National Reports:
CARMICHAEL, JOHN & POSNER, SEYMOUR J. & VOTAW, ALBERT N.
National Reports San Francisco: Frank Mankiewicz. Minneapolis: Sam Romer. Chicago: Albert N. Votaw. Boston: Courtney Sheldon. Dallas: Bicknell Eubanks. New Orleans: John Carmichael. St. Louis:...
...It is not now the tightly-knit organization that existed under Huey...
...All this was standard practice in the real estate industry, but clashed violently with traditional cooperative concepts...
...In his latest project, East River Houses, Mr...
...The stage is now set for the Long family's return to the Governor's chair...
...Long Starts Politicking Early By John Carmichael NEW ORLEANS POLITICAL FACTIONS in Louisiana are beginning to jockey for position in the Gubernatorial primary scheduled for the summer of 1955...
...The Catholic hierarchy did state, in response to questions, that the bishop's resignation was not prompted by reasons of health...
...Although it is difficult to chart this one on a liberal basis, Ellender was backed by Senator Russell Long, Earl's nephew and a son of Huey...
...2. The land on which Kingsview will stand is wholly owned and not leased...
...SEYMOUR J. POSNER is an expert on housing for the New York City CIO and the Disabled American Veterans...
...Louis: William Wyant Jr...
...The big church assembly occasioned an unequaled outpouring of religious news...
...The Eisenhower adventure did not do him any good and he is reportedly angling for a Federal District Court spot...
...George Long, Earl's brother, is another member of the family serving in Congress—the House of Representatives...
...One of the chief proponents of increased diversion was Illinois Senator Everett Dirksen...
...President Eisenhower also vetoed a bill that would have allowed the Chicago Sanitary District to increase the flow of water from Lake Michigan into the Chicago River, and thence downstate via the Illinois waterways...
...This may very well be the first time in history that a Socialist mayor has gotten more from a Republican President than a Republican Senator...
...Schwarz once achieved a temporary sort of fame by casting the only pro-Ike vote in the 60-man Illinois delegation to the 1952 GOP convention...
...No better demonstration of what goes into the unsavory reputation this city enjoys throughout the world could have been planned...
...Balloting by both of these groups is being done on a more highly organized basis than ever before...
...An estimated 125,000 filled the lake-front stadium and overflowed into the parking lots outside, jamming traffic for miles and hours in what was, until then, the largest outdoor religious meeting in the city's history...
...By the end of 1955, the members of the Foundation will have developed over 10,000 dwelling units ranging from a community of 36 single-family homes to the 2200-unit Electchester, sponsored by Local 3 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers...
...As a result, the man on the street is leery of all cooperatives...
...He had hoped to be named U. S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Illinois, but wasn't...
...A friend of the CIO and a vigorous critic of Senator McCarthy, Bishop Sheil left the organization he founded with no official word of explanation...
...The purpose of the foundation is to create new housing cooperatives, to unite existing cooperatives and to provide a clearing-house of building, financial and technical know-how to groups interested in developing cooperative housing...
...Finally, in 1927, a group of active members of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America initiated the first large-scale housing cooperative for middle- and lower-middle-income families in New York...
...Both candidates backed Stevenson...
...Kingsview differs from the projects currently under fire in a number of important ways: 1. The sponsors and members of the Board of Directors can make no profit in any way from the development...
...The words "non-profit" were continually used in promoting cooperatives where in fact the sponsors were making a profit on the land, the placing of the mortgage and on the construction itself...
...Led by Abraham E. Kazan, the Amalgamated pioneers have developed a series of projects which will house 4400 families by the end of 1955...
...The odds are that Long will draw the labor-liberal vote, as well as the traditional farmer-small town ballot which has been going to the family since the early reign of the late Huey...
...Roman Catholics, who were forbidden to attend the Protestant assembly in any capacity whatsoever by their ranking prelate...
...With one exception, every civic-, veteran- and labor-sponsored cooperative housing project in the New York area belongs to the United Housing Foundation...
...Bishop Sheil has been seriously ill...
...Copy readers grew as familiar with words like "ecumenical" and "eschatology" as with that traditional humorous wheeze of the police reporter: "mopery, gapery and intent to gawk...
...indeed, it would be hard to point out one man as its general...
...Probe Hurts Legitimate Housing Co-ops By Seymour J. Posner ALTHOUGH the recent Senate Banking Committee's hearings are exposing the exploitation of cooperative apartment seekers by a handful of windfall profiteers, the newspaper headlines fail to differentiate between builder-sponsored and legitimate housing cooperatives...
...Kingsview is part of a program sponsored by the Mayor's Committee on Slum Clearance Plans (Robert Moses, Chairman) to clear a 20-acre deteriorated area in the heart of downtown Brooklyn...
...For example, a 2-bedroom, 41/2-room apartment would cost from $81 to $90 per month, including utilities, after a down-payment of $2,650...
...In 1950, after an on-the-spot study of cooperative housing in Europe, Congress passed Section 213 of the National Housing Act which provided for Government guarantees of loans to cooperative housing projects...
...In the same year that saw the passage of Section 213, a group of New York cooperatives, including Amalgamated, Hillman and Queensview, organized the United Housing Foundation...
...The mortgage will amount to 80 per cent of land and buildings, and therefore the cooperators' share is 20 per cent...
...He flew in from Springfield, where he had made a political speech at the state fair...
...Since 1948, monthly carrying charges at Queensview and Hill-man Houses have risen an average of only 5 per cent despite a 16 per cent increase in costs...
...What is more, his administration has not been outstanding...
...Samuel Cardinal Stritch...
...One of the high points of the gathering was a gigantic opening-night pageant, held in Soldier Field...
...In the 27 years of its existence, it has weathered depressions and inflation, housing shortages and periods when many apartment houses stood vacant...
...Kazan has had the active support of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union...
...This year, Kennon apparently was afraid to pick an Eisenhower Democrat and tried to hedge by selecting Ainsworth, a conservative who voted for Stevenson...
...Kennon has also alienated the labor vote by signing a law banning union security agreements, and he has lost the Negro vote by signing education bills to circumvent the Supreme Court's segregation decision...
...In addition to Kingsview, the new neighborhood will include a modern campus for Long Island University, an addition to Brooklyn Hospital, a relatively high-cost commercially-sponsored apartment group, a new shopping center and playgrounds...
...For many years, the Longs have received support from labor and the "little people" in the state, for, generally speaking, they fight the vested interests more than any other political group in the state...
...Our town has seen plenty of shootings, but no victims of this high caliber since the Prohibition-era gang wars...
...Although intended to encourage labor-, veteran- and civic-sponsored cooperatives, the record shows that it was primarily the commercial builders and speculators who made use of Section 213...
...And well he might be...
...One of the most vociferous opponents was Milwaukee's Mayor Frank Zeidler...
...He probably will be the conservatives' choice, unless they can come up with someone who has more prestige in the state...
...he has had trouble with members of his legislature on a number of occasions, although relations with them are probably better now than they were when he took office...
...practices in the real estate industry has created a series of anomalies which are filling the newspaper headlines...
...In another skirmish, Senator Allen Ellender was renominated for another term over Bob Ellis...
...This 1600-unit development in the Lower East Side was described by ILGWU President David Dubinsky as a living memorial of what independent working people can create through their own effort...
...Despite their differences, when the Longs go to the polls they go together...
...Even such details as washing machine contracts were arranged so that these sponsors would reap a benefit...
...This will probably mean a battle between the Long forces—with ex-Governor Earl Long as their candidate—and the big-money, conservative group, which has not chosen a candidate as yet...
...4. The cooperators have a much greater equity in the project...
...However, Gravel, who has been associated with Long for some time and had his unofficial backing, won the post...
...Governor Robert Kennon, who threw his support to Eisenhower in 1952, and, unlike Texas' Governor Allan Shivers, failed to deliver the state, is considered out of the picture...
...quickly broke the record, however...
...The Long political machine has always been puzzling to outsiders...
...The first units of the Amalgamated project housed 250 families...
...Perhaps the most striking advantage enjoyed by cooperatives under the Foundation's sponsorship is the relative stability of the carrying charges...
...President Eisenhower was one of those who addressed the Protestant gathering...
...In a typical builder-sponsored cooperative, the tenant-owner starts off with only a 5 to 10 per cent equity in the buildings and with no interest at all in the land...
...Although Kennon won't run, he undoubtedly will throw his support to the conservative candidate and play a key role in the campaign...
...Atlanta: Joseph Fiszman...
...Night life in Chicago has not been brightened by open gangland warfare for more than 20 years, but it would probably be difficult to convince our distinguished visitors of this...
...Increased diversion, they felt, would clean out the city's rivers and canals and lower slightly the level of Lake Michigan, which has been eating away at lake-front properties...
...The effort to combine traditional cooperative principles with the accepter...
...Thus ended a 24-year battle by Chicago authorities...
...Richmond: Lawrence King...
...Typical of the United Housing Foundation - sponsored projects is Kingsview, a 290-unit, 16-story apartment group in Brooklyn...
...Their outdoor mass in that same Soldier Field, celebrated in honor of the Marian Year, drew 260,000...
...James McLemore, wealthy Alexandria cattleman and darling of many conservatives, has already announced his candidacy for the Governor's job...
...Prominent among those who were not at the fair to hear him was Henry A. Schwarz...
...An interesting development in the early sparring between the factions came this summer when Camille Gravel, of Alexandria, beat out Ainsworth for the post of Democratic National Committeeman...
...He declined to comment on whether his resignation was a result of his denouncing the junior Senator from neighboring Wisconsin, whom he accused of operating "a kind of shell game" on the American people...
...Since the turn of the century, American labor and civic leaders were thinking of ways of applying cooperative principles to the problem of the nation's ill-housed workers...
...Housing experts such as Charles Abrams have said that Kingsview is "the best buy around" because of the above factors and the resultant low monthly carrying charges...
...Chicago Features Murder, Religion, Fight over River By Albert N. Votaw CHICAGO IN THE MIDDLE of the World Council of Churches meeting at Evans-ton, two big-shot Capone gang hoodlums were gunned down within 72 hours...
...Louis H. Pink, former head of the Associated Hospitals Service (Blue Cross) in New York State, is the President and Gerard Swope is the Chairman of the Board...
...Other possible candidates include Jimmy Davis, guitar-playing ex-Governor, and State Senator Bob Ainsworth, Kennon's floor leader, who has connections with New Orleans Mayor Delesseps Morrison's powerful machine...
...3. Construction will be handled on a straight fee basis by Community Services Inc., a subsidiary of the United Housing Foundation...
...Yet the fact is that, since 1927, housing groups organized on a cooperative basis for middle-income families have been a smashing success...
...For this reason, the down-payments in Kingsview are about twice as high as the typical 213 project offered today...
...Young Senator Russell Long has the allegiance of another wing of the group...
...However, at this point, it appears highly unlikely that the Eisenhower Democrats, who polled a sizable vote in 1952 but failed to carry the state, will even enter the race—at least, not under the Eisenhower banner...
...He also hoped to be invited to Springfield, but wasn't...
...The Governor has been permitted to select his man for this job for at least the last 25 years...
...Not only did editors delight in the pictorial possibilities of the bearded, begowned delegates from the Eastern Rile churches, but they published lengthy accounts of the assembly's doctrinal laborings...
...The scare headlines offer new scandals almost daily, while the news about the successful union- and civic-sponsored cooperatives rarely appears in print...
...Despite the misleading headlines, bona fide cooperative housing offers a unique opportunity for middle-income families to live decently in homes which they own and control themselves at prices they can afford...
...More than 100 persons collapsed, 20 more were hospitalized, and a team of Civil Defense observers came from Washington to watch how the traffic was handled...
...The Presidential veto reflected opposition arguments coming chiefly from other lake cities, anxious lest diversion cause navigation problems, and from the State Department, ever fearful that unilateral action would offend our Canadian allies...
...Earl probably controls more of its "courthouse corporals" than anyone else, and it is ironic that he should be the heir to Huey's power, since he was a bitter enemy of his brother...
...Shortly before this Marian Year outpouring, citizens were stunned to hear that popular, liberal Bishop Sheil had resigned as head of the Catholic Youth Organization...
...Some doctrinaire liberals will go with Earl Long reluctantly, but they will probably vote for him in the end, for they have no other place to go...
...present indications are that he and his uncle are not on friendly terms...
...Acrimony and lawsuits fill the air and the legitimate cooperative movement suffers from the public's failure to distinguish between the builder-sponsored and the civic-sponsored developments...
Vol. 37 • September 1954 • No. 39
