Mr. CLARK. I can only say that our experience in Philadelphia is quite different. The statistics that we are prepared to file will reveal that. I find myself unhappily in almost constant disagreement with my good friend Mayor Poulson of Los Angeles.

Mr. MCDONOUGH. That is to be expected. We are happily a little different than most people from other parts of the United States. Mr. CLARK. I commend you for being different in so many fine ways. Mr. MULTER. In that respect, Mr. McDonough, I am afraid your city stands alone.

Mr. MCDONOUGH. Yes, and we are proud, happy, willing, and able to stand alone. Has your city council passed a resolution asking for this public housing?

Mr. CLARK. Yes, sir.

Mr. MCDONOUGH. You think you need 70,000 units, and you need them now?

Mr. CLARK. If we could get them and finance them now. I am not so unrealistic as to expect we could finance them all in 1 year.

Mr. MCDONOUGH. And there is no program so far as the State or city is concerned to build public-housing units out of its own funds? Mr. CLARK. No, sir.

Mr. MCDONOUGH. That is all, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. BROWN. Mayor Clark, thank you very much for your fine statement. I am happy to state that Congressman Barrett from your city is a very valuable member of our committee.

Mr. CLARK. Thank you very much, sir. I have no doubt that is a

fact.

Mr. BROWN. The clerk will call the next witness.

Mr. HALLAHAN. Mr. Bert Seidman, American Federation of Labor. Mr. BROWN. You may proceed, Mr. Seidman.

Do you have a statement you wish to present?

Mr. SEIDMAN. I have a written statement, Mr. Chairman. If you feel that the time is short I would be glad to try to summarize the statement rather than read it.

Mr. BROWN. You may proceed in your own way.

STATEMENT OF BERT SEIDMAN, ACTING SECRETARY, HOUSING COMMITTEE, AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR

Mr. SEIDMAN. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, my name is Bert Seidman. I am acting secretary of the housing committee of the American Federation of Labor.

I appreciate the opportunity to appear before your committee today to state the views of the American Federation of Labor on the proposed housing amendments of 1955, H. R. 5827, and the related bills your committee is considering.

No sector of the American economy is more strategic to our overall economic health than residential construction. The key role of housing in our national economy has never been more evident than it is today. During the recent recession it was the relatively high rate of residential construction which helped to moderate the economic decline. Again housing has been a key factor in the recent upward movement of economic activity. Precisely because housing does play such an important role in the economy, a major question facing the Nation

financial crisis in its history, which calls for the levying of $500 million of additional taxes this year.

Mr. BARRETT. Mr. Chairman, may I interpose this one point?

I would like to inform the members that the mayor is hoping to board a plane for Harrisburg at 11:30. So I think we should try to utilize the time effectively. I am sure he would appreciate it.

Mr. MULTER. I would like to touch on one subject very briefly, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. CLARK. I have 25 minutes more, Congressman. I am quite relaxed. Thank you for the assistance, Mr. Barrett.

Mr. BROWN. Mr. Multer.

Mr. MULTER. We have found in New York somewhat the same situation as you have in Philadelphia on the minority problem. I believe the main difficulty is not so much the law, or the provisions and regulations of the law, as the reluctance of lending institutions to lend for that housing for minority groups. Do you find the same situation in Philadelphia?

Mr. CLARK. Yes, sir. I think we are making some progress in breaking it down. I do feel that some of the Federal agencies could give us a little more help than they do.

Mr. MULTER. We were told in this committee last year that this voluntary mortgage plan was going to help that situation. The lending institutions were going to get together and make a special effort to channel funds, for mortgages, into those areas where they had this problem, where they weren't able to get that kind of mortgage money. Has that helped any?

Mr. CLARK. 245 has not helped a bit yet. It is a little too soon to condemn it out of hand. But the difficulty is that if the voluntary mortgage group does succeed in getting a mortgage available for a Negro purchaser, he still can't find a house that anybody is willing to sell him.

Again I say, we realize our local responsibility in that regard, but we do think that the VA, and Fannie Mae, and other Government agencies, could help in encouraging the breakdown of that prejudice. Mr. MULTER. I might say this, that I have found, from actual contact with borrowers and those developers in the field, that the large lending institutions in New York and New Jersey, insurance companies particularly, have gone out of their way to try to help in that problem, and channel money into that field. I think you may find that some pressure from home on some of your large Pennsylvania institutions, insurance companies particularly, might help along that line.

Mr. CLARK. Mr. Congressman, Mr. Rafsky, our housing coordinator, who is here with me, has called meeting after meeting in that regard, and we get some promises, but we haven't gotten much action yet. I do think it is breaking down. I would agree with you, sir, it is getting better.

Mr. MULTER. Maybe the threat of amending your State law or reg ulations to require these large insurance companies that have their home offices in your State to stay within their State on their lending and not go outside the State, may make them keep some of that money at home.

Mr. CLARK. I would hate to use that.

Mr. MULTER. I said the threat.

Mr. CLARK. Yes, sir.

Mr. MULTER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. BROWN. Dr. Talle.

Mr. TALLE. Mr. Chairman, out of deference to the witness' transportation problem, I will ask no questions.

Mr. BROWN. Mr. O'Hara?

Mr. O'HARA. Mr. Mayor, you have made a constructive and most helpful contribution to the deliberations of this committee. I come from Chicago, and I might remark that your presentment of urban problems in Philadelphia could apply to Chicago. I also must congratulate you and Philadelphia on having the gentleman to my left as your very able member on this committee. There is not a finer member in the Congress than Congressman Barrett. He is doing a great job, and Philadelphia has a great future ahead to match its historic past with such a mayor and such a Congressman.

Mr. CLARK. I concur with the latter statement, sir.

Mr. BROWN. Mr. McVey?

Mr. McVEY. Mr. Clark, I wish to compliment you on the splendid way in which you have presented the case for Philadelphia.

I would like to ask this question: Do you have a balanced budget in Philadelphia?

Mr. CLARK. Yes, sir.

Mr. MCVEY. You are proud of that, are you?

Mr. CLARK. I am very proud indeed of it, sir.

Mr. McVEY. You should be. Here in Washington we don't have a balanced Federal budget. You have asked for considerable help for Philadelphia. Do you have any suggestion to give to us whereby we might balance our budget here and still help Philadelphia?

Mr. CLARK. I am afraid, Mr. McVey, that is a little out of my cognizance. Could I say this, though, sir: I think in the laudable efforts to balance the budget, the type of housing program which I have advocated is not going to deter you very much because these things pay for themselves over a long-range period, and we find that, on the basis of the overall balance sheet of the American people, the improvements to the property, and the improvements in the earning capacity, and the general decrease in crime which comes from the elimination of slums, results in an enormous national asset far in advance of the amount of money which is necessary to carry it into effect.

It is too bad that our free-enterprise system isn't able to solve this problem by itself. Would that it were. But I think we must face the reality of the fact, that just as we don't expect to have the privateenterprise system sponsor and provide the educational system of this country, so in the long run it is not going to solve the housing problem all by itself.

Mr. McVEY. That is all, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. BROWN. Mrs. Sullivan?

Mrs. SULLIVAN. Just a passing remark, Mr. Chairman, to the mayor of Philadelphia. We have a comparable problem in St. Louis, and the slum clearance and the building of low-cost rental housing is one of our big problems. We are endeavoring now to integrate the colored with the white in some of the public housing. As yet we have had no experience in how that is going to work, but I was very much interested in hearing your discussion on it.

Mr. CLARK. I have had the pleasure of discussing the problem with your splendid mayor out there.

Mr. BROWN. Mr. Bass?

Mr. BASS. No questions.

Mr. BROWN. Mr. Reuss?

Mr. REUSS. Mr. Mayor, I would like to join with my colleagues in congratulating you on the outstanding job you have done of spearheading this attack by private and public forces on the problem of blight and urban redevelopment. It has been an inspiration to many another American city, including my own home city of Milwaukee.

I notice on page 13 of your prepared statement that you refer to the "restrictions placed on the program by the 1954 act," and you say that they were so confining that only a small number of units have been or are likely to be authorized.

What is the Philadelphia experience under the 1954 act, with particular reference to whether you have been able to secure authorization for units so far?

Mr. CLARK. We have been able to get our share of the 35,000, but it was certainly like pulling wisdom teeth to do it.

Mr. REUSS. You go on to say that in your opinion the proposed amendments of the act we are now considering, H. R. 5827, to remove those restrictions from the 1954 act, may not be as effective as, I am sure, members of this committee want them to be, and then you set out on pages 13 and 14, some of the reasons why.

I haven't had an opportunity yet to go over the material you have submitted, but it occurs to me that it might be very helpful if you would be willing to submit to this committee proposed changes or amendments to H. R. 5827, which in your opinion would help to achieve what I believe to be the President's purpose in H. R. 5827, of freeing up the housing legislation of undue and unnecessary restrictions which keep its purposes from being carried out.

Mr. CLARK. I would be happy to do so, sir.

Mr. WOLCOTT. Mr. Reuss, may I suggest that in the bill itself the Administration has made some suggestions along that line?

Mr. CLARK. Except, sir, if I might be so bold as to say, the principal restriction which we think is unwise is the requirement that only those displaced from slum clearance projects should be eligible for public housing, and that no city can get any more public housing than it can show it has displaced units from existing slums.

As I said awhile ago, we have a waiting list of 10,000 now, which has no reference whatever to our slum clearance problem.

Mr. REUSS. That is all.

Mr. WOLCOTT. I had assumed that the bill was designed to do that very thing. Maybe I am wrong.

Mr. BROWN. Are there other questions?

Mr. BROWN. Mr. Vanik?

Mr. VANIK. With respect to your statement on page 5, with respect to specific administrative regulations on urban renewal, do you have any specific points you wish to bring out with respect to those regulations? I am concerned about the really slow progress on the urban renewal program, and I am concerned with my city of Cleveland, as you are with Philadelphia, with respect to slowness of this program. Mr. CLARK. Mr. Vanik, we would be happy to submit some.

It

occurred to me that was something we ought to submit to the administrative agency and not to Congress.

Mr. VANIK. Yes. Well, the thought that I had was whether or not any legislative action might help clear up some of the administrative details that seem to be bogging down the urban renewal program.

Mr. CLARK. We think it would be simpler to do it administratively, except for the specific suggestions which are made in the body of my testimony, sir.

Mr. VANIK. I concur with your recommendations. I certainly think they are very proper, and should be carried through. I wanted to ask you, with respect to the housing project, what percentage of the public housing families are socalled welfare cases, supported either directly or indirectly by one of the social agencies of the community? Mr. CLARK. I would have to guess, Mr. Vanik, but if I did guess I would think 25 percent would not be far wrong. Twenty to twentyfive percent.

Mr. VANIK. So that in a direct sense the public housing program has helped considerably to take care of the social and welfare needs of the community?

Mr. CLARK. We are one of the relatively few communities where there is substantial unemployment. So that thing varies from time to time.

Mr. VANIK. And that area of public housing certainly hasn't offered any competition to any field of private enterprise in that area? Mr. CLARK. Absolutely none.

Mr. VANIK. And that is true about almost all of the people living in the public housing projects?

Mr. CLARK. I am confident, sir, that at that level of income, private enterprise is unable to furnish decent housing at rates those people can afford.

There are, of course, as we know, the occasional unscrupulous landlord, and we like to beat him over the head with a stick, but I don't think that is typical. I don't think we can say enormous sums of money are paid that way.

Mr. VANIK. What is the spread between the area at which public housing the income which would permit people to go into public housing, which is $2,800 a year in Philadelphia, and the nearest area of competition with private development?

Mr. CLARK. Well, of course, sir, it varies somewhat with regard to the size of the family, so you can't be categorical, but the burden of my testimony is that we are not providing adequate housing for anybody who has an income of less than $5,000 a year.

Mr. VANIK. So that the spread is at least $2,200?

Mr. CLARK. Yes, sir. Now, I would not advocate raising the level of income in public housing to $6,600. Not at all. I think with adequate financial assistance, and insurance of mortgages, and various other types of assistance, we can keep that middle-income group on a basis where they don't have to go into a public housing project.

All I am saying is that current legislation doesn't provide for it. Mr. VANIK. How effective has your local administration of zoning laws-I am speaking specifically with respect to overcrowding-how effective have your zoning ordinances and your building code been