St. Louis Post-Dispatch from St. Louis, Missouri • Page 3

ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH ST. LOUISTHURSDAY THURSDAY, JUNE 14, 1990 3A City Moves To Sell Bonds For Lambert Buyouts would finance it. City officials Insisted Thursday as they did in December that the purchases are for "noise mitigation," not airport expansion. But the 900 homes In Bridgeton are the same ones that would have to go if Lambert wins federal approval of its $1 billion expansion plan.

A key element Is construction of a runway westward into Bridgeton. Milton F. Svetanics chief of staff to Mayor Vincent C. Schoemehl said Thursday that the company incorporated itself on Wednesday. Svetanics is its secretary.

Its other members are Schoemehl, Comptroller Virvus Jones, Aldermanic President Thomas A. Villa, airport director Donald W. Bennett and city counselor James J. Wilson. makes them all but unlivable.

"This is a noise-mitigation effort, and it's important that we all view it as that," Svetanics said. "We don't have an approved expansion plan." But he also said, "If the expansion is ultimately approved by the FAA, certainly we have to acquire property. It will be easier to expand into areas we already own. That's a no-brainer." Federal regulations do not allow airports to use noise-mitigation money for expansion projects that the government has not approved. Svetanics said Lambert planned eventually to buy the Bridgeton area, with or without expansion.

He said St. Louis wanted to speed the buyout because the announcement last October of the expansion plan had damaged the housing market in that area. Jack Taylor, a spokesman for Bridgeton Air Defense, a group opposing the Lambert expansion plan, his group expected the city to find some way to sell bonds. "What they're trying to do is get funding for an idea that hasn't been approved," Taylor said. Bridgeton Councilman Thomas Fehren-bacher, a member of Bridgeton Air Defense, said he believed the accelerated buyouts are for expansion.

Fehrenbacher said St. Louis is speeding them "just to aggravate the people in Bridgeton and push this thing because of the expansion." By Tim O'Neil and Nordeka English Of the Post-Dispatch Staff The city of St. Louis has set up a special company to sell $95 million in bonds so that Lambert Field can speed up its purchase of homes that are In the path proposed for a new runway. The non-profit company, called the Lam-bert-St. Louis International Airport consists of the city's three top officeholders and three other officials.

It proposes to sell as much as $95 million in tax-exempt bonds to buy about 900 homes in Bridgeton and some other properties north and east of the airport. The Board of Aldermen adopted the buyout plan in December, and the new company WW? Slain Officer Wanted To Make A Difference ass I 4 By Bill Bryan Of the Post-Dispatch Staff An apartment clothes dryer that wasn't hooked up led an off-duty police officer to the coin-operated laundry where a robber killed him in an exchange of gunfire Tuesday night. The officer Lorenzo Rodgers, 23 was shot shortly before 9:30 p.m. outside the laundry, at Des Peres and Washington avenues. Before he died, he wounded his assailant.

A short distance from the scene, police arrested Lamarr Pearson, 20, of the 5800 block of DeGiverville Avenue. Pearson had collapsed with wounds from two bullets In the leg, arm and abdomen. He Is hospitalized police refused to say where and was charged Wednesday with murder. Police say the robber apparently was unaware that Rodgers was a police officer. Rodgers lived with his uncle in an apartment less than two blocks from the laundry.

On Tuesday evening, he visited his grandmother. While he was at her apartment, he washed a pair of his tennis shoes. "But our dryer wasn't hooked up," said his grandmother, Elma Rodgers, 62. So the young police officer set out for the laundry. He was a patrolman in the Deer Street (Eighth) District and had been on the force less than 14 months.

His mother died when he was 15 months old, and his grandmother reared him. In December, he moved out of her home to move in with his uncle, Nathaniel Rodgers. "He was a good boy; he was a good man," Elma Rodgers saidj "He was my baby." She said her grandson "loved being a police officer because he thought he could make a Jerry Naunheim Jr.Post-Dispatch Tom Gieseking kissing the hand of his bride-to-be, Linda Ivery, at the Cardinals game Wednesday night. That's A Winner: Ballpark Betrothal Is A Hit As if that wasn't enough, a small plane simultaneously flew overhead trailing the words, "Linda Ivery, will you marry me? Love, Tom." Of course, she said yes. "She wanted something terribly romantic, and I wanted something off-the-wall that would surprise her," Gieseking said.

The couple plan to marry next May. Gieseking, national service supervisor, Vardeman Kendra Marie Fleming chair after he had gone to the bathroom. Vardeman has not changed his story, said assistant Prosecuting Attorney John P. Zimmerman. Authorities said that when the autopsy results were returned on Tuesday shaken infant syndrome, Vardeman became I 2 1 "fi It took five years and three months for him to get around to it, but Tom Gieseking probably could not have topped the manner in which he popped the question to his lady love Wednesday night.

In front of a crowd. of about 30,000, just before the bottom of the second inning of the Cardinals-Pirates game, Gieseking, 26, knelt on the home dugout at Busch Stadium and asked Linda Ivery, 25, to marry him. House Committee Allocates Baby Sitter Charged In Death Money For Valley Park Levee Villa and Alderman JoAnne Wayne, D-lst Ward, have filed a bill with the Board of Aldermen to allow the bond issue. On Wednesday, the company agreed that Jones would hire financial advisers and bond sellers, while Wilson would hire bond lawyers. Dividing those powers has been a major source of conflict in the occasional feud between Schoemehl and Jones.

Svetanics said the company would pledge airport revenue to back the bonds, but Lambert would seek reimbursement from the Federal Aviation Administration for 80 percent of the cost. That has been the practice throughout Lambert's 10-year program of "noise mitigation" the purchases of homes so close to the runways that the constant aircraft noise i -f with Enterprise Fleets, lives in Webster Groves. Ivery, sales support manager with Clinical Systems In Fenton, lives in Des Peres. It took Ivery to get the relationship started. The two used to work near each other.

Gieseking said he had noticed Ivery and wanted to ask her out but couldn't work up the courage. How did he work up the courage Wednesday night to propose so publicly? Said the groom-to-be, "Five years can change things quite a bit." Of 3-Year-Old the prime suspect. Only an adult could use the force it takes to shake a child to death, Zimmerman said. "He was the only one present," he said. Zimmerman said investigators were able to pin down the time Kendra was injured because authorities had left the Fleming home Sunday afternoon just 45 minutes before getting a report of a child "not breathing" at the residence.

The earlier visit concerned an investigation into whether one of Kendra's sisters had been sexually abused. After that investigation, officials concluded the children were not in "clear and present danger," said Capt. Thomas Neer of the Sheriff's Deaartment. Kendra's mother, Althea M. Fleming, had been gone less than an hour when Kendra was injured, Neer said.

Kendra's four sisters were taken into protective custody on Sunday night and placed In foster care, Neer said. by name as the person who registered the truck. Klarich said that although the employee had made an error, "It wasn't intentional." In Jefferson City, Revenue Director Benton apologized to the Kiblers. He said that although their money had been received, nobody could find a copy of their title application. "It's still 'The Case of the Missing Papers, he said.

orxr HI Rodgers Pearson difference." Rodgers' supervisor, Sgt. Michael Frederick, said, "We lost great potential there. He had a future. We lost a good one." Frederick recalled how Rodgers had come up to him last month to show off his paycheck, which reflected a small raise for graduating from probationary officer status. Frederick said, "In addition to being a good cop, he had a great sense of humor and was the type of guy you liked being around." Frederick said Rodgers had a 3-year-old son "as cute as a button." "Lorenzo was proud of him and spent a lot of time with him." The suspect in the shooting, Pearson, has a police record that Includes arrests on suspicion of assault, flourishing a weapon, stealing, and drug possession.

But he has no convictions. The laundry is in the Skinker-DeBaliviere area. Nancy Farmer, executive director of the Skinker-DeBaliviere Community Council, said she was "shocked and saddened" by the shooting. But she said crime had been decreasing in the neighborhood. Valley Park Levee Project VALLEY PARK CITY LIMITS BIG BEND outs Tom BoigmanPost-Dlspatch House Majority Leader Richard A.

Gephardt, D-St. Louis, for their work in getting the money. Palmer said some municipal officials planned to return to Washington for meetings with Danforth and Sen. Christopher S. Bond, to make sure the Senate comes through.

If the money arrives, Valley Park will begin to buy land in the levee's path, Palmer said. So far, it has sought only donations of land. With a levee, he said, "the whole basin will develop and revive the way it was years ago. You're going to see people wanting to buy property that two years ago was being given away." Susan Brown of the Post-Dispatch staff contributed information for this story. On Lawyers' Role degree murder in connection with the drownings of Stacy Price, 15, and Tyler Winzen, 3..

The killings occurred in 1986 when Price was caring for the boy at his family's apartment near Fenton. Fleer was scheduled to go on trial Jan. 22, but jury cards were never mailed. Last month, the trial had just begun when Circuit Judge John L. Anderson declared a mistrial.

He cited the potential conflict of Fleer's attorneys as one of his reasons. The question of a conflict arose because Almond formerly represented a man who is scheduled to testify against Fleer. 1,800 feet i i it if 1 PROPOSED Area Of COUNTY Detail a4v1- vl4 By Marianna Riley 'Of the Post-Dispatch Staff Anthony Vardeman, a 17-year-old high school student, was charged Wednesday with killing a 3-year-old child for whom he baby-sat. The victim, Kendra Marie Fleming, of the I first block of Warsen Avenue in the Wentzville area, died Monday of shaken infant syndrome 'at Cardinal Glennon Children's Hospital in SL She was injured Sunday, less than an -hour after child welfare investigators had to the home to investigate a separate report of child abuse. I Vardeman, who completed his sophomore at Wentzville High, was charged with -second-degree murder and was being held in St.

Charles County Jail after failing to post -a $100,000 bond. Vardeman was baby-sitting with Kendra her other four sisters on Sunday. He told 'investigators that she fell off the back of a 'Unfeesible' Couple Gets A Hand Clearing Up Trouble With Title On Truck By Louis J. Rose Of the Post-Dispatch Staff Larry and Donna Kibler of Breckenridge Hills found themselves stuck in a paperwork pothole with their new pickup truck. But with a little push from the Post-Dispatch, they're back on the road and running smoothly.

On Friday, the Kiblers received a letter from the Missouri Department of Revenue demanding prompt payment of $827 in sales taxes and $100 in title penalties on the pickup. The letter warned that unless the Kiblers paid up in 15 days, they would lose their license plates. In addition, the state said it had suspended the registrations on the Kiblers' boat trailer and all-terrain vehicle. The Kiblers said they had paid the taxes and title fees at a fee office in Clayton five months ago, when they bought the truck. What's more, they had the paper to prove it.

"I couldn't believe this was happening," said Donna Kibler, a secretary for the St. Louis County prosecuting attorney's office. Her husband, an electrician with the county's Public Works Department, was no less stunned. "What do you suppose would have happened if we were stopped by police in another state and they checked on us?" he asked. But the Kiblers had kept the pink-slip copy of their title application stamped as paid in full ($862.68 in taxes and fees) on Jan.

3. And when a Post-Dispatch reporter began making inquiries on their behalf, state officials began moving to make things right. State Revenue Director Duane Benton ad- By Robert L. Koenig Post-Dispatch Washington Bureau WASHINGTON The House Appropriations Committee has ticketed $500,000 for a levee in Valley Park, Mo. U.S.

Rep. Jack Buechner, R-Kirkwood, said Wednesday that getting the start-up money put in the House bill was "the most difficult hurdle" in the effort to get federal money for the project. The full House must still approve the legislation, which covers energy and water appropriations. Although the Senate has yet to write its own version, Sen. John C.

Danforth, has urged the Senate Appropriations Committee to include the $500,000 for the Valley Park levee. "The House action gives us something to work with," said Steve Hilton, a spokesman for Danforth. President George Bush's administration has opposed any "new starts" in water projects. Valley Park's levee would protect 418 homes and 161 businesses from the Meramec River, says the Army Corps of Engineers. A flood there late in 1982 caused about $27 million in damage.

The levee would average 22 feet in height, run for 3.1 miles and take five years to build. Buechner said he thought the House panel had been impressed by Valley Park's commitment to pay about $4 million of the levee's cost, estimated at $12.5 million to $13 million. The $500,000 approved by the committee would be for the fiscal year that starts Oct. 1. The Corps of Engineers would use the money to start construction probably on a sewer to let storm water drain out, said Ron Lindsay, a project manager with the corps in St.

Louis. After that, the corps would join Valley Park officials in seeking federal money to finish the project in the coming years. Valley Park worked hard for its money. In March, Mayor Fred L. Palmer led a delegation from Valley Park to Washington for appearances before congressional committees, and residents papered Congress with more than 1,100 letters.

Buechner hailed Valley Park for "the depth of local commitment." "That makes a difference," he said. Leon McKinney, a consultant for Valley Park, said Congress first looked into flooding in Valley Park in 1889. "One hundred and one years is a heck of a long time to look at a problem and study it," he said. He and Palmer praised Buechner and Judge Ask Opinion A judge In Jefferson County has appointed lawyer Donald L. Wolff to determine whether the attorneys defending a man accused of slaying a teen-ager and the young boy she was baby-sitting should be removed from the case.

Assistant Prosecutor John Appelbaum had asserted that Eugene "Geno" Fleer's attorneys, Clinton Almond and Marsha Brady, had a conflict of interest and he requested an independent evaluation. In an order issued Wednesday, Circuit Judge Timothy J. Patterson said Wolff had agreed to review the matter without cost and to report his opinion within 10 days. Fleer is charged with two counts of first- Sam LeonePost-Dispatch Larry and Donna Kibler with the receipts for the fees they paid on the purchase of their truck. The state, however, did not believe them.

mitted that mistakes had been made. He said his agency was issuing a title for the Kiblers' truck and restoring the other registrations. But nobody is sure what went wrong. The transactions were handled at a license fee office at 8015 Forsyth Boulevard in Clayton, run by Jan Klarich. The employee who handled the transaction forwarded the Kiblers' money to the state.

But the employee failed to list Kibler.