The Waterbury Democrat., 1933-09-18
Seeking NRA Funds
 For Rural Homes
Self.Supporting Units for Older Unemployed Planned
 to Relieve Concentration in Industrial Towns

Hartford, Sept 1s-Executives of the state department of Fisheries and Game, commission on parks and forests and the commission Of forests and wild life are seeking support under the NRA at Wash. ington today for a "Connecticut rural home acres plan" which would take the older unemployed, and particularly disabled veterans, from indus trial centers to self-sus. taining marginal land utilization units in the country. The project has the approval of Governor Will bur l.. Cross.
 The plan calls for acquisition of low priced 1500.acre tracts, erec- ton of one-family houses thereon, allotment of two and one-half acre subsistence gardens, seeds, farm tools and poultry to each fam fly as well as providing small stock herds, pasturage, forests and wood and water supply and agricultural machinery for each unit. Funds to inaugurate the plan are to be sought from appropriations al- ready authorized by congress under the NRA and particularly those earmarked for decentralization of everbalanced populations in indus trial centers.
 Income and subsistence after es- tablishment of the units would eventually have Q sustenance value to each family of approximately $50 per year, state department officials who have compiled the plan estimate. thus bringing about pos. sible economies In municipal relief Ca, Aa a q xx,An vtVtyaO ayf. n avY, enf to older persons, who, 1t Is pointed out, have not directly benefited from national recovery plans thus far adopted. Subsistence sections of the plan are based on crops, eggs, milk and meat raised by the families them- selves, with fuel supplied by the forests. Cash income would be de- rived from part-time employment, home industries, operating the acres as managed game preserves With sale of shooting rights, furs and rental of camp sites. From forestry activities, sale of greens for deco rative purposes as well as income from wood for fuel and material for wood-using industries has been included.
 The Rural Home Acres Plan" will be presented today to Prof M. L. Wilson, in charge of federal de- centralization activities in the de- partment' of the interior, by the fol- lowing: Superintendent of Fishre- les and Game Arthur L. Clark, State Forester Austin F. Hawes, Secre- tary W. 0. Filley and Field Agent Elliott P. Bronson of the state com. mission of forests and wild life and | EtatA III .InAA nf fh A state department of Fisheries and Game. Cooperating with the com mittee in supplying data for the plan were Lester B. Scheide, Hart ford architect. who voluntarily con- tributed all housing plans, and many members of the state of the IConnecticut Agricultural college, in- cluding Profs Allen Manchester and Paul Putnam, domestic animals; Prof J. A. Gibbs, extension forest CT; Prof A. D. Wilkinson, veget- ables; Prof A. E. Moss, forestry; Prof David D. Warner, domestic poultry, and Mrs Marion E. Da- kin, home economies. Additional data for the plan was supplied by the Connecticut unemployment commission, the American Legion, and State Veterans fund officials. The plan points out: During the period of present economic disas- ters the most pressing problems of Connecticut have arisen from a too intensive concentration of people In urban centers.
 "Out of the 169 towns in the state there are at present 32 towns with a population of over 10000 people. These 169 towns are group ed as 26 towns urban, 35 towns small urban or suburban, 5S as rural with manufacturing and 50 towns strictly rural.
 Seventy per cent or the total population of the state live under urban conditions with very limited confines due to the requirements or high pressure manuiacturins. Roughly the proportion of workers in non on-agricultural industries is one to four of the total population. Due to this concentration the effects or unemployment have been increased
 many-fold and have made the problem more difficult of solution than it would have been if the pop ulation had been spread over a larger area.' ..
 For the first six months in 1888 the Connecticut emergency reiiei commission estimates that there were l94,400 persons unemployed' which is 11.S percent Of the estl- mated population" the plan states
 "This cost the state. town, and pri- vnte relief agencies between Jan. uary and July this year .. Iosal W .'