The poor socio-economic conditions of the Spanish-speaking population as verified by the preceding facts require a solution that requires input by the people themselves-the Spanish-speaking people at executive levels within the Department of Labor.

Statistics show that 2 percent of GS-9 through GS-18 level positions in the Department of Labor are occupied by Spanish-speaking people. Only 2 percent in spite of the fact that Spanish-speaking are approximately 6 percent of the total population, 2 percent in 1970 and 1.1 percent in 1967 *** a 9-percent improvement over a 3-year period.

This is not good enough. Mr. Brennan should know that the Spanishspeaking community is not satisfied with this kind of representation. Speaking as an individual and as a leader of the American G. I. Forum, I am concerned with the new policies being formulated for the Department of Labor and how they are going to affect the Spanishspeaking people. I am concerned about the Spanish speaking being given the opportunity to provide input into the policies and programs, not from outside the Department of Labor in an advisory capacity but from within as a permanent, functioning member of the policyformulating staff. The administration's 16-point plan has not been very effective in providing the Spanish-speaking representation needed at policy-formulating levels.

I am concerned that more and accurate data be provided on the Spanish-speaking people, and programs of action for their benefit be based on this new accurate data. And most of all, I am hopeful that Mr. Brennan's experiences within the union have provided him with insight into the employment problems of people which insight may be applied in attacking these problems of the Spanish-speaking people in particular.

It is important to realize that, based on studies conducted, people would rather work for their money than have it handed to them. The Spanish-speaking community needs and wants jobs and training and education to prepare them for the jobs.

Thank you.

Senator HUGHES. Mr. Villa.

STATEMENT OF PETE V. VILLA, NATIONAL PRESIDENT, LEAGUE OF UNITED LATIN AMERICAN CITIZENS

Mr. VILLA. Mr. Chairman, it is a great honor and privilege for me to appear before you to present testimony concerning the nomination. of Peter J. Brennan as Secretary of Labor.

My name is Pete Villa. I am national president of the League of United Latin American Citizens, more commonly known as LULAC. LULAC is an organization with over 250,000 Spanish-speaking members all dedicated to developing a better understanding of the Spanish-speaking in the fields of education, civil rights, housing, job training and job placement.

LULAC is a patriotic, civic-minded organization dedicated to the principle that all men are created equally and that they have an inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

LULAC is a cosponsor of Social Education Rehabilitation (SER), Jobs for Progress, Inc., the largest manpower delivery system serving the disadvantaged Spanish-speaking people in the United States.

During the past 6 years, SER, Jobs for Progress, Inc., has grown from a small job referral service operating in three cities to an organization authorized to operate 39 MDTA projects providing various manpower-related services to the disadvantaged.

The steadfast commitment of the staff at the local and national levels to the mission of SER has been the cornerstone of every SER project. SER's success can be attributed to the fact that SER programs are indigenous to the people served. Another major reason for their success is their ability to be creative and innovative, providing a pioneering thrust in the manpower field.

Several of the initial projects worked out of donated space for a while: from a friendly businessman's cramped storerooms, or from unfurnished, unheated and unair-conditioned warehouses. From such modest beginnings, SER has struggled and pulled itself up to meet the tremendous needs of the Spanish speaking.

Twenty-five percent of this country's Spanish-speaking population lives below the poverty level, and now they are knocking on the economic door of this country, asking for something they have always been willing to do, and that is to work.

SER is the instrument by which an unskilled and uneducated citizen can train for, gain, and retain employment. No other program in this country has the trained and seasoned bilingual, bicultural staff that SER has.

Year after year, SER has been consistently refunded at higher levels by the Department of Labor because of the expert and sensitive leadership of the SER staff and its board of directors.

Performance standards, goals, and objectives set forth at the beginning of each contract year have been repeatedly surpassed each year. The dedication and spirit which permeates the entire staff binds it together in working toward its goal: which is to efficiently and effectively educate, train and find employment for the disadvantaged. During fiscal year 1972, SER served a total of over 11,000 clients. The numbers trained in skills exceeded the contractual obligation to the Department of Labor by over 1,400 clients.

The target population which SÉR has been servicing consists of: the Spanish speaking; females, those under 22; high school, junior high and elementary school dropouts; welfare recipients nad monolinguals.

Quality training is provided by SER to the enrollee in the areas of job preparation; adult basic education; English as a second language; institutional skills and training, and on the job training.

By the end of its last fiscal year, SER was operating at a 101 percent of planned capacity. This represents excellent planning and management on the part of the local project directors and their staffs.

Yet, over 36,000 applicants qualified for training last year, and only 11,000 were served by SER. That means that 25,000 qualified persons last year alone were not served because of insufficient funds. Of those served in 1972, 79 percent were placed on a job, and SER

exceeded its contractual obligation by 2,847 job placements. The earning capacity of each enrollee was increased by $3,074.

While accomplishing all this, SER has taken quite seriously its obligation to utilize Federal moneys judiciously. This can be seen in SER's overall efficiency as reflected in the cost per trainee and cost per placement statistics.

One of the major achievements of SER is the low-cost per trainee figures of only $1,085 and the very low cost per placement of $1,341. The culmination of all these achievements was reflected last year as SER was rated No. 1 of all national manpower programs by the Department of Labor. This year, SER was well on its way to achieving its contractual goals until January 8, 1973, when the Department of Labor Manpower Administration imposed severe restrictions hindering the effective operation of Jobs for Progress, Inc.

The reasons for these restrictions were given as:

(1) Compliance with the President's economy program, (2) examination of manpower programs, and (3) insurance of economical and effective performance.

The directive calls for: (1) restrictions on travel; (2) suspension of equipment acquisition; (3) restrictions on all long distance telephone calls: (4) restrictions on personnel hiring; (5) restrictions on signing first-tier, second-tier and CJT subcontracts; and (6) restrictions on institutional training.

The objectives of this action by the Manpower Administration are to evaluate programs and to bring about economy. SER supports these ends and has always achieved its goals and objectives as set forth in the prime contract.

But complying with the directives given in the telegram can only force SER to be noneconomical and noneffective. I cannot see how following the directives outlined in the telegram can assist the Department of Labor in achieving economy and effectiveness.

SER has a contract for $18 million which calls for it to serve 7.200 people during 1971-72. Nationally, SER had scheduled over 400 enrollees into skills training during the month of January 1973, and over 150 enrollees in OJT. Now, by halting these plans, SER is forced to increase its holding number, and this will result in a higher dropout rate. As a direct result of the restrictions, SER may not be able to meet the 10 percent early dropout maximum and the 75 percent placement rate minimums as stipulated in the prime contract.

If SER does not start skills training as planned, in most cases, this training will not be able to be provided at all.

The overall cost per placement and cost per slot is rising every day that the freeze is maintained.

The severe restrictions on travel are a handicap to consider in that the staff of the newer projects need to be trained by the national staff. The projects with problems need to be visited and their problems addressed by experts from the national staff.

This is the situation today. It is a grave problem that the nominee, Peter J. Brennan will have to deal with. The question is how he will do it.

The Spanish-speaking community has expended a tremendous amount of energy in its support of SER. Through the years, Spanish

speaking leaders have been steadfast in their support of SER and have helped guide it to its present level of efficiency and professionalism. The services rendered to the Spanish-speaking disadvantaged are unparalleled in quality and in sensitivity to the bilingual and bicultural qualities of the clientele.

With the freeze in effect, every day that passes lessens the performance level of SER. What this means is, that the poor who need training, remain untrained; the poor who need education, remain uneducated; and the poor without a job, remain unemployed.

The commitment of this administration to the poor of America is questionable.

The commitment of this administration to the Spanish speaking has been shown by its freeze on the only national manpower program serving the Spanish speaking.

Upon approval by this committee, Mr. Brennan will have to answer to the millions of Spanish-speaking citizens who are asking:

How can a manpower program such as SER be evaluated as to its effectiveness and economy when restrictions placed on its activities can do nothing else but force it to be uneconomical and ineffective? How can the overall goal of economy be achieved when the cost per placement continues to rise with each day that the restrictions are maintained?

How can effectiveness be determined when the people are not being served?

Why restrict the only national manpower program serving the needs of the 10 million Spanish citizens?

This administration is not the first to fail and neglect the Spanishspeaking people. We are now aware of reality and consequently a great deal of anger and great deal of harshness is felt for the Federal Government and its inadequate attempts to bring parity to the Spanish speaking.

The Spanish-speaking people are no longer satisfied with the false promises of this administration. We are no longer viewing the world as ending on barrio boundaries, we are very much aware of the fact that every night millions of our people go to bed hungry. The Spanishspeaking people clearly see such failures, unresponsive school systems, ineffective plans to create a more representative work force such as the 16-point system plan, and the minority understaffing of all Government agencies including agencies purposely set up to assure equal opportunities. These offices are the Departments of Labor, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The Spanish speaking are also disappointed with the removal of talented Spanish-surname officials, such as Phil Sanchez, from the Office of Economic Opportunity and Carlos Villareal from the Department of Transportation.

It is disturbing to know that the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission was created by the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and charged with the enforcement of title VII which prohibits discrimination in public and private employment because of race, creed, color, sex or national origin consistently ignores the problems of the second largest minority in the Nation, the Spanish speaking.

It must be made clear to all Government agencies that the worn out statement "we do not have more Spanish-speaking employees because there just aren't any qualified," is no longer acceptable to our people.

A major domestic problem facing the administration today is assurance of equal opportunity to all Spanish-speaking people. The need for equal opportunity in employment is particularly acute because of past and continuous discrimination in the hiring of the Spanish speaking.

Every time a Spanish-speaking student drops out of school, the school has failed in some way. Every time a young adult can't find a job, society has failed in some way. Success feeds on success and failure feeds on failure, so consequently SER must be allowed to continue its operations without any restrictions to correct such injustices and inequities.

As president of the National LULAC organization and its 250,000 voting citizens, we demand that the restrictions be lifted immediately. The lifting of said restrictions would thus enable SER to once again continue its operations in giving valuable and much-needed technical assistance to the new SER sites and allow over 400 enrollees into skills training plus enabling over 150 into on-the-job training slots in the month of January 1973. The lifting of such restrictions would also permit SER national to comply with its stiff performance standards outlined in its prime contract and would continue to give its vital services to the Spanish speaking of the barrios.

The problem I have just discussed demands an immediate solution and I hope that Secretary-designate Peter J. Brennan recognizes the urgent need to lift the severe restrictions imposed not only on SER but to each citizen in need of manpower services.

Thank you.

Senator HUGHES. Thank you very much, Mr. Villa. Mr. Zazueta. STATEMENT OF RICARDO ZAZUETA, CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL MANPOWER COALITION FOR THE SPANISH-SPEAKING AMERICANS

Mr. ZAZUETA. My name is Ricardo Zazueta, and I am testifying in my capacity as the chairman of the National Spanish-Speaking Manpower Committee.

Before addressing this committee regarding the nomination of Mr. Peter J. Brennan, I would first like to give you a brief description of the group which I am privileged to represent. The National SpanishSpeaking Manpower Committee was first organized in March of last year in an effort to establish a representative body of experts who could work with various agencies concerned with manpower. Assuring that available manpower services reached the Spanish-speaking and that the needs of the Spanish-speaking were met not only by existing programs, but through new programs. The committee has representatives from each of the three major Spanish-speaking groups in the United States: Mexican Americans, Puerto Rican Americans, and Cuban Americans. The full committee and its individual members have met with various Department of Labor officials during the past year, including the former Secretary of Labor, James D. Hodgson, former Assistant Secretary Secretary Malcolm Lovell, Jr., and Mr.