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journalism contest, the Headliners \(see Obs., Jay Milner, whose checkered career has encompassed stints as an Observer editor, editor of the Mississippi Delta Democrat Times and acting dean of the SMU Journalism School, is the new editor of the Iconoclast in Dallas. Milner wrote in his first column for the weekly that publisher Doug Baker was enlisting his help in bringing about a new public trust and respect for what some underground-turned-alternative newspapers are doing. The 40ish Milner claims the dubious honor of being the oldest living underground newspaper editor in the country. Iconoclast subscriptions are $10 a year. Address: P.O. Box 7013, Dallas, Tex. 75209. Vinson, Elkins John Connally’s Houston law firm is working out the details for a merger between two of the nation’s five largest beef-packing and processing companies. The merger between Iowa Beef Processers of Dakota City, Neb., and Missouri Beef Packers of Amarillo, Tex., “could easily rocket beef prices entirely beyond the means of the general public,” according to James Rowen, writing in the March 26 Nation. The new company would be the predominant factor in the Texas panhandle’s cattle industry, from the production of cattle feed to the slaughterhouse to the boxing and shipping of already-cut beef. End of the campaign Jack Anderson reports that President Nixon’s double-time courtship of “Hispano” votes last fall \(see Obs., Nov. 3, fall’s affair. There were quickie grants, about $47 million worth by some accounts, to be funneled through HEW, HUD and OEO to chicano projects \(some speaking tours by U.S. Treasurer Romana Banuelos, OEO Director Philip Sanchez and Carlos Villareal, urban mass transportation administrator. And Nixon personally told the staff at Operation SER, a manpower development program, he would raise their funding by $18 million. Now, says Anderson, things are a little different. Leaving aside the general uncertainty about continued social services funding, SER in particular had its fund increase rescinded. And Sanchez and Villareal no longer hold their top-level positions in the administration. The Nixon administration has released $507 million dollars in aid to impacted school districts. The funds, channelled through HEW, are designed to reimburse districts for the impact of large federal installations \(resulting in lots of tax-free federally-owned land and lots of 8 The Texas Observer budgets \(see Obs., re presented a “split-the-difference” compromise with Congress, which authorized $615 million in funds. HEW originally announced it would spend only $415 million. Local run-offs Both female CCA candidates in Dallas city council run-offs defeated their male opponents. Lucy Patterson, a black woman running against Clay Smothers, took about 53 percent of the vote, with most of her margin coming from black precincts. Smothers, the black Wallaceite, carried white middle-class areas in Lakewood, Oak Cliff and Pleasant Grove. Though all precincts were accounted for within two hours after polls closed, Smothers claimed black precinct judges delayed their reporting. He promised to call for a recount. The second race was a laugher for Adlene Harrison, who pulled in more than 60 percent of the votes cast. At about the same time, CCA president John Schoellkopf filed campaign expense reports on the “Top 10” group campaign by the CCA. Expenditures totaled $147,935. Schoellkopf and the CCA’s treasurer borrowed $105,000 to get the thing going, and about half still has to be repayed. The two were also the largest individual donors, giving $3,000 each. There is no way to determine how much of the CCA’s kitty was used on behalf of Fred Zeder, who had the toughest race. Zeder reported an individual expenditure of amost $20,000. But then he was running against Gary Weber, who spent $77,787. Weber says he favors a limitation on campaign spending. By contrast, re-elected Mayor Wes Wise reported only $14,233 in expenditures, compared with more than $19,000 in contributions. A quarter of the gifts came in five large packages: $1,000 each from two developers, a real estate executive, the chairman of the board of the First National Bank and Ross Perot. In San Antonio city council run-offs, the Good Government League defied tradition and almost lost control of the council. As it is, the GGL has a five-to-four majority, but one of the five is a close friend of Charles Becker, the ex-Leaguer who beat GGL man Roy Barrera. Becker has not yet declared he is a candidate for mayor \(the council votes to select the “Not since I started to do my own thinking have I been in any doubt as to which sphere most attracted me. The duties and pleasures of the average woman bore and irritate. The duties and pleasures of the average man interest and allure. I have never met a man who at any time wanted to be a woman. I have met very few women who have not at some time or another wanted to be men.” Inez Haynes Gillmore, Agri welfare Washington, D.C. Through an odd form of “revenue sharing,” the Texas Department of Corrections last year received more than a half-million dollars in farm subsidies for withholding cotton and grain production on its vast East Texas prison farms. Since 1967, the TDC has received more than $3 million in “grain payments” and for “retired” cotton and grain acreage. This may be the largest series of USDA payments to any Texas grower. A spokesman for the prison system emphasized that all money received is turned over to the state general revenue fund. Using convict labor, the prison system is largely self-sufficient and is able to supply food to other state institutions. Last year, 5,195 farmers and organizations in Texas received nearly $172 million in subsidies from the Agriculture Department payments which the Nixon administration and an increasing number of congressmen hope to eliminate. “In this time of high food prices, meat boycotts and feed grain shortages, the magnitude of the federal government’s generosity to the big, rich farmers is clearly outrageous,” says U.S. Rep. Silvio 0. payments, which this year are expected to top $2.5 billion, “welfare-for-the-rich.” Conte annually publicizes the names of all recipients of $20,000 or more in subsidies, an ever-growing “honor roll” of prosperous farmers and corporations. According to the lengthy USDA list of Texas subsidy payments, the TDC received a total of $553,813 through units in Walker and Fort Bend counties. The only other public institution listed was the Texas Tech University research farm in Carson County, receiving $66,608. While many payments go to agri-business organizations, thus concealing the names of individual recipients, the list reveals that Mr. and Mrs. Allan Shivers of Box 433, Mission, were paid $23,639 on their Hidalgo County acreage. A cousin of powerful U.S. Rep. Bob Poage \(House $22,509 on farmland in Upton County. Other payments of interest last year included: $59,176 to La Casita Farms, Inc., of Rio Grande City; $35,505 to the R. Farenthold Estate of Corpus Christi; and $36,079 to W. L. Moody IV, whose address was listed as Box 1467, Del Rio. Paul Slater Paul Slater, formerly a reporter for the San Antonio Express and News, is now spending a year as a fellow at the Washington Journalism Center in D.C.