The Des Moines Register from Des Moines, Iowa • Page 2

2 A 1 HE DES MOINES REGISTER Monday, January 8, 1990 Vis iJXi RlNDY EVANS, Iowa Mwt editor, 515-284-8065 DATELIHE IOWA Legislators return today for 1990 session Kleckner criticizes reactions to ag 'Bible' Iowa Legislature Tha House and Senate convene ni nawhu raramnnlai and committee meetinas. Tha action ttarta In earnest at 10 a.m. Tuesday, when Gov. Terry Branstad presents his legislative proposals in the annual condition of the state speech and delivers his budget recommendations. How long Twill session In a nnu aknrion tha 1000 UDjllnn.

lanislativ loader haVS adopted a plan to complete their work by March 31, but the session easily could spill into the first week of April. Lawmakers will receive a $40-a-day Til ReofcM reconvenes at 10 a.m. today with agenda last? HEEL 3 a3) 61 Democrats 39 Republicans session Abortion Although most legislators arent spoiling for a fight over this volatile issue, anti-abortion forces are expected to press for a ban on privately financed abortion at University Hospitals in Iowa City and other abortion restrictions. Environment Proposals to Improve energy conservation are expected to be at the top of the Legislature environmental juire ion Interstate banking The House and Senate last year approved different version of a bill to allow interstate banking in Iowa. This year, lawmaker appear to be near an agreement on the issue, which has been debated for year.

That would mean bank-holding companies from outside Iowa could acquire banks here. Smoking Critics of the current law restricting smoking say it contains too many loopholes and is virtually unenforceable. Branstad recommend raising penalties and expanding smoking restrictions to include most restaurants. Home schools Last year, the Legislature failed to approve a plan to relax state regulation of home schools that donl use state-certified teachers. But Branstad and (he Iowa Board of Education are pressing for a compromise.

Pat Murphy, 30, a Dubuque Democrat, was elected to the House to fill the seat vacated when Michael Connolly moved to the Senate. Murphy, who writes computer program manuals for CyCare Systems Join his older brother in the Legislature. Larry Murphy of Oelwein Is serving hi second term as a state senator. 3 Continued from Page One the political rhetoric In the Legislature will be turned up a notch or two. "Potentially it could be a very political session with all those people running for governor," said Hultman.

A leadership struggle among House Democrats over who will succeed Avenson as speaker will add to the political intrigue. Like last year, Democrats outnumber Republicans in the House by a 61-39 margin, and Democrats hold a 30 20 edge in the Senate. The decision of legislative leaders to get the 1990 session off to a fast start, with House and Senate appropriations committees actually beginning their budget work in December, probably helps explain why legislators have deluged the Legislative Service Bureau with such a large number of bill-drafting requests for so early in the year. Because lawmakers will decide not to go forward with some of their ideas, only a portion of the bills that have been drafted actually will be introduced, and only a fraction of them will be passed. The 1989 session produced 3,135 requests for bills to be drafted.

Some 1,347 bills actually were introduced and only about 320 became law. The shorter 1990 session isn't expected to be as prolific. But the 50 some bills waiting to be introduced today provide a flavor for some of the issues facing lawmakers this year. On the volatile abortion issue, a small group of Democratic and Republican representatives proposes that doctors be required to conduct "viability" tests to determine whether fetuses believed to be in the second trimester of development can live outside the womb. If the fetuses can survive, doctors are prohibited under most circumstances from terminating the pregnancies.

Also, a trio of Republicans who opposed legislation last year allowing casino-style gambling on river boats is offering a bill to repeal the law. There also is a pair of proposals to toughen Iowa's drunken-driving laws. The "potty parity" bill sponsored by Senator Beverly Hannon, an Ana-mosa Democrat, would require that women's restrooms in government buildings constructed or renovated after 1990 be equipped with twice as many toilets as men's restrooms. Hannon says women take more time in restrooms than men, but builders often make no allowance for that in buildings used by the public. He said when he makes his annual presidential report today, he plans to tell the 7,000 delegates of his concern about current emphasis on methods of sustainable agriculture that have limited use of farm chemicals.

"I am concerned because so very little solid research has been done that many assumptions appear to be offered as fact," he said. "In many farmers' minds, It Is easy to exchange the word 'sustainable' with which is a type of low-input, low-income farming associated with the so-called good old days when food supplies were uncertain and farmers were poor. "It is also worrisome that alternative agriculture appears to define what environmentalists think farmers should do, rather than what must be done to assure a truly sustainable meaning profitable and competitive American farming system," he said. On other topics, Kleckner said: Farmers like the 1985 farm bill. Most of its features will be included in the 1990 farm bill.

Environmental- ists will have a major say in the new farm bill, Kleckner believes. "Farmers are environmentalists, too," he said, but they are fearful of tighter laws and regulations, Trade worldwide should be "fre- er," but Kleckner doesn't see subsidies ending in foreign countries or in the United SUtes. The best rural development is a "good, prosperous agriculture" and with local not federal leadership. Kleckner is completing his second two-year term as president of the na-. tional Farm Bureau, which gained 110,000 members last year.

Its membership now is 3.8 million. Opposing the Iowan in his re-election bid here is the national vice president, Harry S. Bell, president of the South Carolina Farm Bureau for nearly 20 years. Bush set to speak at Farm Bureau meeting President George Bush is scheduled to speak at the national Farm Bureau meeting in Orlando today in the Orlando-Orange County Convention Center. The president's speech is scheduled to follow tha annual report by American Farm Bureau President Dean Kleckner of Rudd, la.

By DON MUHM Rcthtar Pwm idwr ORLANDO, FLA. A recent report on alternative agriculture Is being considered in Washington, D.C., as "the new mmti of farming despite a lack of research on its tenets, the A A presioent or me jJi-hv American at 111 Bureau Federation i said nere aunuay. Dean Kleckner, in a news conference before the opening of the 71st annual convention 4 OIAN KLICKNIR of the American Farm Bureau Federation, criticized reaction to the report and added that the Farm Bureau is "becoming increasingly critical of challenges to the farmer's right to produce." These challenges come from animal rights activists, from those who promote a low-production, minimal agriculture and those who would slow down or deny the application of new farm technology, said Kleckner, an Iowa hog farmer from Rudd. Specifically, he criticized the report on alternative agriculture published last fall by the National Academy of Science as being viewed by national legislators as "the new Bible" on bow to farm. "I have no problem with the academy" or its report, Kleckner told reporters.

"Our problem is more with the interpretation of the alternative agriculture report than with the report itself. "They deal a lot with assumptions; there's very little solid research done "Let's not forget that American agriculture got as productive as it is today by cooperation with land-grant colleges. We developed the most productive farming system in the world by cooperating with them," he said. "Now, apparently based on this book and perhaps some other studies, suddenly every farmer in the country can adopt something new overnight. The report doesn't say that, but that's what's being interpreted.

And I think we need to stand up and say, 'We can't do that" "Farmers are adopting alternative agriculture procedures I'm doing it on my Iowa farm. I'm using less chemicals, less fertilizer than I used some years ago," Kleckner said. said, is that typical victims of weight-reduction schemes are too embarrassed or feel too guilty to file complaints. "They feel it's their own fault if they don't lose weight," she said. That's why Cleland believes weight-reduction fraud is particularly vicious and Iowa officials don't wait for complaints to act against such firms.

"It preys on others' psychological needs," he said. "It's a market where victims have a psychological dependency." GARY FANDELTh Rwlltor Iowa an aggressive foe of weight-loss scams Pickup truck strikes, kills exchange student TM Rfoltter't tewa Ntwl trvlc FREDERICKSBURG, IA. A 15- year-old exchange student from Ja pan was killed about 6:25 p.m. Satur day near here when he was struck by a pickup while riding his bicycle. Chickasaw County sheriff's offi cials said Aklo Kimura, who was liv ing at the Daniel McFarland home in rural Fredericksburg, was struck by a pickup driven by James Kuennen, 34, of rural Maynard.

The accident occurred as the youth was riding his bicycle on a county gravel road. Mason City native charged with taking football money MASON CITY, IA. (AP) A Mason City native who started the ill-fated North Iowa Bulls semi-professional football team has been charged with taking money from a football league in Florida. Ed Esquivel was charged with grand theft, a felony in Florida, for converting to his use "several" thousand dollars of the American Pass-ball League. Police in Maitland, say Esquivel made false claims to persuade the American Passball League to hire him as commissioner.

American passball is a nine-map sport similar to American football. Esquivel's resume mentioned the North Iowa Bulls, which never played a game, although Esquivel organized a squad in 1988. "He told them great and wonderful things about what he'd done" with the league, said Maitland Police Detective Pat Taylor. Taylor said Esquivel was charged in December. He is free on bond while awaiting trial, which has not been set.

Poll: 60 percent oppose casino in Council Bluffs COUNCIL BLUFFS, IA. (AP) -An Omaha newspaper poll on a high- stakes gambling casino that has been proposed for Council Bluffs indicates that 60 percent of those surveyed oppose the operation. Of the 244 Omaha residents surveyed in the Omaha World-Herald poll published Sunday, 60 percent disapproved of casino gambling in Council Bluffs, 34 percent approved and 6 percent said they did not know. The Santee Sioux Indian Tribe of Nebraska has announced plans to work with a Lake Tahoe, casino company to open a gambling casino near the Bluffs Run dog racing track in Council Bluffs. The telephone poll, conducted by SRI Research Center Inc.

of Lincoln, had a margin of error of plus or minus 6.3 percentage points. Dubuque officials arrest fugitive on felony charges Th Rteister't Iowa Newt Strvtc DUBUQUE, IA. Dennis Sharkey, a Dubuque man who eluded authorities for three months after stolen property was discovered at his home, was arrested and jailed Friday in Dubuque County. Dubuque County sheriff's officials said they issued an arrest warrant Oct. 19 for Sharkey, 48.

He disappeared from the Dubuque area shortly thereafter. Relying on tips from sources, officials found Sharkey living on a farm in Clayton County. He is being held on three counts of felony theft as well as an unrelated charge of tampering with a witness. Bond has been set at $101,000. Cherokee administrator named superintendent TOLEDO, IA.

(AP) An administrator from the Mental Health Institute at Cherokee has been named superintendent of the Iowa Juvenile Home in Toledo, the Iowa Department of Human Services announced. Robert L. Eppler has been academic principal at the Cherokee institute since 1974, supervising educational services to children there. Before that, he was an instructor at Cherokee for eight years. He begins his new job Jan.

22. Investigation of cow-mutilation continues Tht RtdiMr'i towt Nnri SarvK THAYER, IA. The sheriff's investigation of a November cow mutilation near here is continuing despite a dearth of leads, officials say. The mutilation of a cow at the Lloyd Abbott farm had possible signs of satanic ritual, said Union County Sheriff John Coulter. So far, the investigation has produced "a lot of misinformation and a little information," he said.

Coulter said he's pursued rumors of a witches' coven in the area, but "I don't know if it's a full-fledged coven qr kids playing." expense allowance. 1 How the parties stack up I sflWi. 30 Democrats 20 Republicans fterHssliieTto'watch this Lottery spending Rather than putting lottery profits in a fund that's been used principally for economic development, Branstad, a Republican, recommends puttng the money in a fund used for general support of government. But Democrats, who control the Legislature, want to earmark lottery profits for environmental protection. Drug Democratic and Republican leaders have narrowed their differences over tactics to use in battling drugs, but Branstad' recommendation to crack down on drunken drivers is expected to face stiff opposition.

Prison Lawmakers must decide how to deal with the problem of prison crowding. They are expected to use a combination of approaches, but building a state pnson near Newton probably wont be one of them. Property tax Legislative leaders have pledged to find a plan to provide $30 million in additional property tax relief, but the debate over which taxpayers should receive the benefit could turn into a nasty fight between rural and urban lawmakers. Collage tuition Proposals to lower community college tuition and adopt a one-year tuition freeze at the three state universities enjoy the backing of legislative leaders who argue that a public education should be made more affordable, but Branstad doesn't like the idea of the Legislature setting tuition policy. Newcomers Stewart Iverson 39, is a farmer from Dows, who was elected to the House in a special election to fill the eat opened when House Minority Leader Delwyn Stromer resigned.

A Republican, he has been appointed to the education and local government committee and the justice systems subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee. and they "did absolutely nothing," he said. William Roach, a spokesman for Miller, calls weight-reduction schemes "a vicious kind of fraud" because many customers already have low self-esteem and are "conditioned to failure." Iowa is among the most aggressive states in pursuing perpetrators of such fraud, said Frances Berg, editor of Obesity Health, a periodical for health professionals. Assistant Attorney General Richard Cleland, who heads the consumer protection division of the attorney general's office, said Iowa has more such cases than any other state or the Food and Drug Administration. "It was determined a few years ago that health fraud would be a priority," he said.

This year, Obesity Health inaugurated its Clipped Fleece Awards, naming six products and practices as the year's worst examples of weight-reduction fraud. Among them are the Fat Magnet and "Diet Patches," which the periodical calls "snake oil on a Band-Aid." After complaints by the Iowa attorney general's office, Baker received a refund. The Iowa case against Fat Magnet has not yet come to trial. In a dozen or so other lawsuits, involving some 25 defendants over the past three years, the state has collected thousands of dollars in fines and refunds and obtained court orders against the marketing of many products in Iowa. As the result of court action against a firm called Consumer Direct Inc.

of Canton, Ohio which sold "Formula 75," "Fat-Off 75," "Quicktrim II," "Dyna Slim" and "Slim Again" $32,000 was refunded to about 4,600 lowans and the state collected $20,000 in fines. More than a dozen lawsuits, including two in Iowa, were filed against Meditrend International Inc. of San Diego, the manufacturer of diet patches, which according to court documents have grossed $20 million nationwide. Official-Sounding Names eland said makers and sellers of such products typically adopt official-sounding names, such as "National Dietary Research and advertise in newspapers, supermarket tabloids and on television that their products are "safe," "natural," represent a "scientific breakthrough," are "effortless" and "fast." in and offer testimonials that are usually staged. Nancy Mann, advertising operations manager for The Des Moines Register, said that to help protect the consumer, the newspaper requires that advertising intended to simulate news stories must be labeled and set in type other than that used for news articles.

Still, some readers are fooled. Obesity Health's Berg said many states pursue only auto and other consumer fraud and do nothing about weight-loss scams. One reason, she mnmmm -for Fred I Fnrm a 1 Golfers want liquor at course in Mason City By PATRICK BEACH RtaltNr Staff Writer Herman Berding Sr. would like to add a watering hole to the Highland Park Golf Course In Mason City, but some residents say selling liquor at the city's only public golf course runs counter to anti-drug campaigns. Berding, who runs the concession operation at Highland Park, is asking the city to approve a license to sell liquor at the golf course, which already has credentials to sell beer.

"We don't know if it will even go," Berding said. "We'd like to try it one year, and if it works, fine. If it doesn't, we'll take it out. We're not trying to run a full bar. We'd just like to serve the people what they want." Other residents don't wholeheart-' edly endorse the idea.

Ernie Zerble, a member of the city's park board, thinks the idea might confuse the. anti-drug message Mason City is attempting to convey to its residents. "If alcohol is a drug, and if Mason City is very effective in saying no to drugs we seem to be one of the top cities in saying no to drugs I don't think, in our park system, we should promote drugs," Zerble said. "I think parks are for enjoyment. We don't need a bunch of drunks down there tromping through the flower beds." Zerble says he received some 60 calls on the issue, all of them opposed to selling liquor at the clubhouse.

Berding says he's talked only to golfers, and all of them support it Then there's City Councilman Joe Cookman, who says the public opinion he's heard is equally divided. "The golfers seem to want it and the people in the neighborhood don't want it," he said. "I'm on the line right now. I can see both sides of it" Cookman said his concern is that youths and non-drinkers might be exposed to the drinking of hard liquor because the clubhouse now is one room. If liquor is to be consumed there, Cookman said he wants to see it done in a separate area.

Another bone of contention is exactly who will decide the issue. Cookman says it ultimately will be up to the City Council. Zerble says the city code likely will have to be amended to allow liquor consumption in city parks, then the park board will decide on whether to grant the request. By TOM CARNEY Staff Writer When he saw it in the newspaper, Britt Baker thought it was a news story on a medical breakthrough. The headline was something like, "FDA releases new drug," said Baker, of Des Moines, who at 225 pounds and 5 feet, 10 inches tall was intrigued by what he thought was the discovery of an easy, safe way to lose weight.

"I thought it was a medical breakthrough," he said. "There were names of doctors who had developed it and testimonials. It upset me that I'd be so gullible to fall for a scam like that." Baker saw an advertisement for one of dozens of weight-reduction products or services being investigated by officials in Iowa and other states. He is not alone in falling for them. Thousands have become victims of such fraud, estimated to constitute a $10 billion-a-year business.

$49.95 Product The $49.95 product Baker ordered was "Fat Magnet," manufactured by Allied International Corp. of Beverly Hills, Calif. The company claimed the pill, developed by "two prominent doctors at a world famous hospital in Los Angeles," breaks into "thousands of particles, each acting like a tiny magnet, attracting and trapping many times its size in undigested fat particles. "Then, all the trapped fat and calo ries are naturally flushed out of your body." Allied International, said Iowa Attorney General Thomas J. Miller's staff, claims the product is a result of doctors' invention of a "lazy way to lose weight" and that the pills "automatically help reduce calories by eliminating dietary fat, with no exercising." State officials have another view.

State documents say that the ingredients listed in Fat Magnet various plant fibers and bile extract "would not be expected to inhibit fat absorption," in the opinion of experts. "Moreover," they say, "if it were possible to inhibit fat absorption significantly, the absorption of essential vitamins such as and would also be inhibited, so that such a product should only be taken with medical supervision." Two bottles of the pills came in Baker's order, along with a guarantee they would begin to work within a couple of days. He took them for 10 days, faithfully following directions. 1 -7T -YU I '1 W' Richard Cleland, bead ef the consumer protection divisioa of the attorney general' office, demonstrates a patch-type appetite control program. The directions include applying the patch te the right wrist Cleland aggressively parson suspicious weight-red actios products and services.

The bottles of tablets front of him are among the wtiht-lo products he has investigated..