February 9, 1980

TOWNSHIP 17, RANGE 4, Me.--It is the dead of winter in backwoods Maine now, and the summer people with their lakeside cottages, expensive power boats, $20,000 campers and $75 Italian hiking boots have long since gone back to their city homes with central heating and their jobs with pension plans.

WASHINGTON, Feb. 8--Treasury Secretary G. William Miller acknowledged to a Senate committee today that he had failed to prevent improper overseas payments while he was chairman of Textron Inc., but he continued to deny that he had known of them.

To the seasoned consumer, whose jaded eye has taken in everything from the pet rock to generic beer, no new product, however offbeat, would seem to warrant astonishment.

WASHINGTON, Feb. 8--Four leaders of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence today introduced "charter" legislation for United States intelligence agencies that would require the President to give prior notice of covert intelligence operations to at least eight members of Congress, even in a national emergency.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority announced yesterday that it had completed the reincorporation of the Long Island Rail Road to bring its employees under the jurisdiction of the state's Taylor Law, which prohibits strikes by public employees.