The Palm Beach Post from West Palm Beach, Florida • Page 108

Hurricane-Force Warning Issued for '85 Major Atlantic storm 16 14 12 Total number of storms. CORAL GABLES (AP) The upcoming hurricane season is the most likely one in several years to produce a catastrophic storm like the 1935 killer that tore through the Florida Keys, forecasters warn. And the dangers of such a hurricane are made more extreme by the fact that since 1935 many more people have moved onto vulnerable coastal lands that are difficult to evacuate. Forecasters use increasingly sophisticated tools, including radar, satellites, computers and reconnaissance planes, to measure and track storms that can grow into hurricanes. But technology hasn't been able to keep up with exploding population growth along coastlines, said hurricane specialist Robert Sheets.

"Our (forecasting) skill level is not sufficient to tell people in the 30 hours they need (to evacu ate) in many areas," he said. "We try to provide 12 hours of daylight warning." Sheets is deputy director of the National Hurricane Center, where forecasters are preparing for the 1985 Atlantic hurricane season, which opens Saturday and runs through November. This year's tropical storms will be named Ana, Bob, Claudette, Danny, Elena, Fabian, Gloria, Henri, Isabel, Juan, Kate, Larry, Mindy, Nicholas, Odette, Peter, Rose, Sam, Teresa, Victor and Wanda. The 1935 hurricane, strongest ever recorded in the Western Hemisphere, predates the practice of naming tropical storms and is known only as the Labor Day hurricane. It slashed the Florida Keys just 36 hours after it was sighted as a tropical storm over the Bahamas on Aug.

31 and killed more than 400 people. If such a storm slammed Florida's southeast coast this year, a half-million people would have to be evacuated, a feat that would probably be impossible with so little time, Sheets said. "You'd see property damages of at least $10 billion; in terms of loss of life, hundreds to thousands," he said. Evacuation time for the upper Florida Keys is estimated at 30 hours; no plan exists for evacuating the lower Keys because it would be pointless with only one two-lane highway across the chain of islands. The time is approximately the same for Miami's Key Biscayne and other barrier islands.

Forecasters say coastal residents have reason to be concerned because El Nino, a Pacific weather phenomenon that has suppressed formation of massive storms in the tropics in the last few years, shouldn't linger into the summer. Unlike last year, when only one tropical storm and one hurricane from the Atlantic basin made Turn to HURRICANES, A4 Hurricanes IK 10 8 ,6 4 2 I 1971 72 "73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 '83 '84 Chicago Tribune Graphic; Sourc: National Waathar Servica SOUTH COUNTY The Palm Beach Post Copyright0 1985 Tl Pott WEST PALM BEACH, FLORIDA THURSDAY, MAY 30, 1985 112 PAGES 25 CENTS VOL. LXXVII NO. 78 BBaHBHOBHaa eagan: It iff Overhaul Conferees Seek Tax Accord Legislators Bid To End Session i '-5. 'l I JUT nevitable i it Jl.

i 7 i Belgian riot police try to hold back the fence as soccer fans push forward prior to game Wall Collapses; Scores Trampled Stadium Riot Kills 40 Soccer Fans By Brian E. Crowley THhSM Bureau TALLAHASSEE Determined to end this year's legislative session tonight, House and Senate leaders met late last night in an effort to reach agreement on a new transportation tax program. Negotiators were heading toward an agreement which would allow local governments to increase the gas tax by as much as 4 cents per gallon. Counties and cities also would be given additional authority to issue road construction bonds. Also, tolls on Florida's Turnpike which were scheduled to end next year, would be continued.

However, South Florida legislators are insisting that the tolls be used only in the counties where they are collected. Others have proposed placing the money in the general road fund. But legislative leaders still weren't able to reach an agreement late last night. Sen. Jack Gordon (D-Miami) was opposing a move by the House to purchase additional bonds with the turnpike tolls.

He wants to spend the tolls as they are collected rather than lose money on bond interest payments. Another element would keep the current gasoline sales tax at 5.7 cents per gallon. The tax was scheduled to be reduced slightly next year. But rather than lose those transportation dollars, House and Senate leaders agreed to keep the tax at the current level. House Transportation Committee Chairman Steve Pajcic (D-Jackson-ville) was pushing a so-called "matching funds" program which would require the state to spend $200 for every $800 a local government spent on qualified road projects.

During a meeting with Pajcic, Gov. Bob Graham expressed concern about the the matching funds program. Graham indicated that he might not support the program if local governments did not receive the same level of free state funding during the next five years which was promised by the Legislature in 1983. Pajcic said his proposal would not severly hurt that promise. Instead, it would reward counties "such as Palm Beach and Broward which have been willing to do everything they can for road construction," he said.

"If those counties are willing to Turn to LEGISLATURE, A4 Current Tax System Called 'Old Jalopy' Plan Benefits Florida, A12 Business Leaders React, A13 Post Wirt Strvlcn WASHINGTON President Reagan declared yesterday that an overhaul of the nation's tax code is "all but inevitable" and said that under his plan, "Making ends meet is going to be a lot easier for a lot of people." In a speech before an audience that the White House said would benefit from Reagan's plan, the president denounced the current system as unfair and as "an old jalopy" and said the country has only two options: "We can either declare April 15 (the tax-filing deadline) a day of national mourning or we can change the system. And I don't think Americans can recognize an injustice without trying to change it." Barely acknowledging that any opposition has been voiced to his proposal, Reagan said: "Even those in this town who are still reluctant are being lifted up and carried forward by the momentum of public support for a fundamental change in our tax laws. Once called impossible, tax fairness and simplification are now all but inevitable." The president's assessment of the prospects for change was more optimistic than that offered by Treasury Secretary James Baker, who said, "We have a fair shot at getting this through Congress this year a fair shot at keeping it reasonably intact." Baker added, "Nobody ever said it's going to be easy." From Reagan at the White House to Vice President George Bush speaking before the convention of Rotary International in Kansas City, the administration put on a major push to sell the tax plan the president unveiled Tuesday night. Baker appeared on two morning network television shows to tout the package and White House chief of staff Donald Regan appeared on a third program. "Fifty-eight percent of the American people benefit from this as they get a tax reduction," Regan said.

"Twenty-one percent of us no change. Twenty-one percent are hurt. "We're going to rely on the 79 percent that benefit overall from this to help us in gaining this victory," Regan said on ABC's Good Morning America. "In other words, it got to be the people against them, the special interests." In general, the biggest winners in Reagan's program would be the lowest-income families, people who do not itemize or who claim few deductions and wealthy Americans. Under Reagan's plan, a hypothetical two-earner couple with $45,000 income and no children would have to pay almost $300 more.

If the same couple had two dependent children, their tax bill would drop by $165. Reagan addressed a group in the East Room that White House deputy press secretary Larry Speakes said Turn to TAXES, All BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) At least 40 people were killed and more than 100 injured in a riot last night between fans of British and Italian teams about to play the Super Bowl of European soccer. Most of the victims were trampled to death or crushed under a wall that collapsed, said Louis Wouters, president of the Belgian Soccer Federation, who reported the death toll. But he demanded an autopsy for two of the victims who he said were either stabbed or shot. Officials said the riot started when British fans broke through a wire fence and surged into an Italian section.

Television crews set up for the game broadcast it to millions of fans watching worldwide. A brick wall collapsed as panicked fans tried to escape over it, and mangled bodies piled on top of one other. Broken metal crowd-control barriers were used as stretchers to carry the victims out of Heysel Stadium. The game the Cup of Champions final matching Europe's best professional teams was played after a 90-minute delay during which police and riot troops gained control of the stadium. The Juventus team of Turin, Italy, beat Liverpool of England 1-0 on a penalty kick.

Police had urged that the game be played, fearing more violence if it were called off. Large sections of the stands were empty during the contest except for clothing and personal belongings stained with blood. Wouters said the victims included 25 Italians, seven Belgians, one French citizen and eight people still not identified. Bodies of many of the Italian victims lay outside the stadium covered with the black and white flags of the Juventus team. Wouters said more than 100 people had been injured.

Police said 117 people were admitted to hospitals, including nine in critical condition, and about 150 others suffered lesser injuries. A Brussels fire brigade chief, Col. Hugo van Gompel, told reporters that there had been no English victims, adding "Your British football fans are murderers and you can quote me." Bars around the stadium were closed, and police patrolled to avert new riots after the game. Belgian authorities had mobilized more than 2,000 police outside the stadium, but spectators said there were too few inside. Soccer, which stirs nationalistic passions almost everywhere it is played, has been plagued by hooliganism for years.

In Britain, where the problem is among the worst, extra police are assigned to stadiums and drinking often is banned. "This is the defeat of soccer, the end of the European Cup," said Michel Hidalgo, the former French national coach, who watched the bloody melee in the stadium. In London, Prime Minister Marga-Turn to RIOT, A4 1 THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Dead, injured lie on stadium steps game was played after 90-minute delay Pahokee Laborer Gets 3 Life Terms Gemayel Uninjured Lebanon President Amin Gemayel 'miraculously escapes unhurt' after two shells smash into his office. And, King Hussein, in Washington to speak with President Reagan, said that Jordan and the PLO now on holding negotiations for peace with Israel. Stories, A2 irrp lit; 7.v t' rt I ii-r- J- Partly Cloudy Mrs.

Hartman, who later described the crimes for police by writing down answers to their questions on paper, said Harris tried to force her to come with him after the rape, but she convinced him it was too cold outside. Harris left the couple's home after taking frozen foods from the Hartman's freezer. Police found the food in Harris' house at 795 Padgett Circle and they found his finger and palm prints in the Hartman home. Mrs. Hartman provided a detailed description of Harris and identified him in a lineup, according to records.

After his arrest, Harris admitted breaking into the home and beating Ha. but he denied any memory of the rape of Mrs. Hartman. Mrs. Hartman has moved from Pahokee and now lives with a nephew in another state, Perhacs said.

She and police agreed to the plea deal. Harris' grandmother, Annie Harris, broke down and cried in the middle of the hearing and left the courtroom in tears. She had helped Harris' mother, Sarah Bell Harris, raise Harris, an Uth-grade dropout, from a young age, Assistant Public Defender Rich- ard Greene said. The three life sentences will run consecutively, which means that Harris will remain in prison until he dies, Perhacs said. "He's not going anywhere, unless in the year 2050 the governor decides that our practices were barbaric and changes it," he said.

0- i Man Pleads Guilty To Terrorizing Pair By Ron Bishop StiH Wrlttr While his grandmother wept, a mildly retarded Pahokee laborer pleaded guilty yesterday to subjecting an elderly deaf-mute couple to a night of terror in their Pahokee home two years Ronnie Lee Harris received three life sentences for the Thanksgiving 1983 murder of Bennie Hartman, 76, and the rape of his 83-year-old wife, Beulah Hartman, during an early morning burglary of their home at 452 Friend Terrace. Harris, 20, said he accepted the plea offer to avoid a trial that might have ended with a sentence of death in the electric chair. "I'd rather live than die any day because my life means more to me than to let someone pull the switch and let me die," Harris told Circuit Judge Richard Burk. Prosecutor Pablo Perhacs said the state attorney's office offered the plea deal to avoid tying the case up in anticipated appeals had a jury convicted Harris and recommended the death penalty. "My gut feeling is that a jury could have given him the death penalty for the wrong reason and it would have come back (for a second trial)," Perhacs said.

"Mrs. Hartman is a very lovable, dear old lady and a jury could have emotionally fallen for her They might have recommended the death penalty because he raped her, and that is not 'K THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Emlllo Vazquez Jr.THE POST Harris listens to attorney a legal reason under Florida law This is final. It's over with." Harris was arrested for first-degree murder, sexual battery with force and armed burglary Nov. 26, 1983 the same day of the crimes. Police said he entered the couple's home about 2 a.m.

through a kitchen window, and severely beat the husband before tying him up with a belt. The husband died about five hours later at a hospital from head injuries and strangulation, according to a medical examiner, but Perhacs said there was little if any evidence that Harris killed Hartman with premeditation. After beating Hartman, Harris woke up Mrs. Hartman and raped her repeatedly at knifepoint, according to court records. Inside Today Business D10 Classified Ads C6-18 Comics B16 Contact ci Editorials A16 Horoscope C3 Steve Hummer Dl Legislature A14 Letters A16 Listening Post A17 AAichals B14 Obituaries C6 Stocks Dll-15 Theaters C5 Ron Wiggins Bl TV Listings TV Sports D8 CTM TMI Protesters Arrested Pennsylvania State Police remove a protester from the front gate of the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant yesterday after the Nuclear Regulatory Commission decided to reopen the plant's undamaged reactor.

Police arrested 83 during the protest. Story, A3.