The Nation : Cities Urge Bush to Alter Spending Plan

The National League of Cities, aware of a squeeze on federal funds, called on President Bush to reorder his priorities away from military and foreign aid spending to greater funding of child-care facilities, low-income housing and anti-drug and teen-age pregnancy programs in urban areas. The league issued a 118-page survey of the nation’s cities that showed that local officials were shifting their efforts to dealing with human needs such as child care instead of building roads and providing other traditional municipal services. But the report showed that severe shortages of funds plagued this new direction. President Bush in his 1990 budget froze federal funding for cities at the 1989 level, the league said.