European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - April 29, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 4 a a the stars and stripes sunday april 29,1990 my. A a a a / 1 Sili Izill a Quot / 2slick look a the air forces f-117a stealth fighter taxis Down the ran Way Friday at cars Well fab near fort Worth Texas. The Bat shaped plane is on Public display Over the weekend at the bases annual air show. The air Force Only recently lifted the shroud of secrecy on the radar evading twin engine subsonic  plaguing Hud elderly centers Washington apr one third of the projects in a $ 1.6 billion elderly housing program Are in or near financial ruin with bloated Loans and bad management according to auditors who say the government will have Little Choice but to foot the Bill. On at least two occasions prominent Republican political consultants swayed senior department of housing and Urban development officials to overrule Field deputies and approve Loans for projects in the troubled retirement service Center program the audit says. The study details anew the favouritism and myriad management problems during the Reagan administration tenure of former Hud Secretary Samuel r. Pierce or. It also suggests that the Price tag for that mismanagement is rising with no end in sight As millions of dollars in Loans insured by the government go sour. A there is a High probability that As More recently approved retirement centers proceed through their processing stages additional projects will become troubled or go into default a the auditors concluded in the new report obtained by the associated press through the Freedom of information act. And the Money lost and wasted in Many cases went to projects that catered not to Low and moderate in come people but for developments featuring Fountain filled lobbies Plush dining rooms swimming pools a and rents in excess of $2,000 a month. It would take an income of at least $25,000 a year to live in Many of the centers while the median annual income for the Over-65 population is roughly $ 15,000. As in other Hud programs in which private lenders were allowed to underwrite Hud insured mortgages the audit found lenders were too generous in their appraisals and thus approved excessive mortgages. Such bloated Loans bring lenders higher fees. They also result in higher rents because of the Cash flow needed to pay the mortgage. The High rents in turn contribute to the unusually High vacancy rate in such projects the auditors said ultimately causing Cash crunches that trigger defaults. Hud Secretary Jack Kemp suspended the program last july after a limited audit in the Chicago area first touched on its problems finding bad or shaky Loans totalling $ 119 million. Kemp has yet to decide whether to revive the program the auditors said it would need a total overhaul and cited a Sample justification to kill it. In the reports nationwide review of the program auditors said 62 of 190 retirement service centers a or nearly 33 percent a either had defaulted or were financially troubled. The mortgages for the 62 facilities total $599 million a nearly 40 percent of the $1.6 billion spent on the program. Hud is liable for at least 85 percent and in some cases 100 percent of the Loans if they should default. The $599 million figure was from loan data through last october. Preliminary results of a follow up review that includes More recent data paint an even bleaker picture a Hud official said Friday. The auditors told Kemp he needs to develop a program to sell the centers that Are coming under huds control through defaults. The report said that in at least 17 cases Hud Field offices and private lenders ignored reports in which Hud economists said local housing markets would not sustain the projects. Fifteen of those projects Are now in default or severe financial trouble. The auditors also questioned 10 cases in which officials at Hud Headquarters overruled Field office rejections of project proposals. In most cases no documentation could be found to support the reversals the report said. At least two of those involved political favouritism the audit said. In one Case a project Developer rejected by Hud officials in san Francisco because of a saturated Market hired gop consultant Lou Kitchin for $30,000. Kitchin worked for both the Reagan and Bush presidential campaigns. A Kitchin met with senior Hud officials in Washington including top Pierce Deputy Deborah Gore Dean and won approval for the $13.2 million project. That project the Woodcrest retirement service Center in Escondido is surviving because of the default of a nearby Hud insured Center the audit said. In the second Case Robert Weinberger a Republican consultant and the Nephew of former defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger persuaded Hud Headquarters officials to overrule local officials and approve a $3.7 million Hud insured mortgage for the Rosewood estate development in Roseville , girl scout cookie inventor Dies new York up a journalist and playwright Bella Spewack who co wrote the Tony award winning musical a kiss me Kate and invented the girl scout cookie died in her Manhattan Home a longtime Friend said saturday. She was 91. Spewack who Rose to Fame As a reporter with her exclusive interview of the woman who claimed to be Anastasia Romanov the Only surviving child of the executed Czar or Russia died of natural causes in her upper West Side Home Friday night said her Friend Lois Elias. Spewack who was born Bella Cohen in Hungary and brought As an infant to new York began her writing career As a journalist for the socialist new York Call the new York evening mail the new York world and the new York evening world. She later became a feature writer for the new York Herald Tribune and the new York times. Elias said during her career As a journalist Spewack a found the woman who claimed to be Anastasia and broke the  Anastasia Nikolayev a was the Young est daughter of emperor Nicholas ii who was believed to have been executed in 1918 with the rest of her family following the october revolution. In 1922, the Joum Alist playwright married Samuel Spewack and in their nearly 50 years of marriage the couple wrote Many plays for Hollywood and Broadway Elias said. Among them were a kiss me Kate a which won the Tony award for the 19481949 season and a leave it two me a two musicals that had scores by Cole Porter. Other plays the Spewack wrote included a boy meets girls and a my three  among the movie scripts they wrote together were a weekend at the Waldorf and a my favorite wife a which was remade into the 1963 film a move Over Darling a starring Doris Day. Elias said Spewack also worked As a publicist for the girl scouts and came up with the idea of the girl scout cookie As a Way to a help the girl scouts make Money and get into the  Spewack whose husband died in 1971, had no children and no known survivors she said