President Bush's decision to roll back several government policies supported by organized labor drew swift criticism yesterday from union officials who said they were never consulted.
Bush is preparing four executive orders on separate aspects of labor policy, including one to make it easier for union workers to stop their dues from being used to pay for political activities. The others deal with union-management relations on government contracts and in the government's own workplace.
'Revoking these policies without any prior consultation with Congress and organizations representing working people would undermine the wage base and jeopardize the economic security of millions of workers in the construction trades and other sectors,' said Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., a member of the House committee that deals with work force issues.
A White House official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Bush believes unionized and non-union contractors should compete for federal projects.
Clinton, city reach deal on Harlem office space
NEW YORK - Former President Clinton struck a deal with the city yesterday to lease penthouse office space in Harlem for his post-presidency.
The 14th-floor office space is in a newly renovated building on 125th Street, the main thoroughfare in the historic capital of black America.
Clinton decided to look there after coming under fierce criticism for trying to rent far more expensive space in midtown Manhattan for an estimated $800,000 a year.
The former president still needs the approval of the General Services Administration in Washington before he can move in, and it was not immediately clear how much the deal would cost taxpayers.
ELSEWHERE
SOUTH AFRICA - South Africa's worst cholera epidemic in more than 15 years has killed 111 people and sickened more than 50,000 others since August, health authorities said yesterday. More than 1,500 people were diagnosed with the disease over a 24-hour period from Thursday to yesterday alone, raising the number sickened in the epidemic to 50,614, the provincial health department in KwaZulu-Natal said.
SPACE - Space shuttle Atlantis and its five astronauts undocked from the International Space Station yesterday, leaving behind NASA's first permanent, orbiting laboratory since the 1970s. Atlantis delivered Destiny, a $1.4 billion laboratory that is far more sophisticated than NASA's last science workshop in space, Skylab. Atlantis commander Kenneth Cockrell and his crew are due back on Earth tomorrow after 11 days in space. Just 21/2 weeks later, Discovery is scheduled to fly to the space station to deliver a fresh crew.
CALIFORNIA - The city that symbolizes liberalism and sexual openness is about to extend its health insurance to cover sex-change operations for municipal employees. The Board of Supervisors and San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown are expected to sign the measure within weeks. It will extend up to $50,000 in benefits to city workers who want to switch their gender. San Francisco apparently would be the only governmental body in the nation to make sex-change benefits available.
