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PORTLAND OBSERVER
June 30, 1982
V olum e XII, Num ber 38
250 Per Copy
Tw o Sections
USPS 959-680-855
Young advocates
economic coalition
C losing the 50th A n niversary
Meeting o f the U .S . Conference o f
M ayors today in M in n eapo lis-S t.
P au l, D e tro it M a y o r C olem an
Young reminded the mayors o f A m
erica’s principal cities that a lesson
was learned when the Conference
was o rig in a lly established in the
midst o f the Great Depression: “ For
America to w o rk ,” he said, “ there
must be work for Americans.”
Young, who w ill serve as presi
dent o f the mayors* organization for
the com ing year, said that the na
tional government has “ washed its
hands" o f its cities and its essential
industries. " E v e n A m erica is not
rich enough to a ffo rd disposable
cities or throw-away industries,” he
said.
Young’s remarks came at the con
clusion o f a five-d ay m eeting in
which a N ew York Times descrip
tion o f a d raft urban policy state
ment prepared by the Departm ent
o f H ousing and U rb an D ev elo p
ment triggered some sharp criticism
o f the A dm inistration by the more
than 200 mayors assembled. The ur
ban p olicy recom m ended in the
H U D d ra ft would elim inate much
federal assistance fo r cities and
would minimize federal government
responsibility for urban affairs. The
day after the Times disclosure o f the
d ra ft re p o rt, the President dis
claimed its content.
M ayo r Young said that the high
points in the Conference's H istory
were marked by its role in the devel
opment o f a national urban policy
and its establishment o f local coali
tions involving government and the
private sector, “ to revitalize and re
industrialize A m e ric a ." He called
for the formation o f a new national
coalition for economic recovery to
consist o f mayors and leaders o f
business, lab or, academic in s titu
tions and community organizations,
and announced that a special C o n
ference o f Mayors meeting would be
convened " in the near fu tu re ” to
bring the coalition together “ to de
velop a set o f recommendations for
A dm inistration and Congressional
action and to m obilize each o f the
groups in the coalition to contribute
their share to strengthening A m eri
ca’s economy.”
Young emphasized that the coali
tion must represent all mayors, “ be
cause the C onference has alw ays
represented and worked for all o f us
— Democrat, Republican, or Inde
pendent— and for all o f our cities,
w hether they are com m unities o f
three million or 300,000 or 30,000.”
Leek wins in recount
Results o f a lim ite d recount in
House D istrict 18 failed to change
the results o f the Democratic Party
primary election. Ed Leek won the
election in a field o f eight, with H a r
old W illia m s a close second. The
count remains 1,555 for Leek and
1,095 for Williams.
Williams requested the recount of
three precincts— 3004, 3039 and
3042. The cost o f the recount— $15
per precinct— is borne by the candi
date who requests it unless the result
is reversed.
Leek w ill face Republican Party
nominee M el H am ilto n in the N o
vember general election. Kent Ford
plans to run as an Independent and
there is the possibility o f another
minor party candidate.
Draft resisters expect indictment
Indictments o f d raft resisters ac
ross the nation and here in Oregon
are expected to be issued this week.
Selective Service (SSS) estimates
that in Oregon there are 19,000 to
20,000 (89.92 per cent compliance)
young men who have failed to
register for the draft.
It is expected that SSS w ill send
out two warning letters before turn
ing names over to the Justice D e
partment. SSS will accept late regis
tration in most cases. Even though
the court system can handle prose
cution o f only a h andful o f these
non-registrants, N orthw est D ra ft
Counseling C enter (N W D C C ) en
courages all non-registrants to be in
formed about their legal rights and
to establish a support group o f fam
ily and friends. The center, located
at 313 E. Burnside, has established a
list o f a n ti-d raft lawyers w illing to
provide legal counsel. N W D C C has
organized a draft resisters group to
provide support and information. A
D raft Resisters Legal Defense Fund
is also being established to help cov
er legal costs.
Angel leader discusses crime
by C. Eddie Edmondson
The leader and fou n d er o f the
G u a rd ian A ngels, the c itizen s ’
p atro l o rg an iza tio n that gained
national prominence in New Y o rk
City for trying to make the subways
safer, told over 100 Portlanders at
the K ing N eighborhood F a c ility
Tuesday night th a t i f a G u a rd ia n
Angels chapter is form ed in P o rt
land it w ill not be like the federal
government’s citizen volunteer pro
grams.
" W e are not ta lk in g about the
needy helping the g re e d y ," said
Curtis Sliwa. The 28-year-old New
Y o rk e r’ s fast-paced com ments
appeared to be warm ly received by
his audience.
Begun in New York City in 1978,
Sliw a said the G u a rd ia n Angels
started with thirteen young people.
They wanted to do som ething to
make the neighborhood streets
safer, he said. Today there are seven
chapters in the U n ited States and
one in C an ad a. G u a rd ia n Angels
membership is over 8,000 he said...
T ra ve lin g unarm ed in bands o f
eig ht, Sliw a said that G u a rd ian
Angels patrol their own neighbor
hoods. They do not carry weapons
or observe criminal behavior from a
distance, he added. "S o m etim es
you have to stand between tw o
groups o f people like peanut butter
between tw o slices o f b re a d ," he
said.
Sliwa is in Portland at the request
o f the Burnside C om m unity C oun
cil. The Council, which sponsors a
six-month community patrol in the
Burnside area d u rin g the w in te r,
brought Sliwa to Portland as an al
ternative to M ayo r Frank Ivancie’s
"w ar on crime" proposals.
In a d d itio n , Sliwas said his
organization has received 38 letters
fro m Portlanders requesting the
G u a rd ian Angels to come to
P o rtla n d . H e said he has received
letters from blacks and whites,
young and old, from across the city.
H o sp ital nurses said they needed
pro tectio n in th e ir p arkin g lots
between shifts; inner Northeast and
N o rth Portland streets and neigh
borhoods were pointed out; shop
ping centers and dow ntow n P o rt
land were listed by others, Sliwa
said.
Wearing the traditional red beret
and t-shirt o f the Guardian Angles
over a nicely cut shirt and tie, Sliwa
was taken on a w a lk in g tou r o f
downtown Portland and the Burnside
area by Michael Stoops, chairperson
o f the Burnside C o u n c il. Stoops
said that if the community shows it
is w illin g to support a G u a rd ia n
Angels chapter the Burnside Council
w ould pay to have a G u a rd ia n
Angels trainer get them started.
Over a year ago a Guardian Angel
on patrol was shot and killed by a
Newark, New Jersey police officer.
Sliwa said the cop was responding to
a call by the Guardian Angels who
had trapped some burglary suspects
on top o f a ro o f. W hen police
arrived one officer pointed his gun
and fired at a 2 7-y e a r-o ld black
Guardian Angel who was the father
o f three children.
A crim onious relationships be
tween police and the Angels is a
pattern in the beginning, Sliwa said.
" T h e y perceive us as doing th e ir
jo b ,” he said. But citizen patrols are
a natural response to high crime and
lawlessness, he said. “ The Guardian
Angels is something we would have
done in A m erica 40 or 50 years
ago i f crim e were as high as it is
"o w ," he said.
«
Once police understand and
accept what the Angels are trying to
do, Sliw a said, the police-A ngels
relationship im proves. Letters o f
understanding have been reached
between several police departments
and the Angels, he said, but not in
most cities where the Angels have
chapters.
The Guardian Angels are not the
approach to reducing com m unity
crime, Sliwa said, but an approach.
But obviously he believes that they
are m ore viable than other a p
proaches presently in use.
The G u ardian Angels only deal
w ith crimes that they see and in
situations that could get ugly i f
immediate direct intervention is not
made as soon as possible. S liw a ,
who managed a M cD onald’s in New
Y o rk C ity before establishing the
Angels, said many people are
concerned about you th fu l o ffe n d
ers.
“ The way to adequately deal with
crim e by y o u th fu l o ffend ers is to
create positive role
m odels,
alternatives to the pim ps, p ro s ti
tutes, flashy dressers, and thieves
who seem to be selling everything
you ever wanted to buy for less than
half its cost at the store.
" G u a rd ia n Angels end up
showing the very best o f what a
c ity ’ s youth has to o ffe r . They
replace the reflections o f what we
see on television," he said.
t
J*' <
Curtia Sliwa, founder and laadar of the Guardian Angela, visited
Portland thia week.
(Photo: ©Lena Bertucci. PANS)
W hen G uardian Angels observe
someone’s rights or property being
v io la te d , they intercede, he said.
They do not bother the drug user,
drunk or the "yahoos” who try to
bait the Angels into fighting.
He said less than a fourth o f those
who volun teer to become Angels
pass the in itia l three months
training. This consists o f physical
conditioning in the first m onth, a
study o f the penal code and the
nature o f citizen* arrest the next
month, and lastly, C PR and first aid
training in the third month.
“ But the key in g redien t,” Sliwa
points o u t, “ is to tu rn the other
c h e e k " when in the G u a rd ian
Angels uniform (which can only be
worn when on tour duty) and others
try to start a fight.”
" O n ly one in eight (applicants]
has learned to keep his tongue in his
mouth, his hands at his side and his
feet on the ground when this hap
pens,” he said.
A fifte e n -y e a r-o ld graduate o f
Boise, asked whether he would con
sider becoming a G uardian A ngel,
said, “ Yeah, but my father would
kill me if he found out about it.”
Confidential memo discloses nationwide insecticide contamination
by Ken Cook
Pacific News Service
W A S H IN G T O N . D C . — Sources
inside the U.S. Environmental Pro
tection Agency ( E P A ) have dis
closed I hat the agency is considering
the o u trig h t ban o f the chemical
“ toxaphenc,” once the most heavi
ly-used insecticide in the U n ited
Slates.
The ban w ill be imposed unless
the substance's m a jo r A m erican
m a n u fa c tu re r, B FC C hem ical o f
W ilm in g to n , D e là ., v o lu n ta rily
adopts severe restrictions. The deci
sion is based on findings that signifi
cant amounts o f the insecticide have
been carried through atmospheric
contam ination to the Great Lakes,
more than I ,(XX) miles from its chief
point o f ap p lica tio n in the Deep
South.
The disclosures come five years
after the agency began an intensive
review o f t b . ch e m ic al— and one
and o n e-h alf years a fter the E P A
positively determ ined that toxa-
phene poses a risk o f cancer to hu
mans and causes serious environ
mental problems. One former mem
ber o f the E P A ’s scientific advisory
panel has concluded that the pesti
cide is dangerous enough to warrant
even more stringent con tro l than
DDT.
In 1976, just before E P A began
its review, toxaphenc accounted for
one fourth o f all agricultural insecti
cide in use by volume in the United
States, making it the nation's num
ber one pest killer. A pproxim ately
26 million pounds, or 85 per cent o f
all toxaphenc use then was for insect
control in cotton, and over 82 per
cent o f (hat application occurred in
the Southeast and the Mississippi
Delta.
Since 1978, however, toxaphene
use on cotton has fallen sharply be
cause o f insect resistance to the
chem ical and the a v a ila b ility o f
new, m ore e ffe c tiv e insecticides.
Only 3 million pounds o f toxaphenc
were sprayed on cotton in 1978, and
7.5 million pounds in 1979. But the
drop came after contamination was
already widespread.
According to confidential internal
EPA memoranda dated this Febru
a ry, " s ig n ific a n t new develop
ments” in the scientific understand
ing o f toxaphenc’s impact on the en
vironment left E P A "lim ite d flexi
bility in devising a position" on the
chemical short o f m a jo r cancella
tion.
The most s trik in g o f the new
developments is a recently observed
b u ild -up o f toxaphene residues in
fish in the G reat Lakes, "e v e n
though little or no toxaphene is used
in the region,” according to E P A .
The agency contends that toxaphene
is v o latilize d in to the a ir in the
warm, humid conditions common in
the South during the spraying sea
son. The residue travels north via
prevailing spring winds, and is de
posited by ra in fa ll in the G reat
Lakes.
David Severn, chief o f the agen
cy’s Environmental Fate Branch for
pesticides, said that until analytical
methods were refined in the m id -
’70s, it was very d iffic u lt to trace
toxaphene in the environm ent, be
cause it is composed o f at least 177
distinct compounds. A fte r submit
ting the Great Lakes fish samples to
two laboratories “ considered to have
the highest expertise in toxaphene
analysis,” Severn and his colleagues
concluded that the residues o f toxa
phene had been " u n e q u iv o c a lly "
identified.
The cool temperatures and slight
ly alkalin e conditions in the Great
Lakes "fa v o r the retention o f toxa
phene and its m ovem ent in to the
food w e b ," according to the E P A
m em oranda. L ike D D T and other
organo-chlorine compounds, toxa
phene accumulates in ever-greater
amounts as it is taken up by aquatic
plants, snails and fish. Lab and field
studies have shown that fish can ac
cumulate toxaphene in amounts tens
o f thousands o f times greater than
are found in the surrounding water.
One E P A memo warned that "the
persistent nature o f toxaphene and
its movement into the food web may
present a serious problem to future
commercial and sport fishing in the
Great Lakes." In the most dramatic
exam ple o f c o n tam in atio n , E P A
learned that levels o f toxaphenc suf
ficient to cause such problems were
found in adult trout taken from an
"iso la ted landlocked lake on Isle
Royale, an island in Lake Superior
near the C an ad ian border whose
only known input o f water is from
the atmosphere.”
In the same F e b ru a ry , 1982,
memo from Sevren to Edwin John
son, director o f the E P A O ffice o f
Pesticide Programs, the “ frequency
o f occurrence and levels" o f to x a
phene residues found in the Great
Lakes were said to be “ among the
highest o f a ll U . S . D . I . IU .S . D e
partment o f the Interior] m o n ito r
ing stations.”
Moreover, the agency character
ized the toxaphene contamination as
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