St. Louis Post-Dispatch from St. Louis, Missouri • Page 18

:4 STLOUIS POST-DISPATCH Founded by JOSEPH PVUTZER mT7. Dtrtmber 12, 1878 editorials Child Abusers Cii i Environmental I Protection ''PMr y-s 1 Agency $'0 How To Get To As a recent Post-Dispach series on child abuse by reporters Gregory B. Freeman and Kathryn Rogers has illustrated, successful prosecution of offending adults can be difficult. Indeed, only 10 percent of neglect and physical and sexual abuse cases that were investigated in St. Louis County last year ever made it to court.

Of the 192 investigations of this type in the city, only 59 warrants were issued out of 166 requested. One of the problems is often the victim's age and inability to articulate what was done to him. Doctors may disagree as to whether broken bones and bruises were caused accidently or by physical violence. And even where medical evidence supports charges of abuse, the prosecutor still must show who beat the child. That comes back to the ability of the child to describe what happened.

Some medical teams, notably those at Children's and Cardinal Glennon hospitals, have become well known for their ability to distinguish abuse from accidents and to have their testimony hold up in court. How these teams handle abuse cases could provide a model for other hospitals and clinics. Another positive note is found in programs such as the Victim Witness Assistance Unit of the St. Louis circuit attorney's office. Here the emphasis is on removing the child's fear of testifying against parents or before adults who are strangers.

A serious complaint by the St. Louis Police Department is that the Division of Family Services does not notify the department, which has a child abuse unit. City social workers identified approximately 1,500 valid abuse cases in 1982; the child abuse unit was called in only 176 of them. Relations between the county police and the New Federalism Repudiated eo 'Now That's What I Call A Super Cleanup Job' Low-Cost Arms Control Test Ban, Salt II Ratification And No-First-Use Are Three Options THE POST-DISPATCH PLATFORM I KNOW THAT MY RETIREMENT WILL MAKE NO DIFFERENCE IN ITS CARDINAL PRINCIPLES, THAT IT WILL ALWAYS FIGHT FOR PROGRESS AND REFORM, NEVER TOLERATE INJUSTICE OR COR-RUPTION. ALWAYS FIGHT DEMAGOGUES OF ALL PARTIES.

NEVER BELONG TO ANY PARTY, ALWAYS OPPOSE PRIVILEGED CLASSES AND PUBLIC PLUNDERERS. NEVER LACK SYMPATHY WITH THE POOR. ALWAYS REMAIN DEVOTED TO THE PUBLIC WELFARE, NEVER BE SATISFIED WITH MERELY PRINTING NEWS, ALWAYS BE DRASTICALLY INDEPENDENT, NEVER BE AFRAID TO ATTACK WRONG, WHETHER BY PREDATORY PLUTOCRACY OR PREDATORY POVERTY. JOSEPH PULITZER April 10. 1907 Thursday, February 17, 1983 letters For Public Schools My stomach churns at President Reagan's insinuation that effective schooling is only available in private schools.

What does he mean? That children only learn in schools where religion is taught, in schools that are racially segregated, where no poor children go? How much wiser and more statesmanlike he would be to advocate taxation of private schools. Elitism, separatism and racism are as undemocratic today as they were when our great public school systems were established. For the president of the United States to undermine the public schools' very foundation commitment of public monies to the education of the Republic's children is appalling. Marcle Wolfrum Webster Groves Supporting a fine performing arts program in a school system whose students need remedial reading at college recalls Marie Antoinette's response to the starving hordes of Paris, "Let them eat cake!" Robert Hyland's opinion that cultural institutions supersede public education reflects the same enlightened sense of social responsibility. A society that confuses what mankind needs with what he wants has no future.

Unless one's purpose is to create a two-class society, public education must not only be supported, it must be aggressively advanced. When all those concerned with the future of our country see to it that no child moves out of the third grade unless he can read, write and figure not just adequately but well, then there will be a solid base on which to build whatever type of society is desired. Until then, it is doubtful that even an inspired performance by our own fine symphony orchestra will compensate a listener for his inability to read the program. M. 0.

Walsh St. Louis As outlined in a Jan. 30 story, the administration is proposing a $50 million program to increase the number of teachers "proficient in mathematics and science instruction at the secondary level." What the administration no doubt wishes to say less loudly is that, at the same time, it would like to cut $100 million in educational aid to school districts containing disadvantaged children. Taking inflation into account, this amounts to a $250 million reduction in aid to the students who need it most. Cutting the budget may be a priority; mortgaging the future of the country by de-emphasizing the education of our children is a crime.

To promote specific types of education with one hand, while taking away five times as much with the other is unfortunately typical of Reagan's methods. To be heading in the wrong direction is bad enough; to be dishonest about one's priorities is worse. In a related vein, the administration proposes offering a tax credit to those families sending their children to private schools. This goes hand-in-hand with the attempts to weaken our public school system by encouraging parents to abandon them. The administration apparently feels that the best solution to perceived inadequacies in our schools is a fatalistic one: The only real answer consists in our running from the problems, not solving them.

Eugene Mitchell Jr. Shrewsbury Our country moves into the high-tech future with most major businesses converting to computer-base information systems. President Reagan's $50 million initiative to upgrade math and science curriculums in our secondary schools makes good sense. If high school students of today want to survive financially tomorrow, they will need a solid foundation of math and science. In most high schools, two years 1 of math is the basic requirement and for many of us that's all the math we've had.

Perhaps if students were shown how math is applied to computers and economics as well as many types of scientific research, they would be challenged and encouraged to continue past the one or two year requirement. Computer know-how is even needed in management and administrative positions. Susan Clancy Concord Village Since President Reagan took office, the states have enacted more than 75 new taxes on such things as motor fuels, alcoholic beverages, cigarettes, incomes and general sales. From that statistic, compiled by the Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations, one might easily conclude that a central tenet of President Reagan's new federalism concept has been confirmed: As the federal government retrenches on its outlays, the states will correspondingly increase their own expenditures, recapturing from Washington in the process authority for many of the programs and services that affect their citizens. In this case, appearances are deceptive.

As the commission found, state and local spending including dollars received from the federal government has declined from a level of $880 per capita in 1978 to $820 last year. In that same period, federal expenditures fueled considerably by the Reagan military buildup, deficit financing Another Try For Missouri Insurance Director Donald Ainsworth, with the backing of Gov. Bond, is trying once again to get the Missouri Legislature to adopt a no-fault automobile insurance law, one providing for a program that is long overdue in this state but that in the past has always been blocked by the lobbying of trial lawyers. Under the no-fault concept, a motorist's own insurance company pays him for medical expenses and lost wages regardless of who was at fault in the accident that led to the injuries. Under pending bills being sponsored in the Senate by Sen.

James Murphy and in the House by Reps. Ray Hamlett and Phil Curls a motorist would be barred from suing except in cases of death, serious and permanent disfigurement or serious and permanent injury. By helping to remove all but the most serious cases from the time-consuming process of litigation, such laws lead to more social workers have improved greatly since November 1981 when a mutual concerns committee was set up. And Capt. William Relling, head of the city juvenile division, says that cooperation is improving there.

However, he complains of inadequate training of some social workers and a difference in philosophy. A proposal in the Legislature to consolidate children services into one division ought to be approved with provisions for better training and a career ladder so that competent field workers can be financially rewarded without being promoted into office work. Maintaining cooperation and communication will be something that each law enforcement agency will have to strive for with social workers. Of all forms of child abuse, sexual abuse is often the most difficult to discover and to prosecute successfully. There is also controversy as to whether a child molester should be incarcerated or assigned to counseling and treatment.

While treatment may be the better course for some, city and county prosecutors have a valid point in urging that the trial be completed and treatment assigned as a part of probation, rather than use pretrial diversion programs. A grievous wrong has been done to a child in the case of sex abuse, and the offender should have no doubt that deviation from the terms of probation will send him straight to prison. That questions on all types of abuse are being debated indicates concern is not waning. The recent series gave a reassuring portrait of a community that will not forget the children or let up on striving for the best response to the evils of abuse. and the growth in old age assistance programs have risen by 21 percent, from $1,150 per capita to $1,396.

There is less than meets the eye, too, insofar as the increases in state taxes are concerned. The commission found that states typically have resorted to major increases in their levies only out of desperation occasioned by drastic revenue shortfalls. Moreover, many of the new taxes are written with sunset provisions that automatically take them off the statute books in six months or a year. So despite the number of new taxes, it would be rash to conclude that the tax revolt movement has lost its power. Far from validating the theoretical underpinnings of new federalism, the commission's figures repudiate them.

As federal spending on education, health and nutrition programs has been cut back, the states have not taken up the slack. Those who depend on these essential services are now worse off not better. A No-Fault Law expeditious and less costly (in legal expenses) settlement of claims and to a reduction of backlogs in the courts. But trial lawyers often oppose no-fault laws because, under them, lawyers are deprived of a profitable segment of their practice. Under the fault concept which seldom is an issue in hazard insurance covering, say, fire damage a large part of premium costs are eaten up by lawyers' fees; and, while some claimants collect large amounts, other deserving claimants collect nothing.

The no-fault insurance bills being offered in Missouri this year, unlike some proposals in the past, do not cover property damage which should help to reduce the issues in contention. The legislation being promoted by the state Insurance Division may not contain the perfect formula. But it is one that is worth exploring and that should not be weakened in the process of legislative consideration. long flight time to target, like that of U.S. bombers, makes the cruise a good second strike deterence weapon.

Under the new Air Force plan, the current production model of the ALCM would be terminated in late-1985, with a production run of nearly 1,500 missiles, or about 35 percent of the originally planned procurement. The new Stealth model would then be phased into production and the Air Force has indicated that more than 2,800 of the new missiles may be built. The new Stealth ALCMs should not only be harder to detect, but they will be more manueverable and have a longer range than the present version. All these factors will make the new Stealth ALCM a far more survivable system. That, in turn, will strengthen U.S.

nuclear deterrence against the Soviet Union without lowering the nuclear threshold. retarded women in a home at the southwest corner of Woods Hill and Clayton Road. Euphemistically termed developmentally disabled, the women would be under the 24-hour supervision of a couple trained in such work. The prospective residents are people who are advanced enough that they do not require institutional care, yet would not cope well if left to their own devices; hence, the sheltered living arrangement. The fears expressed at the County Planning Commission hearing are not unlike those sometimes heard when a black family moves into an all-white neighborhood.

They are different, therefore they are undesirable. But it is the uncharitable and narrow-minded stance of the opponents that is really undesirable. Fortunately, they seem to be in the minority. By almost 3-to-l, those at the hearing signified that they supported the group sr- twr Mfr-ptrrAivH a declaration of no-first-use. Currently, NATO policy calls for a limited nuclear war if conventional defenses fail to repel a non-nuclear Warsaw Pact assault.

The doctrine results from the belief that Russia possesses an overwhelming superiority in conventional strength. But NATO's first-use doctrine is badly flawed, and should be changed. First, there is no guarantee that nuclear war on any scale can be controlled: the use of tactical nuclear weapons would likely escalate to a worldwide nuclear war, with catastrophic results. Second, the Soviets do not have the decisive power needed to win a conventional war in Europe. A new study of NATO and Warsaw Pact-strength directed by Vice Adm.

John M. Lee (USN-Ret.) for the Union of Concerned Scientists shows that the Warsaw Pact cannot have high confidence in its ability to attack in Central Europe. Though outnumbering NATO forces, its troop strength does not attain the more than two-tc-one advantage believed necessary to overcome a defender. The Soviets also lag behind in technical prowess: NATO's advanced electronics and training give us a clear especially in the weaponry that can cripple a Soviet tank assault. The numbers simply do not add up for Russian mischief in Central When four former U.S.

policy makers raised the issue of no-first-use last spring, many disparaged the idea as "declaratory diplomacy." That is ill-founded. Under no-first-use, the decision to forgo reliance on nuclear weapons will be built into our thinking, our 'planning, and our military posture allowing, for example, the withdrawal of forward-based tactical nuclear weapons. No-first-use will strengthen NATO's decision-making, for no one in wartime will equivocate over the alliance's response to a Soviet attack. We will take measures to shore up conventional forces, allowing us to reduce the risk of nuclear escalation without sacrificing the strength of the West's deterrence. No-first-use is a unique approach to arms control, for it alone addresses the way weapons are utilized.

Along with other "low cost" measures like a comprehensive test ban and SALT II, no-first-use offers us a major step out of the arms race quagmire toward stability and peace. Be Damned manufacturers. Uniroyal obviously has an interest: its tires come out well on the But the fact that even one tire maker seems to get consistent results suggests the test is more valid than the administration says. The replacement tire business, now worth $7.3 billion a year, was required by Congress in 1966 to institute a grading system for safety reasons. But because of litigation by the tire, makers, the tests have been in full force only since 1980.

Instead of first trying certain obvious ways to improve the tread test, one of three in the grading system, the traffic safety agency has chosen to rob consumers of their only objective source of information, imperfect as it may be. The Reagan administration would evidently prefer our shopping for this technically complex product to be guided solely by such authorities as the Blimp and Michelin Man. STLOUIS POST-DISPATCH MO Want Tact Ri.lmrJ Ultl sut tone JOSEPH PULITZER, EDITOR AND PUBLISHER lrtimi JOSEPH PULITZER, EDITOI AND PUIUSHER HIUW Joseph fuutzei editoi and publisher MICHAEL 1 PULITZER. ASSOCIATE EDITOI DAVID UPMAN. MANAGING EDITOI WILLIAM F.

WOO. EDITOR Of THE EDITORIAL PACE C. CHRL3TOPHER. VICE PRESIDENT AND GEN. MANAGER I Right Decision On Cruise Missile A Statement By Howard C.

Ris Jr. Director, Nuclear Arms Program, Union Of Concerned Scientists Arms control proposals have been swirling around Washington, Moscow, Geneva, Bonn and Vienna in a hopeless maelstrom. It's hard to remember the acronyms (SALT, START, INF, MBFR), much less believe that something fruitful will result. Soviet boss Andropov seems to offer a new idea every week, often tttirmi self-serving, but it's 111111 Ul never put to the test by nf niitiliV the s- ne Reaan Ul UUU11V team drags its feet on ntlinlnn everything but the UpiUlUU building of more weapons. Europeans, who have a much different stake in the business, seem caught in the middle, with sharply differing views on what the superpowers should do.

The arms control quagmire is not only muddy, but dangerous too much confusion, too little bargaining, and too many angry words, while the arms race threatens us more every day. What to do? An attractive approach is "low-cost" arms control: relatively painless steps that the U.S. could initiate promptly to move the entire process forward. They are low cost because they won't rob us of military might, but they embrace measures that will achieve stability. Three such opportunities immediately spring to mind: a test ban treaty, ratification of SALT II and a policy of no-first-use of nuclear arms.

The first requires an agreement with the Soviets. The 1977-80 talks on a comprehensive test ban were not renewed by the U.S. last summer. Yet a test ban treaty would prohibit all tests of nuclear warheads, slowing the arms race by making it hard to develop new weapons. Before the talks were last suspended, important progress had been made on the thorny problem of verification, namely, tentative agreement to limited on-site inspections and seismic monitoring stations.

No other step would respond better to the Americans' call for a mutual and verifiable freeze. The test ban might also preserve some U.S. technological advantages. Ratifying SALT II which took more than six years to negotiate through three presidencies, but was never passed by the U.S. Senate is another low-cost item.

We now comply with its terms, even though President Reagan pooh-poohs its significance. Ratification would reduce some of the uncertainty for nuclear planners on both sides, place a ceiling on the number of weapons launchers, and even promise some reductions. It's worth showing our support for SALT II. Another ripe opportunity for arms control is Consumers The New York Times If you need new tires, you can ask for the brand you last saw advertised on television or you can compare tread life by objective test grades stamped on the tire. At least you once could: the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has now suspended the standard.

The move is supported by manufacturers with high brand-name recognition, like Michelin and Goodyear. It is opposed by another tire maker, Uniroyal, which cites the tests in its advertising. The consumer's interest manifestly lies on the side of having the information available. Since all the manufacturers make good tires, they should surely welcome a yardstick of quality by which to compete. Raymond Peck, the traffic safety administrator, says the standard had to be suspended because of its unreliability, and the risk that consumers might be deceived.

It's a shaky rationale. Like meat grading, the test is intended to provide only a useful basis for comparison, not an exact measurement. Tires are tested on a 400-mile test course in San Angelo, Tex. The traffic safety agency asserts that a given brand may get different results from one test run to another. True, the scores vary.

But when one brand is compared with another, argues Uniroyal, the government's test puts brands of tires in very much the same rank order as do the more accurate private tests conducted by The Reagan administration's surprise decision to terminate the production of the Air Force's air-launched cruise missile in favor of a more advanced Stealth version of the weapon is a good one. The air-launched cruise missile (ALCM) is one of the Air Force's major strategic arms modernization programs. Mounted on specially modified B-52 bombers, these torpedo-sized, nuclear-armed missiles are designed to be launched outside Soviet airspace. They would then fly to their targets at speeds of over 500 miles per hour and at very low altitudes. The-ALCM's small size and low-level flight profile makes it difficult to shoot down and it is more survivable than large manned aircraft.

Although the ALCM is designed to have an extremely accurate warhead roughly equal to the missile silo destroying capability of the MX or the Pershing II missiles its On Being Different If a family living on Woodr Hill Drive in west St. Louis County had mentally retarded children, would its neighbors feel that the family was a blight on the area? Would they believe that the value of their homes was diminished by the presence of mentally retarded persons nearby? Of course not; on the contrary, it's safe to say that they would empathize with the family and would go out of their way to befriend the retarded youngsters. Yet some of the people in the Woods Hill area are saying such cruel, alarmist things about a prospective extended family that would move into the neighborhood of expensive, single-family homes if the County Planning Commission paves the way by recommending a permit. The permit is being sought by Residential Planning and Development Group a nonprofit corporation, which wants to place six TV Violence Concerning Eric Mink's Jan. 30 article in the P-D magazine, "Does TV Promote I feel he raised some thought-provoking arguments.

I have seen children and young people turn off and walk away from violent programs. Perhaps we should study people who choose to watch violent programs and why they choose to do so. Grace Poertner St. Charles 18A.