Box 13, Folder 21, Document 69

Box 13, Folder 21, Document 69

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FROM: The Urban Coalition
For further information: Donald Canty, Urban America Inc. , 265-2224

The Urban Coalition has scheduled its Emergency Convocation for
August 24 at the Shoreham Hotel in Washington, D.C,

Co-chairmen of the Convocation will be Andrew Heiskell and
A. Philip Randolph. Mr. Heiskell is chairman of the board of Time Inc.
and also of Urban America Inc. Mr. Randolph is president of the Brother-
hood of Sleeping Car Porters.

The Coalition was formed Monday, July 31, by 20 national leaders
of business, labor, religion, civil rights, and city government. It is call-
ing the Convocation to mobilize the nation's public and private resources in
a concerted attack on urban problems.

Announcement of the date and co-chairmen of the Convocation
was made today at a planning meeting in the Urban America offices. Also
released was a list of 12 additional individuals who had expressed support
of the Coalition but were unable to attend the July 31 meeting, and have joined
the original 20 leaders as members of the Coalition Steering Committee:
Mayor Ivan Allen of Atlanta; Roy Ash, President of Litton Industries; Mayor
Jerome P. Cavanagh of Detroit; Frederick J. Close, Chairman of the Board
of the Aluminum Company of America; Mayor John F. Collins of Boston;
Mayor Richard J, Daley of Chicago; Henry Ford II, Chairman of the Ford
Motor Company; James Rouse, President of The Rouse Company and of

Urban America Inc.; Theodore Schlesinger, President of Allied Stores Corpora-
The Urban Coalition FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Page 2

tion; Asa T. Spaulding, President of the North Carolina Mutual Insurance
Company; David Sullivan, President of the Building Service Employees
International Union; and Mayor James H. J. Tate of Philadelphia, Presi-
dent of the National League of Cities.

The Coalition expecis an attendance of 1,000 at the one-day
Convocation. Each segment will issue invitations to 200 individuals,

In the morning, there will be a general session on the Convoca-
tion's three major programs, They are:

--An emergency work program to provide job training and employ-
ment for the urban poor, now being drafted into specific legislation;

--A major expansion of the private sector's efforts to train and
provide jobs for the hard-core unemployed, such as the "Earn and Learn"
programs now underway in several cities;

--A long-range program for the physical and social reconstruction
of American cities "to break up the vicious cycle of the ghetto," in the
words of the Coalition's July 31 statement of purpose.

Following the morning session, a delegation from the Coalition's
Steering Committee will call upon Congressional leaders of both parties
to present these programs.

In the afternoon, the Convocation will break up into work groups
to discuss the means of implementing these programs, particularly through

formation of local coalitions involving the same segments as the national
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Page 3

effort. At the end of the day, there will be a general session to heara
report of the Steering Committee delegation to Congress.

The July 31 meeting at which the Coalition was formed was con-
vened by Mayor Joseph M. Barr of Pittsburgh, president of the U. S. Con-
ference of Mayors, and by Mayor John V. Lindsay of New York, a member
of the Conference's executive committee,

A copy of the Coalition's statement of purpose and a roster of

the full Steering Committee are attached,

HHH