Prepared statements, letters, supplemental material, etc.—Continued Page Letter from Birdie Meshorer (Mrs. H. S.), dated April 28, 1969. 2132 2132 Letter from Marjorie M. Herrick, Cleveland WICS project 2133 Letter from Dorothy Koeblitz (Mrs. William), Cleveland, Ohio, Letter from Margie Sutton, Cleveland, Ohio, dated April 28, 1969- 2133 2133 2134 Rosenwald, Mrs. Robert E., member, Kansas City Council of Jewish Telegram from five women, Kansas City, Mo., to President 2082 Telegram from 100 women sent to President Nixon.. 2081 Sander, Frank, professor, Harvard Law School: "The 1967 Lawyer Statistical Report," a report entitled__. 1866 1866 2121 Scherer, Charles A., Clinton Men's Wear, Inc., Port Clinton, Ohio, Exhibit No. 1.-Communities visited by representatives of Exhibit No. 2-Progress report of the National Commission on 1940 1829 1829 article entitled_ 1833 Exhibit No. 4.-Target areas of unmet legal services for the poor.. Soll, George, chairman, American Jewish Congress, New York, N.Y., letter to Chairman Perkins, dated April 17, 1969. "The Informer," a newspaper article entitled_. 1835 2075 1943 Tracy, Mrs. Donald, project director, Women in Community Service, 2078 Tunney, Hon. John V., a Representative in Congress from the State of California, statement of 1519 Wagner, Mrs. I. H., WICS coordinator, north Missouri, letter to 2077 "Ware's Firing Is Upheld at GAP Directors Meet," a newspaper article entitled_ 1939 Warren, Mrs. Robert, director, League of Women Voters of Ohio, prepared statement of.. 1527 Waterman, Mrs. Denison R., president-elect of the League of Women 1548 2048 "West Cal Unit Still Protests GAP Offices, Wilson, Mayo D., Clarksdale, Miss., telegram to Chairman Perkins. 2126 dated May 4, 1969_. 2085 ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITY AMENDMENTS OF 1969 WEDNESDAY APRIL 30, 1969 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, TASK FORCE ON POVERTY OF THE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND LABOR, Washington, D.C. The task force met at 9:45 a.m., pursuant to recess, in room 2175, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Carl D. Perkins (chairman of the committee) presiding. Present: Representatives Perkins, Green, Hawkins, Hathaway, Mink, Clay, Quie, Reid, Scherle, Steiger, Landgrebe, and Hansen. Staff members present: H. D. Reed, Jr., general counsel; William F. Gaul, associate general counsel; Robert E. McCord, chief clerk and senior specialist; Charles W. Radcliffe, minority counsel for education; and John Buckley, chief minority investigator. Chairman PERKINS. The committee will come to order. A quorum is present. It is a great pleasure for me to welcome here a close friend, a former member of this committee, and majority leader in the House of Representatives, to tell us something about this $100 million cut that is being proposed by the administration. This eliminates one-third of our urban centers and two-thirds of the conservation centers, some 63 centers all told. It involves half of the Job Corps enrollees, some 17,500. Í have listened to the Secretary say that they were going to place them. But they don't plan to give them the quality training that they are presently receiving, because it would be in an entirely different atmosphere. The so-called skill center plant will not work, in my judgment. If it is permitted to go through, we are going to throw millions of dollars down the drain. I am just delighted to welcome you here, Mr. Albert. Naturally we want the benefit of your views. STATEMENT OF HON. CARL ALBERT, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA Mr. ALBERT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. May I reciprocate the kind words you had to say about me. I have said it to many people: You certainly are a bulwark of strength in this House and on this committee, and I think every Member of the House knows that. My purpose in testifying here today is to add my voice to those on both sides of the aisle who are convinced that in acting to close down 59 Job Corps centers, the administration is making a serious and costly mistake. Mr. Chairman, I know that you have been conscientiously developing an exhaustive analysis of this action on the part of the administration and I merely wish to add a few personal observations in my role as Representative of the citizens of Oklahoma's Third Congressional District. I do so not as an advocate of partisan causes, but as one who is deeply concerned with the welfare of our young people, and with the conservation of our resources, both natural and human. I am at a loss, Mr. Chairman, to understand the reasoning of the administration in this instance. How can the administration square this administration position with the White House statement of February 19 on the Economic Opportunity Act? That was a lofty, reasoned, thoughtful document which tends to inspire our confidence in the future of the war on poverty. It talks of providing time for the Congress to debate fully and discuss the future of OEO. It talks of the value of having in the Federal Government an agency whose special concern is the poor. It talks of the economies, the efficiency, and the better program management to be expected from the delegation of Job Corps to the Labor Department. One gets the definite impression that the administration intends to shuffle boxes around on a chart while it figures out what to do next, after which the Congress is free to debate the issues. What are we to think about the administration's February 19 statement when Secretary Shultz tells us that the administration plans to cut the Job Corps by $100 million, from $280 million down to $180 million? What are we to think when the administration has unilaterally decided to cut a popular program such as the Job Corps by almost 45 percent before the appropriation hearings have even been scheduled? What are we to think when the administration has decided to close down 59 Job Corps centers, cost over 6,000 people their jobs, turn 36,000 young men and women back to their dreary hopeless environments, terminate $40 million worth of contracts with American industry, wreck dozens of painfully negotiated agreements with building trade unions to train young men in our conservation centers, cause almost 60 communities to lose the taxes and local business that stems from a $55 million payroll, chuck an investment by our taxpayers of over $70 million right out the window, and finally, arouse the righteous wrath and indignation of the conservation interests in this country? What indeed, Mr. Chairman, are we to think? Mr. Chairman, the administration is doing away with 59 Job Corps centers without permitting the Congress properly to express itself on this matter or to authorize this action. That is a basic constitutional question. Policy should be decided in the House of Representatives and that has been the historic position and as I understand it, that was the position of the administration when it was making its campaign across the country and complaining of the efforts on behalf of the then-President of the United States to inject himself into the operations of the legislative branch. It seems to me that the administration has almost completely ignored the Job Corps accomplishments and has acted through the Labor Department-which I believe as of this date lacks any legal authority over the Job Corps-to execute these drastic retrenchments in a vital national program. Even though the President said that the Labor Department would take over control on July 1, we find officials of the Labor Department making all the major decisions now. I supported the Reorganization Act. I believe in giving the President the authority to juggle things around in the interest of efficiency and economy. But here is an action coming before the transfer is made, if I understand what is taking place, and I haven't been very well informed, I must confess. I learned about these Job Corps cutbacks when I was watching a group of Job Corps workers working on a conservation highway at a national forest in my district. That is the first time in 23 years that any action has been taken with respect to any Federal project in my district and this was true of 8 years of Eisenhower-that I wasn't notified in advance of what the administration proposed to do in my district. They have decided on the magnitude of the cut, they have decided on where the cuts are coming from out of the Job Corps budget, they have decided which centers to close, they have decided that rural centers are less effective than urban centers, they have decided that the answer is to open up 30 new minicenters. They have made all these decisions before even getting the program officially, Mr. Chairman, or before they got the program in the Labor Department they have made these decisions, as I understand it. I hope I am correctly informed, because I have found it very difficult to get correctly informed on this matter. To this date I have not had a word about this thing from the administration. I called the White House the very night that I heard about it and friends of mine at the White House tried to find out what was going on, but even they didn't know what was going on. What if the Department proceeds to close down the centers and then does not receive the authorization to open up the 30 new ones? That certainly is within the realm of possibility. Congress is going to make the appropriations under which these new centers operate. Is the Secretary prepared to take that chance? If the Congress were able to assure him today, which of course we cannot, that he would not get the $30 million for the 30 new centers, would he still proceed to close the 59 centers? I don't know. There is very specific legislation on the Job Corps-of course, this committee knows that better than anybody else and I suspect these 30 new centers do not meet the legislative authority of the act. The Labor Department seems to believe that these things-I am talking about the existing Job Corps and particular Conservation Corps centers are simply bunkhouses where people merely sleep, whereas the Job Corps Act requires that the Job Corps program furnish a full range of services: educational, vocational, health, counseling, recreation and others. Ancillary questions are also raised such as congressional limitations on costs, percent of males in conservation centers. I supported the gentlelady in her amendment to require that a certain number of the Job Corpsmen, as I recall it, be women. Can they act on this authority to say that only 10 percent of them will be women? The legislation is just as substantive on other issues. Just how far do they think they can go in shuffling things around? |