The Montgomery Advertiser from Montgomery, Alabama • 1

I I I I SPORTS Auburn wins first SEC game 1C Montgomery expecting to open new dragway this summer 1C ARTS Big-band sound is back LIFE Children confront trials of cancer 1G The beavers are striking back, warns columnist Dave Barry 1G M0NTG0 I ADVERT FEBRUARY 13, 1994 MONTGOMERY, ALABAMA FINAL EDITION $1.00 I MEM 3HBE MORRIS DEES and the SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER ft mm mtf (og) 01 a is Main No hearing: Tonya Harding will drop her $25 million lawsuit and the USOC will allow her to skate J' I 111 By Bob Baum ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER OREGON CITY, Ore. Tonya Harding will skate in the Winter Games after all, her berth secured Saturday by a deal cut with the U.S. Olympic Committee hours after the opening ceremonies in Lillehammer, Norway. Ms. Harding, accused by her ex-husband of helping to plot the attack on Nancy Kerrigan last month, will join Ms.

Kerrigan as a teammate upon arrival INSIDE: Games begin: Overview ol Day One of the Winter Olympics. 1C. Wednesday at the athletes' village near the figure skating arena. "I finally Main events in the Tonya Harding case: Jan. 6: Nancy Kerrigan is struck on the right knee after practicing for the U.S.

Figure Skating Championship in Detroit. The assailant escapes and Ms. Kerrigan withdraws from competition. Jan. 8: Tonya Harding wins the U.S.

Figure Skating Championship. Jan. 13: Ms. Harding's bodyguard, Shawn Eckardt, and another man, Derrick Smith, are arrested; next day Shane Slant, the alleged hitman, is arrested. Jan.

19: Ms. Harding's ex-husband Jeff Gillooly is arrested and in subsequent days implicates her in the attack. Jan. 27: Ms. Harding reads statement saying she found out about the plot after returning to Portland.

She concedes she initially withheld this information from authorities. Feb. 1: Gillooly pleads guilty to racketeering in a plea bargain. Feb. 5: A U.S.

Figure Skating Association panel says there is reason to 'believe Ms. Harding violated the Olympic code of fair play. It calls tor a disciplinary hearing and gives Ms. Harding 30 days to respond. Feb.

7: The U.S. Olympic Committee announces plans for a disciplinary hearing on Feb. 15 in Oslo. Feb. 9: Ms.

Harding files a $25 million lawsuit against the USOC asking an Oregon court to block the hearing. Feb. 10: The USOC files documents defending its authority to discipline Ms. Harding. Feb.

11: Clackamas County Circuit Judge Patrick Gilroy instructs both sides to try to reach an agreement over the weekend. Feb. 12: As the Games open in Norway, Judge Gilroy announces a deal in which Ms. Harding drops tier lawsuit and the USOC cancels its disciplinary hearing, allowing Ms. Harding to skate in the Olympics.

MARK MILLERSTAFF The Southern Poverty Law Center in downtown Montgomery has $52 million in reserves, an $8,000 wall sculpture In Its lobby and three executives who each make more than $100,000 annually. Critics question $52 million reserve, tactics of wealthiest civil rights group devotion to a good cause, and circulated it in the office along with a memorandum complimenting her devotion, said three former staffers. Please turn to CRITICS, 14A lionaire who co-founded the Law Center in 1971 and remains its driving force. Mr. Dees' fund-raising skills have given the Law Center the money needed to attack poverty and racism.

He saw the woman's letter as a touching example of get to prove to the world I can win a gold medal," Ms. Harding said later, climbing into her truck outside the apartment where she has been staying. The agreement calls for Ms. Harding to drop her $25 million lawsuit and for the USOC to let her join in the Olympics without a disciplinary hearing. "Tonya Harding will skate in the 1994 Olympics," Clackamas County Circuit Judge Patrick Gilroy' said after attorneys for the two sides met in chambers for seven hours Saturday.

Frustrated American athletes and Olympic officials had put pressure on the USOC to resolve the dispute, which was threatening to overshadow everything else at the Olympics. Moments after the settlement in Oregon, USOC officials held a news conference in Lillehammer. Asked whether the USOC had Please turn to HARDING, 12A By Dan Morse and Greg Jaffe ADVERTISER STAFF WRITERS The Southern Poverty Law Center had more than $10 million in the mid-1980s when the letter and donation arrived. The writer needed a new overcoat. But Bookkeeping methods differ I ii 1 Jt 'torn is.

Number of charities overwhelms The Advertiser used the same practices as the National Charities Information Bureau in examining how the Law Center used its $13.6 million in total revenue for the 1993 budget year. Those methods differ from the center's, which shift a portion of fund-raising expenses to program costs. The center says its fund-raising letters are public education. i regulators 14 A she'd rather give the money to the Law Center. Some staffers were uneasy.

They all knew how little poverty there was at the Montgomery-based Southern Poverty Law Center, the nation's wealthiest civil rights charity. "There were all i Highlights of the I Southern Poverty It Law CenterISA 'Mill lsisiUWt''i IS Center refuses access to key recordsISA "7t Peace prospects growing tenuous these millions of dollars there," said former legal director Dennis Balske. "People shouldn't be giving up their overcoats to an organization that has that kind of money." But at least one person was touched by what he read Morris Dees, a mil Source: Law Center's financial audit for 1992-93 budget year STAFF Quake aid package comes with extras with no progress reported, raising further doubts about the viability of the Sarajevo cease-fire. The U.S. State Department ordered the families of American diplomats and government employees to leave Yugoslavia immediately, embassy officials in Belgrade said.

The decision was precipitated by NATO's ultimatum to Bosnian Serbs to withdraw their heavy weapons from Sarajevo by midnight Feb. 20 or face air strikes. Many in Serb-dominated Yugo- Please turn to PEACE, 12A By Samlr Krlllc ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina Government and Serb fighters who had just begun surrendering their big guns to the United Nations stopped Saturday, but whether it was only a hitch in the 2-day-old truce or a more dangerous sign remained to be seen. The day was full of ominous developments. Despite U.S.

and Russian pressure on the warring sides, peace talks in Geneva broke up By David Espo ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER Ceremony: President Clinton signed the bill containing $8.6 billion in federal grants and loans for earthquake victims Saturday WASHINGTON The earth heaved under Los Angeles on 17, and by the time the aftershocks subsided in the Capitol, papaya growers in Hawaii had money to offset the damage caused by Hurricane Iniki in 1992. Another $10 million materia DAILY PLANET: Summary of today's newspaper. See 2A. help us in disaster created a second, artificial disaster," said Mark Watson, one of the owners. With an amendment to overturn FEMA's ruling in hand and virtually certain to pass the House, Rep.

Deutsch forged a compromise: The houses can stay. But the owners must post a plaque made of "bronze or other durable material" declaring the first floor can be used only for "parking, storage and building access." U.S. Sen. Daniel Inouye won approval of an amendment offering relief to papaya growers in his state of Hawaii where crops were destroyed by Hurricane Iniki. "The Agriculture Department has ruled that if trees were damaged or stunted, they would get relief," Sen.

Inouye, a Democrat, said of the growers. "But if they were destroyed, no relief. I have difficulty explaining that to my Please turn to QUAKE, 12A lized in preliminary redevelopment money for Penn Station 'in New York. And condominium towners at the Royal Harbor I Yacht Club in Florida won gov 7 axi -1 7 a. STt.

salted it with provisions for other causes disaster-related and otherwise. When all was said and done, total spending in the bill came to $11 billion. "It is a gravy train that is on a fast track," observed a frustrated U.S. Sen. Russell Feingold, as he sought futilely to strip out $1.2 billion to the Pentagon for operations in Bosnia, Somalia, Haiti and Iraq.

When Hurricane Andrew tore through the Miami area in 1992, 48 townhouses in the Royal Harbor Yacht Club development were damaged. According to U.S. Rep. Peter Deutsch, the owners knew in advance that the first floors were below the flood plain, and thus not covered by insurance. Even so, owners of the four-story buildings, base priced at $350,000, rebuilt "legally with permits" under the watchful eye of officials from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, according to Rep.

Deutsch. But after some units had been completed, FEMA declared the structures had been improperly constructed originally in 1983 and would have to be torn down. FEMA warned Dade County that if it approved a zoning variance for the structures, flood insurance eligibility would be cut off for all property owners in the county. "The agency that's supposed to ernment permission to occupy their homes. In the end.

the bill containina $8.6 billion in federal grants and ARTS LOCAL NEWS IB BUSINESS 9F MOVIES 5 CLASSIFIED 5D, IE OBITUARIES 4B COFFEE BREAK 4H PERSPECTIVE IF CROSSWORD 4-1 REAL ESTATE ID EDITORIAL 2-3F TRAVEL 1H LIFE 10 TV LOG 5H loans lor earthquake victims made it to President Clinton on schedule. He signed it at a ceremony Saturday. But along the way, lawmakers and the Clinton administration We recycle paper and use soy-based inks. A Multimedia Newspaper 1 994 The Advertiser Co. Vol.

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