THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, August 9, 1994 TAG: 9408090430
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A6 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DAVID M. POOLE, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 69 lines
Republican U.S. Senate candidate Oliver L. North paused Monday during a walking tour of an impoverished Norfolk neighborhood to impart the Parable of the Flood:
A farmer whose fields and home were inundated along the Mississippi River last year was asked by a young television reporter if he was upset about the federal government's shoddy upkeep of levees and its slow response in delivering disaster checks.
The old man replied that he wasn't counting on the government; he would rebuild with the help of neighbors and sweat of his own brow.
North's message - self-reliance is better than a government handout - was immediately put to the test during a photo opportunity with a local shopkeeper.
Paul Blowe, owner of Paul's Barber Shop II on Hampton Boulevard, was whisked into a North entourage that included two Republican congressional candidates and Jack Kemp, a potential GOP presidential candidate in 1996.
As TV crews captured the scene, the Republicans took turns squeezing Blowe's hand, slapping him on the back and asking about his business.
Blowe explained that his barbershop has been hurt by road construction on Hampton Boulevard that has dragged on for years. It would be nice, Blowe said, if the government would provide him and other small-business men with compensation.
``Everybody has suffered,'' he said.
North's welfare-reform agenda bumped up against the hard realities of government dependence during a rare campaign foray into a low-income, predominantly black neighborhood. He encountered Lamberts Point residents who said they were looking to government for jobs and affordable housing.
``Are you going to get us a recreation center?'' asked Wayne Moore, a 26-year-old high school dropout who works part time as a short-order cook. ``We need something to keep us out of trouble.''
``Maybe if you win, you can come back and build some new houses here,'' said the Rev. Anthony Paige, pastor of First Baptist Church of Lamberts Point.
A few hours earlier, North and Kemp had outlined their welfare-reform agenda to an all-white audience at a $40-a-plate luncheon at the Omni International Hotel.
Kemp called for an overhaul of the federal tax code to give welfare recipients incentives to leave ``public-housing plantations,'' to own their own homes and save for their children's future.
The current system, Kemp said, tells public-assistance recipients: ``You must not work, you must not save and you must not marry the father of your children.''
North contended that an overgrown federal government robs welfare recipients of any drive for economic advancement.
``That's why Jack and I are going this afternoon through those areas on the other side, (with) their twisted definition of what government is doing for people, to show them what government is doing to people in the housing projects,'' North said. ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by JOSEPH JOHN KOTLOWSKI
U.S. Senate candidate Oliver North hugs Norfolk resident Mary
Williams during a campaign stop Monday. GOP presidential hopeful
Jack Kemp joined North on the visit.
KEYWORDS: CANDIDATE U.S. SENATE RACE
by CNB