CITY OF MONONGAHELA, PA., June 15, 1961. Hon. JOSEPH CLARK, Washington, D.C. MY DEAR SENATOR CLARK: I have been instructed by the Council of the City of Monongahela, Pa., by unanimous vote on motion made by Councilman Charles M. Brady, seconded by Mayor William B. Hill, to ask you to support bill S. 1633, for the establishing of a Department of Urban Affairs and Housing and for other purposes, now pending in the Senate. We shall appreciate it greatly if you will support this bill. Very truly yours, ELIZABETH BAKER, City Clerk. PORTLAND ASSOCIATION OF BUILDING OWNERS AND MANAGERS, Senator WAYNE MORSE, Washington, D.C. Portland, Oreg., April 15, 1961. DEAR SENATOR MORSE: A letter on behalf of this association was sent to the President recently commending his decision to create a Department of Urban Affairs; a copy of that letter is attached for your information. The Portland area is one of the 25 or so great metropolitan complexes of the country; the problems faced here are the same, to one degree or another, as those in the other metropolitan areas. Proper zoning and planning, adequate financing, a realistic structure of local government, and the efficient functioning of the entire system, are problems common to all of our great cities. Many persons are aware of the nature of the problems, and the recognized methods of cure. For example, from improper planning derives great economic and esthetic loss, poor use of land facilities, traffic congestion, problems of health and sanitation (such as air pollution), and many others. This is well recognized. Yet, the units of local government are not sufficiently rich nor sufficiently strong to accomplish the necessary regional planning needed. This association has been one of the leaders in urban renewal legislation through its various stages; has developed plans and statutes for municipal transit; a municipal parking authority; and has been in the forefront of numerous other moves for civic improvement. We recognize that a bigger view must be taken, and that funds must be very large if our cities are not to suffer further decay and disintegration. It should not be overlooked that while much time and thought has been given to the great metropolises, many communities of every size in Oregon and elsewhere do not escape these problems. Efforts in recent years in Salem, Eugene, and Springfield show this. Even the smallest communities can suffer dislocation by reason of traffic pattern changes or highway developments, for example. These cities, like Portland, should welcome an attack on these problems on a regional basis. We urge that the Senate give the President's plan the earliest possible attention. Our cities are undeniably in a state of crisis; we offer our assistance to you personally, and to the other members of the Oregon delegation, in any way that it may be useful. Yours very truly, PAUL F. MURPHY, President. ARVIN A. BURNETT, Chairman, Downtown Committee. PORTLAND ASSOCIATION OF BUILDING OWNERS AND MANAGERS, Re Department of Urban Affairs. Portland, Oreg., March 21, 1961. PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, The White House, Washington, D.C. SIR: This association, composed of the principal office buildings in the downtown area of Portland, wishes to express its thorough endorsement of your 71743-61-8 recently announced plan for a Department of Urban Affairs, headed by an Administrator of Cabinet rank. With more and more of our population gathering in the Nation's metropolitan areas, we think that the health and welfare of these regions needs greater attention and study at the Federal level. Within the metropolitan areas, the downtown, or core area, is the vital center of service to the populace, and is the principal location of professional, commercial, cultural, and governmental facilities. This concentration of services is essential to the proper functioning of the metropolis. Yet these central areas are ringed by decay, and often are themselves congested, drab, and inefficient. These difficulties cannot always be cured by local efforts alone. We would envision that the Department of Urban Affairs would function along the lines of giving advisory service to the cities, relief in the form of selfliquidating loans, perhaps for rehabilitation, transit, parking, or similar basic needs, and give direction to metropolitan planning, which is one of the fundamental deficiencies. We offer our support for your program and any aid or counsel which we can provide, and will enlist support for your program among business, labor, and local governmental circles. Yours very truly, PAUL F. MURPHY, President. ARVIN A. BURNETT, Chairman, Downtown Committee. CRAIG KELLEY, Executive Secretary. INTER-COUNTY REGIONAL PLANNING COMMISSION, Denver, Colo., January 11, 1961. Hon. GORDON ALLOTT, Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. DEAR SENATOR ALLOTT: In the event that you may work on new Federal urban policies in connection with the establishment of a Department of Urban Affairs, there are two particular ideas in the metropolitan field that you may wish to consider. As you know, the present size of the Denver metropolitan area (about 850,000 and its rate of growth about 50 percent per decade) puts us in the upper tier among 180 of the metropolitan areas in size and rate of growth. Altogether, these 180 make up two-thirds of the U.S. population. Nowhere in these metros is areawide planning being really implemented ahead of growth problems. On the local level a combination of circumstances-old legislation, unprecedented expansion, and a fragmented pattern of local governments and districts-generally impede effective planning. But there are two ways in which Federal policy in metropolitan areas could expedite metropolitan planning : (1) Encourage the local preparation of a "basic metropolitan reference plan," like a workable program, and make it a prerequisite to large Federal urban projects. (2) Provide for loans or loan guarantees for essential public facilities to be built in advance, as the anchors of new satellite towns. The basic metropolitan reference plan is, of course, already in preparation in most large metropolitan areas, but it carries little meaning for major Federal agencies. Since 701 began supporting 50 percent of the cost of the preparation of area wide plans, it has encouraged more metropolitan planning cooperation than ever existed prior to this aid. The 701 formula is fine. What is needed is recognition of resulting plans by the numerous Federal construction agencies, also State agencies. Near the top of the list of builders in any metropolitan area would be 1. State highway departments handling Federal urban aid projects. 2. Federally aided airports. 3. HHFA's own branches including public housing, urban renewal, and building insurance. 4. HEW's branches aiding sewer construction and water system construction. 5. GSA with all its sites and buildings. 6. Defense Department bases, arsenals, and regional headquarters. 7. Defense industries. In times like these when metropolitan planning is trying to pull itself up by the bootstraps it would seem that these Federal instrumentalities which make big city building commitments would reap the greatest benefits from sound metropolitan plans. The impacts of Federal and assisted projects on the form of the metropolis are enormous. Subject to a formalized metropolitan plan, they could make all the difference. As matters now stand, neither the internal relationships between these Federal instrumentalities nor their relationships with metropolitan planning seem to be advanced much beyond "facing each planning problem as we come to it." It is true that city plans and metropolitan plans in most cities have not matured to their necessary stature. But one reason has been their impotence among the higher levels of government. Any city or metro planning process can be electrified into action, by making it more responsible for future construction or engineering aid in the area. This is not too for fetched. The principal has gained acceptance in the form of the workable program required in each city as a prerequisite for Federal aid for urban renewal. And it carries teeth: codes and ordinances, comprehensive community plans, neighborhood analysis, administrative organization, financing of local share, housing for displaced families, citizen participation. It was even enlarged and redefined as the program for community improvement, with Federal aid offering a continuous communitywide inventory of housing conditions and ongoing plan for housing conversation or redevelopment. But the "threat of Federal interference" in local planning has never arisen in all this, because the Federal role was handled discreetly and need not arise in the suggested basic metropolitan reference plan. An important side effect of this reference plan would be the more systematic cooperation of those State agencies which have a direct hand in administering Federal public road funds and HEW funds. The importance of a reference plan can be described as follows: We estimate an annual recurring planning and engineering expense in this metropolitan area, about $3 million, and an annual capital appropriation of $80 million for 15 categories of Federal, State, and local construction. Then there is the amazing fact that we already have some 220 units of local government for 900,000 people. Our latest tally shows 27 fire districts, 68 sanitation districts, 56 water districts, 14 recreation districts, 27 school districts, 12 downtown improvement districts, 5 counties, and 19 cities. Add to this about seven Federal instrumentalities and five State agencies. All these governments divide up the responsibility for planning but produce no binding mutual plan. It would be a salutory thing for the Federal Government to raise the question: "Are we going to get together in a metropolitan plan now or later?" What would be the definition of a basic metropolitan reference plan? Since the HHFA very succinctly defined the elements of a workable program, a metropolitan reference plan could be set forth in the same fine language. Among other things, it might include: (a) An organization for continuous planning among the local, State, and Federal agencies; (b) A 20-year or longer forecast of population and land uses; (c) A main framework of circulation, utilities, major public sites and buildings; and (d) Periodic requirements for review, updating, and reissue of the reference plan. How might this definition be initiated? Possibly by a White House Urban Conference starting in each metropolitan center and covering this matter among others. Out other suggestion, community facility loans for planned new towns, would be contingent on a basic metropolitan reference plan. This commission and other metro planning agencies recognize the need for planned new communities outside of the contiguous mass that resulted from extension of pipelines and roads. Fast scattering new suburban sprawl, ahead of all organized local public services, eventually drags along the components of community life, but too late, too expensive, and disorganized. It is clear from a few new town examples that they can be established miles from the metropolitan mass on open land, provided that the minimum essential water, sewer, fire protection, public works, and schools can be brought to focus. Of course the Greenbelt towns illustrated this. But there are encouraging examples of private enterprise towns, like Broomfield Heights, Colo. Often old suburban villages expand if even a few essential public facilities are present. This is the case in Castle Rock, Colo. While modern transportation makes the outlying community quite practical, it also makes planless sprawl possible. The real difference between these two ways of building suburbia is to have a core of essential public facilities-at least water, sewer, fire protection, and schools around which suburban sprawl can fuse into a functional community. The financing of these public facilities in advance of a full tax base need not be in the form of a subsidy, because these facilities will pay for themselves with the maturity of the town. Insurance capital would step in behind a loan guarantee which is guaranteed in turn by a formal metropolitan plan, complete in its zoning and working relationships among all levels of government. The ways in which these facilities are patched together now, suburbs eventually pay much more for them than in an organized community. We made an estimate of comparative annual costs of essential urban services inside Denver and outside, and found that local property taxes and district charges (not including schools or State taxes) ran 25 percent higher in the scattered suburbs, for fewer services. In support of these two particular policy suggestions, there have been some earlier Federal statements. One is a report by a Federal adviser of the last administration, Maj. Gen. J. S. Bragdon, special assistant to the President, to the Association of State Planning and Development Agencies in Des Moines, Iowa, on May 13, 1958: "Our job is to devise and encourage more and better planning for the construction of public facilities at all levels of government. "In 1954, a limited survey as to actions by local governments revealed 72,000 projects valued at $28 billion in various stages of planning. However, comparatively little of this was on the drawing board, just about the annual production rate. The backlog of needed public works at all levels of government is so large that there can be no necessity of developing 'make work' or 'leaf raking' projects. "Today the conflight of simultaneous demands for all types of public facilities upon all levels and departments of government demands systematic comprehensive long-range planning. Aside from the 40-odd Federal agencies and the 53 States and territories, there are over 3,000 counties, some 12,000 special districts, 16,000-odd municipalities, some 17,000 townships, and over 50,000 school districts—in all, over 102,000 units of government, all doing public construction. "This multitude of government entities last year spent over $12 billion for public works between 12 and 13 cents of every dollar spent by government. This equaled about 3 percent of the gross national product. "In 1955, the Department of Commerce estimated the outstanding requirements of major State and local public works as $200 billion. This total includes $92 billion for highways, $41.5 billion for educational facilities and $25.3 billion for water and sewerage requirements. Using this last as an illustration, we can identify three components of the requirement: $10 billion backlog, those needs which have been deferred; $6.2 billion for obsolescence; and $9.1 billion for growth. These same components exist in all public works fields. If it were decided to catch up in 10 years, State and loval governments would have to be spending more than $20 billion a year on new public works. The 1954 rate was 42 percent of this. In 1957, the rate was nearly $14 billion; however, because of price increases and new requirements, we consider the ratio about the same as in 1954. We do not assert that deficiencies should be made up in 10 years. Extreme judgment is needed in selecting programs to be expanded." And there was a recommendation by Representative Chester Bowles, published in the Congressional Record of April 4, 1960: "Numerous, overlapping governmental units-most of them too tiny to be effective in dealing with metropolitan problems; the irrational pattern of State boundaries, which slice through rivers and valleys and metropolitan areas; the absence of any layer of government coterminous with the metropolitan areas; the proliferation of special purpose authorities; obsolete city charters; outmoded political machines-these defects are generally beyond action at the Federal level, although there may be an occasional avenue through which the Federal Government can exercise influence. We might, for example, borrow the 'workable program' idea from urban renewal and make certain grants or loans conditional on the development of a workable program on a metropolitan scale. If this were the case in regard to Federal aid for mass transit, the financial incentive might force the municipalities that comprise a metropolitan area to get together for effective areawide transit planing. Water development, which can be rationally organized only by river basins, surely demands greater Federal participation, which might be conditioned on new forms of organization among the States and their local governmental units. "The States, likewise, cannot be reformed from Washington. Urban underrepresentation in State legislatures; obsolete State constitutions; limited tax structures-these can only be dealt with by the people of the several States. But there is this safety valve: If the States cannot be made effective participants in dealing with metropolitan problems, they can always be bypassed as they have been, generally, in such fields as housing and urban renewal. "But what we at the Federal level can do is reorganize the Federal Government itself for purposes of the new federalism." We sincerely hope that these policies are already in the mill, but if they are not, we feel sure that metropolitan planning agencies would be willing to help work them out. Sincerely, GEORGE NEZ, Director. THE U.S. FLAG COMMITTEE, Jackson Heights, Long Island, N.Y., May 24, 1961. Senator HUBERT HUMPHREY, DEAR SENATOR HUMPHREY: According to the Congressional Record of May 19, S. 375, a bill dealing with the establishment of a Department of Urban Affairs and Housing, will be before your committee on June 21 and 22. I believe such a department within the Federal Government would be completely unconstitutional for it would place the Federal Government in charge of purely local affairs. It would not save the taxpayers any money at all and would create more jobs within the Federal bureaucracy to be paid for by the American taxpayer who is already overburdened with taxes. We believe the establishment of a Department of Urban Affairs and Housing would tend to take away the right of private ownership of property and would also tend to dictate to the private owner what use he should make of his own property. Please place my name on the list to receive the hearings on this subject and also place this protest in the printed hearings. Please send the hearings to me at Post Office Box 448, Berryville, Va. Yours very truly, Hon. JOHN L. MCCLELLAN, Chairman, Committee on Government Operations, U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C. ELIZABETH H. OSTH, STATE OF ALASKA, DEAR SENATOR MCCLELLAN: Recently I received from the Governors' conference a communication expressing opposition to bills now in your committee which would create a Cabinet-level Department of Urban Affairs. Since I cannot agree with the opinions expressed by the majority of Govvernors' conference executive committee members, I am writing you to endorse S. 289, S. 375 and S. 609 and to set forth some of the reasons for this endorsement. The argument has been raised that establishment of a department of this type would tend to weaken existing relationships between the States and their political subdivisions. I think this assumption is incorrect. The establishment of this Department would not create innovations in Federal assistance programs. Such functions as housing, home finance, urban renewal, slum clearance, pollution control, |