FS
au Dawn Adorno
Atari has reinstated the five-day work week for 350 coin-op
manufacturing employees because of an increase in orders for Pole
Position and Millipede, a company official said.
In April, Atarl
cut back )5 percent of the division to a four-day work week.
(See
Play - Meter,_ May 15, p. 3 2. ) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Meanwhile, at an April gathering of sales and marketing execu-
tives in Kansas, Atari's Don Osborne announced that the decision to
lay off 1,700 computer division employees in favor of manufacturing
in Hong Kong and Taiwan is saving the company labor costs of an
average of $8 to $9 an hour . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Two sections of a video game ordinance in Summit, New Jersey,
were ruled invalid in March in a Superior Court case filed by oper-
ator/attorney Jeffrey Pocaro.
Judge Milton Feller said that requir-
ing a three feet perimeter around each machine is "arbitrary, un-
reasonable, and invalid." The judge also called a license fee of
$500 per machine "confiscatory and exorbitant." Pocaro plans to file
an additional suit to force the city to refund all fees paid by Sum-
mit operators in the last three years . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
A proposed licensing fee on video games in North Greenbush,
New York, was reduced in March from $100 to $50 as town officials
reached an out of court compromise with the town's Coin Machine Asso-
ciation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
An Arkansas anti-token bill, which failed to pass the state
Senate Revenue and Tax Committee, was revived in March because an
amendment to the bill changed its direction.
Originally, the bill
was backed by distributors, claiming the tokens jam their machines,
and by a small group of operators.
(See Play Meter, May 15, p. 20-21)
The amendment no longer proposes the banning of tokens, but would re-
quire token distributors to engrave the name and address of their
business as well as the face value of the token on the tokens and to
redeem the tokens for face value. According to the Arkansas Demo-
crat, opponents to the amended bill may claim that thls measure-Is an
~ttempt to usurp the constitutional authority of the U.S. Congress to
lssue currency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
A Pittsburgh bill to prohibit arcade owners from allowing stu-
dents to play video games during school hours was rejected in March by
the city council.
In place of the bill, Councilwoman Michelle Madoff,
its sponsor, asks operators to police their arcades voluntarily and to
sign a statement reading: "As a good neighbor who cares about child-
ren, I pledge to voluntarily post and enforce a sign in my establish-
ment prohibiting youngsters under 18 from playing video machines in
my place during school hours." Truancy is a problem in Pittsburgh,
but no statistics show that video games are linked to student
absences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
In April, Franklin, Massachusetts, citizens voted by a 2-l mar-
gin in favor of a non-binding referendum limiting the number of video
games to five in any one location and to ban game rooms.
After deny-
ing a Maine man licenses for 25 video games, town council members put
132
Pt.A Y METER. June 15, 1983