Corpus Christi Times (Newspaper) - September 25, 1975, Corpus Christi, Texas corpus christi Vol CORPUS CHRISTI TEXAS THURSDAY SEPTEMBER 25 1975 52 15 Cents Zinnias are still thriving in the median on Ocean Drive near Amistad partly due to the recent abundance of rain But even when they fade away it wont be iong be Flowery Fall fore more color is showing Kenneth Kre nek Park and Recreation Department operations director said calendulas will be planted and they should grow through Photo by George TuSey the fail winter and into spring Shown here weeding the flower bed are Norvel Montgomery of 4522 Jose and Daniel Can tu of 1094 Papaya Tax Picture S By DON RODMAN Staff Writer What your tax bite will be and what the city will do about a looming financing crisis remained up in the air today City Manager Marvin Townsend said he was less certain today about an proposal he made to the City Council yesterday The idea called for revaluing ail of residential property in the city which has not been covered in the last two years Basically that would mean a tax increase for those property owners and retention of increases struck down by the judge on other property because of higher values determined by the tax office in the last two years Im not sure how those ideas will stand up Townsend said The legal solutions dont fit with the best tax solutions and the tax solu tions dont fit with the best management solutions The judge has told us what we cant do but not what we can do said Hal George city tax office attorney Judge Noah Kennedy ruled Monday that the citys tax valuation process is unconstitutionally structured because it tends to forecast that an area of the city will not be revalued for three years Townsend was meeting this morning with the tax office staff and city attorneys seeking to come up with a solution that will cause the least budgetary disruption for the city and the school which has its taxes assessed and collected under contract through the city tax office George said it will probably be next week before a final courl order is issued more clearly defining the findings against the city He said Kennedy is out of the city at a judicial conference and that in the meantime both sides in the case are preparing proposed drafts of the order for Kennedys consideration The judge issued an oral judgment Monday finding unconstitutional a revaluation program set up by the tax office to be sure all residential property is looked at at least every four years In it he enjoined the city and school district from approving a tax roll for the coming year Kennedy apparently ordered that values raised under the cycle system this year be reduced to last years levels and said he like to see this relief applied to residential property caught in 1974 the first year o the cycle In explaining the citys evaluation system to the council yesterday Townsend emphasized that the plan to make sure all residential property was cov ered in a minimum of four years has in reality made the tax roll now being prepared the most ac curate the city has had in the last 20 years He also stressed that the plan was only a supple ment to the citys routine practice of revaluing all commercial and industrial property and those resi areas where a rapid change is taking place The city manager indicated that the 24000 resi properties that would have to be clerically updated under a crash revaluation program prob ably will not mean a major increase in total proper ty value on the tax rolls because they are in older westside and central sections of the city where val ues have remained more stable Townsend said that the tax case crisis may mean he will not be able to attend a national meeting for city managers next week in Seattle He is scheduled to be a program speaker Zertuche Store By NICK JIMENEZ Staff Writer Elvira told the jury hearing the Carrillo trial today that the Zertuche General Store sold a variety of items including tele vision sets cameras silverware and linen The store which the federal government says was a fake had so much merchandise that it took several trucks to move it another witness said today The Zertuche General Store the govern ment has said never existed and was a only a pad of invoices through which suspended Dist Judge OP Carrillo and Duval County Com missioner Ramiro Carrillo illegally sold mer to government agencies from their own store The are on trial in federal court here for allegedly filing false income tax re turns The second defense witness Mrs Rodri guez said she worked at the store from 1965 to 1967 when it was located in Valleo Sales Build ing in Benavides Hurricane Beulah she said damaged the building so the merchandise was moved to the Farm and Ranch Supply store She said the store was operated by Hector Zertuche until May 1967 when it was taken over by his brother Arturo She said however that she never saw either of them at the store She said she received no salary while work ing at the store She received per month however from Duval County to distribute food commodities The store she said had television sets cam eras silverware linen refrigerators stoves irons and other items Contrary to the governments assertions the former store clerk said the Zertuche Gen eral Store sold to the general public She said she herself never sold to the Benavides School District county or local water district George Zertuche Sr father of Hector and Arturo said he helped move the merchandise after it was damaged by the hurricane in Sep tember 1967 He said it took several trucks to move the merchandise perhaps as many as 12 One juror Mrs Clara Hunt was excused from the jury today and was replaced by one of the alternates Mrs Norma Deal US Dist Judge Owen Cox did not publicly explain the reason for the change Call Her But He Helped Blow Million By RAYMOND R COFFEY Cully LONDON You think youve got trouble with the wife buying funny clothes and blowing the money faster than you can make it Consider Christopher Reeves Two years ago he inherited million Today hes broke and in hock to the tune of million And Reeves turned up in bankruptcy court yesterday to blame the disaster on wildly extravagant spending by his wife 40 He calls her Zsa Zsa which in the cir seemed more than just a loving nickname Mrs Reeves who is in the process of di her now penniless husband did not understandably agree entirely with his ver sion of the big splurge It is unfair of my husband to say I was extravagant she averred Someone who has five cars including a Lamborghini and a Ferrari must be extravagant himself In his appearance at Taunton bankruptcy court Reeves a big jowly man said all he had wanted to do after coming into his in heritance was be a simple West Country farmer breeding exotic Italian cattle and palomino ponies and collecting parakeets But his wife he said was attracted by the bright lights and circles of London where she spent most of her time while he was down on the farm For his own part Reeves acknowledged spending more than on his pet para keets He also paid for his farm and another having it renovated and refurnished He and his wife took a world trip while the farmhouse was being put in shape so they wouldnt be underfoot while the decorators and plumbers were hard at it And Reeves also bought his wife a apartment in ritzy Belgravia and a seaside summer cottage in Cornwall Then there was worth of jewelry and another for paintings antiques and assorted knickknacks Reeves also managed to get rid of buying those exotic Italian cattle and other continental breeds lor the farm But the real problem he insisted was his wife who was getting rid of nearly a year on miscellaneous living expenses I pointed out to her she was spending far too heavily he said adding that our joint bank account was drained by my wifes spending Her biggest single contribution to his go ing broke he said was her insistence on opening a London boutique to deal exclu sively in clothes by the Italian designer Va lentino Mrs Reeves blew about on a par ty attended by Princess Margaret and er London to celebrate the open ing of the boutique Five months later the place had gone bust with debts of There is possibly some consolation for Reeves in the fact that at the time he inher the money and was blowing it his 18 million pound bonanza was worth mil lion But the pound has been slipping steadily and today the inheritance would be worth a mere million See SPENDERS Page Editors Choice Here Lies Karen Shes 17 but she died two years ago Page Action Line IB Crossword Dave Anderson Dear Abby Deaths Editorials Eater Et Cetera Golden Years 6C 1C IB JD ID Horoscope Junior Art Tempo TV Scant VanDellen Ads Weather 2D ID 1C 1C ID 3B 1C Fair Mild Winds NNE 515 High Life for the Geriatric Set Too Many Prescriptions Handed Out By WILLIAM HINES WASHINGTON Ignored in the flurry of excitement over juvenile use of marijuana and pills and the contri bution of heroin abuse to the crime wave is an equally serious medical problem the grandma syndrome This is the contention of some cians who say that medicine in par and society in general have turned their becks on the problem of drug abuse among the elderly Much of this drug abuse is apparently caused by An article in Psychiatric News the house organ of the American Psy Assn contains an assess ment of the problem based on the statements of experts who partici pated in a recent seminar on the el derly at San Diego One of the speakers Dr Wendell R Lipscomb of Berkeley Calif said that in recent years he had been in called on to consult about ancient chemical hippies who owe their status to the good in tention of their family doctors He termed this the grandma syndrome is being the medical code word for a condition caused by a doc tor This comes about said when an old person is treated for mul tiple conditions arthritis high blood pressure periodic headaches occasional sleeplessness and moon swings Each complaint is dealt with on a pragmatic basis of one sympton one drug Lipscomb explained Some how the total effect of the therapeutic cocktail is never The results may be quite surpris ing as grandma stops being a burnt out drug abuse case of the kind that blew their brains with LSD Lip continued Much of this problem is created when aged patients are medicated not for their own convenience but for that of the relatives if at home or of the custodial staff if in a nursing home of many nursing home members is part of a general picture of Lip said Eccentricity non conformity even irascibility are not indications of sedation Of the socalled recreational drugs the one most frequently abused elderly persons is alcohol Cohen reported He said there may be 1 mil lion persons over 55 who are bona fide alcoholics Heroin users dont often reach the geriatric age brackets Co hen said because it takes a rare com bination of constitution good luck and unusual survival ability to reach even the birthday as an addict A common form of drug abuse is bromism based on overuse of compounds containing bromides Lip said Despite all the warnings about bro mides their use as tranquilizers and analgesics pain persists Lipscomb said The problem of grand ma does not apply to elderly persons in pain due to terminal illness Said Cohen Those who are going to die within a short time should be kept as comfortable as possible and given suf analgesics V
