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NEWS CONFERENCE
OOVERNOR'PARRIS RESIN!
TALLAHASSEE
DECEMBER 23. 1963
NEWSMEN PARTICIPATING: Robert W. Delaney, ORLANDO SENTINEL-STAR;
Barbara Frye, UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL; David Gretsch, FRBELANCE;
John Hayes, WFGA, WTVJ; Jerry Nook, JOHN B: PERRY PAPERS; Budd
Mellichamp, ABC RADIO; Don North, associam mass; Ray Starr, ABC
RADIO; Everett Hilliard, FLORIDA TIMES UNION.
GOVERNOR: Good morning. merry Christmas, and since I won't see you
again, I guess, Happy New Year.
R.STARR: Governor, speaking of the New Year and since we won't get
together before that time, what are your predictions for the future of
Florida industrially for 1964 as you look ahead?
GOVERNOR: I think we are going to find in Florida that the pace of
growth is going to accelerate. I think that all of the things that
have come to pass over these last years since the way are multiplying
factors so that increased education increases industrial production,
increases wage rolls, increases consumption and this increases demands
for education -- all of these forces are not self-satisfying forces,
they are generative forces. And in my opinion the pace of Florida's
growth qualitatively and quantitatively is going to pick up.
3.8TA3E: You don't feel then, air, that the change of administration
in Washington has hurt Florida at all?
ecvaanoa: No, I do not. I don't feel that as a matter of fact at
the moment I think there is probably more a feeling of confidence with
what stimulative effect that has. I talked last week here with a
number of businessmen of national interests and they reflected that
wherever they went there was a feeling on the part of business people
of confidence in the administration and the future of the nation.
DELAXEY: You fellows almost sound like you have a script going. I
hate to interrupt with a question. (laughter)
cavemen: Just go right ahead we didn't. (laughter)
DELANEY: Governor, the famous Lyndon Johnson treatment has been talked
about a great deal lately and there has been a great deal written about
his tendency to get on the telephone and call people. Have you talked
a th him recently?
GOVEhHOR: Hell, there was a call from him Saturday as a matter of
fact, but I was out of the house at the time and did not complete it.
That is the only time I had occasion to talk with him and that did not
materialize.
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DRLANEY: You may be scolded for not being available by phone.
GOVERNOR: I was working.
FRYE: I think that was deliberate. The last time you talked to him
he hasn't gotten over it yet. (laughter)
NORTH: Governor, anything on your appointment to the Board of Control?
GOVERNOR: No, there in not at this time.
DELANEY: Governor, you haven't had a chance you don't know what he
was calling about on Saturday?
GOVERNOR: No, I don't.
DELANEY: No word at all?
GOVERNOR: Just when I got back to the house they told me that he had
called and when he was told I was out of the house the call was
cancelled.
FRYE: YOu didn't call him back from curiosity?
GOVERNOR: No, if he wants to'talk he will call, I am sure.
R.STARR: Governor, looking ahead in lgh in the field of politics,
especially in the Democratic Party in Florida, do you see any rifts
in the Party for 1964, or do you think it is pretty well unified?
GOVERNOR: I think you are going to find, in Florida particularly and
that is the only state that I am in any degree qualified to talk about,
the Democratic Party is going to be better unified than within my
memory. I anticipate the Cabinet will be running full steam and I nape
the entire delegation will be unified under the Democratic ticket.
R.STARR: What about the Senate race, Governor?
GOVERNOR: In what county is that?
R.STARR: The United States Senate?
GOVERNOR: Oh, the United States Senate. well, I.understand that
Senator Rolland is running.
R.STARR: Did you hear this from the Senator?
uOVERNOR: Yes well, not in those words. I have reason to believe
from what he said, however, that he will be running. I don't believe
he made a declaration of intent.
WAVES: Do you have any comment on eight of the ten Florida delegation
to the Congress going to support Rolland,if he does run, over Collins?
GOVERNOR: I read that, but I have no personal information about it.
FREE: If Rolland has apposition, will you actively campaign for him?
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GOVERNOR: I would have to resolve that question within the framework
of my feeling that the Governor should be very careful not to use the
powers of his office to influence the voters in a strategic way. I
don't think it applies quite as much to a Senate race as it would to
gubernatorial succession, but nevertheless I do have that feeling very
strongly. I, as you know, personally do support Senator Holland.
PRYE: Do you think, Governor, that Florida will go back to the
Democratic column in the presidential election next year?
GOVERNOR: Well, of course, w don't know who the opposition is yet,
nor do we know who the nominee is yet, but I think that the chances
are substantial.
NORTH: In other words you think the chances are improved with
President Johnson in office?
GOVERNOR: So far as Florida is concerned, I would think so.
DELANBY: Governor, specifically if former Governor Collins should run
against Senator Rolland would you actively campaign for Senator Holland?
GOVERNOR: Oh, I don't think that is going to happen.
DELANEY: Have you reason to believe that?
GOVERNOR: Just what little I know about the situation o no commitment
by anybody, no statement of intent by anyone, but Just a feeling to
that effect.
R.3TARR: Has anyone from the National Democratic Committee spoken to
you about this race from Washington, Governor?
GOVERNOR: Senate race from Washington?
R.STARR: Yes, has anyOne in washington of the National Democratic
Committee spoken to you about the united States Senate race in 196k
here in Florida?
GOVERNOR: No, I don't believe so. Are there other questions?
GRETSCH: Governor, have you had any discussions with anybody, do you
have any feelings or thoughts that the legal cloud may lift in regard
to that $50 million land reclamation program?
GOVERNOR: Well, I believe we won the first law suit at the circuit
court level and that lifted the cloud a little bit, but of course
nothing but a supreme court or a district court of appeals decision
will be conclusive.
GRETSCH: Are you moving ahead in any areas? Do you have any funds?
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I noticed before the election was final that you released some funds
from the motor boat tax to get --
GOVERNOR: Well, of course, we are collecting about $70,000 a month, I
believe, of the tax money, but this is relatively small in comparison
with the funds that we hope to utilize for an overall program. These
are the only funds that I know of that are available, in addition to
the reserve that was already there.
DELANEY: There was a report over the weekend, Governor, that Dr. Blee
was planning a graduate center in connection with the FICUS program in
the Cape Canaveral area and that it would include an engineering program.
Do you see any possible conflict between this and the GENESYS program
that is being planned by the University of Florida?
GOVERNOR: I think there is a possible conflict. I am confident that
there won't be any conflict. As I understand it the university of
Florida's engineering offering will be necessarily limited first of
all, limited to those that are presently given at the University of
Florida and limited by the personnel that they have available or can be
made available and FICUS would continue, I would assume, under any
circumstances to render the graduate services that it has been render-
ing anywhere in the state not in direct conflict with a similar offering.
DELANEY: Have you discussed this idea with Dr. Blce?
GOVERNOR: No, I have not. I have no official information on it at all.
NORTH: Governor, do you think that under the sense of the organization
of TiCUS that it is a good idea for them to offer courses such as
cathode of teaching elementary education and that sort of thing?
GOVERNOR: One of the great educational needs in the state is the need
for the centinuing education of teachers. I was speaking with Dr.
Allen at the University of South Florida yesterday and he commented to
me that there were some 10,000 teachers within commuting distance of
the University of South Florida, that some 79 per cent of them, I
believe, were married and therefore he felt that the University of
South Florida would have a particularly great future in this particular
field because of that situation. Married teachers find it difficult to
leave their families in the summertime, or any other time, for Special
training and through this university, as well as through FICUS, this
particular kind of training which our teachers need is available.
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NORTH: Then you see it as a dual Job one would be to teach graduate
engineering courses and the other would be to teach teachers in Florida?
GOVERNOR: It is more than dual FICUS' task is to extend the campuses
of our universities to any place in Florida where there is a Sufficient
need to warrant their peculiar kind of operation. The whole concept or
FICUS was that those individuals who are employed or for other reasons
cannot leave their home base but do need continuing education he allowed
to secure it through this method in whatever field.
DELANEY: If the University of Florida's GENESYS goes into the Canaveral
ares to get back to what I was asking about a moment ago o with one of
their satellite facilities or the main installation under the OENESYB
plan than would a permanent FICUS installation with permanent personnel
not be a possible conflict or a likely conflict?
GOVERNOR: Well, new first of all I dont know what the proposal is.
Secondly, FICUS uses instructional peeple from the universities. FICUX
doesnt employ professors per se. It takes professors employed by the
universities, and the universities pay them, F1008 repays the universi-
ties, and they do the operating. None of this can be done under FICUS
without the approval or the universities involved. I can't imagine the
university of Florida setting up two competing programs in a particular
place. So without knowing the details, I would say there are certain
built-in safeguards against duplication.
DELANEY: Do they not have some personnel or their own in a couple of
installations West Palm and St. Petersturg?
GOVERNOR: Housekeeping, I believe, but not instructional. Without
knowing the specifics of the thing we are talking about the concept is
that they use the instructional personnel of the universities.
R.STARR: Governor, have you filled the vacancy on the Council of the
Blind yet?
GOVERNOR: I believe that we have.
R.STARR: Is it a blind person?
GOVERNOR: No, it is not.
H.8TARR: There is no one on the Board now that is sightless?
GOVERNOR: I believe that is true Are there other questions?
HELANEY: what are your holiday plans, Governor?
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GOVERNOR: I plan to stay here in Tallahassee and play Santa Claus
to a limited audience. (laughter)
R.STARR: or three, Governor?
GOVERNOR: Thats right.
DELANEY: You are not going off to any football games or anything?
GOVERNOR: Oh, yes, I will attend the Gator Bowl and the Orange Bowl.
Other than that I have no plans. we may develop some. There may be
some in the making I dont know about,right now that is. Thank you.
SEVERAL: Thank you, Governor.
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