Friday, September 20, 1985
Pago 4
Daily Nebraskari
1 A
Commission on
itatus of Women
must stay open
ebraska will be without an important service if the
state Commission on the Status of Women perishes
because of the severe budget cuts the organization
suffered this year.
Instead of receiving the $220,000 it had requested
this summer, the commission was granted only $30,000 just
enough for the commission to close its doors and hand out
unemployment checks to its staff.
. Because the' commission's work was not yet finished, its
members refused to terminate the organization, said Ada
Munson, commission chairwoman. Instead, the commission
has reduced its staff from eight to two people, moved to a
smaller office in the State Office Building where rent is
cheaper and cut back considerably on its services. The
organization now relies on private support, Munson-said.
With private funding, Munson said, the commission should
survive until next June. But without public money, the future
of the organization is uncertain.
Without proper funding, the commission will not be
effective in helping women and the state.
Last year, the commission received about 6,000 phone calls
requesting information about legislation, publication, tech
nical assistance and legal action.
Many times, Munson said, women seeking legal advice used
the commission as a type of referral service. Because of the
reduction in staff, no commission members can help callers.
Statewide forums on the status of women, which are
presented by the commission, also could be eliminated
because of the cut in travel expenses.
Nebraskans need and use the commission's services.
Without it, women and others will have difficulty getting
needed help.
The commission merits enough of the state's tax dollars to
help it continue until members think their work is done.
But the commission still has work to do.
In 1980, Nebraska women earned only 64 percent of the
amount paid to men. And in 1983, 75 percent of women
government employees in Nebraska were in the lowest paying
jobs office and clerical work.
And Munson said rural women and single parents still need
support from the commission.
State legislators should be concerned about the plight of
Nebraska women. After all, about half of Nebraska's 1.5 million
voters are women.
The Daily Nebraskan
34 Nebraska Union
1400 R St., Lincoln, Neb. 68588-0448
EDITOR
NEWS EDITOR
CAMPUS EDITOR
ASSOCIATE NEWS
EDITOR
EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR
WIRE EDITOR
COPY DESK CHIEFS
SPORTS EDITOR
ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
EDITOR
PHOTO CHIEF
ASSISTANT PHOTO CHIEF
NIGHT NEWS EDITOR
ASSOCIATE NIGHT
NEWS EDITORS
ART DIRECTOR
ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR
GENERAL MANAGER
PRODUCTION MANAGER
ASSISTANT
PRODUCTION MANAGER
ADVERTISING MANAGER
ASSISTANT
ADVERTISING MANAGER
CIRCULATION MANAGER
PUBLICATIONS BOARD
CHAIRPERSON
PROFESSIONAL ADVISER
VickiRuhga, 472-1766
Ad Hudler
Suzanne Teten
Kathleen Green
Jonathan Taylor
Mlchiela Thuman
Laud Hopple
Chris Welsch
Bob Asmussen
Biil Alien
David Creamer
Mark Davis
Gene Gentrup
Richard Wright
Michelle Kubik
Kurt Eberhardt
Phil Tsal
Daniel Shattil
Katherlne Pollcky
Barb Branda
Sandl Stuewe
Mary Hupf
Brian Hogtund
Joe Thomsen
Don Walton, 473-7301
The Daily Nebraskan (USPS 144-080) is published by the UNL Publica
tions Board Monday through Friday in the fall and spring semesters and
Tuesdays and Fridays in the summer sessions, except during vacations.
Readers are encouraged to submit story ideas and comments to the Daily
Nebraskan by phoning 472-1763 between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. Monday
through Friday. The public also has access to the Publications Board. For
information, contact Joe Thomsen.
Subscription price is $35 for one year.
Postmaster: Send address changes to the Daily Nebraskan, Nebraska
Union 34, 1400 R St., Lincoln, Neb. 68588-0448. Second-class postage paid
at Lincoln, NE 68510.
ALL MATERIAL COPYRIGHT 1985 DAILY NEBRASKAN
65T
A!PS.
IPON'T
ASSOCIATE
I PONT
GiveBtoop
OR VISIT
V HOSPITALS.
ID R55W
RANTS 7
Vfoves...
em
1m
Hi
ipwriMK row
(N THIS
ROOM. J
ft
ft r x
IfoNTKISS
tWBOW
FROM RJ&I(!
WNTAIHS
ihi
....ITS
GREAT-
10 BE
uwe.
II
1 I(h
Ironing depresses columnist
My laundromat is a grim, depres
sing place. Not only is it dank
and seedy, but it spells trouble
for me in one little word: wrinkles.
I can't go there without thinking of
Duncan, a character in one of the books
I read for Canadian literature class.
Duncan was a compulsive ironer. He
was always begging his friends to loan
him their wrinkly blouses. I wouldn't
want him for a love interest, but I'd fix
him a good dinner if he would come
over once a week and do his thing.
There's no money to be made on an
"I Hate to Iron" book, but I could write
a million words on the subject. Ironing
is an unpleasant, boring, incredibly short
lived task. Plus, you have to pay atten
tion or you'll iron in creases that look
worse than the wrinkles.
My roommate and I struggled for
years with the little table-top ironing
board my mother gave me one year for
my birthday. I guess its diminutive size
was her concession to my known distaste
for the pressing game. It was supposed
to be handy and unobtrusive, just for
minor jobs or something. But it was
never unobtrusive, and we never used it
on a table. It was permanently set up in
a corner of the dining room and we sat
on the floor to use it, generally one
after the other at 7:30 a.m.
My great aunt Mabel died last year,
and I got first crack at an 82-year
accumulation of households goods. I
felt fortunate, since most people have
to get married to score a windfall like
that. Not only did I get muffin tins,
placemats and myriad other fun stuff I
would never actually buy, but I got her
rickety old ironing board. It's one of
those full-sized, primitive wooden
models with thick padding and shaky
legs.
Colleen
Holloran
We've got it set up in the extra
bedroom permanently, I'm afraid,
because it makes a swell coat rack, too.
I was hoping some of Aunt Mabel's
karma would come along with her
ironing board, because she and Duncan
would have had a lot of common
ground. She went after sheets, towels
and underwear. She was just a step
below Erma Bombeck's old neighbor,
Mrs. Beck, who ironed the tongues of
canvas tennis shoes.
I recently ruined a silk blouse on the
ironing boardcoat rack, so I'm more
wary than ever now. Certainly I know
all the tricks: Wearing suits is the best
one because all I have to do is smooth
out the wrinkles on a six-inch panel
across the front of the blouse.
Like practically everything, my aver
sion to ironing probably goes back to
my Catholic upbringing. Every Sunday
night I had to stand in our musty
laundry room and iron five white uniform
blouses. .
Maybe I could do a takeoff on my
favorite Tillie Olsen short story, "I
Stand Here Ironing." Mine would be
about a young girl whose mother refuses
to let her go to school in wrinkled
blouses. She can hear all the neighbor
kids outside playing kickball while she
toils inside next to a mountain of
blouses and her father's handkerchiefs.
I would call it "I Stand Here Seething."
When the royalties start pouring in
I'm not going to waste any time. Forget
Tidy Troops and personal secretaries
I'm hiring an ironing service.
The tough life of a convicted killer
It's impossible to ignore a letter that
begins with the poignant words: "A
mother's plea."
Especially when the mother says she is
fighting for the life of her son.
And as Delores Maxey describes it,
the situation does sound desperate.
Her son, Brian, happens to be an
inmate in an Illinois state prison, first
in Joliet, and most recently at Pontiac.
Mrs. Maxey writes: "My son's life is
at risk because of violent inmates and
gang members who control the inside
living of other inmates. . ."
Last June, she says, her son was
"brutally stabbed" in the face by pri
son gang members because he refused
to join a gang. The wound required 32
stitches and he has almost lost the
sight of one eye.
Because of the attack, she says, she
pleaded that her son be transferred to a
safer prison.
But instead, she says, he was trans
ferred from Joliet to Pontiac, which
isn't any safer. The gangs, she says, are
still after him.
She has written to newspapers, state
officials, prison officials, anybody she
thinks might help in her crusade to
save Brian's life. And she has had some
publicity.
After I read her most recent letters, I
phoned Mrs. Maxey and asked her to
elaborate.
"Brian wouldn't go along with the
gangs, he wouldn't join, so they came
into his cell and two of them stabbed
him. Now he might lose the sight of his
eye.
"They have put him in protective
custody. That means nobody can get
near him. He's isolated from the other
prisoners. But that wouldn't have to be
if they would just transfer him to one of
the other prisons, where the gangs
don't operate that way."
She was talking about one of the
more benign institutions, where there
are fewer violent, hardened criminals.
(f'TY
JliRl
Mike
Royko
After she talked about this, I asked
her what her son had done to get into
prison. She has never mentioned that
in her letters.
She paused, then said: "Murder."
But she was vague about details of the
crime. She turned the conversation
back to her son's safety.
"They keep saying they are review
ing the case, they are always reviewing
it. But my son is in danger. And he
should be better protected. He should
be transferred."
After talking to her I decided to
check on how her son, Brian, landed in
prisoa
We can begin with Sarah Harmon,
age 16. She was in a Chicago disco and
rejected Brian't amorous advances. So,
he followed her from the place, raped
her, strangled her and dumped her
body into a South Side river. Then there
was KatrinaTolbert, age 14. He decided
to have sex with her, too. And when he
finished the rape, he strangled her and
left her body to rot in a nearby forest
preserve.
He pleaded guilty to those two
murders, as well as to another rape
along an expressway in which he allowed
the victim to live.
He also was accused of a rape
murder in Alabama, but never stood
trial for that one.
And that's why Brian, now 29, has
been in prison for the last seven years.
Simply stated, he liked raping and
strangling teen-age girls.
Well, state prisons can be harsh pla
ces, as Brian has discovered. Inmates
do get hurt or killed. There are gangs
that are extensions of the city street
gangs.
But those brutal prison conditions
are something that a person should
really think about before he squeezes
the life out of some kid's throat and
tosses her into a muddy river.
That's one of the reasons why many of
the prisons are overcrowded, unplea
sant, even dangerous places: Most of
society knows that they are filled with
people like Brian. And most people
would vote "aye" to having Brian taken
from prison and tossed into that same
" Please see ROYKO on 5
art-
