The Boston Globe from Boston, Massachusetts • 1

Tomorrow: A two-page color update on the Boston Harbor cleanup project LOTTERY PAGE 3 FLAKY CRUST Sunday: Flurries, 35 Monday: Sunny, wind, 40 Details, Page 78 Volume 244 Number 165 $1.50 IG81 SUNDAY, DECEMBER 12, 1993 Weld finds support in special interests Corporate donations, plugged-in consultants, easy access mark GOP influence game liiiiini.il. ti 7 This series was prepared by the Spotlight Team: Editor Gerard 1 O'Neill, reporters Bruce Mohl, Brian C. -Mooney and Adam Pertman, and researcher Karen Douglass. Today's story was written by O'Neill First of three parts On a February day last year, a thick package of $1,000 checks landed at a Winter Street office in Boston and instantly made the state's leading auto insurer the biggest donor to the reelection of William F.Weld. In one day, executives of Commerce Insurance Co.

had put together $43,000 for the governor, an unprecedented contribution from a single company that distinguished it even in a campaign chest brimming with special interest money. Why would the employees give so much, and what does the company get out of it? To hear Commerce's lawyer tell it, the company's executives and lobbyists seek only a healthy economic climate. But industry insiders tell a different tale. Using the power of political money, they say, the company president and his top advisers have become the state's premier insurance players, giving them a front-row seat at all major decisions made by the state Division of Insurance. Last year, for example, Commerce won a low-profile battle for higher auto-insurance rates, benefiting from an 11th-hour flip-flop within the administration.

A sudden windfall for the industry meant nearly $3 million in profit to Commerce. Commerce's clout doesn't square with the governor's pronouncements that his administration is open to all comers and occupies the ethical high ground above the Democratic Legislature and its coziness with lobbyists and reliance on special interest money. A five-month investigation of the administration showed a reelection campaign hip deep in special interest money, and found regulators lunching with lobbyists, unfettered access to state officials, and high-powered companies pulling together massive donations from executives for between $10,000 and $40,000 a shot. SPOTLIGHT, Page 28 Gov. Weld "bundled" is aided by contributions.

I Atomic legacy MffiWKS pecldii I A a til'- lilt at deficit l. 11 'lilt 1 i US senators talk thrift, pass up spending cuts By John Aloysius Farrell GLOBE STAFF It! 1 1 9 7 WASHINGTON Some of the Senate's most vociferous fiscal conservatives, in actions that contradict their rhetoric, have repeatedly passed up opportunities to cut spending, a survey of this year's appropriations roll-call votes shows. Such self-proclaimed fiscal watchdogs as Sens. David Boren, a Democrat from Oklahoma; Phil Gramm, a Republican from Texas, and Paul Simon, a Democrat from Illinois, failed on all but a handful of occasions to support amendments that would have cut specific federal programs, according to a Globe analysis of votes on 25 cost-cutting amendments to the 1994 appropriations bills. "The ones who give the most speeches about deficit reduction never vote to cut spending.

Or rarely, I should say, rarely," says Sen. George Mitchell, the Maine Democrat and Senate majority leader who has repeatedly raised this point this fall. "It's just incredible when you look at the figures. And they are the ones who are always up talking about formulas and mechanisms and caps and processes." Mitchell, who rarely criticizes a colleague's motives, said senators propose grand deficit reduction schemes "precisely to avoid" real spending cuts that would offend special interests or reduce federal largesse to their home state constituents. "They have always got some alternative to actually cutting spending." The senators in question defended their actions, saying that analysis of votes on the 25 amendments does not necessarily provide a true picture of a lawmaker's com- I W1, GLOBE STAFF PHOTOSTAN GROSSFELD In a home for abandoned children in Semipalatinsk, Kazakhstan, Dr.

Natalya Borisovna Averbach comforts a child suffering from small brain syndrome. "What future do these children have?" she asks. "Death by infection. She will live like an animal and usually die like an animal." Two countries, nearly 2,000 nuclear tests. The US and the USSR each bombed its citizens with radiation, poisoned its waters and lied about it for decades.

All in the name of national security. The tests have stopped but the nuclear waste continues its devastation. In the end, each superpower did to it-self what it feared most from its rival. In Part 6 of a yearlong series, Globe associate editor Stan Grossfeld examines the horrifying nuclear legacy. Story and photos, Focus, Page A2.

EpifOD mitmentjp cutting spending. Appropnations bills are the obscure but critically important measures by which Congress formally OK's spending the taxpayers' money. The 25 votes could have cut the federal budget by about $4 billion, and ran the CUTS, Page 26 Russians vote on post-Soviet future today Help needed for helpful young girl Globe Santa 1 Beard may hide a famous Santa Silent, he charms city again Inside INDEX, PAGE 3 Hubble success: Repair mission surprised many when everything worked. Page 30. Statistically safe: Boston's Quincy Market area is safer than many small towns in Massachusetts, a city analysis says.

Page 33. Programmed learning: Children's educational software is becoming increasingly sophisticated. See what's new for this year. Learning, Page A23. Heisman Trophy winner.

Florida State quarterback Charlie Ward wins college football's most prestigious award. Sports, Page 51. Globe Newspaper Co. By Brian McGrory GLOBE STAFF and David Armstrong CONTRIBUTING REPORTER he city's mystery Santa may have a voice so famous that it would reveal his identity. Stopped outside of Fenway Park yesterday and asked why he is blanketing Boston with $50 bills, he politely wrote on a note pad: TO HELP GLOBE SWT Mail your donation to Globe Santa, Box 1525, Boston, MA 02104, or deliver it today to the downtown Globe Corner Bookstore at Washington and School streets.

By Douglas S. Crocket GLOBE SANTA STAFF Her name is Beth and life has made her older than her 11 years. Each day she sees her brother waste away and come closer and closer to death. Each day, she tries to help her mother tend to him. Each day, she GLOBE SANTA, Page 79 Santa's friends Steven Giaonone 5.25 Happy Holidays (rem Barbie Flaherty and friends at the Mornsette Post party Chretopher and Timothy 50.00 in Memory of Frank Keyes, tomw Globe pressman 50.00 Moreen A.

Murray Edward and Joanne Mahan 25.00 In Memory of John Asinari The Marrones 10 00 In Uanw f4 InM RffllMI 25.00 By Fred Kaplan GLOBE STAFF MOSCOW The Russian people elect a new parliament today in a vote that will shape how far and how quickly President Boris N. Yeltsin can push for free-market economic reform and a pro-Western foreign policy. The people will also approve or reject a new constitution, proposed by Yeltsin, which could decide whether Russian politics settles into minimal stability or collapses once more into a severe power struggle like the one that climaxed in armed insurrection in October. "Your Vote Could Decide the Fate of Russia," bellowed the banner headline in yesterday's Izvestia. Other recent elections have cut Russia loose from its Communist past Today's will outline its post-Soviet future.

It is Russia's first experience with multiparty elections. Several shades of democrats, Communists, nationalists, state-industrialists, collective-fajrj, bosses and other RUSSIA, Page 20 "People need to be reminded giving at Christmas. I am reminding them in my own way." And with that, the silent, secretive Santa sped off in his chauffeured silver limousine through the traffic of Kenmore Square, to spread more holiday cheer in the form of cash to shoppers, passersby and even a group of firefighters. Before he left, though, he also penned, "It thrills me to be out here doing this -1 hope everyone else will give what they can as well OK?" Asked how long he would be doing this, Santa wrote, "All I promise is that many people will have $50 extra SECRET SANTA, Page 40 50730 JL In Memory of Sob, Florence, Leo and Mike 100.00 Our trarxlchiklren Elizabeth, Dam, Maile and GLOBE PHOTO EVAN RICHMAN The mystery Santa Claus is seen yesterday on Lansdowne Street. v.

94 7726111 11 1C (VI uanie' fc- FRIENDS, Page 79.