European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - December 14, 1987, Darmstadt, Hesse Page 4 the stars and stripes monday. December 14.1987 Post office fights plan to shift costs Washington a a Senate Bud get culling p an that Wou d sri f nearly $2billion in costs to inc . Postal service could Force an end to saturday mail delivery cause Sharp cuts in Post office hour Sand Hall hundreds of construction projects postal officials warn. Postmaster general Preston r. Tisch has called a press conference for monday to discuss the possible effects of the proposal which besides shifting costs to his Agency would also give it a spending limit specify areas to be Cut and ban a rate increase to cover the new expenses. The proposal is not included in House passed budget legislation and will have to be settled this week in Confer ence committee. Thus the exact effects cannot be calculated until the final Deci Sion is known. However documents obtained by inc associated press show that As now Struc tured the Senate proposal could Force a Hall in construction of As Many As 70 major postal facilities across the nation and More than so smaller offices. Post office projects in los Angeles san Diego Denver Miami Atlanta Chi Cago Kansas City to. Minneapolis new York Cleveland Dallas and hous ton Are among those facing cancellation. Purchase of new vehicles and Auto mated mail sorting equipment also would be halted the officials said with a spending Cul taking effect Jan. 1,1988. In addition finding the extra Money could Force the Agency to reduce its staff by eliminating thousands of part time workers suspending saturday mail delivery reducing window hours at Post offices to six hours monday through Fri Day Only and cutting Back mail collections. The result would be slower mail delivery. Postal service officials said speak ing Only on condition they not be identified. First class mail would get first priority followed by second class items such As newspapers and magazines and then parcels the officials said with Advertis ing mail coming last. But All classes of mail would Likely face some delays they admitted. In question is payment of Cost of Liv ing and health care benefits for thou Sands of postal workers who retired be fore the service became an Independent Agency in 1972. The Federal Goyim men continued to provide the pension benefits for those workers As former Federal employees while the Post office took Over paying benefits for the workers it has had As an Independent Agency. Now the Senate plan would shift about 11.7 billion to 11,9 billion in costs for the former postal workers benefits to the postal service Over two years. Postal officials say they would be will ing to accept thai extra Cost and could find ways to Cope with in. Apollo 17 commander Eugene Cernan stands near the lunar Landing vehicle whits Harrison Schmill watches on dec 13,1972. Sex Apollo astronaut wants revival of space program Cape canaveral a. A America s greatest Era of space exploration ended is years ago this week and the Man who commanded the last Moon Landing flight is disheartened that the Promise of project Apollo never materialized. We Haven t had a successful space program since 1 left the surface of inc Moon we be had a series of space events said former astronaut Eugene a. Occman. Our space program has never stepped into the future. The final Apollo Mission no. 17, began on dec. 7, 1972. During the. 12 Day Mission Cernan and astronaut geologist Harrison h. Schmidt spent Ihrck Days exploring inc lunar surface in a Mountain ringed Valley named Taurus Lillow while Ronald e. Evans orbited overhead. Cernan and Schmitt were the Lith and 12lh americans to walk on inc Moon. As Cernan prepared to re enter the lunar Landing vehicle for the final Lime he said pm just like to record Hal America s Challenge of today has forged Man s Dasliny of Apollo 17 ended a Brilliant chapter in the history of adventure and exploration and Nasa officials at the time were talk ing confidently of building space stations and a reusable transportation system establishing lunar bases and dispatching humans to Mars. However the Molina Lions that fun eled the space Agency s Early Yean National prestige Competition with the soviets no longer were valid and the a fell heavily on Nasa s budget. Only inc transportation system the space shuttle survived. We built inc shuttle the most Soji his Lic aled flying machine that Man has Ever seen Cernan now a Houston business Man said in an interview last week. But each flight was an event to put up or to retrieve a satellite or to do experiments. You cannot look at a series of shuttle flights As a Mission or As a space pro Gram because there s no ultimate Desti nation. No one flight is lied to the next or to the future. Until we put a program together Hal utilizes the shuttle As a transportation by slim each and every flight is nothing but an cd Cal he said. Such a program would be the space Lalion which Nasa plans to begin assembling in Orbil with a series of shuttle flights in the mid-1990s. Earlier this month Nasa awarded space station construction contracts initially Worth about is billion to inc aerospace Divi Sions of Mcdonnell Douglas corp., the Boeing co., general electric co. And Rockwell International corp. The project already has slipped two years its Cost has nearly doubled and the current congressional budget discussions could significantly Cut ils funding so Hal it could be delayed fur incr scaled Back or cancelled. Obviously space is not on the minds of those who make decisions Cernan said. It s unfortunate. There s absolutely no leadership anywhere from the president on Down through Congress Nasa and the by slim. Nasa management is not willing to fight for whal is Rihl. It s disheartening. I think president Reagan truly is excited and interested in space he said. I think he s gelling a great Deal of poor advice. We need a space program Trul transcends political boundaries. Criminal population in . Hits record 3.2 m/7.on " left prison As a result of a parole Board s discretionary decision fell from almost 72 percent of those release Washington a one Oul of every 55 Amer ican adults a record 3.2 million people was on probation parole or behind bars at the end of Lasi year the government reported sunday. The number of criminals out of jail and under com manily supervision was rising More rapidly than the number of people serving Lime in local jails and prisons the Bureau of Justice statistics said in its report. From 1983 through 1986, there was a 32 percent in crease to 2.1 million in the number of probationers 18 y tars and older. Parolees Rose by one third to 327,000. The number of inmates in prison As of a year ago was 547,000. Up 25 per Cuni from 1983. And there were 273,000 people in local jails up 23 Percy no. The 3.2 million adults in the nation under some form of correctional supervision at inc end of 1986 Rose 7 Percy no from 1985 and was 30 Percy no higher than in 1983. The duration of probation and parole typically is longer than the length of a prison term. The longer duration is contributing to the rapid growth in the Community supervision segment system criminologist say. Texas had the highest rate of people on probation 2 468 per 100,000 adults. Regionally the South had i 377 Prada liners per 100,000 the Northeast 1,040, the Wesl 1,034 and the Midwest 1,003. The Northeast had 233 parolees for every 100,000 adults compared to 205 in Lite South 150 in the Wesl and 99 in the Midwest. In inc past decade inc percentage of offenders who to just 4 3 percent. The change results from increasing Reliance on de terminate sentencing with a prisoner serving the full sentence the court hands Down minus a reduction for Good suffering from overcrowded prisons Oul Lac ing Public demands for tougher treatment of criminals arc beginning to Lum to intensive supervision Proba Tion and other programs As alternatives to Marcera probation being tried in at least one county in each of 35 Stales involves close supervision with artial caseloads paying Orcsi Tutum to crime victims find performing Community service says Joan be Tarsi Lui. A War Char at inc Rand corp
