Evening Star Newspaper, November 19, 1935, Page 24

SLUM CLEARANCE DEFENDED BY CLAS Director of P. W. A. Housing Calls for Support in Forum Address. Answering critics of the slum clear- Ance program of the Public Works Ad- ministration A. R. Clas, P. W. A. housing director, last night urged support of the movement. Clas was speaking on the National Radio Fo- rum, sponsored by The Evening Star and presented over a Nation-wide net- work of the National Broadcasting Co. In advancing his viewpoint the ad- Ministrator emphasized three factors: 1. “That public housing is vitally and permanently essential. Slums Being Subsidized. 2. “That you are already subsidizing your slums and that public housing is an incomparably superfor alternative to the maintenance of slums in their present miserable state. 3. “That the wholesale construction of public housing will not only tend to Tevive one of the fundamental in- | dustries of the country and to re- habilitate our cities, but it will af- ford an immediate and calculable ben- efiit to as much as a third of our urban population.” Opposition of the real estate in- terests to the program, Clas declared, is unjustified since they “have done nothing about it (the low-cost hous- ing need) because there was no profit in the construction of decent housing for slum dwellers. For this I do not blame them. After all, you can con- duct a business at personal loss for Just so long, after which you fold up. ‘What I do blame them for is their refusal to admit the self-evident truth.” The text of Mr. Clas’ address fol- lows: Thank you. Mr. Kuhn. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. To undertake the construction in one year and one-half of a city of | 130,000 population, the size of Nash- ville, Albany, or Des Moines, is a size- able job. This is the program of the housing division of the Public Works Administration, the largest Govern- mental department directly charged wita the construction of housing. Every project is now under way. Some are completed, others are under con- struction and the balance are in the hands of contractors for bids. Until recently the housing division has hid its light under a bushel and for this reason much confusion and misunderstanding of its purposes and accomplishment has arisen. Particu- larly has it been confused with the Federal Housing Administration, al- though with a similarity in name, and co-operative relations one with the other, the connection between these organizations ceases. The housing division was set up as & self-contained unit in the Public ‘Works Administration to make a study and demonstration of decent housing for low-income urban workers. If you will grant the assumption that in the final analysis no such worker with an income of less than $1,500 per year has a sufficient margin of economic security to justify home ownership, you find that nearly haif of all urban families should always remain on a rental basis. Even in the boom year of 1929, 54 per cent of all urban fami- lies in the United States had an in- come of $2,000 or less. For those in the lowest income groups only two types of housing have been hitherto available. The first is the cast-off homes of the well-to-do which their former occupants vacate, as a rule, for one of two reasons: Either because they are obsolete or dilapidated. The other type is jerry- built, shoddy housing which was in- adequate to begin with and deterio-r ates from that point. Few Good Low-Pficed Homes. ‘The plain facts are that no really decent housing has ever been built for the low - income urban worker. Real estate and the bullding industry have never tackled this problem because it offered no profit. Low-income work- ers cannot pay, and probably never will be able to pay, the rents neces- | sary to make their housing an attrac- tive venture for private enterprise. ‘The product of this economic stale- mate is the vast reaches of slum areas | which disgrace almost every city in the country. It has been obvious for many years, not only from the stagnation of these areas, but from European experience, that if anything is to be done to pro- vide better housing for these people, it must be done through some gov- ernmental agency, either national or local. Years before the United States began, almost every country in Europe had recognized the necessity of gev- ernmental participation in housing. At this time the only agency in a position to tackie the problem in this country was the Federal Government. In order to provide a measure of re- lief for the hard-hit building trades in conjunction with a demonstra- tion program of better housing. the President created the housing division, ‘The division is constructing 57 projects distributed over the country, 34 in the North, 23 in the South, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. ‘They will cost $148,000,000 and will house somewhat over 29,000 families. Description of Projects. “Housing Project” is a vague term and connotes no picture of what we are undertaking. I should like to give you some idea of what these housing projects will provide. In the first place the built-on area varies from 10 to 30 per cent of the total, thus leaving at least 70 per cent for open gardens, or playgrounds. The buildings, with few projects excepted, are limited to three stories in height. In the South the majority are one- building is more than two rooms deep and every dwelling unit has cross ventilation. Every unit has an indoor toilet, heating and bathing facilities, cooking and refrigerating equipment, and electric light. These are con- sidered basic fundamentals and an absolutely minimum standard. Types of dwelling units are the row house, the flat and the apartment. We have found that construction of de- tached houses, according to the stand- ards set, was too expensive to permit rentals at prices workers could pay, for these projects are to last for 60. years, which means that only first- class fire-resisting materials may be used. Occupants of these projects will pay rent within their means but they will not own their dwellings— at least not until the Government's investment is amortized. Rents will be fixed by prorating annual cost of maintenance, depreciation, sinking funds and fixed charges. The projects vary in size from one in Wayne, Pa, with 50 units, to the great Williamsburg development in New York with 1,625 units. Every one embodies the fundamental stand- ards of design already described and Defends A. R. of the P. W. A. P. W. A housing director, speaking last night in the National Radio Forum, denounced criticism of the slum clearance and low-cost housing program THE EVENING STAR, WASHINGTON, Housing Plans CLAS, —Star Staff Photo. !as an enduri every one will,stand in its community 3 l’lg monument of what | can be done. Causes of Low Standards. | No one can with justice deny the { right of every man, woman and child {in this country to occupy a home { which is at least sanitary and ade- quate in space provision. Hence, it must seem strange to those who con- sider living conditions, other than thelr own, that as much as a third of our urban population has never en- Jjoyed that right. Why not? I can best answer this question by reviewing the forces, either passive or active, whics have worked against the improvement ¢’ these conditions. This review will also (......i of an answer to thoee crtics who vizorously oppose our entrance into the housing field. The most persistent of these critics have been the realtors. The general tenor of their criticism is that we are ! competing unfairly with private en- | terprise. The realtors claim that they have always been able to supply the housing needs of the country and that our operations threaten to ruin their legitimate business. How does this criticism check with facts? In 1934, the Department of Commerce made a real-property in- ventory of 64 typical cities in the country. This showed that one out of six dwelling units was more than 40 years old. About the same per- centage was unfit for habitation; one out of seven had no private indoor water closet; and one out of five, no bathing facilities. It does not necessarily follow that all these latter conditions will apply to the dwellings over 40 years old; yet breakdowns of this inventory in- dicate that the oldest urban housing is always to be found in the slums, and even the most cursory glance tells that there also the worst hous« ing is to be found. What conclusion is to be drawn from a study of these facts? Simply this: Pirst—there is 2 tremendous amount of housing—in these 64 cities alone, a quarter of a million dwelling units—declared unfit for habitation; and second, nothing whatsoever has been done about it. We need not look far for the reasons behind this state. The realtors, in spite of their claim, have done nothing about it because there was no profit in the construction of decent. housing for slum dwellers. For this I | do not blame them. After all a busi- ness can be conducted at personal loss for just so long, after which it folds up. What I do blame them for is | their refusal to admit the self-evident | truth. If there had been profit to | be made of slum clearance we should | be rid of the slums by now. { Sees No Competition. | T have always maintained that the | slum clearance work undertaken by the housing division offers no competi- the real estate business. As our proj- i ects go into operation I can now state that their construction is proving to sider Atlanta, Ga., where we have two | projects, “Techwood” and “Univer- sity,” nearing completion. Note that neither project is yet finished. In the Techwood area, within a month after construction began, five large tion and a $70,000 theater. | University area a real estate corpora- tion has purchased a whole block | for development. In addition, 12 scat- | tered lots have been sold. In both |areas new houses have been built | {and therq has been a substantial | (amount of remodeling of existing | | structures. It is the openly expressed | opinion of local real estate firms that | the construction of these projects has | 3 I stimulated, in the immediate vicinity, | real estate activity for which there | has never been a demand in the | past. Anyone who could forget his | prejudice long enough to digest truth would realize that this is only reason- able and inevitable. For our slum clearance projects are always located in decaying sore spots in potentially | profitable areas. Their fundamental purpose is to cut | out the cancers in these areas, in or- | der that, in time, they may be wholly rehabilitated. I have sufficient re- spect for the business acumen of the | realtors to know that, in time, they must and will realize that we are opening up large virgin territories for | As a matter of fact, we have to date | employed nearly 3,000 persons in our | real estate activities. In almost every city in which we are operating, our first move was to call on the local real estate board, to explain our in- tentions, to ask for advice and rec- ommendations for personnel. Our ap- praisers have been, almost without exception, members of the Real Estate Board Appraisal Committees or mem- bers of the American Institute of Real Estate Appraisers. Our negotiators have been members of the National Association of Real Estate Boards. With the exception of the building trade workers, realtors stand to profit directly and immediately as much as any single group, from our pro- gram, My somewhat acidulous remarks have been directed so far, only at the average realtor in answer to the op- position offered to us by his national associations. As a general rule, he is concerned with the sale or rental of average middle class hous- ing. There are other types, however, whose income is derived from the rental or slum 3 Pproperties, Irefer to those landlords, who, to use & slang expressiom, “put the tion to the traditional operations of | be a boon to private enterprise. Con- | | lots were sold in a rising market; | construction was started on a gas sta- | In the | their benefit. I do not ask them to | | indorse our work on any higher level. story. with some of two stories. No | squeeze” on slum tenants. Through- out the country there is a depressing number of such racketeers and they do not operate in secret. During the years of great immigra- tion, the deliberate congestion of our citles proved to be a gold mine for property owners. If a profit could be made by crowding four immigrant families into & shoddy tenement, it could be doubled by doubling the| height of the building. No need to give tenants a window in every room, | | or heat, or light. or water, or a toilet | Those things cost money and cut down | | profits and, besides, the tenants were, an inferior people who would not ap-| | preciate such luxuries. The result of | such practices was the notorious lower | east side in New York, where, in one | | census tract, picked at random, the | following conditions were found. 75 | per cent of all dwelling units had no| | heat; 57 per cent had no bathing| facilities; 66 per cent had no tollets; | 88 per cent were 35 years or more | |old; and 42 per cent either needed major structural repairs or were unfit | for habitation. | Through these stinking fire traps has poured a steady stream of be- wildered foreigners, whose simplicity, illiteracy, or ignorance of our Wways| and language, have made them the| perfect prey of those chiselling land- | | lords whose only concern in their ten- | | ants was to bilk them of a maximum | of their pitifully earned pennies. As these foreigners became naturalized, | learned their way about, and began | to reap some small benefit of their | hard work, they refused to submit longer to such exploitation. They | moved from the Bowery to the Bronx or the suburbs. But there was always a fresh crop from Galicla, Hungary, | or Sicily, to keep these warrens full. | With the end of wholesale immigra- | tion, however, the steady flow of prof- | its in this type of housing began to ! dry up. The lower East Side has lost )nearly 40 per cent in population since | | 1920. There are no further “inno- cents abroad” to be exploited. The means by which this racket is being | killed is indirect and less satisfying | than a frontal attack. Yet it surely is effective. An extremely complicated and con- | troversial issue in our program is the | question of taxation. So long as our | | projects are under the control of the | Federal Government, they cannot pay | ad valorem taxes on the same basis | as private residential properties. At first sight it will seem unreasonable that such apparent discrimination | should be afforded the tenants of our | projects. The most vituperative critics of this policy do not, I imagine, pro- ceed further in their analysis. « Problem of Taxation. But there are good and sufficient reasons for such a policy. It is prob- | ably true that the bulk of local tax | revenues is raised from a tax on real property. Yet it is not the property which pays these taxes, but the people who live in these properties. Fluctua- | tion of their means is independent of the type and condition of housing they may occupy. At the present time slum | dwellers or their landlords pay very small real estate taxes. The condi- tion of tenements and shacks is such that, they have the most nominal value and it would be useless to tax them higher in any case since the slum dwellers simply have not the | money to pay. This then is the pres- ent condition. | Let us say the Government has de- | cided to build a slum clearance project. We tear down the existing shacks or tenements and replace them with decent new housing to be rented at reasonable prices to the‘ former slum dwellers. In so doing | we have created opportunity for these people but—and this is the crux of the whole question—we have not raised one iota their capacity to pay 2 higher real estate tax. They are the same people with the same in- comes as recently lived in misery and paid but a pittance in taxes. To assume that such people can promptly step up their tax payments to the level required by an ad valorem tax on the new improvements is to For Bad Cough, Mix This Better Remedy, at Home Needs Ne Cooking! 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Big Saving! real estate market and the tax struc- ture, to say nothing of leaving a large number of slum dwellers (who could not pay the rentals of the vacated dwellings) on the street. By succeed- ing in imposing full taxation on these projects, realtors and city officials would find themselves in far worse position than they were before this program was launched. We believe firmly that, if the re- habilitation of slum areas should not be crippled by the levying of ad va- lorem taxes, these projects should cer- tainly not be entitled to a joy ride at the expense of local tax payers. ‘We have maintained that city services, such as fire and police protection, wa~ ter and sewage disposal, street mainte- nance and lighting, garbage removal, etc, should be bought in the same way that all citizens buy them. In the early stages of our program we analyzed many slum areas from the standpoint of total taxes paid. Next we considered the probable rental revenues from the projects which we proposed to build in these areas. We found that 5 per cent of the gross revenue derived from the probable occupancy at low rentals in every case exceeded the present tax revenue from these areas. In other words, we could afford to return to the citles a higher income than they now received from their slums and could still re- house slum dwellers in new and decent housing. In view of the municipal economy which such rehousing would inevitably effect, such as lower cost of hospitalization, fire and police pro- tection, we considered such a proposi- tion definitely magnanimous. Most city officials saw eye to eye with us. We have repeatedly stated that we wished to pay this service charge. Recently, the Controller General of the United States, who is the final authority in disbursement of Federal fun@s, ruled that we could not pay this charge without having a specific appropriation for such payments. Legislation is now pending in Con- | gress which will authorize these charges. I consider the passage of this legislation absolutely imperative to the success of the housing program. ‘The experiences of European coun- | tries, England, Germany, Holland, Austria, Italy, Norway, Sweden and Denmark, has indicated that decent new housing for slum dwellers is im- possible- without subsidy. When the Housing Division was being set up, most of us realized that a subsidy | would be no less inevitable in this country, if we were to do our job right. Yet it was felt that we should attempt at the outset to stimulate private en- terprise and to keep our activities on the so-called “business basis.” We soon proved to the country that this D. C., TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 1935. Subsidy As New Procedure. This subsidy has been attacked as un-democratic and un-American. May I recall to the attackers such time- honored subsidies as that which has kept our merchant marine afloat or o rather familiar device known as the tariff? You may argue that a subsidy for housing is a new departure. But is it? ‘Within the last couple of years a number of studies have been made, notably in Cleveland, Indianapolis and Boston, which investigated the balance sheets of slum areas. The cost to the city of maintaining a slum area was determined in terms of jail and court costs; in terms of free hospitalization and treatment in asy- lums; in terms of fire and police pro- tection, etc. The total of all these items was balanced against the total of taxes paid by slum dwellers. The answer was in every case written in red ink. For every dollar in taxes paid by a slum dweller, other tax payers subsidized him from $7 to $10 in order to maintain him in the sad state to which he was—alas!—ac- customed. Thus the subsidy does exist and has existed in your tax dollar for many years. 1f you realize this fact it may seem to you wiser to spend the sub- sidy on decent housing, rather than decent jails; on supervised play areas, rather than walled in reformatories; on healthful homes, rather than the best municipal hospitals. The crux of the realtors’ dispute with us lies in the selection of tenants who will inhabit these projects and not in the projects themselves. Since they will be rented at an absurdly low rate In relation to the class of accom- modation offered, they will be most | attractive to the average incom2 group. The history of private socially plan- ned housing projects has always been that the occupants were of a higher class than that for which the projects were planned. This fact only serves to demonstrate once again that private enterprise, even the most enlightened and altruistic, cannot supply decent housing for the low in- come urban worker. We should vitiate the whole purpose | of our program if we permitted in our projects those who could afford to | pay average commercial rents. This seems to be a major fear of the real- tors and yet it should be obvious that | we would lose even more in prestige than the realtors, in business, if we | did not insist that these projects be | reserved for the benefit of those who have never known a decent home. the down-and-outers. We are con- structing housing on a modified, yet still a definitely business basis. We started from a conservative profit set-up and applied to it the subsidy necessary to reach down and touch the class we intended to rehouse. Had we sought as our goal the housing of those to whom the slighest economic tremor would mean disaster, we should have been obliged to start from the other end. We should have started with 100 per cent subsidy, offset, in 80 far as possible, by such payments as the tenants could make. Between the two extremes I have mentioned, however, there is a class which is counted in millions. and is composed of hard working, self-re- specting people. The men work at semi or unskilled trades, many of which, like the building industry, are seasonal and their incomes average from $800 or $900 in the South to $1,500 in the North. These are the people who have furnished the man power to make and maintain our cities. These are the people who with few exceptions, whatever their rights, have never known a decent home and who never will unless Government steps in to help them. I have discussed the Housing Divi- sion’s program hitherto wholly in terms of its effect once the projects are completed. The division, how- ever, is a part of the Public Works Administration and that organization was created primarily to afford em- ployment. We may well consider, therefore, the immediate benefits to be produced by our work. Jobs Provided by Projects. I have already mentioned that nearly 3,000 persons have been en- gaged in the real estate phases of our program. The construction of the projects wil give jobs to 50,000 build- ing trades workers daily for more than a year, working a total of 45,- 000,000 men hours. At least another 50,000 will be employed in the fabrica- tion and production of materials. Among the incidental employment is work for blue printers who are turn- ing out over 4,000,000 square feet of | blue prints for the plans of these projects. | ‘The total employment is conserva- tively estimated at 100,000 men work- ing somewhat over 100,000,000 man hours. Eighty-six million dollars will | go into their pay rolls. To an in- dustry which has suffered from acute anemia during the past six years, this employment must bring a definite measure of relief. And yet, I say candidly, it is only a drop in a bucket to what can and should accrue from a real housing | program. | To attempt to combine housing and | emergency relief has been a trying| task. As an immediate and purely | relief measure, housing in this coun- try cannot as vet be wholly effec-| tive. We have had too much to learn | about technique. Countries like Eng- | land, with & long experience in houa-‘ ing and with vigorous enabling legis- lation, may employ housing as a rapid | and effective relief measure. And| yet, Sir Raymond Unwin, the fore-| Selection of Tenants. This can and will be effected by | | the most careful selection of tenants. | | The management branch of the hous- | | ing division is now engaged in the | | training of men with real estate ex- | | perience to manage these projects. | If we will not accept for tenants | most world authority on housing, told ‘ me last year that the United States | had accomplished more in its first year in public housing than England J had in its 15. | I cannot forbear, in closing. to| outline what I regard as a proper | housing program. In the first place | method led directly and swiftly to|those whose means are sufficient to|it should not be a highly centralized | stalemate. Sudsidy therefore was inevitable. NOW....at047 make them eligible for average com- mercial housing, neither can we house | show directed entirely from Washing- | ton, in which local authorities play no | At the outset, of course, we had to centralize. We could assemble in short order all the available knowl- edge and experience, we had the greatest enabling powers, and we had the funds. To have decentralized the first demonstration program would have been to guarantee chaos and a speedy collapse of the whole move- ment. The majority of local agencies are still in no position to handle their problems effectively. I do not believe that it will be wise for the Federal Government to relinquish authority in most cases until the local agencies are ready to join in the financing of their projects; until they have ade- quate enabling legislation; and until they have trained and experienced technicians to develop their programs. Held Vitally Essential. We are now in the midst of a pe- | riod of national education. I can not emphasize too much some of the facts I have already stated. First: That public housing is vitall and permanently essential, no less in | good times than in depression. Second: That you are already sub- sidizing your slums and that public housing is an incomparably superior | alternative to the maintenance of the slums in their present miserable state. | And third: That the wholesale con- struction of public housing will not | only tend to revive one of the funda- mental industries of the country and to rehabilitate our cities, but it will afford an immediate and calculable benefit to as much as a third of our urban population. These facts should be broadcast and hammered home until 50,000,000 who inhabit our cities are conscious of the fact that they can not afford not to support this movement, I foresee a day when our citles, like those of England, Holland, Austria, Germany and the Scandinavian coun- tries, will have municipal housing authorities which will no longer coun- tenance the construction of the foul tenements and shoddy shacks which disgrace every city in this land. They will not tolerate the degeneration of huge urban areas until they become drab and pestilential dump heaps on which the step-children of soclety are tossed to exist as best they may. Instead, they will see to it that, for the welfare of the whole country, every man, woman and child shall be entitled to a home which at least ap- proaches the much vaunted, if infre- quently seen, American standard of TheBest GRAY HAIR REMEDY IS MADE AT HOME YOUunmmkclt homes better gray hair remedy buy, by following ple recipe: To half pintof wateradd one ounce bay rum, a small box of Barbo Compound and one-fourth ounce of glycerine. Any druggist _ean put this up or you can mix it yourself at very little sost. Apply to the hair twice a week until the desired shade is obtained. Barbo imparts color to streaked, faded or than you e | wray hair, makes it soft and glossy and takes = off your looks. It will not color the scalp, not sticky or greasy and does not rub off, The GOLDENBERG Co. 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