The Star Press from Muncie, Indiana • Page 2

PAGE 2 THE MUNC1E STAR. FRIDAY. OCTOBER 20. 1989 Indiana New Attendance Policy Approved at Blackford Students With Too Many Absences Can Lose Credits building project The company will be paid 1315.000. The board recently hired R.W.

Clinton and Associates of Richmond as the architect to draw plans for a new middle school to be located at the high school. Construction on the project isn't expected to begin until May of next year. Supt Jerry Wolfe said it was important that a construction manager be hired as soon as possible. "If you're going to use a construction manager then they really need to be in on the beginning of the planning process," he said. "They can have important input even in the very early planning stage." The board also hired Ice, Miller, Donadio and Ryan of Indianapolis as bond counsel and Summers and Co.

of Fort Wayne as the underwriters for the project The law firm will receive between 310,000 and $15,000 and the underwriter will collect three-fourths of a percent of the project cost license. A law passed by the Legislature last session instructs school officials to notify the Department of Motor Vehicles when a student is suspended, expelled or deemed habitually truant Board members Susan Parks-Baughey and David Clamme voted against the policy because it eliminated an appeals committee utilized last year. Blackford's policy last year allowed the student to appeal the adminstrator's decision to the committee composed of faculty members and students. That committee issued a recommendation to the principal, who made the the final ruling on the matter. Board President Joe Pearson said be felt the committee should not have the responsibility of determining school policy.

"Those are administrative decisions that should be handled by the administration," Pearson said. Gamme said it was not the students who were deciding policy. "They would only be there if the administrator withdrew the credit or the driver's license," Clamme said. They would only be making recommendations so I dont see it as quite a critical position." In other news, nearly SO Blackford High School students attempted to address the board about the cafeteria situation. Students have complained about the lack of variety and the quality of the meals served in the school.

The snack bar in the cafeteria was closed recently. Pearson told the students that they must go through the proper administrative channels that included the principal and the superintendent before the board would become involved in the matter. "Talk to them first and if you are still not satisfied come back and talk to us," Pearson said. After the meeting, the students and Pearson discussed the cafeteria problems. The board also hired Construction Control, a division of Schenkel and Schultz Inc.

of Fort Wayne, to serve as the construction manager for the board's By DREW BROWN St Su importer HARTFORD CITY. In! The Blackford County School Board spent a majority of Thursday'! 90-minute meeting debating Blackford High School's new attendance policy before finally approving it in a 3-2 vote. The policy calls for administrative actios to be taken against any student who misses 8 percent or more of the school days with unexcused absences. The administrator, defined by the board as the principal or one of the two vice principals, has several options in disciplining the student The administrator may withdraw credits in the courses missed or request the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles to suspend the student's operator's 1 1 2v-J 'A -i 1 The State FROM WIRE SERVICE REPORTS J- r. PORTLAND The Redkey Volunteer Fire Department and the Indiana State Police will be conducting a bomb explosion demonstration training exercise 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

Saturday at the Redkey Sewage Treatment Plant Sixty area firemen and emergency response units will attend. Persons in the Redkey area should be aware that explosives will be detonated for the exercise during the early afternoon. The public is welcome to witness the exercise from a designated area. 1 i 1 4 ft 4 HARTFORD CITY, Ind. The American Red Cross, Fort Wayne Regional Blood Services, has issued a plea for blood donors who have A negative, negative, negative and AB negative blood types.

Blood donors with those types are strongly asked to donate blood 10:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. today at City Hall. The Red Cross is trying to avoid a critical situation which could result in the postponement of elective surgeries in hospitals served by the Fort Wayne region. Star Photo by David Thurston Mmm, Mmm Good Yvonda, 6, and Anthony Robbins, 10, taste from Redkey Elementary School on Thursday, the flavor of the fall snowfall on their way home For a weather update, see Page 20. Pager System to Be Updated "We definitely need to go to pagers," he said.

"How, and how we're going to get the money? I don't know. With our phone system, we're walking on thin ice." Town Council President Ted Champ agreed. "Our phone system was installed 25 years ago and that phone system was the best at that time," he said. "Now we're the only fire department with a phone system" In a related matter, councilmen voted to pay for emergency medical service training for seven volunteer firemen. Weaver said the Jay County Emergency Medical Service would train the firemen for about 3250 apiece.

He said the town should pay for the training because the community would benefit Weaver said there might be enough money in the fire department budget to pay for the training. "It's a pretty big step for our fire department" he said. By JIM CHAPMAN Star Staff Reporter REDKEY, Ind. Fire Chief Bryan Weaver asked town council-men Thursday night to consider buying a new pager system to replace the town's 25-year-old emergency phone system. Weaver said he wanted to buy 25 pagers from a Columbia City firm.

The pagers might cost as much as 3823 apiece, but the town might get a reduced rate if Dunkirk also agrees to buy 25 pagers, Weaver said. Town councilmen told Weaver to pursue a deal. Fourteen pagers, an encoder and base radio were donated to the fire department in January. Those pagers, however, are not compatible with Jay County's paging system that Redkey would depend on if a countywide enhanced 911 emergency phone system were installed. Police Seek Help in Murder Case WARREN, Ind.

State police are looking for information about a car and driver in connection with the murder last week of a southern Wells County woman. According to Trooper Rod Mitchell, Sheri Herr, 18, was killed sometime between 8 a.m. and noon on Oct 13 after she was stabbed and beaten "severly about the head" in her rural home southeast of Warren. Police believe the woman died from one of the blows to her head. Officials are looking for a white male who was driving a mid- to late-1970s dark red or maroon Chevrolet Camera.

The car had stock sport wheels and darker double stripes running from front to back on the hood, roof and trunk. Mitchell said the car also had a raised back end and a spoiler on the trunk. Anyone with information about the vehicle should call Det Rick Oatess at the Fort Wayne State Police post The toll-free number is 1-800-552-0976. County commissioners have asked United Telephone Co. for prices on installing an enhanced 911 system.

United Telephone officials estimate it would take at least 2 years to install the system. Weaver said tuning the donated pagers to the proper frequency would cost 31,680. The town also would have to pay 3150 to apply for a license it might not get from the Federal Communications Commission to use the frequency. "That would be 31.680 to me thrown away," Weaver said. The town now has a faulty, 25-year-old fire conference call system in which phones ring constantly in the homes of volunteer firemen when a fire is reported.

"I know of about three occasions when it has failed," Weaver said. Weaver estimated the town probably could scrape up slightly more than $3,000 towards buying the system. First-Graders Adopt Astronaut as a Hero OTTERBEIN, Ind. First-graders at Otterbein Elementary School are learning to reach for the stars by watching Capt Donald E. Williams pilot the space shuttle Atlantis.

Williams, 46, who grew up on a farm near Montmorenci, about 8 miles from Lafayette, is proof that "if you can dream it you can become it" Mary Strawsma told her pupils. Strawsma assigned her class of first-graders to watch Wednesday's shuttle liftoff on television because Williams, who commands the mission, is from their hometown. The children will be 12 and 13 yean old before they see the first reports from the space probe sent by Atlantis to the planet Jupiter. Williams' mother, Mrs. Robert Williams, taught classes at the school in the small town of about 1,100.

Because of that hometown connection, Williams has become the school's adopted hero. A picture of Williams in his sky-blue astronaut uniform greets visitors in the front entrance to the school and posters of rockets and solar systems dot the walls of the cafeteria and hallways, wishing good luck to Williams, "our Otterbein boy!" Some children celebrated the blastoff by wearing, pinned to their shirts, bright yellow paper stars with Williams' name on them. Williams, a 1964 Purdue University graduate, became a Navy aviator after his introduction to flight in the open cockpit of a two-seat biplane used by the school's Department of Aviation Technology. California Man Crossing the Nation by Wheelchair SOUTH BEND, Ind. An early snow dumped huge, wet flakes on a California man crossing the nation in a wheelchair to raise scholarship money to benefit handicapped people.

"I sent back my winter clothing, so I wasn't prepared for this," said John Enright as a 2-inch snowfall greeted him Thursday in South Bend. Enright has traveled more than 5,600 miles, starting in Santa Monica, last December and reaching Boston in July, then turning around for the trip back home to Van Nuys. He says his route will have taken him 10,000 miles. Along the cross-country trek, he has visited hospitals and stumped for better wheelchair access to public buildings. He's also collected 340,000 in contributions along the way for his private scholarship cause, the Will Power Foundation.

He hopes to collect 31 million eventually. Enright traveled Thursday covered by a pancho, with a red bandana tied around his head. He wheeled barehanded, unable to find a pair of gloves with the proper grip. 'We all have to do things and get out in this, whether it's beautiful or not" he said. 1 When Enright was 7, doctors removed a rare spinal tumor.

But scar tissue developed and left his legs paralyzed when he was 23. Shortly after that he traveled by wheelchair from New Jersey to Los Angeles. Enright now 30, took a leave of absence from his job as an aerospace engineer for the current journey. Teachers in Newton County Strike; Schools Closed LAKE VILLAGE, Ind. North Newton School Corp.

teachers had no intention of reaching a contract agreement in time to avert a strike that gave 1,875 students the day off Thursday, Supt Dan Blackketter said. "The teachers had no intent of settling this contract yesterday," Blackketter said Thursday. "While contract negotiations with them were going on, five ISTA Indiana State Teacher Association officials showed up during the day to begin planning their strike. "I believe it was already predetermined that North Newton was going to be targeted by the ISTA" The district's 109 teachers in Newton County in northwestern Indiana went on strike Thursday morning at three elementary schools and one junior-senior high school. Talks had broken off at midnight between the school board and the North Newton Education Association.

Teachers were seeking a 22 percent pay raise, but had been offered a 3 percent increase. Other issues included changes in transfer and dismissal procedures and the percentage of employee health insurance premiums the district contributes. The teachers are asking changes in the contract covering reprimands, union dues, seniority and transfers. Blackketter said the administration would decide if the schools will be opened on day-to-day basis. The decision will be made each night and broadcast on the radio, he said.

Teachers on the picket line Thursday said they would prefer to be in the classroom. Alcohol Sales Prohibited in Gary During Vote INDIANAPOLIS The sale of alcoholic beverages will be prohibited in Gary while polls are open in the city's Nov. 4 referendum on casino gambling, the Alcoholic Beverage Commission said Thursday. The commission adopted an emergency resolution to block sales of alcohol from 3 a.m. to 6 p.m.

the Saturday of the voting in the non-binding referendum. Indiana law prohibits alcohol sales during general and primary Under the law, sales until 3 a.m. the day of the election are considered a continuation of sales from the previous day. Bars, taverns and liquor stores are required to stop selling alcohol at 3 a.m. Industries Need to Cut Output of Hazardous Waste INDIANAPOLIS Indiana industries should reduce their use of hazardous materials to slow down the buildup of hazardous waste, a report to the U.S.

Environmental Protection Agency says. The Indiana Department of Environmental Management study, required by the federal Superfund law, concluded that Indiana will be able to handle its own hazardous waste for the next 20 years if industries reduce the amount they produce. "Our study emphasizes source reduction and waste minimization as the real solutions to the future of Indiana's hazardous waste management" said DEM Commissioner Kathy Prosser. "Waste minimization means you're going to have waste, but during the process you're trying to create less," said IDEM spokesman Catherine Lynch. "Source reduction is set up in such a way not to have waste." Garbage Ordered Out of State East Central Indiana Weekend Clay County.

There it was loaded onto trucks by United Waste and hauled to Center Point by O.K. Storage. State officials said they did not know how much garbage brought in by rail had been disposed of at Center Point before they learned of the boxcars' existence. asked 48 hours in which to move the boxcars. "The commissioner said, 'No and gave them one hour.

Ten minutes later they were moving," she said. The department said the garbage originated at Girard Point in Philadelphia and was moved by rail into Land Bought for Excess Sludge will probably be about the best farm ground in Blackford County." He said the state required the city's wastewater treatment plant to have a designated site for dumping excess sludge. The city paid $825 an acre for the property. The brief meeting to approve claims and hear updates was changed from Monday to Thursday to accommodate board member's vacations. INDIANAPOLIS (AP) Railroad boxcars filled with rotting household garbage rolled west out of Clay County after the Indiana Department of Environmental Management ordered them to "just keep on going." "If they thought we'd turn a blind eye to their illegal managing of waste, they were dead wrong," Commissioner Kathy Prosser of the Department of Environmental Management said Wednesday.

It was not clear where the garbage was headed when it left the state Wednesday, but Vigo County Sheriff James Jenkins said, "They are sadly mistaken if they think they are going to leave that in our county." The cars, which reportedly have been in Indiana since late last week, had been waiting to unload trash for the nearby Center Point Landfill in Clay County. Under a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Indiana cannot prohibit trash from entering the state in railroad cars. However, state solid-waste rules do not provide a way for the trash to be unloaded from railroad cars onto trucks that would take it to landfills. Indiana allows trash to be transferred from one truck to another at transfer stations that have state permits.

There are no facilities approved for rail transfer. IDEM spokesman Bettie Cadou said one of the parties involved had HARTFORD CITY, Ind. Hartford City Attorney William Ervin on Thursday told members of the city's Board of Works that the city now owns land where it can dump non-hazardous sludge from the wastewater treatment plant He said the city reached an agreement Wednesday with the owner of 56.2 acres located at Blackford County Roads 175-W and 100-S. "It's all tillable ground that we intend to rent" Ervin said. "That Getting It Right TODAY Blackford County 10:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m.

American Red Cross Bloodmobile, Hartford City Hall, walk-ins welcome. SATURDAY Jay County 10 p.m. Psi Iota Xi antique show, Portland Armory. Blackford County 9 p.m. St Joan's Home and School annual fall dance, National Guard Armory, $15 a person.

SUNDAY Jay County 11 a.m.-5 m. Psi Iota Xi antique show, Portland Armory Blackford County Blackford County Drug Council's Red Ribbon week begins. 3 p.m. Purdue University Glee Club, Blackford County High School cafeteria, part of First Christian Church centennial celebration, tickets needed. Henry County p.m.

Celebration of 100th anniversary of New Castle water works plant; dedication at 2 p.m.; free bus service; 50th anniversary of the start op of the original facility, tours and information available; New Castle Fire Department to mark 80th year of service with free rides on the trucks for children; police department to be open for tours. An article this week about a boating accident in Michigan misspelled the name of Roy Jent of New Castle. The article also said Jent was not hospitalized. He was not admitted to Berrien General Hospital, but was treated and released there. Jent's fishing companion, Paul Matthews, also of New Castle, was pulled unconscious from the St Joseph's River and was hospitalized overnight The accident occurred when the two, fishing from a 14-foot aluminum boat were caught in rapid water from a floodgate of the Indiana Michigan Power hydro-electric dam near Berrien Springs, Mich..