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