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

DATE: MONDAY, July 30, 1990                   TAG: 9007300242
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: A-3   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: DWAYNE YANCEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

WILDER VOWS TO CUT DOWN ON HIS TRAVELS

"I'll be spending far more time in Virginia in the next six months and the rest of my tenure, and still trying to participate at the level of speaking out on issues that affect my state," Wilder said today on a live, call-in show on the C-Span network.

But then, Wilder's jet-setting may already have accomplished his main goal - to get noticed as a national figure.

In the latest issue of The New Republic magazine, columnist Fred Barnes quotes Wilder strategists as saying that the governor has spent so much time traveling around the country this spring and summer because he knew that if he waited, he risked being overshadowed by other rising political stars coming out of this fall's election.

Indeed, Wilder had to share space on New Republic's cover this week with a fellow Democrat who hasn't even won a governorship yet - Dianne Feinstein, the party's nominee in California.

If Wilder holds to his promise to scale back his national travels, he's going out in a big way.

Today, he's in Mobile, Ala., for the National Governors Association conference, and made two appearances on national television - NBC's "Today" and the C-Span call-in, where he fielded questions ranging from property taxes in Petersburg to what Virginia has done to help Lithuania achieve independence.

Wilder also got in a dig at President Bush's proposal to set a $10,000 limit on the amount of state and local income taxes that can be deducted on federal income tax returns.

The proposal would generally affect only upper-income taxpayers, but Wilder said he was still opposed. "I feel it's a matter of getting the camel's nose under the tent. And once you start bringing it to $10,000 then you bring it down to five, then to four, then to none," Wilder said. "It's an increase in taxes that we can ill afford to pay at this time."

Wilder brushed off several questions about whether he'll run for president, and what he'll do after he leaves office in 1994. After being governor, Wilder said, "you can participate in the political forum at any number of levels, but it would be hypothetical to say I've even considered" a presidential race.

Nevertheless, he's keeping the schedule of someone with his eye on the national ticket. Later today, Wilder was to be in Houston to address a black lawyers' group. He flies to New York to speak to a dentists' convention on Tuesday and the National Urban League on Wednesday.

On Friday, it's on to Aspen, Colo., to speak to an international think tank, and to Los Angeles for the National Association of Black Journalists.

Saturday and Sunday, he'll be in Chicago for the American Bar Association convention. After that, he takes a break. His schedule doesn't show another out-of-state appearance until Aug. 27, when he speaks to B'nai Brith in Dallas.