It is now urgent that the Government of all the people of the United States do something about it. As the Advisory Commission recommended, employment should be at the top of the agenda.

That is not to say that a public service employment program would be for Negroes alone. Many persons with Spanish surnames suffer unemployment. And in all national statistics the majority of the unemployed are white.

Nor should a public service employment program be only for urban areas. Although the greatest concentration of unemployment and the most explosive situations are found in urban ghettos, the highest proportion of unemployment among residents of a community are found in rural areas. If persons cannot find work in South Carolina, they move to Washington, Philadelphia, or New York. Those unemployed in Eastern Kentucky head for Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and Detroit. Those without jobs in the Mississippi Delta migrate to Chicago. The jobless in the Rio Grande Valley move to Texas or California cities. Indeed, the cities and the rural areas alike will benefit if a public service employment program is both urban and rural.

As I have studied S. 3063, the proposed Emergency Employment and Training Act of 1968. I find that the bill is in basic accord with the principles I have described. The main shortcomings seems to be the speed with which the objective of one million public service jobs is achieved. In the bill, this level would not be attained until the third year. It seems to me that this pace should be accelerated so that 500,000 jobs are made available the first year and a total of one million the second year. We are in a period of great urgency and should stretch both our fiscal and administrative capacity to the utmost.

In conclusion, I reiterate the plea of the Emergency Convocation held last August which called upon "all Americans to apply the same determination to these programs that they have to past emergencies. We are confident that, given this commitment, our society has the ingenuity to allocate its resources and devise techniques necessary to rebuild cities and still meet our other national obligations without impairing our financial integrity. Out of past emergencies, we have drawn strength and progress. Out of the present urban crisis we can build cities that are places, not of disorder and despair, but of hope and opportunity. The task we set for ourselves will not be easy, but the needs are massive and urgent, and the hour is late. We pledge ourselves to this goal for as long as it takes to accomplish it. We ask the help of the Congress and the Nation."

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF THE URBAN COALITION ON PUBLIC SERVICE EMPLOYMENT

The Urban Coalition Executive Committee calls upon the Congress to enact urgently needed emergency legislation to provide at least one million jobs through public service employment.

In support of this objective, The Urban Coalition's Statement of Principles, Goals and Commitments, endorsed in August 1967 by 1,000 representatives of business, labor, religion, civil rights, and local government, calls for action consistent with the following principles:

The federal government must enlist the cooperation of government at all levels and of private industry to assure that meaningful, productive work is available to everyone willing and able to work.

To create socially useful jobs, the emergency work program should concentrate on the huge backlog of employment needs in parks, streets, slums, countryside, schools, colleges, libraries, and hospitals. To this end, an emergency work program should be initiated and should have as its first goal putting at least one million of the presently unemployed into productive work at the earliest possible moment.

The program must provide meaningful jobs-not dead-end, make work projects so that the employment experience gained adds to the capabilities and broadens the opportunities of the employees to become productive members of the permanent work force of our nation.

Basic education, training, and counseling must be an integral part of the program to assure extended opportunities for upward job mobility and to improve employee productivity. Funds for training, education, and counseling should be made available to private industry as well as to public and private nonprofit agencies.

Funds for employment should be made available to local and state governments, nonprofit institutions, and federal agencies able to demonstrate their ability to use labor productively without reducing existing levels of employment or undercutting existing labor standards or wages which prevail for comparable work or services in the area but are not less than the federal minimum wage.

Such a program should seek to qualify new employees to become part of the regular work force and to meet normal performance standards.

The operation of the program should be keyed to specific, localized unemployment problems and focused initially on those areas where the need is most apparent.

The Clark-Javits Emergency Employment Act proposed in the last session of Congress was responsive to these principles and was endorsed by The Urban Coalition. It is now even more urgent for the Congress to respond to the conditions of unemployment despair revealed in hearings held by the Senate Sub-Committee on Unemployment. The principles endorsed by The Urban Coalition are consistent with the findings and recommendations of the National Committee on Technology Automation and Economic Progress (Feb. 1966), the White House Conference to Fulfill These Rights (June, 1966), and The National Advisory Commission on Food and Fiber (July, 1967). The Report of the President's Commission on Civil Disorders leaves no doubt as to the nation's responsibilities.

STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN W. GARDNER, CHAIRMAN OF THE NATIONAL URBAN COALITION, FORMER SECRETARY OF THE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH, EDUCATION, AND WELFARE, ACCOMPANIED BY RON LINTON, CONSULTANT TO NATIONAL URBAN COALITION; AND DR. HAROLD L. SHEPPARD, W. E. UPJOHN INSTITUTE FOR EMPLOYMENT RESEARCH

Mr. GARDNER. I think, Mr. Chairman, under those circumstances, perhaps if I read it, it will provide the basis for questions on your part. Senator CLARK. Yes. You do not mind if we interrupt since the statement will be printed in the hearing record in its entirety.

Perhaps you would like to introduce your colleagues.

Mr. GARDNER. Yes, sir. Ron Linton, consultant to the Urban Coalition, played a very important role in the early days of the coalition. You know him well.

I also have Harold Sheppard, who prepared the study of public service employment which we will be referring to in the course of the testimony. He is associated with the Upjohn Institute and the study which he has prepared is the only data of the sort available on public service employment.

Senator CLARK. Mr. Sheppard was also on the subcommittee staff as one of our most valuable consultants. He may have a conflict of interest in appearing here this morning. Please go ahead.

Mr. GARDNER. I am John W. Gardner, chairman of the Urban Coalition, an organization representing business and the professions, organized labor, religion, civil rights groups, and local government.

Members of this committee have heard me testify on a good many occasions in connection with measures relating to health, education, and welfare. They will understand that 30 days on a new job has not turned me into an authority on questions of employment. But a good many members of the coalition are very well qualified to arrive at judgements on that subject, and I am speaking on their behalf.

The Urban Coalition came into existence on July 31, 1967, as the Nation was exercising its third straight summer of widespread civil

disorder. Immediately upon formation, the coalition called an emergency convocation; and on August 24, 1967, 1,200 leaders of American life assembled in Washington. Those who attended felt a deep sense of national urgency and a great need for a positive response to the urban crisis. Setting aside the differences which sometimes divide the Nation, the convocation called for immediate and significant national action.

The coalition represents a remarkable coming together of leadership from the various sectors of American life. On the steering committee are such businessmen as Henry Ford II and David Rockefeller; labor leaders such as George Meany and Walter Reuther; minority group leaders such as Whitney Young, Roy Wilkins, and Bayard Rustin; and mayors such as Richard Daley, of Chicago, and John Lindsay, of New York.

It is the purpose of the Urban Coalition to awaken the American people to their responsibilities in dealing with the urban crisis, to assist them in organizing to cope with that crisis, and to help them in the search for solutions. It is not an operating organization; it is not an organization that will build an empire of its own; it will always remain small and it will supplement rather than supplant other organizations concerned with the cities. In connection with these other organizations our stance is one of total cooperation.

The convocation held last August urged the Federal Government to develop an emergency work program to provide jobs and new training opportunities for the unemployed and underemployed.

Representatives of the private sector in the Urban Coalition committed themselves to assist the deprived to achieve full participation in the economy as self-supporting citizens. To that end, they pledged full-scale private endeavors through creative job training and employment, managerial assistance, and basic investment in all phases of urban development.

The convocation called upon the Nation to take bold and immediate action to provide "a decent home and a suitable living environment for every American family" with guarantees of equal access to all housing, new and existing.

The convocation appealed for educational programs that will equip all young Americans for full and productive participation in our society to the full potential of their abilities.

Leaders of the Urban Coalition realized that these actions were not the responsibility of the National Government alone but also required the participation of State and local governments and of local leaders representing all phases of community life. Therefore, since last August a nationwide effort has been made to organize local coalitions. Today there are 33 in existence. Others are organizing.

Senator CLARK. Mr. Gardner, would you furnish for the record a list of the members and their occupations of the steering committee? Mr. GARDNER. Yes, sir.

Senator CLARK. Also a list of the 33 local coalitions which have. already been brought into being.

Mr. GARDNER. Yes, sir.

(The information subsequently supplied follows:)

STEERING COMMITTEE MEMBERS OF THE NATIONAL URBAN COALITION

I. W. Abel, president, United Steel- Hon. John V. Lindsay, mayor of the city workers of America of New York

Hon. Ivan Allen, Jr., mayor of the city George Meany, president, AFL-CIO
J. Irwin Miller, president Cummins
Engine Co.

Hon. Richard J. Daley, mayor of the Rabbi Jacob P. Rudin, president, Synacity of Chicago

Henry Ford II, chairman Ford Motor David Sullivan, president, Building Co.

John H. Johnson, president, Johnson Roy Wilkins, executive director, NAACP Publishing Co.

EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE MEMBERS OF THE URBAN COALITION

A. Philip Randolph
Walter Reuther
Rabbi Jacob Rudin
Theodore Schlessinger
Mayor James H. J. Tate
Whitney M. Young, Jr.
Bishop Guilfoyle

(Diocese of Camden)

LOCAL URBAN COALITIONS

CITY AND CHAIRMAN

Atlanta, Ga.: To be named.

Baltimore, Md. Theodore R. McKeldin, former mayor of Baltimore (has staff). Boston, Mass.: Robert Slater, John Hancock Insurance Co.

Bridgeport, Conn.: To be named.

Dayton, Ohio: To be named.

Dener, Colo.: To be named.

Detroit, Mich. : Joseph L. Hudson, Jr., Hudson Co. (has staff).

Fresno, Calif.: Mayor Floyd H. Hyde (has staff).

Minneapolis, Minn.: Stephen F. Keating, Honeywell, Inc. (has staff).

New York, N.Y.: Christian Herter, Jr., Mobil Oil (has staff).

Norfolk, Va.: To be named.

Oakland, Calif.: To be named.

Pasadena, Calif.: David Allen Hubbard, Fuller Theological Seminary.
Plainfield, N.J.: Luther L. Roberts, Ruberoid Corp. (has staff).

Riverside, Calif.: Mayor Ben H. Lewis (has staff).

Saginaw, Mich. : R. Dewey Stearns.

San Diego, Calif.: To be named.

Tacoma, Wash.: Donald J. Browne, Rhodes Investment Co.

Washington, D.C.: Walter McArdle, president, McArdle Printing Co. (has staff). Winston-Salem, N.C.: To be named.

Harrisburgh, Pa.: James Reynolds.

Niagara Falls, N.Y.: To be named Executive director: Lester Niesz.

Chattanooga, Tenn.: To be named.

Gary, Ind. George Coker, Gary Urban League (has staff).

Huntsville, Ala. To be named (has staff).

Philadelphia, Pa.: Philip Kalodner, City Development Coordinator.

Phoenix, Ariz.: Milton Gan.

Ventura County, Calif.: To be named.

Los Angeles, Calif.: Dr. Lee DuBridge, president, California Institute of Technology.

Indianapolis, Ind.: To be named.

Joliet, Ill. Prof. Eugene Buff, Academy of St. Francis (has staff).

Kansas City, Kans.

Kansas City, Mo.: To be named.

Stamford, Conn.: To be named (has staff).

Mr. GARDNER. The formation of local coalitions is only part of a very large-scale effort which we will undertake with the aim of informing and educating the American people with respect to the urban crisis. The time has passed when American citizens can hide their heads in the sand. Our cities are in trouble. We intend to do everything possible to alert the people to the nature of the problems and the possibilities for constructive action.

As there must be local response to go along with national action, so also there must be private enterprise participation to complement governinental action. In the vitally important matter of employment opportunity, private enterprise must play a crucially important role, for about seven out of eight jobs in the United States are in the private, profitmaking sector. This commitment to a partnership approach by Government and private enterprise is at the heart of the Urban Coalition's program.

The coalition was pleased, therefore, when the President established the National Alliance of Businessmen. As you know, the Alliance will work closely with the Departments of Commerce and Labor and with local businessmen in promoting the program called JOBS, which stands for Job Opportunities in the Business Sector. It is essentially an on-the-job training program, which develops the job skills the