The Town Talk from Alexandria, Louisiana • Page 44

D-10 Town Talk, Alexandria-PineviUe, La Saturday, December 20, 1986 Makers of Ethanol Survive the Session With Subsidy Intact SINCE IMS Chavertys) Big Iff BATON ROUGE (AP) -While most state services bled during the special session of the Legislature, the 10 ethanol manufacturers wound up unscarred, keeping their taxpayer-paid cash subsidy of roughly $52 million. The subsidy has come in for more heated debate than any other subject in the special session but was protected throughout by the Edwards administration. Several former elected officials are involved in the ethanol business, including former New Orleans Mayor Moon Landrieu and former Rep. Tony Morrison, also of New Orleans. Landrieu's daughter, state Rep.

Mary Landrieu, has pushed hard to protect the ethanol subsidy. With the state facing a deficit of more than $180 million in addition to $215 million in services cuts made by the governor, the Legislature couldn't agree to cut the subsidy. Last summer, the Legislature authorized up to $80 million for the industry, which manufactures ethanol from grain a product used in gasoline to make gasohol. However, all officials acknowledged that the manufacturers couldn't make enough this fiscal year to draw more than $52 A vocal minority in the House tried to cut the cash payments to $30 million, complaining that education, welfare, highways and other agencies were doing without The Senate didn't want to go that far, deciding to cut the ethanol manufacturers by 5 percent to roughly $47 million. The bill finally wound up in a House-Senate conference committee forr a compromise and the bill came back as allowing the ethanol manufacturers the $52 million they would have gotten anyway.

"So, the gasohogs got everything, with no cuts whatever," said Rep. Ed Scogin, R-SlidelL "We wiped out half of the state and the gasohogs got home with $52 million." "That's about the size of it," responded Rep. James David Cain, D-Dry Creek. "Well if we don't concur in the conference committee report, we'll be back to $80 million," said Rep. Dale Sittig, D-Eunice, a supporter of the ethanol industry.

"Well, they can't get more than $52 million so that's not right," Cain responded. The House accepted the conference committee report 64-16. Later, the Senate voted 27-7 to adopt the report. i-. 5S9 With ciJw:" or comin t' 's is r-fect for I in plan: cr your lie kniiA-L'- Cur lowest price ever.

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30" H. BATON ROUGE (AP) A measure that would stop many present legal age drinkers from entering bars is a pen's stroke away from law, and Gov. Edwin Edwards has said he will use that pen. The Legislature, holding its collective nose, passed the unpopular bill to ward off the federal threat of a withholding of highway funds. The measure, however, has plenty of loopholes, enough to allow those in the 18 to 21-year-old bracket to continue drinking without facing a $50 fine.

Louisiana is the only state in the nation that allows 18-year-olds to legally drink and the fed eral government requires a 21-year-old minimum drinking age by Oct. 1, 1988. The Louisiana law will go into effect next March. Anyone born before Oct. 1, 1967 can continue to drink under the measure and that takes in all teen-agers 19 and older.

Those between 18 and 19 must change their habits. However, they too can drink legally if they do it with their parents, a legal-age spouse or in private clubs or who drink for religious reasons or for medical reasons. The state faced a loss of at least $18 million in highway funds in 1987 without passage of such a law. Rep. Kember Is Sentenced, Resigns From Legislature I In ish.

I 1 rounil 7 by r.clion! With heater-vibro-tor and covered in tweed nylon. While they lastl While they lastl I Padded bock, and seat in a Brown Color, Seat, and foo-trest adjust together BATON ROUGE (AP) State Rep. Harry "Soup" Kember was sentenced Friday to five years in prison for a conviction on six counts of mail fraud. He then resigned from the House of Representatives. Kember was ordered by U.S.

District Judge John Parker to repay the $150,000 state development grant which he was accused of misusing. Plaquemine businesmann Wesley Verret was sentenced to serve three years. He also was told to pay $150,000 restitution. Parker said he imposed the heavy penalty because the two were "lining their pockets" with the state development grant. Maximum penalty was five years on each count of mail fraud.

House Speaker John Alario announced in the Legislature that Kember, a Democrat from White Castle, had resigned effective at the end of the year, heading off an expulsion hearing on the calendar for later in the day. It was the last day of the special session, and Kember was not on the floor. Rep. Clyde Kimball, a New Roads Democrat and confidant of Kember, had told House members Thursday that they should have compassion for their colleague. "It's not for us to hurt him any further," Kimball said.

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