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Show UI BILLION SHIPBUILDING PlfpED Congress Requested for Authority Au-thority to Place $701,000,-000 $701,000,-000 Worth of Additional Contracts. WOULD APPROPRIATE MILLIONS FOR YARDS Ambitious Government Programme Pro-gramme Revealed inWash- ington Includes Fabri- cated Steel Vessels. WASHINGTON, Jan. 4. Plans for a two billion dollar government shipbuilding ship-building programme were revealed today to-day when the shipping board asked'eon-grcss asked'eon-grcss for authority to place $701,000,000 worth of additional ship contracts. At the samo time an immediate appropriation appropria-tion of $82,000,000 was asked for the extehsion of shipyards and foT providing provid-ing housing facilities for workmen. Thus far the board has been authorized author-ized to spend for shipbuilding $1,234,-000,000, $1,234,-000,000, contracts for most of which have been awarded. Today's request for a further authorization and an additional ad-ditional appropriation brings the estimates esti-mates of funds needed for shipbuilding to $2,018,000,000. If the additional funds are made available they will be put largely into fabricated steel ship contracts, although some contracts for ordinary 'steel ships' will be let as will a few for wooden ships on the Pacific coast. No new shipyards are planned by the board. The fabricating yards have eon-tracts eon-tracts for about 500 ships now, which will keep them constantly em-pluycd em-pluycd into 1919, but the board is anxious anx-ious to place more contracts and begin on the task of providing materials. The board's housing plans call for the expenditure of about $35,000,000. The remainder of the $82,000,000 asked will' be used to expand shipyards already built. Probe High Profits. Tho aenate commerce committee in-( in-( vestigating the progress of shipbuild-iiig shipbuild-iiig took up touay alleged high profits ; allowed in letting contracts, wooden sdiip construction and the subject of housing. tjuestioniiig of Theodore E. Ferris, chief constructor for the emergency Uoct corporation, in connection with a report by the corporation 's- district officer of-ficer at Seattle, brought out that the ; 'I inch field Navigation company of New York was alleged to have obtained profits prof-its amounting to $743,000 on ship con-liacts con-liacts when in fact the company was not an actual builder of ships. The company, it was testified, sold to the government at, a profit of $420,000, four ships which the Sloan shipbuilding cor-i cor-i ' poration of Seattle was building for it, ;nnd that it received a com mission of $323,000 on contracts it obtained from I lie fleet corporation for twelve ships .which the Kluan corporation is now building. Mr. Ferris denied that he had anything any-thing to do with the contracts, but said lie introduced officers of the Clinchficld j company to Major General George W. Goethals, formerly general manager of j the fleet corporation. Brown Is Witness. Conditions affecting the construction of wooden ships were outlined by F. A." Brown, general purchasing officer for the fleet corporation, and F. L. Sanford, a member of the southern pine emergency emer-gency bureau. Mr. Brown explained the j fleet corporation's granting of an in-1 in-1 crease in lumber prices and said he 1 thought it was fully justified in view 1 of the fact that timber sizes wore made larger. He said that the sizes were made so large that pine producers could not make deliveries, but that the cor: poratiou expected to have delivered from Oregon within sixty days enough fir to furnish the heavier timbers for 200 wooden ships. Delays in pine deliveries were attributed attrib-uted by Mr. Brown to some extent to the fact that builders, anxious to draw ion the fleet corporation's Advance funds, laid down too many keels instead in-stead of going ahead with the construction construc-tion of ships already laid down. Their contracts, he said, called lor the payment pay-ment of money advances when keels were laid and many builders took advantage ad-vantage of this to get money quickly. The fleet corporation, he said, finally was forced to put a stop to the laying! of keels. M Mr. Sanford contradicted the testimony testi-mony of Hear Admiral Bowles, of the fleet corporation, who declared that nine producers had fallen, down on deliveries. |
