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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (July 2, 1981)
Vol 83, No 4 Eugene, Oregon 97403 Thursday. July 2, 1981 Local tax levy suffers defeat By DONALD COULTER Ot Dw EmaraM In a display of fiscal conser vatism, Eugene and Lane County taxpayers voted Tues day to keep local spending at its present level Tier II — a supplement to Eugene's core budget — and the county’s $1 6 million property tax levy were among the special budget election s casualties Tier II, which would have ad ded $1 3 million in property taxes to the existing core bud get, was defeated by more than 600 votes The "Eugene Plan,” the $129 million core budget approved by voters last year, provided for operating services and capital projects The Eugene Plan set a limit of $16 5 million on the amount of property taxes the city can levy in the 1981-82 fis cal year The defeat of Tier II means that Eugene will do without 27 services and 11 capital projects that the budget committee labeled essential The voters must have con sidered them frivolous items," says Carol Baker, city commun ity relations director "They knew that nobody was going to lose jobs if it went down to defeat " Tier II package benefits in cluded installing lights along bike paths not on city streets or in parks, acquiring land for a new fire station in south Eugene and operating 19 playground programs during the summer of 1982 An additional Tier II public library measure would have maintained current service levels, provided additional staff and covered inflation costs “I wonder if people got all the information on it. or if they just decided they couldn't afford it," Baker says Baker says she doesn't know whether the Tier II ballot mea sure will appear again in the near future “The assistant city manager and city manager will bring it up to the budget committee at the end of the month and they'll decide if it should," she says The Lane property tax ballot received a fate similar to Eugene's, as county voters decided by almost 4,000 votes that the current operating bud get of $45 2 million will do just fine The budget defeat will strongly affect Lane County law enforcement which was slated to receive two-thirds of the property tax funds Lane County Sheriff Dave Burks said in a press release prior to the election that his staff, already stung by budget cuts, would suffer greatly by defeat of the June 30 levy Immediately following the defeat, the Department of Pub lic Safety was reduced by 30 personnel, including 13 un iformed officers Springfield voters passed both the "A" and B levy mea sures, while in Eugene, school board levy A passed and levy B' was defeated Jack Billings won a special election for the Eugene School Board seat vacated by Howard Warner Billings, a Eugene lawyer, had been a temporary appointee to the seat Photo by Bill Wack 150 supporters of the Equal Rights Amendment gathered at the Eugene courthouse Tuesday to call for the amendment's ratification. ERA rally speakers support ratification By HEIDI SWILLINGER CM mm Emerald Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex,” reads the Equal Rights Amendment Nearly 150 people were present at a June 30 "countdown rally” supporting ratification of the ERA The event, coordinated by the local chapter of the National Organization for Women, was one of several staged across the nation While 35 states have endorsed the ERA, 38 are required to validate the amendment before its ratification deadline in June of 1982 According to Oregon NOW press officer Laura Johnson, NOW is concentrating its efforts on Virginia, Florida and Illinois, which are among the states that have not ratified the ERA "If any of (the states) are to be swayed, it will be those.” she says Other states that haven't ratified the amend ment include Utah, Nevada. Arizona. Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama. Georgia. South Carolina and North Carolina Johnson says NOW is recommending that people boycott all unratified states "Don't gamble in Reno, don't go to Disney World or buy Florida products Let's hit them in the pocketbook,” she says Regionally, NOW is focusing its efforts on Utah, where "the Mormon Church has come out over and over again against ERA," Johnson says ERA "missionaries" are going door to door in Salt Lake City and surrounding areas, asking that people mail cards indicating support of the amendment to Spencer Kimball, head of the Mormon Church, she says. There were several speakers at the hour-long rally Tuesday, including representatives from the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, Girl Scouts, Eugene Women's Commission, Oregon Women’s Political Caucus and the Women’s Rights Coalition Sharon Gordon, from the League of Women Voters, said. "The real philosophical question is whether women and girls will be denied the same rights as men. "We have to share our resources with people in states where the ratification fight is still going on,” Gordon said "We cannot count on anyone else to do this for us." Irv Fletcher, a speaker from the Lane County Labor Council said that passage of the ERA is the only way to end job discrimination According to NOW literature distributed at the rally, women make only 59 cents for every dollar men make working full time Maxine Hayes, from the International Feder ation of Business and Professional Women, referred to Switzerland, which recently voted an equal rights amendment into its constitution "The rest of the world has its eyes on the U S right now." she said Financial aid ready for summer recipients By ANN PORTAL Ol ttw Em*ratd The financial aid office began hand ing out summer term aid Wednesday, but financial aid director Ed Vignoul says students should stay tuned for further developments Levels of funding for Basic Educa tional Opportunity Grants, National Student Direct Loans, Guaranteed Student Loans and Oregon State Need Grants still have not been decided for next year. Vignoul says, although all are entering their final stages of discus sion We re not going to Know anything final until the first or second week of August," he says Summer financial aid is being awarded late this year because the financial aid office was unable to re serve enough money from the previous fiscal year to fund summer aid However, the office s new fiscal year began July 1 and Vignoul says his office now can begin payments, even though final amounts from the federal and state governments have not yet been received Vignoul says payments are going smoothly and that most students weathered the temporary delay without applying for the special emergency loans made available “The vast majority of people just played it cool," he says According to the latest information from Washington, Vignoul says he 'fully expects" BEOGs to be reduced by $80 next year on grants where the maximum amount was awarded Although the exact amount of NDSLs to be awarded to the University still is not known, Vignoul says that Oregon stands to gain from a new way Con gress is considering distributing funds Students have not accepted more NDSLs than anticipated, but the total amount accepted is "really hanging out there," Vignoul says Guaranteed Student Loans are being processed at all levels — banks, the Oregon State Scholarship Commission and the financial aid office — and Vig noul says students shouldn't wait to apply for GSLs for next year "If people are going to apply for GSLs, they need to do it now," he says GSLs currently are being discussed by joint Congressional committees for resolution, and should be decided dur ing the first two weeks of July, Vignoul says Two GSL proposals are being dis cussed, but neither proposal would go into effect before Oct 1, so all loans approved before that date should go through, he says “Again, God knows, they can change their minds I have no idea how it’s going to rattle out.” The new GSL requirements "defini tely will be more restrictive than in the past,” Vignoul says The interest rate already has increased from 7 to 9 per cent on all new loans, although the student still does not pay the interest while in school Vignoul says his office probably will have to refigure nearly all financial aid offers for next year, but that nothing will be definite until mid-August. Meanwhile, students should just sit tight “It'll all settle down and sift out,” he says
