The Boston Globe from Boston, Massachusetts • 15

15 Time to kick back After 75 years of service, Grace Edwards, 92, of Newton, finally decided to retire. Page 18. Also Inside Business 20 Deaths 22-23 Comics 24-25 MetroRegion news, 15-16, 18,23,26 QGDDD THE BOSTON GLOBE MONDAY, APRIL 20, 1992 Councilor Missing Agawam woman is dead ft? 7, nI As Worshipers arrive at EARLY TO RISE y-m-JTirr- 'inii- MtsFIynn on budget Nucci wants funds to hire more police By Don Aucoin GLOBE STAFF Dismissing Mayor Flynn's austere budget proposal as "simply a transparent attempt to get the governor's attention for more state aid," City Councilor John Nucci yesterday called on the council to send the spending plan back to the mayor's desk with a demand that he provide funds for more police officers. "I don't think the City Council should even waste its time considering a budget that doesn't have additional police officers for the neighborhoods," said Nucci in an interview. "It is complete folly to expect this city to be safe without additional police officers." Flynn, who says deep cuts in local aid by Gov.

Weld and the Legislature have plunged the city into its current fiscal straits and left him no choice but to recommend $19 million in budget cuts, responded angrily to the ultimatum from the freshman councilor at large. "If you reject the budget, how would you pay for the police officers and the firefighters that are on the street?" the mayor demanded. "You can't shut the city down because you're trying to make a political statement." Tv Flynn said a letter Nucci plans to circulate to his colleagues today, urging them to reject the mayor's current budget proposal and any future proposals unless they contain money for more police officers, "should really be going out to the State House and the governor." The city has seen its local aid allotment reduced by $80 million in the past three years. But Nucci, while agreeing the city should press for more local aid, said the mayor should devise a budget that makes, hiring new police officers a priority whether or not local aid is restored. "First of all, the city doesn't shut down until July 1, so there is ample time for the mayor to send back a budget that contains additional police officers," said Nucci.

"I don't believe in holding essential city services hostage. And we can't keep blaming Gov. Weld for everything." The bitter exchange underscored the tensions that have arisen as city officials begin to BUDGET, Page 26 Retirement! bill awaits Weld return By Peter J. Howe GLOBE STAFF Tiir inn 'iilffi tot, By Linda Matchan GLOBE STAFF AGAWAM The body of a woman found in a wooded area here yesterday afternoon is that of Lisa Ziegert, 24, a gift shop clerk missing since Wednesday night, Agawam police confirmed last night. Police said they were alerted by a passerby who discovered the body shortly after 2 p.m.

near a residential area off Route 75 near the Connecticut border. But neither Agawam police nor State Police in Springfield would provide additional information last night about the discovery of Zie-gert's body or the cause of her death. They said they had no suspects and would not speculate on a motive. Earlier, police had said they thought Ziegert was abducted Wednesday evening from Brittany's card shop sometime between 8:21 p.m., when she talked with a customer, and 9:05, when another customer found the shop empty. Ziegert had been alone at the store, where she had been employed since 1989.

Agawam Police Lt. Robert Campbell had said Saturday that police classified the case as a kidnapping, and had "eliminated the possi-. bility of a voluntary walkaway." ZIEGERT, Page 18 A Resident who warns By Chris Reidy GLOBE STAFF In the Back Bay, where parking may now be more important than pedigree, William Campbell is regarded as a good Sa- maritan. ZTfgymg7l A retired electrician, BOSTON Campbell has taken it upon himself to warn I A iC I tourists who mistakenly believe they have parked in legal spaces when in fact their cars are in tow-away zones. It is a service sorely needed, some of his neighbors say.

Fooled by the presence of parking meters, confused by badly worded street signs, strangers routinely get towed away, said surgeon Oon Tian Tan, whose patients have been among those caught unawares. Lawrence drug gangs add arson to arsenals i one-man space patrol out of towners away from no-parking zones must face city in court 6 a.m. yesterday for Easter services don streets, near where Campbell lives on Commonwealth Avenue. The city says the signs are clear. Campbell says they aren't, hence the need for his hand-printed signs.

Once, Campbell handicapped horses at Suffolk Downs. Now he has a new hobby -glueing and taping his warnings onto parking meters. "My wife thinks I'm crazy," said Campbell. "I guess he's taken on a cause," said Harold Simon, who owns Simon's Men's Clothier on Clarendon Street "Whenever he puts his signs up, they Transportation Department personnel rip them off. He puts them back on.

They rip them off again." The upshot is that a 63-year-old man who says he's never before been in trouble is about to take on the city in court while if TS.i 9F' GLOBE STAFF PHOTO BILL BRt I at the Scituate lighthouse. acting as his own lawyer. The city has offered to drop the charges, he said, if he agrees to end his campaign. He refused. He wants an apology.

And new signs. At the Transportation Department, Deputy Commissioner Bill Good said he could not comment on "a pending criminal case." As for the claim that city parking signs are badly worded, Good said, "In terms of what the signage says, the department has taken every step and made every reasonable effort to provide adequate information." Merchant Simon disagrees, saying the signs are "truly misleading." In the neighborhood where Campbell patrols, the streets are lined with parking meters. During rush hours, long stretches become tow-away zones. DIARY, Page 16 We did a lot of advocacy for the school We started with the belief that the children are worth it and entitled to have what other children MARY RUSSO Mason Elementary School principal In 1989, when principal Mary Russo first stepped into Mason, there were only 143 children enrolled in a school that had become as forgotten as its surroundings. Today, the nearby pubs, vacant lots and garbage heaps are contrasts to the quaint building on Norfolk Avenue where paper flowers adorn windows and where parents and community volunteers are as integral to classes as the teachers.

"We did a lot of advocacy for the school," Russo said. "We started with the MASON, Page 16 Such unpleasant surprises discourage outsiders from visiting downtown, she said. "We think he's a terrific citizen," said Tan, referring to Campbell's 11-month-old tourist-alert campaign. "We think he should be commended." City officials see it differently. To the Transportation Department, Campbell is a gadfly and a possible felon.

At a court hearing set for April 29, Campbell must respond to department charges that he has defaced parking meters by festooning them with homemade signs and that he once assaulted a plainf clothes detective who was taking his signs down. This one-man-against-City-Hall dispute is about the wording of parking signs and the regulations printed on parking meters. The battleground is Berkeley and Claren 3F" -IF Parents give gold star to Mason experiment After a yearlong battle, Gov. Weld this week is expected to sign a bill that will allow up to 7,000 state workers early retirement Weld aides estimate the plan, approved by the Legislature last week after months of bitter wrangling on both sides, will save the state $30 million over the next two fiscal years. The final version of the bill saves much less than Weld initially wanted.

But the administration believes the bill is "about as much as we can expect to get out of the Legislature," said Dominic Slowey, spokesman for Weld's budget office. Slowey said the governor, who was on a fishing vacation in Virginia last week and was not able to review the final version of the plan, "is likely to OK it" But Slowey added that until Weld returns and scrutinizes the plan, "I can't say anything more definitively than The early-retirement offer applies to most state workers outside the judiciary and the higher-education system. While many of the workers who retire will be replaced, Weld is counting on saving money by replacing senior employees at the top of wage scales with workers who wLU be paid less. State workers will be able to add five years to their age or to their length of state employment for the purpose of calculating their pension benefits, making it more lucrative for them to consider retiring early, Slowey said. Workers will be able to sign up for early retirement between May 1 and June 30, Slowey said.

They will not actually leave the payroll until after July 1, so that the cost of JL their pension benefits will not add anything to RETIRE, Pige -16 By Lauren Robinson GLOBE STAFF A little boy sits alone in his action-packed classroom, contemplating a puzzle. Nearby, another boy carefully combs the hair of his friend, who is physically disabled. Across the room three students decorate themselves with building links. Another trio sits sandwiched in front of a computer. One, who reads on a level two grades higher than his own, gives instructions while another child clamors for his turn.

It is a time in the day when first graders at Samuel Mason Elementary School in Roxbury get to do whatever they want at class work stations. The children, who moments earlier listened to a talk by Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, are content but for the wish that they had had more time to show the senator what their school has taught them. Parents of Mason students see it as testimony to the modern education movement that emphasizes the ability of every child to learn in a supportive environment They point to it as proof that urban public schools can fulfill their obligations to children, despite adverse additions.

By Luz Delgado CONTRIBUTING REPORTER LAWRENCE Sections of this city plagued by 43 suspicious fires so far this year have begun to look like an urban war zone, with charred and vandalized vacant buildings on almost every street corner. Authorities theorize that drug dealers, addicts and gangs are waging a turf battle over the use of the city's more than 500 uninhabited or abandoned buildings, and are torching large areas of northern Lawrence in the process. "The city is being burned up," said Deputy Fire Chief Jack Bergeron. Police and firefighters have established several scenarios on what is motivating the arsonists, who mostly burn abandoned buildings. "Drug users and drug dealers have been using the vacant buildings LAWRENCE, Page 18 'W-V.

1 GLOBE STAFF PHOTO WENDY MAEDA Detective Thomas Murphy of the arson squad sifts through the debris after a fire In Lawrence..