May I add, until this action in 1961, nonrural people did not have any kind of insured loan program. People in the city had one, but nonfarm people had none, and response to this has truly been amazing.

Mr. WHITTEN. I might interrupt at this point, Mr. Secretary, to point out that it was this committee that broadened it from farm to rural. One of the things that we are proudest of is that the Department has, with the committee's help, brought to rural areas somewhat the same program that has been available in the cities all along. You may proceed.

Secretary FREEMAN. Since the rural housing program began in 1949, it is interesting to note that some $680 million has been loaned, creating an estimated 163,000 man-years of employment and a market for a billion board feet of lumber and $340 million worth of materials and supplies. Losses are less than two one-hundredths of 1 percent.

Rural power needs continue to grow, not only for the farm but also for a growing array of rural, nonfarm uses. We can identify over 400 uses for electricity on the farm alone. Thus, the clamor that cooperative rural electrification has done its job is about as logical as to claim that urban power needs are satisfied once the utility runs a line

down the street.

Communication needs in rural America also are far from satisfied. Almost one out of four farms as well as other rural establishments do not have phone service or the facilities to provide it. Even where rural telephone systems do operate, costs are high because of the small number of users per mile of line. Interest costs in many areas-even with the 2-percent interest rate-amount to $1.50 to $2 a month.

ELIMINATING THE CAUSES OF POVERTY

All of the programs and projects which I have described here today are important instruments in the war on poverty in rural America-a war to which President Johnson has called us all.

RAD can help lift an area out of poverty *** and it can keep an area from sliding into poverty *** and it can help every area raise its standard of living to new levels, for RAD is designed to stimulate new jobs and new income throughout rural America.

The Congress in 1962, as part of the Food and Agriculture Act, authorized what I believe to be, up to now, the best single program technique for getting at the areas of severe poverty in rural America.

This is the rural renewal program, a carefully planned effort to help rural people use the urban renewal concept to deal with pockets of need. We are moving ahead with pilot programs now where the need is so great and the resources are so limited that an overall, concentrated effort is required.

The first funds for this program were provided on a limited basis in the 1964 appropriation act.

At the request of local people who have assured us that they will be responsible for local leadership of rural renewal efforts, we are providing help in five areas: Little River County, Ark.; Washington, Holmes, and Walton Counties, Fla.; Monroe and Appanoose Counties, Iowa; Dallas and Hickory Counties, Mo.; and Mineral and Hardy Counties, W. Va.

These pilot counties are representative of problem farming areas in various sections of the Nation. Experience will thus be gained for eventual expansion of the program as additional resources become available.

The five areas contain about 100,000 people, whose net incomes average $2,900 per family. Farms are small and underdeveloped. The lack of off-farm work to supplement farm income is a chronic problem. Many of the communities in these areas are without essential public and other services.

Local private and public leaders already are being aided in their survey of all their resources, in drawing up overall development programs, and planning specific projects that include land redevelopment. This technical aid in planning and carrying out development programs will be supplemented by loans to local public agencies to supplement existing public and private credit resources needed to finance specific projects.

The result will be a total and concentrated attack on pockets of rural need on an areawide basis. Many different approaches and many different combinations of projects will be used, depending on the wishes of local leaders and the resources available to them.

For example, local agencies may aid the residents of rural renewal areas to purchase and develop land for efficient family farms, public recreation, reforestation, industrial sites, housing, and other needed purposes.

We have assigned personnel with broad experience in rural areas development to each of the five areas. They are assisting the local people in making full use of all the resources available from private and public sources and in securing whatever additional aid is needed. In listing some of the projects local people are planning to undertake in one of these five areas, I emphasize that most of the financing for these projects will be handled not with rural renewal loans but with funds obtained from other public and from private sources. This is, of course, as it should be.

in

Rural renewal loans are designed specifically to fill certain gaps financing of needed basic community development. The most important aspect of the rural renewal program is the extension of technical assistance that will help local groups prepare specific development plans and projects.

The services provided by the technicians like those of the Depart ment and the specialists hired by loans and grants made available under the technical assistance phase of the rural renewal program are the catalysts that will make the effort successful.

In Little River County, Ark., rural renewal efforts of the people of Little River County, Ark., were speeded up when the Arkansas Legislature authorized the counties to create legal public bodies that may cooperate with the Federal Government on rural renewal and resource conservation and development projects.

I might point out that this, as you well know of course, is how the urban renewal and slum clearance works with a local governmental body authorized by local law to borrow money, to bond, in some cases, to levy local taxes and all the rest, and, therefore, there is a local entity with appropriate authority to act, and this has been done by the Legislature of Arkansas.

Incidently, the group from Arkansas that is really doing some pioneering on this in great detail is coming in here Friday to meet with Sargent Shriver and the staff planning group on the whole rural poverty problem.

Moving ahead with their rural renewal work, the residents of the county are seeking modern water systems for the towns of Winthrop, Ogden, and Wilton. A sewer system is planned for the town of Foreman.

A study is being made to learn whether a large-scale camping, fishing, swimming, and boating recreation site can be developed on Millwood Lake. Consideration is being given to purchasing large tracts totaling 6,000 acres and dividing them. into family farms for resale to young farmers.

Industrial sites, already obtained by the towns of Foreman and Wilton, are being considered by Ogden and Winthrop.

In the early planning stages are two alfalfa processing mills, the expansion of vegetable production for sale to a nearby large canning plant, the establishment of a wood products industry for manufacturing furniture and toys. A pine pole peeling and preserving plant now is under construction.

The development of a recreation area at Stallion Ford is being considered, as is the development of two large tracts of land into small units for rural homes and part-time farms.

I know you recognize that the nine objectives for RAD are highly interrelated and that some of the specific examples cited under one category apply with equal force to another category. This always will be the case with any arbitrary definition of goals and objectives.

There is a common thread that runs through the entire RAD effort, however, that I constantly keep in mind and which I would like to emphasize to all who are concerned with the need to move rural America ahead more vigorously.

All the programs and projects within the RAD designation cannot produce anything without local leadership. The Department cannot make them go nor can any Federal or State agency. Only people concerned with the future of their community have the ability to use these programs. In a manner of speaking, local leadership is like the battery in a car. Local leadership is the element necessary to make RAD produce the power to make rural America go.

Thus, RAD broadens the dimensions of public understanding as to the needs in rural America and it broadens the dimensions of public response to those needs. It emphasizes the use and not the idling of resources. It provides the catalyst which brings together the needs of both rural and urban America and from this union will come progress for both the city and country.

I urge your favorable consideration of the requests for RAD programs which this budget contains, and I would be pleased to answer any questions you may have on these and other programs covered by the budget requests we have submitted.

Thank you for your patience, Mr. Chairman.

30-080-64-pt. 1--2

(The additional information referred to on p. 5 follows:)

INSTANCES OF BENEFITS RECEIVED UNDER THE PRICE SUPPORT PROGRAM BY INDIVIDUAL SMALL FARMERS

Robert Ray Nowell, McCool, Miss.

The producer placed 1,438 pounds of cotton under CCC loan in September and October 1962. The loan rate was 34.04 cents per pound and the local price at the time of the loan was 33.35 cents per pound. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was 36 cents per pound. The producer received $38.10 increase in gross income as a result of placing the cotton under price support loan. Lloyd C. Stamm, Washington, Kans.

The producer placed 661.33 bushels of wheat under CCC loan in July 1963. The loan rate was $1.81 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $1.78 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $1.99 per bushel. The producer received $138.88 increase in gross income as a result of placing the wheat under price support loan.

William E. Wright, Route No. 3, Sebree, Ky.

The producer placed 432 bushels of soybeans under CCC loan in October 1962. The loan rate was $2.21 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $2.25 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $2.51 per bushel. The producer received $112.32 increase in gross income as a result of placing the soybeans under price support loan.

S. T. Apple, Route No. 1, Cedar Hill, Tenn.

The producer placed 600 bushels of wheat under CCC loan in August 1962. The loan rate was $2.02 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $1.80 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $2.10 per bushel. The producer received $180 increase in gross income as a result of placing the wheat under price support loan.

F. S. Mennish, Route 4, Commerce, Ga.

The producer placed 884 pounds of cotton under CCC loan in November 1962. The loan rate was 32.63 cents per pound and the local price at the time of the loan was 32.75 cents per pound. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was 33.25 cents per pound. The producer received $4.42 increase in gross income as a result of placing the cotton under price support loan.

Walter B. Walling, Fort Motte, S.C.

The producer placed 479 bushels of soybeans under CCC loan in December 1962. The loan rate was $2.21 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $2.45 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $2.66 per bushel. The producer received $100.59 increase in gross income as a result of placing the soybeans under price support loan.

John Kell, Route 1, Wingate, Ind.

The producer placed 514 bushels of wheat under CCC loan in August 1963. The loan rate was $1.85 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $1.65 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $2.02 per bushel. The producer received $190.18 increase in gross income as a result of placing the wheat under support loan.

Foy C. James, Charleston, Ill.

The producer placed 445 bushels of soybeans under CCC loan in October 1962. The loan rate was $2.28 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $2.29 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $2.46 per bushel. The producer received $75.65 increase in gross income as a result of placing the soybeans under price support loan.

Donald Gossard, Route 1, Peoria, Ohio

The producer placed 462 bushels of soybeans under CCC loan in November 1962. The loan rate was $2.25 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $2.30 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $2.54 per bushel. The producer received $110.88 increase in gross income as a result of placing the soybeans under price support loan.

Frank Henke, O'Fallon, Mo.

The producer placed 930 bushels of soybeans under CCC loan in October 1962. The loan rate was $2.28 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $2.14 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $2.56 per bushel. The producer received $390.60 increase in gross income as a result of placing the soybeans under price support loan.

Kile Guthrie, Miami, Mo.

The producer placed 1,713 bushels of corn under CCC loan in December 1962. The loan rate was $1.22 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $1.06 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $1.27 per bushel. The producer received $559.73 increase in gross income as a result of placing the corn under price support loan.

Dwight Krumboltz, Cedar Rapids, Iowa

The producer placed 771 bushels of corn under CCC loan in December 1962. The loan rate was $1.19 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $1.14 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $1.23 per bushel. The producer received $69.39 increase in gross income as a result of placing the corn under price support loan.

George H. Meyer, Pilger, Nebr.

The producer placed 1,166 bushels of corn under CCC loan in December 1962. The loan rate was $1.14 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $1.05 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $1.20 per bushel. The producer received $174.90 increase in gross income as a result of placing the corn under price support loan.

D. H. Bowles, Rockville, Va.

The producer placed 550 bushels of corn under CCC loan in January 1963. The loan rate was $1.34 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $1.24 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $1.35 per bushel. The producer received $60.50 increase in gross income as a result of placing the corn under price support loan.

Jacob K. Mast (R.D.), Lancaster, Pa.

The producer placed 1,313 bushels of wheat under CCC loan in August 1963. The loan rate was $1.93 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $1.61 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $2.12 per bushel. The producer received $669.63 increase in gross income as a result of placing the wheat under price support loan.

Arland Van Zant, Route No. 5, Caldwell, Idaho

The producer placed 935 bushels of wheat under CCC loan in September 1963. The loan rate was $1.68 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $1.59 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $1.92 per bushel. The producer received $308.55 increase in gross income as a result of placing the wheat under price support loan.

John E. Campbell, Route No. 1, Madras, Oreg.

The producer placed 777 bushels of wheat under CCC loan in September 1963. The loan rate was $1.86 per bushel and the local price at the time of the loan was $1.83 per bushel. The local price at the time the loan was repaid was $2.10 per bushel. The producer received $209.79, increase in gross income as a result of placing the wheat under price support loan.

IMPORTANCE OF OTHER AGRICULTURAL PROGRAMS

Mr. WHITTEN. Mr. Secretary, I think you made a very excellent statement. I would say, however, that your attention has been given primarily to the new programs to help folks on a farm to make a living without farming.

I remember some years ago that Mr. Morse, then Under Secretary, said the answer to the farm problem was to get a job in town. I really took him to task on it, but I believe you read his book.