made here today by William Belanger, president of the New England Conference of ČIŎ Councils.

I wish to emphasize a few of Mr. Belanger's points by making refence to the Connecticut situation, with which I am most familiar.

First, a special session of Congress should be called to appropriate immediately the necessary funds for carrying out the program of Federal aid which we all agree is urgent.

I am afraid that if we delay action until the regular session of Congress, many additional months will be lost before actual construction of dams can be started. Each month of delay is another month of peril to the people in the danger areas of our river valleys. The people in these areas in Connecticut are so apprehensive after being struck twice, that now they actually are afraid when it begins to rain.

In the lower Naugatuck Valley, for example, businessmen and industrial management people as well as factory workers are demanding action to defend themselves from the river. They want to have the Army engineers dredge the river as a first step, to deepen its channel. This is, of course, only a temporary expedient. The only long-term protection they can get from floods is a dam at Thomaston, a project drafted by the Corps of Engineers and previously authorized by Congress.

But work on this project cannot be started until Congress appropriates the $6 million or more which the dam will cost. If Congress acted next month, work could probably be started before the ground freezes. If Congress waits until next spring or summer, the valley will be exposed to another full season of hurricane and flood damages. So a special session of Congress is the first requirement. I hope this committee will support that proposal.

Secondly, with respect to Federal disaster insurance, I suggest that many ordinary people who have lost homes and small-business establishments in the last two floods are not going to be helped by insurance for the future. Many of these are not eligible for aid by Red Cross, and to borrow even at low interest rates means starting all over for many of them.

To rebuild their homes and businesses, why should not Federal flood insurance be made retroactive to cover these last two floods, at least? Anything they may have received from Red Cross would be deducted, naturally; but if we can help people be compensated for losses in next year's floods, why not help those who have been hard hit by the last two?

I believe that such a program would have to be carefully worked out, to prevent boondoggling; but I am convinced that present programs of State and Federal aid at least those I know about-will not help a large number of individuals who deserve actual financial aid right

now.

For large industrial corporations with greater resources and the capacity to absorb much of their losses through tax writeoffs, such a program as I suggest would not apply. But possibly they could be granted certificates of necessity by the Federal Government for the equipment and buildings which they have had to replace.

I hope your committee will give some study to this idea, which may be novel, but I believe to be sound and equitable. If we can afford $34 billion or more for Federal defense spending this year, we should be able to afford half a billion for the rehabilitation of our people.

Mr. JONES. Thank you very much, Mr. Driscoll.

Have you reviewed the task force discussion of disaster insurance contained in volume 3 of the task force report?

Mr. DRISCOLL. No, I have not, sir.

Mr. JONES. Are there any questions?

(No response.)

Mr. JONES. Thank you very much, Mr. Driscoll.

Mr. DRISCOLL. Thank you.

Mr. JONES. Mr. Belanger.

STATEMENT OF J. WILLIAM BELANGER, PRESIDENT, NEW ENGLAND CONGRESS OF INDUSTRIAL

CONFERENCE,

COUNCILS

ORGANIZATIONS

My name is J. William Belanger. I am president of the New England Conference of CIO Councils.

To the workers of the region, floodwaters are not only a menace to be controlled, but also a great asset which can be stored and used for stream regulation and power. With proper planning and unified Federal development, the storage and release of such waters will also contribute to pollution abatement, water supply and recreation.

Rivers are thus an important part of the common wealth to be harnessed for the benefit of all. We would point out that, following devastating floods in New England nearly a generation ago, the Boston Society of Civil Engineers concluded that the construction of power storage reservoirs would afford New England the best floodcontrol program.

From this point of view we are convinced that adoption of the recommendations of the Hoover Commission in this field, resting on the colossal misrepresentation found in the report of a power-trustminded Task Force on Water Resources and Power, would contribute a blow at the welfare of New England from which it would probably

never recover.

Actually, the effect of the Hoover recommendations would be to fasten permanently on New England the restrictive water resources policy which the private power monopolists have so far been able to maintain through their influence in the governments of some of the several States. That policy has so far never had Federal sanction, except through the administrative decisions of the Eisenhower administration, which is reported to be putting into effect the Hoover Commission recommendations so far as it can without the sanction of Congress.

This administrative misinterpretation of the country's water resources and power legislation can be quickly reversed by Congress and the people. But such reversal might be postponed until too late if Congress itself, as a result of misinformation and utility propaganda, should modify existing laws to give force to the Hoover Commission recommendations. Action by the Congress itself may be postponed until too late if New England's water problem is not resolved in the immediate future. Our area is the most studied of any in the world. The time has come for action, and the sooner the better. We of CIO in New England feel the time has come for a special session of the Federal Congress.

We urge this committee, and the New England congressional delegation, to help us get the extensive and special attention which the recent floods again prove we need to finally solve New England's water-control problems. Federal action is long overdue and a special session is necessary because authorization of the program and appropriation of the necessary funds cannot be delayed by the usual processes of next January's session of Congress if we are to have the opportunity to contain similar floods in 1956 or 1957. Congress can and must act on proposals for a system of disaster insurance in sufficient time to benefit areas which might be affected by next spring's freshets.

PRIVATE POWER COMPANIES OF NEW ENGLAND BLAMED

We feel that the private power companies of New England today must shoulder a tremendous burden of responsibility for the flood damages which portions of this region have suffered, as well as for the excessive electric rates which are restricting the region's use of electricity, thereby cramping its business expansion and industrial progress.

By this, we do not mean to imply that the multiple-purpose projects for flood control and hydroelectric power, which have been planned or considered for the region's major river basins, would have protected all the areas hit by the particular floods of 1955. What we do mean is that the continuous influence of the power companies on the region's public opinion and governmental policy has kept New England from getting its fair share of the Federal multiple-purpose water resources programs which would have provided not only flood control power reservoirs affording maximum protection against basinwide floods, but also single-purpose flood-control reservoirs and local flood protection works on smaller streams not adapted to multiple-purpose development.

We all know the extent to which the private power companies, to maintain their monopoly position, have played up regional attitudes, including the so-called "sturdy independence" of New Englanders, and suggested objections to reservoir occupancy of valley lands as a means of blocking Federal multiple-purpose river-basin development. And within the last few months we have learned where the rejection of Federal programs has brought us.

We of CIO are convinced that if this policy, which has thwarted comprehensive river-basin development in New England for nearly 20 years, is given congressional sanction through approval of the Hoover Commission recommendations, it will mean higher electric rates and less flood control for New England. This will seriously affect the region's industrial activity. It will be reflected in less employment and lower living standards.

On the other hand, our members feel certain that a vigorous Federal program of multiple-purpose river-basin development in the region will not only assure maximum flood control, but also will show the way for very substantial reductions in the electric rates charged by the region's private power systems, without interference with their earnings.

We are in favor of the prompt undertaking of such a Federal New England river-development program.

A COMPREHENSIVE RIVER DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM FOR NEW ENGLAND

In amplifying this general point of view, I want to emphasize first the importance to New England of a program for catching and storing floodwaters, rather than simply catching them and then letting them out as rapidly as the capacity of the river within its banks will permit.

The Connecticut River, for example, reveals the extreme variations in flow which are characteristic of all New England streams. During the March 1936 flood the flow at Hartford reached a maximum of $13,000 cubic feet per second. On the other hand, the average monthly river flow in the same vicinity reached a low of 2,890 cubic feet per second in September and October 1930. Now we all know how disastrous the high flows are, but we sometimes forget that the low flows result in shortages of water for industrial purposes and increased pollution concentrates until they become a nuisance. This means that a sound flood-control program requires more storage for river regu

lation.

Projects have, at one time or another, been included in the plans for this river which, in addition to controlling floods, would have more than doubled the low flows. Furthermore, they would have provided much good hydroelectric power. These projects are available for undertaking today, if we can get the New England States to cast off the reactionary private power company influence which has penetrated almost every agency of government. But, even if the New England States free themselves of this power company dictatorship, they will be checkmated if the Hoover Commission recommendations are put into effect at the national level.

PRESIDENT'S WATER RESOURCES POLICY COMMISSION RECOMMENDS SOUND MULTIPLE-PURPOSE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM FOR NEW ENGLAND RIVERS

The situation today is summed up in the report of the President's Water Resources Policy Commission, volume II, Ten Rivers in America's Future, issued in 1951. This survey points out with respect to the Connecticut River Basin that no projects—

which include hydroelectric powerplants are presently recommended for construction by any Federal agency.

It notes that 21 flood-control reservoirs were authorized for Federal construction but

because of local opposition to such reservoirs, only five of these have been constructed and placed in operation.

The study further states that the 953,000 kilowatts of undeveloped hydroelectric power in the basin

could be used within the basin, integrated with steam electric power in the present power system, or if desired by the local people, it could be used, in part, in a separate system integrated with base-load power from the International Rapids project on the St. Lawrence River.

Since the issuance of that report, private power interests have undertaken two developments rated at a combined total of 144,000 kilowatts in the Commission's estimate of undeveloped power in this basin. So the present potential would be slightly over 800,000 kilowatts.

The Water Resources Policy Commission recognized that the development of a sound multiple-purpose program in the basin presents

problems involved in the inundation of valley floors, but indicated that this merely required the selection of sites for conservation storage and power which would hold interference with existing land use to a practical minimum. In fact, it pointed out that, because of these difficulties, every advantage should be taken of the possibilities of multiplepurpose storage and that there should be systemwide management of reservoir operations to permit the maintenance of pools at relatively constant levels during the recreation season. After listing the potential projects, the Commission said:

The many possible reservoirs can greatly extend the recreation base, improve the low flow of streams, and greatly reduce the floodflows. The power possibilities are such that if a properly integrated system is established it can be a catalyst that may place New England on the same basis or even at some advantage over many other areas in electric rates. The people of the region have a choice a status quo or a great integrated development.

A preliminary reconnaissance of the possibilities of combining St. Lawrence power with certain power developments in the streams of northeastern New York and northern New England, prepared for the Commission, revealed possibilities which are of great interest to the workers and farmers of New England and, in fact, the entire Northeast. The combination selected included about 40 percent of the undeveloped waterpower, exclusive of the St. Lawrence and Passamaquoddy, in the combined areas.

The report shows that, serving what then was a normal system load, the St. Lawrence project and the selected projects mainly in New England streams would have a combined dependable capacity of 1,866,000 kilowatts with coordinated operation, as compared with a corresponding figure of only 1,450,000 kilowatts if operated separately. The report says:

The gain due to coordination would result from the use of the International Rapids project for base load in support of the peak power capacity of the listed river plants, and from the use of peak load power at the river plants in coordination with the base load of the International Rapids project.

The report further points out that another advantage would be derived from the diversity of seasonal power, which it explains as follows:

For instance, in 1934 the low St. Lawrence flow and power would have been supported by normal power from New England rivers, and again in 1930 the St. Lawrence flow and power was above the average and would have supported the deficiency of energy from New England rivers.

The report estimated that the cost of the combined hydro power from the 52 projects included in the coordinated program, delivered to markets, would be about 6 mills per kilowatt-hour for the 9.7 billion kilowatt-hours available after allowance for transmission losses. This compares with power costs approximately double that figure today. Public development of the great Niagara resource would add about 1,500,000 kilowatts of capacity and nearly 8 million kilowatt-hours of energy to this low-cost power combination.

It is our view that such a program would result in tremendous gains for New England in the way of lower electric rates for homes and farms, and lower power costs for business and industry. The region has so far forfeited its opportunity to share in these important possibilities with a resultant loss in jobs and industry. But if the changes in Federal water resources and power policy recommended by the

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