Page 14-Wednesday. July 16, 1980-The Michigan Daily
Carter orders
emergency aid
for heat wave-
afflicted families
By United Press International
President Carter yesterday ordered
almost $7 million in emergency funds
be made available to low-income in-
dividuals in states sweltering under a
relentless heat wave that has claimed
almost 700 lives.
The heat wave in the Midwest, South
and Southwest which has brought 100-
degree plus temperatures' to some
areas for more than three weeks, was
at least partially responsible for 679
deaths in a 16-state "Heat Belt"
sweeping from Georgia west to Texas
and as far north as Illinois and Indiana.
CARTER DIRECTED the Com-
munity Services Administration, the
federal government's anti-poverty
agency, to make available $6.725
million through CSA's network of
community action agencies.
The money will be used to provide-
transportation to local and state
operated heat relief centers, purchase
or rental of low-cost appliances such as
fans and window air conditioning units
to reduce heat, payment of utility bills
as well as the provision of other suppor-
tive services which will reduce the
potential hazards to the health of low-
income persons resulting from extreme
heat.
In Dallas, which was in'its 23rd con-
secutive day with temperatures above
100 degrees, welfare officials said a
summer version of "cabin fever" had
caused an increase in child abuse. With
children out of school for the summer
and often unable to play outside
because of the heat, families were un-
der great stress.
"IN THE LAST two to three weeks
my case load has been up substan-
tially," said Carole Bowdry, director of
Dallas County's child abuse program.
"It has the potential of being a terrible
problem."
The toll of heat-related deaths has
slowed in the Southwest in the past
week but was jumping in the South and
Midwest, especially in Missouri where
189 deaths have been recorded.
One of the latest victims was a two-
year-old boy who was left locked in a
pickup truck two-and-one-half hours
because his mother could not find a
babysitter while she went to her dish-
washing job at a Fort Worth, Texas,
hospital.
The boy's mother, Patricia Angela
Harris, 17, Monday was arrested for in-
vestigation of injury to a child. Police
said the truck was parked in direct
sunlight with the windows rolled up and
temperatures inside could have gone as
high as 120 degrees. The high in the
Dallas-Fort Worth area, in the midst of
a record-breaking heat wave, was 107
A box fan provides the only relief from the heat Aurora Garcia gets in her
apartment in Kansas City, Kansas, a state in which at least 131 people have
died during a three-week long heat wave. A church secretary calls daily on
the 82-year-old woman to check her health.
Kelley rules for equal,
access to- li braries
degrees. v
LANSING (UPI) - Attorney General
Frank Kelley said yesterday state
residents are entitled to full use of all
public libraries - a ruling library of-
ficials said might put their funding on
the same level as school aid.
Kelley based his ruling on a section of
the state constitution that says the
legislature must 'establish and fund
public libraries for use by all state
residents.
HOWEVER, the legislature
traditionally has refused to fund
libraries in districts that do not collect a
0.3 mill tax for their operation.
"Clearly ...'the right of state
residents to use the facilities of any
public library includes not only the
right to enter a public library and read
books there, but the same right to
borrow books.. ." Kelley said.
The attorney general said a local
library may adopt rules to assure the
return of books, but the rules must be
uniform with the community and must
grant all state residents equal library
privileges.
Kelley made the ruling at the request
of Sen. Thomas Guastello (D-Mount
Clemens)
Residents of Washington Township in
Oakland County, which has no library,
wanted to use nearby Avon Township's
library in Macomb County but were
unable to since the two counties do not
have a reciprocal agreement.
The executive director of the
Michigan Library Association said the
ruling could-lead to increased library
funding by the legislature.
SOFTBALL BEER SPECIAL
No cover and half-price draft to teams in uniformSunday thru Thursday.
Trivia mformation supplied
by Detroit-area libraries
(Continued from Page 5)
asked have been so offbeat. "Just think Booth said the project was helping to
of all the reporters out there trying to promote the city of Detroit. ''This is the
dream up different angles for their first time that any convention has had
stories," he said. such a service, and it has succeeded
Booth said the project was completed beyond all my expectations," he said.
about three months after he initiated it.
He said he got the idea for the project
from two sources, a workshop he atten- K Ws e
ded in Texas on working with We can't
legislators, and a conference on
libraries he attended in Washington,
D.C., at which an information service to
was made available to conference
delegates.
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