high percentage of the employees are women, we have a large and active child-care program. As soon as there is no longer any need for such services we will terminate them. We have reduced the $36,000,000 estimate of the communities to $21,300,000.

Mr. SNYDER. May I make this observation? With the cessation of the war with Germany, as a part of the war emergency, but with the likelihood of a greater part in the Pacific, we know that we cannot bail out all of a sudden. We have to bail out slowly as things adjust themselves.

Mr. FIELD. There are other types of assistance shown here other than schools or wartime child-care centers. We will have to provide some assistance for these services, but it has been reduced, so that in the next fiscal year, we will assist in the operation of only nine hospitals in the country. Some of those are on the west coast, where we have built new hospitals that we own. We have to give some assistance to get the new hospitals in operation.

There is one hospital in Los Angeles County that receives about $400,000 in the maintenance and operation of services in connection with war workers. The Los Angeles County Hospital, at the beginning of the war, had several hundred vacant beds. There was a demand for new hospital facilities. So the county said, "We will take care of the new in-migrant war workers but we need Federal assistance. in operating our public hospital.” We provide funds for such services rather than going to the expense of constructing a new hospital.

Mr. ROBERTSON. I would like to ask you what has been your experience in the liquidation program which you evidently started in a most creditable manner? Do you find the local communities are willing to take this property, just as the hospital you referred to? When the time comes to dispose of the property, do the communities expect those properties to be given to the community, or are they showing a disposition to be willing to pay for them?

General FLEMING. Typical examples are the recreation centers built to take care of the soldiers in nearby camps. Many of the camps have now been abandoned and we own the buildings. Our policy is to sell them to the community. Unfortunately many of these communities have been advised by their Congressmen or Senators that if they just hold on long enough they will get them for a dollar.

The CHAIRMAN. That is not the purpose of this act.

Mr. FIELD. We want to see what it is worth to them and try to get at least that much. We are selling such facilities whenever we can get a reasonable offer.

The CHAIRMAN. I will also say that we have a general statute that relates to property owned by the Government which becomes surplus, and if a city wants to purchase that for public use, or if it is to be purchased for public use, they can purchase it for 50 cents on the dollar. That is the general surplus property law.

Mr. SNYDER. It is bringing around 45 cents on the dollar.

Mr. FIELD. In the actual disposition to date we have disposed of 60 properties which cost $15,000,000, and we got back $6,500,000. Considering that these projects were built to war emergency standards, we think that the percentage of recovery is a good record to date.

Mr. SNYDER. Usually the amount is a fair measure of the residual value of the facility to the community or as it probably will be when the thing is cleared up.

Mr. JOHNSTONE. It should be said, Mr. Chairman, that certain of these facilities, particularly military facilities, were purely temporary facilities and were built with the understanding that they would be demobilized. Some of these things are not worth anything to the community and will probably be a loss.

Mr. FIELD. The communities are showing a very good attitude about that. We have not disposed of very many yet. After the war, we will have a real problem of disposition.

There are four other types of services. The recreation program started as assistance in recreation for servicemen where for one reason or another the USO could not take care of them, and we provided funds for this help in the community.

We also aided in the isolated areas where there was a new community set-up, to help them in their recreation programs.

The CHAIRMAN. Have you not had to do that where powder plants are located, necessarily, in rural areas?

Mr. FIELD. Yes, that is true.

We made an attempt to get the USO to take all of our recreation service over with their funds, but they have had a new load put on them because of their work in the Philippines. We have already started to reduce assistance for recreation services because, in my judgment, it is a problem for the communities to handle.

We also have a few other types of projects. There are only about 28 projects that have to do with police and fire protection, garbage disposal, and some other types, wherein a community has no way to take care of the problem. But, that has been reduced, and we think we can cut that down pretty rapidly; probably we will spend less than $1,000,000 on that in the next year.

The CHAIRMAN. A great deal of that is in the housing projects that we have built.

Mr. FIELD. Yes, sir.

In these tables that are here, from pages 28 through 34 we have them broken down by States. You will notice that there are only a few of the other types of projects. Most of them are in the Northwest, in California, and on the west coast.

Mr. HOLMES. On what page is that?

Mr. FIELD. On page 34 it shows a tabulation of all of the miscellaneous types of projects, and you will notice that there are only a relatively few States where we are providing assistance outside of schools and child care. Next year the maximum will be 29 projects, and if we can cut that down to less than that number, we will do so.

Mr. McGREGOR. This additional request here for the extra $30,000,000 does not include any postwar projects that might be brought up? You are going to come in and ask for additional money on that later, after you have your program established?

Mr. FIELD. The Lanham Act is purely a wartime measure and it should be closed out at the end of the war. If there is any legislation that has to do with postwar projects, it should be entirely separate. We have not made any recommendations outside of what General Fleming and the rest of us have made in the way of helping in the

planning of postwar public works on a loan basis or through advances made to them. They would pay that fund back, but that is entirely separate from this.

Mr. McGREGOR. We find the mayors of our various cities in our districts getting letters from some Federal agency telling them that money is available for the planning of a postwar program, and then when they get the postwar program planned I believe there is not any question but they will say "Where are we going to get the money, Congressman, to help carry out this plan? You have allocated Federal funds to arrange a program. Now, we have a program arranged. Where are we going to get the money to carry the program through?"

The CHAIRMAN. I do not think there are any Federal funds, as a matter of grant, for any postwar planning in these States and cities. General FLEMING. We have an appropriation, under title V of the George bill, of $17,500,000 to advance to States and political subdivisions for the planning of projects to be built in the postwar period, but the law specifically says that it is not the duty of the Federal Government in any way to assist in the construction of the projects. The CHAIRMAN. Are those not loans?

General FLEMING. Yes, sir; those are loans.

Mr. MCGREGOR. Do you not feel generally that if we loan them money to plan for their postwar projects that they are going, at least, by inference, to feel that we are going to loan them the money to carry those plans through?

Mr. FIELD. I think if we administer it on the basis of making advances or loans to the communities for the plan preparation of only those projects which they indicate they can construct with their own funds, that we can discourage any such idea that they may have. Mr. MCGREGOR. Then you recommend that when we get a letter from a certain locality stating that they are interested in participating in the funds as a loan by the Federal Government for postwar planning projects, that we should call their attention to the fact, that, although we are loaning them the money for the plan, that they are going to have to use their own money for the construction?

Mr. FIELD. Yes, sir; that is correct.

The CHAIRMAN. I think you would be entirely justified in doing that.

Mr. McGREGOR. A lot of people are going to get an awful shock when we do that.

The CHAIRMAN. This committee held very voluminous hearings on that particular subject, irrespective of any bill. We were pioneers in getting informational data with reference to postwar projects, quite apart from any participation by the Federal Government. The States and the cities are in much better financial condition to do that than the Federal Government is.

What we have been trying to obviate, from the standpoint of these loans, is what occurred with the WPA when we had no plans of any character and we were about 18 months, I think, getting about 100,000 people employed, in a great deal of which work was not of permanent value. The loan provision is to enable us to obviate that and to have our States and cities ready to go with their work when the war is over, and not have that interim of unemployment.

Mr. MCGREGOR. My first fear is that a lot of these communities do not realize when they are setting up this planning program for postwar work that they are going to have to pay for it themselves, and that they are not going to get Federal contributions.

Mr. FIELD. I think our regulations and information to applicants that we have just released in the last few days will clarify the situation. I will be glad to send any member of the committee our instructions on advance planning, because we bring out in the beginning that the responsibility for all construction is with the local people, and not with the Federal Government.

Mr. MCGREGOR. I think that is fine, because I know from my own mail that officials of localities are feeling that we are going to help them out in the actual construction of the program if we are going to help them in the planning.

Mr. FIELD. Well, the amount of money that will be available out of the $17,500,000, is broken down by population, and it is so small, and our regulations are so tight that I think, after they read them, they will have a different idea about it.

Mr. MCGREGOR. I have just one other question. There is very little of actual construction work in this request for $30,000,000. This is mostly for welfare?

Mr. FIELD. This is for maintenance and operation. I might say this about construction. You remember, we got a deficiency appropriation a few months ago of $20,000,000. $5,000,000 was set aside for services. That left us about $15,000,000 for construction. Taking into account the allocations since made and those which will be made between now and June 30 for urgent construction needs, we will still have available on June 30 about $8,500,000.

We are going to conserve that money for construction to take care of any urgent situation that may arise. Under the authority that the National Housing Agency has, there will be some new housing built, and in those localities we would go in and help them with their schools, sewer, and water, and so forth. We think the funds now available for construction will take care of such needs unless the war with Japan extends beyond another year. In that event we might have a situation that would require additional money, but our attitude is that our construction work is coming to an end, and we are of course meeting only the urgent needs. One example of that is in Hawaii. We appeared before a subcommittee of the House Committee on Naval Affairs. Those members had been out there and examined the situation. They are preparing to construct a considerable number of new houses there, and we are going to have to provide sewer, water, and a couple of school buildings, in addition to a hospital. We will build them with money we now have.

The CHAIRMAN. That is all in prosecution of the war in the Pacific. Mr. FIELD. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. As I understand it, you feel, with the reductions you have made, from the standpoint of authorization that would emanate from this committee, that you have this down to the minimum, and then, of course, when you get your appropriations you would have to make out your case before the Appropriations Committee?

Mr. FIELD. Yes, sir; that is right.

Now, General Fleming told you about the contacts with the governors, and in this document on pages 16 to 23 we explain the contacts that we have had with them, and we have copies of letters to them, and we have a typical answer from one of the governors showing their attitude.

In general, it was this, that the States were willing to help out in increasing the over-all State aid for schools, because they are doing that through their legislatures right now, but they do not believe they could take State money and go down into one locality where there was a bomber plant, for instance, or a shell-loading plant and give special State funds to one or two communities within the State. We would have to help out in these areas during the war.

On the child-care program the governors felt that it was entirely a war-emergency program, that the State governments did not want to get involved in it, feeling that it was a problem between the local governments and our own organization. New York State is putting in some money for child care, and one or two others, but the general reaction of the governors and the State people was that they wanted it to be continued as in the past 2 years and to be closed out when the war is over. They did not want to start a State program for child care. We find the local people are picking up these services. One example is Dayton, Ohio, where for 2 years we helped them on their garbage collection and police protection because of the tremendous impact of the activities at Wright Field. We have been able to close that service out, and after May 1 of this year we are providing no further assistance. The local people recognize that it is their responsibility, that we are just helping them during the war. Just as soon as possible the local communities will provide these needed services with their own resources.

If the war with Japan should be over in a short time we could not withdraw assistance to schools immediately, because the people who are there are not going to move out immediately. For example, on the west coast, around San Francisco, when Mr. Kaiser started curtailing employment in his shipyards we found that the people living in the temporary houses around that area did not move. They are either working for the Navy or some other activity, and the schools will have to be continued as long as those people remain in the area. The CHAIRMAN. You necessarily have to make your arrangements with them on a school-year basis?

Mr. FIELD. That is right, we feel that we have to make arrangements with them on that basis.

Mr. McMILLEN. This child-care item is so much greater than any other item here. Is there any great proportion of that that goes for looking after the children of mothers who are employed in war plants? Mr. FIELD. Yes, sir; all of it is for that purpose.

Mr. McMILLEN. All of it?

Mr. FIELD. Yes, sir.

Mr. McMILLEN. Well, it occurs to me that the first employees they will have to move out of those plants will be the mothers of those children, and in the program of reduicng our war effort that it will be the mothers of these children who go first, and that this money that has heretofore been used for child care will be relieved, and therefore, that item will be greatly reduced. I appreciate that the children must still go to schools, and that we must have hos