---

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, January 31, 1992                   TAG: 9201310448
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

---

HOSPITAL TAX TIED TO LIQUOR STORES

GOV. DOUGLAS Wilder wants to put a tax on hospital beds. But he wants to be sure there are patients in the beds. So he wants to let private liquor stores in the state.

He knows it only takes one drunken driver to hit a school bus and fill up the beds. One drunken driver can kill a lot of people. Fill up the jails, and our tax money has to feed them.

Government cannot pay for all the teen-agers and children whose lives have been destroyed by tobacco, alcohol and drugs. They are what make health insurance go so high.

My Daddy raised 18 children and didn't have any health insurance. I'm 72 and work seven days a week. I made about $8,000 last year. Now take part of that for taxes; Blue Cross gets $148 every month. If you put a tax on beds, how can people go to the hospital? BEA SPRAKER SALEM

---