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

REGION Finding Bargains With Class ib SPORTS Umps Enjoying Paid Vacation ic BUSINESS Ford Plant Makes History 6a More To Talks Than Abortion The debate over abortion is obscuring many facets of the population conference that churches support. ANALYSIS 13B TV Ads IVIay Go Way Of Dinosaur Television witholit commercials? Madison Avenue and big companies that depend on the tube for advertising worry about the future EVERYDAY ID PffiT-flSRKr ex to 3-STAR SATURDAY, AUGUST 27, 1994 VOL. 116, NO. 239 Copyright 1994 Lif esaving Technique (3) on Tax Bm Fir EdlLOarDirl 3 Pi Nixon Seeks To Block Move To Put-Increase Of $315 Million On Ballot 6 i By Terry Ganey and Virginia Baldwin Hick Of the Post-Dispatch Staff A judge ordered on Friday a statewide vote on the $315 million tax increase for education the Missouri Legislature passed last year. "We are finally giving people a chance to vote on this," said Rep.

Todd Smith, R-Sedalia. Smith was one of the plaintiffs who filed a suit that led to Friday's order by Cole County Circuit Judge James F. McHenry. "We feel we have to push for a vote this year," Smith said. "If we don't do it this November, we are forever going to lose our chance to vote on it." But whether it will come to a vote then or ever is uncertain.

McHenry scheduled a hearing on his ABC OKs Move To KDNL Channel 30 Gains 10-Year Agreement By Adam Goodman and Jerry Berger Of the Post-Dispatch Staff Roseanne, Home Improvement and NYPD Blue will head to Channel 30 next summer. The ABC television network has reached a 10-year agreement to air on KDNL (Channel 30) in St. Louis beginning in mid-1995, the companies said Friday. The deal will set off a flip-flop of network affiliations for Channels 30 and 2. KTVI (Channel 2), the current ABC station in St.

Louis, is set to join the Fox network next year as part of a deal announced three months ago. KTVI is being bought by New World Communications, which has formed a $500 million, 12-station joint venture with Fox. The ABC agreement is a life-saver for Channel 30 and another coup for Barry Baker, its owner-dealmaker. Signing on with ABC not only prevents Baker's flagship station from possibly being knocked out of competition by its loss of Fox, but probably positions it for future growth. "To go from a fledgling Fox station when Fox was a newcomer to becoming affiliated with the No.

1 network is beyond my wildest dreams," said Baker, president and chief ex-ecutive of River City Broadcasting. River City Broadcasting owns Channel 30 and radio stations KPNT-FM (105.7) and WFXB-FM (101.1) in St. Louis. It also owns television stations in Des Moines, Iowa, Indianapolis, Kokomo, and San The companyis in the process of buying four more television stations and three radio stations. Baker, a former executive at KPLR (Channel 11), and part-See TV, Page 4 ,11 order Wednesday, and Attorney Gen eral Jay Nixon said Friday that he1, would be there to oppose any vote.

The tax increase money began to flow into public school district coffers at the beginning of the last school year. About two-thirds of the new money comes through individual in-. come tax increases and the other third from businesses. The law that raised the taxes also included a package of school reforms and a new formula for distributing state school funds. When the Legislature narrowly ap-, proved the law, it debated whether it should go to a public vote.

Gov. Mel Carnahan and legislative leaders said then that there was no time for that because Circuit Judge Byron Kinder See TAX, Page 4 Mitchell Retreats On Health WASHINGTON (AP) Senate Majority Leader George J. Mitchell of Maine abandoned on Friday his quest for sweeping health care reform, and President Bill Clinton hinted that he, too, might settle for less. Laying the groundwork for a limited bill when Congress re-. turns after Labor Day, Mitchell conceded that comprehensive reform was not in the cards this year.

Asked three times whether he was standing by a threat to veto any bill that did not guar-4 antee universal insurance cov erage, Clinton refused threap times to answer. Meanwhile, a relatively modest bipartisan Senate plan gathered steam in a negotiat- ing session between Mitchell and three of its authors. Clin-See HEALTH, Page 5 Crime Bill Debate; Lingers After Vote Opponents Pledging To Keep On Fighting Margie M. BarnesAP Mark Condrich of the Cleveland Fire Department pulls a 175-pound dummy in the Firefighter Combat Challenge here Friday. Firefighters from 40 cities are competing.

The skills tests continue today on the Monsanto Co. campus in Creve Coeur. The event coincides with the International Association of Fire Chiefs convention downtown. Story on Page 4B. By Kathleen Best Post-Dispatch Washington Bureau WASHINGTON Republican leaders and the National Rifle Association vowed Friday to defeat in November the supporters of anti-crime legislation that they failed to beat on the floors of Congress.

Bumper stickers already are circulating in St. Louis and the Metro East urging gun-ban opponents to dump Rep. Richard J. Durbin, and retire House Majority Leader Richard A. Gephardt, D-Mo.

Both voted for the crime bill and its ban on 19 assault-style weapons. And Senate Republican leader Bob Dole suggested that he may launch campaign commercials this fall criticizing Democrats for passing pork, not good public policy. "I think this has become a big, big spending bill," Dole said. But Gephardt, Durbin and other crime bill supporters headed home for the Labor Day break with some powerful ammunition of their own: tens of millions of dollars in crime-fighting grants for their districts and bragging rights that they had acted on the No. 1 concern of voters.

See CRIME, Page 5 Congress takes final actions, quits for summer 13B Gephardt sees hope for a health care bill 13B Judge Voids Suit In Rockwood District affidavits by Superintendent Dennis Peterson, board secretary Ann Hanekamp, former board member Peggy Ashton and board member Janet Puis. They claimed Corley had voted to hire his son. Hanekamp claimed she was told to alter the minutes of the meeting of Aug. 26, 1993, to show Corley abstaining. Campbell wanted to know why the minutes of a board meeting in September 1993 showed unanimous approval of the so-called altered minutes.

And minutes of a meeting in October 1993 reflect-See ROCKWOOD, Page 5 By William C. Lhotka Of the Post-Dispatch Staff A judge in St. Louis fiunty has dismissed a suit by Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon to oust Michael Corley Sr. from the Rockwood. School Board.

Presiding Judge Robert L. Campbell ruled in Corley's favor after a hearing Friday. Nixon had alleged that Corley, the School Board's president, voted a year ago Friday to hire his son, Michael Corley II, as a teacher in the district. Nixon claimed Corley's vote violated the state's ban on nepotism. The punishment would have been loss of Corley's job.

"My wife and family and I are relieved," Corley said later. "I am very pleased with the verdict. Now we can get on with the business of working for the boys and girls of the Rockwood School District." Corley has claimed he abstained from the vote to hire his son. His attorney, Robert P. Baine argued Friday that minutes of that meeting and minutes of two subsequent meetings supported Corley.

Baine argued that, historically, the best evidence is the written record. Assistant Attorney General Edward Ardini cited Jones Admits Mishandling Campaign Reports INDEX But Comptroller's Committees Pay $10,000 Fine Business 6-1 2A Classified Everyday 1-10D Letters 15B Movie Timetable 9D NationWorld 3A News Analysis 13B Obituaries 4B People 2A St Louis 1-4B Sports 1-6C Weather 16B EDITORIAL PAGE WEATHER Warm Weekend FORECAST Today Mostly sunny withaSW breeze at 10-20mph. High 94. Mostly dear tonight Low 74. Sunday Partly ctoudy and windy.

High 95. Other Weather, 16B FoxTtcrr POST 'SPTCM WEATMCRB4BO 09 1100 i acted are less than $5,000. The new law provides for the appointment of a special prosecutor in cases where the commission finds grounds to investigate a complaint In Jones' case, the complaint was brought by Alderman James Shrewsbury, D-16th Ward, who ran against Jones in the comptroller's race last year. Shrewsbury filed the charges after the Post-Dispatch published stories questioning Jones' campaign reports. The hearing Circuit Judge Michael P.

David lasted less than three minutes. In the hallway after the hearing, Jones played down the importance of the affair. "I don't think anyone would say that thisAvas a pleasant experience." Sec JONES, Page By Phil Linsalata Of the Post-Dispatch Staff Standing before a Circuit Court judge Friday, St. Louis Comptroller Virvus Jones admitted mishandling reports on $62,000 in campaign expenses and turned over $10,000 in fines for his violations. But Jones won't have to pay the fines himself.

"They were paid by the campaign committees." Jones said after the hearing. "The complaints were not against Virvus Jones. They were against the committees, so the committees will pay." The fines in the civil proceeding are the largest in the short history of the state's new Ethics Commission, established last year. Commission of-ficialisaid the largest fines since new campaign disclosure laws were en Mr. Clinton's Healthy Response Dangerous Nonsense On Population 1 14B Kren Bsnout'Post-Oispatch Computer Virvus Jones (left) shakes, hands with specif prosecutor Ronald E.

Jenkins after his brief hearing Friday..