The Des Moines Register from Des Moines, Iowa • Page 1

TKE INDEX Branstad I 3gT makes plea fgjg as drought fXZ hits farms iy 3 Page5S I Oilers ice I the Bruins in 4 to win nTfVflg Stanley Gap Page IS 1 1 'Kid who MTfi didn'tgo 5 0 to school1 to graduate ffcf? Page IT kMIJI'tLaj THE WEATHER Partly sunny today; highs in the mid- to upper 80s. Partly cloudy and mild tonight; lows from 60 to 65. Mostly sunny and warmer Saturday; highs in the mid-80s to 90. Sunrise: 5:45 a.m.; sunset: 8:39 p.m. Details: 5T.

Ann Landers 5T Business 5S Classified Comics 4T Crossword 2T Editorials 6A Letters 7A Lotteries 5T Sports 4S TV schedules 2T Slje tics ilahtes A SECTION Copyright 1986 Oes Moints Register and Tribune Companv A Gannett Newspaper ri v- ffrfi 'A THE NEWSPAPER IOWA DEPENDS UPON Iks Moines, Iowa, Friday, May 27, 1988 Price 3St ession cut 'hi: April jobless rate in state sharply lower wrangling umn.it Reagan already looking to another 1988 meeting By OWEN ULLMANN 1988 Knight-Ridder Newspapers HELSINKI, FINLAND U.S. and Soviet officials Thursday engaged in some last-minute wrangling over arrangements for the Moscow summit, which starts Sunday, as President Reagan spoke optimistically about chances for another superpower meeting this year. In an unusual move so close to Reagan's first visit to the Soviet Union, the Kremlin unexpectedly canceled one of the five sessions the president was scheduled to hold with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. And in another sudden dispute, the Soviets objected to one of the religious groups that had been invited by Reagan to be with him Monday during a visit to a monastery, White House officials here disclosed. Tension Over Visit Administration officials, while characterizing the scheduling incidents as minor, said they apparently reflect Soviet tension over the first visit by an American president in 14 years and sensitivity over the issue of human rights, which Reagan intends to emphasize during his four-day stay.

Meanwhile, the White House reacted coolly to what might be a conciliatory pre-summit signal from Gorbachev reports that Vietnam has announced plans to withdraw 50,000 Soviet-backed troops from Cambodia. The move suggests Gorbachev plans to follow up the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan with further efforts to reduce regional conflicts between the superpowers. The United States has been demanding Vietnamese troop withdrawals ever since Vietnam invaded Cambodia in 1978. Hopes for 5th Summit Reagan, who flew here Wednesday for a long stopover to rest, planned to prod the Soviets on liberalizing human rights today in a speech in Helsinki, where an international accord on respecting human rights was signed in 1975. In an interview with European newspapers released Thursday, Reagan said he would like to hold another summit with Gorbachev if they can reach agreement on a long-range nuclear missile treaty before the end of Reagan's term next January.

"And then I could see where we SUMMIT Please turn to Page 3A A moment of for 'Glass of irst-quarter growth put at 3.9 percent From Register Wire Services WASHINGTON, D.C. The U.S economy grew at a surprisingly rapid annual rate of 3.9 percent from Janu- ary through March, much better than previously believed, because of the biggest decline in the trade deficit in eight years, the Commerce Depart' ment reported Thursday. The report represented a sharp up ward revision from an initial esti mate made a month ago that the gross national product, the country's total output of goods and services, grew at a more modest 2.3 percent rate in the first quarter. It provided fresh evidence that the economy has escaped unscathed from last fall's stock market crash, and it sent economists scurrying to revise up their growth estimates for the full year. Allen Sinai, chief economist of the Boston said he had revised his forecast to show GNP growth of 3.5 percent for all of 1988.

That would be the fastest rate of growth since 1984. "Amazingly Strong" "The Reagan years are ending with a bang. The first quarter GNP report shows an economy that is amazingly strong and resilient for such an aging expansion," Sinai said. An upward revision was expected, but the magnitude of the adjustment exceeded most predictions. It reflects a vigorous economy that is reaping the benefits of an export boom, brisk business investment and consumer spending, economists said.

"The revised first-quarter gross national product data provided a pleasant surprise, even for those of us consistently more optimistic than the pack," said U.S. Chamber of Commerce deputy chief economist Lawrence Hunter. Although the rapid growth rate fueled concern that an "overheated" economy would spawn a renewed burst of inflation, the GNP report showed prices moderating in the first quarter. The GNP implicit price deflator, a ECONOMY Please turn to Page 3A The Register Gross National Product Percent change from previous quarter at annual rate 8 Quarterly 1st Qtr. '8 3.9 '84 1985 1986 1987 '88 SOURCE: U.S.

Department of Commerce Bv The Associated Press Iowa's jobless rate dropped sharply to 4.4 percent in April on the strength of a recovering construction industry and substantial gains in the service sector of the economy, officials said Thursday. The April rate was down about 24 percent from March's 5.8 percent rate and well below the 6 percent unemployment rate for April of last year, said Richard Freeman, head of the Iowa Department of Employment Services. Freeman said April's lower rate was sparked "by an improved statewide job market, as well as by favorable seasonal factors." Total employment in the state in April stood at 1,395,700, up 29,400 from the previous month and up 35,200 than the same month last year. National Rate There were 64.100 Iowans without jobs during the month. The state's 4.4 percent jobless rate in April was a full point lower than the 5.4 percent national rate.

The April showing marked the third consecutive monthly decline, and Freeman noted that figures released earlier in the week showed that the state's non-farm employment in April surpassed 1979's previous high. The state's economy was generally strong in the 1970s, before stalling in the face of high interest rates and sagging land values through the first years of this decade. Freeman said the construction industry and trade sector of the economy posted the strongest gains during April, but "substantial monthly gains were also reported for service and manufacturing." Construction Gains The construction industry gained 4,500 jobs during the month, officials said. "Most of the gains that occurred in services were concentrated in amusement and recreation for example, JOBLESS Please turn to Page 3A Iowa Unemployment rate A II ASON OJ II A 1987 1988 SOURCE: Iowa Department of Employment Services April I 1988 I g1" 4.4 I 'lrf President Reagan Resting up Mikhail Gorbachev Session scratched The Moscow Poll: Doubts, divisions; Reagan an enigma 1988 New York Times MOSCOW, U.S.S.R. After three years of Mikhail Gorbachev's leadership, about half of the Muscovites say they have yet to see tangible benefits from his program of economic change, according to a poll of Moscow residents conducted for the New York Times and CBS News.

Just 40 percent said they expected the standard of living to improve, and 18 percent predicted things would get worse. However, Muscovites expressed strong support for Gorbachev's overall program, and especially his calls for greater democracy and openness. The poll presents a picture of a Soviet people divided and doubtful about the changes taking place in their country, and even about some of the tenets of the communist system. The vision of America that emerges is also ambivalent. Muscovites see in the United States a land richer and more hard-working than their own, but less humane.

President Reagan is viewed as something of an enigma. The minority who said they knew enough about Reagan to have an opinion about him were narrowly divided, with slightly more responding favorably. silence 19 Never' VALLEY Please turn to Page 3A Schools fo see arrest records of job-seekers By LINDA LANTOR Register Staff Writer Iowa schools can now check state records to see whether candidates for jobs involving contact with children have criminal backgrounds, Iowa Public Safety Commissioner Gene Shepard said Thursday. Some school district officials including those in Davenport, Des Moines and Sioux City said they will request criminal record checks for prospective teachers and other job applicants. Others said they probably won't or aren't sure.

Cryss Farley, executive director of the Iowa Civil Liberties Union, said she wants to study the matter further, but "I think conceivably there could be a problem with it." "We would need to look closely at how such requests would be made and how they would be complied with and how the school district utilized that information and how they would protect the confidentiality of the information," said Farley. Sought Legal Opinion Under state law, youth service agencies such as the Big Brothers and Big Sisters organizations have been able to ask the state for arrest records of people who want to work with children, said Shepard. He recently asked the Iowa attorney general's office on behalf of school officials whether a school district meets the definition of a youth service agency. "The attorney general's office indicates that schools are youth service agencies for the purpose of the appli- TEACHERS Please turn to Page 3A N.Y. to for $5.3 billion nuclear plant ALBANY, N.Y.

(AP) The Shore-ham nuclear power plant, long a burden to Long Island Lighting will be taken over by the state and torn down under an agreement reached Thursday by state officials and the utility. If the agreement, which is subject to many conditions, goes through, it would be the first time a completed nuclear power plant was abandoned before it opened. The deal calling for LILCO to sell the $5.3 billion plant to the state for $1 was a victory for opponents of the facility 55 miles east of Manhattan on the north shore of Long Island. At a news conference Thursday, Gov. Mario Cuomo said the plant should be torn down, rather than mothballed, to prevent its resurrection.

"That would be very much like taking a loaded rifle and storing it in the closet," Cuomo said. While Cuomo said a few details remain to be worked out, he insisted, "We have gotten everything we wanted." "Shoreham has to die, Shoreham will die," he said. The Shoreham project, begun in 1965, ended up 10 years behind schedule and more than 80 times as expensive as originally predicted, driving LILCO to the edge of bankruptcy. Completed in 1984, it never went into service because state and local officials refused to participate in emergency evacuation planning, arguing that Long Island, because of its geography, could not be safely evacuated during a nuclear accident. Without such a plan, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission refused to issue anything more than a low-power testing license for Shoreham.

By FRANK SANTIAGO Register Staff Writer There will be a moment of silence at Valley High School's graduation ceremonies Sunday, a stillness that will speak loudly about teen-agers growing up in the 1980s. Five students who might have been among the 490 graduating seniors won't be there. They have, in widely separate circumstances, been kidnapped, slain, killed by accident or died of natural causes. "I've never seen this many missing," says Principal Robert Brooks, who will ask that the fieldhouse crowd be hushed "in memory of those students who could have been part of the 1988 graduating family." "These are the kids who in the last 13 years since they started in kindergarten could have been here," he says. Johnny Gosch might have been on stage.

He was 12 years old and a seventh-grader when he was kidnapped Sept. 5, 1982, while delivering newspapers near his West Des Moines home. He remains missing. Harold Ketelsen Jr. was killed by a bullet that penetrated a window of his home in 1986 as he sat on a cot in his bedroom.

Police say the shooting was the result of a neighborhood dispute. Franklin Sanchez collapsed in a school darkroom in 1986 when he intentionally inhaled Freon from an aerosol can, apparently as a lark. His heart developed an irregular beat and stopped. James Olson died last year in a hospital after developing intestinal problems. Kyle Douglas Wiesner was killed May 13 when the car he was riding in left a curve three miles north of Winterset and rolled several times.

During the ceremonies, his brother Bryan, a sophomore at Valley, will go to the stage to receive Kyle's diploma. Brooks says the missing classmates have beeii on the graduates' minds. "I read a poem at practice yesterday and you could hear a pin drop. It was written by a mother of a graduating student and she's called it, Former Olympian's graduation speech rates 3.5 to 5.9 By GENE RAFFENSPERGER Register Staff Writer Dick Button, the former Olympic figure skating champion and television commentator, was stately in cap and gown as he addressed the graduating class at Buena Vista College in Storm Lake. As he finished, there was the usual slight pause that precedes applause.

But then a roar of Storm Lake I DES MOINES The other faculty members were Dennis Dyke-ma and Mac Hornecker, professors of art; Carl Ad-kins and Manny Aryanpur, professors of English; and Sandra Madsen, associate professor of speech. "I loved it," Button said in an interview Thursday from New York City, where he is president of Candid Productions. He won two Olympic gold medals in figure skating and is the holder of numerous other American and international titles. "Naturally, I expected all 6's," he said, referring to the perfect score in figure skating. "So the one who gave me a 5.9 clearly was the most far-sighted, intelligent, clear-thinking and knowledgeable person in the group." scored performances of figure skaters at the Olympic Games.

The six held aloft cards with numbers ranging from 3.5 to 5.9, rating Button on technical merit and artistic impression. "We were just having some fun with him, sort of turning the tables on him," explained Michael Whitlatch, associate dean of the faculty and one of those in on the prank. Whitlatch said the idea came from his wife, Jean. Before getting five other faculty members to help him, Whitlatch ran the idea by Buena Vista President Keith Briscoe. "He told me to go ahead, but to remember that if anvone asked he never heard of it," said Whitlatch.

200 laughter rose from Siebens Field-house, and Button laughed along with the audience. The cause was six gowned Buena Vista faculty members seated in the front row of the fieldhouse Sunday. The six stood when Button finished speaking and "scored" his speech in the fashion that judges.