The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • 21

Cos Angeles 5imes Bus Company to Study Closure if Union Rejects Offer Drivers Expected to Spurn Contract Tonight Diego County cause unacceptably high operating costs. The results would be sent to the City Council for its approval The board acted on the basis of recommendations by bus company General Manager Tom Prior in response to the union's refusal Tuesday to make a counteroffer to the company's final proposal. Bus officials said the offer represents a major compromise from previous hard-line positions. Up until last week, management wanted drivers to take cuts in both wages and fringe benefits. It then modified the proposal to freeze wages but allow use of part-time drivers and change the method of calculating pen -sion benefits.

Please Turn to Page 9, CoL 1 settlement short of arbitration and severe service cuts. The latest moves in the month-long dispute threaten to expand short-term service cuts scheduled to begin Sunday into long-term cuts and major route terminations affecting tens of thousands of daily riders after July 1. In a late afternoon City Hall press conference, Wilson said the future of San Diego's bus service is in the hands of the drivers. "The drivers will determine whether we continue to operate with the present service or go to arbitration and face further (service) reductions," Wilson said. would turn down the management proposal and go to mandatory and binding arbitration.

"It's clear now that the city has been trying its utmost to weaken or eliminate the union," said Charles Yelkey, international vice president of the Amalgamated Transit Union. -Bus riders from Citizens for Better Bus Service demanded that new funds be found to keep present routes running and berated transit officials at the Board meeting for failure to solve the problem. A source familiar with both management and union positions told The Times that neither side has cooperated in trying to work out a mutual Roman, left, and Dan Trejo in i a ess r' BY DAVID SMOLLAR TIikm Staff Wrttor The San Diego Transit Corp. board of directors voted unanimously Wednesday to study dissolution of the bus company and seek cheaper ways of providing bus service should drivers, as expected, reject management's final offer tonight. The action hightlighted a day of development in the increasingly bitter labor dispute.

Among them: Mayor Pete Wilson warned that the area's bus situation was "grim and growing worse" and appealed to drivers to ratify the company offer to avoid service cuts that ultimately could force layoffs of half the system's 561 drivers. Bus drivers, union officials said, remained confident their membership GETTING READY-David Castro Sale of Klauber House Canceled Owners to Press for City Demolition Permit BT CILLA BROWN TimM Staff WrHtr Owners of San Diego's historic Melville Klauber house will seek a city permit to demolish the 1906 structure because a deal to sell the property has fallen through, the owners' attorney said Wednesday. The future of the 6th Ave mansion designed by Irving Gill has been debated for several months by historical preservation advocates and investors who would like to build high-rise condominiums or apartments on the site. The house is owned by La Jolla Financial, which had asked the City Council for a demolition permit in October. However, the council at the urging of several historical groups delayed action on the request for 90 days in hopes a buyer for the house could be found.

James Piatt, president of Southwest Consultants announced Dec. 4 that he planned to buy the property, move the house probably into Balboa Park for use as the Camp Fire Girls' county headquarters and build luxury condominiums on the 6th Ave. lot. But John Davies, attorney for La Jolla Financial, said "escrow was terminiated" Wednesday afternoon in that sale "because the buyer (South-Please Turn to Page 5, Col. 1 "hp0 i.iilii(-imii iiiiiiiiiMwOTiiMiiniii "History does not make me hopeful." Rejection of the contract, as urged by union officials, will bring the arbitration that the company fears will result in a final labor settlement too costly to the financially plagued corporation.

The inability to cut labor costs means a continued reduction in service, Wilson said. Earlier Wednesday, at a raucous board meeting, the eight-member transit board agreed to "aggressively pursue" ways to set up a new company, unfettered by federal labor provisions that the officials believe City Gets Offer For Its Tickets $17,446 Check Sent In; Councilman Returns It BY RICHARD C. PADDOCK Tlnrn Staff Wrlttr An offer to rid San Diego city officials of their embarrassing free baseball tickets arrived at City Hall Wednesday in the form of a check for $17,446. But the proposal from Edward C. Malone, who wanted to buy the officials' 50 choice seats for a middle-aged "boys" club, didn't get past first base his check was sent back the same day.

Malone's bid for the tickets was one more attempt to resolve a continuing squabble between the city and the San Diego Padres over the box seats owned by the city and valued at The seats are used free by city and county officials and their friends. On Tuesday, the Padres offered to take over the seats for 8 of their ticket value, the same basis on which they rent the rest of the stadium. The City Council Rules Committee had decided Monday to lease the seats to the public for at least $20,000 a season. Malone, an architect and rancher who recently was appointed to the new city Housing Commission, said that after reading about the controversy in newspapers for the last several weeks he decided he would like to surprise his friends by buying the tickets. So he sent his check to City Councilman Fred Schnaubelt, suggesting Please Turn to Page 2, Col.

6 TOM GOFF 1 pile sandbags in front of a low-lying home on beach in Del Mar. Timet photo by Michael Yada LOCAL NEWS EDITORIAL PAGES CC PART II THURSDAY, JANUARY 25, 1979 Mercy Hospital Plan Endorsed by State Officer BY rAUL JACOBS firms Staff Writer Mercy Hospital's plans for a $24.5 million expansion have won the endorsement of a hearing officer for the Office of Statewide Health Planning a decision that probably means the hospital can move ahead with construction within a year. The proposal for a two-story addition and remodeling project was a pared-down version of Mercy's original plan to spend $27.8 million to expand its outpatient treatment space, X-ray and lab facilities and business offices. Before the hospital can go ahead with detailed architectural plans and construction, the state hearing officer's report will have to be signed by the director of the health planning office. But, after several months of hearings and detailed negotiations on cost-trimming changes in the project, the signature on the hospital's certificate of need document is likely to be no more than a formality.

Henry Zaretsky, director of the state office, has until Feb. 2 to accept or reject the hearing officer's recommendation. Despite an endorsement by the local health planning body, the Health Systems Agency, Mercy's project ran into opposition from the staff of the statewide health planning office, which argued that the expense could not be justified. But the state planners and hospital officials negotiated their differences, and 25,000 square feet was removed from plans that originally called for a new, building. Plans to remodel 45,000 square feet of existing space were not changed.

The state officials insisted that the hospital cut the number of new rooms for outpatient surgery, emergency examinations and X-ray testing, as well as reduce the amount of space allowed for storage, corridors and lobby. The renovation and construction will allow the hospital to greatly expand outpatient services. The plans call for no additional hospital beds at Mercy, which already has more beds than any other civilian hospital in the county. An expansion that added hospital beds would have run into even more obstacles under the state's certificate-of-need law, which is intended to cut down on unnecessary duplication of costly health-care services. San Diego has an excess of hospital beds.

Officials of University Hospital, situated a few blocks from Mercy in the Hillcrest area, had complained that the new emergency room at Mercy might draw patients away from University's regional trauma center. The trauma center is intended to handle the most difficult emergency cases from all area hospitals. But cost-cutting and not the fear of Please Turn to Page 2, Col. 3 Jury Convicts Robert Harris in 2 Murders BY ROBERT WELKOS Tltmt Staff Writer Robert Alton Harris, a parolee from Visalia, was convicted by a San Diego jury Wednesday of premeditated murder and other crimes stemming from last summer's shooting deaths of two Mira Mesa teen-agers in a remote area near Miramar Reservoir. Harris, 26, showed no emotion as clerk George Bernstein spent 20 minutes reading guilty verdicts in the crowded but silent courtroom of Superior Court Judge Eli H.

Levenson. The jury of seven men and five women will return Monday at 10 a.m. to begin the penalty phase of the trial, where they will decide whether Harris should die in the gas chamber or go to prison for life without possibility of parole. It took the jurors slightly more than four hours over a two-day period to reach guilty verdicts on two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of kidnaping for the purpose of robbery, two counts of robbery and one count of receiving stolen property. They also determined that Harris was guilty of various "special circumstances" in the crime spree, requiring the court to impose a harsh sentence.

Those circumstances included carrying and using firearms in commission of the crimes and inflicting great bodily injury on the victims. Key prosecution testimony at the trial came from Daniel Harris, the defendant's 18-year-old brother, an eyewitness to the crime. The younger Harris said he looked on with horror as his brother fired two shots from a 9mm Luger pistol at John Mayeski, 16, and then chased Michael Baker, 16, into the bushes and shot him to death, again with the handgun. Evidence was also produced to show that Mayeski was shot once with a rifle. Police said the guns were stolen from a Visalia residence, which constituted the receiving stolen property charge against Harris.

The victims were abducted near a Mira Mesa fast-food outlet July 5 and their car later was used in the robbery of a nearby branch of San Diego Trust Savings Bank. Robert Harris testified he was in bed smoking marijuana while his brother was in the canyon not far away shooting the two teen-agers. Harris said he confessed earlier to the double slayings to shield Daniel from a murder prosecution. After the verdicts were read, Chief Dep. Dist.

Atty. Richard D. Huffman, who prosecuted the case, said he was pleased with the outcome. "These are horrible crimes, as the Please Turn to Page 2, Col. 4 OTHER SAN DIEGO COUNTY NEWS Part 1, Page 2.

Part 3, Pages 1, 8, 10. Coastal Residents Mostly Unruffled by Tide Threat BY NANCY RAY Timm Staff Writer High tides but not the 40-foot "killer tides" predicted in the headline in a major Midwestern newspaper will occur this weekend along northern San Diego County beaches, but most coastal beach and bluff residents remain unimpressed and unprepared. In Del Mar, city officials have scrapped plans to build a six-foot sand berm to protect nearly a mile of homes on low-lying beaches this year. So far, beach homeowners have made only minor efforts at protection. Del Mar Planning Director William Healy said the berm that protected beachfront residents from winter storms and high tides was not built this year because affected homeowners pledged only about 10 of the $9,000 needed to put up the sand barrier and remove it in the spring.

"It's each man for himself this year," Healy said. Sandbag seawalls are the best way for residents to protect their homes from the high tides predicted for Saturday and Sunday, but few residents seem to have begun preparations, he said. "We've done all we can to prepare ourselves ahead of time, "Healy said, referring to berms and sandbagging at low -lying city properties including the lifeguard tower. "The beach is slightly over two feet lower than it was last year when we had some property damage," he added. Erosion from last year's tides and storms caused the loss of beach sand.

Grant Larsen, Del Mar lifeguard captain, confirmed that 7.4-foot high tides are expected at beaches all along the San Diego County coastline, but added that "there's no real problem unless we have storm conditions and high winds." Residents atop Solana Beach bluffs are divided in their concern about the erosion problems that are caused by waves at the base of the 80-foot cliffs. James Salscheider, president of the Seascape Shores Condominium Assn. said none of the half-dozen condominium developments have succeeded in completing projects to protect the cliff base from wave damage. The 51 property owners at Seascape Shores have pledged to participate in an improvement program that will restore stairways to the beach, fill sea caves and lower cliff damage and stabilize the eroding tops of the beach. But, Salscheider admits, not even the first phase a $150,000 restoration of the beach stairways has yet gained local government approval.

Another group of Solana Beach bluff property owners at Del Mar Beach Club have put up $1.2 million to build a 550-foot seawall and riprap protection along the bluff base. A spokesman for Guy F. Atkinson contractor for the work said the project is about half completed and is not expected to be damaged by the weekend high tides. Equipment will be removed from the beach this weekend, he said, but that precaution is taken on every nonworking day. Please Turn to Page 4, Col.

1 Birth i mmmmmvmm mmmmm ssiippss mmmimmmmmmmmmi. of a Bureaucracy? It's too early to pass out cigars. The baby, after all, has barely been conceived. Nevertheless, if we all sit quietly and keep our eyes open we may discover that we have ringside seats to the spawning of a brand new bureaucracy in San Diego. Superior Court Judge Louis M.

Welsh's task force to monitor voluntary integration in the San Diego Unified School District is about to hire its first salaried employe a full-time "executive secretary" or "executive director," whichever term you prefer. It would be difficult to argue that the task force chairman, Police Chief William B. Kolender, does not need help. He does, after all, have a taxing job to begin with. Then, too, this really isn't a classic case of how a bureaucracy, once started, continues to grow.

As of the moment there is no direct public money involved. A variety of business interests in the city have agreed to put up the necessary funds about $30,000 to get the project under way. Secondly, the task force and its mission, if Judge Welsh's original instructions should stand, are scheduled to be ended in about six months. However, there are no guarantees at this point that either of these conditions will prevail. A similar operation in Denver has been going for four years now and shows no indication of expiring.

Kolender, in fact, already is talking about at least a second year of classroom watching by the San Diego task force. And then there is the matter of funding. Even if business interests in the community were willing to continue supporting a task force staff, there is grave question as to the propriety of such a program. Private donors were sought this time, we are told, in order to assure that the task force could maintain a degree of independence not possible if school district funds were used. How long can a body ostensibly serving the broad public interest in integrated education maintain its independence if it is dependent on one segment of the community (business) for its support? At any rate, we now are faced with the simple prospect of hiring one person to help the task force with its monitoring teams.

And that may work at the outset. You can bet it won't stay that way for long, however. The simple act of hiring virtually guarantees that every effort will be made to keep the operation going. And then, if the normal bureaucratic process is followed, there will be pressing reasons found for the staff to be enlarged. After all, how can either an "executive secretary" or an "executive director" function properly without secretarial help? The secretary will soon get too busy to answer the phones so a receptionist will be needed.

And, as the paperwork grows, a filing clerk will be an essential addition. Next, again if the normal process is followed, will come a dire need for more office space. And then more help to fill that expanded area. And so on, and so on, and so on. It may not happen, of course.

Perhaps one person for six months or so actually vill complete the job, close out the office and call it a day. And then, of course, there's always the possibility that the sun may fail to rise tomorrow, too. FALLEN TIGHTER -Navy men examine the wreckage of an A-4 Skyhawk jet fighter that crashed in the foothills four miles east of Miramar Naval Air Station after the pilot safely ejected. The plane, flown by Comdr. Dave Gauthier of Fleet Composite Squadron 7, was returning from a training flight when it crashed.

The accident is under investigation. TimM photo Robert Lacbmia.