August 18, 1985

The Giants won their third straight preseason game tonight, an inelegant 10-2 victory over the Green Bay Packers. There were pluses and minuses on both sides of the ball for the Giants. Phil Simms returned at quarterback and looked good, but the running game sputtered with only 86 yards in 38 carries. The defensive line, especially George Martin, and the linebackers played well, but the secondary gave up many receptions by the Packers' swift receivers.

UNPLANNED events sometimes have a way of intruding on Presidential vacations. Ronald Reagan and the supporting cast he travels with were at his ranch near here in 1981 when American fighters downed two Soviet-built Libyan warplanes, and again in 1983, when Korean Airlines Flight OO7 was shot down by Russian pilots. Last week there was an unusually brisk flurry by the President's aides, but there was nothing unplanned about it. Many Congressional Democrats who were spending their off-duty August well to the east of the Santa Ynez Mountains, and a few members of the President's Republican Party as well, professed to not quite know what to make of the unexpected intrusions into their vacations.

President Reagan's proposal to eliminate the deduction for state and local taxes in calculating personal income taxes would lead to major changes in the financing of public schools, according to economists and educators. Whether the change would be good or bad for the schools is a topic of vigorous debate. The deductibility proposal, a key element of the Reagan Administration's broad plan of tax revision, would cost taxpayers who itemize deductions a total of $39 billion a year by 1990, according to Treasury Department estimates, although the overall lowering of tax rates would make up for some of that. Allowing people to deduct from taxable income the amount they pay in state and local taxes is widely regarded as an indirect Federal subsidy to public education that the American Federation of Teachers estimates at $16.5 billion a year. Critics say eliminating deductibility would encourage local tax revolts around the country and, as a result, force school districts to cut their budgets by as much as 20 percent when they are losing Federal funds. The effects of the change would be felt most harshly, they say, in districts that have tried hardest to aid disadvantaged students.

The Federal Government is preparing to abolish building standards that have served for half a century as the basic guide for the nation's housing industry. The Minimum Property Standards of the Federal Housing Administration are to be replaced by state and local codes as part of the Administration's drive to reduce Federal regulations and transfer authority to the states. Officials of the Department of Housing and Urban Development said they expected the change to take effect by the end of this year. The proposal has aroused confusion and controversy. Advocates of the change say the Federal standards are an unnecessary burden blocking creative solutions to housing problems. But opponents say the lack of some Federal control could lead to low-quality construction. Papier-Mache Bathtubs? Al Louis Ripskis, who works for H.U.D. and publishes a newsletter often critical of the department, said, for example, that papier-mache bathtubs, or no bathtubs at all, would be permitted in some areas.

THE chemical industry suddenly seemed a lot more risky last week. The toxic gas leak at a Union Carbide plant in Institute, W.Va., sending 135 people to the hospital, was by no means the most serious American chemical accident. But among the public and regulators, it clearly produced the most alarm in recent memory. Something had changed dramatically, both the industry and its critics agreed. The long shadow of Bhopal, where 2,000 people died last December from a toxic leak at a Carbide plant in India, had made many more Americans sensitive to chemical accidents. Even small leaks were prompting mayoral press conferences in Charleston, W.Va. and news stories nationally.