Daily Citizen from Beaver Dam, Wisconsin • 1

CntnscBirn Beaver Volume 88 Number 31 Monday, March 30, 1998 50 cents40 cents home-delivered i Clinton enjoys African safari I TOMORROW nciilW HIGH sli ir: ClOUdy With good chance of showers, storms. WeatherPage 9 Energy savings Something for nothing is an offer that is too good to be true unless it is part of an energy conservation program offered in Beaver Dam by Wisconsin i Power Light. To learn more about the program, turn to Page 14 CHOBE NATIONAL PARK, Botswana (AP) Out before dawn on an African safari. President Clinton today watched a Ifon play with four cubs under a shade tree. Elephants strolled nonchalantly near the president's open-air touring truck.

"It's been an amazing day," Clinton said as he and his wife Hillary wrapped up a nearly five-hour excursion. "We've seen probably 20 or 30 different kinds of birds, fascinating ones, including some eagles I've never seen before and some storks I've never seen before." Hippos stared at Clinton from the Chobe River. Baboons scampered in the scrub. A huge herd of cape buffalo with curved horns gathered at a watering hole. One of them had been wounded, its stomach ripped open, apparently by a lion.

"He won't survive, will he?" Clinton asked. "Probably not," said his guide, Richard Randall. At another point, vultures lingered around the remains of a kudu apparently killed by a lion. All that was left were the horns and skull of the African antelope. In the afternoon, Clinton returned to the park and saw more than 20 elephants frolicking in the Chobe River and on the shore.

It was a breed herd of females and their young, one of them about two months old. The Clintons came within 20 feet of the elephants and one of them brazenly walked up to about 10 feet from Clinton's van. After that, the Clintons boarded a boat for a river cruise. The safari was Clinton's first and only break from an otherwise grueling, 12-day tour of Ghana, Uganda, Rwanda, South Africa, Botswana and Senegal to forge a new partnership with Africa and expand American business investment opportunities. Sprawling over 4.200 square miles, Chobe National Park is named after the Chobe River on Botswana's northerly border with Nambia.

It is one of the last unspoiled wilderness areas in Africa. The Clintons drove along 30 miles of dusty trails in search of wildlife. The Clintons arrived early Sunday evening at Mowana Safari Lodge, an air-conditioned resort located on the river. The evening buffet features steaks of zebra, crocodile, impala in monkey sauce, and giraffe. "I tried it all," the president said.

The Clintons headed out at 6 a.m. in a four-wheel drive excursion van. Three Secret Service agents sat on the back bench, and other security forces followed in other trucks. At the Chobe River, the Clintons saw a hippo raise its head from the crocodile-infested water and snort at them. An eagle watched the scene from atop a tree.

The air was filled with bird calls and sounds of the wild. Botswana is home to 80,000 elephants, and nearly half of them are in Chobe National Park. The president and first lady saw plenty of them. A long-tusked elephant walked slowly by the president's entourage and on toward the water. The first lady said they saw hippos and crocodiles, adding excitedly, "We saw the lions.

We saw a mother lion and four cubs." Taking over the story, the president said, "They were up underneath a tree. You could barely see them. And the mother lion was on her back playing with the kids. It was great. At one point she even had one of the cub's tail in her mouth.

They were playing back and forth." Associated Press Photo COMFREY, Minn. A residential street in damage. Tornadoes leveled homes across Comfrey, Minn, shows the devastation caused by southern Minnesota, killing at least one and the tornado that struck Sunday. The city of about injuring more than a dozen. 550 was evacuated because of the extensive Storms rake state, Minnesota 1 23.4 mm -iiiiiimw 1 rff-i, By The Associated Press Wisconsin's first tornado of the season may have been a little early this year, but it needs to be kept in perspective, according to a weatherman.

At least one tornado was reported as severe storms swept through western and north central Wisconsin Sunday, producing downpours and golf-ball size hail in some areas. Paul Collar, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Sullivan, said February is the only month of the year when there has never been a tornado in Wisconsin. Sunday's storms hit as warm and cold air masses clashed. "As we move' into the spring season, keep in mind we can get these surges of warm air as spring aftd summer try to take hold," Collar said. Northern Wisconsin was right along a "battle zone between this warm, relatively humid air mass and colder air farther north," Collar said.

The same weather system produced devastating tornados in Minnesota. The powerful tornadoes cut a ragged swath of destruction across southern Minnesota, throwing a 6-year-old boy to his death and injuring at least two dozen others. Dustin Schneider died Sunday afternoon when a twister blew his van off the road and into a muddy field near St. Peter. The force sucked the boy out of the van's cabin and tossed him 150 yards.

At least 27 people were rushed to hospitals in Mankato and Springfield, and three were listed in critical condition. The twisters flattened homes, uprooted trees, downed power lines and shattered windows in St. Peter and Le Center in south-central Minnesota and Comfrey in the southwestern portion of the state. IN WISCONSIN, the Buffalo County Sheriff's Department said a twister hit in backwaters of the Chippewa River near Maxville without damaging any structures. "There was one in the wildlife bottoms, but it didn't cause any damage to any property or persons," a sheriff's dispatcher said, declining to give her name.

"One of our trained weather spotters for the fire department observed it. It was just in the trees and it went north out of his sight." Jean Borseth, a dispatcher with the Chippewa County Sheriff's Department, said heavy rains caused water to cover roadways in three or four places in the county. She said hail the diameter of golf balls poured down at times in Chippewa Falls. "We were sitting here and all of a sudden, holy cow, it sounded like people were throwing rocks," she said. She said some residents might be in for a surprise today when they find their vehicles have been pelted with hail.

There had been no reports of damage, she said. Tree damage was reported in parts of Buffalo County. A wind gust of 61 mph was recorded at the National Weather Service in La Crosse at 7 p.m. To the north, winds gusting to around 60 mph damaged trees at Tomahawk in Lincoln County. At Ashland, police closed U.S.

Highway 2 because ice was being blown off Lake Superior and piling up on the road 10 to 15 feet high. In east central Wisconsin, 4-inch hail fell in St. John in Calumet County, Collar said. Thunderstorms began late Sunday morning and continued into the early evening. That rainfall amounts averaged from two-tenths to four-tenths of an inch with isolated areas in west central and north central Wisconsin where an inch fell.

After a few scattered morning showers in southern Wisconsin, it became mostly sunny there during the afternoon. Highs ranged from the mid 40s over the far northwest to he mid to upper 50s across central Wisconsin and the mid to upper 70s in the south. Some showers and thunderstorms continued over portions of the southwestern, north central and northeastern Wisconsin overnight. Rainfall amounts averaged one-quarter to one-half inch, with isolated west central areas where 1 34 inches fell. The National Weather Service said a cold front over northwestern Wisconsin was expected to slowly sag southeastward today into the central and possibly southeastern Wisconsin.

Highs were forecast to be from around 50 in the northwest to around 70 in the southeast. Meteorologists say a strong surge of moisture into the Great Lakes region will produce periods of showers and thunderstorms in Wisconsin through Tuesday. State unable to check on all sex offenders Associated Press Phpto Best ever? Tennessee's Chamique Holdsclaw celebrates as the clock runs out during the championship game of the Women's Final Four at Kemper Arena in Kansas City, Sunday. The win capped a perfect season and confirmed the opinion of some that the Lady Vols are the best women's team of all time. Page 12 MILWAUKEE (AP) A lack of manpower keeps the state from checking up on hundreds of convicted sex offenders who may have failed to register with authorities as required.

The situation is likely to worsen as more released offenders are added to the number required to register with the state. Two factors at the core of the problem are that offenders no longer under state supervision must be trusted to inform the registry of any address change, and that if they don't report the address change, there's a good chance the state doesn't have the personnel to find them. The state has about 10,000 offenders on the registry. Officials estimate about half are no longer under any type of state supervision. "You're talking about people who don't have anyone watching over them," said Andrew Streveler, director of the Bureau of Offender Programs in the state Department of Corrections.

"It becomes very problematic." Initial returns of letters being sent to the 10,000 offenders listed on the registry indicated about 15 percent or as many as 1 ,500 individuals may have absconded, Streveler said. State's consumer protection switch costs consumers By ANDREW BLASKO Associated Press MADISON, Wis. The state's success in winning full refunds or exchanges for unhappy consumers plunged after the governor and Legislature switched the agencies that pursue such complaints, an Associated Press review found. At the urging of Gov. Tommy Thompson, the Legislature in July 1995 moved responsibility for consumer protection from the justice department to the agriculture department.

In its last year handling such complaints, the justice department won full compensation for the consumer in more than one out of five Lottery Numbers Sunday SuperCash 4-9-18-26-32-34 Pick 4 9-6-2-4 Pick 3 2-6-2 Daily Millions Red: White: 7, 15; Blue: 5, 19 Saturday SuperCash 7-9-11-18-21-35 Megabucks 18-21-26-29-44-47 Powerball 27-30-33-38-44 Powerball 15 Pick 4 4-4-8-5 Pick 3 Where to file a complaint Where consumers can go to file complaints with the Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection: SOUTHEAST REGIONAL OFFICE 10930 Wj Potter Road, Suite Milwaukee. WI 53226-3450 (414)266-1231 SOUTHWEST REGIONAL OFFICE 281 1 Agriculture Drive PO Box 8911 Madison, Wl 53708-8911 (608)224-4960 HOTLINE: 1-800-422-7128 cases, the AP found. The year the agriculture department took over, that dropped to less than one out of seven. We still don have our money, if that tells wheel well of his brand-new car when he brought it in for transmission repairs. "They don't do anything for you.

They more or less take your complaint and put it in a file," Valley said. Mary Quartuccio of Madison complained last May that a cleaning company ruined a $225 rug. "I got no satisfaction. I didn't get any justice," Quartuccio said. Marina Guterman of Madison complained last October that a dry-cleaning company damaged her $100 leather coat.

Guterman said she was surprised the agriculture department did not help. "I will not go again because I know that this will not help me," she said of the agency. In all three cases, the agency wrote back saying no laws were broken and suggesting the complainants either go to small-claims court or hire an attorney. The agriculture department was able to help Miriam Dahl of Milwaukee, who said she paid a home-improvement company $1,000 for painting and repairs that were never done. The company refunded the money after the agriculture department forwarded the case to the Milwaukee County district attorney.

In a letter to the agriculture department, Dahl wrote, "I feel very warm and much helped when I think of you." Another consumer, Richard Moon of Beloit, said the mere mention of the name "justice department" carried weight and seemed to expedite a solution to his complaint. Moon complained to the justice department in May 1995 after a phone company billed him $46.95 for a call he didn't make. The agency sent the company a letter, and the business canceled the charge and apologized. "If I called them up and said, 'If you don't take care of me, I'm going to call the agriculture what would happen?" people who are living out there in their homes and getting ripped off aren't getting their money back," Doyle said. However, Bill Oemichen, head of the agriculture department's consumer protection division, said the agency takes the job "very, very seriously.

I think there are a number of independent observers who at least have told us that we're being quite successful." Oemichen said there are other measures of success. He said his agency issues far more warning letters to businesses and does a better job than justice officials did in preventing rip-offs by letting consumers know about fraud schemes. The justice department handled consumer complaints until July 1996. Doyle said the agriculture department is shirking and in some cases fumbling the job. He said that unlike his agency, the agriculture department cannot prosecute and must ask him or district attorneys for help.

The unhappy renter, Paul, said the agriculture department did little when she, her husband and a roommate complained in January 1996 after a landlord refused to refund a security deposit for a four-bedroom house in Montello. They demanded their money back after the owner failed to move out on the agreed date of Jan. 1, 1996. Paul said the agriculture department sent letters thanking the three for filing their complaint, telling the landlord he could be breaking the law, then informing the three there was nothing the agency could do. "All they did was sent us a packet of stuff and that was it," Paul said.

"It didn't seem to be a big priority to them." Others also said they were dissatisfied with the agency's response: Keith Valley of Janesville complained last October that a mechanic damaged the you anything," said Candis Paul of Portage, who filed a complaint with the agriculture department in December 1996 trying to recover an $800 security deposit on a rented house. The AP's review of complaint records provided by the agriculture department found: 4-4-6 The Department of Justice won full compensation for consumers in 1 ,624 of the 7,180 complaints filed in 1994-95, or 22.6 percent of the time. That was the last full year the justice department handled complaints. Daily Millions Red: 1, 18; White: Blue: 19,20 Nobody won the jackpot in The Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection won full Moon said. At least 3 1 states use attorneys general for consumer protection.

Wisconsin, Florida and Virginia use agriculture departments. Thompson sought the shift to save money. The change eliminated overlapping duties, saving about $573,000 in fiscal 1996-97, state budget director Richard Chandler said. Thompson chose the agriculture department because he felt justice officials took too many cases to trial and wanted more complaints settled out of court. Having all complaints handled by one agency would save about the same amount regardless of which agency got the job, the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau said.

the Powerball and Megabucks compensation for consumers in 1 ,449 of drawings. 10,951 complaints filed in 1996-97, or 13.2 percent. That was the first year after the shift. Attorney General James Doyle said figures Citizen Publishing on full compensation won were the best measure of how well the agencies handled complaints. 887-0321 887-0333 News, ads Circulation What these numbers show is that regular Printed on recycled paper.