Dublin Core
Title
Box 22, Folder 2, Document 41
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Draft: 5/10/67
CONFIDENTIAL
Dear Mr. President,
Your Task Force on the Cities agreed early in its deliber-
ations that now was no longer the time merely for minor adjustments
in current programs.
The nation's urban condition demands far more.
What more it demands is not simply a matter of money. A much
higher level of spending and investment - private as well as public -
is clearly in order, But we concur in your own expressions, and those
of your Cabinet, that money in itself is not an urban panacea.
We have attempted in the attached report to state what else
is involved in "working at scale" on the nation's urban problems.
We do not pretend to have all the answers, and we are not as
certain as we would like to be about those we do put forward. We are
also aware of the constraints governing your own and the nation's
response.
Nevertheless, we conclude our work on a note of great urgency.
The growing apartheid of our urban populations, segregating by race
and income, presents this nation with an ugly fact and an ominous
future - and possibly a threat to our security which might well over-
shadow that of Vietnam.
This threat may not materialize. Yet we think it would be
folly to test that possibility by doing no more to dispel it than
is explicit in the nature and scale of our current urban efforts.
We submit this report to you with our deepest respect and
our very best wishes.
CONFIDENTIAL
Dear Mr. President,
Your Task Force on the Cities agreed early in its deliber-
ations that now was no longer the time merely for minor adjustments
in current programs.
The nation's urban condition demands far more.
What more it demands is not simply a matter of money. A much
higher level of spending and investment - private as well as public -
is clearly in order, But we concur in your own expressions, and those
of your Cabinet, that money in itself is not an urban panacea.
We have attempted in the attached report to state what else
is involved in "working at scale" on the nation's urban problems.
We do not pretend to have all the answers, and we are not as
certain as we would like to be about those we do put forward. We are
also aware of the constraints governing your own and the nation's
response.
Nevertheless, we conclude our work on a note of great urgency.
The growing apartheid of our urban populations, segregating by race
and income, presents this nation with an ugly fact and an ominous
future - and possibly a threat to our security which might well over-
shadow that of Vietnam.
This threat may not materialize. Yet we think it would be
folly to test that possibility by doing no more to dispel it than
is explicit in the nature and scale of our current urban efforts.
We submit this report to you with our deepest respect and
our very best wishes.
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