THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT said in Washing-
(on it has spent nearly $2 million improving President
Richard Nixon's hames in Florida and California for
security purposes. The White Flouse disclosed that
businessman Robert H. Abplanalp, who helped the
President buy his San Clemente, if. retreat, has
been getting some money bavk in the form of rent asso-
ciated with Nixon's Key Biscayne, Fla., place.

 

 

A5.5 PER CENT increase in 1974 payments to all 28
million Social Security recipients is considered certain
to pass the Senale and is likely to confront President
Richard Nixan next week. Its approval by the House
would test Nixon's post-Watergate mood of accommo-
dation with Cangress, signaled this week when he
signed three bills he originially had opposed.

THE U.S. SUPREME COURT Thursday slapped
down activily by roving border patrols arbitrarily
stopping and searching cars near the United States
border — even if they do find large amounts of mari-
juana. The court overturned the conviction of an indi-
gent Mexican who was arrested when federal officers
stopped and searched his car, without su
25 miles north of the Mexican border in California and
found 161 pounds of marijuana.

  

THE HOUSE APPROPRIATIONS Committee, ap-
parently unshaken by the upheaval within the FI,
voted today (o allow the full administration budget re-
quest of $366.5 million to operate the agency in the 1974
fiscal ycar thal starts July 1

ANUMBER OF East Coast Banks Thursday boosted
their prime interest rate from seven and one-half to
seven and three-fourths per cent, following the lead of
the First National Bank of Chicago, which made the
move earlier in the week. The prime rate is the interest
charged by a bank to its top corporate buyers.
 
PPV PEELE YB RENAE CES?

WASHINGTON (UPI) — The federal
government says it has spent nearly $2
million improving President Nixon’s
homes in'Florida and California, all of it
relating to ‘“‘security.”

The White House also disclosed that
businessman Robert H. Abplanalp, who
helped the President buy his San Clemen-
te, Calif., retreat, has been getting some
money back in the form of rent associated
with Nixon’s Key Biscayne, Fla., place.

A month ago the White House had
listed $39,000 in federal funds for im-
proving the Western White House at San
Clemente since Nixon bought it in 1969.

Last week, after a further search of
record, it raised this figure to $460,302.

On Thursday, General Services Ad-
 ministration (GSA), the government’s
housekeeping agency, said a still more ex-
tensive audit put the total federal expen-
diture at San Clemente at $703,367 over
four fiscal years beginning July 1, 1969.
This included only the residence there,
not the White House office space.

GSA listed for the first time the federal
expenditure for improvements, equip-
ment, operation and maintenance at the
White House complex at Key Biscayne,
including both residence and office
space— $1,180,522, spread over five fiscal
years beginning July 1, 1968.

Included in the Key Biscayne figure
was $161,463 for renting two houses in the
complex for the Secret Service and White
House communications staff.

The White House said one of these
 houses is owned by Abplanalp and the
other is owned in the name of Edwin H.
Underwood, trustee for the Indiana
National Bank, Indianapolis.

The White House said all of the tax-
payers’ money spent in San Clemente and
Key Biscayne was for security-related im-
provements and that all work was done at
the request of the Secret Service, not the
President.

The GSA data showed items such as
$53,644 in fiscal 1970 for interior security
and communications at San Clemente. It
also included $3,303 in fiscal 1970 for golf
carts for the Secret Service patrol at Key
Biscayne.

Two years later there appears another
item of $5,230 for three Secret Service golf
carts there.
 