FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE OCTOBER 16, 1992 MAYORS OF FIVE MAJOR CITIES SET THE RECORD STRAIGHT ON PRESIDENT BUSH'S RELATIONSHIP WITH THE NATION'S MAYORS AND CITIES Mayors of five major cities called on George Bush today to make good on his rhetoric and meet to discuss economic problems with the mayors of the nations's big cities. The mayors took exception to George Bush's remark during the first presidential debate that "the mayors of the big cities...came to me, and they unanimously said the decline in urban American stems from the decline in the American family." The five mayors -- Raymond Flynn of Boston, Richard Daley of Chicago, Michael White of Cleveland, Jerry Abramson of Louisville, and Norm Rice of Seattle -- noted that since George Bush has been in office, the U.S. Conference of Mayors invited President Bush on six occasions to address the mayors of the nation's largest cities. On only one occasion, in January 1990 did President Bush agree to address the mayors. He has declined all invitations since 1990. If substantive meetings were held, the mayors said they would want to discuss hard economic problems, not family values. "The White House has shut the door in the face of America's mayors in its refusal to meet with the mayors to discuss the recession," Flynn said. "The fact that we have double-digit unemployment rates in major cities like New York and Los Angeles proves that this Administration has totally failed to address the most basic problems of the American economy," he added. In an August 4, 1991 letter to the President, Mayor Flynn, then President of the U.S. Conference of Mayors offered a briefing by Democratic and Republican mayors on "the need for a renewed national urban agenda." Later that month, 32 leading mayors requested a bipartisan meeting with the President "to work for balanced and affordable, but real solutions to the terrible problems affecting so many millions of our citizens, particularly working families and needy individuals." "It is time to set the Bush-Quayle team straight: It is their lack of leadership, their lack of concern for what is happening to American families that has led to the crisis," said Mayor Abramson. "Even after the crisis in Los Angeles," Abramson added, "Bush and Quayle failed to act. While they endorsed enterprise zones, President Bush is threatening to veto the legislation setting up such zones." ---30---