August 30, 1993

In the final thrust of a major strike against Asian organized crime, law-enforcement authorities said last night that they were searching for six more associates of a powerful gang leader arrested in Hong Kong on Friday who was deeply involved in smuggling Chinese immigrants into the United States. The sweep has already netted 19 suspects, 6 of whom were arrested during a burial ceremony on Saturday at Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn and 5 of whom were already in prison on other charges. The raids followed the Hong Kong arrest of Guo Liang Chi, the reputed leader of the Fuk Ching gang, whom one law-enforcement official referred to as "the crown jewel in this operation."

Douglas A. Fraser, the former president of the United Automobile Workers, vividly remembers the moment his union discovered it could no longer squeeze more money and benefits out of the nation's auto makers by playing one off another during contract negotiations. It was 1958, and the auto makers were presenting their three-year contract proposals to the union in different locations at the same time.

A problem for the health plan: how to keep requirements that companies insure employees from costing low-wage workers their jobs. Page A14.

Less than a month before President Clinton is to unveil his proposal for a national health insurance program, disputes have broken out among Administration officials over how to finance it and how tightly to limit overall health spending. Officials said that the White House, seeking to avoid new taxes, was seriously considering a proposal to squeeze more than $100 billion of additional savings from Medicare, the Federal health program for the elderly, by holding down increases in the program through the year 2000. The savings, along with a possible increase in the tax on cigarettes, would help pay for Mr. Clinton's promise of guaranteed coverage for all Americans.

A continent away from the bustle of New York City, where the months-long search for a schools chancellor may soon be over, Ramon C. Cortines enjoyed the simple pleasures of a weekend by the bay and pondered the ultimate question: Why would a man who has already run three school districts, who quit his job as head of the San Francisco schools last year because of a grinding work schedule and a painful ulcer, eagerly await a summons to New York and a thankless job that has bowed several distinguished educators before him? 'I'm Not Willing to Give Up' "Attempting to make urban school districts work challenges me," said Mr. Cortines, a 61-year-old Mexican-American who is now the top choice of the four-member majority on New York's Board of Education. "People say New York can't be done. Well, I'm not willing to give up on our big cities."