a booklet which is being distributed to you. I should like at this time
to direct your attention to a few of the projects.

You will find therein an appropriation of $199, 300 for the first
phase in the establishment of a statewide microwave communication
system, which not only will serve our Civil Defense Agency in emer-
gencies but will provide a coordinated system of communication for
other State agencies.

Our forests and parks in Maryland are among our finest assets, and
I am recommending a capital appropriation of $1, 479, 500 for their
improvement. This includes $1, 000, 000 for the continued acquisition
of land for the Gunpowder Falls Park and $100, 000 to purchase land
for the development of an ocean-front park on Assateague Island.

In the treatment of the mentally ill, authorities at Spring Grove
State Hospital have been handicapped for too many years because
of the obsolescent Old Centre Building. I am proposing an appropria-
tion of $2, 700, 000 to speed up the timing for razing and replacing
this structure. Funds also are provided for projects at the other
mental hospitals. The overall appropriation for our mental hospitals
is $3, 690, 300.

The teachers colleges will receive $1, 183, 300 for various projects,
including $515, 000 for the Coppin Laboratory School. The University
of Maryland is to get $1, 587, 000 for building at College Park and
$2, 050, 000 for land acquisition and the purchase of a building in
its expansion program in Baltimore. Funds are being made available
for construction of two new academic buildings at the Maryland State
College in Princess Anne and for the planning of an administration
building and various remodeling and improvement projects at Morgan
State College.

This, then, is the fiscal program for the State that I am asking
you to adopt at this session. It has been drawn up with great care,
and in my mind it is a sound, sane program under which this great
State can continue its march of progress. It takes into consideration
both the needs of the people for services and their capacity to pay
for them. I have no hesitancy in recommending it to you for your
approval, but once more I invite your serious examination of the
whole and all of its parts.

I realize that great pressure will be brought to bear upon you
during this session by representatives of special groups. These groups
in their zeal usually are asking essentially for a disproportionate
share of State funds. No matter how sincere their intentions and how

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