.Serbian police crack
down on protesters
NATION/WORLD
The Michigan Daily - Monday, December 2, 1996 - 5
Los Angeles Times
BELGRADE, Yug6slavia - In a bid to inthni-
date the huge crowds marching daily against Sertian
*esident Slobodan Milosevic, police arrested a
group of demonstrators yesterday and state telMi-
sion likened opposition leaders to Adolf Hitler.
Issuing an unusually harsh condemnation of a
protest movement it has virtually ignored, televi-
son controlled by
Milosevic accused
demonstrators of using
"pm-fascist hysteria and
violence" to "introduce -
terrorism" onto the
treets of Belgrade.
The commentary was Protest
accompanied by repeated
footage showing a small
group of demonstrators Democratic pa
destroying government
property and a warning
ftom police headquarters that it will no longer tol-
erate illegal acts. All of the demonstrations, tech-
nically speaking, have been illegal.
The warning and the harsh language, coupled
ith the first reports of arrests in the protests,
ppeared to signal an imminent crackdown.
Until yesterday, Milosevic had officially
ignored the biggest-ever sustained protests against
his authoritarian rule. Independent media were
largely gagged and state-controlled media had
mostly ignored the unrest. But as international
pressure mounted - and as the largest crowd yet
filled downtown Belgrade on Saturday -
Milosevic apparently decided to up the ante.
Dozens of busloads of police from southern
Serbia were seen moving into Belgrade, which is
both the Serbian and Yugoslav capital, last night.
Whether or not Milosevic actually orders police
to repress the next round of marches, yesterday's
warnings chilled opposition passions.
"They are trying to nibble away" at the protest
movement, said Miodrag Perisic, vice president of
the opposition Democratic Party. "They see the
TrI trying to
my (a8-t the
iovement)E"
- Miodrag Perisic
rty vice president
determination of the peo-
ple who come out every
night, and they are trying
to play on the fears of the
people."
A smaller crowd than
on previous days turned
out yesterday in Belgrade
as the protests - which
began after Milosevic
annulled the opposition's
landslide elections in
municipal elections -
entered their second week.
In an interview that occupied a third of the
rightly newscast, Dragan Tomic, speaker of the
Serbian parliament and a frequent proxy for
Milosevic, labeled the opposition coalition
"Zaedno" (Together) a collection of "pro-fascist
grdups and ideologies" that simply could not
accept defeat in the elections.
Opposition leaders said five demonstrators,
were rounded up by police and being held without
access to lawyers or family members.
Attorney Milojica Cvijovic said he was con-
cerned they would be rushed through a quick judi-
cial procedure that would send them to a remote
prison within hours.
GOP to raise
opposition to
Clinton plans
Republican legislators say there will
not be significant changes to the
new welfare law
WASHINGTON (AP) - Sen. Don Nickles, the Senate's
second-ranked Republican, ruled out fundamentally chang-
ing the new welfare law, as the White House wants. Even
Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the Democrats' leading
expert on welfare, reluctantly agreed yesterday it won't hap-
pen in the coming Congress.
Nickles, appearing with Moynihan on NBC's "Meet thei
Press' also said the GOP doesn't want first lady Hillary
Rodham Clinton actively involved in the welfare debate.
Clinton pledged when he signed the Republican-crafted
welfare overhaul bill last August to fix aspects he said were
too severe - particularly cuts in food stamp spending and
benefits for legal immigrants.
The White House is now considering a plan to restore $13
billion of the projected $54.6 billion in savings from the new
law of over six years. The law shifts responsibility for welfare
programs to the states and sets time limits for how long peo-
pIe can remain on welfare rolls.
"I think Congress is going to be very cool to make those
changes," said Nickles (R-Okla.), the Senate Majority Whip.
"I think you'll see technical corrections this year. But signif-
icant reforming or undermining the welfare bill? No."
Moynihan, asked if he believes Congress would go along
with White House-proposed changes, responded, "No. None.
Whoever said that?" The New York Democrat strongly
opposed the legislation, predicting that ending welfare enti-
tlements will significantly increase poverty in the United
States.
Moynihan urged Clinton to concentrate on protecting chil-
dren, who he foresaw as the first victims of a smaller social
safety net.
"If the president can produce a national awakening about
the condition of children and not get us into fussing about eli-
gibility for food stamps, we may pull it off," Moynihan said
yesterday. "If not, why, we have a calamity, I believe.'
Clinton emphasized in his weekly radio address Saturday,
"Now that we have ended welfare as we know it, let the
change not be to have even more children in more abject
poverty but to move people who can work into jobs.:
On the House side, Ways and Means Chairman Bill Archer
(R-Texas) said last week that House Republicans would fight
"with energy" any attempt by Clinton to alter the new law
significantly.
During the election campaign Clinton raised the prospect
of Mrs. Clinton participating in welfare policy, and the first
lady told Time magazine last month she plans to "speak out
about welfare reform and write about it."
"She has suggested she would like to see what is happen-
ing on the ground out there, and that's good. I'm for it"
Moynihan said.
But Republicans, highly critical of Mrs. Clinton's lead role
in promoting the White House's failed national health care
legislation in the administration's first two years, have warned
that the first lady would not be welcome in the welfare debate.
AP PHOTO
Belgrade students walk through the streets during a peaceful protest in Belgrade
yesterday. Thousands of students continued to participate in a series of protests
against Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic.
Mai hovers on verge of nkruptcy, takeover,
The Washington Post
MIAMI - When the picture-postcard
skyscrapers gleam in the warm winter sun,
it's tough to imagine the specter of bankrupt-
that looms over Miami this week.
But in the aftermath of a sordid civic cor-
ruption scandal that saw the city manager
arrested on bribery and corruption charges,
local and state officials have uncovered a
massive financial mess. The city, which has
an annual budget of about $200 million, pro-
jects a deficit of at least $68 million in the
fiscal year that ends next September. Money
may run out as early as February. The city's
once-strong bond rating has sunk to junk sta-
tus.
Some activists have gathered enough sig-
natures to force a special election on whether
the city should disincorporate and become
just a part of Dade County.
The mess has been thrown into the lap of
Gov. Lawton Chiles (D), who aides say is
likely to declare a state takeover of Miami in
the next few days. Chiles has been forced to
act because locd efforts to boost revenues
and reduce spending have failed. The city
could soon be under a financial control board
or it might file for bankruptcy protection.
How did it happen? Although corruption
appears to have played a role, many of the
underlying reasors are similar to those that
have caused financial problems in other
cities: an unwillingness to reduce city ser-
vices in the face of falling revenues; a declin-
ing downtown real estate market; difficulties
in raising revenues; and ineffective oversight
by elected politiciars.
"This is a classit story for the history
books of what mismaanagement and corrup-
tion will do to a city," said Mayor Joe
Carollo, who was elected in July following
the death of his predecessor. "Before it's over,
it will be a classic story that should be told to
every municipal administrator so this will
never happen again."
Miami is a city of about 350,000 people,
two-thirds of them Hispanic, many of them
poor. It sits in the midst of affluent Dade
County, which has almost 2 million residents.
Those expensive condominiums full of afflu-
ent retirees are outside its city limits.
Despite the cluster of tall flashy office
buildings downtown and a few wealthy
waterfront neighborhoods, Miamians overall
are the fourth-poorest city dwellers in the
nation. Affluent Hispanic families have fol-
lowed their white counterparts to the sub-
urbs. The city has been left largely to the
poorest Hispanics --the elderly and recent
immigrants - and to native and immigrant
blacks, who often are even poorer.
But until recently, the city government was
painting a rosy budget picture. "During the
past 11 years, my foremost challenge as city
manager has been to provide quality services
to city residents while containing costs,"
then-manager Cesar Odio boasted in July.
His goals for the year, he wrote in a summa-
ry in the city budget, were to "maintain fiscal
soundness and improve city reserves" and
"maintain or improve the city's current A
credit rating."
But in September, after Odio was arrested
by the FBI for theft, embezzlement and fraud
as part of a sting dubbed "Operation
Greenpalm," the city's financial realities
were exposed: Miami was broke.
Miami's fiscal problems are truly grave.
The roughly $200 million it needs to cover
this year's projected deficit.
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