I have had the feeling, from listening to other witnesses, that the one thing that LEAA has done is to bring together, in many instances for the first time in the same room, most of the elements of the criminal justice world within the State. The lubricant here has been money.

New York City has had a history of this attempt at cooperation. Would you say the lubricant of money here has enhanced the cooperative effort?

Mr. RUTH. Absolutely, Congressman Steiger. I did not mean to sound as pessimistic as perhaps you read me. What I was really saying in terms of LEAA funding was not that it could not produce change, but it would not produce change in itself unless it was combined with these other activities that I tried to describe.

This is why I hate to see funding programs stopped.

OEO was mentioned here before this morning. I see a nucleus in many areas of New York City of people who achieved experience and education and knowledge in the OEO programs, and when those were cut down it was really a tragedy to meet these people, because they thought they had learned from the mistakes of the past and were willing to go forward.

I hope that does not happen in this program. I think patience is so important because, in a way, we are launched on something which may take, if we are talking about fundamental change, a decade or maybe longer. I think we ought to stick at it.

We were invited to the first meeting of the Criminal Justice Council in Paterson, N.J., the other day, and at the very first meeting, just listening to those people from different parts of the system in that part of New Jersey was extremely encouraging.

I can remember in Crime Commission days in 1965 and 1966 the kind of programs that were being proposed. Just sitting in Paterson, N.J., and hearing this discussion just 4 years later, there was a tremendous change even from rural police chiefs in the county in the kinds of approaches that they thought they would want to take. Mr. STEIGER. Why was the change?

Mr. RUTH. I think the media have picked up a lot of the approaches that the Crime Commission put forward. Of course, the police were in focus from 1964 to 1969. Ĉorrections are now in focus. I think the general public is becoming more educated. I think there is more training available to people. I think a lot of emotion is being discarded, at least in the conference room. People are really looking for different kinds of approaches. I would just plead for that kind of time in this program.

I am happy to be monitored. We have had auditors with us. The day after I arrived in New York City, GAO arrived, which I assume was a coincidence. We have had State and city auditors. We like to be watched. I think people in this program should. You feel more comfortable if somebody is watching, because you cannot be aware of everything. If you have a lot of people watching, you are going to hear about more things and be able to correct them.

Mr. STEIGER. Along this very specific line, it seems to me, no matter what structure you design, no matter what standards you establish, however specific they are, they rise and fall on the quality of the people involved, particularly the leadership, but also up and down the line.

You indicate your complete awareness of the implacability of the civil service system in which quality plays no role at all. Recognizing this, does it not still offer more hope if we apply as much money as the taxing structure can stand and watch the expenditure of that money on a specific qualitative basis and make sure it is not being stolen, rather than some kind of esoteric standard? As you very clearly established, it would be very difficult to project any kind of standard that would be acceptable to everybody involved.

No. 1, make sure nobody is stealing. As you say, we watch that nobody is stealing. That is an achievable goal. Then we hopefully entice intelligent and innovative people into leadership roles and somehow free them from the civil service syndrome.

If we could approach it on that basis, do you think we would be approaching it in the right direction?

Mr. RUTH. Absolutely, Congressman Steiger.

in prepro

I point out here that we expend too much of our energy gram review. Our Xerox machine has caught on fire five times, mainly Xeroxing copies of programs before approval.

Mr. STEIGER. Is not most of that effort pretty cosmetic?

Mr. RUTH. It takes a lot of time.

Mr. STEIGER. It is rhetoric, is it not?

Mr. RUTH. It is not rhetoric. If one board approves and then you go to another board, that board figures it has no function unless it does a de novo review. It does not want to be a rubber stamp. So, you are through two boards, which does not leave the third board much to do except to try to find something else wrong with the program.

Mr. STEIGER. Mr. Chairman, I regret we do not have more time with Mr. Ruth.

Mr. MONAGAN. Do you want to come back at 2 o'clock?

Mr. STEIGER. I Would be happy to.

Mr. ST GERMAIN. I would like to ask a question right now.

Does your group in New York City employ outside consultants to help in the preparation of your program, such as Ernst & Ernst? They do pretty well in some programs in some places.

Mr. RUTH. We do our own planning within our staff, with the help of people in the criminal justice system and some of the community groups.

Mr. ST GERMAIN. How many people do you have on your staff engaged in planning?

Mr. RUTH. I have a total of 17 professionals. We have one person who is the coordinator of the plan. We ask for contributions from each program planner on our staff. Then the deputy director and I and this one chief of planning really work together on the whole thing as it proceeds. It is about a 4-month process.

Mr. ST GERMAIN. Thank you.

Mr. MONAGAN. We will recess until 2 o'clock.

(Whereupon, at 12:20 p.m., the subcommittee recessed, to reconvene at 2 p.m., the same day.)

AFTERNOON SESSION

Mr. MONAGAN. I will call the hearing to order.

When we recessed, I believe Mr. St Germain had started his round of questioning. I am glad to recognize him again.

Mr. ST GERMAIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Ruth, on two occasions in your summary of your statement you used the phrase, "Well, the Federal moneys would man the New York City criminal justice system for 3 days" or "7 days."

You realize, of course, I am sure, the purpose of the act is not to help take over the cost of manning the criminal justice system of New York or anyplace else but, rather, to help supplement the system and improve it.

Mr. RUTH. Yes, sir.

Mr. ST GERMAIN. I presume you were merely using these figures as a device to illustrate that the city and the State of New York were pouring a tremendous amount of funds into this program.

Mr. RUTH. The point I was trying to make, Congressman, was that with that percentage of the total criminal justice money, that alone is not enough to give one the power or the leverage to create the kind of change that is needed.

Mr. ST GERMAIN. To produce a crime-free community.

Mr. RUTH. That is why it has to be linked with these other efforts. Mr. ST GERMAIN. On the question of juvenile delinquency, is it your feeling that LEAA should properly spend funds in this area, also? Mr. RUTH. Absolutely. I must say I would like to see in HEW a youth development program. As an example, if we wanted to fund a recreation program in a ghetto community, I do not think we could get away with that as a crime prevention problem. The juvenile delinquency efforts in HEW probably could not, either.

I think money should be available for that. I just have an instinct that while we are trying to improve housing and everything else in the ghettos, if we had some sort of systematic recreation program with storefront or clubhouse activity, that would be useful both from the social standpoint and the crime prevention standpoint. We cannot do it with these moneys. I wish there were some vehicle in HEW that would have a youth development program.

Mr. ST GERMAIN. I believe you were in the room when the preceding witness testified and was questioned by members of the subcommittee. Mr. RUTH. Yes, sir.

Mr. ST GERMAIN. I brought out the fact there is so little respect for law enforcement authorities. This goes back to the family and the community and what have you.

Talking about other agencies having responsibilities, even without an infusion of funds, if they would only carry out their duties a little differently, it would be very helpful.

I wonder what your opinion would be of this. The Federal Communications Commission is criticized by some of the media because of statements about the fact that we should uplift the morality of the media, particularly television. I believe you may have read of instances where crimes have been committed, and when these crimes were studied it was found if you went back a few months or a year, the whole crime or method of committing the crime was lifted from a television show. Do you recall instances like that?

Mr. RUTH. I have seen that. I do not happen to believe that is important, though, because I think there are plenty of sources of knowledge about the commission of crime in these communities and, in fact, in our correctional institutions.

Mr. ST GERMAIN. We are off and running on that one.

If you take that attitude, if you go on that premise, that is a road with no end.

Mr. RUTH. It is a long road, but I would not take the position there is no end.

Mr. ST GERMAIN. If you say there are other sources, of course there are other sources of knowledge, but what source is most readily available? Not too many people read books. We keep building libraries, but a limited percentage of the population goes to a library. There are a limited number of people who are in prison. But everybody

watches television.

I am not talking solely about the modus operandi of committing a particular crime. My comment is directed toward the attitude of our younger people and some adults, the new freedom and loose morality.

Mr. RUTH. As far as violence on television, I guess for my own children the news clips from Vietnam seem to me to have had more influence on the respect for human life. I think there has been a lowering of respect for human life. I worry more about the constant news about war than, say, the serials or shows that depict violence, because I think children are so skeptical and so cynical about advertising that when they watch the shows, they do get a sense of unreality about the violence they see there. But the violence they see about war seems to be quite real and to have an impact.

Mr. ST GERMAIN. Absolutely. I say that, coupled with the other.
That is all, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. MONAGAN. Mr. Thone?

Mr. THONE. I have no questions, but I do have an observation.

Mr. Ruth, on behalf of the subcommittee, I would like to thank you very much for your constructive approach this morning and briefly this afternoon. Frankly, speaking only for myself, I think it is a very refreshing contrast to the witness who preceded you, whose obvious bias and inconsistency left me cold. I thank you very much.

Mr. RUTH. Sir, I must say Charlie Rogovin is an old friend of mine, and I cannot support your views on Mr. Rogovins contribution. He worked hard in LEAA under a frustrating troika operation.

Mr. THONE. I noticed a story in the New York Times of April 10, 1970, which associates you two together.

Mr. RUTH. We put a lot of effort into this.

Mr. THONE. It still reinforces my thought that your contribution here today was much more substantial than his.

Mr. RUTH. I appreciate that.

Mr. MONAGAN. I must say, as you said before, sometimes there is a subjective judgment. Of course, we are not trying to censor or weed out. We are trying to get all points of view. I think we can reach better conclusions that way.

Mr. Ruth, you have spoken about the layer of governmental boards that you must go through. You isolated one question in all that we are trying to get at, and that is to reach a method whereby there can be a reasonable amount of freedom but still adequate control.

The reason you have that layering is past municipal administrations where the management and control have not been sufficiently strong. Do you feel there is some middle ground that can be effective in this area?

Mr. RUTH. Mr. Chairman, I think a system could be worked out with block grants from the States to the cities if the city plan had to be fairly specific and had to be followed within reason, with procedures for making exceptions when that happened.

I do feel, also, that sometimes when you put a program on paper and envision what is going to happen, it is very difficult to anticipate the problems that will occur. Indeed, it is best most often to change a program as it goes along, as learning is obtained from it.

I would like to see more effort go from the preprogram stage to the monitoring effort. I have five or six people who do nothing but monitor existing projects. I have four students from Fordham who are really State parole officers who took 2 years off to get degrees, who are with us 3 days a week doing nothing but field site visits to our projects. We are trying to work with the city university on a criminal justice research institute that will do action research, and we have the evaluation effort that I mentioned previously.

I think with that kind of monitoring, in addition to constant presence of auditors of the fiscal aspects, we would learn more and the programs probably in the long run would be more productive. It is very hard for a board to look at a piece of paper that says we are going to do this or that and really get a feel as to whether that is going to happen, but if the board spends half its time looking back at what is happening, it has more of an idea, and we would have more of an idea if we had more time to do that, about where to go in the future.

Mr. MONAGAN. In other words, you are saying the close audit is perhaps, in your judgment, more important than spending an inordinate amount of time on the planning stages.

Mr. RUTH. I think so. I think it would be more productive. There would have to be some exceptions.

If you wanted a large program, a million and a half dollar program, obviously a lot of people would want to look at that closely before it is funded, and it should be looked at.

I think we would have better program planning if there were more post grant perusal.

Mr. MONAGAN. With reference to LEAA, would you say that those auditors should be in the State organization or in LEAA itself, or in both?

Mr. RUTH. I think there are two kinds of auditors. There might be program auditors and fiscal auditors. The program audit we try to do ourselves, and the State office works with us. They will set up a monitoring unit and go with our people on the site visit.

I am not quite sure where the fiscal audit should come from. I have not seen too much difference among auditors, be they State, city, or Federal. The city and State auditors have firmly in mind, and have been trained in, the LEAA guidelines, and I think they could do just as well. Certainly, they are as independent, I find.

Mr. THONE. Would there not be more of a check, though, by Federal auditors?

Mr. RUTH. I really do not believe so. I think the performance is about the same. We lived with GAO for about 8 months, and we have had city auditors, and now we have State auditors. They really basically follow the same approach.

Mr. THONE. Would there not be more of a tendency of local auditors to cover up?