ago. Then they showed some sensitivity to this, but we will have to just wait and see in the development of those regulations.

But I think you have been very specific in these suggestions, and I want to commend you for them. I am in complete agreement.

Mr. PEPPER. Thank you very much.

Senator KENNEDY. Senator Percy.

Senator PERCY. Just a very few quick questions to be sure the record is complete now. Before I ask them, I would like to say I have never sponsored a piece of legislation that groups could not go after it later and find ways to improve it. I am asking these questions in that spirit. If the answers are in any way critical of what has been done, I want to go on the record now in saying I know Commissioner Martin almost dropped everything in order to try to put out the regulations to cover this kind of program when there was not much time.

Do you feel the regulations reflect the original intent when drafting the authorizing legislation or are they subject to improvement?

SOME GUIDELINES CONTRARY TO INTENT

Mr. PEPPER. I think they are subject to improvement and in several respects, most of which I enumerated in my statement. The proposed guidelines do not reflect the intention of the authors of the legislation and in some respects they go exactly contrary to the intent, as, for example, with respect to the means test and with respect to the area projects and who is going to administer the programs.

Senator PERCY. So I think from the standpoint of our intent in the Senate we possibly in the legislative history should have made it a little clearer. I think the incidence of cheating in this area would be very small. I am willing to tolerate, let's say, 3 or 4 or 5 percent because I have gone around and I have wondered occasionally at seeing a retired teacher sitting there, but I would not want to take that retired teacher who is living on a minimum income and subject her to a means test. I have seen some of them who, because they came there, they needed something else. Maybe they could have afforded a dollar and a half for a meal, but with their higher educational quality they gave something and stayed. They needed nourishment for the soul, really. They were there for a purpose, and I think they contributed more than they took away from the total program. So I would not want to subject them to

a means test.

Is the State of Florida prepared to implement this program on July 1?

Mr. PEPPER. No. We recommended that Mr. Oliver Jerrigan be permitted to appear today and I hope he appears. He is the head of the Bureau of Aging under the Department of Public Welfare in Florida, and he revealed rather disappointingly to me that he had not prepared any kind of a comprehensive program. I spoke to the Governor about this and asked him to put some impetus behind it, but we cannot possibly come up with a comprehensive State program that would have an opportunity to be considered and criticized and then reviewed in Washington and get this thing started in the next 2 or 3 months.

That is the reason I think this committee can perform a magnificent service, if you will get them to start something with the people that are

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already able to put a program into effect that are already carrying on a nutritional program in many areas, with such others that might be brought in, and then we could perfect the organizational chart at a later time.

Senator PERCY. One last question. It is not directly related to this legislation, but we have had 1 day of hearings on what I consider to be quite an interesting fact that we discovered. As of June 30, $400 million is going to be returned to the Treasury Department as unused by the Department of Agriculture, that was authorized and appropriated by Congress to feed the hungry and malnourished in this country. I chaired these hearings to find out whether the hunger gap had been closed and to proclaim hallelujah if we had closed the hunger gap and we returned all that money because we had solved the problem. Could I ask the question of you: Have we closed the hunger gap in the State of Florida?

FAR FROM CLOSING HUNGER GAP

Mr. PEPPER. I will say to the able Senator, far from it. Not only are the statistics generally available that show that a large-I believe it is about 20 or 30 percent-group of the senior citizens of this country have a below poverty line income level, but I know from my own area at the present time that I have within my district, South Beach along Miami Beach, there are some 30,000 or 40,000 people below that level. I was down there one time with a member of the Ways and Means Committee from the House of Representatives, and we had a public meeting and had 300 to 400 people there.

I asked the question of those people: "How many of you here receive any income other than your social security? Those who do not receive any income but social security, hold up your hands." There was a forest of hands in the room.

Then I said, "Everybody in this room who receives less than $100 a month, hold up your hand," and three-fourths of the hands went up. Then I asked, "How many of you receive less than $75 a month total income?" and at least 30 or 40 percent of the hands went up then.

I have been in the apartments of those people where they had their food in paper sacks along the floor because they did not have any kind of a refrigerator. In the winter they would use their gas stoves to heat the place because their apartments had no central heat; and sometimes, when there was a little temporary cool period, the landlords would shut off the gas. If they bought a newspaper it meant, ordinarily, a sacrifice in some food for them at the cheapest cafeteria-or any other place that they could possibly find.

Now, the able Senator has been out over the country and seen the need for it, and it is shocking to me that there would be a surplus of money for food from the Department of Agriculture turned back to the Treasury when there are so many hungry people in this country as there are, particularly in the senior citizens' groups.

Senator PERCY. We have had testimony that there is still a great deal of hunger among elderly people and among other people in this country, and in a few days the administration will be called in to answer as to why $400 million is being returned. I will precede the

hearing by this statement: That in recent years we have done more to close the hunger gap than at any period in our history-and Senator McGovern made that statement originally-but the question is: Have we finished the job? I am told delivery is difficult to get meals to the elderly. Let me ask this question: Do you find any citizens in the State of Florida that we cannot, somehow, that the Federal Government cannot get an income tax statement to before April 15?

Mr. PEPPER. It is shocking to suggest that with all this communication and transportation facilities that we have and the ingenuity that I still think Americans possess, that we cannot get some meals to the people that need it in any part of America. Senator PERCY. Thank you very much.

TAKE CAREFUL SCRUTINY OF MERGE PROPOSALS

Mr. PEPPER. Mr. Chairman, there is one thing I would like to throw out as sort of a caveat. I am advised that there is an administration proposal to merge possibly this Older Americans Act and the Social Services Act. Now, I think all of us ought to take careful scrutiny of such proposals to see whether or not it is in the interest of the elderly people that we do separate these two functions. If we do put them together, at least let's see to it that there is no diminution in the amount of money provided for them separately if they should be merged.

Senator KENNEDY. Before leaving, Congressman Pepper, we hear so much about the response that if we set a minimum figure, which I think should be probably established or set by the local groups, that maybe there will be people that will come in there and cheat on it. I mean, we do not even blink about 35 or 45 percent pilferage in Saigon Harbor, and yet when it comes to 4 or 5 percent or something of our elderly people, everybody starts making a big issue of it.

Senator PERCY. Nor do we fail to blink at the possibilities of fraud that exists in our agriculture surplus crop support programs that cost $3 or $4 billion and the excess payments that may be made in those programs. These programs have been going on for 30-some years now. Mr. PEPPER. Senators, we have all been around here a good long while. I have generally observed that the Government of the United States can do what it really wants to do. When we establish a list of priorities, we carry them out, and I am glad to see this problem emerging as a priority, and we can do it if we just will, and we are not beginning to meet the needs in this area.

Senator KENNEDY. Just finally, Congressman, we will be talking about these regulations this morning and about the difficulties of Florida getting a chance to develop a program. As you remember, we passed this legislation at the end of last year. We could have passed that and the President could have signed that in December, but Mr. Ford in the House of Representatives, the minority leader over there, objected to the consideration so it was put off until February and not signed by the President until March. I know Commissioner Martin will be taking the heat from many of the State Governors and administrators for the failure of getting the regulations out until the past few days and not giving elderly people a chance to respond to these regulations.

But if there had not been objection to this, we could have passed that bill and it could have been implemented. It would have given Mr. Martin the time to develop these regulations and given more time for elderly people to make comments, and States a chance to take advantage of this program much earlier.

Since we are talking about regulations and giving Commissioner Martin some heat about them and about their development and the lack of time, I think it is appropriate to look back and find out where some of the problems began.

Mr. PEPPER. I think what you say is so significant. I remember very well the disappointment we all had when that objection was made. We would not, under any circumstances, criticize adversely Mr. Martin, but we might induce him to recognize that in view of the tardiness with which he was able to get these guidelines prepared, perhaps due to circumstances beyond his control, we might have a more flexible system of effective application of the program, at least in the first year, until we can perfect the organizational symmetry of what may seem most desirable.

Senator KENNEDY. Thank you very much.

Mr. PEPPER. Thank you.

Senator KENNEDY. Our next witness is Dr. Jean Mayer, who is professor of nutrition at Harvard University, perhaps the Nation's foremost authority on what we eat and shouldn't and what we do not eat and should. Dr. Mayer has distinguished himself throughout his career, not only in the expertise area of nutrition, but in educating the public of the linkage between the problems of nutrition and the problems of poverty and the problems of child care and problems of the elderly. He is Chairman of the White House Conference on Food, Nutrition, and Health; and Chairman of the nutrition section on the White House Conference on Aging.

Dr. Mayer has been a source of counsel for both the executive and legislative branches of Government. We want to welcome you here. STATEMENT OF DR. JEAN MAYER, PROFESSOR OF NUTRITION, HARVARD UNIVERSITY

Dr. MAYER. Mr. Chairman, Senator Percy, a number of the points which I think deserve to be emphasized have already been made in Congressman Pepper's interesting testimony. I would like, though, to have an opportunity to review the social and general medical context in which the elderly have problems, to talk about their specific nutritional problems, and to discuss a number of criticisms of proposed regulations.

I think that it is worth mentioning that while we have recently become interested in the problems of the elderly, our country has never been particularly kind to the old. It has always been a country which offered opportunities to the young and the vigorous, but I think it may be said that in the very founding of the country and in its settlement westward the elderly were left behind. They were left behind in Europe, England, Italy, Ireland, and they were left behind in the westward migrations. People who settled in Illinois probably left

aged parents in New England without the insurance that they would receive needed help, such as the provision of wood in winter.

The geographic abandonment of the elderly has been precipitated by the great mobility of our citizenry in the pursuit of better job opportunities. People move extremely frequently and either do not want to or cannot take their aged parents with them. So we are dealing with a population which is not only poor, but also tends to be isolated from their relatives.

Sometimes the isolation takes place even in a small geographic area. I think all of us are familiar with neighborhoods, which have changed in character, leaving the elderly behind, increasingly isolated from friends and relatives, trying to center themselves around their churches and what community centers they can support.

From the medical viewpoint, the aged suffer from a great many handicaps. In fact, to become older is to be hit by various diseases of old age. The most significant, of course, is cardiovascular disease, heart disease, disease of blood vessels, which are not only our number one cause of mortality but also our number one cause of disability. The hardening of the blood vessels leads not only to strokes and coronaries but to renal diseases, to loss of hearing, to loss of vision, and to loss of limbs. A great many of our older people are diabetic, which aggravates the risk of cardiovascular diseases. Many have arithritis which. seriously hampers their mobility.

The lack of mobility due to chronic diseases is compounded by the inability of the elderly to afford cars.

Another problem suffered by the elderly, particularly the poor, is the loss of teeth. A great majority have either no teeth or badly fitted dentures. This of course limits their diet.

Finally, as has been said already by you, Mr. Chairman, by Senator Percy, and by Congressman Pepper, the elderly are poor. Most of the elderly today are not covered by Social Security. Their occupations were not covered by Social Security when they worked. Many have no pension, and certainly one of the outright scandals of our industrial society is the loss of vesting of pension rights causing people who have worked a very large part of their life to lose pension rights if they lose their job due to changes in the economy.

The net effect of all this is that the elderly either live alone, isolated, or they tend to be put prematurely into nursing homes by their children, usually because their children fear that unless their parents are institutionalized they will not be fed and no one will look in on them every day-they could break a leg or hip coming out of the bathtub and not be found until too late.

ELDERLY FEEL INCARCERATED IN NURSING HOMES

It is my experience that the elderly feel about nursing homes just the way the young feel about the draft. They do not want to go. They feel that it is an abrogration of their most basic freedoms and they feel that it is forced on them by the middle-class power structure over which they have no control. It is done for "their own good," but very often their house is sold out from under them so that the money will become available for them to be incarcerated in the nursing homes.