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Mr. Chairman, Mayor John Driggs of the city of Phoenix, Ariz., I think, emphasizes the fact that housing problems are acute even in those cities that have an image of having great wealth, and we are pleased to hear from him.

MAYOR JOHN DRIGGS, PHOENIX, ARIZ.

Mayor DRIGGS. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, the city of Phoenix' with 730,000 people, has only 1,580 public housing units. In my 4 years as mayor, we have been authorized only 200 additional units.

Clearly, that is inadequate. We were one of the last large cities to go into urban renewal. We are just in our second year of the neighborhood development program. We have an $11 million project for 100 acres right in our downtown area that is virtually at a standstill pending the passage of some community development legislation. We desperately need funds to get this first project off the ground and let our citizens know that appropriate governmental action is important in our community.

We feel that the phase-in must be complete. We must have some continuation of construction. Clearly, in our city, if we do not have new construction authorizations in the public housing sector, we are just not going to be able to approach the problems in our growing cities. We have long, long waiting lists for these units.

We urge action by the Senate and the Congress at the earliest possible moment. Thank you.

Chairman SPARKMAN. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor ALIOTO. Mayor Kenneth Gibson is doing an outstanding job in a very tough situation in the city of Newark, and I think he brings a particularly incisive viewpoint to this problem.

MAYOR KENNETH GIBSON, NEWARK, N.J.

Mayor GIBSON. Thank you. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, for over 2 years now the cities and the counties and the States have pressed for the enactment of a major housing bill and comprehensive community development legislation.

During this seemingly endless period in the absence of new legislation, we have experienced major hardships for our waiting on approval for the extension of the present program.

We have been riddled with impoundment. For almost a year, we have been at a standstill because of the housing moratorium. From the onset, our planning capabilities have become severely hampered. Our costs have increased, and our rehabilitation and new housing efforts have come to a virtual halt.

The situation need not continue if there is speedy action on community development block grants and new housing legislation. Certainly we are not suffering from a lack of need or know-how at the local level. What we lack is legislation.

Two years ago, in preparing our rehabilitation application for the city of Newark, we identified more than 8,000 units in need of rehabilitation. The number related to our needs for new housing starts clearly exceeds that figure. The housing moratorium alone has cost

us the loss of 5,390 new units, and I can provide equally convincing statistics on urban renewal, neighborhood facilities, and the other community development and housing needs.

For better than a year now, we have heard over and over and over again that the new federalism approach is designed to return the decisonmaking power to the governments closest to the people, the ones most directly affected by public policy. Yet we are still waiting for this to become reality.

The whole situation reminds me of a person who once said, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." Your proposed community development block grant legislation represents the best of all that has been proposed to date. I urge you to take whatever steps are necessary to move this legislation through the Congress in order that it will be signed into law at the earliest possible date.

Thank you very much.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor ALIOTO. Mr. Chairman, Mr. Landrieu of New Orleans is doing such a good job of running his city that nobody is going to run against him for reelection this coming year. Nevertheless, he has serious housing problems.

MAYOR MOON LANDRIEU, NEW ORLEANS, LA.

Mayor LANDRIEU. If the problem were not so complex, Mr. Chairman, I am sure I could suggest to you some rather specific and simple solutions. But it is one of the more complex problems that this country has to solve.

The city of New Orleans is a very great city, but it is not New York City. Los Angeles is a great city, but is it not New Orleans.

Some cities have growth problems; others have problems of renewal, and reconstruction; and San Jose and Phoenix have enormous problems of rapid development and growth.

Older cities such as New Orleans have problems of redevelopment and rehabilitation.

The point is that no single program is going to solve the housing problems of this country, but there has to be a sufficient variety so that we can help New York and New Orleans and Phoenix and San Jose and Syracuse. All the cities should be able to use whatever programs are most effective for their particular problems, for their particular localities.

No. 2, whatever program you develop has to be adequately funded. The most carefully drafted legislation will produce nothing unless there are sufficient funds adapted to it.

The problem is not tomorrow but today. I would urge very quick and serious action now.

I think the country has to find a way to deliver the housing in a more efficient way. We are going to have to buy the top amount, quality, and number of housing units for the least amount of money. In the present process, there is some inefficiency. Whatever legislation you adopt should be geared to developing a more efficient delivery system. I do not think you can just be concerned with numbers of units. I think you have to be concerned with where do you want those units to be built and what do you want the cities of America to be in the

future. It has been my experience that suburbia is not interested in taking the poor into their jurisdictions, and that in the past we have not looked at this particular problem seriously enough. As a matter of fact, we have ignored it, and I think in many instances we hope that it will simply evaporate, but it has not.

Do the cities continue to build housing only for the poor, with middle America moving continually to the suburbs? What policy is going to be developed to urge suburbia to accept part of their responsibility for the housing of the poor?

Are those cities that do the job most successfully in providing housing and transportation for all to be helped? Will all of America. be penalized by a further influx of the poor into the cities with the outflow of those who can best afford to support the services for the center city, but who now will live in suburbia and take the advantages there?

Unless there is housing available in those areas for the poor, unless there is transportation available, the poor can only live in the center cities where the housing is being made available and where the transportation is.

Perhaps most importantly, my city needs a community development program. It does very little good, frankly, to try to do rehabilitation house by house unless an individual lives in an environment that is somehow conducive to a safe life.

We have to have suburban surface drainage and streets. You have to have necessary community services. Without a community development program, I doubt that the housing program will be very successful.

Mr. Chairman, my remarks are of necessity general, because the problem is extremely complex. I am satisfied that this committee has the wisdom and that this country has the resources to solve that problem.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor ALIOTO. Mr. Chairman, the very talented mayor of the city of New Brunswick, N.J., Patricia Sheehan.

MAYOR PATRICIA SHEEHAN, NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J.

Mayor SHEEHAN, Mr. Chairman and Senators, I am pleased with the opportunity to be here.

I hope as a cumulative effect we are making a point that we know we have problems, and we recognize them. We want the opportunity and more particularly the resources to continue to try to solve them. I am here really to chime in for the smaller cities.

I think that most of us know that Newark or San Francisco or any number of the large and distinguished cities represented on this panel. Across the country there are a lot of "New Brunswicks," smaller cities where the problems are less severe from a statistical point of view, but no less severe from a human point of view.

There are very real, human people living in the smaller center cities across this country. In most cases, I am not ashamed to say, we have much fewer resources in terms of staff and expertise and we have had our problems with delay, with a lack of understanding of some of the rules and regulations, with changing guidelines that hamper our

ability to shift gears and rework even our applications to participate in these programs.

But the fact remains that the smaller center cities no less than the larger ones are more and more having a concentration of the poor, the old and the otherwise disadvantaged. Most particularly these smaller cities do not have the resources to cope with these problems in terms of housing and sewers and police and general community development by ourselves.

Yet, we look back and realize that we have fostered the growth of the suburbs and now those most able to pay and most able to support the kind of municipal services that people who live in the cities are entitled to have are no longer living in the cities.

What is of most concern is this interim period. It has been said many times that "to do nothing is to decide." We encourage all kinds of experimentation and recognize that no matter what the program is, it can be improved and we should try different approaches.

In the meatime, these small cities with very real people with very real needs have to address the problem of housing and community development now. To have it come to a stop or a dead walk for a year or 18 months means that then we are wiped out.

We would have to start all over again. We just now have reached the state where we have developed a little bit of expertise, a little bit of ability to cooperate with the States and Federal Government to do a program. To dismantle all of this, or to leave it in limbo for 6 months, or 9 months, or 18 months, means that it does disappear. All of the smaller cities with all of the big problems, are asking for your help. [Mayor Sheehan subsequently submitted the following letter for the record:]

Senator JOHN J. SPARKMAN

U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C.

CITY OF NEW BRUNSWICK,
New Jersey, October 5, 1973.

DEAR SENATOR SPARKMAN: I want to thank you once again both for the opportunity and the gracious reception I received before your Committee.

I hope I made myself clear in my brief presentation that the needs of the smaller so-called "core cities" are no less severe in human terms than that of the larger and more outstanding great cities of America. All of us who daily face the firing line have become expert in problem identification and even occasionally solution identification but nevertheless lack the resources within our boundaries to implement these solutions. Given our ability to pay, we lack the talent bank of expertise available in the larger jurisdictions-most of our people, resourceful though they may be, are forced to wear the double hats of both administrative and operational responsibilities. This makes the task of successful relationships with both state and federal agencies all the more difficult when faced with red tape, delay, and ever-changing guidelines that have become standard operating procedure.

We feel we have come a long way and now are truly in a "go" position in many areas yet now find that all is halt or wait. I respectfully suggest that this situation invokes a double penalty on our smaller older cities.

I wanted particularly to respond to Senator Taft's question regarding financial management provisions. While I do not pretend to any financial expertise, I do want to strongly urge that your Committee, in its wisdom, consider the impact on smaller, older cities of various federal actions. I truly feel that if the federal government won't help, at least we can expect it won't hinder our survival and/or growth. Thus far most of the financial programs end up fostering the flight to suburbia.

1. In the last 20 years, the massive home-building that has taken place in each of our suburban communities has in-fact been underwritten by either F.H.A. or

V.A. mortgage activities. Given the age of our housing stock and density of our land use, V.A. mortgage in particular, were not an instrument available to homebuyers within the city.

2. Aside from our state-owned exempt properties, we must cope with the needs of our citizens in federally supported housing. Yet, in the area of greatest costi.e. education we receive no help. We receive $39,000 in lieu of taxes, which means that 20% of our school-children provide no economic support to the tax base. Our average per-pupil cost exceeds $1,000 per child, the miminum one million dollars we bear in cost is a far cry from the $39,000 cited above. Federal Impact Aid has never been available to us due to lack of funding. This heavy burden falls most critically on the 20% of our home owners who are senior citizens.

I don't need to tell you what a social problem this creates which is further exacerbated by the fact that so many of our senior citizens, facing virtual confiscation of their homes due to ever-rising property taxes, are white and so many of our youngsters are black or spanish-speaking!

It seems that in implementation, our federal programs, foster the development of surburbs at the expense of the cities-one final example is that of sewers. Continuously since I have been in office we have sought outside assistance in replacing our antiquated, faltering, combination water and sewer lines-always to hear that monies were not available for other than new systems!

We need and want maintenance and rehabilitation in sewers, in housing, in roads. Just when we get underway and are making progress in these areas, we are faced with these programs curtailment with nothing immediately taking their place.

We are committed to the cities but ask you to recognize that we are bearing a disproportionate share of the population most in need of services and least able to pay and are thus seeking meaningful assistance to provide for these needs.

Very truly yours,

PATRICIA Q. SHEEHAN,

Mayor.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much.

Mayor ALIOTO. We thank you, Mr. Chairman, for hearing our presentation.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you all.

Now, we are going to propound questions to the panel. We are going to have to limit our time. Someone suggested, I believe it was one of the staff members of the mayors organization, that we allot time. That means limiting ourselves to about 6 minutes each. That is pretty hard to do when you have had so many very fine statements. Well, it is 7% minutes each, since there are four of us. Did you get that?; 7%1⁄2 minutes each-time us!

By the way, let me say this on my time. Some of you have given us statements in writing, not all of you have. If any of the others do have statements in writing and would let us have them, we would be very glad to have them and we will print them in full in the record, even though your remarks may have been curtailed somewhat.

Mayor JOHN LINDSAY. I have one of my own, which I did not mention.

The CHAIRMAN. Fine (see p. 104).

I want to assure you that we are going to move right along to try to get before the end of this Congress a housing bill. When we came here in January, the majority leader listed, or gave a list of "must" bills. We passed through the Senate last year a comprehensive bill, as you may recall, and it was hoped that we could do it again quite early.

I assured the majority leader I was going to do my best to get one through by April but we had a new Secretary of Housing come in at the time and he said April was too soon. I then tried to bargain for

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