Daily News from New York, New York • 5

5' ThByiBoutto put dmt in South Bfom 1 By Martin Gottlieb With the temperature topping 80 degrees and the sun resembling a giant road sign pointing toward Orchard Beach, Pedro Rodriguez Jr. should have been far from the South Bronx last Instead, he was in the thick of it in tha middle of three lots where the garbage runs deeper than the sand under many a beach blanket. At a time when the city now at its dirtiest level ever measured is in the midst of a Daily News recruitment drive J-1 i :1 5- i- '7'- 4 BE AN APPLE POLISHER T7K r- 44 for apple polishers, Rodriguez and 40 other denizens of the St. Mary's Park section are polishers extraordinaire. In fact, they're apple scrubbers, attempting to establish tiny oases of cleanliness in the midst of Section 211, the more than 50 square block Sanitation Department quadrant that is probably the dirtiest part of the city.

Not a single block in the section, near the Willis Ave. Bridge, was judged to be clean by city surveyors. They're trying harder Rodriguez and his aides de broom have been hacking away at three crucial, gunk-filled lots since April, when they organized the St. Ann's Avel Development Corp. to clear the filthy, lot-scarred street centered on historic St.

Ann's Church. Last weekend, after The News reported their section's lowly ranking, the group seemed to be sweeping a little more sweepingly. Bll TumbuHDailr Hrmt Community residents ignore the heat and clean up lot on St Ann's Ave, Bronx. I want to help clean up New York! Please pass my 'name along to my community board. have fallen on deaf ears, he says.

His neighborhood is a lowly 34th on a list of 58 hoping to get a few of the 162 mechanical brooms awaiting delivery- And city officials have told him, he says, that they will level and blacktop the lots for use as temporary parks, only if community groups pay for insurance and maintenance. The community is as poor in greenbacks as it is rich in filth. Broadway pitches In any event, Emanuel Sorge, executive director of I Love a Clean New York, a pioneer apple polisher, had pledged to talk with the group and expedite its requests before the city. Tomorrow the group will sponsor a star-spangled "Polish the Apple" campaign on the steps of the main Public Library at Fifth Ave. and 42d St Casts of several Broadway plays will be there.

"That ranking really hurt that's why we're cleaning harder," said Rodriguez. "I'd rather clean than hit the beach. If it's going to help the community, I'll do it." "We're willing to get down and sweep," agreed Ray Oritz, executive director of the corporation and chairman of Community Board 1 in the Bronx. "We have a lot of pride. This is not a thing being donefor us.

This is a thing we're doing for ourselves." Low-priority area Oritz complains that even though his community is besieged by garbage strewn on the street by junkies and derelicts, and dumped after nightfall in the grim brick prairies that blanket the area, the city has given a low priority to a South Bronx cleanup. Requests for brooms and shovels NAME. ADDRESS. Send to: Apple Polisher, Daily News P.O. Box 2453, Grand Central Station.

New York, N.Y.10Q17 Bf we don't all step on gas, July will be 0E(: Larocca Gas saver hailed by cops A secret lubricant whose maker says it will reduce gasoline consumption by 15 is being tested in police patrol cars and the unofficial results so far range from "extra" to "super." The petroleum-based compound, called XPCL, is added to the gasoline in the car's tank where it "hitches a ride" with the gas, then coats the cylinder walls and exhaust valves. Stephen Smiley, marketing director for the Management Improvement Corp. of America, manufacturer of the lubricant said yesterday: "Our product has been around for the last 10 years, but now it's an idea whose time has come." Apparently the Police Department which has been given a 55 gallon drumful of the stuff enough for a six months' test thinks so, too. Eugene Masci. the civilian in charge of the department's motor vehicles, said yesterday: "I was very pessimistic in the beginning, but there seem to be some positive results so far." "We plan to make XPCL available to the consumer at about 2 cents per gallan of gasoline," Smiley said.

jerry Schmetterer By STEVE LAWRENCE Delivering his most optimistic as in June from either their July supplies or from the state's emergency set-aside. Delivery day advanced "They pushed their normal delivery day up a day or two to cover the July 4 weekend, that was all," the energy chief said. "This change in the normal distribution pattern is not enough to create significant end-of-the-month problems," Larocca said, even though July deliveries will be slightly lower than June's. Moreover, the state was prepared to give the oil companies up to 10 million gallons from this month's emergency set-aside to compensate companies for in the last days of June. "But so far only one company, Mobil, has asked us to cover an early delivery and that was only for 700,000 gallons," Larocca said.

The commissioner said the odd-even rules themselves "should cut gasoline demand 10 to 15, if California's experience is any indication, and that will belp out, too." sessment of the gas crunch to date, State Energy Commissioner James Larocca declared yesterday that "we have turned the corner for tha moment" and predicted that "this easing should continue through the end of the month." Larocca gave several reasons why the serious shortages and long gas lines of June should not reappear. And he said motorists and service stations would have only themselves to blame if a severe crunch recurs. "I hope he's right and it's possible that hie is," said Pete Hahn, Auto Club of New York spokesman. "Certainly we shouldn't have the kind of lines we've had, but I see no reason for optimism because the federal allocation rules will-continue to shortchange New York until they are changed." But Larocca said the oil companies Bid not borrow as heavily as anticipated even rationing is in effect Larocca said that some portion of the remaining 12 million gallsons could still be sent here "if it is needed." "Now if the public will just continue to show some restraint we could fre okay this month," Larocca said. Service station owners said they hope Larocca is right but many were skeptical.

He is doubtful "He may be right, but you know these things always seem so nice anj neat oa the surface," said Rusi Murwar, president of the Long Island Gasoline ReUilrs Association. In addition, oddven regulations require service stations to space their pumping hours so they sell no more than one sixth of their week's deliveries each day. "Retailers can now space their pumping so they will have some gas through the end of the month," Larocca said. He pointed out too, that July does have a major, end-of-the-month holiday weekend to contribut to a crisis as did May (Memorial Day) and June (July 4). The State Energy Office has already committed nearly half its July emergency set-aside about 12 million gallons to the metropolitan area where odd-.