Urge Lumbeimen to Get Behind \(/estern Bankers Discuss New Construction Program Housing Plans

R. F. Pray, General Sales Manager of The Red River Lumber Company, Westwood, Calif., has sent out a letter to their customers in all territories from coast to coast, urging each lumberman to get behind the new Government housing program. His letter follows: "Gentlemen:

"The purpose of this letter is to call to your attention the desirability and necessity of those interested in the production and distribution of lumber and lumber products, to see that means are taken at once that the terms of the National Housing Act are carried out promptly.

"Our belief is that no form of efiort will put back to work more men and recreate a recovery of the industrial and financial conditions faster and more substantially than the building program made possible under the National Recovery Act.

"To this end we urge you to bring every pressure you can on your political representatives, your bankers, your newspaper men, your Chambers of Commerce, your Boards of Trade and your service clubs, to force the terms of this act to a prompt and successful conclusion.

"As lumbermen and interested in the wide use of lumber we hope you will ,conceive it as a personal responsibility to get behind the enforcement of the terms of this act.

"May we have from you a letter indicating your interest in this matter and what steps you may take to bring this about.

Yours very truly, THE RED RIVER LUMBER COMPANY.

By R. F. Pray, General Sales Manager."

First Remodeling Loan Job in L. A. Under \(/.y

Paul H. Hutchinson, l7I8 West Thirty-eighth place, Los Angeles, received the first remodeling and imprclvement loan in that city under the National Housing Act on August 18. He will remodel and build a garag.e. The loan was handled through the California Bank. Delivery of lumber which included Douglas fir and redwood was made by the Bank Line Lumber Co. of Los Angeles, and construction work is already under way. The Los Angeles Evening Herald and Express of August 25 f.eatured a photograph showing a truck load of redwood siding being unloaded at the lumber yard ready for delivery to the job.

FHA Opens Office in S. F.

Offices were opened at 1722 Russ Building, San Francisco, by the Federal Housing Administration, August 17. These offices will serve the Northern district of California. Clifford C. Anglim is District Director.

Alfred B. Swinerton,225 Bush Street, San Francisco, is regional director of Region No. 10, which includes Arizona, California, Idaho, Nevada. Oregon, Utah and Washington,

Bankers of seven Western states met with the National Emergency Council at the Palace Hotel, San Francisco, August 21, to work out plans for handling in the West the home modernization program of the Federal Housing Administration.

Alfred B. Swinerton of San Francisco, regional director of the FHA, read a dispatch from James A. Mofiatt, federal housing administrator. The dispatch said that already banks representing 87,000,000 of the nation's population had promised unqualified support.

Hearty cooperation was promised by Andrew Miller, secretary of the California Bankers' Association, and by Clifford A. Anglim, district director of the FHA for Northern California.

Mr. Miller, in behalf of the. bankers of California, said: "The banks are anxious to help in every way possible, and we believe the home modernization loan setup is a fine program."

Under the terms of the loans, which are payable in one, two and three years, the borrower must have an income of five times the service charge, which will be $5 per hundred on the loan.

Loans will be made to improve and modernize property up to $2000.

FHA Opens Los Angeles Office

Fred W. Marlow, district director of the federal government's new housing program in Southern California, has established offices in the Great Republic Life Building, Eighth and Spring Streets, Los Angeles.

Mr. Marlow addressed 300 leading building and construction executives of Los Angeles on August 22. The meeting was held before the constru,ction industries committee of the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce and was presided over by John H. Austin, a former president of the chamber.

Flnds Dealers Enthusiastic About FHA Program

Russell D. Baker, manager of the Redwood Sales Co., sales organization for Eastern sales for an important group of Redwood mills, returned to his office in San Francisco, August lQ from a four months' business trip.

Mr. Baker called on the company's representatives and salesmen, and a large number of retailers, in all the states east of the Rocky mountains.

Asked about the attitude of the retail lumber dealers to the Federal Housing Administration's modernization and renovation program, he said he found retailers everywhere rvithout exception enthusiastic about the possibilities for new business to be created by the campaign.