Rock'n'roll revival
The University Daily
KANSAN
Love of music of '60s and '70s pays off for radio show host.
See story on page 6.
Warm, cloudy
High, 70. Low, 40s.
Details on page 3.
Published since 1889 by students of the University of Kansas
Vol. 95, No. 125 (USPS 650-640)
Thursday, April 4, 1985
Wrecker service employees, assisted by firefighters and police officers, right an ammonia tanker at Iowa and 31st streets. Police yesterday afternoon diverted traffic for more
Ammonia tank blocks streets
By KATHY FLANDERS
Staff Reporter
A Farmer's Co-Op Association ammonia tank, carrying 850 gallons of ammonia, fell off a trailer and into the intersection of 31st and Iowa streets yesterday, blocking traffic and keeping law enforcement officials busy and anxions for more than two hours.
Officials from the Lawrence fire and police departments, state fire marshal's office, Kansas Highway Patrol and Douglas County sheriff's office worked together to keep traffic out of the area as they pulled the tank back onto its trailer.
Jim McSwain, Lawrence fire chief, said no ammonia had leaked from the 1,000-gallon tank, and one no one had been injured in the fire. It was to be used as farm fertilizer, he said.
"This was the first time we've had an overturned ammonia tank in Lawrence in seven years." McSwain said.
The tank overturned about 4 p.m. as the truck came on at 31st Street, turned south onto Iowa River.
"THE TANK WAS on a trailer," said Rex Johnson, Douglas County sheriff. "On the
front axle of the trailer, there's a shaft that goes up to the tank pin which holds the tank to the axle.
"The pin broke that holds the tank to the trailer, and the tank fell off."
When the fire department received a call from the police that an ammonia tank was on its side, they notified surrounding businesses but didn't evacuate the area.
"Ammonia is toxic." McSwain said. "At the right concentration it could kill you. What's in the tank is liquid. One gallon of liquid would expand to 800 gallons of vapor if there was a leak and it hit air."
MCSWAIN SAID OFFICIALS would have had to evacuate people from homes and businesses at least one-half mile around the site if gas had leaked from the tank.
Police parked their patrol cars about two blocks from the accident, preventing traffic from reaching the accident from all directions.
Two fire trucks responded to the accident. Another fire truck and an ambulance waited in the parking lot on the east side of Iowa Street, ready in case of an emergency.
The fire department called a Co-op manager to the site to have the tank
inspected before workers tried to place it back onto the trailer.
Richard Barr, of the fire marshal's office, said officials were most concerned about a pressure valve giving way, causing ammonia to escape.
THE CO-OP MANAGER inspected the tank and said there was no danger of it leaking or being damaged when workers tried to lift it.
McSwain said, "We weren't afraid of problems, but we wanted to take every precaution possible."
Another Co-op tank was emptied and brought to the site in case some of the ammonia in the overturned tank needed to be drained off to lighter the tank before trying
Two tow trucks were brought in to pull the tank upright. They were parked on both sides of the tank.
Air bags were put under the tank and inflated by firefighters. The bags lifted the tank enough for the firefighters. Co-op and latch chains were used to under the tank and latch chains around it.
As a safety measure, bales of hay were placed between the tank and one of the tow trucks. Barr said.
Panel restores funds for degree program
By MICHAEL TOTTY Staff Reporter
TOPEKA - Money for a computer engineering degree program, at the top of the University of Kansas' budget list, was endorsed yesterday by the budget committee KA-10.
The computer engineering program was
See related story p. 3.
reinstated in the report on the KU budget endorsed by the House Ways and Means Committee. A House subcommittee report had deleted $266,000 to finance the program from the budget recommendation approved last month by the Senate.
The funds for the program are in the fiscal year 1986 appropriations bill for the seven Board of Regents schools. Regents schools are located in Chicago, the Kansas Technical Institute in Salina.
The Ways and Means Committee's recommendations would cut about $1 million from the Senate's recommendation for the KU section of the budget.
THE FULL HOUSE is expected to debate the bill next week.
Although disagreements between the
House and Senate probably will send the Regents finance package to a joint conference committee, the computer engineering department, since both chambers agreed to the proposal.
KU officials have told legislators that the computer engineering program is their top priority for state funds in the fiscal 1986 Regents budget. Robert Cobb, executive vice chancellor, said he was pleased that the committee agreed to finance the program.
The House subcommittee in charge of analyzing the KU section of the Regents budget proposed adding $250,000 to the KU section to increase the University's revenues, or OE, to replace the $266,000 it deleted for the computer engineering program.
STATE REP. SANDY Duncan, R-Wichita and chairman of the KU budget subcommittee, said his panel had decided to finance the University's second priority, the OOE increase, instead of its first, the computer engineering program.
ims is the only new program for the Regents this year." Duncan said of the computer engineering program. "We decided we should go slowly on this one."
In its report, the subcommittee said increasing the OOE amount was a way to
See BUDGET, p. 5, col. 1
Senate rejects request for GALA week funds
Staff Reporter
By JULIE MANGAN
Student senators last night refused to consider a bill requesting funds for Gay and Lesbian Awareness Week, even though they also voted to proclaim next week GALA Week.
the senate failed to raise enough votes to allow it to consider the GALA Week financing bill, which requested $165 for the week's activities. A two-thirds majority would have allowed the Senate to temporarily suspend Senate rules, which stood in the way of the GALA weekly financing.
GALA Week is sponsored by Gay and Lesbian Services of Kansas. The purpose of the week is to promote awareness of the gay community, according to Ruth Lichtwardt. GLOSK director. Films, musical performances and a dance were among the activities planned for the celebration.
Lichtwardt said Monday that the event would be canceled if it did not receive Senate funds.
EARLIER YESTERDAY, THE Student Executive Committee, the executive body of the Senate, voted to give senators the opportunity to consider the GALA Week bill, which was approved but later overturned by the Finance Committee on Monday. Senate rules would have had to be suspended for the Senate to consider the bill.
The rules state that there must be a five-day waiting period after a bill is approved by a committee before it can be introduced to the Senate.
Suspending the rules to consider the bill would have set a bad precedent, said Jeff Polack, student body vice president. Other
See SENATE, p. 5, col. 3
Parimutuel proposal gets push; liquor talks hit snag
By United Press International
TOPEKA — A resolution to allow Kansas voters to decide whether to legalize betting on horse and dog races advanced another legislative lap yesterday but a proposal on liquor by the drink stalled in a conference committee.
After about 90 minutes of testimony from supporters and one opponent, the House Committee on Federal and State Affairs adopted the parimutuel resolution on a close voice vote and sent it to the full House for consideration.
If the House passes the resolution by the necessary two-thirds vote, Kansans will be able to cast their votes on the question during the 1986 general election.
Attempts to put liquor by the drink on the 1986 ballot are being threatened by a stalemate between House and Senate negotiators, who failed again yesterday to agree on what should happen to private clubs that permit alcohol if voters approver liquor by the drink.
But those measures, contained in a package of anti-drinking bills credited with getting lawmakers to vote for liquor by the drink, could be in danger if the compromise group cannot agree on the fate of the for-profit. Class B clubs.
Before breaking up, the group managed to whittle away at some of its major differences on stiffening drunken driving penalties and setting closing hours for establishments that
AFTER A HEATED session that lasted just 15 minutes, the joint conference committee adjourned without scheduling a future meeting.
or the job position.
In what head Senate negotiator Edward Reilly Jr., R. Leavenworth, called a "fabulous offer," the upper chamber agreed to move closing hours for liquor-serving establishments from 3 a.m. to 2 a.m.
AFTER REFUSING TO BUGE earlier, the Senate team yesterday offered to set the mandatory license suspension for first-time drunken drivers at a minimum of 21 days and to deny entry into alcohol diversion programs to persons convicted of driving with an alcohol-blood content greater than 20 percent.
However, the House team refused to give in to Senate wishes to keep the Class B club system intact, even if voters approve a constitutional amendment to end the ban on public sale of liquor by the drink. The panel has agreed that liquor by the drink will be allowed only in those counties where it is approved by voters.
House negotiators appeared willing to back off their earlier insistence on a 1:30 a.m. closing time, a 30-day minimum suspension for first-time drunken drivers and a .15 percent blood-alcohol level cut-off for entry into diversion agreements.
With the liquor-by-the-drink resolution and the accompanying package of antidrinking measures hanging in the balance, Reilly threatened to ask the Senate to concur on the House version of the resolution. The House added to the Senate-passed resolution that no alcohol should be drunk to establishments that make at least 30 percent of their profits from the sale of food
SENATE NEGOTIATORS FAVOR leaving the Class B club system intact in counties where voters turn down liquor by the drink, while counties that approve the amendment would be served only by the new public liquor establishments.
"The Senate has been arguing all along,
"Give the people the chance to vote, give the people the vote," on liquor by the drink," said House Speaker Mike Hayden, R.Atwood.
"What you want to do is to impose Class B clubs on those people who vote dry."
House members on the compromise panel said keeping the Class B clubs in some counties would not give those voters a clear choice between "wet" and "dry."
IF THE SENATE agrees to go ahead and concur with the House version of the resolution, Reilly warned, the accompanying measures will be dead for this year's session.
Formed about two weeks ago to try to work out differences between House and Senate versions of the liquor resolution, the committee already has agreed in principle to strip the county authority and 30 percent food provision from the resolution. Those provisions would be included in a yet-to-hed-draft measure outlining the implementation of liquor by the drink if it is approved by voters.
House milks official state drink
By NANCY HANEY
Staff Reporter
TOPEKA — No one seemed to notice the new drinking bill when it was introduced in the Kansas House in February. Maybe because this bill addresses the consumption of a different kind of cereal beverage
Yep, the stuff you pour on your Frosted Flakes
It's not a bill that would make it illegal for 18 to 20-year-olds to drink milk in public. And there aren't any amendments to the law, a nice, tall, cold one with dinner a crime.
A state representative introduced the bill so the "better refresher" would become the official drink in Kansas.
become the new manager.
"Passing a bill to make milk the official drink does a great deal more for the state than passing liquor by the drink," said the Rev. Richard Taylor, an anti-liquor jobbist.
STATE REP, ROBERT Wunsch, RKingham, said he introduced the bill because the state already had an official song, animal, bird, flower and insect. In the age of official everything, Wunsch decided Kansas needed an official dint
The House Federal and State Affairs Committee met last week to hear testimony from supporters of the bill. An opponent showed measure and curiously silent.
And, according to the bill, "Milk, one of nature's most inspiring wonders, is readily available in Kansas for everyone."
Ken Rock, a dairy farmer from Kingman County and a member of the Associated Milk Producers in Kansas, spoke in support of the bill.
"Milk is not just a drink," he said. "It is a wholesome, refreshing drink from which the human body can absorb it."
OF THE FOUR basic food groups, Bock said, only foods from the dairy group come from one source - milk.
Bock spoke of other reasons for advocating milk as the official state drink.
"In view of the efforts to improve the image of the state by allowing liquor by the drink, today is a good time to send the signal to the rest of the world that liquor is
not to be the official state drink of Kansas," he said.
"It's a wholesome drink and Kansas is a wholesome place," he said.
State Rep. John Solbach, D-Lawrence,
also sponsored the bill, along with 36 other
representatives from around the state.
Kansas is home to more than 5,000 milk producers who make sure that 125,000 dairy cows produce more than 1.83 billion pounds of milk a year to help keep the state's good citizens in good health.
Some key issues brought up during debate on other drinking legislation probably won't be heard on this measure, though.
No one is expected to amend the bill to assure that minors wouldn't lose their jobs at dairies or ice cream parlors across the state.
surd did anyone appear to dispute
Sunday sales of the beverage
Anti-milk lobbyists will have to assemble fast; the bill comes to a House vote next week.