Senator MAYBANK. But the thing that worries me was this tremendous displacement that they had me believing would happen if it was given.

Mr. KETCHUM. We may be accused of being selfish in that matter but we look at it this way: the present occupants have had the benefit of what we believe to be reasonably priced rental units, now we think the veteran ought to have an opportunity. In other words, if it is a choice of who is going to occupy those eventually we feel that the man who did not have that opportunity to occupy them ought to have first opportunity if the Government is going to dispose of them. Senator MAYBANK. The thing that worried me was the displacement feature.

Mr. KETCHUM. That is right. Well, certainly.

Senator MAYBANK. How are veterans doing on the sale of surplus housing properties now throughout the country? Mr. KETCHUM. Not very good.

Senator MAYBANK. Why are they not?

Mr. KETCHUM. Because we cannot get any preferences for veterans in the purchase of them. They insist on selling to the present occupants.

Senator MAYBANK. Take a project that has been declared surplus and is left with the local administration. In other words, a housing development that we will say the city of Detroit or Charleston might have. That is now empty, because of the war industries moving away. Are not the veterans given preference?

Mr. KETCHUM. I would like to refer that to our national officer. Mr. PEARCE. Yes, sir, I think that they are giving veterans a preference on rental of the low-cost rental.

Senator MAYBANK. I mean where they have been abandoned because of a war sale.

Mr. PEARCE. No, sir. I do not think they are getting a fair shot. I think it is going to large contractors.

Senator MAYBANK. How can we stop that?

Mr. KETCHUM. By just what we have suggested.

Senator MAYBANK. How can this committee be of assistance now to see that outside-now you take the college, in the instance of a college there is a veterans preference and the veterans in the colleges I know have first call on them. How can we get legislation immediately to make certain that the veterans get these surplus properties? Mr. KETCHUM. You cannot be assured of getting legislation through promptly. Therefore, the only thing I know that you can do is for this committee to indicate to Mr. Dillon Meyer who is the Administrator of the Federal Public Housing Administration, that you would like to see a policy established of giving veterans preference. Senator MAYBANK. To that I thoroughly agree but can Mr. Meyer make the city of Detroit or Cleveland or Charleston or what have you, can he make that city do that?

Mr. KETCHUM. Now, we are getting into two phases. As I understand your question now it is the property that is owned and controlled by the city and not by the Federal Public Housing Administration. Senator MAYBANK. It is owned by the Federal Housing Commission, but it has been operated under contracts with the cities.

Mr. KETCHUM. Well, if the city is relinquishing a contract, then

Mr. Meyer, as Administrator of Federal Public Housing has the authority to determine the disposition of the property.

Senator MAYBANK. And not the commissioners of the city?

Mr. KETCHUM. I should not see why if they are relinquishing their contract and they have not taken it over even on a sales agreement. I do not see why the authority does not rest with the Federal Public Housing Administration.

Senator MAYBANK. I have heard of instances where the Federal Public Housing Administration have left it to the communities, maybe just passing the buck you might say.

Mr. KETCHUM. That is right. That is a discretionary authority. We have appealed to more than one committee of the Congress, to try and get them to indicate to Mr. Myer that veterans preference in the purchase or disposition of those properties is very desirable.

We have repeatedly asked him for that preference, and the only preference that we have ever been able to obtain was on one housing project down in North Carolina at Wilmington, and we got that through Mr. Wilson Wyatt before he resigned as Housing Expediter, head of the Housing Administration.

Senator MAYBANK. My Myer has not done it.

Mr. KETCHUM. No, sir. Mr. Chairman, if there are no more questions

Senator MCCARTHY. Mr. Chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. Senator McCarthy.

Senator MCCARTHY. I gather you have made quite a study of the housing situation. Have you gone into the question of just what effect the practices of your building trades unions have upon the Housing Authority?

Mr. KETCHUM. That is a rather involved and complicated subject, Senator. Of course we look with some apprehension upon some of the restrictions that have been employed by the building trades unions which were developed back in the days of the depression when they were trying to spread the work.

It is unfortunate that in these tight labor markets today that some of those restrictions are still held over. However, our policy has been not to intervene or intercede in disputes between labor and management. We try to keep as far as possible

Senator MCCARTHY. Let me interrupt there. I do not know of any dispute between labor and management in your building trade. You seem to have an unusual set-up there with your building-trade union and your building contractors. They have a very definite mutuality of interest, have they not?

Mr. KETCHUM. Nominally, on the surface, but if you talk to the building contractors on the side, they will gripe their heads off about the restrictions which the trade-unions have imposed. They may not do it here before this committee.

Senator MCCARTHY. Does not your study convince you that the restrictive practices in that particular trade may be more responsible than anything else for the tremendous housing shortage.

Mr. KETCHUM. As a matter of fact, I would not say that it was primarily responsible or was more responsible than any other factor, but I will tell you this: That our commander in chief in communications to the president of the American Federation of Labor, where many of

the building crafts have their membership, has appealed to him to cooperate with the Government, and with the construction industry, and with the needs of veterans, to try, insofar as humanly possible, to remove existing restrictions which we feel are a handicap to a full and expanded housing-construction program.

We have appealed to them to eliminate those restrictions and to encourage the unions to eliminate those restrictions.

Senator MCCARTHY. Unless those restrictions are eliminated, no matter what housing law we pass it is going to be impossible to get low-cost housing.

Mr. KETCHUM. That is right because naturally you are going to pay more for the labor that goes in there on account of these restrictions.

Senator MCCARTHY. Would you agree with me that in this particular instance it is not primarily a contest between labor and management but a contest between the building trades unions combining with your contractors against the public.

There is no point here between your labor union and your contractors. They have got a mutuality of interest in restricting building.

Mr. KETCHUM. I would not want to brand it as a contest between the labor unions and the public.

Senator MCCARTHY. No, let us get this straight. We are not talking about the labor unions versus the public. I am asking you this question: In this particular instance, are not the interests of the building trades unions and your contractors identical to the point that there is no contest, and that they are both cooperating in the extension and perpetuation of these restrictions, and that your contractor is equally guilty with your building trades unions.

Mr. KETCHUM. I am not so sure. It is entirely possible that the contractor is going along. Maybe it is because he has got a gun at his head and there is nothing else for him to do. In order to keep harmonious relations with labor it may be necessary for him to subscribe to those practices but I know from my experience that many contractors are not in agreement with those restrictive practices and would like to see them discontinued. They may not talk about it publicly.

Senator MCCARTHY. In any event, can we say this: that unless we go into that whole field and do something to eliminate those restrictive practices, that the passage of housing bills will help very little.

Mr. KETCHUM. I would not say it would help it very little, but I will tell you this: the continuation of those practices are going to make for high cost housing and the only way you can make for low cost housing for the veterans is through Government subsidy just like we are proposing here.

The Government is going to have to add the difference between what the high costs are and what the veteran can afford to pay. You are right as far as that is concerned.

Senator MCCARTHY. So in effect, we end with the Government—

all of us-paying for these restrictive practices?

Mr. KETCHUM. Absolutely. There is no question about it.
Senator MCCARTHY. Thank you very much.

The CHAIRMAN. The chair will call to the stand Mr. Coleman Woodbury, executive director of the National Association of Housing Officials. Mr. Woodbury.

STATEMENT OF COLEMAN WOODBURY, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF HOUSING OFFICIALS

Mr. WOODBURY. Mr. Chairman, I have here a short statement which I think will take me about 5 minutes to read, possibly. The CHAIRMAN. Go ahead.

Mr. WOODBURY. My name is Coleman Woodbury and I am the executive director of the National Association of Housing Officials. The association's primary purpose is to help in improving standards and practices in the administration of official-housing programs. Although it does not formally act on housing bills, Federal, State, or local, I am confident that an overwhelming majority of its members do strongly endorse the objectives, principles, and substantive content of S. 866.

I understand that your committee wishes witnesses to confine their discussion of the bill largely to differences between its provisions and those of S. 1592 passed by the Senate of the last Congress. To save as much of your time as possible, may I limit my remarks to suggestions on three points:

(1) First, there is wide agreement, I believe, on the need for better information and analysis of local housing needs and markets. Probably no activity comparable to housing in size and importance proceeds with so little reliable, up-to-date information on the nature and extent of the needs it is trying to fill. This accounts in part for the sharp ups and downs in volume of housing produced. It also contributes to the volume of misunderstanding and of heated but often unnecessary controversy among the various kinds of housing producers and agencies.

S. 1592 not only authorized the National Housing Administrator to encourage local market analyses and surveys of need but also authorized him to give financial help on a 50-50 matching basis to official local bodies for these purposes.

S. 866 drops out the provision for financial aid. I would suggest that the committee might consider putting it back for a limited period of time; the amount would be small as housing figures go; it could benefit the whole range of local housing agencies and enterprise; the results would also be of real value to Federal housing agencies in their programs and to the Congress itself in determining national housing policy.

(2) Both S. 1592 and S. 866 would provide a 20 percent gap between the upper rent limits in public housing and the lowest rent in a locality at which a substantial supply of decent housing is available-either newly built or second-hand.

Although the provisions of the two bills are the same on this point, I venture to call it to your attention today because I believe that during the last year or more, the movement of housing costs and family incomes probably has increased substantially the proportion of families who, under this policy, would have access to no supply of decent housing privately built, secondhand, or local authority.

Although I firmly believe that public housing should be confined to needs safely below those served by private builders, I would suggest that your committee might consider whether the 20 percent gap provision, under present conditions, is not unnecessarily severe.

If you should agree on this point, the provision might be modified without endangering the principle of adequate separation. The gap, for example, might be reduced from 20 percent to, say, 10 percent. Or it might be kept at 20 percent but be measured between the upper limits of local authority rents and the rents of newly built private housing. Under the latter provision, families whose rentals fall within the gap would often be able to get acceptable housing via the handing-down process.

(3) The earlier bill provided for a national housing agency, the Administrator of which would have general supervision of three operating constituents, each of which, however, would keep a very substantial amount of administrative discretion and responsibility. S. 866 created no such agency but in its place, provides for an eightman coordinating council presided over by a National Housing Administrator who, in addition to his responsibilities as leader and spokesman for the council, is also responsible for administering the Federal aids for land assembly and redevelopment. And he is specifically prohibited from delegating any of his functions and powers in respect to urban redevelopment.

Although the parallels are not exact, the committee-coordinator arrangement has many similarities to the set-up of the Central Housing Committee, established as an administrative device in 1935, and the Division of Defense Housing Coordination, organized in 1940.

I would suggest that the committee might find the record of these two organizations pertinent in deciding whether the proposed National Housing Commission is the best set-up for its purpose. If some such arrangement is kept, I believe the position of the National Housing Administrator would be somewhat more tenable if he were able to delegate his functions in respect to urban redevelopment.

In closing, may I thank you for this opportunity to comment on some phases of the bill. May I also say again that with or without the changes suggested, its passage would, in my opinion, be a real milestone in housing progress in this country.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much.

STATEMENT OF F. H. LAGUARDIA, CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL FAIR RENT COMMITTEE, WASHINGTON, D. C.

The CHAIRMAN. Fiorello LaGuardia, sometimes known as the Little Flower, but I paraphrase that. I call him the little giant. Here he is.

Mr. LAGUARDIA. Thank you very much.

It is my understanding that a basketful of rent-control bills has been introduced into the Congress and, if you put them together, the schemes run all the way from abolishing control of rents to throwing an essentially administrative function into the courts and bogging down the local judicial administration to flat increases varying from 10 to 20 percent.

I want to judge these various proposals by a rather simple measuring stick: Will they maintain stable rents throughout the United States during this acutest housing shortage in our history or will they not?

If they fail to maintain stable rents, I do not care what kind of administrative language you write into the bill and what formula you