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Show Page AA-1 pinion SheSalt LakeTribune SUNDAY/April 27, 1997 PUBLIC FORUM Page AA-2 RUSSIAN VIEW Page AA-3 OUR VIEW The Salt Lake Tribune's Editorial Position Risky Welfare Plan contracting, vouchers or other forms of privatization. With proper oversight, companies might be trusted to collect data or provide housing, food and counseling to welfare clients. But when it comes to deciding who will receive public assistance or who should lose custody of a child, the private sector has its limits. If a private group’s primary mission is to make profits or to save souls, for example, services may be reducedor reserved for people considered worthy of kindness. Government employees,on the other hand,are subject to moredirect publie serutiny and are expected to promote the public good within constitutional protections for As riled Texas Republicans wait impatiently for White House permission to hire private contractors to run their welfare programs, other Americans should think twice about hitching themselves to the Lone Star State’s wagon. Two years ago, in anticipation of federal welfare reform, Texas legislators adopted plans to privatize the state’s welfare system. The Clinton administration had promised a March 31 response to the Texas request for a waiver from federal rules, and Texas leaders are none too happy about the delay. Union opposition has been blamed for White House stalling, and there surely is an elementofself-interest at work in the anti-privatization campaign. Laborleaders claim thousands of governmentjobs are at stake and that private contractors will jeopardize welfare applicants’ confidentiality. As Utahns saw in the recentfailure of a busing contract in Salt Lake City schools, there is no guarantee that private companieswill deliver services as efficiently or as well as public employees. And as the health-care system’s shift to managed care demonstrates, the profit motive tends to threaten the quality of certain kinds of services, particularly the delivery of charity. Welfare, of course, is a form of public charity in which members of a community agree, through elected representatives, to pool resources to help peoplein financial need. Certain elements of a welfare program lend themselves well to private Privatization does not necessarily cut government costs. Salt Lake City School District's bus contract will have cost taxpayers extra money in the long run. Defense and health-care industries have formed constituencies that lobby hard for more government spending. What’s more,cost savings are diminished if private contractors pay their employeesless or reduce their benefits, since those employees may experience performance-crippling morale problems and contribute less to the local economy. Texas is eager to prove that systemwide privatization can improve welfare services while cutting costs. This is a case where other states can — and should — let the pioneertake the risks and proveits point before jumping on any bandwagon. plicate the reform effort in Salt Lake County thatis currently under way. Political opponents of the Salt Lake County Commission’s reform plan could urge voters to defeatit and awaitthe results of thelegislative study. While legislators are right to be wary of any development that might cause voter confusion, they are being too cautious in this instance. If the siudy committee developed into a fullblowneffort to rewrite the laws thatset out the available optional forms of county government, perhaps providing new optional plans in the process, the concern about muddyingthe reform effort in Salt Lake County might be justified. However, if the mandate of the study group werelimited at the outset to cleaning up ambiguities or contradictions within the existing optional forms, that concern could be mitigated. Eventually, the Legislature aust address the shortcomings of the existing law. Postponements won't makethedifficulties go away. Utahlegislators should notdelay efforts to clear up ambiguities in state law concerning optional forms of county government. Unfortunately, a legislative committee on political subdivisions has decided notto create a study group to tackle the issues. Salt Lake County's effort to put a government reform plan on the ballot Nov. 4 has turned up a numberof contradictions in the state laws that spell out how county governments will be organized. Consequently, it would seem thatthis is an ideal time for officials in Salt Lake and other counties to take these concerns to a legislative study committee. Such a group could examine the issues and prepare proposals for solutions that could be considered in the next general session early in 1998. However,the legislative committee that would appoint such a study group declined to take that action last week. The committee decided that appointment of a study group now might com- A Blow to Term Limits The term-limits bandwagon suffered anotherflat tire last week, when a federal judge ruled that California's limits on the terms of state legislators are unconstitutional. Her decision, the first against state legislative limits, should further temper enthusiasm for this quick-fix concept that limits not just terms but also voters’rights. Californians voted in 1990 to limit the terms oftheir state legislators — six years in the Assembly,eightin the Senate — and some lawmakers have already been “termed out.” One of them, Tom Bates of Berkeley, sued for his and his constituents’ right to re-elect the representative they want, namely him, and Judge Claudia Wilken ruled in their favor last Wednesday. The ruling may not be particularly relevant to the deliberations that Senate President Lane Beattie promised this year on Utah's term-limits law. That's because Judge Wilken objected most strenuously to California's lifetimelimits; Utah’s 12-year limits apply to consecutive terms and do not bar lawmakers from interrupting their tenure in office and running again later. The judge did not think the California law passes constitutional muster be- cause “it imposes an absolute and permanent ban on the participation of a certain category of candidates: experienced legislators.” She indicated that consecutive-term limits like Utah's might be valid. Still, Utah legislators, who nearly overturned the state’s 1994 lawlast session (the Housevoted to do so but Beattie blocked a Senate yote), could take some counsel from Judge Wilken as they examineterm limits. For instance, she disputed the contention that term limits would endpolitical “careerism,” arguing that in fact career-minded legislators might feel more accountable to their constituents, not less. Herdecision also refers to the fundamental objection to term limits that the U.S. Supreme Court elucidated whenit ruled against congressionallimits in 1995 — that is, that term limits constrict the voters’ right to choose the person they wantto represent them. Term-limits advocates expect Judge Wilken's decision to be overturned at the appellate level. Whether that happens, Utah lawmakers should heed the constitutional concerns expressed by her and by the Supreme Court and decide to “term out” Utah's law TheSalt LakeTribune UTAH’S INDEPENDENT VOICE SINCE 1871 John F. Fitzpatrick (1924-1960) John W. Gallivan (1960-1983) Jerry O'Brien (1983-1994) KEARNS-TRIBUNE CORPORATION, Le ¢ individuals. Fix County Government Law PAST PUBLISHERS a “DESER eT PUBLISHER Dominic Welch EDITOR James E. Shelledy EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR Harry E. Puller, Jr 143 8, MAIN ST. SALT LAKE CITY, M1 _—— In Loan From Dole, Newt Made Another Mistake JAMESK. GLASSMAN THE WASHINGTON POST WASHINGTON — Once again, Newt Gingrich has decided to be too clever by half. Instead of simply paying the ethics fine out of his pocket, he’s announced he'll borrow the money from Bob Dole, a man who's generousto a fault. Rep. David Bonior, D-Mich., the speaker’s fanatical antagonist, called this a “sweetheart deal,” implying that Dole, who has joined a big Washington law firm, is offering the speaker a gift and expects something in return. That claim is notjust wrong,it’s beside the real point — which is Gingrich’s consistently poor judgmentas a leader. With the sameself-destructive grandi- osity he displayedin his initial book deal, in the 1995 budgetfiasco and government shutdownandin the affair (using tax-exempt groups for political purposes) that led to the fineitself, Gingrich has chosen the complex and devious over the simple and straightforward. Bankers don’t normally lend $300,000 to someonewho,based on his currentsalary and apparent assets, can't repay it. Gingrich told the Houselast week he is “a person oflimited means,” but the asset question rankles. doesn't have to pay taxes until the inter- He earned $471,348 in 1995 alone for his book To Renew America. Doeshestill haveit? If so, unless he thinks he can earn est is actually paid. If Gingrich waits until 2005, then Dolewill earn about $190,000 after federal andstate taxes. It would benice to have somecollateral more than 10 percent a year on that mon- (the agreement so far is vague on this ey, the wise course would betouseit to pay his fine — or, to be moreprecise, “cost assessment.” Still, this is no sweetheart deal, Dole doesn’t haveto actlike a banker, because he’s not one. He doesn’t have to answer to shareholders or examinersor follow the rules on extending credit. Dole knows that Gingrich will leave the House in point). And it would make more senseif Gingrich at least made annualinterestonly payments of $30,000. With a $171,500 salary, he can afford it. But while this is no typical bank loan, it's also no sweetheart deal It is, however, a needlessly sly arrangement. Bonior, with whom I rarely agree, 2002, whenhis term as speaker is up, and assumes he'll be raking in huge fees as a was absolutely right when he said it showed Gingrich’s “theatrical, narcissistic approach again Thatis the way he though Dole should worry that the Inter- does business.” Sadly, it is. It's a shame the speaker didn't pay the fine with his own money. Closing the cir- speech-maker. That's not a bad assumption — alnal RevenueService, which is reported to beinvestigating the same matters the ethics committee did, might slap Gingrich with a largefine. Analyzed as an investment, the deal holds up. Dole will be earning 10 percent, cle, he would have created the perfect opportunity for ending Boniorism, as practiced by both parties. But Gingrich being Gingrich, he couldn't doit that way. In bowingto the art of the deal, Gingrich reminded us of the style (yes, theatri- which is 3.1 percentage points higher than the rate on an eight-year Treasury cal and narcissistic) that got this smart bond — about right, considering therisk. Dole’s deal has an advantage over an place — and heprovided another portent of the disaster which I'm afraid may en- analogous zero-coupon T-bond: He snare Republicans 18 months from now. and energetic man into trouble in the first When Research Results Displease the Sponsors But Synthroid is no moreeffective than JOANNE JACOBS KNIGHT-RIDDER NEWSPAPERS SAN JOSE, Calif. — “There must be some mistake,” I told the pharmacy clerk. “I've been taking thyroid pills for 22 years, My new prescription changes the dose by .025 milligrams. It can't possibly cost twice as much." Mymistake.It can andit did — because the doctor specified Synthroid, instead of generic levothyroxine. The pills keep people like me, with underactive or nonexistent thyroid glands, from turning into zombies. Americans spend $600 million a year on thyroid medications. Synthroid, the first synthetic thyroid hormone approved, has 84 percentof the market. cheaper versions of levothyroxine for most patients, according to a study pub- lished in the April 16 Journal of the American Medical Association, known as JAMA. Thyroid zombies could be just as perky and save $350 million a year. The research was completed 62 years ago at the University of California at San Francisco. It was supposed to be published by JAMA morethan twoyearsago. But the company that makes Synthroid paid for the study — and blocked publication when the results didn't turn out as trol over the results. In 1987, Flint Laboratories gave $250,000 to Betty J. Dong, a UCSF pharmacy professor, to compare Synthroid with three cheaper alternatives. Not knowing university policy, Dong signed an agreement giving Flint a veto over publication. The company approved the study's design and monitored its execution. In late 1990, Dong’s team concluded Synthroid was equivalent to the alternatives, The company, which had become Boots Phar maceuticals, launched an energetic cam- expected, paignto discredit the study andthe scien- creasingly, university researchers are est. Nonewere found. looking to industry for funding. But companies can't be allowed to buy the prestige of academic research — and buy con- to evaluate the study. All said the flaws It’s a story that should makeall of us nervous, whatever our thyroid levels. In- tists’ ethics. Boots hired private investigators to look for conflicts of interUCSF asked independent researchers were minor. It was good science. The university asked for specific ethics charges that could be investigated. Boots didn't provide any Finally, in 1994, Dong sent her paper to JAMA, which asked five experts to reviewthe study. (The journal had a hard time finding five thyroid experts with no financial ties to Boots.) Again, the review ers said the research was sound. JAMA scheduled publication for Jan. 25, 1995. But UCSF’s new lawyer told the researchers they'd face a lawsuit from Boots — with no university support — if they published without the company's OK. Dong withdrew the paper A few monthslater, Boots was sold to BASFAG for $1.4 billion, and merged into Knoll Pharmaceutical Co. The sell ing pricereflected the market dominance of Boots’ most profitable product, Synth roid. After a Wall Street Journal story on the controversy last year, and pressure from the Food and Drug Administration Knoll agreed to let Dong publish in JAMA, Knoll still asserts the study is flawed, but its company president apolo gized for insufficient sensitivity to aca demic freedom. My insurance pays most of the cost of prescriptions, and | hate being a zombie So I figured it was worth paying a bit moreout of pocket to get Synthroid Now | feel stupid. We zombies don't like that feeling. I'm asking my doctor for 4 new prescriplion as my protest against Boots/Kooll's attempt to manipulate and muzzle academy research |