TESTIMONY OF CAROLINE RUSSELL MILLER, GREENBELT, MD.

Mrs. MILLER. By way of introduction, I would like to say that I am a Greenbelt housewife. As far as service to the community has gone, I have served in the capacity of chairman of the food-conservation committee. Some of you gentlemen may remember that.

In Greenbelt, we formed a committee, which pattern was followed throughout the country during the emergency food program.

Incidentally, the cooperative out there was most helpful in sponsoring that, and in helping me to get it going, and I feel we did a job which helped Greenbelt and set a very good pattern.

My point of view, which I would like to present, is that I think for the best protection of the people of Greenbelt, Greenbelt Consumer Services should continue to operate the stores in the center within the half-mile radius and by all means to go ahead with the new supermarket.

The chairman has suggested to some of the other witnesses, or has asked them what their opinion would be if another store came into that new building.

Chairman FLOESER. I will not have to ask you. You go right ahead. Mrs. MILLER. Should I answer that?

Chairman PLOESER. Go right ahead.

Mrs. MILLER. I would really like to.

Chairman PLOESER. I would like to have it.

Mrs. MILLER. Because I have seen the work of the cooperative very closely. I have been very interested in it.

I feel that they deserve the chance to operate in a first-class store. The management that we have now is doing a fine job. They have had to operate under difficulties. Management difficulties which were inherited from the former manager, wartime difficulties, labor shortages, and so forth and so on.

I would like to see them have the opportunity to demonstrate what they can do in a first-rate store.

Chairman PLOESER. You need additional facilities out there?
Mrs. MILLER. Definitely we need them.

Chairman PLOESER. And you feel that this restriction on the center, as you said, should be restricted to the present cooperative that is operating?

Mrs. MILLER. I do. I definitely do.

I also would like to point out that I think there has been mentioned or suggested to other witnesses that for instance the haberdashery might come in where the old food store was. Another operator might come in there.

Chairman PLOESER. Junior department store.

Mrs. MILLER. Junior department store.

Chairman FLOESER. I do not know what that is.

Mrs. MILLER. It occurred to me that even if you had 10 different operators in there, 10 different stores, there would be no competition between them if they were each in a different line. I just wanted to mention that in passing.

Chairman PLOESER. That is right.

Mrs. MILLER. One other point. Besides my confidence in the present management, I wanted to make

Chairman PLOESER. Would you have any-I guess it is useless as a question, because I think you have already answered it. I was going to ask if you would object to the competitive store coming in.

Mrs. MILLER. I would within that radius, because I have confidence in the present management that we will get first-rate service.

The other point that I was going to make I think amplifies that. It is a consumer cooperative.

If I find out, as a housewife, that I am getting poor treatment in any way, I have a definite course of action I can take.

I first go to the store manager. If I do not get satisfaction there, I go to Mr. Ashelman. If I do not get satisfaction there, I go to the board of directors, and if necessary take it up on the floor of the membership meeting. You cannot do that with any other kind of business.

Chairman PLOESER. What do you do with private business, when you do not get satisfaction?

Mrs. MILLER. You go somewhere else.

Chairman PLOESER. You are not restricted to that. You could do that where you are now, if you had some place else to go.

Mrs. MILLER. I suppose you could, but I think it is better to try to improve a bad situation than to have to go elsewhere.

Chairman PLOESER. If you found a bad situation in a private store, what would you do?

Mrs. MILLER. I would probably go to the manager and bawl him out, but I would not have any control if he still refused to carry, for instance, an article I thought was essential. There would be no way in the world I could get him to do it. With the set-up we have now, there is a way.

Chairman PLOESER. If you were a stockholder in that store, do you think you would have any influence in his carrying it out?

Mrs. MILLER. In a private business? Well, I suppose if I were a very large stockholder I would, but in Greenbelt you only have to have $10.

Chairman PLOESER. That is my size. All right.

Mrs. MILLER. I think that is all.

Chairman PLOESER. May I ask you this: Do you own class A and B stock?

Mrs. MILLER. Yes. My husband and I each have voting shares totaling $20, and we have five additional shares, totaling $70. Chairman PLOESER. You did not have to tell the amount.

Mrs. MILLER. Well, I do not mind.

Chairman PLOESER. That is all right.

Mrs. MILLER. I did want to say that the additional $50 that we have has largely been accrued through patronage dividends.

Chairman PLOESER. That is class B?

Mrs. MILLER. Yes.

That is all I have to say.

Chairman PLOESER. Any questions?

Mr. Reihlman?

Mr. RIEHLMAN. No questions.

Chairman PLOESER. Mr. Patman?

Mr. PATMAN. No.

Chairman PLOESER. Thank you.

Next witness.

Mr. BALLINGER. Mr. Paul Borsky.

Chairman PLOESER. State you full name, please.

Mr. BORSKY. Paul N. Borsky.

Chairman PLOESER. Do you swear that the testimony you are about to give will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth? Mr. BORSKY. I do.

TESTIMONY OF PAUL N. BORSKY, GREENBELT, MD.

Mr. BORSKY. I think Mrs. Miller has made a number of points that I intended to make.

Over lunch I jotted down a few notes and observations I have made during the past 2 days.

I do not think-well, first, for the record, since everyone else has been identifying their town contribution, I am just a town resident. I have served on a number of town organizations and committees, and to the best of my knowledge have attempted to share the responsibilities of various aspects of the town. At the present time, I am on the elections committee of the cooperative, and was formerly a director of the health association and a number of other things.

I am not a paid employee. I have no intention of becoming one. I am a professional economist, by means of getting a livelihood, and

Chairman PLOESER. All right.

in a minute.

Mr. BORSKY. About monopoly. to take up.

We are going to ask you a question

That is the first thing that I want

Chairman PLOESER. Go ahead. Define it for us.

Mr. BORSKY. That I hesitate to do because I believe the professional economists have been debating as to what constitutes monopoly for a long time. They have written books about it, volumes about it, and I do not think it is germane to the question before the body here.

Chairman PLOESER. What is the question before the body?

Mr. BORSKY. The question before the body, it seems to me, is whether the community in Greenbelt has voluntarily chosen a form of carrying out its business, and whether that business is in any way oppressing the community.

I believe the answer to both questions

Chairman PLOESER. You are setting the question for the committee, are you?

Mr. BORSKY. No, sir.

Chairman PLOESER. That is your opinion of what the question should be?

Mr. BORSKY. That is correct.

Chairman PLOESER. That does not happen to be the question before the committee.

Mr. BORSKY. I understand from your release that the question before this body is to determine what relationship there is between an alleged monopoly of the Greenbelt Consumer Services, and taxes and other things. I am not attempting to set the question.

Chairman PLOESER. But you said the question was

Mr. BORSKÝ. In my opinion.

Chairman PLOESER. That is all right.

Mr. BORSKY. The question that should be before the body is whether the community is being adequately served in a voluntary fashion, whether something is being imposed upon them that is harmful, that the Government should intervene and do away with.

I do not think that is the situation which exists at Greenbelt today. Now, as to this question of monopoly. The town, when it was originally conceived, was of much smaller degree than it is today. The physical layout of the shopping center, as such, is restricted, and everyone has testified to that.

You have made a good point, I think, Mr. Chairman, about the difference between a single owner, and multiowners in some of the centers where they restrict competition.

Chairman PLOESER. Do not address that to me. I think I did, too, but address it to Mr. Patman.

Mr. BORSKY. If you will wait a moment, sir, I am not so sure you will be happy with what I have to say.

Chairman PLOESER. I probably will not be, but I want to enjoy what I can.

Mr. BORSKY. That is fine.

The point that I want to make is this:

In a community of our size and our physical layout, you probably cannot afford in terms of space-and I am not so sure in terms of business-maybe one or maybe two stores of a kind. If those stores were owned by private individuals, as Mrs. Miller has pointed out, not subject to the same type of control our cooperative is, you would be at the real mercy of those individuals as to whether you got the services you really wanted.

Now, you could say, "Take his business elsewhere." Well you would be in a real hardship if you had to go elsewhere for certain necessities, and you would have to probably toe the line in terms of whatever practices private management laid down for you.

I know a lot of people have cars and a lot of people can get out of town. They do get out of town. But for those people who have to remain in Greenbelt, it would be a real oppression, and they would be subject to arbitrary judgment, no matter how benevolent it is.

It is one man's opinion many times against another man's opinion, but in the cooperative it is 800 men's opinions, which control our stores and everything in the community.

Chairman PLOESER. Well, if a cooperative is allowed to remain and the private stores come in-suppose you still have your cooperative. You still have your private stores. Could that take place then?

Mr. BORSKY. It could not take place for this reason: That the physical layout is such, if you had a store come in selling children's shoes, because of the scarcity of space you could not afford a second store selling children's shoes unless you had a second line selling radios.

Chairman PLOESER. That is not in line with your other argument. Your other argument is private business might oppress, if private business were in with the cooperative.

Mr. BORSKY. I believe it is in line with my former statement in this

way

Chairman PLOESER. Will you answer the question. If private business was there with the cooperative in competition, would you get oppression from the private business?

Mr. BORSKY. By competition, I infer you mean there would be two stores of the same kind selling similar goods and services. Chairman PLOESER. Right.

Mr. BORSKY. My point is that there is no space

Chairman PLOESER. Grant there was ample space. If the two were there, private business and the cooperative, would the private busi ness be able to oppress you?

Mr. BORSKY. There would be competition, and there would be the alternative of buying in either of the two places.

Chairman PLOESER. And that oppresses?

Mr. BORSKY. No, sir; but you would have to do without some other service. Here is a question of

Chairman PLOESER. You are assuming that.

Mr. BORSKY. That is my considered judgment, that the facilities are such, and limitations of space are such that you could not economically afford to have several businesses of the same kind without doing without other kinds of business which the community needs.

If you are going to have this situation, it seems to me hands down that the control of such enterprise should be in the hands of the entire community, and that in my way of thinking is more in line of a public utility, rather than the odious term of monopoly.

Here we have services given by a single person. That is correct, but subject to the control not of a small group of private individuals. When you say subject to stockholders, stockholders almost become synonymous with the entire community, and it becomes subject to the entire community.

Chairman PLOESER. A public utility can be a monopoly, can it not? Mr. BORSKY. Yes, it can.

Chairman PLOESER. Very frequently is.

Mr. BORSKY. Very frequently is.

Chairman PLOESER. Commonly is, is it not?

Mr. BORSKY. In many places it is. And I believe that the best and most efficient way of operating the services in Greenbelt to the advantage of the community is keeping the control of those facilities in the hands of the community by means of our cooperative enterprise. I would like to take up the other two points.

Mr. MADDREN. May I just ask a question at this point?

Mr. BORSKY. Surely.

Mr. MADDREN. Is there any other location in Greenbelt at which the playing field could be located, the athletic field? Any undeveloped section in which that could be located?

Mr. BORSKY. I am not a town planner. I have read something about it.

The town athletic field is centrally located, right next to the school, and easily accessible from all parts of town.

The town is built like a crescent, and I think that the town planners were very wise in placing it where it is. It is a beautiful amphi theater, if you have been out there. Trees surround it. Green all around. Tennis courts. I would hate to see, and would oppose having that messed up; I think it is one of the prides of our town.

Mr. BALLINGER. Have you had any experience in the selecting of business sites?

Mr. BORSKY. I have not.