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

DATE: MONDAY, September 13, 1993                   TAG: 9309130093
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-2   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND                                LENGTH: Medium

POLL: VOTERS DON'T APPROVE OF WILDER'S JOB PERFORMANCE

The poll by the Richmond Times-Dispatch and television station WWBT found 40 percent of the 726 registered voters contacted by telephone Sept. 3-8 approved of the governor's performance. Six percent said they were undecided.

The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

Glenn Davidson, a Wilder spokesman, declined to comment on the poll's results. Wilder is in the final months of a four-year term. He cannot succeed himself.

Wilder, the nation's first black elected governor, has said he plans to run for the U.S. Senate seat held by fellow Democrat Charles Robb in 1994. Robb and Wilder have feuded publicly for several years.

A Times-Dispatch and WWBT poll in October 1992 found 50 percent disapproved of Wilder's performance and 42 percent approved.

In other findings, the poll found:

Eighty-three percent of those surveyed favored a five-day waiting period to purchase a handgun, while 14 percent opposed the idea. Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mary Sue Terry supports the waiting period. Her Republican opponent, George Allen, opposes it.

Forty-two percent of those surveyed favored keeping Virginia Military Institute all-male and setting up a similar program or college for women. Twenty-three percent said women should be admitted and 29 percent said VMI should become a private school for men. The federal courts have ruled that VMI's single-sex admissions policy is unconstitutional.