The Courier-Journal from Louisville, Kentucky • 29

Couple help make Indiana hospital's chapel special Elmer and Frances Hoehn are giving about $50,000 to help make Clark Memorial Hospital's chapel more attractive. Page B2 23 (mxitxJSmtml Wednesday, December 11, 2002 Regional briefs Louisville news Weather Deaths B2 B4 B4 B10. 11 Editor: Kristin Wilkison Phone: 582-4657 Fax: 582-4200 www.courier-Journal.com US -si IltllCKV l(gtolls ysff warns ff (MidiS risk Paranoia over Santa caused by Kentuckian Further cuts may put majority of districts on state Vatch list' 5.2 percent in 2003-04 amounts that Gov. Paul Patton has asked state agencies to prepare for if the state doesn't raise additional revenue through tax increases or other measures. "This is a very sobering environment" for schools, Wilhoit said.

"At this point I don't see any solution on the table" to avoid the cuts. The state faces a revenue shortfall of $144 million in the 2002-03 fiscal year and $365 million in 2003-04. At a news conference last month, revenue through higher taxes or expanded gambling. The Kentucky School Board Association, the Kentucky Association of School Administrators and the Kentucky Education Association have endorsed raising the state's 3-cents-a-pack cigarette tax and reforming Kentucky's tax system to raise more money for schools. "We've accepted the responsibility for education reform, and we've done a lot of it with- See SCHOOLS Page 7, col.

1, this section Patton said the state must raise taxes, cut services or do both to balance the budget this year and next, but he didn't offer specific recommendations. Because the General Assembly never passed a budget this year, the state is operating on a spending plan prepared by Patton. Tomorrow, he plans to discuss potential cuts to education, including higher education, if a budget isn't passed and new revenue isn't raised. Wilhoit's remarks yesterday came as school officials endorsed raising additional state reserves below 2 percent can't spend money on significant purchases, travel or major maintenance without state approval, said Lisa Gross, a department spokeswoman. Districts would be able to spend small amounts without state approval, but the state would still periodically review those expenditures as well, she said.

Having 100 school districts on the watch list would be a worst-case scenario, Wilhoit said in an interview. But it could occur if schools face a 2.6 percent cut this year and By MARK PITSCH The Courier-Journal More than half of Kentucky's school districts could be put on a "watch list" indicating they are at risk of running a deficit if they are hit with further funding cuts this year and next, Education Commissioner Gene Wilhoit said yesterday. Wilhoit told school superintendents that up to 100 of the state's 176 school districts could come close to falling below the state-mandated 2 percent budget reserve. That would put them on a list of districts whose budgets are periodically reviewed by the department. Districts with Next to "Angel Hair" in my socks and pajamas, these lyrics from the song "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" troubled me most about Christmas when I was a kid: "He sees you when you're sleeping, He knows when you 're awake.

He knows if you've been bad or good. So be good for goodness sake." Maybe kids who had been good all year were comforted by the song, but I took the words to mean I was at risk of not getting any of the toys I had painstakingly circled with red crayon in the tattered Christmas catalog whose Lawmaker critical of state contracts Rep. Heleringer, leaving office, notes needs of families 1 Letcher mining method assailed Prayer protest laments removal of mountaintops pages I studied for hours in the glow of lights from the tree. Several years ago, thanks to Robert Linehan of Goshen in Oldham County, I learned that the man who wrote "Santa Claus is Coming to tr- 4 BYRON CRAWFORD ..2. I i Is nA I I 'X PHOTOS BY PAM SPAULDING, THE COURIER-JOURNAL Maggie Tackett Wilkerson helps care for her mentally retarded brother, Ronnie Tackett, while her family waits with about 2,300 others for a place for him in a group home or other setting.

By TOM LOFTUS The Courier-Journal FRANKFORT, Ky. In a final piece of official business as a state legislator, Rep. Bob Heleringer has taken Kentucky to task for spending too much on contracts and consultants and too little to help people who need it. Before the state hired lawyers to defend itself against Tina Conner's sexual harassment lawsuit or commissioned a study of Kentucky's dairy goat industry, Heleringer said yesterday, it should have done more for people like the Tackett family of Frankfort. Heleringer held a news conference at the Tackett home to draw a contrast between what he considers wasteful spending and worthy government programs such as services for the mentally retarded.

Kenneth Tackett, 82, and his wife, Jeanne, 78, each cope with a variety of their own health problems as they care for their 56-year-old son Ronnie, who has been mentally retarded since birth and bedridden since suffering a stroke five years ago. For about 2lA years the Tacketts have been getting help from a state program that pays their daughter, Maggie Tackett Wilkerson, $10 an hour to help care for Ronnie for up to 40 hours a week. But the Tacketts are on a waiting list with about 2,300 other families to place their son in a group home or other setting where he would get 24-hour supervision and other services. "We're receiving some help now, but it takes a lot of effort, a lot of work and a lot time to take care of him," Kenneth Tackett said. "I'm worried about down the road when I may not be here." Heleringer, an Eastwood Republican who has served 23 years in the House and did not seek re-election this year, said cutting state contracts can be a big part of the answer to solving Kentucky's fiscal problems and helping people like the Tacketts.

"Contracts are words on a piece of paper and the exchange of some money," he said. "When that money goes down the rathole of some consultant's pocket, theoretically at least, it deprives families like the Tacketts from receiving services for their adult retarded family member." But Mike Haydon, deputy secretary of Gov. Paul Patton's Executive Cabinet, said he found Heleringer's criticism "a little disingenuous." A large percentage of contract spending is for health and social services that Heleringer advocates, Haydon said. For 13 of his years in the legislature, Heleringer has served on the Government Contracts Review Subcommittee, which meets monthly to review all state government M' By ALAN MAIM0N The Courier-Journal McROBERTS, Ky. Some of the people who met yesterday to pray on a strip-mined mountaintop in Letcher County were devout Christians.

Others were ardent environmentalists. All were fed up with a mining practice they say is destroying communities. The coalition of citizens gathered to protest mountaintop-re-moval mining and related practices they say have caused flooding, cracked foundations of homes and dust problems. The Rev. Steve Peake, pastor of Corinth Baptist Church in Fleming, where yesterday's event started, told the gathering of about 50 people that strip mining has ruined the beauty of the area.

"When I was a boy, all the mountaintops were beautiful," Peake said. "Now the mountains are scarred and marred." Mountaintop removal, which involves shearing off tops of mountains, separating the coal from the dirt and rock, and then filling in valleys with the waste, is an abuse of God's creation, said the Rev. John Rausch, a member of the Catholic Diocese of Lexington who helped lead the event. Rausch told the crowd that "part of our spirit is being ripped asunder" when mountaintop removal takes place. No one from the coal industry spoke at the service.

In a telephone interview, Bill Caylor, president of the Kentucky Coal Association, said he resented people bringing religion into the debate on mountaintop removal. "I disagree when people try to justify their actions with quotes from the Bible," Caylor said. "Let's not bring religion into this." Caylor said he could justify mountaintop removal by quoting a Bible passage that reads, "every valley shall be filled in, every mountain and hill shall be made low." At yesterday's prayer session, co-sponsored by the environmental group Kentuckians For The Commonwealth, participants made a procession to a flattened mountain on a TECO Energy strip mine overlooking McRoberts. As she sang in prayer, McRo- See LETCHER Page 6, col. 1, this section i.

Town" was Haven Gillespie from Covington, Ky. Linehan, a native of Fort Mitchell, said he never knew Gillespie, but his mother attended grade school with Gillespie for a short time in Covington and followed the songwriter remarkable career. Every year before Christmas, Linehan unaware of the anxiety the song once caused me has been sending a note suggesting I ought to pay tribute to Gillespie. I might have known it was the work of a Kentuckian. AS A CHILD, James Lamont Haven Gillespie is said to have lived in a basement home near Third and Madison in Covington.

He was writing songs and working at a print shop while still in his teens in the early 1900s. He later lost count of all the songs he composed which include "Lucky Ole Sun," "Breezin' Along" and "You Go to My Head." Gillespie wrote "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" on the back of an envelope he found in his pocket while on a New York subway train in 1933. Eddie Cantor sang the song on his radio show, and it has been a Christmas classic ever since. "What he wrote were all the things he had heard from his mother 'You better watch out, you better be and so forth but he had a natural flair for poetry and a natural writing ability," said his daughter-in-law, Audrey Gillespie of Encino, who now owns the family's music publishing company. "The song is like a snowball.

It just keeps rolling and picking up more and more play. Gene Autry used to ask us every time we'd see him if we were ready to sell him the rights to 'Santa ALTHOUGH Haven Gillespie relocated to the West Coast to better market his songs and died in Las Vegas in 1975, he never lost his love for Kentucky and wrote several songs about the state, Audrey Gillespie said. Her husband, Haven Gillespie was a 1933 graduate of Centre College in Danville and died in 1990. Father and son are buried in Hollywood Hills, Calif. George Foreman, director of Centre College's Norton Center for the Arts, said generous gifts from the Gillespie family have made possible a recital hall at the center and the large fountain and plaza at the center's entrance, which is named in honor of Gillespie and his family.

It is a worthy monument to a man who scribbled a simple song about Santa Claus on the back of an envelope and made better children of millions of us for a few weeks every December. Byron Crawford's column appears on the Kentucky page Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays. You can reach him at (502) 582-4791 or e-mail him at You can also read his columns at www.courier-journal.com. Bob Heleringer said Kentucky Kenneth Tackett, 82, and his wife, Jeanne, 78, must deal with their spends too much on consultants, own health problems as well as those of their 56-year-old son. While Heleringer conceded that the state needs most of its contracts to hire engineers, attorneys, doctors, accountants and others, he complained that much of the approximately $350 million that the state spends each year on personal service contracts is for unnecessary consulting and speakers at state government and university functions.

"We need engineers and architects to build the roads and the courthouses and that kind of thing," Heleringer said. "But do we need so many studies? We hire consultants and consultants for the consultants, trainers for the trainers. We lead the nation in keynote speakers. It's unbelievable the money we blow, to the tune of millions and millions of dol Cutting unneeded contracts could save tens of millions of dollars and go a long way toward digging the state out of its current financial mess, Heleringer said. Patton has projected a $144 million budget shortfall this fiscal year and a $365 million shortfall next year.

"Before our current governor, or any candidate running for governor, advocates a dollar of a tax increase to address the budget shortfall or contemplates the possible layoff of a single state employee, or worse, the cutting of any essential government service, they all need to address this See LAWMAKER Page 6, col. 1, this section lars per year." Heleringer distributed a list of what he called the "Dirty Dozen" personal service contracts the state has awarded in the last three years. Among them: an $8,000 contract issued by Kentucky State University for a workshop to strengthen the relationship between the university president and board of regents; a $33,000 contract to "research, analyze data and write a report about Kentucky's dairy goat industry;" and the $50,000 contract with a Lexington law firm to represent the state against the lawsuit filed in September by Conner, the Hickman County nursing-home operator who named the state as a defendant in her sexual harassment suit against Patton. Former teacher pleads guilty to abusing 3 students in Louisville LAWSUITS: Two more lawsuits against Louisville archdiocese name the Rev. Louis Miller.

B7 agreement states that the victims may favor it. If probation is rejected, the plea calls for a sentence of 20 years in prison. "We are under the firm belief that he needs to serve his time in prison," Fantoni said in an interview. "I'll be glad when it's over with," said victim John J. Davis 43.

"I'm worn out on this thing. I want it over," His brother and another victim, Robert M. Davis, 39, declined See TEACHER Page 7, col. 4, this section an Alford plea, he maintains his innocence but admits the evidence against him would likely result in a conviction. Greene and his lawyer, David Lambertus, declined to comment after the hearing.

If Conliffe agrees to probation, Greene would pay each of his three victims $25,000 and would pay each $100 a month for five years. The money would be to compensate for past and future medical and counseling costs related to the charges. Prosecutor J. Bryan Fantoni opposes probation even though the By GREGORY A. HALL The Courier-Journal A former parochial school teacher in Louisville pleaded guilty yesterday to abusing three students in an agreement that could have him spend two months in jail and pay more than $90,000 in restitution to victims.

Joseph Ben Greene III pleaded to 22 charges listed in two indictments. Five other charges were dismissed. Jefferson Circuit Judge F. Ken- yr i'r 1 i neth Conliffe will have to decide whether to accept the recommendation at a sentencing scheduled for Jan. 28.

If he doesn't sentence Greene to probation, which would include the jail time and restitution, then Greene can withdraw his plea. Greene, 56, entered an Alford plea on 19 of the 22 charges. Under BY DAVID R. LUTMAN, SPECIAL TO THE C-J Joseph Ben Greene III was accused of abusing students at two schools. i.