Hawaii Tribune-Herald from Hilo, Hawaii • 1

'73 io Insurers scoff at value of tort 'reform' Another Marine embassy guard is charged Most golfers like Hilo muni; Marathon set 200 years ago today Tit Convtntion elected a committee to formulatt a compromise on representor tion in the national legislature. rem 1 1 nn Clouifad 14-19 Comiq 20 Crottword 20 tWAbby 2" Entertainment 9 Horoscope 19 Obrtuorit 10 Opinion 4 Sporh 11-13 Stocks 2 IV log 9 WalUr 5s4TH YZAR. MSI ft M1WAH II1IY 1 1C7 NO. 152 2 SECTIONS 23 PAGES 3 CINTS Puako fire contained Reagan starts Economic Bill of Rights' push A i -V I J- Ml it IX '0: I I 1 1 A large brush fire raging out of control at Puako destroyed seven homes and a vehicle before weary firefighters finally were able to contain it shortly after sunrise this morning. Early damage estimates given to police indicate the blaze caused at least $487,000 in damages to the property at Wailea, South Kohala.

A Fire Department spokesman said as of this morning the unofficial count stood at seven homes which had been from half to fully-engulfed by fire. Other homes also have been damaged in varying degrees. Fire Department officials said the blaze was contained as of 6:34 a.m. today and that firefighters continued to work' to keep the fire contained. The total number of acres burned was not available yet, nor was the official cause of the fire.

Fire officials said, however, that they had received reports that a cooking fire at a beach campsite started the fire on Wednesday. As of this morning, the roads leading into Puako remained closed. 'The blaze -has forced the evacuation of several hundred people. One of the homeowners who lost a house to the flames told the Tribune-Herald the fire was caused by a campfire started by squatters in the area. The campfire apparently went out of control on Wednesday, said Samuel Monet, a contractor.

Monet said several earlier fires also have been caused by the squatters. He said he has complained previously to the state Department of Land and Natural Resources and to the police about squatters camping in the area. The fire, which raced through kiawe forests, was not expected to threaten the Mauna Lani Resort due to the natural terrain in the area. The resort is separated from the forested area by a wide WASHINGTON (UPI President Reagan harkened to the spirit and words of the Founding Fathers today to offer a low-tax, balanced budget "Economic Bill of Rights" and promised to spend "the rest of my public life" pursuing it. Proclaiming that "property rights are central to liberty and they should never be trampled upon," Reagan said, excessive taxation is the equivalent of economic slavery.

Standing coatless in the typically muggy summer heat on a marble landing in front of the Jefferson Memorial, facing the Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial and the White House, Reagan renewed his call for a constitutional amendment to balance the budget. He also added a new twist a proposed requirement that any tax increase win passage by more than the simple majority required for all other legislation. Reagan also announced he will appoint a bipartisan commission to determine how the government can "privatize" selToff to private industry many of its assets and enterprises such as federal power projects, Amtfak and various loan programs. Little in Reagan's proposal is new, and most of it stands little chance of adoption by a Democratic Congress. Even when the Senate was run by the Republicans, Congress did not act on the balanced budget amendment or on his can for power to veto individual items in large spending bills.

But 34 states four short of the required three-fourths have passed resolutions calling for a constitutional convention to adopt such an amendment, and Reagan said, "If the Congress won't act, I will have no choice but to take my case directly to the states" and seek such a convention. Quoting Thomas Jefferson's support for a balanced budget amendment 200 years ago, Reagan said, "It is time to finish the job Jefferson began and to protect our people and their livelihoods with restrictions on government that will ensure the fundamental economic freedoms of the people." The speech wrapped into a new package the budget, tax and regulatory reforms he has championed with mixed success for more than two decades in the political limelight. "They are basic to the philoso- J)hy that brought me into public ife and, for the rest of my public life, I will pursue the goals we've set forth in the 'Economic Bill of he said. A senior White House official said that in addition to pressuring Congress for budget reform, the speech was meant to set an agenda for both parties in the 1988 presidential campaign. Democrats seemed eager to take T-H photo by Lorry Kadooko DEBRIS DISPLAY Officer Joseph Kealoha of under control a destructive blaze that ravaged South Kohala police stands by the remains of the coastal community, causing damages of Michael Lowrey's home in the Puako area, nearly $500,000 and destroying seven homes.

Firefighters this morning managed to bring RONALD REAGAN new agenda Reagan on. House Speaker Jim Wright said Jefferson "would have been shocked at the insensitive priorities and grossly excessive borrowing of the Reagan, "Instead of dealing with the substance of deficit reduction," he said, Reagan "trots out the tired old ideas that were rejeced by the authors of our Constitution and have been repeatedly rejected throughout American history." Senate Democratic leader Robert Byrd of West Virginia said: "What the American people really need is not a speech in front of the Jefferson Memorial filled with shop-worn ideas and wrapped in patriotic bunting. What this country needs is a declaration of independence, independence from the Reagan deficits, independence from the Reagan debt." Reagan told the sparse crowd of about administration officials and guests of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce about a colonial saying that there are two ways to get to the top of an oak tree. "One is to climb and the other is to find an acorn and sit on it.

"Well, I didn't come to Washington to sit on acorns," he declared. "It's time to roll up our sleeves and start climbing." Reagan, whose earnings in his most productive year in Hollywood were taxed at more than 90 percent in the 1940s, declared, "We must insist that there be a limit to the level of taxation, not only because excessive taxation undermines the strength of the economy, but because taxation beyond a certain level becomes He called taxation "the harnessing of free people. It is forced labor and, if it goes beyond reasonable bounds, it is a yoke of oppression." Borrowing from Franklin D. Roosevelt, he laid out "four See REAGAN, Page 10 Daredevil balloonists bail out would guess they came within half a football field of us," said Francine Duncan, Mauna Lani's assistant vice president for marketing. "Later, the winds changed and the fire moved away from us." tion if the men were injured.

As the journey ended, two helicopters buzzed on both sides of the massive balloon, one carrying project director Tom Barrow and other crew members. Project spokesman Crispen Williams said the ocean landing' puts into question whether the trip is a legitimate crossing of the Atlantic. Branson and Lindstrand had already beaten the distance record for hot-air balloons by riding a jet stream across the expanse of lava and grassland. Some of the maintenance and support buildings for the resort are located near the edge of the property. "I watched the flames from the window in my office and I After 34 hours aboard the huge balloon, millionaire owner Richard Branson of England and partner Swede Per Lindstrand leaped from the huge black-and-silver Virgin Atlantic Flyer at an altitude of 3,000 feet about 7 p.m.

(9 a.m. HST). They landed in the Irish Sea about two miles from the town of Mull of Kintyre on the Scottish coast. They were quickly picked up by rescue craft and then flown to a hospital. There was no indica The resort itself never was threatened during the period, although smoke from the flames forced some hotel guests with respiratory problems to be moved io other hotels, Duncan said.

Atlantic from the United States. The previous hot-air balloon distance record was 907 miles and set by American Harold Warner, who flew from Calgary, Canada, to Arnold, Jan. 26-27, 1985. The 21-story-high craft, traveling at about 100 mph, had breezed across Belfast, Northern Ireland, with no problems and appeared on course for an evening landing about 150 miles north of London. next year LONDON (UPI) Two daredevil balloonists parachuted into the Irish Sea two miles off the Scottish coast today, ending their record-breaking flight across the Atlantic in a 21-story hot-air balloon.

"The men abandoned their trans-Atlantic attempt after the balloon touched the sea several times," the BBC said. "They regained height and then bailed out to be recovered from the sea by rescue services." New TV station due in Hilo By Chris Reed nearby areas. The KHNL worker said he did not expect any "competing applications" for channel 14. Under FCC procedures, other parties interested in using the channel can apply until July 31. King Broadcasting began the process with its May 8 application to the federal agency.

If there is more than one applicant, the FCC will hold a hearing in Washington, D.C. to decide who is assigned channel 14. Aotaki said he understood the process would probably take about sue more months before the FCC assigned the channel to KHNL or a competitor. King Broadcasting is a Seattle-based media conglomerate with five television stations, including KHNL, and several AM and FM radio stations on the mainland. a legitimate statewide broadcaster.

Keith Aotaki said KHNL already had translator stations on Maui and Kauai and might eventually set up a translator in the Kona area. "We're trying to pick up people in areas that aren't on cable," said Aotaki. While Hilo is very "cable-intensive," service in rural areas like Puna is not nearly as available, he ooted Aotaki said KHNL's translator, if the FCC gives King Broadcasting the right to proceed, would be put up next to KGMB-TV's transmitter known technically as station KGMD at Piibonua in upslope Hilo. The KHNL translator would broadcast on channel 14. Aotaki said the translator station would not broadcast a very strong signal beyond Hilo, but that it could still be received in' Body found in mango grove Puna police are investigating the discovery of the remains of a human body which were located in the area of a mango grove off Pohoiki Road approximately a half mile from the geothermal plant The remains were discovered by a person who was picking mangos io the area and reported to the Puna police at mid-afternoon yesterday.

The body was badly decomposed and an examination of the remains will be performed in an effort to establish a positive identification, said Detective Robert Kualii of the Criminal Investigation Section in Puna. Kualii said the investigation will be continued by Puna police and further information will be released as it becomes available. Hilo is likely to get a new television station by early next year, but its programming won't seem especially original to residents who are cable subscribers. King Broadcasting Co. has applied to the Federal Communications Commission to establish a 10-kilowatt "translator station" in Hilo to retransmit programs broadcast on KHNL-TV channel 13 in Honolulu.

KHNL, which is not affiliated with the major networks, is already available on Comtec cable. The station features sports, Japanese-language programming and reruns of former network TV hits. An engineer with KHNL said yesterday it was part of the station's strategy to become.