromyko were disappointingly fruitless.' The State Department had been led to believe that the Kremlin was ready to discuss critical questions such as a Middle East settlement, nuclear controls and perhaps even the Viet Nam war. The preliminary soundings, which always precede a major diplomatic event, had been so encouraging that President Nixon had intended to invite Gromyko to the White House. Instead of joining in diplomatic negotiations, however, Gromyko merely presented a bill of complaints. He protested that the U. S. had gone ahead with multiple — warhead tests without waiting for talks to be arranged on limiting strategic weapons. He complained over CIA Director Richard Helm’s discussion of a possible Soviet attack on Red China, and expressed Soviet disappointment over President Nixon’s trip to Romania and the U. S. moves to improve diplomatic relations with China. Gromyko was affable enough, personally, but nothing constructive was accomplished. Rogers, therefore, advised the President to forget about inviting Gromyko to the White House. MEANY VS HAYNSWORTH The inside story can now be told of how the opposition developed against Supreme Court nominee Clement Haynsworth. President Nixon had carefully greased the political skids so the nomination should glide easi-

tax liability owed on it, there are always many people willing to bid upon delinquent tax properties. Once a delinquent tax property is sold, the true owner still has two years after the sale to redeem his property and no deed is issued to the delinquent tax sale purchaser until after this two year period has passed. In redeeming his property, however, the owner must pay in addition to the cost of the sale, such as advertising and other delinquency fees, interest to the purchaser of the tax property. This interest is divided by statute into four brackets of six months each covering the two year redemption period.

ly through the Senate. He even went through the motions of clearing the nomination with George Meany, the old curmudgeon of the AFL-CIO. But when Meany notified the White House bluntly that Haynsworth was unacceptable to labor, the President decided to ignore this and appoint Haynsworth anyway. The affront made Meany so furious that he ordered a full investigation into Haynsworth’s business deals, and these findings stirred up the opposition on Capitol Hill. FLORIDA PEARL HARBOR The ability of a Cuban pilot to fly his MIG fighter to Florida virtually undetected by U. S. radar last week sent shudders through Pentagon old-timers — it sounded like the story of Pearl Harbor all over again. At Pearl Harbor, radar was shut down much of the time — partly because of complacency, a feeling that full-time protection wasn’t necessary. In this case, the airborne radar surveillance around Florida needed to spot low-flying aircraft had been cut back two-thirds because of the economy orders of Secretary of Defense Laird. At Pearl Harbor, Japanese spies were continuously tipping off the approaching Japanese navy as to the American defense system. To reach the United States undetected, all the Cuban pilot needed was word as to when the radar plane was flying. He probably didn’t have a spy contact in this case. But if it had beep an enemy attack, the enemy certainly would have had a spy watching the base from which the radar planes take off.

For the first six months the property owner must pay ten per cent penalty, for the second six months fifteen per cent penalty, for the third six months twenty per cent penalty, and for the final six months twenty-five per cent penalty. In other words, if a real estate owner permits his real estate taxes to become delinquent and waits the full two years to redeem the same, he must pay 12% per year interest on the tax delinquency. This goes to the tax purchaser and not to the civil authorities. In this period of exceedingly high interest rates, some economists theorize that the 12% per cent interest rate payable to the purchaser of delinquent tax property may become less and less attractive. This, of course, would change the very effective method governmental authorities now have over Indiana real estate taxes. It is also being noted that in the tax sales more and more properties are being passed over and not purchased because the amount of taxes owed is, in the judgment of the purchasers, too much for the value of the property. In this case the title to the property eventually passes to the county.

There was a third grim similarity to Pearl Harbor: A Pearl Harbor radar operator detected a flight of planes approaching Hawaii, but nobody took his warning seriously. They were thought to be planes coming from the United States. In Florida, land-based radar did briefly pick up a blip shortly after the Cuban pilot took off for Florida, but again nobody took it seriously. No interceptor planes were sent up. Yet the Air Force is fully aware that aircraft trying to approach the U. S. undetected can dive below the range of land-based radar. So to Pentagon old-timers, the Cuban pilot’s flight to Florida was the same old Pearl Harbor story all over again. Only this time no bombs were dropped. DANGEROUS ARTIFICIAL SWEETENERS Food and Drug Commissioner Herbert Ley a few days ago confirmed that safety tests on artificial sweeteners using cyclamates had revealed possible dangers. He said, however, that though the tests had caused birth defects in chickens, there was no evidence that they would be harmful to human beings. Yet one of his subordinates, Dr. Jacqueline Verrett, had advised that pregnant women not use cyclamates until it was determined whether they could cause human birth defects. o This week Secretary of HEW Robert Finch issued an angry blast at the FDA — which is part of HEW — and threatened to make changes in FDA procedures and personnel to prevent such information on safety tests from leaking out in the future.

Congressional Comer: John Brademas Reports From Washington

House Takes Action In Three Important Areas Last Week

Last week the House of Representatives took significant action in three important areas — water pollution, conservation and farm subsidies. WATER POLLUTION The public interest in preventing the pollution of our streams and lakes was given a big boost when the House passed a Public Works bill appropriating S6OO million in grants for construction of sewage treatment plants for the current fiscal year. The amount appropriated was almost three times as great as the amount requested by the Nixon Administration. An attempt to raise the appropriation to the authorized level of $1 billion was defeated by just two votes The funding increase is certainly good news for the State of Indiana. If the Nixon budget recommendation had been accepted, only Jour of some 135 Indiana communities with applications pending for assistance in building sewage treatment plants could have been funded. The bill as passed by the House will give Indiana more than sls million for anti-pollution programs, rather than the $5 million requested. Nine communities in the Third District have applications pending for funds to make our waters clean: South Bend, Argos, Bourbon, Middlebury, North Liberty, Culver, New Carlisle, Walkerton and Mentone. Six other communities — Pierceton, Nappanee, Goshen, Plymouth, Bremen and Wakarusa — have already received grants under the Federal anti-pollution program. CONSERVATION — BIG WALNUT VALLEY The Public Works bill touched on another conservation matter of interest to all fellow Hoosiers — the future of Big Walnut Valley. The Army Corps of Engineers has been planning to build a dam and reservoir which would flood major portions of the Big Walnut, destroying much of its value as a natural landmark. The House Appropriations ComSince most people pay their real estate taxes and all other taxes on time, tax sales are of no concern to them, but if your taxes should become delinquent you should be very certain tq redeem the property within the two year redemption period provided by law before title to the property passes to the purchaser.

mittee wisely deleted funds frerh the appropriations bill wh ch would have allowed work on he dam to proceed. Instead the C< mmittee ordered a restudy of he impact of the project on the latural values of the valley. During the floor debate on the bill, Congressman John My ers (R-Ind.) offered an amendment which would have reversed the Committee and restored .fu ids for the construction of the d;un. Fortunately for all those who are interested in the quality of our environment, the arm ndment was defeated. LIMIT ON FARM SUBSIDIES Earlier this year durijfg consideration of the Agriculture Appropriations bill, the House voted by a convincing majority of 224-142 to place a limit of |>2o,000 on the amount of money that could be paid to any individu; il in farm subsidies. The Senate deleted this provision from its version of the bill. A conference committee of Senators and Representatives will meet in the near future to reconcile tlie differences between the House and Senate bills. When House Members of the Conference Committee were appointed last week, Rep. Paul Findley of Illinois introduced a motion which would bind the House conferences to hole out , for inclusion of the subsidy ceiling in the final version cf the bill. By a margin of fust four votes, the House decided to table this amendment. I feel it is unfortunate th it the House passed up this opportunity to take a major step forward in improving the soundness of our farm programs. It makes no sense to spend hundreds of millions of dollciri; subsidizing wealthy farmers, when it is the average farmei who feels such intense pressure from the squeeze of increasing farm costs and lower com nodity prices. OTHER NOTES Last week I sat on a Joint Conference Committee oi Senators and Representatives which completed action on a bill to strengthen the Insured Student Loan Program to make it possible for more college s;udents to obtain loans at a time of high interest rates. If the Conference Committee’s report is a ?cepted by the House and Sena e, the bill will go to the Presic ent for signature.

By JACK ANDERSON

We can report that despite Dr. Ley’s statement that cyclamates have not been proved harmful to people, the government has recommended that their use be limited to not more than 3% grams per person per day. Among other things, heavier use can cause diarrhea and digestive difficulties. MADDOX REVERSAL Gov. Lester Maddox of Georgia, the peppery segregationist who turned Negroes away from his Atlanta restaurant with axe handles and has long been a bitter foe of civil rights, now is thinking seriously about invoking the federal civil rights law to try to stay in office four more years. His strange turnabout originated with a lawyer friend, Tully Bond of Macon. Bond, working confidentially through a Maddox aide in the capitol, has convinced the governor a federal court suit has a chance. The Georgia constitution prohibits a governor from succeed ing himself. Bond has drafted < suit to be filed on behalf of t group of Georgia voters claiming that this provision of th< i state constitution tramples on their civil rights. The suit, i: filed as presently drafted, wil 1 charge discrimination, saying that the voters are being deniel the right to vote for whom they please. The Macon lawyer’s argi tments are ingenious. He will argue that the civil rights law s voting and office- holdirg clauses are being violated is well as the 14th amendments guarantee of “equal protection of the laws.”