We would appreciate your adding this material to that submitted yesterday by Senator Ferguson. Sincerely yours, Senator HOMER FERGUSON, United States Senate: H. H. HUMPHREY. PLYMOUTH, MICH., June 1, 1949. Presently asking taxpayers for 17 additional mills over 20-year period. This satisfies need for 2 years. Third year we need 40 classrooms, and no funds available. Then Board of Education requests your support of S. 287 for school building. H. O. JOHNSON, Superintendent, Livonia Township Schools. Mr. WIXCEY. We have a statement presented by Mr. J. Harold Saxon, executive secretary, Georgia State Education Association, in the form of a letter addressed to Hon. Hubert H. Humphrey. It is noted that the material within was prepared by Mr. Pendleton Mitchell, director of schoolhouse planning, State department of education. The statement will be included in the record at this point, together with a table consisting of the consolidation of returns to questionnaire for estimate of school plant needs for Georgia. (The documents referred to are as follows:) Senator HUBERT H. HUMPHREY, STATE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, Atlanta 3, Ga., June 14, 1949. Chairman, Subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Labor and Public Welfare: The following facts and conclusions are submitted in support of proposed Federal legislation for aid to States and Territories in financing capital outlay expenditures for school plants and facilities and in support of the amended Neely bill (S. 287) under your consideration. 1 1. A comprehensive study of school buildings in Georgia 1 reported in February 1945 revealed that "39.1 percent of the white high-school plants, 40.3 percent of the white elementary school plants, 86.4 percent of the Negro high-school plants, and 96.9 percent of the Negro elementary school plants * * * are incapable of being economically and satisfactorily made acceptable.” 2. Continued study of the conditions of present facilities indicates that building programs including rehabilitation since that date have not succeeded in reducing the general percentages of inadequacy. (For example, in the biennium July 1, 1946, to June 30, 1948, total capital outlay expenditures reported amounted to only $5,500,000.2) 3. Estimated construction costs as presented in the education panel study: (a) Employed, cost estimates "admittedly 25 percent less than the present (time of study) cost per classroom with the necessary storage rooms and offices." (b) Included no provision for purchase or development of school sites. (c) Included no provision for increased enrollments due to increased birth rates, nor for the addition of the twelfth year of public-school education, toward which Georgia schools are now in transition. Total estimates of this early study must now be revised, therefore, because— (a) The 25-percent decline in building costs was not realized; rather was there an increase. (Engineering News Record reported 297.7 for March 1944 to 356 for November 1948. The $83,500,000 total arrived at in this study would be adjusted on the basis of these increases, to over $130,000,000.) (b) Larger sites are necessary. (The study showed that nearly one-half the total number of sites are inadequate in area, and that site location and development are also substandard.) (c) Average daily attendance has not remained, and will not remain, constant due to 1. Increased enrollments due to birth rates. (For biennium ending June 30, 1948, an increase of 5,082 over preceding period was reported.) 1 A Study of School Buildings in Georgia, issued by the Educational Panel, Agriculture Industrial Board of Georgia, Athens, Ga., February 1945. 2 Seventy-sixth and Seventy-seventh Georgia School Annual Reports of the Department of Education to the General Assembly of Georgia. 2. Increased attendance due to compulsory attendance law and visiting teacher program. 3. Transition to 12-year program. 4. A questionnaire survey conducted in the spring of 1949 reveals the fact that the need is greater at this time than ever before. Returns from approximately 80 percent of the administrative units in the State show a need for a building program cost of $130,198,762. On the basis of this report for those systems reporting, the total estimate for the State would be $162,748,452. The attached table presents more detailed data from this questionnaire study. 5. Based upon questionnaires returned (approximately 80 percent of the total), the maximum amount of capital outlay funds which would be made available by voting the complete legal limit of bonds for all systems was reported to be $28,454,675. Considering only those systems reporting, then, there is an estimated need for $101,624,087 for which no present provision is made. 6. Surveys and studies of some individual county and city systems have revealed needs in excess of those reported on the questionnaire form, indicating that figures just quoted are conservative. 7. A number of the county and city systems in the State have also reported acute need for facilities to take care of abnormally increased enrollments resulting from the impact of Federal activities. 8. Present efforts among leaders in Georgia are directed toward a reorganization of the education finance procedure by which an economic index rather than a 5-mill base on assessed property valuations may be employed. It is anticipated that such a move would lead toward sounder and more effective financing procedures. 9. A number of counties and cities have voted the legal maximum of bonds and are making heroic efforts to provide school buildings. Progress (which can be documented) in providing educational opportunities for all of the children of the State of Georgia is being recorded. The attitude of the people and of the press indicates an awareness of and a determination to deal with the critical problems. Federal aid should induce extended local and State effort far beyond any previous record. 10. A program of Federal, State, local cooperation in financing the establishment of school plants based upon educational need and specifications offers the only possible hope for adequate relief. Presented by: J. Harold Saxon, executive secretary, Georgia Education Association. Prepared by: Pendleton Mitchell, director, schoolhouse planning, State department of education. Consolidation of returns of questionnaire for estimate of school plant needs, Georgia (approximately 80 percent returns) Present active enrollment_. Number of classrooms in use. 583, 016 15, 911 2, 861 Additional classrooms needed. Number needed to replace those not to be continued.. Anticipated increase in enrollment next 6 years.. Number classrooms needed for increase__ Total number additional classrooms needed.. Estimated cost to provide additional classrooms_ Total number additional special rooms needed.. Number of special rooms in use.. Estimated cost to provide additional special rooms Number special rooms needing major repair. Estimated total cost of repair. Number of new service facilities needed. 2, 885 131, 353 5, 126 10, 057 $54, 241, 969 6, 868 Number of service facilities needing rehabilitation_ Estimated total cost of service facilities added or rehabilitated.. Total cost of site purchase and development.. Maximum local funds possible_ Balance of funds required____ 911 $972, 175 1, 210 1, 332 $41, 576, 974 $4,791, 555 $130, 198, 762 $28, 454, 675 $101, 624, 087 Senator HUMPHREY. Our first witness is Mr. Raymond Goodloe, chairman, board of education, Midwest City, Okla. Mr. Goodloe. STATEMENT OF RAYMOND GOODLOE, CHAIRMAN, BOARD OF EDUCATION, MIDWEST CITY, OKLA. Mr. GOODLOE. As chairman of the board of education for the Midwest City school district for the past 4 years, I wish to present the viewpoint of the board of education concerning the problems of financing the public schools in war and defense areas. Midwest City, as well as its school system, has been a direct outgrowth of the war and defense effort resulting in Federal activities being located wholly within the boundaries of the school district. During the war period, both the Douglas Aircraft plant and the Oklahoma City air material area, including Tinker Field, operated with employment rolls exceeding 40,000 civilian and military personnel. Since the close of the war, the Oklahoma City Air Technical Service Command including Tinker Field has been established on a permanent basis and at the present time has over 13,000 employees. The school attendance grew from 104 pupils in the original rural school to 1,198 at the close of the war and has continued to grow until at the present time there are 2,648 pupils in active attendance on seven different school cites within the school district. This continuous growth is a result of permanent employees changing from commuters to local residents which improves their value as employees. During the war period approximately 100 percent of our scholastics came from families employed in the Federal installations. At the present time approximately 70 percent of our pupils are from families so employed. Housing for these Federal employees, located in the Midwest City school district, has been provided through private construction financed by Federal Housing Authority loans and either sold or rented at privately owned levels. These homes and the necessary public service investments have been the only increase in tax valuations experienced. All of this property has been placed on the tax rolls at equal or above the assessments of similar property in this area. Due to the increase in number of scholastics occasioned by the increase of nontaxable (federally owned) investments, the taxable wealth per child has been reduced from a prewar level of $5,763 to $1,410. While the average total tax rate for school purposes for the 3 years prior to the war impact was only $1.12, it has been raised by the vote of the local citizens to $2.87. Of this total, prior to the war impact only 12 cents was needed for schoolhouse construction compared to 86 cents at the present time. During the last normal year the 104 pupils in average daily attendance were housed in four permanent modern brick classrooms of the highest quality. At the close of the war, over 50 percent of the 1,198 children were housed in temporary prefabricated plywood classrooms of the worst kind. They are highly combustible, very poorly lighted and heated, and have no modern toilet facilities. They, in no way meet the criteria for classrooms. At the present time, 2,648 pupils are in approximately 25 percent overcrowded buildings, as follows: 1,135 or 43 percent in permanent classrooms on normal school sites; 850 or 32 percent in temporary classrooms on normal school sites. These buildings consist of both plywood sectional construction and rooms constructed by moving temporary barracks from abandoned army camps. Six hundred and sixty-three or 25 percent in temporary classrooms in abandoned buildings on Tinker Field. We were able to meet the school-housing need of our more than 800-pupil increase during the present year by obtaining the use of an abandoned temporary building on Tinker Field and are transporting 663 pupils to this site at the present time. This building has a ceiling height of only 7 feet, is of very temporary construction with windows which are only 40 by 40 inches. The area surrounding it for playground use is less than one-half acre, and it fronts the four-lane highway carrying the heaviest traffic in the area. Our lease on this building expires June 30, 1949, and unless it can be extended, over one-half of the pupils in the Midwest City school system will have to be placed on half-day sessions for their educational program next year. Its continued use under any circumstance cannot be justified for any other reason than to meet the greatest emergency. The fiscal economy of the Midwest City school district is thrown completely out of balance through the large percentage of federally owned, tax-exempt property located within the district. The tax pattern for Oklahoma, as for most States, provides revenue for schoolhouse construction wholly from ad valorem tax, levied on the assessed valuation of the property within the school district. In areas of heavy industrial activity which necessitates a large number of families to meet the employment needs, the industrial property provides the major part of the assessed valuation for levying the tax for building revenue. In view of this situation, I am certain that the other boards of education from these schools would join me in urging Congress to enact legislation providing some measure of relief in properly financing these school systems. Congress did provide for this in the Lanham Act, and I believe that was enacted in 1942. They thought that they had provided adequately for this type of district, but no one could forseee the great increase that would be here after World War II. After World War I we had a slight increase, I think, which they used as a criterion to base their judgment on, but it is sorely inadequate for what we have to face now. Senator HUMPHREY. Thank you, very much. Mr. Guernsey, would you like to proceed now? STATEMENT OF GEORGE T. GUERNSEY, ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR of EDUCATION OF THE CONGRESS OF INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATIONS Mr. GUERNSEY. My name is George T. Guernsey. I am the associate director of education of the Congress of Industrial Organizations. I have been engaged in various types of educational work for the last 12 years, including editing two national educational journals. On behalf of the members of the Congress of Industrial Organizations, I wish to support granting Federal aid for school plant construction. It has become almost commonplace to state that there is a crisis in the field of American education, but if we mean to maintain our democratic way of life, we must drastically improve the quality of education offered to our youngsters. We must meet the problem of low salaries for teachers, which has driven many of our best teachers out of the teaching profession; and most of all we must meet the problem quickly of erecting new school buildings to meet the needs of our expanding school population. Not only will we have an expanding school population during the next 10 years but, because of the lack of materials during the war period, we have not kept pace with our normal school building needs. Recent Census Bureau reports indicate that by 1958 we will have between 71⁄2 million and 10 million more children in school than there were in 1947. According to the Federal Works Agency, it will take at least $11,000,000,000 to do the school construction job necessary to provide our children with school buildings. Whatever proportion of the expenses of this program that can be absorbed by the local school districts and by a State-aid program, it is clear that this job will not be done without adequate Federal aid. During the war, when we thought that the purposes justified it we were willing to spend billions of dollars so that our democracy might survive. Today, although we may find those who question it because they fear an educated citizenry, it is important that the Federal Government allocate between three and five billion dollars for a school building program for the next 5 years. For this reason, representing the Congress of Industrial Organizations, we prefer Senate bill 1670 because it does allocate $500,000,000 of Federal aid for school building for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1950, and $500,000,000 for the next five succeeding years. The CIO feels that this is but the minimum program necessary to wipe out the blighted school areas in the United States and to provide those youngsters without school buildings the opportunity of attending public school. As long ago as 1938, the CIO went on record with a resolution for Federal aid in the school building program. Its first convention in 1938 resolved: * * * Whereas (3) the President's Advisory Committee on Education has recommended a detailed program of Federal aid for the purpose of eliminating such conditions, providing among other things for general grants in the construction of school buildings; * * * Be it Resolved, That this convention approves the principle of Federal aid for schools and the program laid down by the President's Advisory Committee on Education. When the problem of the formula by which the Federal grants are to be given arises, the Congress of Industrial Organizations prefers the formula used in S. 287 so that a greater share of Federal funds may be allocated to those States least able financially to support the school building program. I might say that we would even be interested in a greater equalization program than the formula of S. 287. Under the formula worked out in Senate bill 1670, it is possible in the matching process that a Federal grant-in-aid program will actually 92679-49- -23 |