of its total budget. This indicates substantial local effort on the part of the citizens of Philadelphia.

This local effort, however, is being stretched very nearly to the breaking point. Very frankly, gentlemen, the School District of Philadelphia which is the fourth largest in the United States faces a cloudy outlook for the future. The proposed enactment of Senate bill 2528 is the only small ray of light to appear on the horizon in some

time.

What is the problem in Philadelphia? It is perhaps not too unlike the problem in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, or in fact many smaller communities greater numbers of children who urgently require intensive educational opportunities with a local tax base which is not keeping in step.

An area of our city known as North Philadelphia contains 20 percent of our schools and has an unemployment rate among males of 11.4 percent. Here, roughly one-fifth of the families have incomes of less than $2,000. Of every 1,000 people residing in this area, 146 receive public assistance and there are 314 aid to dependent children recipients for every 1,000 persons under 18 years of age.

These figures are not necessarily typical of the entire city. By the same token they are not unique.

In our Mantua area there are 322 aid to dependent children recipients for every 1,000 persons under 18, and in our South Philadelphia area, 374. The male unemployment rate in South Philadelphia is 11.2 percent and in Mantua, 12.4 percent. As you can clearly see a significant segment of the population of our school district is having a desperate time finding a place to live and getting enough to eat. There is very little left over to provide education for their children which is so desperately needed.

We have determined that there is a definite correlation between economic conditions and school achievement. The School District of Philadelphia is doing its utmost to create educational opportunities for these children in order that they may become self-sufficient and responsible members of the community. In recent years we have installed many programs, designed to raise educational achievement, develop a sense of civic responsibility, and insure the possibility of eventual employment.

We have developed significant programs for on-the-job in-service training for teachers, use of school-community coordinators, extension of the school day and week through remedial, tutorial, and enrichment programs offered after school and even on Saturdays.

Last year the Philadelphia School District instituted an all-out effort to prevent students from dropping out of schools. We sent counselors to visit with parents and students at home. All of this, however, costs money, and we must look to you gentlemen for help. The provisions of Senate bill 2528 are most laudable. They will assist the public schools in providing the various programs so necessary for the children of needy parents.

At this point, I would like to refer specifically to one of the provisions of Senate bill 2528 which I feel is of extreme importance. This is the provision which permits the Commissioner of Education to continue the impacted area payments for an additional 2 years when a Federal facility within a school district is closed. The closing of

Federal installations present many problems to a school district such as the one in Philadelphia. While the activity is in operation we have to provide buildings, teachers, and equipment. This results in obligations which cannot be terminated the moment the Federal activity is closed. Indeed it may take several years

Senator MORSE. I want to interrupt only long enough to say I enthusiastically endorse this recommendation that you just made. I am somewhat familiar with what has happened in community after community after a Federal installation has been shut down and the community was in large measure dependent for its economic livelihood or at least hundreds-in many instances, several thousand-of workers were dependent for their livelihood upon that installation.

It has many economic effects, but one of the most serious is the effect that it has on the schools, and I quite agree with you that we ought to have a tapering off period, at least. Whether it is 1 year or 2 years, it depends as far as I am concerned upon the proof, but it seems to me 2 years is quite a reasonable figure, and I heartily endorse the proposal.

General LABRUM. May I say at this point, too, Senator, that I heartily endorse the statement you made after Commissioner Keppel had finished his talk. I think it is vitally important, one of the most important things that is facing the American people today, to provide proper and adequate education for many of the children who at the present time are not being properly and adequately educated because of the lack of funds and because of the great burden that is placed on local taxation where in many instances, as in Philadelphia, we are limited to those areas not already occupied by the State so that we are in competition with our own community for the tax dollar which makes it awfully difficult to do the things that we in the school district should be doing to help place these children of ours in a position to make a living after they graduate from high school.

Senator MORSE. I appreciate your remarks, General. I have heard enough of your statement to give the following instruction to counsel, and that is that I want him to send your statement to Commissioner Keppel with strong urging on my part that he read it and call it to the attention of the President.

I want to say also that we know how right you are in your statement and how wrong this administration is in its stalling tactics on this legislation prior to an election. Why, of course, we must spend money to meet the needs of this country. We ought to come out and tell the taxpayers that they have got to spend some money for their own protection. To be quibbling over whether or not we need to spend $218 million or twice that much or triple that much in the schools in the ghetto districts of this country is simply shocking to me, and to have such a suggestion come out of my administration this morning made it necessary for me to serve notice on this administration they have lost me on this issue as they have lost me on so many of their positions on economic programs before the election.

The time is now to tell the American people before the election what their problems are and what they ought to do to resolve those problems. I am shocked by this performance this morning. Proceed. General LABRUM. Indeed, it may take several years to make the necessary adjustments in our school system brought about by the term

ination of the Federal activity. Furthermore, it is difficult to adequately plan on a proposed termination of a Federal activity in that decisions are changed, circumstances change, and it is usually not until the activity is formally closed that the school system can take the necessary steps to make adjustments in its school facilities.

Not having experienced a disaster such as that recently suffered by our sister State, Alaska, we in Philadelphia are naturally more concerned with the provisions of Senate bill 2528 than those of Senate bill 2725 which would provide funds for the repairing, renovation, or restoration of public schools in disaster areas. I must say, however, that should a disaster strike the city of Philadelphia which would destroy our buildings, equipment, materials, and supplies without the aid which Senate bill 2725 proposes to furnish, many schoolchildren of Philadelphia could suffer irrevocably. Under the best of conditions and without the excessive burdens brought by a calamity we are having difficulty in Philadelphia in providing the desired facilities and equipment for our children.

As I have indicated, the Philadelphia Board of Education strongly urges the passage of both bills before this committee. More importantly, however, our board urges the extension of the life of Public Laws 815 and 874 which are scheduled to expire June 30, 1965. The Federal contribution

Senator MORSE. General, may I interrupt very briefly? This subcommittee and the full committee, I am pleased to advise you, have already passed the committees-and it will be on the calendar of the Senate next week-a recommendation to extend the impacted area legislation for another 2 years. That item will be in conference with the House.

General LABRUM. That is wonderful, and we are very pleased bebecause this will permit us in making up our budget for 1965 to count on that help from the Federal Government.

Senator MORSE. As you may know, General, we have recommended that during the period of extension, be it 2 or 3 years, that the Department of Education conducted a thorough investigation into alleged abuses in connection with the administration of the impacted area law. I wish to eliminate any abuses that can be proven on the evidence, but I do not want to see a whole house torn down because part of it may have a few termites in it. I am for eradicating and exterminating the termites.

General LABRUM. The major responsibility of a school system today is the preparation of youth for successful vocational pursuits. Automation and new technology are taking over our economy. The public schools must educate our youth to be ready for the change. Help us make them ready.

As president of the Philadelphia Board of Public Education, I assure you that we have accepted and do accept full responsibility to do everything within our power to overcome educational deficiencies. However, we cannot do the job alone. The time has come for the Federal Government to assume its share of the responsibility for the educational well-being of our Nation.

The cost to educate is small compared with the cost of failing to educate.

Senator MORSE. General, I thank you very much.

General LABRUM. Thank you very much for your patience.

Senator MORSE. You have been very helpful to this subcommittee. Our next witness will be Dr. Benjamin C. Willis, general superintendent of schools, Chicago, Ill.

Superintendent Willis, you may have to do a solo this morning be cause I have just been advised by counsel that Dr. Samuel Brownell, superintendent of schools, Detroit, Mich., may not get here prior to the adjournment of the subcommittee because of plane difficulties. His plane is late. And it apparently has not even landed as yet. But he did get a message to us, and we will put the statement he wishes to make, and would have made, into the record, but it will give you that much more time to enlighten this subcommittee. I cannot begin to tell you because I am more of a student of yours than you probably know-I cannot begin to tell you of my appreciation for your leadership in American education, and I think it is very important that we have your contribution to the record of this hearing. You may proceed in your own way.

STATEMENT OF DR. BENJAMIN C. WILLIS, GENERAL

SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS, CHICAGO, ILL.

Dr. WILLIS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I am Benjamin C. Willis, general superintendent of schools in Chicago, where I have served since September 1, 1953. I am here to testify on behalf of Senate bill 2528 and to endorse the amendments to Public Law 874, 81st Congress, to provide assistance to local educational agencies for the education of children of needy families and of children of unemployed parents residing in areas of substantial unemployment. I will proceed through this statement so we might have time for questions and discussions if you care to do so.

It is the responsibility of the school to provide for the education of all the children of all the people, regardless of the parents' economic contribution to the community or their direct or indirect payment of real property taxes. But in fulfilling this responsibility, the great cities of the United States are confronted with the effects of four factors shaping our society today: the tremendous mobility of our people, the mounting urbanization of the country, the technological advances, and the tensions of today's world. Each poses a challenge to education particularly in the great cities.

Mobility has drawn to the great cities large numbers of the persons least experienced in urban living while it has drawn to the suburbs many of those persons most highly urbanized. The concentration of people in large centers has altered the way of life and introduced persons needing more help. Not only have technological changes challenged educational programs directly but they have altered employment opportunities, particularly for the least able. Social ills concentrated and accentuated in the great cities have increased the tensions. It is upon the children that the penalties fall.

This situation is not peculiar to Illinois or the city of Chicago.

These figures describe, as you will find in this document, some dimensions of the problem at present, but they do not indicate the dramatic recent growth of the number of children on ADC rolls. In the fall it was estimated that 50,000 pupils lived in public housing which represented some 10 percent of our total school enrollment. What this burden means to the financial health of the public schools in the large cities of America is underlined by the fact that financial support for the public schools in the Nation's great cities comes mainly from the local property taxes, and this is illustrated in a table which I shall skip.

The great cities pay more of the cost of education with local funds and are receiving a smaller proportion of State and Federal support than do other school districts within their State, and there are some tables which illustrate this point.

Less than 1 percent of the public schools' budget in each of these cities comes from the Federal Government, with only two exceptions, Washington, D.C., which derives its funds through congressional action, and Philadelphia, which is a federally impacted area, and derives 2.3, or as the general said a moment ago, I think he used the figure "3," of its budget from Federal sources. The major financial source for the public schools is still the revenue from the local communities.

Now, this sharp increase in cost between elementary and high school instruction and the still greater costs of vocational and special education are revealed in table 3 which summarizes the findings of the Research Council of the Great Cities Program for School Improvement. Revealing as these cost ratios are in themselves, their full significance cannot be understood until they are applied to school budgets.

I would now reflect another financial problem of the schools in large cities arises from the fact that the cost of sites in large cities is many times that of the sites of other school districts. And again we reflect this. It is not anything that the schools can help.

The public schools in the great cities have shown a tremendous growth in enrollment since World War II, and as indicated in table 6, enrollments in 14 cities have grown from 234 million in 1950 to 4 million in 1963 and for 1965, a conservative projection suggests a growth of more than 4 million, an increase of 48 percent between 1950 and 1965. So the problem of financing the schools becomes even more critical as enrollment rises.

The greater loss of taxable assessed valuation in large cities, relative to the loss in the rest of the State, when coupled with the exploding school population in the cities, dramatizes the fact that the large city school systems are in the midst of a financial crisis. And again there is a table dealing with assessed valuation.

Moreover the taxable assessed valuation is not keeping pace with the growth in pupil enrollment and school costs in many communities. The fact is that over the past 5 years, the tax base per pupil has decreased in 10 of the 14 cities listed in table 8 while during the same period the tax base per pupil has increased in 8 of the 10 States reporting.

I will take just a few more moments on this, table 9 illustrates the fact that in these cities from 51 to 77 cents of every property tax

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