Local players Camp Fire Gazette earn from honors district Page 11 group soldier's meets mom Page 6 ESTABLISHED 183, No. 63 LANCASTER, OHIO, MONDAY, MARCH 4, 1991 PER COPY 20 PAGES Monday WEATHER Tonight will be partly cloudy, with lows between 20 and 25. Tuesday will be mostly sunny and warmer, with highs in the low 50s. LOCAL City Council to meet tonight Lancaster City Council will meet tonight for an informal Council of the Whole discussion to discuss the findings of a recent state auditor's report. The report found that two city department heads and a former department head improperly spent money.
collected from the sale of scrap metal. Council is considering legislation that would excuse the department heads from repaying the city. Council will meet at 7 p.m. in Council Chambers on the second floor of City Hall. NATION Eight killed in nursing home fire COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo.
(AP) Fire swept through a nursing home early today, killing eight people and injuring at least nine others, authorities said. Six engine companies from the Colorado Springs Fire Department were battling the fire at the Crystal Springs Estate home this morning, along with two aerial ladder companies, said Colorado Springs Police spokesman Lt. Rich Resling. Eight people were confirmed dead and nine others were taken to hospitals, Resling said. fire was fully involved when they arrived on the Resling said.
will be there for a while battling that fire." He said seven other people had been evacuated; he was unsure whether everyone was accounted for. Bill would force release of job funds WASHINGTON (AP) Two congressmen say the federal government should release money intended to be used by the states to administer their jobless benefits programs. "It's time to stop playing games with administrative financing funds that the states need, especially as the recession deepens," Ohio Rep. Don Pease said last week after introducing legislation along with fellow Democrat Rep. Sander Levin of Michigan.
Both said that the government isn't obliged to spend all the tax money it collects. Any money not released to the states is used to help offset the federal budget deficit. But states need that money to pay for such things as office space and salaries. INDEX Business Classified Lottery .......2 Ohio news ........2 Opinion .................................4 Sports U.S., world Weather. NO PAPER? If you don't receive your paper, call your carrier or call the circulation department 654-1321 by 6 p.m.
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to 1 p.m. Saturday. Iraqis release allied soldiers Civil unrest RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) Ten allied prisoners of war six of them Americans were freed today by Iraq in a first step toward meeting truce terms. At the same time, the worst unrest of Saddam Hussein's rule was reported in Iraq. Iran's official news agency reported fierce fighting today in the southeastern Iraqi city of Basra.
It said units of Saddam's elite Republican Guard were fighting people including defeated soldiers returning from Kuwait. The Islamic Republic News Agency quoted refugees fleeing Iraq as saying the governor of Basra province, Basra's mayor and Saddam's eldest son, Udai, had been slain in the unrest. There are no Western reporters in Basra and the reports on the turmoil could not be verified independently. Iran's official radio on Sunday had reported violent antigovernment demonstrations in at least four cities, suggesting Iraqi anger with Saddam for leading the country to defeat was beginning to boil over. Baghdad Radio made no mention AP Laserphoto terms of a permanent cease-fire.
The meeting was at a captured Iraqi air base at Safwan, Iraq. Before the talks, Schwarzkopf barred photographs of the Iraqi delegation. Nev Newspapers useful as educational tool By SUSAN L. PROSCH The Eagle-Gazette Staff U.S. GEN.
H. Norman Schwarzkopf (left), the top allied commander, and Iraq's Lt. Gen. Sultan Hasheem Ahmad exchange a military courtesy by saluting at the close of Sunday's meeting to set Promoting newspapers as a method to teach the most up-to-date information available in the classroom is the purpose of Newspaper in Education Week. Newspaper in Education Week, celebrated this week in Lancaster and across the country, also promotes the idea that students can relate skills and information learned in a classroom to daily life by reading a newspaper.
To that end, the Eagle-Gazette will provide more than 1,300 newspapers every day this week to local fifth-grade classrooms, EagleGazette Circulation Manager Tim Granlee said. Sixteen city and county elementary schools are participating in the program. Within a single issue of a newspaper a student can read about events, politics, social issues, education, sports, fashion, entertainment and business, EagleGazette Publisher and General Manager Russell L. McCauley said. By sharing newspapers with fifth- -grade students the EagleGazette hopes to "foster better readership habits among children, especially in their formative ages, and to draw interest to the newspaper," McCauley said.
"'We want students to become readers." The purpose of NIE week is to "make children aware of 1 the value Tire Tire-melting By JODI CLEESATTLE The Eagle-Gazette Staff Tire-melting equipment Lancaster Mayor Don Maddux viewed in Arkansas last year may not be a feasible solution to the city's tire dump woes, despite the mayor's original belief that the recycling process might be less costly than other methods of removal. The equipment, which breaks down tires and other organic materials into oil and a reusable substance called carbon black, will cost $6 million to build. Springdale, Arkansas-based PTO (Products to Oil) Co. currently has a prototype of the equipment but needs the $6 million to build the first production model. PTO President Bill Meuser said the company recently formed and is in the process of getting financial backing to build the equipment.
Meuser said he initially hoped Lancaster might be one of those financial backers. Once money is available, the company can manufacture a production model in about six months, he said. Maddux said he was not aware of 8 the cost of the equipment before visiting PTO and had hoped reported in Iraq of any unrest in Basra. Iraq's official media instead depicted Saddam as a strong leader who is working to rebuild his war-wrecked country. The Iraqi president who had not been heard from in five days resurfaced Sunday, when Baghdad Radio reported he had two meetings with officials on restoring basic services.
Despite the prisoner release, Iraq took a belligerent line today on another topic allied surveillance flights. A military spokesman said on Baghdad Radio that the overflights were meant to "terrorize" Iraqis and violated the truce. The freed POWs left for Jordan, where they were to be handed over to their respective embassies, AP correspondent Salah Nasrawi reported from the Iraqi capital. The Americans released included Army Spc. Melissa Rathbun-Nealy of Grand Rapids, and Navy of a newspaper and to promote the role a newspaper can play in helping children learn how to read," McCauley said.
"'We want to make sure that we assist schools in helping children learn to read and write so they don't become functionally illiterate statistics." There are approximately 4,500 functionally illiterate people in Fairfield County, according to Grace Meyers, Fairfield County's public library and literacy council liaison. By reading newspapers, students become better informed and, consequently, better citizens. Newspapers also can be used to update textbook information. "In the age of changing technology, students can learn a lot more of the details in a newspaper than they can from television," McCauley said. "Newspapers can teach children about history," McCauley said.
"A newspaper acts as a documentation of what is currently happening. And from the analysis on the opinion page, a newspaper offers a glimpse of the future." Newspaper in Education Week is a project sponsored jointly by International Reading Association and American Newspaper Publishers Association Foundation. Locally, NIE week is sponsored by the Eagle-Gazette, American Electric Power and Anchor Hocking Glass Co. equipment Lancaster might negotiate a deal to use the equipment for low or no cost as a promotion for the new company. Meuser said he invited Maddux to visit PTO and view the equipment in July because ABC "I'm not sure it's city business.
We passed tire cleanup legislation. I don't know why he went (to Arkansas)." Jon Slater Jr. "World News Tonight" was filming a segment on the tire recycling process. ABC requested that Maddux appear in the news segment because of the huge tire fire that brought national attention to Lancaster last May, Meuser said. "ABC asked me to ask him to come down here," Meuser said.
"ABC insisted would that be he come here. They said it a good idea. He was nice enough to come down A transcript of ABC's "'World News Tonight" broadcast of Oct. 24 indicates that Maddux appeared navigator-bombadier Lt. Jeffrey Zaun of Cherry Hill, NJ.
(See IRAQIS, page 3.) Late season storm strikes By STEPHEN HUBA The Eagle-Gazette Staff County and city road crews responded throughout the night to a surprise ice and snow storm, but roads weren't cleared in time to keep all county school districts from canceling classes today. Area police agencies reported no major weather-related accidents as of 9:30 a.m. today. Streets in Lancaster became increasingly passable as the morning wore on, with nine street department trucks out since 9:30 p.m. Sunday salting the ice and plowing away slush, street.
Superintendent Bill Lama said. He said state highways that pass through town were in "excellent condition" by 9:30 a.m. Other residential roads had packed ice and were being worked on throughout the morning, he said. In the county, driving lanes of U.S. 33 and 22 were said to be in "medium to good shape" by Dave Benson, superintendent for Ohio Department of Transportation in Fairfield County.
"We're making progress," Benson said. "We should have (See LATE, page 3.) solution Eagle-Gazette photo by Dick Prochaska Youngsters clown away Wilson (front), Canal Winchester, looks at Scott Haskins of Robby WLOH radio Saturday night during a clown contest at Value City. Haskins interviewed participants for the contest judging. Wilson was the boy winner, while Sara Householder girl winner. may not on the news for about 10 seconds of a 30-second segment dealing with Lancaster's tire fire.
Some Council members said they believe the trip to Arkansas which lasted a little more than four hours according to Maddux's plane tickets of July 16 may have been a waste of time and money. "It was a PR (public relations) stunt," Councilman Richard Cagney said. "'The mayor indicated to me two weeks before he left that it would be a great time for publicity, that he knew ABC would be there and he would have the chance to be on national TV. It seems like he was more interested in getting on TV than he was in seeing the tire facility." Maddux said he did believe national publicity might benefit Lancaster, but his main interest was in possibly saving the city money in tire cleanup. "There wasn't much thought of me personally being on the show, but I thought there was a chance Lancaster might be mentioned on TV," Maddux said.
"Any time the city can be mentioned on national TV, that's very good. It wasn't for my own personal gain. I wasn't up (See TIRE, page 3.) Company may resolve mayor's plane ticket issue JODI CLEESATTLE and City Auditor James Russell By The Eagle-Gazette Staff about whether the airline tickets may be paid from the account. The owner of the Springdale, Council also refused to Lancaster Mayor appropriate money to pay the company Maddux visited last July bill from other city funds when Don resolve recent controversy the issue arose in November. may surrounding the mayor's trip Meuser said he was unaware west to view tire melting of the controversy, though he equipment.
said the mayor's secretary called Bill Meuser, owner of a him in November. Meuser said established tire he did not speak to Maddux or recently recycling company called PTO, his secretary at that time, said Friday he would pay the however. $607 cost of airline tickets "If they (the city) don't, pay fly to it, we will," Meuser "He Maddux purchased to Fayetteville, Ark. Maddux (Maddux) like the don't Lone need to Ranger. be visited PTO in Springdale, just feeling north of Fayetteville, July 16.
We've got a lot of little we bills plan to pay as soon as we get the The bill from Uniglobe remains company all set up. I didn't realize you all had in Travel unpaid because travel costs are a problem up not covered by the mayor's there." said he will call the which was Meuser expense established account for mayor today to discuss paying account, as an prospective for the plane tickets. entertaining clashed with both City Council (See COMPANY, page 3.) businesspeople. Maddux has.