Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. The Executive order, strictly speaking, does not apply to them? Mr. MYER. Yes; it really does; they were evacuated, all of them, under Executive Order 9066, the Executive order which ties in with the military operation. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Then why do you need that language? Mr. MYER. Simply to make it clear to the committee, to give you a chance to understand, so that there can be no misconstruction about it. LEASING OF LANDS ACQUIRED FOR PROGRAM AT RELOCATION CENTERS Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. And at the bottom of the same page you refer to "the leasing to others of land acquired for the program.' Have you done anything under this language? Mr. MYER. We have done some leasing at the central Utah and Heart Mountain projects where we have some land surplus to our program. Where W. R. A. has leased land, the lessees will not be able to get through with their operations by the end of this fiscal year, so we are asking permission to carry these leases to the end of this calendar year. Hence continued authority for leasing is necessary. It will all be liquidated, however, by the end of the 1946 fiscal year. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Will you put a statement in the record covering that operation? Mr. MYER. I will be glad to do so. At two of the War Relocation Authority relocation centers, the Authority is leasing lands direct to private individuals. This land is surplus to the needs of the Authority but to a large extent is intermingled with lands that are still being used all or a portion of the calendar year 1915. Central Utah relocation center, Topaz, Utah, 11,694 acres of land, both cultivated and range land, and 5,298 shares of water stock have been leased as of this date. Heart Mountain relocation center, Heart Mountain, Wyo., 400 acres of cultivated land has been leased on this center. At the Granada relocation center, Amache, Colo., the land has been declared surplus to the Surplus Property Board and leasing is being effected by the Real Estate Division, Corps of Engineers, War Department. A total of 6,815 acres are being leased by the War Department at the direction of the Surplus Property Board. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. There is no authority for that except the language in the bill? Mr. MYER. That is correct. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. The same thing is true of the language on the next page, "Of sums in lieu of taxes against real property." Mr. MYER. That has been in the bill. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. There is no authority for it? Mr. MYER. So far as I know that applies only to the one center, the one in Southern Colorado. PAYMENT OF DISABILITY OR DEATH BENEFITS Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Can you pay disability or death compensation and benefits to the people who are receiving this help? Mr. MYER. To the extent that it is based on salaries they get at the relocation center; yes. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. What is the authority for that; the language here? Mr. MYER. That is right. AUTHORITY EMERGENCY REFUGEE SHELTER PROGRAM Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. With respect to the emergency refugee shelter, what is the authority for setting that up? Mr. MYER. The order issued by the President on June 12 and his statement presented to the Congress at that time, establishing it. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. He made a statement that it had been done; was there any Executive order? Mr. MYER. Oh, yes; he issued an order establishing responsibility for the agencies that were responsible for different parts of this program at that time. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Mentioning the War Relocation Authority especially? Mr. MYER. Yes. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Have any of the refugees left to this time? Mr. MYER. I think one left for South Africa. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. In other words, they have left the country? Mr. MYER. That is right, except where they may have gone to an insane asylum for special treatment that we could not provide. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. This is the only thing of this kind you have anything to do with? Mr. MYER. That is right. OVER-ALL COST OF EMERGENCY REFUGEE SHELTER PROGRAM Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Will you put a statement in the record showing the over-all cost to date of that operation? Mr. MYER. Yes. I think you will find a statement here, for this fiscal year, and I will be glad to insert a statement in the record. The only costs we have had to date ran from midsummer during the fiscal year up to now, and we have had turned over to us out of the present emergency fund a total of $667,000, approximately. (The information requested is as follows:) The cost of operating the emergency refugee shelter for the fiscal year 1945 to March 31 was $512,262. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Above your appropriation? Mr. MYER. Above the appropriation; we have no authority under the appropriation to provide for this program. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. In other words, the emergency fund has been used exclusively for the purposes of this item? Mr. MYER. That is right, up to the present time. We got authority in the first deficiency bill to use an additional $100,000 if needed, out of this year's appropriation to W. R. A. to continue the operation of the shelter. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. You have had much larger costs earlier in the program. The cost this year is going to be larger than the cost estimated for the next fiscal year. That had to do largely with the preparation of the buildings, to receive people, plus some temporary costs in getting people established. TRAVEL EXPENSES Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Why do you need all of this travel item of $350,000 for your administrative personnel? Mr. MYER. The major part of that travel has to do with travel to and from the relocation offices and officers whose jobs will be in the field helping people get relocated, and the travel from the Washington office keeping in touch with the centers and field offices to see that things are moving properly. There will be very little travel except by evacuees from the centers. However, we have a total of approximately 55 officers throughout the country, and these people would be in a travel status for most of the time looking after their business. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. I would think the larger the number of offices the less the travel expense should be. Mr. MYER. Well, that would be true, except that a good many of these people will still have to cover large districts, when you consider we only have 55 offices to cover the whole of the United States. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. It seems to me that you are going to have 180 people in a travel status, despite the number of officers, and you are going to pay them 6, 8, or 10 dollars or 12 per day. Mr. MYER. No; we will not pay them that much per diem; that includes the per diem and their railroad, bus, or other transportation costs. Mr. WIGLESWORTH. The normal allowance is $6; why do you pay them $12? Mr. MYER. That includes their transportation. In other words, we have included in the total estimate the per diem, the travel cost, covering railroad fare or other transportation costs. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Is there authority for allowing them $12 per dav? Mr. MYER. We do not allow them that much; they get their actual railroad cost. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. What do they get? Mr. MYER. Six dollars is the per diem allowance, but in addition to that they do have their railroad or bus or some other transportation costs, which are put on an actual cost basis, but in making up our estimate of the total cost we have tried to simplify it by putting it on a daily basis as compared with the usual figures. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Is there authority for the excess? Mr. MYER. Yes. The excess, as I say, consists of transportation costs. In other words, they do not pay their own transportation out of the $6 per diem. The $6 per diem simply represents the subsistence cost, and this estimate includes the $6 per diem plus whatever it cost them to travel on public transportation, or in their own cars; usually public carriers. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. You have got 454 motorcars, and you are asking for 20 more. Are those 20 to replace cars you now have, or are they additional? Mr. MYER. We are not asking for any additional cars this year. Mr. WIGGLEWORTH. You are not? Mr. MYER. No. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. You have got 454, according to my information, which looks like one for every four employees? Mr. MYER. Most of those cars, Mr. Wigglesworth, are used at the centers for traveling in and around the centers or out to the farms, and so on. For instance, a few of these centers are located where it is necessary to travel some distance, but most of the traveling is done at the centers. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. And you have some 1,256 trucks. Mr. MYER. That is right; they are used at the centers. One of the centers is as much as 17 miles from a railroad, and it is necessary to transport all of our mess supplies, our construction material, all of our maintenance materials, and the things of that kind quite a distance from the railroad, and at four or five of the centers we have a rather large convoying job. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. It looks to me like you have made quite a dent in the gasoline supply. Mr. MYER. We have used quite a little gasoline, but we think we have been pretty conservative, in view of the job we have had to do. PUBLICITY SALARIES Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. You want $129,300 for publicity salaries alone, I think. Why do you need all of that money for publicity? Mr. MYER. As I pointed out to Mr. Case, our major job now has to do with the information program, keeping the evacuees in the center informed, and the public informed as much as possible in order to expedite relocation of the evacuees. In addition to that, we have a continuous job of maintaining contacts with newspapers and other agencies interested in this program. There probably never has been a program, Mr. Wigglesworth, where there has been as much misinformation put out about it. We have received continual requests by telephone and through letters in large volumes of mail that we have to handle. These information people handle a great deal of correspondence in addition to handling the rest of the information program. We We put out very few of the normal type of press releases. have put out some, but they have been put out in order to keep the public informed about the program. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. I notice at one point you speak of selling the public on the agency's program for the services furnished to the evacuees. Mr. MYER. That is right. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. It does not seem as though there ought to be much of that required in telling the public about it. Mr. MYER. We are constantly having to counteract a great deal of misinformation and misconceptions that have arisen, and we have to put out information to correct it. Back in 1943, and some of them are still doing it, we had people scattering information around about sabotage, and so on. We have spent quite a little time convincing people that that did not exist. We have not had a case, a proven case, on sabotage since the war started among any of our citizens of Japanese ancestry. Right now we have rumor after rumor being put out in certain areas along the coast because of the fact that people do not want to give up farms, do not want to give up homes that they have been living in, and certain organizations are making some money out of taking membership or in carrying on campaigns because of misinformation that has been put out. We have published information, and furnished the information, not only through the newspaper releases but through radio contacts and through other means; we have people sent out to meetings on request in order to clear up a lot of rumors, 'because of the emotional situation that we are in. I think we have been very temperate in the amount of money that has been utilized in meeting these rumors. And I should say that a very large proportion of it has gone to paying the time of people in answering letters having to do with routine work that has been made necessary in serving these people who are under the Government program. PAYMENTS TO REFUGEES Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. I meant to ask what, if anything, is paid to these refugees and refugee centers. Mr. MYER. Paid to them? Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Yes. Mr. MYER. About the same as we do for the evacuees. The refugees are receiving not to exceed $18 a month, which includes, of course, all their needs for clothing or anything else they need. In other words, they buy everything out of the $18 if they are working. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Are they working? Mr. MYER (continuing). In the event somebody need medical assistance or if they need clothing or anything of that kind, the refugees pay that out of their allowance, when they are working. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. If they are working? Mr. MYER. Yes; while they are working. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. And most of them are working? Mr. MYER. Well, not all of them; there are some old people and youngsters. Where they are not working we are providing them with the same kind of assistance, not to exceed in any case $7.50 per month; it would depend upon their age, of course, and their needs for welfare grants, whether they are able to earn some of their subsistence. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Are there any disability or death benefit grants? Mr. MYER. We have not had any as yet. We are asking for provision for that in case anything happens where they are working under Government supervision. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. That is all a grant, I suppose; there is no arrangement through the Refugee Board for any of it to come back? Mr. MYER. No; there has been no grant as yet. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. But in case there is, there is no arrangement. for any of it to come back? Mr. MYER. You mean through subsistence? Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. No arrangements for it to come back through lend-lease or any other way? Mr. MYER. No place that I know of, for it to some back from; no. Mr. LUDLOW. How much did you ask the Budget for? |