The Courier-Journal from Louisville, Kentucky • Page 9

THE COURIER-JOURNAL, TUESDAY, OCTOBER 13, 1987 A 9 mmwmm WINNING AT ANY COST: HOW MONEY POISONS KENTUCKY'S ELECTIONS Jefferson County will establish a national toxic-spill center Saroe50an i custom crcaio labor! FREE labor or 50 OFF on clearance fabrics! Another program? Jefferson County may become a test site for programs to manage chemical spills and leaks. The county is among six communities being studied by the Urban Consortium to develop a model program for responding to hazardous-material incidents, said Ernie Allen, the county's chief administrative officer and head of the consortium's study. The Urban Consortium is a group of 43 of the nation's largest cities and counties. Allen said the hope is to choose a city by the end of the year in which to test "Star computer programs that estimate how a toxic cloud is moving or how two chemicals react with one another. Pick any Aero fabric, and have it created Into a beautiful custom drapery at Just half of our normal price for skilled labor.

Savings are even greater on our 500 clearance or discontinued fabrics your choice of FREE labor or 50 off the fabric, whichever saves you most. fifl him i til, MM I JbtKM Sal pricraqnod on custom draptnei ntfAn Top UMmenual regular low price. 50 OFF shades and blinds, too! Aero SHOP AT HOME Aero Continued from Page One for a comprehensive training in dealing with the hazardous-material problem. "There was nothing comprehensive that tied everything together and emphasized the health aspects," he said. The contract recognizes the development of a program born in 1977, after a seminar on radiological-contamination problems.

Bledsoe said health department and Disaster and Emergency Services staffers returning from the conference began to think of ways to apply the same principles to chemical accidents. The program has grown to include more than 20 local agencies. In an interview Friday, Bledsoe said the county's series of disasters and near-disasters, such as the 1981 sewer explosions and 1984 series of chemical spills, dramatized the importance of the program. "We could have had an Incident here and an incident there and turned our back and walked away and said, 'Thank God no one got hurt in that he said. "But people have had the drive to say we don't want anyone to get hurt at the next one and one after that" The rash of chemical spills in 1984 also led to the county's hazardous-material ordinance, which requires businesses to report spills and to develop plans to prevent and respond to them.

Bartenfeld said the ordinance helped the county obtain the contract. The weeklong programs for out-of-town officials likely to begin in January will include representatives from as many as 30 local agencies and institutions, including police and fire departments, emergency medical services, hospitals and companies. Plans call for about 10 programs a year, with 20 people attending each. Participants will be chosen by the federal agency. The program will begin with identifying hazardous-material problems in a community and conclude with a simulated emergency in which the visitors will play the roles of emergency-response officials, Bledsoe said.

In between, participants will be told about community planning for emergencies, the roles of different agencies and even the importance of media spokesmen. Despite their role as teachers, Jefferson County officials should learn from the programs as well, Bledsoe and Bartenfeld said. Bledsoe said the local officials will get some so- money. Generally there's somebody buying votes against me. The person who gets 'em is the one who pays the most, and I generally have it (the most money)." But Fugate never pays off until he has actually seen the bought vote cast, or else casts it himself.

"You don't give nobody money unless you watch 'em. I go to the bouse, line 'em up. On Election Day, I vote 'em. They let me vote 'em any way I want to. If they want to vote themselves, they won't get no money from me.

I wouldn't trust 'em if I couldn't watch 'em vote." By law, only voters who swear they cannot read, are blind or suffer from some other physical disability requiring assistance can legally receive aid In the voting booth. Such voters generally are assisted by one of two precinct officials while the other observes. But if the voter prefers, he can be assisted by a person of his choice. Under state law, an individual can assist only two voters in any election. In years past, Fugate and others have been able to perpetrate widespread fraud by "assisting" dozens of voters actually casting their votes In exchange for giving them money.

Of the people be votes in exchange for money, Fugate says 80 percent are neither disabled nor illiterate, and could cast their ballots themselves, without assistance. Prevailing wisdom holds that people who sell their votes are poor and uneducated. But Fugate, who should know, disputes that "People who make $30,000 to $35,000 a year, people with jobs, sell votes. People got no respect for politicians, think they're all thieves. One guy says, 'They're up there stealing my money, I gotta work for mine, I want some of it I bought his vote for $50." "College graduates ought to be able to use the voting machine.

But if the judges question it, I just lay the law down. They're not doctors, and who's to say whether somebody can read or write?" Ironically, Fugate says he was victimized by vote-buying when he ran unsuccessfully for constable in 1985. But he's philosophical about it. "I got my share of the bought votes. He (his opponent) just got more.

That's the way you play the game. I've got no hard feelings. I knew what I was getting into before I started." Even though he has never been Custom Window Fashions Louisville Showroom 2227 Plarttside Dr. Mon-Sat, 8 am to 5 pm 491-3930 phisticated computer equipment as well as a chance to hear their plan critiqued by outsiders. In addition to the Louisville seminars, Bledsoe said two or three local officials will travel to about five other cities to offer a two- or three-day program on the county's emergency-response program.

The contract calls for the county to be paid $201,000 during this federal fiscal year. The federal government will have the option to renew the contract for up to four more years. Vote-buyer talks about his trade Continued from Page One do with it what they want to. It's only a misdemeanor. They can't do anything to me.

If It was a hangin' crime, I wouldn't be talkln to you. "I'm not afraid of gettin' caught. There wouldn't be enough room In the jail to house all the vote-buyers and sellers In this county." Sherman Neace was elected Perry judge-executive in 1985. In the primary and general elections that year, Neace paid 27 "workers" a total of $91,600 in cash an average of nearly $3,400 apiece to "set up precincts," as he describes it. Neace says he had no knowledge of vote-buying on his behalf.

But among the recipients of his largess, who included several people widely reputed to be vote-buyers, was Fu-gate. He received $3,000 a few days before the primary. "I don't see how most of them (candidates for whom he has bought votes) could help but know what I did with the money," Fugate says. "Sherman probably didn't, because he didn't know me. He didn't tell me to buy votes, and he didn't give me the money.

A friend did. But most people who hire me know what I'll do. I'll buy votes." Fugate owes his present job as a courthouse maintenance worker to Neace's administration, which hired him after the election. Fugate says he didn't buy any votes during this year's primary election, but only because nobody offered him any money. He supported Wallace Wilkinson, the eventual Democratic nominee, and laments that he wasn't able to ply his trade on Wilkinson's behalf.

"We would have picked him up 1,000 more votes in Perry County," Fugate says. An additional 1,000 votes would have more than doubled Wilkinson's total in the county but still would have left him far behind the winner, Grady Stumbo. The 38-year-old Fugate, a high school graduate who has also worked as a truck driver and a security guard, has been given from $150 to $3,000 to spend in elections over the years. When he was starting out, he bought votes for $5 apiece and gave whiskey away when he ran out of money. "Any election I work in, I've got Pennsylvania governor home after heart surgery HERSHEY, Pa.

(AP) Gov. Robert Casey went home from the hospital yesterday, 11 days after undergoing quadruple-bypass surgery. The governor looked pale and drawn as he walked slowly to his car, but he smiled and said, "I feel wonderful and am anxiously looking forward to getting back to work." Doctors said the 55-year-old Casey would probably return to work full time in about six weeks. Casey suffered a mild heart attack sometime between Aug. 31, when he had a physical examination, and Sept 29, when he was admitted to the hospital, doctors said.

i caught buying votes, Fugate says he's going to quit after he runs again for county office in two years. WE PRACTICE IN PROBATE "Sooner or later the courts will make an example of someone," he says. "I don want to be no exam' pie." Edwin J. LowTy Edwin J. Lomtv, Jr.

Attorneys 621 West Main St. 587-7711 J'jh Stella Hurt "People ought to vote the way they want to" Ntewrtv 'mm 1 Our practice includes disputes between heirs, lawsuits to settle estates, and contests over wills. We provide complete legal services relating to wills, executors, administrators, and estate settlement. We work with estates of all sizes even those requiring no administration. We handle financial management for the elderly, powers of attorney, curator duties, guardianships, and incompetencies.

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Pearlman, MSCCC-A Mr. Pearlman has his Master's Degree in Audiology and has been issued his certificate of clinical competence by the I American Speech and Hearing I Association. He has years of experience in the fitting and dispensing of hearing aids. ceived. As they related when they testified in the election-fraud case: At the poll, the Williamses met Denny Ray Combs, who had visited their home before the primary to line up their votes.

Combs then took them, one at a time, into the booth. "He never give me no chance. He just pulled them (the levers) hisself and that was it," E. C. Williams testified.

"And pushed me out the door. I never seen no names for nobody." Ruschie Williams said she had no idea which candidates Combs voted for on her behalf. "I couldn't even see the names," she said. Once outside, the couple said, Combs flung $20 into the car in which they were riding. The Williamses said in a recent interview that they have not sold their votes since that election more than six years ago.

In fact, Ruschie Williams has not been back to the polling place and has been purged from the roll of eligible voters. "I ain't never votin' no more," she said. "Goin' to court agitated me to death." Both acknowledge that they knew vote selling was wrong. "I've known Denny Ray for years. He just talked us right into it," said E.C.

Williams, who quit school after the first grade and draws disability pay after years of working in the mines. "I only did it because they gave me the money." Combs was indicted in October 1981 for buying E. Williams' vote. Like Spencer, Combs pleaded guilty and was fined $250 and costs. Vote-seller regrets her decision Continued from Page One there a few minutes later, and I give it to Lula (Neace, an election official), and she asked me did I need help voting, and I said 'yes' because it was my first time.

"She got in there and she hollered for Dorothy (Hamblin, another election official). And so Dorothy came in and the curtain was shut, and they started, you know, voting me and when they got finished she said, 'You have to pull this little red button here That "little red button" serves to record the votes cast and to open the voting-machine curtain Manipulating it was Stella Hurt's only overt act inside the booth. She neither cast any votes nor told the women which levers to pull for She simply handed them the slate of candidates that Spencer had given her outside. They did the rest. A month later, Hurt could recall only one candidate for whom a vote had been cast on her behalf.

Although state law requires a voter receiving assistance to swear that he or she is illiterate, blind or otherwise disabled, Stella Hurt was not required to do so and did not. She was neither illiterate nor disabled. After husband and wife had voted, Raymond Hurt received $40 for the two tainted ballots. He had rejected offers of assistance Inside the booth and "earned" his money without even voting for Spencer's slate. Just a few minutes before the Hurts arrived at the Butterfly precinct to vote, 60-year-old E.

C. Williams and his wife, Ruschie, left their house at Grapevine to vote at the Chavies school. Unlike the Hurts, whose vote-selling was a spurof the-moment decision, the Williamses had already been visited by a vote buyer who had promised I hem money in exchange for balk ts correctly cast. And unlike th? Hurts, who were capable of casting their own votes, the Williamses were not. E.

C. Williams is illiterate, and his wife's eyesight is so poor that she cannot see printed words. Thus, both legally qualified for assistance. But they were not entitled, by law, Earn up to 9 with our new Fast Growth CD Liberty's Fast Growth CD starts at a generous 6.5 annual rate and then quickly grows. In six months it begins earning 7.75.

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456-583 1 Ste. No.S, 827 Eastern Clarksville, Ind. M-F Sat Mwntxn of th Acxtomy of Dlpning AucDolotftts. Ptl. 284-2628 As the Williamses recalled the 1981 election and their regrets concerning it, a half dozen of their grandchildren crowded around to listen.

But perhaps they weren't listening closely enough. "They're payin' $25 a vote now," offered one of the boys, who was perhaps 13. He sounded excited, almost envious. Tomorrow: To raise the kind of money it takes to win a governor's race in Kentucky, candidates are forced to make promises for jobs, contracts and appointments to statj boards. Rjfi offnrd Mr suhject to change.

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