News stories from Sunday September 30, 1979

Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:

The Pope's visit to the United States will start with his arrival at 3 P.M. tomorrow at Logan International Airport in Boston, where a 20-mile motorcade route has been prepared. Preparations for his welcome were under way in New York, Philadelphia, Des Moines, Chicago, Washington, and a rural pastorate in Iowa.Extra buses, trains and subway cars will be provided to accommodate the crowds expected to greet the Pope when he visits New York City on Tuesday and Wednesday. In addition, some subway routes in Brooklyn and in Flushing, Queens, will be changed or extended. [New York Times] Peace in Northern Ireland was again a theme that ran through Pope John Paul's addresses to the hundreds of thousands who turned out to greet him on the second day of his visit to Ireland. Wearing a brilliant green chasuble, he celebrated a mass for young people in Galway, and his greeting -- "Young people of Ireland, I love you!" -- received an overwhelming response. The crowd cheered and sang "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands." The Pope then went to County Mayo, where he visited a shrine to the Virgin at Knock. [New York Times] Panama's control over the Canal Zone takes effect at midnight. The 12,000 American Zonians who have lived in the 533-square-mile area fear for their future under Panama. But under the recent canal treaties, the United States will continue to occupy 40 percent of the Canal Zone, and will operate and guard the canal until it, too, reverts to Panama at noon Dec. 31, 1999. [New York Times] The dismissal tomorrow of thousands of workers whose public service jobs depended on federal funds is raising major political and economic problems for the cities that employed them. Under last year's amendments to the Comprehensive Employment and Training Act, workers enrolled in public service jobs under funds provided by the act may remain in those jobs no longer than 18 months. A one-year extension was provided last year for workers already on the job six months or more when the amendments were passed. That year ends today. [New York Times] A sales-tax referendum in Atlanta on Tuesday has developed into a test of public attitudes to the city's soaring crime rate, the political future of Atlanta's first black mayor and his associates and increased government spending. The potential for racial division on the one-cent sales tax issue is so great that its advocates are advertising on black-oriented radio stations, but not on television for fear of raising a backlash among whites. [New York Times] Employees overwhelmingly approved their tentative contract with General Motors, the United Auto Workers union said. The vote by the rank-and-file was 129,374 to 59,391. The contract will provide about $10,000 more in basic pay and cost-of-living increases over a three-year period. [New York Times] Challenges to federal authority will be at the center of several major cases coming before the Supreme Court, which begins its new term on Monday. In one of the cases, the Court will decide whether Congress can constitutionally require that a fixed percentage of federal public-works money be earmarked for minority contractors, a question that will put all other government-mandated affirmative action programs on the line. [New York Times] The Newark Mayor's fundraising activities during and after his 1974 re-election campaign are reportedly being investigated by a federal grand jury. The inquiry is focusing on a Swiss bank account said to be held under Mayor Kenneth Gibson's name or in some way controlled by him, and on allegations that some city employees were forced to contribute a percentage of their salaries to his campaign. [New York Times] North Vietnam rejected an American proposal to begin negotiations to guarantee Cambodia's neutrality in the Vietnam War, Henry Kissinger said in another excerpt from his memoirs in Time magazine. Mr. Kissinger disclosed that in one of his secret meetings with Le Duc Tho, North Vietnam's negotiator in Paris in April 1970, Mr. Tho abruptly rejected the proposal, asserting that it was his people's destiny not merely to take over South Vietnam but to dominate Indochina. [New York Times] The U.S. made an effort to obtain from the Soviet ambassador as precisely as possible the Soviet pledge not to give its troops in Cuba a combat capability. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance held an unscheduled meeting, which was understood to have been an American initiative, with Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin. [New York Times]