Ukiah Daily Journal from Ukiah, California • Page 1

Monday, March 5,1979 WEATHER Fair through Tuesday with patchy low clouds or fog in the valleys and along the coast nights and mornings. Warming trend. Fort Bragg 47-62, Ukiah 44-73. 118th Year No. 271 Recall, spray issues to BOS Mendocino County Supervisors Tuesday will be asked to set election dates for the recall of Point Arena Justice Court Judge Lawrence Cohn and for the phenoxy herbicide initiative.

Mendocino County Elections Department verified recall petition and herbicide initiative signatures early last week. All that remains is for the supervisors to certify the documents. In the case of Cohn, who petitioners allege is unqualified to hold office, supervisors have only to set an election, possibly in June. However, action on the herbicide initiative may be more protracted while supervisors debate whether to enact an ordinance, call an election or do nothing. Complicating their decision may be Thursday's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) mondav from the desk By Jim Garner Over the weekend, and continuing today, the working stiff is making his move to do something about the moratorium on development and construction.

Timm Allred is ramrodding the petition drive that seeks relief from the moratorium imposed because the county's General Plan is inadequate. Addressed to Attorney General George Deukmejian, the petition asks that the lawsuit that triggered the moratorium ruling be withdrawn (except that portion concerning the Eden Valley Ranch). Allred is seeking volunteers to help gather signatures on the petitions. His phone number is 468-0493. "What bothers me is that just a bunch of working guys are going to be idled by this ruling and the entire area is going to suffer economically," Allred explained.

The petition states "the lawsuit has already accomplished its purpose in compelling the board of supervisors to take the steps which will bring the GP up to compliance with state law. Existing state and county laws and regulations guarantee that projects now pending will not be detrimental to the county, to its inhabitants, or its resources. "The continuance of the injunction will cause enormous hardship to the people of the county in that it will halt development and construction for an indefinite time, (thus) causing a county-wide depression in not only development and construction, but in all businesses which supply or are connected with them. It is unthinkable that the people of an entire county should suffer because of a quarrel between personnel of your office and our board of supervisors. "Only your personal and immediate intervention can prevent an economic tragedy." emergency suspension of the use of and silvex, which are two of the materials the herbicide initiative seeks to ban from aerial spray usage.

Barry Vogel, local attorney representing the initiative petitioners, Citizens Against the Aerial Application of Phenoxy Herbicides, said Friday the EPA emergency suspension will have no effect on the group's plans to force a ban on aerial spraying of the herbicides. Dow Jacobszoon, resource manager for Georgia-Pacific in Fort Bragg, said timber industry representatives will be present Tuesday for the scheduled 2 p.m. hearing in the supervisors' chambers. He said the industry is "in the process of putting some information together now" on the possible economic impact of the EPA suspension and the herbicide initiative. "1 think it is a little premature to be doing anything on herbicides until we know what the EPA will decide," said Jacobszoon.

Timber industry representatives met in Ukiah Friday and were expected to discuss the initiative. The results of that meeting, however, remain undisclosed. Also on Tuesday's agenda is a report on the county's revenue sharing audit, a social services quarterly report, and a review of special district funding. Carter to Mideast to salvage talks WASHINGTON (UPI) President Carter will fly to Egypt Wednesday and on to Israel Saturday in hopes of salvaging a Middle East peace, the White House announced today. "Without a major effort such as this, the prospects for failure are almost overwhelming," White House press secretary Jody Powell told reporters.

Carter will meet with Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and with Israeli officials, Powell said. But he said there are currently no plaris for threeway meetings involving Carter, Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin. "The President believes that we must not allow the prospects for peace which seemed so bright last September to continue to dim and perhaps to vanish," a White House statement said. "If we do, the judgment of history and of our children will rightly condemn us." Weather Extended forecast Wednesday through Friday: Mostly fair and dry except chance of showers extreme northwest coast about Thursday. Unseasonally warm days most sections.

Patchy low clouds and fog along the coast nights and mornings. Temperatures averaging 4 to 8 degrees above normal. Highs in the 60s to mid 70s and lows in the 40s to low 50s at low elevations. March, 1979 March, 1978 Date Hi Lo Date Hi Lo 4 62 49 4 59 48 11 a.m. Today Low Today 63 44 Rainfall 24.91 Last Year 45.46 MRS.

REAS THIRD GRADE CLASS AT RIVER SCHOOL They could be attending different school as fourth graders River it close? By ERIC KRUEtJKR Staff Writer Close River School? llial's the painful cost-cutting move parents and the Ukiah Unified School Board will tackle Tuesday, 7 p.m., in the multipurpose room at Oak Manor School, 400 Oak Manor Drive. A large majority of River School parents oppose Uie possible closing, which will save the SOIIOQI district an estimated $40,000 per year. Parents fear the school's special academic and minority programs will suffer or die if transplanted to other elementary schools. They also, say their children's attendance at schools like Yokayo and Oak Manor will cause overcrowding harmful to quality education. Some school administrators stand with the parents.

Others have mixed feelings about boarding up the 132-student, kindergarten- through-11 fth grade school at 2440 East Side Ukiah. The school board won't make a final decision until it hears parent opinion. School Superintendent WO. Murphy, who "suspects" the board will forget about the shutdown if faced with strong parent op )sition, said he "leans" toward keeping River School open to handle current and projected elementary school enrollment. Murphy said the school district would have to "reopen and enlarge" a mothballed River School in about two years if local population growth continues.

District elementary schools have gained 63 students in the last two months, he said, adding that if growth continues with River closed, other schools will fill to capacity. Exactly who first suggested closing River School is a mystery. School Iward President Dennis Denny said the district "administration and the board" hatched the economy move. Murphy said "no one person on the board" made the proposal, rather it stems from the board's two-year search for ways to "economize." Small schools like River cost more to run than larger ones, he said. Asked if the $40,000 per year savings, which he and River Principal Ralph Paulin had calculated, really justified the closing, Murphy said, "Anytime we can save $40,000, we're interested." He noted that $40,000 per year meant a considerable amount of money if the district could keep River closed for six or more years.

However, a one-or two-year closing is not "advisable," he said. Busing River students (o other schools, said Murphy, would only cost $2,500 per year. Although the board thinks the $40,000 figure is too low, and has asked the superintendent to recalculate it. Murphy said he is sticking with $40,000. Parent spokeswoman Melanie Chausse said a recent phone survey shows at least 100 River parents want the school to stay open.

"I really don't know why they want to close River School," said Chausse. "It can't be about $40,000. 1 don't believe that. There's something going on they're not telling us about." Chausse said River the "last, small, country-lyix" school" in Ukiah offers a high degree of parent-child teacher interaction tecaase of its size. She noted River tends to be the Talmage community's "focal point" because parents are involved in the school's academic and cultural programs.

Paulin said Hjver's educationally disadvantaged students and its Mexican, Indian and Chinese children have "special needs" for which larger schools can offer only "diluted" services. It is "possible," he said, some River children will lose extra reading and math help if they attend other schools because the federal Title I program limits the number of children per school who can participate in it. District Indian Education Coordinator and River School parent Pam Mitchell, who is "definitely" against the closing, said 100 percent of the Indian parents want the school open. They fear special Indian programs won't follow their childien to other schools, according to Mitchell, who said their biggest concern is the possible loss of the American Indian Early Childhood Education project. Only River and Hopland schools participate in the state's School Improvement Program (SIP), which promotes both basic skills training for children and parent involvement in school decision-making.

River parents will lose SIP bcncrits if their children end up anywhere but Hopland. Paulin said River generates communal continuity because children who play together in the same neighborhood are also learning together in the same classrooms. The school's small size generates "intimacy" and a sense of belonging, he said. Oak Manor Principal Bob Hayden said that trying to put River's special programs into his school, which doesn't have them, will cause "countless complexities." He also said an influx of River children will cause a space squeeze for Oak Manor's preschool, remedial reading and educationally handicapped classes. Although he understands the board's need to economize, Hayden said he's "ambivalent" about closing River.

Yokayo School Principal Wallace Bralich declined to comment, saying he needed more facts. Denny, calling the issue "a very sensitive arena," stressed the board's need to hear parent opinion at more than one open meeting if necessary. Though a decision has to be "confronted," Denny said the board will deliberate a great deal before it makes one. The board's intertwined goals, he said, are "quality education for all youngsters and efficient fiscal soundness in all school operations." Murphy said some River parents want their children elsewhere because River lacks a cafeteria and a multipurpose room. But he also noted, "It's a happy school.

The kids like it." Denny vs. Jones: Temple members kept out of top jobs Rv irRlnmirR Rarhara Hnvpr plioihilitv wnrlror loft as a TII Honnv taiii ono n( tho ir, tUn By ERIC KRUEGER Journal Staff Writer Copyright Ukiah Dally Journal (Second in a series of six articles) The Mendocino County Social Services Department kept Peoples Temple members it employed out of management and supervisory jobs because it feared they might abuse power on behalf of Jim Jones. Social services Director Dennis Denny justified what he admitted was discrimination against temple members in his employ by alluding to the way things "proved out." Eight employees "identified" themselves as temple members to Denny during his early years at the department. "ITiey came forward. I never asked them.

I will not do that. They identified themselves to me," said Denny. "Some of them told me that Jim Jones told them to do that. Others said, 'We're proud to be members of this great humanitarian effort (the temple), and we want you to know this'." Following each name is information from county records, job title, dates of employment and monthly salary range at the time of departure. Denny named: Linda Amos, social service worker II, Nov.

1968 Oct. 1976, Latrie Efrein, eligibility worker II, Oct. 1970 Aug. 1876, Barbara Hoyer, eligibility worker, left as a III, May 1972 April 1976, Claire Janero, clerk II, Nov. 1971 Dec.

1971, Laura Johnston, eligibility worker, left as a Aug. 1970 April 1977, $742-901. James Randolph social worker II, Dec. 1966 March 1977, Joyce Shaw, eligibility worker, left as a II, Aug. Feb.

1973, Grace Stoen, clerk II, Sept. 1970 Oct. 1971, County Personnel Director Gordon McKillican said a is a trainee, a "11" is a fully-trained employee, and a "HI" is a program specialist, the "lead" person in a unit. "A III would never make policy decisions," according to McKillican, who said Ills sometimes fill in for absent supervisors but are not supervisors themselves. Denny said he never discovered more than the eight employees he named as having been temple members.

None were fired Social services, said Denny, never had to fire any of them for illegal acts or incompetence nor did it try to do so their various periods of employment between 1966 and 1977. Asked if he suspected other department employees of being temple members, Denny said: "Sure, we always always worry about Denny said, "Every one of the employees I've listed came up to me and said, 'You got to give 25 percent of my income (to the Everyone of them told me that. Some of them gave 50 percent half their pay from here went right to the church." No small wonder Jones reportedly was worth $26 million by the time he died in Guyana. According to Denny, the eight teijiple members "were very acceptable employees." Asked if they damaged social services, Denny answered, "Surely in retrospect they haven't helped the department's image. "However, during the period of time they were active members here, they malterof-factly did some very creditable things." He said Linda Amos did "some of the better social work with clients." "1 have to be convinced that there was nothing damaged during that period of (temple) people that were on staff here were in the lowest classifications that we had: eligibility worker land II tliat's as high as they ever got; social worker 1, 11 that's all they got.

They never went into Ills. They never went into supervision 'Iliey never went into management. We never wanted them in a compromising situation." According to Denny, eligibility workers decide if someone qualifies for Ix-nefiLs like grants, medical care or (K )d stamps by determining if the applicant IIHHMS cligiblity based on factors like length of residence in the county, employment and number of children. "They're like insurance clerks, if you will." Social workers help people through 'traumatic" experiences when they can't support themselves, he said. They help the elderly live on their own outside a nursing hotne, protect children from abusing parents and help people work out myriad individual problems.

Denny said although temple members did "standard or above-standard work," the department did not want them in "compromising" situations, namely supervisory and managerial roles where they could abuse power where, as decision-makers, they could influence staffers and department policy to the temple's benefit. the department did not promote them into its officer caste. Possibly Unfair yet dofensive, Denny said, "In retrospect, and I must admit this, it was possibly unfair of this department to make the judgments it did about (certain) persons because of their particular beliefs. 'However, we fell we did it in the interest of this dei)artment when we made those decisions. It's quite obvious none of them went higher than the lowest journeyman class.

I think if was status quo today and somebody wiiuld bring an action against our department. I'm not sure we would prevail (in a job discrimination suit filed by a temple member). "I think our affirmative action (fairness despite religion, race, sex etc.) to that religious group was something to be desired. "But again, we would defend it by we felt we and we attempted to combat that." Would Denny the department didn't trust the temple members on its staff? "No, I wouldn't call it distrust. I would say good management.

I would only say good management from a defensive posture that since I'm responsible, I want to know who and what loyalties are on my staff." Apparently admitting what the department did secretly, Denny said, "I guess it's easy for me to say today that we possibly retarded their professional think it was in the best interest of this department to do what it did: not promote. In retruepect that is a violation of a lot of people's rights. "But to keep the credibility of this department above had to take that particular route. Fortunately, it has proven out to be the best course, but it does not make me feel very an that's pretty sad in our democracy, but I have to admit It'sfact." (Cont'd on Page 2)'.