St. Louis Post-Dispatch from St. Louis, Missouri • Page 1

Will 'Justice7 Prove Poetic? 'Poetic Justice' opens in area theaters Friday and the pressure is on for director John Singleton's second film after his acclaimed debut with 'Boyz the EVERYDAY 1G -v- J. .1 LOCAL EPA, FBI Raid Olivette Firm ib SPORTS Quarterback Leaves Mizzou id CALENDAR Benefit For Black Rep Blooms ie Peabody Counts Strike's Costs The parent firm of Peabody Coal makes a rare statement about its finances: the strike is costing it millions. BUSINESS 1C 0 mm VOL. 115, NO. 203 THURSDAY, 5-STAR sot Copyright 1993 (snoiisiiiini MDir re on Mack III 1.

'I. 1 I' 'I 'W op i i i i )' t' i I If. i i it ftm (1) --s--- JULY 22, 1993 1 T. Ii "l- f. i LI 71 "iibj Resolute Sentry Digs In City Worker Guards Home 24 Hours A Day By Jo Mannies Post-Dispatch Political Correspondent With the electricity shut off and most of his neighbors long gone, Dennis Collins has been roughing it for almost two weeks in his home just a few feet from the straining sandbags piled along the bulging River Des Peres.

Now, things are a bit rougher. Water to the home has been cut because water-main breaks allowed contaminated floodwater to get into his neighborhood's water supply. All told, 264 homes were affected. Collins still isn't budging. "It's worth protecting," he said Wednesday, as he sat with friends on the porch of his ranch-style home at the corner of Crosby Drive and Carondelet Boulevard.

River water may not be the only threat. Some residents who have ignored voluntary evacuation orders spoke of burglaries, or rumored burglaries, in the area. The area has police checkpoints, and police say only residents' vehicles or those of city workers are allowed in the neighborhood. But some residents report, seeing strange cars or vans. Tim Zych, 30, of the 4600 block of Allemania Street, said he was See RESIDENTS, Page 11 If the water comes, it will splash against $3,000 worth of sand in some 35,000 sandbags.

"I would say we're about up to 550 to 600 tons of sand," Ed Macarthy said. "That's over a million pounds. And we're still bagging." Ruth Macarthy has gone to stay with relatives. Ed and at least one other male relative a son, a nephew, or even his brother from Chicago hold the fort at night. "I think I've only gone out two nights," Macarthy said.

"I've been going on about four hours sleep a night, but you don't ever really sleep." The only power comes from rented generators. The city turned off the water this week. Water must be stockpiled, along with food and fuel for the generators and pumps that probably will be busy soon. "I think we'll be here for at least a month," Macarthy said. Macarthy wanted to thank the hundreds of volunteers, dozens of them strangers, who helped.

okmj, rff Gary BohnPost-Dlspatch Kathy Nevills, an assistant vice president at Lemay Bank and Trust on Wednesday carrying a box with a phone and a calculator across a sandbag levee to set up a temporary office. Flood water threatens the bank, at 152 Lemay Ferry Road. Family's Home Gets Love Letters In Sand Wmm Venice Fisherman By Virgil Tipton 01 the. Post-Dispatch Stall The Mississippi River flowed within aa inch of its peak Wednesday as it kept up its stubborn attack against south St. Louis, battered levees in Ste.

Genevieve and severed the water supply to a maximum-security prison in Southern Illinois. In St. Charles County, officials discovered that the flooded Missouri River apparently had peeled away a 100-foot section of highway. In Hardin, 111., the Illinois River thrashed another levee and flooded eight more homes and businesses. Rescue teams were scheduled to resume early today the search for a man who fell into the Mississippi River Wednesday afternoon while fishing near Madison.

The man, Anthony Gatewood of Venice, was fishing with three friends about 4 p.m. when he apparently waded too far from the levee, fell into the water and disappeared, said Ron Young, president of Alton Volunteer Emergency Corp. Young said the man might have got caught under some fallen trees and debris. The search was called off at dusk. The Mississippi reached its crest its high point at 47.05 feet at 8 p.m.

Tuesday, the National Weather Service said. That's a revision of an earlier report of 47.1 feet. The figure is 3.82 feet higher than the record set in 1973. The dropoff after the crest was insignificant. By 8 a.m.

Wednesday, the-river had dropped less than an inch to 47 feet. The weather service" predicted about the same level forfoday. hvChester, 111., the river cut off water to the Menard Correctional Center, leaving 2,450 inmates with no way to shower or flush toilets. The road into the complex disappeared under water, forcing officials to break a 40-foot-wide hole in a wall to let vehicles enter on a back road. Warden George Welborn planned to install 200 portable toilets in the prison yard by today and to haul in 6,000 gallons of drinking water.

See FLOOD, Page 11 Flood Music: More benefit concerts. 6A River Dee Peres: New flood-control questions. 9A Town By Town: Damage in Missouri and Illinois. 10A Dry Prison: Water cut at M. Chester, prison.

11 A 1 Dear World: We're not all underwater. 13A Ste. Genevieve: Town fights on from "The Desert." 3B Shelter Stress: Red Cross, refugees clash. SB Barge Blues: Traffic may be tied up for months. 1C WEATHER Scattered Storms FORECAST Today Cloudy with scattered storms today and tonight.

High 86. Low 74. Friday Partly cloudy, chance of storms. High 90. Other Weather, 8B POST-DISPATCH WEATHERBIRD Hto.

at. or r. 1 00' Missing Mevee frier m-ffti ft Wes PazPost-Dispatch Ed Macarthy barbecuing Wednesday as two of his sons, Ed Macarthy Jr. (left) and Kevin Macarthy, waited for supper inside the sandbag wall the family has put up to protect their home in the 7700 block of Tesson Court, near the River Des Peres. By Tom Wheatley Of the Post-Dispatch Staff Ed Macarthy's home is his sand castle.

Macarthy, 62, is a retired city fireman who lives with his wife Ruth on Tesson Court, a cul-de-sac that connects to Carondelet Boulevard in an evacuated area alongside the River Des Peres. Their six grown children three sons and three daughters persuaded the Macarthys to fight the rising water. The result, in 10 days' work, is a fortress of sandbags 13 feet tall in the back and more than 7 feet tall in the front, where the zoysia lawn is on higher ground. "It's like a bunker," Ed Macarthy said. "When you look out the window, you don't see anything but sandbags unless you get up on the second floor." For now, the Macarthy clan is sitting low and dry, as they tell callers to their sand castle.

The River Des Peres has not broken or topped the levee to test the Macarthy fortifications. would issue an executive order banning smoking in federal buildings in the "not too distant future." "EPA firmly believes that the scientific evidence is sufficient to warrant action to protect nonsmokers from involuntary exposure to secondhand smoke," Browner told the House subcommittee on health and environment. "Please help us protect children from cigarette smoking," she said. The agency does not have the authority to regulate smoking in the workplace, but the Occupational Safety and Health Administration is reviewing the EPA report and may take some action to curb smoking in fee SMOKING, Page 5 "7 It I Vincent Foster Jr. Lifelong Friend Of Clinton's wife, Lisa, and three children, the youngest a high school senior.

None of Foster's closest friends at the White House not White House chief of staff Mack McLarty, not White House counsel Bernard Nuss-See FOSTER, Page 5 ill EPA Makes Target Of 2nd-Hand Smoke EPA Chief Predicts Ban In Federal Buildings INDEX Business 1-8C Calendar 1-16E Classified 1-6F Commentary 7B Movie Timetable 14E NationWorld 3A News Analysis 5B Obituaries 4B People 2A Sports 1-8D Television 6G EDITORIAL PAGE Clues Scant In Suicide Of Clinton Aide Compiled From News Services WASHINGTON Vincent Foster Jr. should have been riding high after seeing his boyhood friend elected president and then joining him in the White House. Instead, Foster, the No. 2 lawyer at the White House, left work early on Tuesday, drove to an isolated park overlooking the Potomac River in a wooded part of suburban Virginia and shot himself to death. His body was found slumped near a Civil War-era cannon, the gun still in his hand.

He left behind no note or explanation just crushing anguish and profound mystery. Foster, 48, had a Compiled From News Services WASHINGTON The Environmental Protection Agency began an offensive Wednesday to protect non-smokers against the harmful effects of second-hand tobacco smoke that the agency says causes 3,000 lung cancer deaths in non-smokers each year. The agency released tough new recommendations to prevent involuntary exposure to tobacco smoke. It also filed a motion to dismiss a tobacco industry suit against a report on second-hand smoke released by the EPA in January. EPA administrator Carol Browner predicted that the White House The Chairman And The Budget Good Government Or Crass Cronyism? 6B.