Punchy Commission

In the meatpacking, oil and aviation city of Wichita, Kans. (pop. 250,000), there is no better entertainment, to judge from the attendance, than the weekly meetings of the five-man nonpartisan city commission. Spectators throng city hall to witness the give and take of sewerage, highway problems and business licensing laws, and frequently the meetings are broadcast to overflow crowds in the corridors. Three TV stations film every byplay, five radio stations record every word of what Wichita fans call "the Tuesday night fights." One reason for the excitement: a furious feud between Commissioner John Stevens, 47, Wichita-born, of Lebanese descent, spokesman for the Lebanese-American colony known as "Syrians," or "West Side Indians," and City Commissioner Alfred Howse, 58, Wichita-born businessman, investment broker, real-estate executive, who lives on the classier East Side of town.

Last week's Topic A was zoning. Adroitly, Commissioner Howse drew from a witness an admission that Commissioner Stevens had been privately consulted on a city zoning matter in which he had a possible interest. "It's just another attempt to smear me," retorted Stevens, whose nerves were already jangled because his vending-machine business is in deep trouble with the state sales-tax authorities. "I would hate to bring up the thousands of people who have conferred with Commissioner Howse on matters like this." Mayor E. E. Baird banged his gavel, declared the meeting in recess.

Then, with all eyes and three TV cameras on him, Stevens got up, walked across the platform, conferred briefly with Howse and belted him on the jaw, knocking the bespectacled Howse out of his seat and off the platform. "He called me a son of a bitch," Stevens told his friends afterward. "I didn't." said Howse, a retired Air Force colonel who still suffers from the effects of a crash at sea during World War II. "I was studying the agenda, and the next thing I knew I was flying through the air."

Next day, from the state capital at Topeka, came cluck-clucks from Democratic Governor George Docking. "I'm glad I don't live in Wichita." said he. "All this is embarrassing, particularly when we are trying to bring in new industries." The Wichita Eagle and the Beacon both called for Stevens' resignation. His Lebanese-American friends* rallied to his support. The old-time reformers suggested that the whole city commission-city manager form of government, pioneered by Wichita back in 1916, ought to be junked in favor of oldfashioned, relatively disciplined "partisan government."

*There are about 1,100 Lebanese-Americans in Wichita, descendants of victims of Turkish persecution who migrated to New York City in the 18503, sold rugs and dry goods, moved west to settle in Illinois, Michigan and on the Chisholm Trail at boomtown Wichita. Leading Wichita Lebanese-Americans: the Farha brothers, owners of seven supermarkets; U.S.A.F. Jet Ace Lieut. Colonel James Jabara.

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