Reagan Budget Cuts Provoke Kansas Debate

The winter wheat lies buried under more than a foot of snow in the fields that stretch away from town as far as the eye can see, and most days Mayor Norm Ellis can be found conducting city business out of his barber shop, where it’s still just $5 for a haircut--flat-top or regular.

It is the second-oldest city in the state--Leavenworth got organized just a little bit sooner back in 1858--and it remains the sort of place where friends don’t feel obliged to phone before they drop by.

An Overflow Crowd

Yet even in this quiet corner of America, more than 1,000 miles from the White House and the marble corridors of Congress, President Reagan’s newest proposals for slashing domestic spending to narrow the federal budget deficit have provoked a vigorous debate.

When the House Budget Committee held a field hearing here last Friday to find how Reagan’s budget is playing, an overflow crowd of 600 persons, dressed in everything from business suits to overalls, jammed the American Legion Hall.

Budget cuts are no stranger to conversation in Atchison. The local unemployment rate, about 8%, may be low by inner-city standards, but it is one of the worst in the state--thanks in no small part to a 1981 cut in federal mass transit spending that triggered massive layoffs at a plant that once manufactured bus undercarriages.

Not Eager for Sacrifices

And today, most townspeople seem less than eager to make any more sacrifices in the name of heading off whatever hazy economic threat a $200-billion annual federal deficit may pose. Why, citizens in Atchison wonder, can’t Congress cut someone else’s budget--foreign aid, perhaps, or the Pentagon’s overpriced spare parts.

Bob Wagner, sitting in the chair in Mayor Ellis’ barber shop, can hardly hold still when talk turns to the proposal that next year’s cost-of-living increase in his veteran’s pension be eliminated. “Definitely not,” he says. “I spent my time overseas.”

Atchison residents say they might give up something if they felt the burden of cuts were being shared, particularly by the Defense Department.

Mildred Ewing, one of the elderly who make up more than a third of the town’s population, said her Social Security check must grow to keep up with rising utility costs. But she added: “I’ve been getting along on what I have now. Freeze everything. That would be fair.”

One of the few who believe Atchison can take the lead in deficit reduction is City Commissioner Doug Merritt, a Republican-turned-Libertarian. He recently voted against city participation in a federal program that raises tax-free money for home buyers.

Stateroom on Titanic

“I could not in good conscience continue to complain of the national deficit and of the lack of leadership in Washington, while at the same time jostle with other small cities of Kansas for a slightly better stateroom on the Titanic,” he wrote in a letter to the Atchison Globe.

The Globe’s editorial writers quickly countered that as long as other Kansas cities were lining up for federal funds, “who’s going to pin a gold medal on us for any noble cause to fight the national deficit?”

Atchison’s economy revolves around agriculture--the only skyscrapers are its towering grain elevators--and Reagan’s proposed cuts in farm subsidies are a favorite source of complaints. One Atchison accountant confides that fully half of his farm clients are losing money this year.

‘Farmers Are Hurting’

“We have a saying around here: ‘If the farmers don’t make it, we all don’t make it,’ ” said Jimmie Mae Weber, owner of the Gaslight Boutique, a clothing store in the pleasant outdoor mall that Atchison built with federal funds.

“We do know the farmers are hurting,” added Pat Smart at neighboring Hilligoss Shoes. “Our farmers aren’t buying the way they used to. That’s for sure.”

At the same time, like officials struggling with the issue in Washington, she wonders whether the government should be in the business of protecting farmers any more than it should be lending a hand to others whose business fortunes turn sour.

“I know the federal government wouldn’t bail me out if I got in trouble,” said Smart, who added that the good-sized shoe store her family now runs can be traced back to a small shoe-repair business started by her husband’s grandfather. “A lot of them got in over their heads (buying) that big fancy equipment. Still, I’d hate to see all the small farmers go.”

Pinch of Budget Cuts

Her family would feel the pinch of the budget cuts that Reagan has recommended. The fourth of her sixth daughters, trying to complete a computer programming degree at the University of Kansas as she works part time and raises two children of her own, has applied for a federal grant even as the White House has recommended tightening eligibility.

“We’ll see that she gets through school somehow,” Smart said, “but if she could get a grant, it sure would help a lot.”

For some not able or willing to spend four years in college, Atchison’s Northeast Area Vocational-Technical School has been the avenue away from agriculture’s dismal prospects. “I’d kind of like to be on the farm, but it’s too tough to get started,” said 18-year-old computer programing student Dean Miller. “Computers are the coming thing, it seems like.”

Despite growing demand for such courses, the school itself has had to halt programs and lay off faculty because of previous cuts in federal funds. Director Dick Kingston said schools such as his are considering asking the state Legislature for the power to raise funds through taxation. In the meantime, he said, the government should recognize the value of technical training “and let somebody else carry the World Bank for a change.”

Over at the Salvation Army building that is serving as Atchison’s senior citizen center until a new $100,000 facility is finished, people worry that the government cares too much about the powerful and is willing to let the weak struggle along on their own.

Julian Jimenez, a 64-year-old forced into early retirement by heart surgery, does not trust the government to keep its word that the annual increase in Social Security benefits would be eliminated for only one year. “They say a year this time,” he said. “Then they’ll decide that’s not enough. They break all their promises.”

Jack White, playing cards with Jimenez, insists that if the government wants to save money, it should “stop buying $600 toilet seats for those damn lazy so-and-sos to sit in.”

City Manager Bill Sachs, who has learned to play one federal grant program off against another to get what the city needs, worries about Washington’s seeming determination to kill general revenue sharing.

“They want to cut those social programs without in-depth analysis of what they are doing,” he said.