On-the-job training was an intergral part of the CCC, and will be in the YCC. The boys will learn how to operate equipment and perform a variety of conservation tasks involving more than rudimentary skills. One example would be surveying, which would require some knowledge of mathematics. What will happen is that vistas of opportunity will be unfolded.

I am for the YCC because it can do so much for our youth.

COST AND BENEFITS

The traditional concept of the cost-benefit ratio is that there must be a favorable balance to secure a project authorization. The YCC meets all tests. The conservation phase stands on its own merit as work needing to be done. The youth phase stands on its own merit.

For example, I am told that a juvenile entangled with the law may cost us $15,000 to $25,000. He is a negative factor in society. An unemployed person not only does not pay taxes, but draws various types of welfare payments. He is a cost to society.

If we invest wisely in our youth-develop their skills and aspirations give them opportunity to be useful citizens, we can convert a person from a cost to society to a benefit for mankind.

Testifying before the Appropriations Committee, the Department of Agriculture revealed that last year it spent $53 million on the 180 million acres in the national forests on fire protection and firefighting. This is over four times as much as was spent in 1951. The acreage burned curve is rising slightly after four decades of decline, and this is due to increased use as well as the deterioration of a vast reservoir of CCC fire-protection facilities built in the 1930's and early 1940's.

Even more basic is the need for trained crews. This was a great extra service the old CCC performed. Now the Forest Service must rely heavily on pickup crews to cope with large fires. This is inefficient and, I think, has been a material factor in the increased cost of firefighting and the recent rise in the number of large fires.

When you add conservation benefits and youth benefits, you cannot weigh them precisely on the cost scale. I submit that under this program the ratio will be favorable. The costs will be largely investments in conservation and youth development. The savings will be real.

In summary, I support S. 404. I view it as a realistic bill. I say, reluctantly, that the Bureau of the Budget has failed to do the job it was created to do in clearing the report on S. 2036.

One minor example is salaries for the enrollees. S. 2036 provides $70 per month, with up to an additional $20 per month for assigned leadership responsibilities or special skills. S. 404 sets a base salary of $60 per month; an additional $5 per month for each subsequent enrollment, and up to $10 per month more for leadership responsibilities or special skills.

I am not arguing for the lower salary, but I find nothing in the administration's report to justify its change which would result in higher costs. I want a bill that gives maximum incentives at the lowest dollar cost. This is the responsible way to proceed.

The Budget Bureau has urged a lesser substitute bill without demonstrating that S. 404 was defective. It has accepted many of S. 404's promises, but so scaled them down as actually to jeopardize the program's success.

S. 404 provides the machinery for coordinating conservation efforts under the YCC with general conservation goals. S. 404 provides the machinery for meeting a growing problem of youth.

S. 404 accepts the challenge of the sixties-to meet its problems and to build for the future.

S. 404 is a bill which shows faith and real determination.

S. 404 proposes action-not talk, not pilot projects, not experiments for a situation where we know not only what must be done, but how to do it.

That concludes my statement, Mr. Chairman.

Senator PELL. Thank you very much, Senator Metcalf. Thank you for the time that you have given to this presentation and your unequivocal statement supporting S. 404.

In that connection, I wonder if you have given thought as to whether the main provisions of S. 404 could be woven into the administration's bill as a new title III, and keep the other measures that are in that, like the on-the-job training and public service jobs?

Senator METCALF. Certainly. I see no reason why S. 404 could not be substituted for title III of the administration bill. The point I sought to make this morning is that title III of the administration bill is so inadequate that something has to be substituted for it if you are going to incorporate the youth conservation program as a part of your overall legislation.

Senator PELL. As you pointed out, the 300,000 people who were in the CCC 20 years ago means that we do not need a pilot project now for 6,000.

Senator METCALF. We do not need a pilot program any more.

Senator PELL. We are particularly fortunate in hearing from you, as you were Justice of the Supreme Court of Montana. In that connection, I was wondering what your view was as to the advisability of having youngsters with a record of some wrongdoing on occasion or minor misdemeanors join with the general mass of youngsters in the proposed YCC.

Senator METCALF. I would be very much opposed to making the new Youth Conservation Corps a penal institution or an institution where judges, trial judges, would say to criminals and juvenile delinquents, "You either go into the Youth Conservation Corps or you go to jail for 6 months, or go to a reform school until you are 21," or something like that.

I suppose that there should be some flexibility and leeway to pick up people who are picked up, boys who are arrested, for minor violations and give them an opportunity. But this should not be a place where we send criminals. This is a place to pick up boys in advance so that they can have an opportunity, so that they will not fall to the temptation that meets them in idleness on the city streets.

Senator PELL. Your thinking is parallel with the thinking of my colleagues on the subcommittee. But the question that bothers us is should youngsters who have some sort of police record for misdemeanors in their background be excluded from joining this of their

own volition? We all agree that there should not arise a situation where the judge says to join-or serve 2 years in jail.

Senator METCALF. No; I do not think they should be excluded. I think there should be some flexibility. I would certainly leave it to the judgment of sound administrators who, if they found that a boy could be rehabilitated and he had only a minor police record, or stolen a car and taken a joy ride-some of those minor things-he certainly should not be excluded from this program, but it should not be a penal program to take care of juvenile delinquents.

Senator PELL. Another question along this line is what do you think should be the lowest age at which youngsters would be admitted? The administration program calls for 17. The Senate bill, Senator Humphrey's bill, S. 404, calls for 16. What would be your view?

Senator METCALF. I can recall the former CCC had 16-year-old boys who came out to Montana to work in the forests, and under the proper supervision they did as well as some of their older colleagues. So I think 16 is not too young, especially if we are going to have this as a program to save boys who might be in idleness.

We should pick them up as early as possible in order to give them an opportunity to get these new values and these new goals, and then maybe return to school, finish their high school, or something of that sort. So I would say that 16 would be better than 17.

Senator PELL. Out of curosity, do you recall how many members of the CCC were stationed in Montana?

Senator METCALF. I do not recall how many, but, Mr. Chairman, I was just graduating from college at the time that the CCC's were in operation in Montana and about the only ones that came out of college at that time who had a job were the ROTC Reserves, who went out to administer the CCC camps and, of course, they were all over the State of Montana.

These boys were building trails and roads and recreational facilities. We in Montana have not had enough people to build the recreational facilities or take care of the forests and roads and trails since then.

We are still operating fire lines on the basis of the trails that were built back in those days. There were camps all over Montana. These boys were incorporated into the communities and many of them, after World War II, have returned to Montana and are businessmen and community leaders, as a result of their experience in the CCC camps out there.

Senator PELL. Are these facilities being kept up?

Senator METCALF. No. When the war came on, they just abandoned all those facilities, and back in the remote canyons you can still run onto and old abandoned CCC camp. Of course, fishermen, hunters, and recreationists in such places as the Bob Marshall Wilderness are still using the trails that were built back in the days of the 1930's.

But we have not had the Forest Service personnel to keep them up, nor have we the personnel to keep up the picnic grounds and the recreational areas that these boys built. If these 100 million people are going to be taken care of in the National Forest this summer, we are going to have to have somebody take care of them.

The best way to do it is to have these boys do it as they did it in the 1930's, and relieve the higher paid and higher skilled Forest Service personnel for other jobs.

Senator PELL. Thank you very much, Senator Metcalf.

Senator METCALF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Senator PELL. We are very grateful to you, indeed.

Senator METCALF. Thank you.

Senator PELL. The next witness will be Mr. Daniel Pool. Mr. Pool represents Dr. Gabrielson. You have a prepared statement?

STATEMENT OF DR. IRA M. GABRIELSON, PRESIDENT, WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT INSTITUTE, REPRESENTED BY DANIEL A. POOL

Mr. POOL. That is correct, Mr. Chairman.

By way of identification, my name is Daniel Pool and I am the editor of the Outdoor News Bulletin for the Wildlife Management Institute.

Dr. Gabrielson, the president of the institute, was scheduled to be here tomorrow as a committee witness, and the committee subsequently requested that he come today. He was unable to do it. He asked that I appear in his behalf.

With your permission, Mr. Chairman, I would like to read his brief statement as though he had presented it.

As the director of the U.S. Bureau of Biological Survey during the latter years of the Civilian Conservation Corps, it was my privilege to see first hand the amazing results that a properly directed body of men can achieve in aiding the public agencies entrusted with the State and Federal conservation programs. In 1942, just before the CCC program terminated, there were more than 40 CCC camps in the National Wildlife Refuges, which were under my direction and supervision.

I will leave to the sociologists any comments about the beneficial effects, both physically and mentally, derived by the thousands of young men who participated in the CCC program. My observations will present the viewpoint of an administrator of natural resources. Many of today's dedicated wildlife, fishery, and forestry technicians and administrators in State and Federal employ received their first true appreciation of the out-of-doors through personal participation in the CCC programs.

When I became director of the Bureau of Biological Survey we had 238 National Wildlife Refuges aggregating more than 9.3 million acres under our control. Our staff was small and our appropriations were limited. Many of the refuges were newly acquired and were in critical need of development.

In a number of cases, the new refuges consisted of little more than posted lands. Refuge managers had nothing other than their own two hands to do all the work. Wildlife inventories required time and money, and the refuge managers seldom were more than generally aware of what breeding stocks were on the lands under their care. The CCC program changed things immensely. Firebreaks were made to protect wildlife cover from fire, waterholes were constructed to provide reliable water supplies in semiarid areas, food and cover plantings were established, and impoundments were built.

The Corps constructed needed patrol roads and erected fences, and picnic grounds and camping areas were created for the visiting public. Accurate inventories of the refuge wildlife populations were possible for the first time. The presence of the CCC boys also was a deterrent to violators and trespassers. More than 3,000 acres of new waterfowl nesting grounds were constructed on the Bear River National Wildlife Refuge in Utah.

Equally important and satisfactory work was done in Federal and State parks and forests. The CCC assisted U.S. Forest Service personnel trap and transplant 1,500 deer on the Pisgah National Forest in North Carolina. It aided in developing the Pennsylvania State Game Lands System of public hunting areas. Hundreds of miles of trout streams were improved in New York State.

Striking gains were made in forest fire suppression in all States. These are a few examples of the many conservation achievements that were made possible under the CCC.

The State and Federal resources agencies are better staffed and financed today than at any time in history. There is none, however, that could not improve its public services and the efficiency of its operations if similar manpower was available again through the proposed Youth Conservation Corps. The agencies are in a much better position today to give young men more intelligent direction than they were able to give their fathers in the CCC.

The need for manpower is urgent in every phase of natural and recreational resources management. S. 404 and the YCC provisions of S. 2036 would provide this manpower. We hope that this proposal will be included in the bill that is reported. It is our belief, however, that the conservation objectives of the plan would be benefited by the authorization of the advisory committee that would be provided by section 7 of S. 404.

We further recommend that at the end of line 20, page 5, of S. 404, the period be replaced with a comma and the following added:

*** of which not less than five shall be organizations generally recognized as primarily concerned with the conservation of natural resources.

It is believed that this clarification will assist in obtaining sound conservation suggestions and advice on the programs that are undertaken.

I also want to emphasize that conservationists believe that the overall program would benefit from the creation of a Youth Conservation Commission as proposed in section 5 of S. 404, which would consist of the Secretaries of Labor, Health, Education, and Welfare, Agriculture, and Interior.

Secretaries Freeman and Udall have principal responsibility for execution of the natural resources programs of the Federal Government, and the overall YCC program could benefit immeasurably from their direct participation.

In my estimation, Mr. Chairman, the proposal to create a Youth Conservation Corps is as double-barreled as the name implies. It aims at the conservation of natural resources and the conservation of youth. Either objective is worthy in itself.

Senator PELL. Thank you very much, indeed, Mr. Pool. You have given a very interesting approach to this problem because you ap proach it from the viewpoint of conservation.