Mayor ALIOTO. We appreciate everything that is being done by the committee. The action we are talking about is the action to give us something on a permanent basis and not on an experimental basis. As I say, some of the proposals of the administration are fine, but they are admittedly experimental. They don't propose to phase in their housing allowances until 1976. Some of us don't think that we can wait that long.

We think we need something for 1974 and 1975. We do appreciate the tremendous action taken by this committee, and we do favor the omnibus bill that we have spoken about.

I would like to call on Mayor Alexander of the city of Syracuse.

MAYOR LEE ALEXANDER, SYRACUSE, N.Y.

Mayor ALEXANDER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am here as a member of the legislative action committee, but also as chairman of the community development committee of the National League of Cities. I would like to say that I join in Joe Alioto's expression of the gratitude that Senator Proxmire suffered no harm.

I think it is symbolic that the attack was made while he was running to his office, and not from his office. I have been here before seeking help and understanding for the American cities. As a result of that, I have developed a tremendous confidence in the judgment of this committee and in its ability to respond to the problems of the cities. You listen to us and then act with great deliberation. I think give us a lot of patience, because very often you gentlemen are fully informed on the subject matter of these hearings from your own experiences. For your past responsiveness and the responsiveness of Congress, I want to express my gratitude.

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I think general revenue sharing is going to be a landmark in the history of American cities. I would like to add my endorsement and the endorsement of the community development committee of the National League of Cities for Senator Sparkman's proposal for a housing block grant. As Mayor Alioto said, I want to emphasize my support for local flexibility, because I think cities do vary in their needs, such as the kind of construction and the site locations and the mix between rehabilitation and construction.

I think the President's proposal for housing allowances does have a place, but I am not sure it will be meaningful to the cities until we have some new construction. Very often in the housing dialog, they talk about the vacancy rate; I would like to submit for your consideration that that is sometimes distorted.

Syracuse is a city of 200,000. We have 70,000 housing units, but one out of every five houses in my city is substandard. Seventy percent of the housing units are wooden frame houses. So even where there is a high vacancy rate, housing allowances may not work. I think we must have new construction and rehabilitation as well before housing allowances can be important.

Now in Syracuse, which certainly is not the size of San Francisco or some of the other large cities represented by the mayors in this room, we have had some 2,100 subsidized housing units built in the last 5 years. That doesn't mean very much when I tell you that we have got some 1,600 on the waiting list each and every year.

There is an important and urgent need for housing at the present time.

I think what I would like to ask you to remember-and I am sure you already know as well as I do that what we mayors are talking about is not an arithemetical need, it is a very human need. In my city in the last 3 years, we lost 40 lives from fire. I can't tell you how many of those lives would have been saved had they been in adequate housing. I know you gentlemen in the Senate are just as concerned about it as every mayor in this room.

I want to add my plea to the urgency of these proposals at your earliest consideration. Thank you.

Mayor ALIOTO. We would like to call on the mayor of Norfolk, Va., Mayor Roy Martin.

MAYOR ROY MARTIN, NORFOLK, VA.

Mayor MARTIN. Thank you, Mayor Alioto. As the mayor said, I had the pleasure of having the Legislative Action Committee visit Norfolk for several days early in the week. I think we have a program there, Senator, that we can show has been successful.

Actually this redevelopment program, which was started back in 1949, has never had any scandal or failures. It has been a complete success. When we started this program, over 40 percent of our housing was substandard. Today we have gotten it down to 15 percent. We have built over 5,000 low-rent units of houses. We have put over 4,000 more in rehabilitation. We showed our program to these gentlement in Norfolk yesterday when we took a tour. We showed them a project where the housing authority had acquired 40 to 50 percent of the land. Then the moratorium came, and there was no way to complete the project.

Here we have properties that have been acquired and the national program has been stopped. I want to emphasize what Mayor Alioto has said. We feel there is an urgency in trying to see that, while the administration and the Congress are working out the details on an overall program, we not be left in a position whereby we cannot continue with the programs we have underway.

Again, I would like to say for the city of Norfolk, I will put up one example of a housing program, Senator, one that you have supported during the years. It has been successful. It is a program that can work if it is properly handled. I would like to urge in every way that Congress consider carrying on many of these programs until we can work out a permanent program that will be acceptable to Congress and the administration.

Mayor ALIOTO. The cochairman of the Legislative Action Committee is the distinguished Mayor of Gary, Ind., Mr. Richard Hatcher.

MAYOR RICHARD HATCHER, GARY, IND.

Mayor HATCHER. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I would like to be as brief as possible, because you are going to hear several mayors here this morning, and we don't want to all repeat the same words. Basically, our message is the same. I would like to very briefly tell you about a few of the things that are happening in Gary and that have been happening in Gary.

In 1968, our community renewal program indicated that about 30 percent of all of our housing in Gary was substandard. We set a goal at that time to build about 15,000 new units of low- and moderateincome housing over a period of some 10 years, about 1,500 units per year. We have been doing pretty well under many of the programs that presently are under attack.

We have had some outstanding successes with some of those programs. Public agencies and private developers working together in all of the Federal programs such as 235, 236, multifamily rental housing, 221(d) (3), and many others, including leased public housing. At the same time, it was impossible to develop an effective housing program. without an effective community renewal program going right along with it.

Under renewal, we were able to install sewers to develop other facilities such as neighborhood facilities at the same time. In 1972, that whole process was slowed down by changes in national policy, and we have only been able to continue with those projects that were in the pipeline since 1971.

Today, that process is in danger of coming to a complete halt, as are many other social and economic programs with which we have been working very hard at the local level in the hopes of correcting many of our problems, problems of long standing. What does that mean for us, and what does that mean for the people of Gary?

First of all, it means that we have been producing somewhere in the neighborhood of about 1,000 new units of housing a year. We won't be able to come anywhere close to that under the present circumstances. Second, of course, it means that jobs that were created by that kind of building will be lost. Third, it means that many, many people in that community, unfortunately some of whom have suffered many frustrations in the course of their lifetime, will have one more frustration to live with. Of course, to the city itself, it means that we will lose substantial tax revenues as a result.

It seems to me that all possible efforts are needed at this time to shore up our national housing program. We need, as has already been suggested, a program that looks to our long-term needs. Perhaps there are things in the administration's bill that might work for us. We don't know, and apparently not too many other people know, at this point. But our problem, I think, is a more immediate one. We cannot wait until 1975 or 1976. We need some kind of interim programing that will not allow us to lose the momentum that we have been able to build up over the last few years. We are certainly here this morning urging this committee to give serious thought to that particular factor.

It seems to me that we are now in a position where we have lost about 6 months in terms of timelag, and it seems that we may even lose more time. Most housing programs require anywhere from 6 to 12 or even 18 months or longer leadtime before the program in fact can be effectuated. So from that standpoint, I am hopeful that we can see some immediate action that will allow us to continue with the successes.

I know there have been failures around the country, Mr. Chairman, but I suspect that for every failure in these programs, in any one of these programs, you can find at least 100 successes. I know that in

our community we can show you successes in every one of the programs that have been mentioned.

Thank you very much.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much.

Mayor ALIOTO. Mr. Chairman, with your indulgence, I would next like to call upon my California colleague, Mayor Norman Mineta.

MAYOR NORMAN MINETA, SAN JOSE, CALIF.

Mayor MINETA. Thank you, Mr. Alioto.

As chairman of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, Community Development Committee, I can tell you that for the past 3 years, the No. 1 priority of that committee has been the development of a community development block grant. As a mayor and as the committee chairman, I can assure you that we cannot afford any additional delay in the development of such a consolidated grant program. Programmatically, we are ready for the development of the community block grant. The need for the activities which such a program supports is approaching desperation in many communities. Further, in our judgment, the obstacles blocking obtaining another year's funding for the existing programs seem insurmountable.

We are dependent upon this committee to act now. As the committee knows, we prefer on many of the key points the congressional as opposed to the administration version of the community development bills.

In the area of housing, the U.S. Conference of Mayors supported the Senate bill last year. We support the existing housing programs. We would support a similar effort this year. This year, we would also urge the committee to consider including in such an omnibus housing bill, two items:

One is programmatic linkage when operated at the national and local levels between the local housing programs and the local community development programs.

Second, provisions which would permit the Department of Housing and Urban Development to allocate housing units to local government based on local needs as set forth in locally developed multiyear. housing plans.

Mr. Chairman, S. 2182 would be a great step toward providing the local flexibility which we need in this area.

Let me capsulize my reaction to the President's housing message and S. 2507, by saying that I am discouraged that after so much study and so long a delay, so little came forth.

We had expected on S. 7 to see a specific set of proposals. However, none really came forth.

After looking at the legislation, we are disturbed that the President is proposing that Congress acknowledge as a matter of national policy that the housing programs have failed, that he is asking the Congress to adopt in advance a housing allowance program, the details of which we have not yet seen.

Furthermore, that he proposes abandoning the national housing

goals.

The substance of the President's message and the legislation do not warrant really taking more of the committee's time. However,

I have appended a separate statement on my reaction to the President's bill.

Mr. Chairman, in conclusion, let me say that today you have before you a group of anxious, concerned, and frustrated city officials who are extremely worried that they may be caught in the middle of a power struggle between the Congress and the administration, a struggle which may ultimately produce nothing in terms of legislation, but which will most certainly damage our capacity to deliver services in the city. Thank you very much.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much.

Mayor ALIOTO. Mr. Chairman, there is a little bit of sadness in the next presentation. We are going to present perhaps for the last time before this committee the distinguished mayor of New York. I want to say before presenting him that he was actually the original moving force behind setting up this Legislative Action Committee for the Conference of Mayors. I think we can see now that Mayor Lindsay was regarded as the articulate spokesman for the cities in the sixties and seventies, and the man who made the greatest contribution to the solution of those problems.

I am delighted to present the mayor of the city of New York. The CHAIRMAN. I know, not too many years ago he was a member of the establishment here in Washington. We welcome you back.

MAYOR JOHN LINDSAY, NEW YORK CITY, N.Y.

Mayor LINDSAY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

After Mayor Alioto's introduction, I ought to be quiet. I can be very brief.

In New York City in 1972 and 1971, we broke all records in the history of the city for numbers of units that went into construction, federally tax-supported housing, both low income and middle income. In 1972, we moved 35,000 units into construction, and in 1971, 22,000 units into construction.

We have in our pipeline right now 70,000 units. We can move by June 1974, 20,000 of these units into construction, depending on whether or not the trickle of 236 and public housing backup money is available. I don't have to advise the distinguished members of this committee that, since the moratorium, we have all been on a bootstrap brinksmanship, day-to-day operation, to acquire Federal funding for housing that is already going into the ground, having no idea whether or not the full financing will come through.

This housing has worked. We have had a lot of problems with established housing programs in the United States. They are not easy. We have to pump a lot of local money into all federally supported housing, including public housing, because of cost limitations, design quality, and various other things.

All of us have had various problems with scattered siting. Even middle-income housing is somewhat suspect because of racial fears. Nevertheless, notwithstanding, even with all that, it has been a massively important series of programs, with enough flexibility in it-not enough—but enough flexibility in it so that with might, and muscle, and good talent we have been able to move a lot of housing forward.