St. Louis Post-Dispatch from St. Louis, Missouri • Page 1

On Today's Editorial Page Siphoning Away School Money: Editorial What Air Quality Goals? Editorial Dl FINAL Stock Market Down Closing Prices Pages 9C and IOC legs! VOL. 91 NO. 307 Home Delivery $2.50 a Month 1969, St, Louis Post-Dispatch THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 19 80 PAGES 10c oard Of Estimate Backs Sales Tax Vote Passage in March is imperative if this timetable is to be met. Comptroller John H. Poelker, who has favored submission of a sales tax referendum almost since it was authorized at the last session of the Legislature, feels that the election should be based on a candid presentation of the city's critical financial situation.

He feels that the people will vote for the tax if they know the alternative. Joseph Badaracco, president of the Board of Aldermen, also has long endorsed the sales tax as the only means of meeting the city's needs. He, Poelker and Cervantes constitute the Board of Estimate and for introduction to the Board of Aldermen at tomorrow's session. One calls for a special election at a date to be decided by the aldermen. The other would enact the tax.

The latter, of course, would hinge on approval by the voters of the general proposition in the special election, It is possible that the election will be the first Tuesday in March. Cervantes did not indicate what type of campaign would be waged for passage of the tax or when it would start. Two main types of campaign have been mentioned. One would be based on lowering of some taxes if the sales tax were imposed. The other would be based on improved city services that could be offered with the $20,000,000 a year the tax is expected to bring in.

These services would include better police protection, better health and hospital services and improved parks. The city would receive a maximum of $10,000,000 in the 1970-71 fiscal year if the tax were approved. Collections are to be made with the state sales tax and then rebated to the city after deduction of a service charge. If the city is to receive payments in the last two quarters of the next fiscal year, it would have to notify the state by April 1 to start collecting it. Mayor Alfonso J.

Cervantes will ask the Board of Aldermen tomorrow to enact legislation for an election on a 1 per cent sales tax on purchases in the city. The Board of Estimate and Apportionment, at a meeting this morning, unanimously endorsed passage of a 1 per cent sales tax. The Mayor plans to speak to the regular aldermanic session tomorrow to make a plea for the tax vote. He is expected to discuss the city's general financial plight and outline reasons for the decision to ask for the sales tax. Two bills have been drafted by the City Counselor's office if.

County Tax Outlook (from left) are: Charles (Pete) Conrad, Richard F. Gordon and Alan L. Bean. (AP Wirephoto) The Apollo 12 astronauts standing in front of a mockup of their lunar landing module, Intrepid. The astronauts Is Thanked L.011 gress Nixon Personally By Tank Fixed, Apollo Trip Not Delayed CAPE KENNEDY, Nov.

13 (AP) A leaking hydrogen tank that threatened to delay Apollo 12's trip to the moon was replaced with one from another spacecraft today and preparations continued for a launching tomorrow. "We look real good now," Paul C. Donnelly, launching operations manager, said after world is involved, when peace is involved, when the lives of our young men are involved, we are not Democrats, we are not Republicans, we are Americans." Mr. Nixon said that a just TURN TO PAGE 18, COL. 2 said: "There will be occasions when this Administration will not be able to get support from the Congress for programs it might get if we controlled the majority of the seats.

"But this Congress his shown that when the security of the By ASA BRYAN Of the Post-Dispatch Staff St. Louis County taxpayers probably will be paying higher taxes next year although no increase is expected in the rate for the five operating funds for county government. County Supervisor Lawrence K. Roos is expected to submit a record budget of about to the County Council this afternoon for operation of the government in the coming year. It was learned he would recommend that the tax rate for operating purposes remain urchanged at 87 cents for each $100 of assessed valuation.

However, a separate tax rate for interest and amortization of bonds is expected to go to 47 cents from the present 30 cents for each $100, a rise of 17 cents. The increase is the result of bond issues approved by county voters. State" law requires that sufficient money be set aside in a special tax account to pay i nt and amortization charges on The total rate for county taxes in the coming year is thus expected to be $1.34 for each $100, compared with $1.17 this year. The proposed budget is about $4,500,000 higher than the current budget. It includes expenditures paid out of general revenue and from the road and bridge, health, hospitals and parks fund.

Roos is expected to tell the council that the present 87 cents rate can be maintained as a result of the continuing growth of the county and an increase in the gross receipts tax on utilities from 3 per cent to 5 per cent, which is in effect. The current assessment of property in the county, on which the new budget is based, is $2, 545,631,536. The 1968 assessment was $2,404,723,026. Both figures include real, personal and miscellaneous property. The increase in the gross receipts tax for public utilities applies to unincorporated areas of the county.

It was passed recently and is expected to bring in about $1,200,000 in additional revenue. The additional money is earmarked for the St. Louis County Police Department, which is allocated $5,436,764 in the new budget. This is an increase of $1,276,037 over the current year. Protesters Arriving, First March Tonight A police dog being held in readiness at thescene of a demonstration by students at Northwest High School today.

The dogs apparently were effective in suppressing violence but were not allowed to attack anyone. (Post-Dispatch Photo) Demonstrators Disrupt Northwest High Classes By a Washington Correspondent of the Post-Dispatch WASHINGTON, Nov. 13 -President Richard M. Nixon made an usual, perhaps unprecedented, trip to the Capitol today to thank personally members of the House and Senate who are supporting his Vietnam policy. Just a few hours before the scheduled beginning of a three-day antiwar protest in the nation's capital, the President snatched the spotlight to try to accenuate the Government's unity on Vietnam.

The occasion presented itself when a majority of both houses adopted a resolution yesterday supporting Mr. Nixon's efforts to end the war. On short notice, the President appeared first in the House and then in the Senate to express his gratitude. He predicted that the action of the Congress, taken by both Republicans and Democrats, would have "great significance in hastening the day that a just peace might come." Mr. Nixon said that the support shown by the resolution was "in the great tradition of this country" in that when the nation was in crisis its leaders forgot political partisanship in behalf of the national good.

In a 15-minute off-the-cuff talk to the House, the President early-morning tests showed that the new tank was in good condition. At noon, a spokesman reported: "We have completed loading hydrogen in the tank and it is stable." While the tanks were being changed, the countdown proceeded toward tomorrow's scheduled launching at 10:22 a.m. (St. Louis time) of the astronauts' Navy Comdrs. Charles (Pete) Conrad Jr.

and Richard F. Gordon Jr. and Navy Lt. Comdr. Alan L.

Bean. The three Navy commanders who will man the flight relaxed this morning by doing acrobatics in T-38 jet trainers at nearby Patrick Air Force Base. Their condition was good and so were forecasts for Friday's weather. President and Mrs. Richard M.

Nixon and Vice President and Mrs. Spiro T. Agnew are scheduled to be among the 300,000 visitors expected for the launching. To keep the launching from being postponed, crews removed the leaking tank from deep in- TURN TO PAGE 9, COL. 1 attracted about 200,000 persons.

Meanwhile, Pentagon police today arrested approximately 150 persons including some Catholic and Episcopal clergymen after they attempted to conduct a incense-burning "Mass for peace" inside the military headquarters. The arrests were carried out with little more than incidental pushing after guards warned the group that its presence was obstructing Pentagon activities. The Right Rev. Edward Crow-ther, former Episcopal bishop of South Arica, led the demonstrators from the Pentagon concourse area where they had conducted a singing, guitar-playing ceremony, to waiting busses, which were to take TURN TO PAGE 16, COL. 1 Related Story on Page 14D By TIMOTHY BLECK A Washington Correspondent cf the Post-Dispatch WASHINGTON, Nov.

13 -Vietnam war protesters, bearing bedrolls and peace buttons, began arriving last night and today as the nation's capital prepared for a long weekend of demonstrations. A solemn, single-file "March Against Death" from Arlington National Cemetery to the Capitol is to begin tonight and continue until Saturday morning when a separate mass march and rally will be held. Government officials and rally co-ordinators expect a Saturday assembly comparable in size to the 1963 civil rights march on Washington, which except when students occasionally looked outside to see what was happening. The incident spread to other schools. There were bomb scares at O'Fallon High School and Vashon High School students milled about and threw pieces of bricks at police cars.

About 50 policemen were on duty in the area. James Rollins and Percy Green, black militants, were on the scene but evidently not as organizers of the protest. Rollins said that he had been invited by the students to take part in the protest. Green arrived late. About three fourths of the Northwest students had left the About 200 Negro high school students held a demonstration in front of Northwest High School today.

The group dispersed in the early afternoon only after most of the students attending classes had left for home. The demonstration was a protest against the expulsion of four students Oct. 17 because of their attempt to lead a walkout in support of black demands for changes in the school administration. Two teachers were injured when demonstrators broke into the building. They are Thomas Guelker and Virgil Yowell.

There was no disruption of classes until early afternoon building by early afternoon and those inside were said by the principal, Clair Houston, to be afraid to come out. Rollins assembled those remaining in the line, about 50 students, just off the school ground and said they should disperse when the building was emptied. Northwest High is at 5140 Riverview Boulevard. A fried chicken carry-out restaurant at 5051 Riverview was invaded by a group of demonstrators and robbed of $100. The students knocked the cash register to the floor and took the money.

Someone shouted, "We'll fire-bomb your place." Rollins said the demonstrators would be back tomorrow and would continue protesting until the four expelled students were reinstated. Rollins said, "Until these four students are reinstated there will be no school here." One of the four, Curtis Wa-terford, 17 years old, a senior, was a spokesman. Leaders of the demonstration admitted to reporters that the purpose of. the demonstration was to put the four "in the public eye." Television cameramen, as well as newspaper reporters, were present. Doors to the building were guarded by policemen, some of them in plain clothes.

The marchers carried no signs, but sang and shook their fists. Lieutenant Accused Of Murdering 109 Civilians Much Colder Official forecast for St. Louis and vicinity: Mostly cloudy and much colder tonight with a cold wave warning and chance of temperatures in the low 20s; possibility of a few snow flurries tonight and tomorrow when the high will be in the mid 30s; proceeding. Calley, meanwhile, is being detained at Fort Benning, where his movements are sharply restricted. Even his exact location on the base is a secret; neither the provost marshal, nor the Army's Criminal Investigation Division knows where he is being held.

The Army has refused to comment on the case, "in order not to prejudice the continuing investigation and rights of the accused." Similarly, Calley March WINDS outlook for Saturday, partly cloudy and inNovember "Pinkville" has a widely known code word among the military in a case that many officers and some Congressmen believe will become far more controversial than the recent murder charges against eight Green Berets. Year's Investigation Army investigation teams spent nearly one year studying the Incident before filing charges against Calley, a platoon leader of the Eleventh Brigade of the Americal Division at the time of the killings. Calley was formally charged on or about Sept. 6, 1969, in the multiple deaths, just a few days before he was due to be released from active service. Calley has since hired a prominent civilian attorney, former Judge George W.

Latimer of the U.S. Court of Military Appeals, and is now awaiting a military determination of whether the evidence justifies a general court-martial. Pentagon officials describe present stage of the case as the equivalent of a civilian grand jury Cong were killed. Many civilians also were killed in the operation. The area was a free fire zone from which all non-Viet Cong residents had been urged, by leaflet, to flee.

Such zones are common throughout Vietnam. One man who took part in the mission with Calley said that in the a 1 i two attacks "we were really shot up." "Every time we got hit it was from the rear," he said. "So the third time in' there the order came down to go in and make sure no one was behind. "We were told to just clear the area. It was a typical combat assault formation.

We came in hot, with a cover of artillery in front of us, came down the line and destroyed the village. "There are always some civilian casualties in a combat operation. He isn't guilty of murder." The order to clear the area was relayed from the battalion TURN TO PAGE 19, COL 1 By SEYMOUR M. HERSH Coyright 1969. Dispatch News Service FORT BENNING, Nov.

13 Lt. William L. Calley 26 years old, is a mild-mannered, boyish-looking Vietnam combat veteran with the nickname "Rusty." The Army is completing an investigation of charges that he deliberately murdered at least 109 Vietnamese civilians in a search-and-de-, stroy mission in March 1968 in a Viet Cong stronghold known as "Pinkville." Calley has a 1 1 been charged with six specifications of mass murder. Each specification cites a number of dead, adding up to the 109 total, and charges that Calley did "with premeditation murder Oriental human beings, whose names and sex are unknown, by shooting them with a rifle." The Army calls it murder; Calley, his counsel and others associated with the incident describe it as a case of carrying out orders. although agreeing to an interview refused to discuss in detail what happened on March 16, 1968.

However, many other officers and civilian officials, some angered by a 1 1 's action and others angry that charges of murder were filed in the case, 'talked freely in interviews at Fort Benning and Washington. Factors Agreed On These factors are not in pute: The Pinkville area, about six miles northeast of Quang Ngai, had been a Viet Cong fortress since the Vietnam war began. In early February 1968, a company of the Eleventh Brigade, as part of Task Force Barker, pushed through the area and was severly shot up. Calley's platoon suffered casualties. After the Communist Tet offensive in February 1968, a larger assult was mounted, again with high casualties and little success.

A third attack was quickly mounted and it was successful. The Army claimed 128 Viet '1 very cold. Temperatures 3 a.m. 47 4 a.m. 46 5 a.m.

46 6 a.m. 45 7 a.m. 45 8 a.m. 43 9 a.m. 43 10 a.m.

44 11 a.m. 46 12 noon 48 1 p.m. 49 2 p.m. 46 3 p.m. 45 350-Pound Campus Queen BELLINGHAM, Nov.

13 (UPI) A 350-pound pig named Grenalda has been elected homecoming queen at Western Washington State College. Grenalda was sponsored by the college rugby News Index Page Editorials 2E Everyday Magazine 1-12F Financial 9-12C Obituaries 15D Sports 1-8C Want Ads 15-23D P09T-DPS PATCH WMTHERBIRO nta. u. yT, orw. Other Weather Information on Page 2A V-.