Article on St Louis Cardinals and Chicago Cubs failing to qualify for playoffs despite league-leading home run hitters Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa; photo (M)

Big Boppers Going Yard and Then Going Home

Article contends that while discovery of mosquito-borne West Nile virus in New York region is fascinating for scientists and public health experts, concern among general public is more basic: people want to know if they are at risk for contracting it and they want to know where virus is headed; scientists and health officials say that too little is known about virus to be able to give assurances (M)

As Fears Rise About Virus, The Answers Are Elusive

George Vecsey Sports of The Times column discusses recent slump by New York Mets that threatens to keep them out of playoffs; photo (M)

Sports of The Movies; Wild Card Confused The Mets

General Motors Corp and United Automobile Workers union reach agreement on new, four-year labor contract that will give company's 143,200 factory workers annual raises of 3 percent plus adjustment for inflation; terms of agreement are similar to those with DaimlerChrysler; agreement might signal GM has turned corner in its frosty relations with union; last year, GM lost $2 billion because of 54-day strike, its 17th strike since 1993 (M)

G.M. Agrees To 4-Year Pact With Union

Exhibit of Martin Johnson Heade paintings to open at Boston Museum of Fine Arts; Brooklyn Philharmonic to open concert season, led by Robert Spano; photos; 1999 Nobel Prize in literature to be announced; ten members of Goncourt Academy issue list of 12 best French novels (S)

Footlights

A year after tearfully telling religious leaders at the annual White House prayer breakfast that he had sinned in the Monica Lewinsky scandal, President Clinton told the same group yesterday that he was continuing to squeeze regular spiritual counseling into his schedule. Saying it was something he needed to recover from what he called ''one of the most difficult years in my life,'' Mr. Clinton said members of his family and staff, the American people and God had shown him forgiveness. ''I have been profoundly moved, as few people have, by the pure power of grace, unmerited forgiveness through grace,'' Mr. Clinton said.

Clinton Tells of an 'Unmerited Forgiveness'

Personal assistants to megarich are in hot demand; Association of Celebrity Personal Assistants, trade group founded in 1992, has become so popular that it turns away 150 people each year who want to be members; Keith Greenhouse says number of personal assistants placed through his Pavillion Agency has increased 50 percent in last five years; salaries of personal assistants usually fall between $50,000 and $80,000, but can go beyond $100,000; photo of personal assistant Leeza Tander-Tostenson with actress Lindsay Crouse (M)

Star-Tenders Wanted: Big Pay, Little Ego

Arts in America article on Reprise: Broadway's Best in Concert, Los Angeles version of New York City Center's limited-run revivals of vintage musicals; latest is slapdash version of The Boys From Syracuse, starring David Hyde Pierce and Lea DeLaria; photos; Reprise, now in third season, draws television stars such as Jason Alexander, who responded enthusiastically to Marcia Seligson's 1995 proposal to start series; musical director is veteran conductor-arranger Peter Matz (M)

Do a Quickie Musical? These Stars Say Yes

Talks among opposition parties to forge coalition that would back single presidential candidate collapse, increasing chances that Institutional Revolutionary Party, which has controlled Mexico for seven decades, will win power once again next year; breakdown comes after four months of negotiations between right-of-center National Action Party, known as PAN, and other main opposition group, left-leaning Party of Democratic Revolution; PAN and its presidential candidate, Vicente Fox Quesada, reject coalition; two parties cannot agree on how to choose between Fox and Cuauhtemoc Cardenas Solorzano, leader of leftist party; Cardenas resigns as Mayor of Mexico City to begin his third presidential bid; photo (M)

RULING PARTY GETS A LIFT IN MEXICO AS FOES DISAGREE

On Baseball column discusses performance of New York Mets pitcher Orel Hershiser in loss to Atlanta Braves; photo (M)

Hershiser Just Seemed to Be Doomed From the Outset

Microsoft Corp chairman William H Gates acquires 10.3 percent of Pan American Silver Corp, tiny silver mining company based in Vancouver; roughly $15 million investment, made by Cascade Investment LLC, one of Gates's personal investing companies, is made public in Securities and Exchange Commission filing; investment is seen as significant vote of confidence in metals markets; silver rises to $5.77 an ounce, up 7.6 percent (M)

Gates Putting Some Money In Silver Miner

A patient has died while undergoing gene therapy in a trial study at the University of Pennsylvania.    If the treatment itself should prove to be the cause of his death it would likely be the first by someone undergoing gene therapy and could be a severe setback for the experimental technique, whose fulfillment has long fallen short of its high promise.  

Patient Dies in Trial Of Gene Treatment

With this issue, The Times introduces two new Wednesday pages -- one covering the workplace and one on management issues. The Workplace page, on the front of a new free-standing section of classified advertising, includes a column by Lisa Belkin on work-life issues. SECTION G.  

2 DEBUTS TODAY: On Work And Managing

Investigation of Russian money flowing through Bank of New York has been snarled by rivalry between Manhattan Dist Atty Robert M Morgenthau and FBI's New York office; law enforcement officials say during last year investigators for each agency discovered that shadowy figures were using obscure company, Benex Corp, to move money out of Russia, but they never pooled information; Morgenthau's office was first to find link between Benex and Bank of New York; Federal investigators say prosecutor never closely examined bank's role in affair and did not obtain crucial bank records that disclosed billions of dollars in suspicious transfers from Russia; some Clinton Administration officials criticize FBI for failing to tell other agencies what it knew about banking case; photos (M)

Law-Enforcement Rivalry in U.S. Slowed Inquiry on Russian Funds

 Ecuador Allowed to Default As a Warning for Markets  The Clinton administration's decision to let Ecuador default on its debts is being interpreted as a message from Lawrence H. Summers, the Treasury Secretary, that a little fear would be good for the markets.    That message, China's possible entry into the World Trade Organization and more aid for Russia are among the topics for the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. [Page C4.]

BUSINESS DIGEST

Accepting a case on the duties of H.M.O.'s to patients, the Supreme Court put itself in the center of the managed care debate. Page A22.  

Court Takes H.M.O. Case

Brooklyn Museum of Art files lawsuit accusing Mayor Rudolph W Giuliani of violating First Amendment by threatening to withdraw city funds from museum because he finds some of artworks in impending exhibition offensive and insulting to religion; museum's officials reject Giuliani's request for another day of negotiations; say by filing lawsuit, they hope to thrust dispute into constitutional arena of free speech and expression, thereby undercutting city's legal strategy of challenging exhibition on narrow grounds that it violates museum's lease with city; city officials order cancellation of next scheduled payment of $497,554 to museum, which is due on Oct 1; photo (M)

Brooklyn Museum Sues to Keep Mayor From Freezing Its Funds

Hector Serrano, building superintendent in Washington Heights section of Manhattan, is shot to death as he attempted to check on tenant who had not been heard from for days; tenant, Allan White, mistakes Serrano for burglar and shoots him; photo (M)

Superintendent Is Shot to Death Trying to Check On a Tenant

Article contends that when torrential rain and surging rivers from Tropical Storm Floyd drove thousands from their homes and knocked out essential infrastructure in New Jersey and lower Hudson Valley, suburbanites there got terrifying look at what can happen when rapid development compromises Mother Nature's fundamental system of flood control; in low-lying New Jersey, worst destruction took place in known flood plains leading to quick and unambiguous plans to redesign or relocate crippled telecommunications centers in high risk areas and push forward with stalled Federal flood control project that should protect communities along Raritan River; in hilly counties of Westchester, Putnam and Rockland damage was more random, often result of aging storm drainage systems; photo (M)

Suburbia Learns It Has Paved Over the Natural Defenses to Flooding

Bell Atlantic Corp plans to ask Federal regulators for permission to sell long-distance communications services in New York State; approval would make it first Baby Bell to enter $80 billion long-distance market; Federal Communications Commision has rejected five previous long-distance applications from other Baby Bell companies, saying they had not opened their local networks to competition, as required by Telecommunications Act of 1996; communications experts expect Bell Atlantic's application to be approved; say it could set regulatory tone for rest of nation (M)

Long Distance By Bell Atlantic Expected Soon

David G Bradley, new owner of Atlantic Monthly, meets with magazine's staff and promises not to change editorial direction of magazine; he also says he has no immediate plans to change makeup of staff or move offices to Washington, DC, from Boston, Mass; Bradley acquired magazine from Mortimer B Zuckerman, who has owned magazine since 1980; photo (M)

At Atlantic Monthly, a Tense Staff Sizes Up the New Owner

Metropolitan Transportation Authority plans to spend $1.6 billion for new Long Island Rail Road tunnel to Grand Central Terminal and $700 million to restart Second Avenue subway project; proposals, in MTA's five-year capital plan, still face scrutiny in Albany, where Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver says he may block plan because it favors suburban commuters; plan calls for spending $16.5 billion on new buses, subway cars and station improvements; additional $1 billion would be provided for Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority for bridge improvements; plan would dedicate $645 million for extension of N line in Queens to La Guardia Airport; MTA chairman, E Virgil Conway, says plan is authority's largest and would represent biggest expansion of city's mass transit system since 1930's; map; photo (M)

WORK IS PROPOSED ON 2D AVE. SUBWAY

Certain New Yorkers, living up to Manhattan's reputation for self-parody, have given way to neurosis about Y2K and are stockpiling their own food essentials: caviar (Charles Baum), truffle butter and Champagne (John Gottfried), foie gras (Marc Murphy), herring and babka (Fred Plotkin); photos; list of Plotkin's larder of Scandinavian specialities that require no heat to prepare (M)

And at Home: Water, Batteries And Caviar

Article discusses bitter controversy over plans by American Marine Rail LLC to build 5,200-ton-per-day waste transfer station in Hunts Point section of South Bronx; main concern of community is air quality; Point Community Development Corp officials accuse South Bronx Clean Air Coalition of accepting money from American Marine in exchange for its support of project; photo; map (M)

A Grass-Roots Garbage War; In South Bronx, a Bitter Split Over a Proposed Transfer Station

Growing bank scandal in Indonesia could jeopardize Indonesia's recovery and transition to democracy; Bank Bali, one of Indonesia's largest banks, paid nearly $70 million to finance company with ties to ruling Golkar Party to help recover loans it was owed by other banks; critics say money was to be funneled into election campaign of Pres B J Habibie; since scandal came to light in July, money has been returned and raft of investigations begun; public outrage is growing; with evidence emerging that other banks may have been asked to participate in similar schemes, Parliament demanded that Habibie suspend seven top officals including Finance Minister and governor of central bank, who it says were involved; nobody has yet accused Habibie himself; but after three scandal-scarred decades under his predecessor, Suharto, people in Indonesia are not willing to tolerate such conduct from unpopular President; among people worried by scandal is man who started it: former president of Bank Bali, Rudy Ramli; scandal is sad ending of Ramli's desperate struggle to hold onto bank he inherited from his father; scandal could jeopardize billions of dollars in loans and aid from International Monetary Fund, World Bank and Asian Development Bank; photo (M)

Baligate, and Why It Matters; Indonesia's Recovery, and Democracy, Tested by Scandal

Choi Ye-na, known mononymously as Yena, is a South Korean singer and actress. She is a soloist and actress under Yuehua Entertainment, and a former member of South Korean–Japanese girl group Iz*One, having finished fourth on Mnet's reality girl group survival show Produce 48. Yena made her solo debut on January 17, 2022, with the release of her first EP Smiley.

Choi Ye-na, South Korean singer and dancer

Choi_Ye-na

Edward William O'Rourke was an American prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as the sixth bishop of the Diocese of Peoria in Illinois from 1971 to 1990.

September 29, 1999

Headlines from September 29, 1999

Big Boppers Going Yard and Then Going Home

As Fears Rise About Virus, The Answers Are Elusive

Sports of The Movies; Wild Card Confused The Mets

G.M. Agrees To 4-Year Pact With Union

Footlights

Billboard 200

Let There Be... EVE--Ruff Ryders' First Lady

Millennium

Christina Aguilera

Fly

Supernatural

Notable Births

Notable Deaths

Historical Context for September 29, 1999