Texas News: September 16-30, 1996

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Texas News Archives (searchable)

• 9/30 - Texas Poll: Texans Trust Local Government More than State, Feds
• 9/30 - DFW Opening New Runway Tuesday
• 9/30 - Texans Donate $10 Mil to Duke: A Texas couple known for making sizable donations to elite universities has promised Duke University $10 million to help improve teaching on campus.
  
  ....The gift from Robert and Anne Bass of Forth Worth is the largest donation Duke has ever received to bolster teaching.
  ...."The gift allows us to recognize teachers who have excelled in research and instruction," said President Nan Keohane. "Those are the ones we want to use as models for others."
  ....The bulk of the donation is a matching grant, meaning Duke will have to raise money to spend it.
  ....The $10 million gift is intended to contribute to a $40 million initiative to institute 25 chaired professorships, which distinguished teachers would hold for five years. The school expects 20 of those chairs would go to current faculty and five would go to new professors.
• 9/29 - Amtrak Routes to Stay Six More Months
• 9/29 - Texas Poll: Too Much Emphasis Put on HS Football
• 9/28 - Religious Leaders Ask Churches to Refuse Christian Coalition Voting Guide
• 9/28 - Texas Poll Shows Marks Up for Bush, Clinton
• 9/28 - Lawyer Claims Baby Killed in Accident Wasn't Human
• 9/28 - Report: Texas Prison Capacity in Good Shape
• 9/27 - On the Border, Agents and Aliens Dubious of Immigration Reform
• 9/26 - Texas Department of Agriculture Coming to Assess Haskell's Potential
• 9/26 - Wendy Gramm Visiting Area: Wendy Lee Gramm, wife of U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm, will be in Eastland and at the EBAA Iron foundry opening near Albany Friday.
  
  
  ....She will be in Eastland at 11 a.m. for a block walk campaign beginning in front of Eastland Drug Store, 201 W. Main.
  ....Gramm will be escorted by community leaders and will walk door to door to small businesses in the courthouse square on behalf of her husband, who is seeking re-election.
  ....Following the event, Gramm will be special guest at the ribbon-cutting ceremony for EBAA Iron Inc. foundry located five miles south of Albany on Highway 6.
  ....The ceremony is set for 1 p.m., followed by tours of the plant until 3.
  ....Gramm is the former chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission under Presidents Reagan and Bush.
• 9/25 - Survey Shows Students Increasing Use of Illegal Drugs
• 9/25 - Study: 29 Million Pounds of Toxic Chemicals Released Into Texas Waterways
• 9/25 - New Education Chair Mulls One-Stop Shopping for Students
• 9/24 - Grievance Committee Vote Overturned: Over the protest of District Clerk Bill Miears, Eastland county commissioners Monday overturned the salary grievance committee's Sept. 9 vote to increase the pay of several of the county's department heads.
  
  
  ....The 3 percent across-the-board salary increase to county employees voted into effect by the county commissioners at their last meeting will stand.
  ....Miears asked commissioners to reconsider their decision and said he thought the salary grievance committee's meeting was improperly held because not all of its members were present.
  ....Because only eight committee members were present at the Sept. 9 meeting, their vote to grant the hefty raises to six department heads was not binding, and the final decision was left to the county commissioners.
• 9/24 - Hawley More P.O'd Now: Post office boxes have been a scarce commodity in this town of 606 for years, but not anymore.
  
  ....Hawley residents who once received their mail by general delivery and spent years at the bottom of a long list awaiting a box will no longer have to do so.
  ....The new Hawley Post Office at 525 East Access Road will have an open house from 9-11 a.m. today.
  ....The 2,700 square-foot building features 793 post office boxes, vending machines for stamps and parcel post lockers for patrons who can not retrieve their packages during business hours.
• 9/23 - Houston getting a downtown underground soon
• 9/22 - Texas Poll: Texans Like Ms. Dole Better than Ms. Clinton
• 9/22 - Report: $750 Million Needed for Education to Keep Texas Competitive 9/22 - Clinton to Visit Texas on Friday: President Clinton will campaign in Texas on Friday in his first trip to the state since June.
  
  ....A recent poll shows Clinton and Republican challenger Bob Dole running even in the race to carry Texas in the Nov. 5 election.
  ...."We're sending a message that the Clinton-Gore campaign thinks that we can do very well in Texas," said Garry Mauro, who heads Clinton's Texas campaign. "Obviously, he wants to do well here, but we don't have to carry Texas to get re-elected president."
  ....Mauro said Clinton will arrive early Friday in Longview in northeast Texas. He will attend a noon rally in Fort Worth, an afternoon rally in Houston, and then a fund-raiser that night in Houston.
  ....He is expected to spend Friday night in Houston and then head to the Northeast to campaign, Mauro said in a telephone interview from Austin.
• 9/22 - Credit card thefts suspected at DFW Airport: Millions of dollars in fraudulent purchases have been made on credit cards stolen in recent months from Dallas-Fort Worth Airport, postal officials say.
  ....Officials believe the thefts began early this summer, likely in loading areas where many people have access to mail being transferred onto airplanes for nationwide delivery, said Linda Kirksey, an inspector and spokeswoman for the U.S. Postal Inspection Service in Fort Worth.
  ....Kirksey said the suspects are not postal workers. Investigators are looking at hundred of airline, security and contract employees, caterers, maintenance workers and plane refuelers who work in the ramp areas daily, she said.
• 9/22 - Last batch of Fort Hood soldiers depart: The last of 12 flights of Kuwait-bound Fort Hood soldiers departed from Robert Gray Army Airfield.
  ....About 3,000 soldiers were deployed beginning Wednesday to join 1,200 Fort Hood soldiers who have been in Kuwait since August.
• 9/21 - After Debate Setback, Perot Reshapes Campaign Strategy
• 9/21 - Limo Ride Makes Money from Touring JFK Route
• 9/21 (early) - Willie Nelson Helps Drought-Stricken Farmers: Singer Willie Nelson was on the road again Friday, this time to help give drought-stricken farmers and ranchers enough hay to get their livestock through the winter.
  
  ....Nelson was among volunteers unloading a tractor-trailer rig filled with hay donated through his Farm Aid organization.
  ...."It's getting harder and harder for families to make a living on the land," Nelson said. "It's good to know that when hard times come, family farmers stick together and help each other get by."
  ....The "haylift" was organized by Farm Aid, the Teamsters Union, the Texas Farmers Union, Lutheran Social Services and other farm and rural groups.
• 9/21 (early) - Bush Says Property Tax an Election Issue: Gov. George W. Bush, vowing to continue his push for school property tax relief, Friday predicted that the issue is hot enough to light a fire under legislative candidates this fall.
  
  ...."The assignment of elected officials is not to duck tough issues but to address them head-on," Bush said.
  ...."I am confident that property tax is an important issue. And I believe that members (of the Legislature) will hear that," he said.
  ....The Republican governor has said he would like to replace the $10 billion a year now collected in local property taxes with a new state levy.
• 9/21 (early) - Texas Man Arrested for Threatening to Kill Clinton: A Texas man has been arrested here on charges he threatened to kill President Clinton and now is undergoing a psychiatric exam.
  
  ....J. Robert Bird, 49, originally of Kempner, Texas, was arrested Tuesday, Lamar Police Chief Michael Biener said. Two rifles were found in Bird's motel room, the chief said.
  ....Biener said he called the Secret Service on Monday after Bird allegedly threatened President Clinton at several businesses here and in Darlington where he was staying.
  ....Willis Johnson, agent in charge of Columbia's Secret Service office, said during Bird's interview with federal officials he also made several threats to kill the president. Clinton has no visits scheduled to South Carolina.
• 9/20 - Texas Poll Shows Morales Behind Gramm
• 9/20 - Two Dead in Sweetwater Shooting: An ongoing domestic problem erupted in gunfire late Wednesday night, leaving two dead.
  
  ....Police Chief Jim Kelley said several 911 calls were received about shots being fired at an apartment complex in the 500 block of Elm, one block northeast of the police station.
  ...."Officers discovered two people had suffered gunshot wounds," Kelley said. "A female victim was located in the bathroom of the apartment, and she was taken to Rolling Plains Hospital."
  .....Carolyn Lansford, 20, later was transferred to Hendrick Medical Center, where she died about 1 a.m. Thursday.
  .....Her boyfriend, 25-year-old L.C. Williams, was pronounced dead at the scene by Justice of the Peace Ben Sasin.
  .....Kelley said it appears Williams entered the bathroom where Lansford was and fired at her, striking her once in the head and then shooting himself in the head.
  .....The couple left one small child. Police were continuing questioning Thursday of people who were acquainted with the couple.
• 9/19 - Convicted Killer's Execution Speediest Since Penalty Resumed
• 9/19 - Choate Missed Deadline to be on Texas Ballot
• 9/19 (early) - Bush's Tax Committee Holds Final Hearing: The blue-ribbon committee Gov. George W. Bush assembled to listen to the public about his call for property tax relief holds its final hearing Thursday.
  ....Bush last year said he believes Texas is approaching a crisis and that he wanted to find a way to replace the $10 billion a year raised by school property taxes.
  ....State Insurance Commissioner Elton Bomer, picked by Bush to chair the tax study committee, said the panel is looking for a "revenue neutral" plan that would generate no extra cash - only enough to replace the property taxes.
  ...."We are trying to find out whether the public wants to replace the property tax as the primary source of school funding. The property tax money would be replaced on a dollar-for-dollar basis," Bomer said.
  ....Property taxes now account for about 54 percent of all spending on public schools in Texas. The average tax rate is $2.30 per $100 property value, with about three-fifths of that levied by school districts.
• 9/19 (early) - Storms Hit Parts of State: Violent storms shattered the early morning hours in counties throughout West Texas Wednesday, causing flash flooding that wiped out part of a U.S. highway and crippled a concrete dam in the Panhandle.
  ...."It still has a least four or five feet water coming over it," said Ochiltree County Sheriff Joe Hataway Wednesday afternoon of the dam that holds back Lake Fryer, a small recreational lake southwest of Perryton, the state's northernmost county seat.
  ....Nearly a dozen ranch houses lie downstream of the endangered dam, Hataway said. Deputies and Department of Public Safety helicopters are prepared to shuttle away residents who don't feel safe, though Hataway said some are staying because they believe their homes are high enough.
  ....No injuries have been reported, though some cattle were washed down the usually docile creek. Authorities evacuated some campers near in Wolf Creek Park, and the raging water engulfed at least six recreational trailers.
• 9/19 (early) - KGB Thought LBJ Had JFK Killed: The Soviet Union's spy agency believed that President Lyndon Johnson was responsible for the assassination of John F. Kennedy, according to an unedited version of a 1966 FBI document.
  ....The document was released Tuesday at a public hearing of the Assassination Records Review Board, a federal commission established to collect documents on the assassination.
  ....The document attributed to an unidentified source the KGB theory about Kennedy's Nov. 22, 1963, assassination in Dallas.
  "Our source added that in the instructions from Moscow, it was indicated that 'now' the KGB was in possession of data purporting to indicate President Johnson was responsible for the assassination of the late President John F. Kennedy," read the document in a section that previously had been edited out.
  ....It did not offer other specifics.
  ....Johnson was Kennedy's vice president and became president after his death.
• 9/18 - Charge Against Cadet Upgraded: The charge against former Air Force Academy cadet David Graham was upgraded from murder to capital murder Tuesday, authorities said.
  
  ....The change raises the possibility of the death penalty if Graham, 18, of Mansfield is convicted of the December killing of 16-year-old Adrianne Jones, also of Mansfield.
  ....In the confession that authorities say they obtained last week, Graham said that he and his 18-year-old girlfriend, Diane Zamora of Fort Worth, also charged in the death, decided to lure Miss Jones out to his car and then drive her out near Joe Pool Lake so he could "break her young neck."
  ...."Kidnapping is the aggravating element that raises it from murder to capital murder," said lead prosecutor Mike Parrish, a Tarrant County assistant district attorney.
• 9/18 - New Tech President "Thinking Money": Money was on the mind of Texas Tech University President Donald R. Haragan on Tuesday, his first full day on the job without the word "interim" preceding his title.
  ...."Our No. 1 priority has to be the capital campaign and getting it off to a good start," said Haragan, whose expected appointment as 12th president of the 24,000-student university came Monday.
  ....Chancellor John T. Montford also tapped Dr. David R. Smith, the state's health commissioner, as the president of Tech's medical school.
  ....Haragan stressed that university officials, particularly Montford, are concerned with stimulating the school's endowment fund. For Texas Tech to continue to compete, he said, the school roughly needs to quadruple its current $125 million fund by the turn of the century.
• 9/18 - Ft. Hood Troops Leaving Wednesday: The first of 3,000 new troops being deployed to Kuwait were scheduled to leave early Wednesday as the Clinton administration continued its pressure on Iraq.
  ....About 70 soldiers from the 1st Cavalry Division were expected to board a C5-A military aircraft Wednesday morning as the first contingent being deployed for training exercises in Kuwait. They will be joining 1,200 soldiers from Fort Hood already conducting exercises there.
  ....The 1st Calvary was alerted Friday of the deployment, but was not given final orders until Tuesday.
  ....Air Force Tech Sgt. Joe Wyatt, who also will be deploying with soldiers, said the on-again, off-again mission has been frustrating. But he looked forward to spending another night at home.
  ....Wyatt was scheduled among the first military personnel to be deployed and expected to leave early Wednesday from Fort Hood, the largest military installation in the free world.
• 9/17 - Regulatory Board Takes Action: AUSTIN (AP) - Regulators who oversee nursing home administrators, under pressure from state leaders to reverse a record of inaction, adopted a plan Monday to improve the handling of public complaints.
  ....The plan, approved at an emergency meeting of the Texas Board of Nursing Facility Administrators, came after an Austin American-Statesman report that the agency hadn't disciplined anyone in three years despite hundreds of complaints.
  ...."I think it's a wakeup call - not only for our board, but for all boards and committees that work with nursing facilities throughout the state," said Ramona Kenedy of Flower Mound, board vice chairwoman.
  ....Ms. Kenedy was named by Gov. George W. Bush about a year ago as one of three public representatives on the nine-member board. The majority of voting members are nursing home administrators.
• 9/17 - Computer Seller Adopts Tupperware Sales Technique: AUSTIN (AP) - Move over Tupperware. Hand Technologies is bringing computer sales to in-home parties.
  
  ....The upstart Austin company says it's busy recruiting sales consultants to push personal computers in customers' homes.
  ....The idea has worked well for the company's similar venture in the United Kingdom, according to co-founders Andrew Harris and Martin Slagter, both former Dell Computer Corp. executives.
  ....Customers will be able to reach the company via the Internet (http://www.handtech.com) and through telephone services.
• 9/17 - Lottery Sets Sales, Profits, Prize Records: AUSTIN (AP) - It's a lot of lotto.
  
  ....The Texas Lottery announced Monday that tickets sold, profits reaped and prizes paid all reached new highs in the 1996 fiscal year - the fourth straight year of records for the state-run gambling games.
  ...."We've been setting and breaking records since the very first day we sold Texas Lottery tickets," said Nora Linares, the Lottery Commission's executive director.
  ....Ticket sales for all the lottery's games totaled $3.4 billion in the fiscal year ending Aug. 31, a 13 percent increase over the previous 12 months.
  ....The state's estimated profits totaled $1.1 billion, a 10 percent increase.
• 9/17 - Red Tide Reappears Along Texas Coast: CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas (AP) - Red tide has returned to the Texas coast, killing thousands of fish along the Coastal Bend and plaguing beachgoers with scratchy eyes and throats.
  
  ....Still air offshore created favorable blooming conditions for red tide, an algae that produces a red tint in water, said Dean Stockwell, a research associate at the Marine Science Institute in Port Aransas.
  ....While the algae normally remains 20 to 30 miles offshore, wind gusts have pushed it toward land, claiming thousands of fish and irritating sunbathers, Stockwell said.
  ....Fish began washing ashore last week, leaving an estimated 40,000 thread-fin herring dead along Mustang Island. On Sunday, dead fish including worm eels, red snapper and hardhead catfish lined the beaches from Port Aransas to Mustang Island State Park.
  .....The red tide also affected beachgoers, who complained of scratchy eyes and respiratory problems.
• 9/16 - Poorer Texans Being Targeted: AUSTIN (AP) - Consumer advocates and state telephone regulators say poorer Texans are being targeted by a new breed of phone companies.
  
  
  ....A handful of credit loan and finance companies have been licensed to sell phone services - a result of the state's effort to foster competition and lower prices in the local telephone market.
  ....However, state utility regulators say they aren't comfortable with the situation, but say they have little choice under the law.
  ....And Suzi McClennan, a state-paid consumer advocate, says Texans approached by these companies should beware.
  ....Lawmakers last year approved changes to state laws regulating phone service. They said competition should be encouraged throughout Texas.
• 9/16 - Troops, Families Continue Preparation: FORT HOOD, Texas, (AP) - Political maneuvering that apparently delayed their departure had little effect on thousands of 1st Cavalry Division troops Sunday as they prepared to deploy to the Middle East.
  ....Kuwait on Sunday temporarily withheld permission for additional troops to take part in ongoing military exercises sparked by renewed threats from Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein toward Kuwait.
  ....Military officials said they expected permission to deploy would come from Kuwaiti leaders, but the delay did not keep at least 3,000 troops from finishing up final arrangements. ...."They are all eager to do what they have come to the 1st Cavalry to do," said Col. Eric Olson, who commands the division's 3rd Battalion.
  ....The battalion was alerted to prepare for deployment on Friday.
• 9/16 - Potent Date-Rape Drug Called 'The Mickey Finn of the 90s': HOUSTON (AP) - An illegal "date rape" drug is being dispensed clandestinely at Gulf Coast nightclubs as a clear liquid in designer water bottles.
  ....As many as 30 people have overdosed on Gamma y-hydroxybutyrate - better known as GHB - and been treated in hospital emergency rooms in the past six months, according to Houston Poison Control reports.
  ....The depressant is blamed in last month's death of La Porte High School student Hillory Farias. Investigators say the drug apparently was slipped into her soft drink.
  ....Miss Farias, 17, complained of a severe headache when she came home after midnight Aug. 4 from a night out with girlfriends. Her grandmother found her unconscious after daybreak.
  ....Most victims in the overdose cases were rushed to a hospital because they couldn't breathe or they passed out in their cars and nobody could arouse them, said Mike Ellis, director of Poison Control.
• 9/16 - Racial Disparities in Lending Surpass 1995 State Average: AUSTIN (AP) - The number of home mortgage loans obtained by black and Hispanic applicants almost quadrupled from 1992 to 1995 in a five-county Central Texas area, according to a study by the Austin American-Statesman.
  ....However, the computer analysis reported in the newspaper's Sunday editions showed that lenders still were biased toward Anglos.
  ....A report showed that in 1995, lenders statewide turned down about one of every four whites who applied for a mortgage loan but rejected one in three blacks and Hispanics.
  ....Results showed greater disparities in home loan denial rates for the Austin area, including Travis, Williamson, Hays, Bastrop and Caldwell counties: 18 percent for whites but 33 percent for blacks and 37 percent for Hispanics.
  ...."Clearly, there are still some disparities" in loan denial rates for Public Affairs at the ....University of Texas, told the newspaper.
• 9/16 - City Officials Mulling Over $3 Million Debt Owed By Prostitutes: FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) - Prostitutes collectively owe the city of Fort Worth more than $3 million, and city officials are not having much luck with the proposition of collecting the unpaid debt.
  ....City officials gave little explanation for the lack of enforcement of such debts, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported Sunday. However, they acknowledged there is backlog of 60,000 citations that were issued, not paid and not processed for warrants and another 4,000 cases pending that haven't been set for court.
  ....There are also some instances where indigent defendants might be unable to pay fines or serve jail time.
  ....Reformed streetwalker Carla Berliner's misdemeanor fines, mostly for prostitution, total over $27,000. The 26-year-old woman, who was released from a yearlong stint in jail earlier this month, said she has no plans to make good on her debt.
  ....While acknowledging she deserved many of her citations, Berliner said she was often ticketed while simply standing outside.