New Jersey Nightly News; 02/20/1979

New Jersey night. With Rebecca suable in Trenton and Clayton Vaughn in Newark. Good evening. In the news tonight state education commissioner Fred Burke is nominated for reappointment three Jersey Shore Kathie's remain under a state of emergency because of yesterday's snowstorm. And we'll have the first of a series of special reports on North Jersey's arson epidemic. Good evening Rebecca. In sports Paul Baldwin has highlights of last night's Rutgers basketball romp over Massachusetts. And on a closer look we'll see Why is security by some private security guards. Maybe no security at all Rebecca. Governor Byrne today nominated state education commissioner Fred Burke for a second five year term. The governor dispelled reporters questions that his administration had been unhappy with Burke's performance saying Burke had in fact done a good job during five tough years. The state Senate will still have to confirm Burke's nomination for reappointment. The governor also told a news conference that the Casino Control Commission or commission is working too

slowly on resorts International's permanent license. He said he had Attorney General John Degnan ask the Commission to work nights and weekends to speed things up but so far the commission hasn't done it. Today was the day after and the state was still digging out of a storm that dumped as much as 24 inches of snow across some parts of New Jersey. Officials said there were at least four snow related deaths including two men who collapsed while shoveling. State transportation officials say almost all roads are cleared now major thoroughfares are back to normal. Amtrak and Conrail officials say trains are running as usual but the snowfall may be only the tip of the iceberg in terms of weather problems. State officials say damaging floods could occur if rains and warm weather causes a runoff that runoff combined with the snow could cause serious flooding conditions. Three of the hardest hit counties in the state ocean Cape May and Atlantic remain under a state of emergency tonight in Atlantic City the snow was so bad that officials say non-essential traffic won't be allowed

into the city until 8:00 o'clock tomorrow morning. Mike Power reports. The best way to reach Atlantic City today was through the air. Most major highways in were still snowbound the Parkway was open but it feeds into the Atlantic City Expressway and the expressway was still closed to incoming traffic from the air. Conditions didn't look too bad but you could still see the traffic had almost stopped. The busiest street in Atlantic City is Atlantic Avenue and the two feet of snow that still here left history almost paralyzed. Thieves looted 15 to 20 stores on Atlantic Avenue and the boardwalk last night in Atlantic City police arrested several suspects. Today the street was full of heavy equipment emergency vehicles and people. Power was restored after a dark and cold night in much of the city. Utility crews repaired wires but people were on their own to dig out and the residents without power or heat last

night were also on their own family children out with the baby sitters in the other section of town they had electricity. But it's got caught in cold you know snowplows worked all night. But they were on the main streets in the neighborhood. People made a run on the corner store for essential bread eggs if you can goods mostly bread or milk. So are you having trouble getting supplies in to sell them. Yes we are. Blanik city finally began to function again late in the afternoon but only at a bare crawl. Officials say the city will stay closed to outsiders until tomorrow morning. In Atlantic City I'm Mike power. A two year old boy in Pomona was dramatically rescued from his home by helicopter yesterday. The boy had accidentally swallowed an overdose of tranquillisers and his family couldn't get out of the house because of the snow. A Coast Guard helicopter came and lowered a basket. The boy was put in it lifted into the copter flown to ospital where he

received emergency treatment. Clayton in New York the snow cleanup means a big bill for an already financially strapped city but the cost is manageable. This year's snow cleanup has turned out to be half as expensive but twice as efficient as last year's. SANDRA KING reports. If it weren't for the snow still under foot it might be hard to believe that a foot and a half of the white stuff fell here just yesterday by this morning's rush hour. Broad Street was cleared of snow and the story was repeated throughout the snow removal in New Jersey's largest city went smoothly and by this afternoon city officials reported that every street in Newark had been plowed at least twice. It was all in marked contrast to last year's mid February blizzard when the city piled up more than a half million dollars in unanticipated costs including hundreds of thousands of dollars in overtime. And even the mayor concedes the job last year wasn't done as well.

Well we were able to plan. This year. To make equipment that we have available but in addition to that. There's whole snow removal problem basically out to private. Those private contractors. I think that the important thing is that we were. Prepared. For any eventuality this year. Last year we were not. Of course the warmer temperatures and sunny skies today did help. But the big difference was a city that learned from its mistake one that refused to be caught with its snow boots off again in Newark. I'm Sandra K.. Blaming the weather union officials canceled the Newark teachers meetings at 4:00 this afternoon to take a strike vote instead of mailed out about on the strike issue will be taken if members approve the union leadership could call a strike against the school system next month. If those 11 hundred layoffs go ahead and are made as planned the storm also prompted many merchants to extend the normal one day Washington's Birthday say all through

Saturday. The extensions may be a good thing for bargain hunters but it doesn't necessarily mean that retailers will recover completely from yesterday's losses. Jeffrey Paul reports. Sale signs like the one behind me were supposed to come down yesterday but because of the snow many stores are going to keep them up through Saturday. Many retailers consider Washington's birthday one of the hottest business days of the year. But yesterday's heavy snowstorm left this year's potential sale business out in the cold. A spokesman for the New Jersey retail merchants Association says the storm cost retailers millions of dollars. Even stores that remained open didn't do well. So in an effort to make up for the losses most retailers have turned Washington's birthday into a week long celebration. That means prices on many items will be slashed 20 to 50 percent for a few extra days. The only trouble according to retailers is that most shoppers won't have those few extra days off to shop like they would have yesterday if they hadn't

been snowbound. Mr. Fenn by extending Washington's Birthday sails through and including Saturday do you think you're going to be able to make up for yesterday's loss. I don't think I'll make it up entirely. Very difficult. But it was a big day and no use crying over spilt milk. We lost the day but we're going to do better in the weeks ahead. Many shoppers say they're crossing their fingers for even bigger bargains than they saw advertised yesterday. But merchants say bigger sales would only be the bigger loss in total revenue. Besides a weeklong birthday celebration is more than retailers bargained for in the first place. From the Paramus Park Mall to Bergen County. I'm Jeffrey Hall. Republicans in Bergen County also lost a lot of money because of the storm. They had to cancel a fundraiser last night by a former California governor Ronald Reagan was to have been a 25 hundred dollar a plate affair and Cliffside Park. Now they're drawing for a comeback next month.

We're back in a funeral home and Paterson was charged today with performing multiple burials putting the bodies of several infants in one coffin. The state board of Mortuary Science charges that funa a Latino the funeral home has been performing the multiple burials for the past 10 years that the burials have involved at least a thousand bodies as well as fetuses and amputated limbs and that in most cases the families of the deceased were too poor to pay for an individual burial. The state board is considering suspending or revoking the funeral homes license. South West man James Florio today called for the establishment of a trust fund to pay for cleaning up hazardous waste dump or spilled anywhere in the country. The Kabah Democrat said the fund should be administered by the federal government but paid for by the chemical and petroleum industries. Steve Taylor reports Congressman Florio is concerned about situations like this. The Qin Buckel landfill in Edison the government says there are 71 million gallons of poison buried here chemical wastes which are mixing with groundwater and

local streams. Federal officials are suing to get cleaned up. Hearings on that suit were to begin today about Ken Buck lawyers got a two week postponement. Congressman Florio chairman of the House Transportation and Commerce Subcommittee says abandoned chemical dumps threatens everyone. He wants to force all chemical and oil companies to finance a trust fund which would pay for cleaning up hazardous waste and oil spills when the guilty parties can't be identified as it and the taxpayers should not be the prime source of funding and I'm not inclined to want to come up with any tax monies for this. Everything is paid by the consumer and the taxpayer. But we're always saying is that it should be a cost of doing business and someone that becomes involved in the chemical industry will probably pay a higher proportion of the share. The Carter administration is considering setting up a fund like this. But Florio said it's being held up by bureaucratic squabbling. The congressman gave administration officials one month

to get their proposals before his committee. Otherwise he said he'll draw up his own plan and then call hearings. In Camden. I'm Steve Taylor. The city of Newark tomorrow begins classes for citizens on fire prevention and safety. Residents of city owned buildings will get information on what to do with those recently installed smoke detectors do go off and hints on how to get out of the building alive. The program in response to an arson epidemic in New Jersey this one are a problem officials now admit is out of control. Almost 3000 fires in New Jersey last year were officially listed as arson. More than 20000 others were suspicious or of undetermined origin in the first of a two part report. Jack connotate looks now at the problem of arson and its victims. No one knows how many arsons are committed in the state each year. Engine Company Six in Newark makes over 15 runs like this each day and increasingly the fires they are

fighting were torched. Started in revenge or degree the end result is often death. By January 22nd of this year this tenement fire on York Street in Jersey City killed a family of seven. Five of them were children. This one was different. A witness saw a man pouring a liquid in the hallway before the fire began. And two weeks later a suspect was arrested. But 20 year old Gary Williams is an exception. Almost 95 percent of the arsons here and across the country go unsolved. Insurance fraud is the most common motive. But as in this fire in Jersey City the killer voices are often acts of personal vengeance revenge fire is probably the most difficult because life is involved the professional flies doesn't want to get involved in homicide and most pyromania said That's another problem that but the fraud fire which is one of our big problems that I was not interested in killing someone. Revenge is done out of anger there's no thought. And they are the ones that kill most of people.

It's the type of person who could be just just about anybody you'd meet on the street. We we just seem to feel that. Everybody has the potential and everybody carries this instrument of death in his pocket. The match there was a time where people would settle their disputes with a gun or a knife or a stick. Today it just seems that the answer is a match in a fire and in crowded tenements. Arson means murder. A father of his four children died here in Newark after this building was torched. Police arrested the suspect and charged him with arson and murder because of arson alone carries only a seven year maximum sentence in this state. But while there's been no statewide effort to deal with the problem before that may be changing. Those close to the arson problem here say the picture will only change when the business community particularly the banks and insurance companies begin to play a larger role in cutting down the opportunities for people who want to solve their problems with a match. We'll look at some of those possible

approaches to the arson epidemic. In the second part of our report on Jack Connelly. The weather seems to be trying to make up to us for yesterday's snow today sunny skies mild temperature were absolutely heart warming. Tonight's forecast calls for clear skies temperatures in the upper 20s in the north 18 to 25 degrees in the south. But that could mean freezing road conditions so Please drive carefully. Tomorrow we should expect cloudy skies with a 40 percent chance of showers by afternoon. Those showers could melt the snow temperatures should be in the mid 30s inland mid 40s along the coast. By Thursday hopefully things will be back to normal with fair skies and mild temperatures. But. Stay away from giving matters worse because you know Control Commission is holding public hearings on the qualifications of Resorts International to be awarded a permanent

casino gambling license in New Jersey New Jersey public television is broadcasting major segments of that testimony each night at 10:30. So for the real story on the future of Resorts International and Atlantic City Watch New Jersey Public Television each night at 10:30 following the updated New Jersey nightly news. And here's Paul Budde line with a nice little record spam. Thank you Rebecca every college basketball team likes a nice easy game once in a while last night it was Rutgers turn. It took about 60 seconds for the minutemen of the University of Massachusetts to realize they were in for a long night. Number 20 James Bailey hit three early buckets in the process moving into third place on the records all time scoring list. The Massachusetts bench could only look on helplessly as Bailey and number 54 Kelvin Troy each scored 21 points. Rutgers at one time in the first half built up a 30 point lead. From there on the Knights coasted home in front of the fans who braved the snowstorm 95 to

76 the final. Perhaps the big moment in the game came in when Rutgers John McDaniel set a new record. Watch this. That's for most time aloft after a Miss Lamb done there is a 17 and a there at pit on Friday night for the final game of the regular season and college ball tonight. Finn is on the road for an Ivy League match up with Pen Pen is already planted the ivy championship Princeton is playing better of late this one over Dartmouth on Saturday made it three in a row. But even with that streak the Tigers are only 11 and ten overall four and five in the ivy. The Princeton players have to go on knowing that this year there will be no league championship no postseason tournaments. Did the team leader is number 40. Bob Roma Sr. averaging 16 a game. According to him despite the season's frustrations. It's still not very hard to get motivated really. Last year we were in the same kind of situation. The only reason to claim it was you know for so private I think it's the same thing this year. You know the

players are just plain out you know sour in the morning rush away you know. Look back and say you know they were down in a year. Also tonight Seton Hall is at home against Catholic University This begins a very important stretch. Three games in five nights just about has to win two of the three to receive a bit of the Metropolitan playoffs. Well the college wrestling team is getting ready for this coming weekend Division Three regional meet in New York three time All-American in the darker uniform is one of the favorites to win that meet and then go on to the nationals. The Trenton State team finished the regular season with a 15 0 record. I am number one ranking among all small colleges. It's with us you know like they want to know it was not a you know what they might say. And you know what if you looked at like we're the best. We feel we're the best. Well every time it's like you know we have sort of a showpiece micros that a three time All-American from Trenton State and the sports thankful

it's utility Texas to the rescue at least temporarily for the state's ailing cities. The state Senate voted today to borrow 20 million dollars from next year's utility tax rebates to ease this year's budget problems in major cities. The tax rebates would ordinarily go to towns that houses utility plants like lower Allawi's creek. But now one hundred twenty cities that recently lost federal anti recession aid may share the one time rescue fund. Well it was delayed hearing the fire a tenured professor at Rutgers began today on the campus of the Scout awide. Dr. Charles Villiers was a tenured professor at Rutgers at the same time that he held a tenured teaching position at CW Post on Long Island. Rutgers is now trying to fire a billionaire on the grounds of being held to full time teaching positions will take on estimated three days just to read the charges and supporting material. Then they'll have to be a recess to allow the lawyers time to build their defense. No final decision expected in the case before early this summer.

The great performances quizzing the pianist and conducted by Leonard Bernstein. Beethoven's debut. For Delhi on Wednesday at a New Jersey Public Television. There's a shadow police force in New Jersey and it's larger than all the public police departments put together. This shadow force is made up of private security guards cops for hire almost anyone can become a security guard and almost anyone can hire one. The situation has Governor burned a long arm. He's called for tighter regulations and

soon the question why are the governors and others so concerned. Our closer look to try to find out. You can rent this. For as little as $3 an hour patrol your property. Guard your valuables. Or check your locks. This man looks like a police officer but he's not. He's a private security guard. And according to some experts he may be armed and dangerous. There's a small army of security guards in New Jersey. 50000 of them. That's twice the manpower the state's public police forces. The demand for guards is growing so fast that agencies sometimes can't afford to be too particular. A contract you have to have men to fulfill it immediately. Today what you get is a warm body because this is the only people that are available for a price that you can afford to pay. We call it a warm body.

We get most of our men from advertising in the media and from referrals from other guards. And we do not take every man that walks in the door. We screen them well we do a background investigation on them. But current and former guards tell us many rent a cops come straight off unemployment or retirement rolls. Many never finish high school. Some have trouble reading basic instructions or following orders. Anyone can become a security guard according to state law. Anyone that is who hasn't been convicted of a crime. But that one restriction doesn't seem to stop many convicts from getting sensitive guard position or every agency do it but I do know and I have seen with the respect that they have taken men who had just recently filled out an application 5 minutes before and within two or three hours they were sent to a post clients post to protect their so-called protected Harry Martin a former Guard lieutenant is organizing a union of security guards in Trenton.

He says he wants to upgrade the business but there's one thing he neglected to tell fellow guards with the same goal. Mr. MARTIN Do you have a criminal record. Yes I've got a criminal record of crowd past criminal you want to talk about 20 years ago when I was a kid. I don't walk around and brag about it and say I'm sorry Martin. I was raised in a tough neighborhood and I was a product of the streets. Why didn't you tell us about it before. He asked me. Is that how other guards get accepted into. Sensitive posts with criminal records. Because nobody asked them and they don't volunteer the information. I would say show in a lot of cases yes. MARTIN slipped through a state police background check because his criminal record was in Pennsylvania. Here's just one example of inadequate screening by guard companies in the state police. We recognize that and we appreciate the problem that it takes. Resource for Brewer to learn and provide any service and we have a limited amount of resource and we have to set our priorities.

Ron take it has worked for Wells Fargo guard services for six months. He says he likes wearing a badge and a uniform. Pride is an old fashioned word but he says it best describes how he feels about his job. He only wish more of his fellow guards felt the same way if they were thinking wear uniform and have a you know. There's something special but it's not the uniform is the man. And another word for God to come is to be hired by me. I think it would have to but you have to go through a serious amount of basic training I mean you have to be 100 percent mentally physically. His employer Wells Fargo says all its guards take the training course in this company. Well written reporters who know Wells Fargo got to know. The report must include the following points. When. Where Why and how the duties for most security guards are pretty simple. They screen visitors to apply and or patrol corridors. They have no more arrest power than the average citizen. If there's any trouble guards are

instructed to call the public police. But many guards still feel the need to carry a gun whether they're trained to use one or not. No one knows for sure how many security guards carry guns but many do without ever telling their employers guards like Richard Fink. He patrolled this liquor Distribution Center in Trenton with a gun. A 357 magnum. One night two years ago Finck spotted a teenager making off with a case of scotch. He allegedly pulled that God and shot the kid to death I think will be tried for manslaughter later this month. There is pressure in the guard business because these fellows are on a very sensitive licious out there. And you put yourself in a warehouse where you're all alone for eight or 10 hours at a time. Somebody comes in there you're going to do it. I don't believe that there's a problem any time a person doesn't have proper training and properly standing the responsibility of carrying a gun is on the street or exposed to the public. I believe there has to be very stringent

standards set. And we were carrying the guns for security because it's the state police who are supposed to keep the bad apples out of uniform. They use this computer to check the past records of guard applicants. But officials say they're still to swap with work to police the security business the way they'd like to. The rules that govern the guard industry are 40 years old. They were written when there were 50 guard agencies not 500. It's this runaway expansion of the business that even state attorneys just start drafting new regulations last fall says the new rules will set the first hiring and training standards for guards and make it tougher for people to work in a guard agency. Right now. I'm at 6 1 but current and former guards warn that new regulations can only help so much. They say the private security business won't get much better until guard companies stop paying the minimum wage and start hiring better men. Until then the copy you read may be costing all of us.

Earlier today there was a new wrinkle in the Security Guard story Howie Martin the former guard with a criminal record told us he's going to end his involvement in a new guards union. He says too many people now know about his criminal past and he doesn't want that to hurt other guards working for a union. We were the only ones to find out about Martin's record. The Wells Fargo guard company knew two and Martin says the company spread the word in an effort to block the Union. Wells Fargo spokesman were out of the state and could not be reached for comment. Once again our top story is Governor Brown today nominated state education commissioner Fred Burke for a second term and New Jerseyans were aided by a warm sun today in digging out from the biggest snowstorm of the season. At least four persons in the state did die because of the storm. And that's the news. Good night Rebecca Goodnight Clayton and goodnight for the New Jersey nightly news. I think it was a joint presentation of New Jersey Public Television and w o any t 13

and is broadcast weeknights at 6:30 on Channel 13 at 7:30 on New Jersey Public Television an updated edition is broadcast at 10 p.m. on New Jersey Public Television. And at seven the following morning on Channel 13 portions prerecorded. Be one.