Evening star., 1936-09-02
S1,O0O,0DO IS HELD
RELIEF NEED HERE
Street Declares Sum Is
Necessary to Care for
5000 Destitute Families.

Appropriation Of an additional
81 900 900 is needed, according to We'll
fare Director Elwood Street, to pro-
vide for 5000 destitute families
numbering about 10000 individuals
now barred from aid either through
direct relief or the works programs.
District residents were urged last
night by the welfare director in
talk over Station VOL to go before
Congress in January to demand a
supplemental relief appropriation.
Until that is DONE" he declared,
very serious suffering is going to
continue and increase. Our COM
munity will suffer more and more the
results of i'll health and low morale,
of the menace of disease. OF delin-
quency and of a discouraged citizenry.
The need is here. I know it is
hard to believe. because those who
are in need suffer in silence, bewil-
dered and discouraged by the lack of
resources, and yet hopeful that the
citizens of Washington and the Con-
gress will take appropriate action"
Poor Bearing Burden.
Street said this group 'gets along,
unhappily, by begging. by doubling
up with neighbors and friends who
are little better off than themselves,
with resultant serious overcrowding in
the poor districts of our city; by not
paying their rent: by borrowing from
friends and relatives who never ex-
pect to have the loan paid back, and
by gifts of food from people but little
better off than they are"
The cost of their living. he said. is
being borne in the main "by poor
people, by small landlords. instead of
being disturbed, as it should be.
through tax funds which the whole
community pays"
Street insisted there was great
suffering here, even in the face of the
apparent prosperity enjoyed by the
District generally. There is boom
here all right" he said. but it is
bringing people from all over the
United States. 1t is not employing
local people.
En0 OF resources.
Many local people. of course, have
gotten employment with the improve
ment in business conditions" he
added. ION the other hand. however,
many people who nave not got en-
ployment have come to the end of
their resources so that there are about
as many destitute unemployed per-
sons in Washington right now as
there were at the height of our relief
activity a year ago. when we were
spending for relief approximately
$40 0.0O0, 900 a year of Federal and Dis
trict funds-mostly Federal funds.
THE difference now is that the
w. P. A. is carrying some Of this load
and that many of the people who are
in need are not receiving any relief
at all because of the cessation of Fed
eral relief and the limitation of local
funds
Some 1000 persons have had to be
dropped from the District direct re-
lief list since March because of re-
duction in funds, Street said. He
insisted the present appropriation of
81 500, 900 for relief here this fiscal
year is inadequate. For the next
fiscal year he has asked an increase Of
$70o, 900, to bring the total to $2.-
100000
The District now Is caring for only
those who are definitely not employ
able" families in which there is no
person capable of working. Street
estimates there are some 5000 cases
in which there are persons only
'marginally employable." that Is. who
can perform only certain kinds of
work. These persons are unable to
find suitable jobs, he says.