[House Hearing, 116 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
LEGISLATIVE BRANCH APPROPRIATIONS
FOR 2020
_______________________________________________________________________
HEARINGS
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
________
SUBCOMMITTEE ON LEGISLATIVE BRANCH
TIM RYAN, Ohio, Chairman
C. A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland JAIME HERRERA BEUTLER, Washington
KATHERINE M. CLARK, Massachusetts DAN NEWHOUSE, Washington
ED CASE, Hawaii
NOTE: Under committee rules, Mrs. Lowey, as chairwoman of the full
committee, and Ms. Granger, as ranking minority member of the full
committee, are authorized to sit as members of all subcommittees.
David Reich, Sue Quantius, and Faye Cobb
Subcommittee Staff
_____
PART 2
FISCAL YEAR 2020 LEGISLATIVE BRANCH
APPROPRIATIONS REQUESTS
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
_____
Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
36-866 WASHINGTON : 2019
COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
----------
NITA M. LOWEY, New York, Chairwoman
MARCY KAPTUR, OhioKAY GRANGER, Texas KAY GRANGER, Texas
PETER J. VISCLOSKY, Indiana HAROLD ROGERS, Kentucky
JOSE E. SERRANO, New York ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama
ROSA L. DeLAURO, Connecticut MICHAEL K. SIMPSON, Idaho
DAVID E. PRICE, North Carolina JOHN R. CARTER, Texas
LUCILLE ROYBAL-ALLARD, California KEN CALVERT, California
SANFORD D. BISHOP, Jr., Georgia TOM COLE, Oklahoma
BARBARA LEE, California MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida
BETTY McCOLLUM, Minnesota TOM GRAVES, Georgia
TIM RYAN, Ohio STEVE WOMACK, Arkansas
C. A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland JEFF FORTENBERRY, Nebraska
DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida CHUCK FLEISCHMANN, Tennessee
HENRY CUELLAR, TexasJ JAIME HERRERA BEUTLER, Washington
CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine DAVID P. JOYCE, Ohio
MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois ANDY HARRIS, Maryland
DEREK KILMER, Washington MARTHA ROBY, Alabama
MATT CARTWRIGHT, Pennsylvania MARK E. AMODEI, Nevada
GRACE MENG, New York CHRIS STEWART, Utah
MARK POCAN, Wisconsin STEVEN M. PALAZZO, Mississippi
KATHERINE M. CLARK, Massachusetts DAN NEWHOUSE, Washington
PETE AGUILAR, California JOHN R. MOOLENAAR, Michigan
LOIS FRANKEL, Florida JOHN H. RUTHERFORD, Florida
CHERI BUSTOS, Illinois WILL HURD, Texas
BONNIE WATSON COLEMAN, New Jersey
BRENDA L. LAWRENCE, Michigan
NORMA J. TORRES, California
CHARLIE CRIST, Florida
ANN KIRKPATRICK, Arizona
ED CASE, Hawaii
Shalanda Young, Clerk and Staff Director
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
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Testimony
Page
Office of Congressional Workplace Rights......................... 1
Open World Leadership Center..................................... 39
Architect of the Capitol......................................... 57
Congressional Budget Office...................................... 93
Government Accountability Office................................. 123
Government Publishing Office..................................... 203
Library of Congress.............................................. 249
U.S. House of Representatives.................................... 297
U.S. Capitol Police.............................................. 425
Members' Day..................................................... 469
Testimony of Interested Individuals and Organizations............ 505
(iii)
LEGISLATIVE BRANCH APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2020
----------
Thursday, February 7, 2019.
OFFICE OF CONGRESSIONAL WORKPLACE RIGHTS
WITNESS
SUSAN TSUI GRUNDMANN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF CONGRESSIONAL
WORKPLACE RIGHTS
Opening Statement of Chairman Ryan
Mr. Ryan. Welcome, everyone. We are going to call the
committee to order. I am pleased to welcome everyone to our
first legislative branch hearing for the fiscal year 2020.
There are lots of new faces here--four new subcommittee members
as well as the new majority professional staff. We even have a
new name for one of the agencies appearing today. A special
welcome to our new ranking member: Ms. Herrera Beutler.
Let me quickly introduce our subcommittee staff to the
members. On our side, we have David Reich as our clerk, and Sue
Quantius and Faye Cobb. They are absolutely terrific and bring
a ton of experience to this committee in helping their new
rookie chairman. And also Jenny Panone, who continues on the
subcommittee as minority clerk. We worked very well with her
last year under Chairman Yoder.
Though this committee is small in size, it has very
important responsibilities in trying to provide Congress with
the resources it needs to properly and independently perform
its legislative functions and to make its work accessible to
the people we represent. We also should remember that several
of our agencies, such as the Library of Congress and the GPO,
provide important services to the Nation as a whole as well as
to the legislative branch. Our bill even supports some unusual
functions for the legislature--the U.S. Copyright Office and
Library Services for the Blind.
This morning, our first hearing will be with the Office of
Congressional Workplace Rights, formerly called the Office of
Compliance. After that is concluded, we will have our second
hearing with the Open World Leadership Center.
One bit of housekeeping: I intend to follow what is pretty
standard procedure in Appropriations subcommittees for
questioning witnesses. For those members present at the
beginning of the hearing, I will recognize members for
questions in order of seniority, alternating between majority
and minority. For those members who arrive after the hearing
has started, I will recognize them in order of arrival,
alternating between majority and minority. This order will
continue through all rounds of questioning. I will try hard to
observe the 5-minute rule for questions and answers. I know
there are always conflicting Appropriations hearings, and I
understand that members may have to come and go, but we are
lucky that the legislative branch budgets come to us
unencumbered by OMB review, and we already have requests in
hand for most of our agencies. We may be able to nearly finish
our fiscal year 2020 budget hearings before the President
submits his budget for the executive branch.
So let's get started. We are pleased to welcome today Ms.
Susan Tsui Grundmann, the executive director of the Office of
Congressional Workplace Rights.
Ms. Grundmann, it is fitting that we begin with OCWR
because it is integral to the high priority Congress has placed
on the effective protection of workplace rights and its passage
of the Congressional Accountability Reform Act last December.
We know that it has been quite an active period for you since
you testified here last year. At that time, Congress was
considering the reform legislation, and last year's hearing
moved away from budget questions and into opinions about how
the reform legislation should be changed.
Now that the legislation is enacted with an effective date
in June 2019, I hope we can get back to a more budget-oriented
session, which, of course, will include discussions of the
resources your office needs to implement the new law.
Before we start, I will turn to our ranking member, Ms.
Herrera Beutler, for any opening comments you may wish to make.
Opening Statement of Ranking Member Herrera Beutler
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Chairman.
Thank you so much for recognizing me. I am looking forward
to joining the subcommittee as ranking member. Congratulations
on being selected as chair. Everyone that I have heard who has
had the opportunity to work with you has spoken very highly of
you. I am looking forward to it.
Thank you for your graciousness this morning. Everyone,
when I have mentioned to people, are like, ``He's a good Member
to work with.'' So I am looking forward to this.
And to the subcommittee, honestly, I feel like this is
probably a good way to get my feet wet, so to speak, in
something that is really focused on the institution and on
preserving and protecting and promoting it in many different
ways. So I think it will give me a good look at some of the
activities and functions that make up our first branch of
government: the legislative branch.
Although, from what I have learned now, we are the smallest
subcommittee, we are still very critical in that if we don't do
our job, the other 11 committees can't do their jobs. So, as we
start consideration of fiscal year 2020 budget request, I look
forward to working with you in putting together a bill that
adequately addresses the needs of our agencies so they can
carry out their respective missions while at the same time
balancing this with being good stewards of the fiscal taxpayer
budget.
Welcome, Ms. Grundmann, I look forward to hearing from you.
I see your budget request is the same as it was enacted in
2019. And I am looking forward to hearing from you on your
office's work to implement the Congressional Accountability
Reform Act, which was signed into law this last December and
which our chairman already alluded to.
So, with that, I yield back. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Ryan. Very good, so now I would like to yield to the
chairwoman of the full committee, Mrs. Lowey.
Opening Statement of Chairwoman Lowey
The Chairwoman. Thank you. Sometimes I feel like I need
roller skates going from one place to another.
Good morning. And I would like to thank Chairman Ryan and
Ranking Member Herrera Beutler for holding this hearing. It is
a pleasure to welcome Executive Director Susan Grundmann of the
Office of Congressional Workplace Rights before the
subcommittee.
The success of Members of the House and Senate depends on
the staff in Washington and in our districts. When we met last
year, revelations of harassment and discrimination shocked the
country and highlighted inadequacies in congressional staff
protections. Substantial legislative changes to the
Congressional Accountability Act were only the first step
toward remedying the institutional damage inflicted during
years of grossly insufficient and often nonexistent staff
protections.
The OCWR is now tasked with implementing these reforms in a
way that celebrates the increased diversity on Capitol Hill,
promotes safety, and ensures everyone in the legislative branch
community can complete their duties free from fear of
discrimination and harassment. It falls to this subcommittee to
ensure that OCWR has the resources to meet this need. I am
pleased the fiscal year 2019 spending bill included $6.332
million, a $1.3 million increase from the previous year, to
cover the costs associated with recent reforms. However, this
subcommittee will need to once again commit an adequate level
of funding to ensure the OCWR can carry out its new
responsibilities and increase services and protections for
victims.
Executive Director Grundmann, I eagerly await your
testimony regarding the implementation of the CAA Reform Act
and major changes to the OCWR after 2 years of troubling
disclosures of harassment and assault across the country and,
sadly, right here in this Congress. So thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
Ms. Grundmann, you have the floor.
Testimony of Susan Tsui Grundmann
Ms. Grundmann. Thank you, and good morning, Chairman Ryan,
Ranking Member Herrera Beutler. On behalf of the newly formed
Office of Congressional Workplace Rights, formerly known as the
Office of Compliance, thank you for this opportunity to discuss
our 2020 budget justification and request.
Today is day 48 on our march towards implementation of the
CAA Reform Act, which takes full effect on June 19th. Now
remember that date because everybody in our office thinks about
that day every single day of the year so far. And while many
things have changed for us, a number of things remain the same,
such as the labor and employment laws that apply to the
legislative branch, such as the 180-day statute of limitations
to file a claim under the CAA, such as the enforcement of the
occupational safety and health laws, the ADA public
accessibility rules, and the Federal Service Labor-Management
Relations statute, and, perhaps most important, what remains
the same is the independent nonpartisan nature of our office.
What has changed is just about everything else. Beginning
with that new name, which really does better reflect our
mission and our purpose. Our jurisdiction has been expanded to
include new employing offices, like the Helsinki Commission,
and additional categories of employees, such as unpaid staff,
and that is detailees, fellows, and interns. So our caseload
could go up.
Our ADR process, administrative dispute resolution process,
no longer includes mandatory counseling, the mandatory cooling-
off period, or mandatory mediation, although mediation remains
as an option. A new step in our process has been inserted which
calls for preliminary review by a hearing officer within the
first 30 days of the filing of the claim.
All employing offices have new posting and training
requirements. We have new reporting requirements, four or five
by our count. And Members of Congress and employing offices
must reimburse the Treasury account for certain types of awards
and settlements.
During the last year, including the last 48 days, we have
accomplished a great deal. We moved forward with the e-filing
system required in the Reform Act. We moved forward with,
actually, fiscal year 2018 dollars. This system will be secure
and will allow parties to have access to it during the pendency
of the procedures. We are currently making modifications in our
case management system to reflect the changes in the process
brought by the Reform Act.
We began discussions with contractors for the climate
survey, the first ever climate survey in the legislative
branch. We have identified statutory changes which require
action and have inhouse teams with timelines and deadlines, the
most significant of which is the promulgation of procedural
rules to reflect changes in the CAA, such as that initial 30-
day preliminary review.
We actually have a single individual in our office whose
primary task is to track every team, note every benchmark, and
to ensure that we adhere to every deadline. He is actually here
with us today. I would like to introduce you to him. His name
is Alex Ruvinsky. We are conducting brown bags with all our
stakeholders on the changes we foresee. We are developing a new
training module to reflect those changes, and actually other
legislative branch offices are reaching out to us to use that
module and require the employees to take this training so that
they can fulfill their training requirements under the Reform
Act.
We have met with CHA and Senate Rules and will continue to
do so. I have meetings scheduled with the House Ethics
Committee and the Senate Ethics Committee. And we have a new
logo and have secured a new domain name, and that is ocwr.gov.
And if I may, I would like to take you through the changes
in the Reform Act. It is in your materials, and you will see
the flowcharts.
There are actually three variations to this process, and
let me go through the one generally that applies to most
employing offices. One step back. Counseling, under the current
system, which is still in effect, can last up to 30 days
currently. Mediation, which is mandatory, must last up to 30
days currently. The so-called cooling-off period must last 30
days. All of that is gone under the new system. The process now
begins with intake. And where the employee comes into our
office, we record their claim. We give them notice of rights,
and we immediately notify the employing office and its
designated representative. At that point, the employee is free
to go to district court within 90 days. So, without the
cooling-off period, the mandatory mediation, immediately to
court.
The next step is entirely new, and that is the preliminary
review I was telling you about and that occurs within the first
30 days of the filing of the claim. It is before a hearing
officer and actually will result in a report, a seven-point
report which discusses a number of things: whether the employee
is a covered employee, whether the named office is actually an
employing office, whether the claim is timely filed within the
180 days, whether the employee has stated a claim for which
relief can be granted under the CAA. The hearing officer will
also note factual and legal issues raised in the claim and
identify the relief sought. And, finally, the hearing officer
will note the potential for settlement.
If the employee is not a covered employee or has not stated
a claim for which relief can be granted, then the employee must
go directly to district court; they will have no further
recourse in our process. If, however, the employee is covered
and has stated a claim for which relief can be granted, they
may stay in our process, and the remainder of our adjudication
process is pretty much the same as it currently is.
new administrative dispute resolution process
Members of Congress----
Mr. Ryan. So let's just open it up at this point.
Ms. Grundmann. Sure, okay.
Mr. Ryan. I think it is really important that, this
committee especially, we really understand this----
Ms. Grundmann. Okay.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. Indepth. So initial process: notice
to the employee's office. So someone comes in, and then you
say, ``Okay.''
Ms. Grundmann. Yes.
Mr. Ryan. Call the chief of staff of the Member.
Ms. Grundmann. We would notify--let me go one step further
because Members of Congress actually have a distinct process at
three junctures. First, initially at intake, not only would we
notify OHEC immediately, we would also notify the Member and
tell them primarily that they have the right to intervene along
with the fact that they may be financially liable for any
settlement or award that comes out of the Treasury fund.
The second part that is distinct for Members of Congress is
during the preliminary review. At the close of the preliminary
review, the report that the hearing officer generates will go
directly to the appropriate Ethics Committee.
And, finally, upon final disposition of the case and final
disposition includes a settlement or an award, the Ethics
Committee will be entitled to the records of that case. So it
is different for the Members of Congress.
Mr. Ryan. So preliminary report, 30 days. There is a seven-
point plan--seven issues that you will cover, including relief
and kind of procedural stuff, like timeliness and stuff and all
that. And when you said the employee is not covered----
Ms. Grundmann. If the employee----
Mr. Ryan. What does that mean?
Ms. Grundmann. What that means is if the employee fails
that seven-point review--not a covered employee, not an
employing office, not timely, failure to state a claim--the
only option the employee has at that point is to go to district
court.
Mr. Newhouse. Civil action.
Ms. Grundmann. Civil action, exactly.
We know you have many questions. We hope to answer as many
questions as we possibly can with the understanding that some
of these answers are yet to unfold as we develop our procedural
rules which will be out for notice and comment in April. Thank
you for the privilege of your attention. And I look forward to
answering your questions.
[The prepared statement and biography of Susan Tsui
Grundmann follow:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
hearing process
Mr. Ryan. Great. So I am going to have you just kind of
quickly go through, you said the administrative proceeding. Can
you talk to us a little bit about how that goes down?
Ms. Grundmann. Sure, you mean the hearing process itself?
Mr. Ryan. Yeah.
Ms. Grundmann. It begins with the filing of a claim, a
complaint. There are----
Mr. Ryan. So they are covered.
Ms. Grundmann. They are covered. They are in our process. A
hearing officer will be appointed for the case almost
immediately. That hearing officer will be in touch with the
parties, talk about any preconference issues, set hearing
dates. There is discovery under our process. There are motions
as well. And the employee is entitled to a decision, under the
new statute, within I believe 90 days of the close of the
record.
representation for employee
Mr. Ryan. So who is representing--who is speaking on behalf
of the employee at this point? Do they have it to get an
attorney that represents them?
Ms. Grundmann. Great question. In the House, the employee
is entitled to an employee advocate. And that is under the CAO
branch. The employee is also entitled to either a designated
representative or a private attorney, or they can proceed pro
se. And the new reform bill brings into light a confidential
advisor. And that person is actually defined by statute, and
for the first time, the confidential advisor will actively work
with the employee to develop the claim that will be filed.
Mr. Ryan. And who is that? They work for you?
Ms. Grundmann. That person has not been hired yet.
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
Ms. Grundmann. But yes, the role is actually defined by
statute. And that person could be an employee of our office,
could be somebody that the executive director designates for
the sole purpose of getting them through the first part of the
proceedings.
Now let's talk a little more about the confidential advisor
because it is a crucial role, and it is defined by statute. He
or she can advise the employee on a privileged and confidential
basis. He or she will also talk specifically about rights and
protections under the CAA, the value of obtaining either an
attorney or a designated representative as opposed to
proceeding pro se, tell the employee that the employee has the
ability also to go to the Ethics Committee, and there is
nothing in our process that bars the employee from going
directly to the Ethics Committee.
There are limitations on the confidential advisor, and this
is also baked into the statute. The confidential advisor cannot
appear in any proceedings before OCWR. The confidential advisor
cannot serve as a mediator in OCWR. And if the employee has a
designated representative or an attorney, the confidential
advisor cannot be that designated representative but can offer
general assistance to the representative.
employee advocate
Mr. Ryan. How is the confidential advisor different than
the employee advocate?
Ms. Grundmann. The employee advocate is actually paid for;
it is free to the employee. The employee advocate will
represent the employee during a House proceeding.
Mr. Ryan. Who is that? Is that in your office?
Ms. Grundmann. It is not in our office. It is a separate
office. It is housed under the Chief Administrative Officer.
And it is a much more extensive representation. And I believe--
I am not sure of this--that the employee advocate can actually
accompany the employee to court.
Mr. Newhouse. Could you repeat that, who pays for that?
Ms. Grundmann. Okay. The confidential advisor is in our
budget.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay.
Ms. Grundmann. The Office of Employee Advocacy, they call
themselves OOEA, they are housed in the Chief Administrative
Officer's Office, CAO.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. OOEA?
Ms. Grundmann. There are a lot of O's in our world. If I
may, let me distinguish our O from all the other O's around. We
are the only nonpartisan independent adjudicator that can
provide a final disposition to a claim. We do not represent
employees, but we can give them final resolution, and no other
office does it in the legislative branch.
Mr. Ryan. I yield 5 minutes to the gentlelady.
permanent record retention
Ms. Herrera Beutler. A couple of questions. One of the
things in terms of the substantial changes includes that you
are tasked with I believe creating a program to permanently
retain records of investigations, medications, hearings, and
other proceedings. You are going to keep permanent records of
medications----
Ms. Grundmann. Not medications. I think it is mediations.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Okay. I had medications. I was, like,
that seems a little inappropriate to me. I don't think it is
anybody's business, so a little typo.
Ms. Grundmann. But the medication could be part of the
mediation so----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. As long as the House is not keeping
records of employees' medications, I am cool with that. Fast
forward. That was the first one.
member reimbursement of treasury fund
What happens if a Member leaves and doesn't reimburse?
Because what I am understanding from this is you are paying
upfront.
Ms. Grundmann. Right.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. And then what if they just leave?
Ms. Grundmann. It is very, very well thought out. The good
news is that we are not in the collections process. As you say,
we pay the money out through the Treasury fund, and then the
matter is turned over to the administrative branch of the
House, so this is the appropriate Chamber. And there is a
period of time allotted to the Member--let me answer your--I am
going the long way around.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. That is fine.
Ms. Grundmann. Bear with me--there is a period of time
whereby the Member can voluntarily repay it. I think it is 90
days. Afterwards, the garnishment starts. Now if you are not a
Member anymore, that is not an issue because there is language
in the legislation that talks about garnishment of non-Federal
wages, garnishment of Social Security, garnishment of TSP, so
there are lots of avenues to get the money back.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. And is any of this retroactive?
Ms. Grundmann. The provision on reimbursement to the
Treasury fund from Members of Congress has already started. So
that started on December 1st. It is not retroactive beyond
December 1st, but it started as of December 1st. That is one of
few provisions of the Reform Act that actually implemented
immediately.
budget to implement changes
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Last year, an additional $1.3 million
was provided in anticipation of this? But your budget didn't
request an increase for fiscal year 2020. So is that amount
sufficient to implement all the changes, or are there going to
be additional costs down the road?
Ms. Grundmann. Well, that is a great question, and let me
answer it in a number of ways. First of all, we think we got it
right. And we have in there the 1 million carryover from 2019
going into 2020. We have asked for the same thing in 2020 going
into 2021. We did anticipate a number of changes just seeing
the similarities between the two bills, between the House and
the Senate. But we didn't actually see the legislation itself
until pretty much the same time you guys saw it. So there were
a number of things that were new to us. But this is a new day
and a new territory and new challenges.
We have never adjudicated a case with a preliminary review.
We know what the numbers look like currently. We don't know how
many preliminary reviews there will be. We don't know how long
it is going to take. It has got to take less than 30 days; that
much we know. We also know that it has to be a hearing officer
that conducts that review. And hearing officers are
specifically defined in the CAA. They have to be retired judges
or adjudicators that are versed in employment type cases. And
they are paid on an hourly rate.
So one final note: When the Reform Act implements in June,
we will only have 3 months of data under the new system. We
won't have a full year of data until the end of 2020 and that
full year review is really important to spot trends: Are people
filing less in the summer? Are they filing more at certain
points in time?
Our numbers are up this year for 2018--even in the
beginning of 2019, we have half of----
library of congress employee claims
So the numbers are up, and we do have the Library of
Congress. They are about half of our numbers now.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. But they were just added, correct?
Ms. Grundmann. They were just added. And it is interesting
because we have only had them for 6 months under the last
fiscal year. And during that 6 months, they accounted for about
18 percent of our docket in that 6 months.
This year, just going from October 1st to today, they are a
little less than half the docket already.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Things that need to be dealt with
apparently.
Ms. Grundmann. The Library of Congress. Yes, that they are
now under our system. They come under our jurisdiction in March
with the omnibus, and they have been filing claims.
The Chairwoman. Oh, so you say they are half of the claims?
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Half of last year's.
Mr. Ryan. How many? What are the raw numbers?
Ms. Grundmann. I can't give you a raw number in 2018.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I think you have a number of
settlements.
Ms. Grundmann. Those are aggregate.
The Chairwoman. Oh.
Ms. Grundmann. Let me be clear: The Library of Congress'
dispute system still exists, so they have an EEO system. The
Library employees are given an option either to come to us or
choose the Library's process. We have talked to the Library
when they first came under our jurisdiction in March. And their
numbers are pretty similar to ours. I mean they get about 40,
60 cases a year.
The Chairwoman. Forty to 60 cases?
Ms. Herrera Beutler. That is a lot.
Ms. Grundmann. With five going through mediation. We get
somewhere between 40 to 60 cases a year. Last year, we had over
70 cases, which was pretty high.
And that included the Library for 6 months.
The Chairwoman. We are really shocked that there are over
70 cases. Are you free to compartmentalize the cases?
Obviously, no names, but what categories do they fall in?
Ms. Grundmann. The vast bulk of our cases involve
discrimination.
The Chairwoman. Oh, okay.
Ms. Grundmann. There are some labor cases. There are other
types. There are FLSA, Fair Labor Standards, cases. We have a
number of unions in the legislative branch, so we do see some
activity there. But the majority of our cases are
discrimination.
employee advocate
The Chairwoman. I see. Now how many employee advocates are
there?
Ms. Grundmann. Let me see if I can answer your question in
a different way. There is----
The Chairwoman. I mean, 5, 10, 15, 2.
Ms. Grundmann. I don't know the numbers. I don't know how
many there are.
The Chairwoman. Approximate.
Ms. Grundmann. You mean that will represent an employee?
The Chairwoman. Yes.
Ms. Grundmann. There is an office that actually represents
employees in the House. I think they have a director, and they
may have two staff attorneys at this point.
The Chairwoman. So my question is about the employee
advocate, let's--that employee advocate may decide this person
is guilty. Do they have an obligation to represent them? And I
would think a Member or employee, whoever they are, wouldn't
want an employee advocate that believes they are guilty. So I
guess they have a right to get an outside attorney.
Ms. Grundmann. True, absolutely, but--and this is a
question better directed to the Chief Administrative Officer,
but it is my understanding that--okay, we are still under the
old system at this point--that the employee advocate would
still have to represent the employee. Now under the new
system----
The Chairwoman. Wait. You are saying they would still have
to represent the employee.
Ms. Grundmann. Yes.
The Chairwoman. But the employee may not want that person.
Ms. Grundmann. Absolutely.
The Chairwoman. So they have the right to get an outside
counsel?
Ms. Grundmann. Always.
The Chairwoman. And pay for counsel themselves?
Ms. Grundmann. Yes.
The Chairwoman. And the employee advocate is free of
charge.
Ms. Grundmann. Yes.
The Chairwoman. So sometimes when things are free of
charge, that is exactly what they are worth. But I am just
curious, do most of these cases use the employee advocate?
Ms. Grundmann. I do not know if--I do not know that. Most
of the cases--I don't know if we have actually seen the
employee advocate in our system yet. And the employee--the
office OOEA--OOEA--stood up I believe last fall. So they are
fairly new to this community.
The Chairwoman. So maybe we have to get to know them. I
guess I am wondering if a person knows they are guilty and the
employee advocate knows they are guilty, is that employee
advocate required to still represent them as lawyers do?
Ms. Grundmann. I think you should direct that question,
with all due respect, to that office.
filing under the new system timing
The Chairwoman. I get it. So, if an incident occurs today
prior to full implementation, can victims wait to have their
cases processed under the new regulations?
Ms. Grundmann. Yes. The only thing the law requires is that
the claim be filed within 180 days of the violation--of the
alleged violation. So we are day 48. So, if the incident
occurred today, they could file under the current system
immediately within the next 4 months or so or under the new
system and wait until June.
Mr. Newhouse. They could file today.
Ms. Grundmann. They can file today.
Mr. Newhouse. For the new system.
Ms. Grundmann. They cannot file today for the new system.
If they file today, they are in the old system. Now the old
system does have mandatory mediation on certain types of
things. The new system has--the primary change, other than the
mandatory nature of certain processes, is that preliminary
review that occurs within the first 30 days. And, again,
bringing this back, that preliminary review, if the employee
loses that review, that seven-point review--actually it is
four: timeliness, covered employee, employing office, failure
to state a claim--if they lose that review, they cannot stay in
our process under the new system. They have to go to court.
notification of workplace rights posters
The Chairwoman. Now we know there are 101 new
Representatives. Have the new House offices received the same
posters? And is the OCWR doing anything to confirm that all
offices have properly displayed this information?
Ms. Grundmann. With respect to the posters, the new
legislation actually puts new requirements in that poster. And
that poster does not need to be up--the new poster does not
need to be up until June. Under resolution 724, which is from
the last Congress, which I still believe is a standing rule,
you must post a poster. And we have gone out, and we will be
happy to deliver them. When the House resolution passed 1 year
ago, 2 years ago, CHA actually picked up about 250 posters of
ours and started handing them out.
family medical leave act
The Chairwoman. The other thing I wonder about, this is to
the chairman too, do you deal with issues such as paid medical
leave?
Ms. Grundmann. Yes. FMLA.
The Chairwoman. I was shocked to learn--I give a very
generous, 3 months paid medical leave. And I realized some of
the offices don't do that. So I guess it is not consistent. Is
that correct?
Ms. Grundmann. Can I respond to that?
Mr. Ryan. Yes.
Ms. Grundmann. Every Member's office is a separate office
in Congress. There is no one office, like the Architect of the
Capitol is a single entity; the Capitol Police is a single
entity. There are 535 different employing offices in Congress.
The Chairwoman. So there is no consistent timeline.
Ms. Grundmann. I do not know if there is consistency, but
there is no requirement.
The Chairwoman. No, there isn't. I just discovered it.
There is no requirement across the Federal Government.
Ms. Clark. That is crazy.
The Chairwoman. I mean, I have been giving 3 month's family
medical leave forever, but some offices don't. You don't?
Ms. Herrera Beutler. We had to just go around and survey
colleagues to try to figure out, how do we do this? And we just
pulled it together. We do give leave and maternity, but there
was no standard. We literally just started asking Members how
they did it, and we pulled together what we felt was the best
practices, and we consulted an outside organization to try to
put together something, but there is no template.
The Chairwoman. No, this is not true confessions. I don't
want anybody to----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. What I mean is that not everybody does
it. There was no help. It wasn't like, ``Oh, this is the way to
do it.'' You just have to make it happen if you believe in it.
The Chairwoman. In fact, I was surprised talking to a
Senator whose daughter worked for another Federal agency, they
didn't get any paid family leave. So that is something we may
want to talk about because I am not sure what the standard is,
but I have always felt that 3 months is fair, but that is not
consistent across the government.
Ms. Grundmann. Let me tell you how we would review a claim
like that.
The Chairwoman. Is anyone responsible for that or no?
Ms. Grundmann. It wouldn't be us because, again, we are
neutral. We don't represent you. You do have representation.
You have the Office of House Employee Advocacy--no, sorry. I
got my O's mixed up. The House Employment Counsel will
represent management, will represent you in a hearing. We would
look at a claim of that nature. We would review the policy in
your office, not across the legislative branch--in your office.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I think we may have used that.
Mr. Ryan. So you gave it to one person and maybe didn't do
it for someone else.
Ms. Grundmann. No, we don't disseminate any boilerplate
language, but if there was a claim in your office, we would
review the policy in your office.
Mr. Ryan. Right.
The Chairwoman. But if there is no standard, each office
does their own thing.
Mr. Ryan. If I am understanding you correctly, so, in my
office, if I gave it to two people, I gave paid leave to two
people, and then someone else came along and I said no, then
you would review it within the context of how I handled my
office previously.
Ms. Grundmann. Your office only, not anybody else's office.
One of the things that we can do is we do provide training.
It is not mandatory in the House, our type of training. And we
can come and talk to you about good practices and best
practices in terms of policies as well. Just let me make clear
that FMLA--we have talked a little bit about this--FMLA is the
floor. Nothing precludes you from giving more than what FMLA
gives you.
The Chairwoman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
notification of workplace rights posters
Mr. Ryan. All right.
Mr. Newhouse, 5 minutes.
Mr. Newhouse. Five minutes.
Well, thank you for being here with us. This is an
important thing; everybody has a stake in it. Like Mrs. Lowey
said, we are not doing true confessions here--for the benefit
of all of my colleagues, can you make sure that all of those
posters have been distributed?
Ms. Grundmann. We can, but bear in mind that you will have
the old posters and not the new posters.
Mr. Newhouse. As long as we are----
Ms. Grundmann. No problem.
clarification of training
Mr. Newhouse. So my questioning is I think pertinent to
you. All of the training stuff that we as House Members have
had to go through and all of the staff, that is your thing,
right?
Ms. Grundmann. That is not our thing.
Mr. Newhouse. Oh, it is not?
Ms. Grundmann. Yes. CHA actually created guidelines as to
who qualifies for certification purposes, and the entity that
is providing the certification training is actually a private
contractor. Now we offer the training for free, but it doesn't
qualify for the certification.
Mr. Newhouse. You just took all my ammunition away because
I was going to bring up the fact that, personally, I guess we
checked the box on the training, but I just didn't really see a
whole lot of value in it, and I didn't talk to anybody who came
out of there thinking, ``Oh, great, I feel much better about
this.''
``I feel much better about this.'' And my staff, I have to
tell you the truth, if this is the right venue, we had to spend
a ton of money to send people for training across the State,
and I thought it was a waste of time.
Ms. Grundmann. Well, we do it for free.
Mr. Newhouse. To get there and put them up in hotels and
all that.
Ms. Grundmann. Well, we are certainly partial to our
training, one, because we know our process and we think we know
our new process.
Mr. Newhouse. Must have been the contractor training that
we received.
Ms. Grundmann. No doubt.
Mr. Newhouse. So that is not you----
Ms. Grundmann. Well, actually we do provide training, and
we think we have the best training because we have lived and
worked amongst you for 23, going on 24 years, and you have paid
for it already. But we provide not just the mere letter of the
law in terms of, like, discrimination or harassment. We go one
step further: we talk about best practices. We have bystander
intervention training, which is not mandatory, but we will
offer it to you. We will come to your offices. We will go to
your district offices. We also offer unconscious bias training.
A number of chiefs of staffs have already attended it. It is
interactive; it is an in-person training. There is a module on
our website for bystanders as well. We talked about I think
something we have learned over the last year and a half or so,
is that the culture has to change, and you can no longer talk
about a mere legal definition to change the culture. You have
to educate on the underlying biases, practices, and bad
behavior that could lead to a hostile work environment, that
could create discrimination. So you have got to go over and
above. We can do it for you.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay. Well, in light of the fact that we have
got between 40 and 70 cases per year.
Ms. Grundmann. Those are not House cases. Those are cases
overall from the legislative branch, to be clear.
Mr. Newhouse. Oh, not just Member offices.
Ms. Grundmann. Right. Member offices, you are our largest
stakeholder. You are half the community that we serve. So, in
relative numbers, it is not that much. Clearly the other
employing offices have more cases before us.
Mr. Newhouse. But the fact that, within the whole
institution, there are that many complaints----
Ms. Grundmann. In the legislative branch, yes.
Mr. Newhouse. Whether theyare all legitimate or successful,
it points out the fact that we need to make sure that the
training that is in place is actually getting the message to
people, right?
Ms. Grundmann. I could not agree with you more.
Mr. Newhouse. So I would just throw my 2 cents in that I
don't--at least from my experience, we are not there yet. It
should be more than just checking a box so we can tell the
public, ``Hey, we are doing this.'' We actually should try to
get to the root of the culture and change that needs to happen.
Ms. Grundmann. We have these modules ready. We are ready to
deliver them to you. It is an interactive module too.
Mr. Newhouse. Good. This is critically important.
Everybody, all of us are certainly interested in this, wanting
to get it right. I don't think that, reading through the things
and listening to what you are saying, that there is a
presumption one way or another. You guys are completely
neutral, right?
Ms. Grundmann. Absolutely. Independent, third party
neutral. Only one in the legislative branch.
Mr. Newhouse. So there is no presumption of innocence or
guilt?
Ms. Grundmann. Well, not guilt so much, but there are
burdens of proof that are part of the law, and that is
available for anybody to see, but there is no presumption of
anything; you are correct.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay. Are my 5 minutes up already?
Mr. Ryan. I have to take a stand every now and again.
Mr. Newhouse. It has to be with me?
I appreciate you being here and discussing this.
Mr. Ryan. Ms. Clark.
Ms. Clark. Thank you. And congratulations, Mr. Chairman and
Ranking Member Herrera Beutler.
Thank you all for the best view. It is pretty fantastic,
and I am just delighted to be here.
contract for house training
And thank you, many of my questions were in line with Mr.
Newhouse's questions that we would like to reduce your numbers
for this whole system, and that starts with good training. And
I think we have found consistently with our staff talking to
other staff, other Members, that the unique power imbalance in
Members' offices is not addressed and the fact that a Member's
staff who potentially may have a claim against a Member then
imperils everyone else's job and livelihood if their claim is
successful is such a unique dynamic that doesn't really exist
anywhere else. So who does that contract for that training?
Where does that fall?
Ms. Grundmann. I believe the contract for the training that
is the required training is Franklin Covey.
Ms. Clark. But who contracts with them?
Ms. Grundmann. CAO. Some of the dynamics that you are
talking about are actually part of our training, which is how
do you deal with that power dynamic between the Member and the
intern because an intern will be covered under the new law--or
a senior staff. I mean, there is a tension. And your offices
are relatively small. So, I mean, we talk about those dynamics,
and we actually talk about, how do you address these things?
In previous training sessions, we have--and it works best
when the Member is present. And the Member will stand up and
say: Look, if any of this happens to you, you contact me
directly.
And that is leading by example.
Ms. Clark. Okay, well, we will look into your training. It
is really having sat through one of the required trainings, and
it was like you pick two--a sentence, and then you start your
next sentence with the last word in that sentence. And I wonder
how does this help us understand the power dynamics in our
office and what is acceptable and what is a mystery? But you
are the wrong person to take that up with.
Mr. Ryan. May I ask, how much did we pay for the Franklin
Covey?
Ms. Grundmann. Oh, I have no idea. Wrong person to ask.
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
ocwr providing this training
Ms. Clark. Would you ever want responsibility for that
training?
Ms. Grundmann. Absolutely.
Ms. Clark. Okay. And would you have the capacity. Since you
have these training modules, would you have the capacity to do
that? I mean, I would think you would need more funding.
Ms. Grundmann. Absolutely more FTE. Just a case in point,
let's go back to November of 2017 when all of this started.
Our deputy executive director trained about 500 people in a
couple of weeks, and she did it not with 500 people in one
room; she did it in ones and twos and threes in individual
offices. And it does work better in that setting because then
you have a conversation going with the staff.
Ms. Clark. Do you know how it came to be the required
training came down through the CAO or how that----
Ms. Grundmann. You should ask the CAO, but that was their
guidelines that CHA had to put out in terms of who could
qualify and what should be in the training. That was not our
determination.
Ms. Clark. Okay, thank you.
notification to member of claim in office
Just a few questions. In the new process, I know that there
is Member of Congress notification when it is a claim against
the Member. But when it is not, if that was from someone in a
Member's office against someone else, is there any notification
for the Member of things they should be aware of in their
office. I know it would be very unusual that you would be
totally unaware, but it can happen. Or is that not----
Ms. Grundmann. I do not believe that there is a legal duty
in the statute to notify the Member if it is a member of the
Member's staff. What would happen is the Office of House
Employment Counsel would be notified, along with the employing
office. So whoever you have designated in your office would be
notified of a claim.
Ms. Clark. So there would be some feedback.
Ms. Grundmann. Maybe you have designated yourself to be
notified of any claim filed.
new administrative dispute resolution process
Ms. Clark. All right. And with the administrative
proceedings, how are you developing the rules of procedure?
Ms. Grundmann. Oh my goodness. We actually have a whole
team for that. That is the biggest, heaviest lift we have.
Ms. Clark. I would think so.
Ms. Grundmann. Those rules are being written as we are
sitting at this table right now. They will be going to our
board of directors at the end of this month for their review.
They will be going out for public notice and comment in April.
It is a 30-day comment period, and then that will give us time
to absorb the comments after the comment period closes and
reform the rules to the comments we received. The final rules
themselves absolutely have to be posted before June 19th.
budget needs
Ms. Clark. Okay. That is great. And with you asking for no
increase in your funding, and I realize that it has
significantly grown since fiscal year 2017. But you think you
are able to do that?
Ms. Grundmann. We think we can, but we don't know what we
don't know. We do not know what kind of burden preliminary
review will give us. It is fairly extensive, and it is 30 days,
and it is with a hearing officer. The statute is very clear.
Ms. Clark. How many hearing officers are you anticipating
you will need?
Ms. Grundmann. We currently have six. They are appointed on
a random or rotational basis. They are contractors, so they
work and are paid by the hour. They are not employees on staff.
The statute actually allows the executive director to designate
a member of staff for a hearing officer. And it makes sense on
some ends, so I think the question has come our way: Why don't
you have a hearing officer on staff? Because the statute also
requires that the appointment be on a random or rotational
basis. And if we have a full-time staff hearing officer, it is
neither random and it is never rotational.
Ms. Clark. Thank you very much.
remote access to proceedings
Mr. Ryan. To follow up on that, do you treat an issue that
happens in a congressional district, like in a State, then
contract with a retired judge there, or does this just all move
to Washington?
Ms. Grundmann. We use FMCS, and they actually provide us
the mediators. And it would go to the employee.
Mr. Ryan. What does FMCS stand for?
Ms. Grundmann. The Federal Mediation Services Conciliation
panel, and they are the folks that give us the names. They have
mediators nationwide. But yes, the employee is not going to be
dragged here to D.C. for something like that.
salary increases
Ms. Clark. One more question. About salary increases, I
think you had 1.9 percent, but we have recently passed the 2.6,
so would you need an adjustment if you were able to----
Ms. Grundmann. It is hard to say no to something like that.
Ms. Clark. Okay.
clarification of training
Mr. Ryan. Mr. Ruppersberger.
Mr. Ruppersberger. The first thing I want to say before I
get to you: Mr. Chairman, do you remember we came in on the
same class, and we came in on the Appropriations Committee at
the same time. And Leg Branch was one of my first
subcommittees. I was a former county executive. And I think our
mission here really is managing the operations of the House and
these issues, the police, and all these areas that we deal
with. So it is a very important committee, and it really helps
us run every day. Now getting to where you are, you are in a
very unique position. I have looked at your bio, and you have a
lot of experience. And yet you are starting up basically based
on the Congressional Accountability Act, and the climate has
changed, and there are a lot of issues that are there. So you
are not really going to know exactly where your budget is going
to be and what you are going to have. And I am really glad you
have the ability to have subcontractors who can help you, and
that is part of what you need to do.
I think one of the most important things we have to deal
with on the issues you deal with is that it starts in our
offices. And the training there and the fact that we have
communication with all employees, including interns, and then
have the ability for anyone at any time to go to someone else--
it could be a Member or designate a chief of staff or a
legislative director so someone could feel comfortable. And I
think one of the most important things if you set those
standards is to try to stop a situation before it gets to the
next level, and I think that is where it is important. And that
is where the training comes in.
And I think the training was pretty well that my staff went
through. We all went through it. Are there things based on what
you know now that you would change in the training? What is
happening there as far as the training, or do you think it is
pretty good?
Ms. Grundmann. Well, your certification training is not our
training. It is that of a private contractor. Our training goes
over and above that, which is we talk about the underlying
practices that can lead to an environment that is hostile, that
is discriminatory. And we open up a line of communication in
the staff so they could talk about how they would handle
something like that. Perhaps you have a staffer that is not the
target of the activity but an observer, a bystander. What
should the bystander do? The bystander should have a number of
options: talk to the employee, talk to the harasser, talk to
their supervisor. So there are other ways of dealing with it so
you can nip this bad behavior in the bud.
vision of agency
Mr. Ruppersberger. Your staff helped my staff. We had
constituents that would call and wanted the names of the
Members where money was paid out, and based on you helping us
and working with us, we were able to answer the questions
appropriately. I think the laws are going to be changed. There
is going to be more transparency and openness, but the
important thing too is the balance. When you are dealing with
these issues, you have someone who files a complaint, who knows
whether it is true or not. There is a process to go through.
But where do you see your mission changing as this law has
changed and the culture has changed on sexual harassment and
issues like that?
Ms. Grundmann. Well, our vision is actually I think far
more reaching than our mission. Our vision really is a
legislative community that is free of discrimination and
harassment, and free from occupational health and safety, and
accessible to the public. It is a zero-complaint year; that is
what we are looking for. Can we get there? We can't stop people
from filing, but again this goes back to changing the behavior
and changing the culture, and you have to have this
conversation. And we want to be able to have this conversation
with you one on one in a group in a larger setting, however it
works for you.
cybersecurity and confidentiality
Mr. Ruppersberger. I think it is important. I do a lot of
cybersecurity, and you are always going to have files on
whatever you do. And a lot of these files are confidential. And
by the way, it is just not about Members; a lot of victims
don't want anything to go out there either. You need
confidentiality. So you have to deal with these issues of
privacy and how you handle them, but once you have files, they
could be hacked, so to speak, which could be used by bad people
and bad guys to leverage or do whatever they want with one
individual or wherever we go. Have you talked to the CAO or
whatever about protecting the privacy of your classified or
confidential files?
Ms. Grundmann. We actually sit on the IT cybersecurity work
group.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Okay.
Ms. Grundmann. We have a seat on it. So there is a cross
conversation going across a legislative branch with other risk
managers, other cybersecurity experts. We are working in tandem
with them. We are undergoing a GAO cybersecurity audit that is
required under the new legislation. We are looking forward to
the results that will come out.
future projected needs
Mr. Ruppersberger. And the final thing: We are
appropriators, and we ask a lot of policy questions, and we are
learning in this hearing about where you are in the process,
your challenges for the future because it is an ongoing
process. From an appropriations point of view, you have already
stated you have an increase from last year. As appropriators,
where do you see you going? What do you think you might need
more in the future, especially as it relates to not only your
staff but the private contractors and the judges?
Ms. Grundmann. That is a great point. Again, we were
talking about not knowing what we don't know right now. What we
do know is that we can expect cases to go up because we have
more employing offices under the new Reform Act. We have a
larger class of potential claimants, including unpaid staff. I
don't know how many people are interns or fellows or detailees
on Capitol Hill, but they are now covered under the act. So the
scope has been expanded for us to cover. And even with the
Library coming in, that has brought new claims and put a
different stress on our system.
library of congress claims
Mr. Ruppersberger. I wanted to ask you about the Library,
how many people work at the Library of Congress?
Ms. Grundmann. I don't know.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Anybody have a clue?
Mr. Ruvinsky. It is between 3,000 and 4,000.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Really? I did not realize that at all.
That is why, because of that amount of people. Now is there a
reason why those claims--are you talking with the Librarian? We
are going to be doing her budget too in this committee. What is
happening that you might look at from your perspective to work
with the leadership there to see what is going on?
Ms. Grundmann. Well, I think what we can do, and I think
the Library has reached out to us in particular to fill their
training requirement needs. There is, under the new
legislation, a requirement that every employing office develop
and implement a training and education program for their
employees. We are working toward making our program part of--to
fulfill their training needs.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Are there more discrimination, sexual
harassment cases? What is the scope of it?
Ms. Grundmann. The scope, overall, the bulk of the cases
are discrimination based on race and color. The second class
category of cases that we see more frequently than anything
else is discrimination based on gender. And gender includes
harassment.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Harassment. You are talking about the
Library of Congress.
Ms. Grundmann. Yes.
Mr. Ruppersberger. How about on the other side, your
regular cases----
Ms. Grundmann. Well, I am talking about legislative branch
overall.
Mr. Ruppersberger. So the trend that you see in the Library
is also the same trend in whatever you do, or is the Library a
little different?
Ms. Grundmann. I don't think we looked into that depth in
terms of spotting trends for individual employing offices. We
certainly have not been required to do so. There is some value
in having this conversation. But clearly the larger the
employer is, the greater the possibility of having claims.
change in culture
Mr. Ruppersberger. Would you say, finally, my final
question, that it really starts in our offices to develop a
communication, a system, a system for reporting and including
the interns--sometimes we have interns 2 or 3 months, and they
move on. And I think that is a focus that we--especially it
could be the Member or the chief of staff or the legislative
director, but the employees who might be working with younger
interns, and I think that is important too. We need to focus on
that issue too.
Ms. Grundmann. I think you nailed it.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Okay, good.
clarification of training
Mr. Ryan. I just have one or two quick questions, and I
think Mr. Ruppersberger just touched upon it. What are we
doing, what are you doing, and what can we help you do as far
as really trying to understand? We did this training in the
Library of Congress, and we are still having problems. And how
do we get the feedback that, you know, it is not working? They
used Franklin Covey. And where you are doing your work, it is
working; and where they are doing their work, it is not
working, so we are going to move on from them and go to someone
else. What is the feedback loop?
Ms. Grundmann. Let me step back, Franklin Covey only does
training for the House, not for the Library of Congress. So
each employing office, Architect of the Capitol, Capitol
Police, has their own, I would presume, training program, as we
do. They have to report to CHA and Senate Rules in June as to
what that program is. So you will actually see what the
individual programs are.
climate survey
But this, though, in particular was very informative
because it gives me an opportunity to talk about the climate
survey, and this is the first climate survey that you will have
legislative-wide. That survey will be--it is, again, defined by
statute, will be voluntary in nature, and must be confidential
and anonymous. And the survey has to tell the respondent ``this
is confidential, this is anonymous'' throughout the survey. The
statute also requires that we have specific questions on
attitudes toward sexual harassment. So, for the first time, you
will actually have the temperature taken, so to speak.
Mr. Ryan. For every employee.
Ms. Grundmann. It is voluntary, but it is part of our
communication plan to get out to all the employing offices,
starting from the leadership and drilling down and encouraging
them to take this type of survey. Now the results are going to
be given to CHA, Senate Rules, and the Committees on Homeland
Security and Government Affairs. We are in the process of
developing that survey right now. I will tell you we talked
about the biggest lift was the procedure rules. This is the
second biggest lift. And this is coming sometime in the first
quarter, first, second quarter of fiscal year 2020. Lots of
questions we need answers to: How long the survey is? Do we
have open-ended questions? I mean, we have been encouraged to
do that. But certainly in developing this survey, the statute
does require that we work with these committees.
Mr. Ryan. And you can let us know when you are ready to
release the survey because I think we can send a joint Dear
Colleague, and I think the House Administration should send a
joint just to make sure everyone--encouraging everyone to fill
this out so we can get that kind of feedback that we need.
Ms. Grundmann. Right. And the more people that respond, the
more accurate the survey will be.
customer survey
Mr. Ryan. Right. One last question, with regard to the
hearing officer and the process that the employee would have to
go through so they get an employee advocate or they get a
confidential adviser, whatever that case may be, and then they
go through the hearing process, and then there is a report, and
onward we go; do you have anything in place to talk to the
employee after they go through that process, so again we can
say, ``Okay, how did this go?''
Ms. Grundmann. Customer survey.
Mr. Ryan. Customer survey, get as much feedback as we
possibly can from the employee so that we know how to maybe
adjust or deal with employee advocates, making sure if a woman
comes in or a person of color comes in, we want to make sure we
are giving them the best service possible and the best skilled
and equipped person to advocate for that.
Ms. Grundmann. So, as we are designing the system, the time
to ask for this is now. And I think we can definitely have that
as an element of the after, the lookback, so to speak.
Mr. Ryan. I think that is really important: do a debrief.
Ms. Grundmann. Debrief. It will obviously depend on
everybody participating afterwards. Some people do; some don't.
Mr. Ryan. Great. Well, this was a great hearing. Thank you.
Thank you so much and your entire team, especially your ace
in the hole from Youngstown, Ohio.
The committee is adjourned.
[Questions submitted for the record follow:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Thursday, February 7, 2019.
OPEN WORLD LEADERSHIP CENTER
WITNESS
JANE SARGUS, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, OPEN WORLD LEADERSHIP CENTER
Opening Statement of Chairman Ryan
Mr. Ryan. I call this hearing to order.
Thank you, Ms. Sargus, for being here today. We appreciate
it. And your entourage. You are like a President of a country
here with all this.
Although the budget for Open World Center is small as
compared to the rest of our legislative branch agencies, it has
had a real impact in showcasing U.S. values and democratic
institutions in an area of the world where Russian officials
stand firmly against our Nation's democratic principles. It
does so by facilitating visits to the United States by
legislators and other government officials from Russia,
Ukraine, and other countries to meet with our colleagues here.
I understand the Center uses the strength and expertise of
local volunteer organizations and cost-sharing in grant
proposals to maximize savings. This is a benefit to the
taxpayer, visiting countries and local communities. A win-win
for everyone involved.
We are thankful for the leadership of the Center, its
staff, and the many volunteers across America who have worked
hard to ensure the success of Open World.
My own State of Ohio is the sixth-most-visited State,
having hosted over 1,200 Eurasian visitors. I look forward to
your testimony today and working with you to continue to
building global relationships.
I was telling the staff earlier today, over my career I
have done a lot of traveling, and I just think the interfacing
of legislatures and legislators is essential to having these
deep relationships that we need. Presidents come and go, and a
lot of times the seniority in our legislative bodies is really
essential to deepen the relationship between the countries.
So I am thankful for all of your work and your great and
well-dressed team that you have over there. We have to look
into the budget. You are paying these guys a lot of money. They
look very sharp, well-dressed.
But, with that, we are happy to hear your remarks.
Oh. Let me first yield to the ranking member, Ms. Herrera
Beutler.
Opening Statement of Ranking Member Herrera Beutler
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Welcome. It is a pleasure to have you,
Ms. Sargus. I look forward to hearing your testimony and
learning more about the Center and how it supports changes in
other countries by inviting developing leaders to observe our
democracy and our free enterprise system in the U.S.
When I get to questions, I am obviously interested in
hearing about the activities that you participate throughout
the U.S. and including my district. We are not the sixth-most-
visited, but, as I was looking through, we do get our share.
Chairman Ryan Outlines Proceedings
Mr. Ryan. Thank you, Ms. Herrera Beutler.
Without objection, Ms. Sargus, your written testimony will
be made part of the record. With this in mind, please summarize
your statement and highlight your efforts of the past year to
the committee. After your statement, we will move to questions
and answers.
So please begin.
Opening Statement of Jane Sargus
Ms. Sargus. Thank you. Thank you for welcoming our
delegation of the Members of Parliament of Serbia. We are
delighted that they are part of this process today. It
illustrates, actually, the real work of Open World, and having
them here with me is encouraging. And I hope that you will have
a chance to speak with them for a moment. I don't know that
they will stay the whole time, though. So we will see.
Mr. Ryan. We will try to keep it brief.
OPEN WORLD LEADERSHIP CENTER FY 2020 BUDGET REQUEST
Ms. Sargus. Chairman Ryan, Ranking Member Herrera Beutler,
and members of the subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity
to present testimony on the Open World Leadership Center's
budget request for fiscal year 2020.
In this request, the Center is asking for $5.8 million, an
increase of $200,000, or 3.6 percent, over the 2019 enacted
appropriation. Open World has been at the current enacted level
since fiscal year 2016. The increased funds are needed mostly
for program costs, especially airfare, accommodations, and
other logistical expenses.
OVERVIEW OF THE OPEN WORLD LEADERSHIP PROGRAM
The Center conducts a one-of-a-kind, peer-to-peer exchange
program that has hosted more than 28,000 emerging leaders from
Russia, Ukraine, and other post-Soviet and transitional states
since 1999. In 2018, more than 140 of our participants were
either members of parliament, parliamentary staff, or regional
or local legislators. By the end of this year, we will have
hosted our 20,000th Russian participant.
As a legislative branch agency, the Center is well-placed
to provide critical support to Congress in its foreign affairs
oversight responsibilities. Indeed, this placement is the
leading component of the success of the Open World program in
these strategically important countries.
Providing programs for informed citizens and, in turn, for
more informed legislators is universally a good thing. And we
do this in a critical region of the world where knowledge-based
democracies with transparency and accountable governance are
not traditions.
On the program side, Open World has an American hosting
network of service clubs, local NGOs, and community colleges,
as well as thousands of volunteer host families. In 2018, these
host families lived in nearly 120 congressional districts in 48
States and contributed nearly $2 million in in-kind
contributions.
Coupled with an increasing number of U.S. embassies working
directly with Open World and other cost-sharing partners, this
keeps the per-person cost of an Open World delegate at about
$9,000--far below the standard executive branch rate of $20,000
per person.
Open World's young leaders stay in private homes in
American communities across the country. They discuss topical
issues of mutual interest and experience firsthand the
functioning of our democratic institutions. They talk with
their counterparts during the professional program and go back
to their countries with high praise for that and for their
American host families. This is how the Open World program
nurtures civil society that develops not only from the top down
but from the ground up and the periphery in.
Each year, there are new American civic organizations, such
as Friendship Force, Rotary, Sister Cities, or other clubs,
joining the Open World network. And because of this network,
these future leaders from Eurasia form positive views of the
United States, which, in turn, influence attitudes in their
home countries.
The most important work we do, however, is to showcase the
American system of governance, particularly the legislative
process.
IMPACT ON FOREIGN LEGISLATORS
Did you know that the Americans with Disabilities Act has
impacted communities far beyond our borders? Last year, a
delegation from Azerbaijan with three disabled participants
went to Reno, Nevada, to examine how that law could be
replicated in their country.
That the GI Bill and other veteran-related legislation
inspired the Ukrainian Parliament to establish the Ministry of
Veteran Affairs last year? An Open World delegation hosted in
Maryville, Tennessee, is taking the lead to help craft legal
and legislative language addressing these needs.
That the Freedom of Information Act leaves an indelible
impression on the Russian journalists that come on the Open
World program? When a state journalist from Foreign Minister
Sergey Lavrov's press pool expresses a favorable impression of
the Voice of America, acknowledging its independence no less,
we have just made an inroad in countering disinformation.
For the United States Congress, the Open World Leadership
Center is a resource. Our delegations are ready and willing to
provide on-the-ground, unfiltered information about events and
developments in their countries.
Open World is an asset. Our parliamentary program is
unmatched in the legislative branch. When your counterparts in
Open World countries meet with you, you are getting direct and
firsthand information. This, in turn, becomes the basis for a
more informed foreign policy.
Open World is an investment. Bringing delegations of rising
leaders to meet with their counterparts here creates a global
network of partners united in a common goal: to endow
democracies in transition with the basic ingredients of
accountable governance and transparency in a civil society.
The Open World program is your toolkit for supporting
democracies in transition--a toolkit that creates opportunities
for Open World participants to experience how legislative
action is the change agent their governments may need; a
toolkit that allows America's constituents to engage personally
in strengthening civil society in other countries. In these
countries that do not have a tradition of open debate or
legitimate opportunities to propose alternatives for their
government, our participants see how the legislative process
can empower them to be that agent for change.
Most importantly, though, the Open World program is an
effective one precisely because it is in the legislative
branch. In today's geopolitical environment, legislative
diplomacy emerges as a unique but no less powerful tool for
engaging governments in critical regions of the world.
There are good examples of Open World success stories
itemized in the justification. This unique program continues to
succeed in a shifting landscape, where it has achieved a
special status in the successor states of the former Soviet
Union and elsewhere.
On behalf of all of us at the Open World Leadership Center,
I thank this subcommittee for its interest in and support of
the Open World Leadership Center.
[The prepared statement and biography of Jane Sargus
follow:]
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Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
We will open it up for questions. I will yield to my
ranking member, Ms. Herrera Beutler, for 5 minutes.
HOST COMMUNITIES
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Well, from the research we have found, you have hosted 12
programs over the years in my neck of the woods, in Washington
State. And I believe Members of Parliament from Tajikistan and
regional economic specialists from Ukraine are visiting our
area, at least, this year.
Ms. Sargus. Yes.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I just wanted to hear what types of
district events you participate in and how you determine what
districts you choose.
Ms. Sargus. So Open World seeks to get geographic diversity
when we issue grants to national organizations. So when we work
with a national grantee, we say, can you get into 50 States, or
how many States can you get into?
National grantees have their own hosting network, and so
they reach out to the different States and seek their
solicitation to see if they would be willing to participate in
an Open World program.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So a national grantee is someone here
in the States who is receiving?
Ms. Sargus. Well, it could be Rotary International.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Okay.
Ms. Sargus. And Rotary International is a good example
because they have clubs in every State.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Okay.
Ms. Sargus. And I would like to give a shout-out to Rotary
because they are a wonderful partner, and they are largely
responsible for creating a network of clubs in Russia. They
increased the size and number----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Really.
Ms. Sargus [continuing]. Of clubs in Russia. Yes.
Everything has abated a bit, but from 1999, in the beginning,
Rotary was very important in working in Russia.
And we still have clubs in the United States who nominate
for the program because of the sister partnership.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Okay.
Ms. Sargus. Yes. So when the grantee selects a host
organization, that host organization creates opportunities for
a professional program. And the delegation will visit--it could
be the State Treasurer's office, depending on the theme. It
could be a hospital administrator if it is on a medical theme.
So they choose meetings and professional contacts with people
involved in that particular theme of travel.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Got it.
Ms. Sargus. The Rotary would be a good example because of
the entrepreneurship and business development connection.
CANDIDATE SELECTION
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I was hoping you could explain to me
how a delegation is formed. Like, is it self-selecting, or are
you looking--how does that work?
Ms. Sargus. So delegates are not self-nominated.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Okay.
Ms. Sargus. There is no self-nomination. In each of our
countries, we work with the U.S. embassy there as well as
having on-the-ground nominating organizations. And then, of
course, on this side, we would have Rotary or Friendship Force
who would also be able to help with that, and Sister City
organizations.
Mostly, though, the nominations come through the embassy
from nominating organizations in that country--trusted, solid
organizations that we can use, especially in Russia.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I was going to say, because I think it
was 2016, there were, with regard to funds made available for
support for Russian participants--obviously we want their
participation, but I saw that we put in a pretty specific set
of criteria for how those are chosen.
Is that pretty typical for this program? Or were we just
kind of looking at this case, saying, this is kind of our
mission here, so we are going to put a few sideboards on this?
Ms. Sargus. I would say that it was a reflection of the
time. And we still do not bring officials from the central
government. And that was the language that was in there. And it
is a reflection of the times.
But we really look for the emerging leader, the young
person. Most of our delegates are 35 years and under or, you
know, in their 20s. And they have demonstrated the ability to
change minds or to lead groups or to create consensus. That is
an emerging leader, and that is the person that comes over here
and meets their counterpart in the United States. And they form
bonds, they form ideas for projects, and they often continue
them.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Very good.
Well, with that, I yield back, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Ryan. Mr. Ruppersberger.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Well, again, I am back on this committee
after a period of time, but years ago, that is when I got to
know Open World. And I don't know if he is still involved, but
Judge Dick Bennett, U.S. district court judge, is a very good
friend of mine, and he was always advocating--in fact, he did
go to Russia, I think----
Ms. Sargus. Yes, he did.
VETTING CANDIDATES
Mr. Ruppersberger [continuing]. And meeting with the other
judges.
You know, the chairman and I are both on the Defense
Appropriations Committee. And we spend billions of dollars in
defense and nuclear and Russia, China, cybersecurity, all those
issues. But this is a program that, really, we invest in what
you are doing--and you have been doing it for 20 years, I
think--that really can make a difference down the road.
Now, we know that China has a culture--they are
communists--they are to be looked at when they are here and
they are not going to be able to make a lot of changes. But the
subtle relationships--it is about relationships--and trust that
might develop. There could be a way, when some of these people
might be in leadership or have input to make a difference in
this world, that we--it is really a dangerous world right now.
So I think it is a really good program. You know, the
numbers are pretty good; 28,000 I think you are talking about.
Ms. Sargus. Yes.
Mr. Ruppersberger. And that is very good.
I want to ask you, because Russia and the Chinese--I know
we are always dealing with issues in my intelligence
background. When you have people coming over, I assume some of
these people are going to be spies. I mean, it is just natural
that they are going to try to get people to these other
countries.
Do you see that? How do you deal with it? And, you know, if
they are, it doesn't make any difference, because you are
exposing them to a free world. So could you address that?
Ms. Sargus. That is a great question. You know----
Mr. Ryan. Do we have to go into closed session for this
answer?
I never thought I would say that in a Leg Branch hearing.
Ms. Sargus. Sure.
That is a great question. All of the Russian delegates are
vetted by the embassy, the U.S. embassy. The visas are issued
in Russia. So that process is pretty well-established and
pretty safe.
Yes, I suppose somebody could be. I couldn't tell you if we
had a spy or not. I will not know that.
But I know that we take care with the vetting. It is
matching the background with the theme of the program and in
the career development of that person. Are they in the right
place? Are they an emerging leader? And that gets vetted by the
embassy. And we trust our U.S. embassy on this matter.
THEMES FOR PROGRAMS
Mr. Ruppersberger. Let me ask you this too. There are
certain major threats that we have in our country. One of the
most serious, other than nuclear weapons, is probably cyber.
And we know Russia is very aggressive in our country and China
and other countries.
Do you ever, as part of a curriculum or educating, letting
your people work with our people, about the issue of
cybersecurity and how it is important to the world that we
understand we need standards in that area? Is there any type of
format for those type of discussions--and it doesn't have to be
cyber. It can be something else that is really important to the
world.
Ms. Sargus. Well, we have programs with Russian
journalists. And----
Mr. Ruppersberger. Yes, and I noticed that. I wanted to ask
you about the Russian journalists, because that is major.
Ms. Sargus. Yes.
Mr. Ruppersberger. And I think you just started that.
Ms. Sargus. It is a very powerful statement to a Russian
journalist to come to the U.S. and especially spend--actually,
they spend a third day in Washington, because of the Newseum,
because of the Voice of America. It is an important part of
their orientation. But often they go to a host city that has a
major newspaper or a radio station.
So they are meeting their counterparts, and they are
talking about the issues in a unusually frank and open way.
They are very, very confident and capable of saying what is
wrong with the situation or what is right with the situation.
There doesn't seem to be much fear of having the wrong opinion.
So everybody gets educated, both ways. We learn a little
bit from them; they learn a bit from us. But, generally, the
journalists from Russia that come to the United States on our
program go away deeply impressed.
Mr. Ruppersberger. They probably want to stay. But
notwithstanding that----
Ms. Sargus. Possibly.
Mr. Ruppersberger [continuing]. In closing, I support your
program. I think it is important that we move forward. I think
we get something out of it in this very dangerous world. And a
lot of it is about networking and relationships, in the end----
Ms. Sargus. Yes.
Mr. Ruppersberger [continuing]. And learning a little bit
about our country and what they have to deal with. And,
hopefully, around the world, it does make a difference,
compared to, again, what you and I do on Defense Approps--
billions of dollars that we are spending to protect our
national security all over the world. And yet this is not a
lot, but it hopefully will make a difference.
When I was a county executive, there was a program called
Ultra program. And we helped fund it--had to do with Northern
Ireland and Southern Ireland, in the same type of format that
you had, where they brought them together. And it really
started to work. Over a period of time, you could see it. And
they would come to the United States, but getting the North and
South together.
Ms. Sargus. I think that one thing that we keep in mind
when we are hosting Russians, there will eventually be a post-
Putin era.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Uh-huh. Yes.
Ms. Sargus. And if you have 20,000----
Mr. Ryan. Don't tell Vladimir Putin that, okay?
Mr. Ruppersberger. Yeah.
Ms. Sargus. And, in that time, we will have already hosted
20,000-plus young Russian rising leaders who are moving into
important positions and influential positions and policymaking
positions. And that will matter in future relationships.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Yes. It will.
Ms. Sargus. We have 20,000 friends in Russia who are going
to be important down the road.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Do you stay in touch with them at all?
Ms. Sargus. Oh, yes, we do. We received a grant last year
from an anonymous donor who wants us to promote and grow our
alumni program, especially in Russia and Ukraine. And Russia
has the 20,000----
Mr. Ruppersberger. That is very important, I think.
Ms. Sargus. Yes, exactly. So we are going to work hard on
that part of program. Ukraine is a much easier place to work
in, obviously, but mostly it will be in Russia.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Good.
I yield back.
DEVELOPMENT AND FUNDRAISING
Mr. Ryan. This is, obviously, critically important work
that you are doing. And, you know, I have been on and off with
this committee and just disappointed at the budget over the
past few years and what has happened. I actually think these
are the programs we need to really be investing in. And you
just articulated why it is so important over the long haul. And
we get very shortsighted sometimes in this body and in this
country, not really recognizing these seeds that we used to
plant all the time around the world that helped us win the Cold
War. We have forgotten those very lessons.
So I am not sitting here promising we are going to get that
budget back up to where it was in 2009 or 2010, so don't get
too disappointed in me, but the opportunities are here for us
to grow this program.
And so I just have a couple of quick questions.
One, you mentioned financial contributions from the
outside, which you are legally allowed to partner and take.
Ms. Sargus. Yes.
Mr. Ryan. How is that going? And are you attracting more
private donations?
Ms. Sargus. We are so-so in our ability to raise private
money. We don't have the in-house capacity, to be honest. None
of us are development officers. We are only six people in the
agency. We are good at talking and asking, and we do submit
proposals, and we will continue to do that.
Where we have more success is, in applying at a budget
review, with the Department of State for funds that are
available. But that is also an unknown quantity of money. So I
can ask for $4 million and I might see $50,000 in a given year.
And I don't know until well into the fiscal year what that
amount might be, so it makes budget execution a particular
challenge.
But we manage. And I have gotten used to the way Open World
operates. Open World is a trust fund. It is different than the
other agencies that you will talk to. And as a trust fund, that
means that we have more fluid beginning dates and end dates of
obligations, because it is essentially no-year money. It is
appropriated once a year, and then it goes into a trust fund,
which means I can spend it over time.
Mr. Ryan. Have you explored the opportunities of building
out the fundraising arm of your organization?
Ms. Sargus. Well, we did hire for a 10-month period an
outside person who gave us a roadmap. And as I said, we do
apply for grants. We have gotten grants. And the grants are
usually for specific purposes, such as the alumni program,
which is really an important part of having an exchange program
and continuing with that follow-up. So we will continue to work
on that, and we will continue to work on fundraising.
Mr. Ryan. And what is the cost-share? You may have
mentioned this. But, like, with the Kiwanis, you have them come
to Boardman, Ohio, and you are working with the local Kiwanis.
They put you up in housing, but is there any cost-share there--
--
Ms. Sargus. There is. I mean, they----
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. Other than, like, an in-kind type of
contribution?
Ms. Sargus. Absolutely. Breakfast. It is the kitchen-table
diplomacy. You sit at the kitchen table with people who are
future leaders of countries and you have your coffee or your
tea together. And most dinners are spent together. The lunches
are working lunches.
But the contribution is that home stay, including the
meals, but it is also sharing the culture and sharing family
time and going to a local baseball game or a hockey game, which
is--it is funny. Those kinds of things really matter, and they
are part of that bonding process.
POLAND
Mr. Ryan. One last question. I know the world is obviously
changing a lot, and there are always conversations about
expanding operations to include other countries. I know there
is an interest that I share with a Member of expanding to
Poland. Can you talk just a little bit about that?
Ms. Sargus. Yes. We have been in conversation, and,
actually, we had a meeting with a staff member from the
Congresswoman's office, and Open World is ready to jump in and
launch a program.
The process that we are going to do, we will be bringing
this up at the board meeting, which is February 28. Your office
has notification of that because you are ex officio member of
the board of trustees.
Mr. Ryan. I have heard that. I am excited about that.
Ms. Sargus. Yes. And it will be in the Library of Congress,
and details will be coming. And so that will be a topic of
discussion. And we are ready to do that program, and the board
will hear the arguments for it.
And it is followed by a 90-day notification to the
subcommittees, both chambers.
Mr. Ryan. Okay. Terrific.
Ms. Sargus. To add a country, we have to notify, a 90-day
notification.
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
Well, thank you so much. And thanks again to your team and
our special guests from Serbia. Thank you for being here. I
hope this is a great experience for you. I hope you get some
good breakfasts in America. And if you are in Ohio, I recommend
Bob Evans. They have very good pancakes.
And, again, thank you. And I would like to continue this
conversation offline around the fundraising piece.
Ms. Sargus. Okay.
Mr. Ryan. I think that can be important. There is a lot of
money floating around the world and around the country today,
and if we can figure out how to supplement some of this, we can
get you expanded to where you need to be.
Ms. Sargus. Yes. We are happy to do it. We are happy to
have that conversation. We will reach out to your office----
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
Ms. Sargus [continuing]. To make that appointment.
And yours, too, if you are interested.
Mr. Ryan. Terrific.
Go ahead.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I would add to that, I have done
development for a small nonprofit, and I realize no one ever
wants to pay for maintenance and operations. There are
different things you are never going to be able to sell the
ticket for. But it is worth investing, if nothing else, because
then you are going to have people coming in and taking, you can
kind of supplant funds.
Ms. Sargus. Right.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. You can cover certain things. And with
the uncertainty that you have experienced with the budgeting,
it just helps, it just adds. It is worth having someone--you
make what you bring in. So you need to get somebody young and
hungry.
Ms. Sargus. Yes. Sure.
Mr. Ryan. And even if it is part of their portfolio with
something else that they are doing, they may open you up to all
kinds of connections. So, anyway----
Ms. Sargus. Sure. Well, thank you.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. We will spare our Serbian friends
the inside discussion here, but thank you so much for all your
work.
Ms. Sargus. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. We really appreciate it, and it is critically
important.
Ms. Sargus. I wanted to say something, that Phil Kiko, the
Chief Administrative Officer, is one of most important people
that our delegations speak to. I just wanted to let you all
know that. He is a font of information that is practically
unmatched in the leg branch. He is wonderful to the groups, and
they love talking to him. He is so great.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
Ms. Sargus. So I just wanted you all to know that.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you. Yeah, Phil is a great guy.
Ms. Sargus. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you so much.
[Questions submitted for the record follow:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Tuesday, February 26, 2019.
ARCHITECT OF THE CAPITOL
WITNESS
CHRISTINE A. MERDON, ACTING ARCHITECT OF THE CAPITOL
Opening Statement of Chairman Ryan
Mr. Ryan. All right. Let's call this hearing to order.
This is the fiscal year 2020 budget hearing for the
Architect of the Capitol. I am pleased to gavel this hearing to
order.
And We will have two hearings this morning: first the
Architect of the Capitol, then followed by the Congressional
Budget Office.
We welcome Ms. Christine Merdon, the Acting Architect of
the Capitol, along with her team in the back against the wall.
Ms. Merdon, this is your first time testifying before the
subcommittee. You are pinch-hitting after the resignation of
Steven Ayers last November. But we know that you have had a
distinguished tenure at the AOC and before that were involved
in several projects near and dear to our hearts in Washington,
like the Martin Luther King Memorial and the Nats baseball
stadium--two really cool projects.
With all the scaffolding and cranes around the Capitol
complex, I am sure we will find lots to talk about today.
I have to note that your budget request is a sizable
increase of $98 million or 13.3 percent. We know that the
increase is driven by several large project commitments, and we
have to hope that we will get a generous enough 302(b)
allocation to address them.
Just to remind our members, we are luckier than the other
Appropriations subcommittees. We can begin our budget hearings
because we have received the leg branch requests, while the
executive branch budgets have been delayed more than a month.
Ms. Merdon, before I ask you to summarize your written
statement, I will ask our ranking member, Ms. Herrera Beutler,
if she has any opening remarks she would like to make.
Opening Statement of Ranking Member Herrera Beutler
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I do. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Welcome, Ms. Merdon. As was mentioned, this is your first
time before the Legislative Branch Subcommittee in your current
role as Acting Architect of the Capitol. Congratulations.
Ms. Merdon. Thank you.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. While maintaining day-to-day services
and operations, which include welcoming 3-million-plus visitors
to the Capitol Visitor Center and Botanic Gardens, the AOC has
a busy year with some major projects, including stone
restoration, co-generation development at the Capitol Power
Plant, the ongoing Cannon renewal and Rayburn garage
renovation--and we just cheer you on in that--the completion of
the first phase of the House childcare expansion, which is very
exciting, as well as numerous other projects and maintenance
work.
And on top of all of that, recently you played a major role
in the moving of hundreds of Member, committee and leadership
offices, impacting the staff and all of us through the
congressional transition.
So I look forward to learning more about the operations and
projects of the Architect of the Capitol and participating in
some site visits around campus.
Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
The floor is yours.
Testimony of Christine Merdon
Ms. Merdon. Thank you.
I would first like to thank all of you for meeting with me
in advance of the hearing. I know your schedules are extremely
busy, but you took time to meet with me, and I greatly
appreciate that so I could introduce myself and you could learn
a little bit about me and the agency.
So good morning, Chairman Ryan, Ranking Member Herrera
Beutler. Thank you for the opportunity to present the Architect
of the Capitol's fiscal year 2020 budget.
Many of you are new to the subcommittee, as I am new as
Acting Architect of the Capitol, but I am not new to
understanding the needs and the responsibilities of this
agency. Serving 8 years as the Chief Operating Officer provided
me the opportunity to work with a very talented team. We have
achieved many successes, including the Capitol Dome restoration
and, most recently, getting significant progress on the Cannon
Building renewal.
Our request of $832 million prioritizes people, projects
and preservation to ensure that we can complete our mission. We
are honored to be trusted stewards of the most iconic buildings
in the Nation: the House and the Senate buildings, Library of
Congress, Supreme Court, Botanic Gardens and the Capitol. Many
visit the U.S. Capitol because it is the symbol of democracy
throughout the world.
Nearly everything you encounter on the Capitol campus is
preserved and maintained by the AOC. From the incredible
architecture that inspires you, to the floors you walk on, to
the lights that brighten your way, there is an entire world of
unseen IT and security infrastructure that allows you to do the
Nation's work in safety and comfort.
Each year, we are asked to do more. Our footprint is
expanding. Our responsibilities and complexity of our work and
security requirements are increasing. Our people work behind
the scenes to help the agency meet the mission every day. In
the past, the AOC has strategically prioritized Capitol budget
increases to maintain and improve our facilities, but this has
been at the expense of our operational support needs. To meet
the current and growing requirements, we must have the right
resources.
We request additional staff to successfully meet our
project and operational needs. This includes project managers,
safety and fire professionals and contracting officers. Today,
for example, a Federal contracting officer executes 100
contract actions a year; our contracting officers at the AOC
execute 200 actions a year.
The AOC has more than 2,000 employees. To attract and
retain specialized talent in a competitive market, we need
human resource professionals.
Our team, as well as our inspector general, confirmed that
cybersecurity is our highest risk. We hold sensitive
information; we must safeguard it. However, our IT funding is
one of the lowest in the Federal Government--3 percent of our
budget compared to the Federal average of 11 percent. Our staff
works around the clock, but our IT support is not available
after 5:00 and on weekends.
We have had many project successes over the last year,
including the co-generation project, funded through a public-
private partnership and now yielding significant energy
savings.
The Capitol Power Plant generates steam and chilled water
throughout the campus through miles of tunnels. We must keep
this critical infrastructure safe and reliable. Additional
security screening is essential to close a critical gap. We
must keep threats outside of the building.
We are in a race against time to maintain our
infrastructure. Stone from this building can crumble in your
hand. Therefore, it is important to prevent the deterioration
of historic fabric. We are requesting $60 million in projects
to ensure major campus landmarks are enjoyed by future
generations. Preservation is a part of our heritage. The
buildings, fine art, botanic assets--their value is priceless.
So, during the Dome restoration, our project team used
AOC's original drawings from 1855 as a resource to complete the
project. We have requested preservation resources to continue
our work.
Chairman Ryan, last year, you noted a concern of us
prioritizing projects over people. We know we must invest in
people we need to carry out our project and preservation
mission. With your help, we will continue to be stewards of our
Nation's living history.
So that concludes my remarks. I look forward to hearing
your questions today.
[The prepared statement and biography of Christine A.
Merdon follow:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
CAPITAL CONSTRUCTION AND OPERATIONS
Mr. Ryan. Thank you so much. We appreciate it.
As I said, I will take the first volley here.
You are asking for: $25 million increase for the Capitol
Building, $28 million for the Power Plant, $53 million more for
the Library of Congress. Also requested is a substantial
increase in the Capital Construction and Operations, which is
akin to your headquarters program management account.
Can you explain to the committee why the Capital
Construction and Operations account requires $25 million more,
which is a 24-percent increase?
Ms. Merdon. Thank you for that question.
Many of you know the Architect of the Capitol has several
jurisdictions, 10 appropriations, 9 jurisdictions, including
the House Office Buildings, the Senate Office Buildings, the
Library of Congress.
Our central staff supports all of these jurisdictions by
being a central location for human resources, for IT, safety,
fire, and environmental protection, project managers.
So the Cannon, which is one of the largest projects we have
ever done in the history of the AOC, project managers for that
project support that project.
So, over time, our line-item construction projects have
increased, our footprint has increased with the O'Neill and
also with the Union Square. We need people to support those
initiatives and those efforts.
So the project increases, the project work to be done
behind the scenes, there is a lot of work by contracting
officers and many others to support that. So we are rightsizing
our organization to accommodate our growing needs and
responsibilities.
Mr. Ryan. So how many people work now, and how many would
you be able to hire if you got the full $25 million?
Ms. Merdon. We are hoping to hire 35 more people in CCO, 12
projects managers. Right now, we are understaffed in project
management. And the project managers are the heart of what
makes us deliver our projects on time.
We also have a need for seven contracting officers. You
know, as I mentioned in my opening statement, we do almost
twice as much in contract awards as the rest of the Federal
Government, so our contracting officers are working very hard.
And if you don't have enough contracting officers, the contract
actions take longer to do, and then it accumulates additional
cost.
Mr. Ryan. So I am going to play dumb. So you need 12 more
projects managers, you need 7 more contracting officers, and
additional money to get those projects done.
So you are saying, if you get all of the requests that you
asked for, that that particular account would handle the
management side of basically all of the increases that you are
asking for?
Ms. Merdon. It would handle the management side.
We also would be able to hire people. You know, working in
Washington, D.C., almost my entire career, it is a very
competitive market. And making sure that we are the best agency
that people can come to, and we reach far and wide for the
talent that comes here. Everybody here is very specialized. So
it is project managers, IT professionals, HR professionals,
safety and fire protection, general counsel, you know, a couple
more attorneys in there----
LINE ITEM CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS
Mr. Ryan. Can you go through exactly what would be done to
the Capitol, what would be done to the Power Plant, what would
be done to the Library of Congress in more detail?
Ms. Merdon. Sure.
The Capitol Building, you can see the construction that is
occurring on the House side. A big portion of that is to--I
think it is about $22 million--to continue the project. You
know, the project will continue until the inauguration, but
after the inauguration, we will begin with the west side, with
this side right over here, for the stone restoration.
That also includes funds for the inauguration, $7 million
for the inauguration. And it also includes funds for electrical
distribution. That is one of the unseen things, is the
electrical distribution that is critical to maintain the
operations of this building.
At the Capitol Power Plant, we have four projects that are
specifically tied to our utility tunnels. The Capitol Power
Plant generates steam and chilled water for this campus as well
as Union Station, Folger Library, the Thurgood Marshall
Building.
So we need--there are 2 miles of tunnels where these steam
and chilled water lines run through. In 2006, we had a citation
from the Office of Compliance because we were not maintaining
those tunnels. There was crumbling concrete, there was
asbestos, there was heat stress. We actually corrected that in
2016, but we need that money to continue to maintain the steam
and chilled water lines. They are kind of the veins and
arteries of the campus, if you will.
Also, on the cooling side, our refrigeration plant
revitalization, that is a multiphase project. We are requesting
funds for that. Some of the equipment in the refrigeration is
over 35 years old. It has gone past its useful life. This is
actually to replace that over time, to put chillers in those
spaces over time.
At the Library of Congress, we have the copper roof that
requires replacement at the James Madison. There is also the
stained glass restoration project that is a multiphase project
over four phases. We are requesting funds for that.
The Madison Building, we are also requesting roof repair
projects because on the roof there is a terrace on the sixth
floor of the Madison that leaks into the spaces below, and that
is where the collections are stored.
So all of these are critical projects. All of these are
projects that are not nice-to-haves, they are absolutely need-
to-haves to keep things functioning.
Mr. Ryan. I will stop there.
Ms. Herrera Beutler.
CYBERSECURITY
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I wanted to ask about the cybersecurity; you were just
explaining to the chairman the needs behind some of the
requests. I think about different businesses in my district,
when they have some of these major capitol maintenance-type
projects, it is not the fun stuff, it is not the sexy stuff.
But even as you are asking for it, you know, you are
talking about the copper dome or you are talking about
protecting where the collections are housed in the LOC, or the
stained glass, those are things that at least, you know, the
general public sees.
The cybersecurity piece nobody sees. And it is probably
more costly.
I would like to hear what you have done to protect your
networks and improve cybersecurity. And I would like you to
maybe elucidate the threat a little bit so that it is easier
for us to, I think, chew on the cost.
Ms. Merdon. Sure.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you.
Ms. Merdon. So the agency undergoes a risk assessment every
year to determine the agency risk. It is called enterprise risk
management. So we determined that cybersecurity is our biggest
threat, the biggest risk for the agency. In addition, we have
our own inspector general, and they also determined that
cybersecurity is our biggest risk for the agency.
So we have large systems at the Capitol Power Plant that
have steam and chilled water. There is natural gas that comes
in there. And we just last year, with your assistance and the
funding, we hired an industrial security officer to maintain
that. So we have to continue to maintain that.
But some of the other risk--you know, we have millions of
events every year that bad actors are coming in trying to look
at our systems. And we are the holders of plans, we are the
holders of information about the campus and how the campus
functions.
So we are concerned about access to that. And so we have
been concerned about it for a while, so we have done things to
prevent people from attacking us----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Can I ask, because you said there are
bad actors who look to take our information, sensitive systems
and functions.
Ms. Merdon. Plans.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Can you be more specific?
Ms. Merdon. Sure. Each building has plans, design plans,
that show the building structure as well as the electrical, the
water, and the other systems for the building, as well as the
plans around campus. So we have access to the plans, and we
have access to, also, things like inauguration plans too.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. And so, with those sensitive plans,
you have seen--when you say bad actors, like, online--can you
talk about some of that more specifically?
Ms. Merdon. In a higher way.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Yes.
Ms. Merdon. So we monitor the people who are trying to
actively get into our internet system, our systems, and we
receive over millions of events every year. We actually have a
screen where you can actually see that happening from other
countries.
So we take this very seriously, and we were the first on
the Hill to implement a two-factor authentication. So, when I
log into my computer, I put in a PIN, also a thumb drive. I
need two pieces to actually activate my computer.
We work very closely with the Legislative Branch
Cybersecurity Working Group. All of our employees, 100 percent,
receive training annually on cybersecurity so they understand,
if somebody is trying to social engineer you to do something to
give them access, they know what to look for. And we test
people on that annually.
But what we are trying to protect is the systems that
provide support to the Capitol and the information that we
hold. We have been here for over 200 years, and we actually are
our own archives. We don't send documents to the National
Archives. We maintain our own archives, older drawings as well
as newer plans. All the plans for the Member offices are done
on our computers----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. And this includes all of our email,
right, the support----
Ms. Merdon. Our email.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Just yours.
Ms. Merdon. Correct.
Mr. Ryan. Mr. Ruppersberger.
Mr. Ruppersberger. First, I want to ask you a very
important question. Where did you go to college?
Ms. Merdon. That is the most important question I think I
will be asked today. The University of Maryland, proudly.
Mr. Ruppersberger. That is great. So you are a Terp.
Ms. Merdon. I am a Maryland Terrapin.
Mr. Ruppersberger. So you hear the phrase ``fear the
turtle.''
Ms. Merdon. The phrase is ``fear the turtle.'' Thank you,
sir.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Very good.
You know, one of the issues that I want to get focused on--
because I do specialize in a lot of this--is cyber. I represent
NSA that does a lot of that work.
And, from your perspective, what do you see as your mission
as it relates to cyber? Making sure that you don't get the
attacks so that they can really shut down our systems? Is that
basically your focus and your mission?
Ms. Merdon. That is one of them. We want to make sure that
nobody can attack our mission.
And one thing with the Capitol Power Plant, we have it air-
gapped, meaning it is not on the internet. But we need to make
sure that nobody tries to access it in other ways. But it is
air-gapped.
But, also, the many plans and specifications, the office
locations of many of the Members that we have here, and any of
the security features that we have on campus--we are
responsible for doing the build-out of, many of the security
features--and making sure that we can protect those.
AOC CYBERSECURITY PERSONNEL
Mr. Ruppersberger. So how many people do you have on staff
to do cyber things?
Ms. Merdon. We have a staff in our organization at the
CIO--I can provide you the exact number. I don't know the exact
number off our head, but it is probably a dozen or so that are
focused on our internet security specifically.
[The following information was provided by the witness
after the hearing:]
AOC currently has eight personnel who focus on cyber
defense. Unfortunately, this leaves us one-deep in some
critical roles--leaving us exposed when personnel are sick or
on leave. For that reason, our FY 20 budget request includes
support for three additional personnel. In addition to these
onsite personnel, AOC has a contract with an industry leading
managed security service provider that provides 24x7x365
monitoring, threat detection and security analysis.
But I think our challenge is many of our employees are now
using, you know, smartphones as a tool just as they use a
hammer and a drill. And if you go to our projects, you will see
them not carrying around blueprints anymore; they will have an
iPad around their neck so they can see the plans right there.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Well, I think it is the future of where
we are going. For instance, last year, pursuant to our Commerce
Department, China has stolen over $600 billion. So they are
everywhere. Russia--I mean, you have it all over. And we are
really far behind.
And I know your IT budget, was cut because of
sequestration, which is one----
Ms. Merdon. Yes.
Mr. Ruppersberger[continuing]. Of the most serious problems
we have dealt with here. It was stupid to do that, but we did.
And, you know, you were cut 32 percent. So you had to
prioritize, and you put it into the infrastructure instead of
digital, but now you are going to hopefully catch up.
Who are you working with, though? I mean, there are so many
people out there, people who know about what cyber is, but
nobody really focuses a lot where it needs to go. Are you
working with our police department here? I know they hopefully
will be working with other law enforcement.
I am just trying to get a hold of what you really do, what
you need, and what your mission is in cyber. And then where do
you get support if you need it?
Ms. Merdon. Sure. So our mission in cyber is to protect the
information----
Mr. Ruppersberger. By the way, let me ask one more quick
question, too, before you get into that.
Ms. Merdon. Sure.
Mr. Ruppersberger. What countries--you were talking about
certain countries were attacking us?
Ms. Merdon. You know, if we are to look at who is coming
after us, I have seen the screen, and they are the usual
suspects Russia and China and some from Africa too, where you
can see they are coming in and trying to get into our systems.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Okay. All right.
Ms. Merdon. Our mission is to protect the Capitol, the
infrastructure, and all the plans that we see. And as people
are using the systems more, folks are using the systems, we
need to get smarter and better, because it is becoming more
robust.
We are working with the Cybersecurity Working Group, so we
work with the House CIO, the Senate CIO, and all the other CIOs
across campus. And I know we have an organization----
Mr. Ruppersberger. All under dot-gov, right?
Ms. Merdon. Yeah, all under dot-gov. These are our partner
agencies. And, of course, I sit on the Capitol Police Board,
and we work closely with the Capitol Police Board if there is a
need to reach out if we see something not working.
We do hire contractors who come in and work with us on the
cybersecurity initiatives.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Okay.
I think we really have to focus on this. There are several
of us on this committee and other committees who have really
focused on that. And I think it is almost impossible that we
don't get attacked, and trying to deal with it and finding out
where it is, because there is so much of it out there all over
the world.
And, you know, our NSA is as good as Russia. China, they
are not as sophisticated as we are and Russia, but they are
volume. And they are constantly trying to learn and find out
what we have so they can do better. Like, our space system, as
an example, they are even with us in space now, they are
putting a lot of money in it, because they have all of our
programs and we didn't even know it.
INFRASTRUCTURE MAINTENANCE
The other thing I do want to say, when you are dealing with
infrastructure, it seems to me that if you don't handle a
maintenance problem which could cost $100,000, then that
maintenance problem becomes a $1 million problem. So I am sure
that part of your focus and your engineers are focusing on
taking care of those maintenance problems that are high
necessity. We always have to deal with those. Do you agree?
Ms. Merdon. Thank you for recognizing that, because we
always try to keep things at the smallest level before it
becomes a big problem. But sometimes--I know appropriations and
resources are tight in these times--we are not able to get to
it immediately. But I firmly agree, preventive maintenance is
much better than deferred maintenance.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you, Mr. Ruppersberger.
He is our resident expert on cyber and has been working on
it a long time, so we rely on his opinion a lot around here.
Mr. Newhouse.
Mr. Newhouse. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I won't ask you any tough questions like where you went to
school because I know that you wouldn't have the right answer.
Ms. Merdon. University of Maryland.
CONGRESSIONAL OFFICE MOVES
Mr. Newhouse. Ms. Merdon, welcome, and thank you for being
here this morning. Thanks for bringing so many of your fine
team with you, too. Certainly, we appreciate the hard work you
have in front of you and that you accomplish in helping to
preserve--I often tell people we work in a living museum. And
it has to be not only a tremendous honor to work here, for all
of us, but a lot of responsibility in keeping things up. So we
appreciate that.
And I know, this last transition, you had almost a record
number of offices to move, or close to it, right?
Ms. Merdon. A record number in 40 years, yes.
Mr. Newhouse. Yeah. And so, you know, that is a big job.
As we have talked--and thank you for coming to my office
prior to the hearing--we had a few issues in our transitional
moving, which maybe--we are an isolated case, I am sure. But we
had a great experience with a lot of the work from your team.
But it seemed like that some of the things that--and we
talked about this. We had different groups of people coming in,
maybe, to do something that had already been accomplished, or
maybe it was the wrong team. And so it just seemed like there
were some communication issues.
Could you go over some of the things that you have been
able to do or are planning to do to try to address some of
those issues so that we have the right people in the right
place at the right time to be more efficient?
Ms. Merdon. Sure. Thank you once again for meeting with me,
and thank you for sharing any of your concerns that you had in
your office. I am glad we are able to work those for you.
You know, as you had noted, we did have a record number of
moves, I think 278 moves, the most in the last 40 years. We
also, in December and January, turned over the first phase of
the Cannon and also completed the Rayburn garage, as well as
turned over the daycare center. So the House of Representatives
was very busy this year. And thank you for all your support on
that.
And I know the House Superintendent, who is here with me
today, works very hard to coordinate all those issues with our
partners--the CAO, the Capitol Police, or any of those. So our
House Superintendent is looking at ways to better coordinate
and communicate on those. And I know we are following up on
your issues.
CANNON RENEWAL
Mr. Newhouse. Okay. Appreciate that.
You brought up Cannon. The first phase is complete?
Ms. Merdon. Correct.
Mr. Newhouse. You also mentioned, too, or visited earlier,
now that Members are moving into the recently renovated parts,
some issues have been expressed to us and other people we know
about some of the lack of built-in storage, the lack of space
for some of the necessary equipment that they need.
I just wondered how that is being addressed and if you are
using some of that input for future plans for the rest of the
building.
Ms. Merdon. Yeah, you are correct, we did finish the first
phase.
For the committee, there are five phases of the Cannon, and
we completed the first phase, which was the infrastructure, the
initial phase, in 2016. And, this year, we have completed the
first phase at the end of the year.
Mr. Ayers, the previous Architect, did comment last year
that phase one is the most difficult phase of the entire
project. It is the longest, physically. It has the Cannon
rotunda, the Caucus Room, two hearing rooms, the food servery.
And it is also going to be the one where we are going to have
our lessons learned, we are going to find out where things
actually exist. You know, you recognize that we actually raised
the roof on the Cannon because there is a fifth floor now, and
we had a lot of lessons learned from that.
And I know our staff is working with the 31 chiefs of staff
that moved in there. We had 31 Members move in there. And we
understand, when you build a building, you know, you have your
one punch list, but then there is another punch list when
people move in, because that creates a different dynamic, with
heating and lighting. And we are reaching out to learn more
about what the occupants think about how the space is working.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay. Good. Good.
CONTINGENCY FUND
With all the things you have going on, you have a lot of
planned expenses, planned projects. Could you talk about your
contingency fund if there is something unexpected that comes
up? Do you have something like that?
Ms. Merdon. Well, each project has a contingency, and we
do--I can say we do 10 to 20 percent, but it is actually a very
educated number. We do a risk analysis on each project's
contingency based on the difficulty of the project. So it could
be a simple project that has 5-percent contingency or the
Cannon or others which had--I think the Dome had a 20-percent
contingency.
But, also, each of the jurisdictions have a minor
construction fund available to them for emergent projects and--
--
Mr. Newhouse. Unplanned things. Yeah.
Ms. Merdon. Exactly.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay.
PRESIDING INAUGURATION
You mentioned the stage, the platform for the inauguration.
Could you tell us how much that costs to construct every--and
then tear down?
Ms. Merdon. This year, we are requesting $7 million. And
the construction and the teardown is included in that.
So we start planning that the day after the last
inauguration. We do----
Mr. Newhouse. So you are assuming it will be on the west
side all the time now?
Ms. Merdon. Yes. I think Reagan may have had the first one;
we made the switch about that time.
But we take the plans, we say what can we do better, what
worked and what didn't work or what technology is changing or
what security aspects are changing after the last inauguration.
So right now we are getting to approach finishing up the
design.
And in September of 2020 we will begin the construction of
the stands. So about 3 months before the end of the year we
begin the stand construction. So it is quite an endeavor.
Mr. Newhouse. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know what the question
is--or what the answer is. It just seems like some streamlining
of that whole thing so we don't have to recreate the wheel
every 4 years.
CPP TUNNEL MAINTENANCE
But, anyway, the other thing I was thinking as you were
talking, you talked about the tunnels and the maintenance and
the citation that you received by--who was it?
Ms. Merdon. Office of Compliance in 2006.
Mr. Newhouse. And then you mentioned that you satisfied
that citation in 2016, 10 years later.
Ms. Merdon. Uh-huh.
Mr. Newhouse. So just expand on that.
Ms. Merdon. So, you know, we were cited in 2006. We have
over 2 miles of tunnel, so I think identifying all the issues,
doing the design, bringing a contractor in, and----
Mr. Newhouse. Oh, wow. It is a 10-year process, huh?
Ms. Merdon. Right. And also having to maintain operations
the entire time. So we had to take it out not all in one time
but in parts and pieces.
And, you know, some of it was asbestos, and asbestos is
very time-intensive to remove. Some of it was heat stress and
concrete repairs. And it is not like you are going into an open
room like this; you are working behind very difficult systems
and pipes all the way.
So it took quite a while to do because of all the
difficulty to identify all the problems, design a solution, and
ultimately remediate it.
Mr. Newhouse. All of those tunnels, they are original? They
are part of the original campus? Or are they----
Ms. Merdon. You know, some of them are very old, but we
have some tunnels--the CVC tunnels are fairly recent, only 10
years old. So they are different ages. The Cannon tunnel is
probably one of our oldest.
Mr. Newhouse. Yeah. It is just fascinating. There is a ton
of stuff around here that you just don't see and people don't
realize.
Ms. Merdon. Exactly. It is all the unseen that takes a lot
of time and attention to keep the campus safe, warm----
Mr. Newhouse. Okay. Well, thank you. Again, thank you for
being here, and----
Ms. Merdon. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Newhouse [continuing]. I appreciate your input.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
CANNON RENEWAL
Mr. Ryan. Thank you, Mr. Newhouse.
I wanted to dig in here a little bit on a couple of these
issues.
What would your assessment be of the Cannon project at this
point? I know you expressed several challenges that you faced
with storage and so on and so forth. I had a couple Members
grab me about privacy within the office space--I don't know if
the chief of staff had mentioned that to you--or maybe
conversations can be heard. I heard it from two or three
people. I didn't go up to check it out myself.
But what would your assessment be of the project so far?
And do we have any red flags that have popped up?
Ms. Merdon. This is the first I have heard about the
conversations. We will make sure we address that.
So, as I mentioned, this is the one where we have our most
lessons learned. So, currently, we are taking the lessons
learned on the phase one and doing an assessment of the cost,
looking at where is going to cost more and where we may have
some efficiencies, and also holding the contractor accountable.
But we have to take those lessons learned and apply them to
phases two, three and four, and, once again, looking for
efficiencies. So the project team right now is doing that
assessment.
One thing to remember, the Cannon is a very large project,
and each of the five phases is larger than the dome, as far as
size. So it takes time for our team to work through the complex
issues and to finalize a number or what the bottom line is. So
I would like to come back to the committee in springtime to
provide you with a number of the cost to complete. We are
working very hard to keep it at the original number, the 752.7,
but we are assessing what we learned on the first phase.
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
The GAO talks a lot about redesign and issues around
redesign once construction has begun. Can you talk a little bit
about that?
Ms. Merdon. Certainly.
This project is a renovation project. Prior to coming to
the Architect of the Capitol, I had spent a number of years in
the industry. And typical with this type of project, you do run
into a lot of unforeseen conditions once you start tearing down
walls or lifting the roof. So there was a lot of redesign,
because we found conditions that weren't as we thought on the
original plans that we had, and we had to redesign to
accommodate the conditions as they were built. So working
through that.
CANNON CAUCUS ROOM
Mr. Ryan. The Cannon Caucus Room, is that part of your
comments just then?
Ms. Merdon. Yeah, the Cannon Caucus Room, some of the
issues--there was a desire to make some changes on installing a
dais and some of the audio-visual equipment too. And so we are
doing the redesign on that, and it should be open by the
beginning of next year.
Mr. Ryan. So how does that happen? I mean, you think you
are going to redesign the Cannon and you are talking about the
dais. Wasn't that thought about beforehand, that that had to be
part of a redesign?
Ms. Merdon. It was. I think the issue with that is the
design for the Caucus Room was done several years ago, and
there may be new people who came in who had a different desire
based on current needs and requirements. And we made those
adjustments--are making those adjustments.
Mr. Ryan. Okay. So when you talk about lessons learned,
that would be a good example, correct?
Ms. Merdon. Absolutely. And one of the things that we did
on phase two is--it is kind of a two-phase--we actually have
been meeting with our stakeholders and the others, like the CAO
in the House, probably starting 2 months ago to review the
drawings to see if there are any changes earlier on, prior to
starting construction, and a more rigorous change management
process.
FUTURE BUILDING RENEWALS
Mr. Ryan. Okay. Good.
So we are talking about Cannon, and we also have Longworth
and Rayburn waiting in the wings. Last year, we had a hearing
where your predecessor indicated that it was going to be around
several billion dollars to do the Longworth and Rayburn. And
that is obviously a huge challenge for us, with the small
budget that we get here in the Legislative Branch
Appropriations.
So how are you planning to manage these projects? And do
you have any ideas around some creative financing? We are going
to talk about this later in our next hearing, but I would be
interested in, given your broad experience on these projects,
is there any creative financing that we can come up with here
to help us expedite some of these projects and pay for them and
get them moving? Because, obviously, they get more expensive as
time goes on.
Ms. Merdon. Absolutely.
Mr. Ryan. And coming up with some way to make these early
investments to get these things done, I think, would be
beneficial to the taxpayer in the long run.
Ms. Merdon. Absolutely. We utilized a public-private
partnership with the co-generation, and the cost savings is
going to be the energy savings on that.
So the Longworth and the Rayburn are both rated, I
believe----
ENERGY SAVINGS PERFORMANCE CONTRACTS
Mr. Ryan. Can you talk--and I don't mean to interrupt you.
Can you talk to me about that?
Ms. Merdon. The Cogen? Yes.
Mr. Ryan. That public-private partnership----
Ms. Merdon. Certainly.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. What did that look like?
Ms. Merdon. So the Department of Energy gives authority to
agencies to do energy savings performance contracts. Those are
changing the lighting and the heat and the ventilation. And we
have done that at the House and the Senate, the Capitol, and we
are doing it at the Library of Congress, where those things are
installed, energy savings are installed, but the government
pays the contractor or the financier back with the energy
savings over a period of time. And we have been very
successful.
Department of Energy also has the utility savings contract
vehicle. That is for larger projects. And we use that authority
and that vehicle to engage with Washington Gas to do the design
and the construction and the financing of the Power Plant.
So we are achieving significant energy savings from the
Cogeneration, and it just started producing energy and steam
and power at the end of last year. So that is about a 20-year
payback period on that.
So those are authorities that we have. To do, I think, what
you are asking for, we would need authority too. We had the
authority in legislation when they built the Thurgood Marshall
Building. It is a court building, but a developer came in and
built that, and we pay the lease costs, and it will become ours
in 2024. So those are opportunities, different examples of how
that can be done.
Mr. Ryan. Department of Transportation, is that a lease
too?
Ms. Merdon. I am not familiar with that building.
Mr. Ryan. All right. I was just wondering.
So the Cogeneration at the DOE and the utility piece
sound--I mean, there is obviously--so the energy savings pays
for----
Ms. Merdon. Pays that back.
Mr. Ryan. Who put the money in up front? Department of
Energy?
Ms. Merdon. No. It was Washington Gas, their financial----
Mr. Ryan. Oh, Washington Gas. Okay.
Ms. Merdon. Yeah. You know, the only money----
Mr. Ryan. So it was like a PACE program, a PACE kind of
program?
Ms. Merdon. Exactly.
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
Ms. Merdon. Exactly. And the appropriations were provided
for the management team. You know, we needed to have project
managers and our own financial consultants and engineers to
oversee Washington Gas, and that was appropriated money. But
the project was paid for and financed by Washington Gas.
Mr. Ryan. That would probably be harder to do, or we would
just have to do it differently, with the buildings that we are
talking about renovating here, right?
Ms. Merdon. Right. We would have a----
Mr. Ryan. Because it is not a Power Plant; it is an office
building.
Ms. Merdon. Correct. You may have to do a lease cost back,
you know, where they would provide a financing for the upgrade
of the building and then, you know, Congress would have to pay
a lease, similar to what was being done at the Thurgood
Marshall Building.
Mr. Ryan. I would like to get some information on that----
Ms. Merdon. Sure.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. If that is okay----
Ms. Merdon. Yeah.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. The Thurgood Marshall Building.
Ms. Merdon. Uh-huh.
[The information follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Ryan. So, anyway, the billions of dollars in Longworth
and Rayburn, how do you plan on managing that beast?
FUTURE BUILDING RENEWALS
Ms. Merdon. It is a big effort. And we have engaged a blue-
ribbon panel recently, who are bringing industry experts, and
they are going to come and assist us, providing some guidance
and some insight on how to do that.
So that is a recent development, and, with that, we can
start planning which building has to be done first. I know the
Rayburn is in poorer condition than the Longworth is. But
helping us determine the priorities, taking a look at some
financing strategies or some funding strategies.
Mr. Ryan. What is the timeline on those projects, projected
at this point, which is----
Ms. Merdon. So the Cannon will be in 2024. And we don't
anticipate being completed with those two until 2030s or 2040s,
quite a while away.
Mr. Ryan. Okay. So Brady Ryan may be the Congressman, I
think, at that point. He is 4 now.
Ms. Merdon. Could be.
ENERGY REDUCTION
Mr. Ryan. I just have one final question on the energy
savings. And that is of great interest to the committee because
of what has already been done. What other strategies do we have
moving forward with Cannon, with Longworth, with Rayburn, any
other projects you have, around energy savings?
Ms. Merdon. So the Energy Savings and Security Act of 2009
required a 30-percent savings by 2015. And in 2015 we made a
decision that the AOC will have energy savings of 2 percent a
year, up to a 50 percent by--I believe it is 2025.
So the Cogen is a big part of that. We actually achieved
the 30 percent, and we are at 42-percent energy savings by
bringing the Cogen on line.
But we are not done yet. We are doing an energy savings
contract at the Library. So that is changing metering systems.
You know, being able to measure what you are doing is a big
part of saving it, so installing meters, better controls of
HVAC, replacing old equipment to more reliable equipment. We
did install, a couple years ago, solar panels on top of the
Hart roof, so that is one technology that has some payback but
I know is evolving over time. You know, we are using natural
gas at the Capitol Power Plant instead of oil.
So I think we have done quite a bit and will continue to do
more. And we are also looking at ways to save water, use our
water more efficiently, because that is a cost to us, so
looking at ways to do that.
GREEN ROOFS
Mr. Ryan. How about on the roofs, the roofing? I know
that--a lot of gardens on the roof and that kind of thing. Are
you exploring any of those?
Ms. Merdon. So there is a green roof on the Hart, and there
is a green roof on the O'Neill. And we are looking at----
Mr. Ryan. That is grass?
Ms. Merdon. Different type of materials besides grass----
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
Ms. Merdon [continuing]. You know, just a little hardier--
--
Mr. Ryan. Yeah.
Ms. Merdon [continuing]. Can take the sun a little bit
more. And we are looking for opportunities in the Cannon, too,
in the courtyard----
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
Ms. Merdon [continuing]. To make it more of a green space.
Mr. Ryan. So the material on the Hart Building, is that
better than the grass and the dirt and stuff that I have seen
on a lot of buildings in some of the bigger cities?
Ms. Merdon. We can provide you with a picture and some
information, but I think it is sedum. It is a grass that is a
little hardier. And I think with the Hart they also wanted some
color variations too.
Mr. Ryan. Oh, it is grass? Forgive me. I have never been on
the roof of the Hart Building.
Ms. Merdon. Ground cover, different types of ground cover.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah.
Ms. Merdon. We can provide you that information.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Ryan. I mean, can you turn it into a place where people
could go and----
Ms. Merdon. I think it is not that accessible.
Mr. Ryan. Okay. Yeah.
Ms. Merdon. I think that is the challenge; it is not an
accessible roof.
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
Well, great. Well, thank you and to your entire team. We
know how much effort you put into your budget and trying to get
it right before you come to this committee, so we are very
thankful for all of your efforts. We appreciate you. It is
important work.
I mean, I think Mr. Newhouse captured it by saying a lot of
people don't really understand. They come here to visit, and we
come here to work, and we walk around, busy, and you all make
it work for us. So we really appreciate it.
And we are going to try to be as supportive as we can,
given the constraints that we have here and all the demands
that we have here, one of which we will hear very soon in the
next hearing that we have.
So thank you so much.
Ms. Merdon. Thank you for your support.
[The following questions were submitted to be answered in
the record:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Tuesday, February 26, 2019.
CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE
WITNESS
DR. KEITH HALL, DIRECTOR, CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE
Opening Statement of Chairman Ryan
Mr. Ryan. All right. We are going to call the hearing to
order.
Welcome. This is our second hearing this morning, as you
know. We are going to be discussing the Congressional Budget
Office and its appropriations request.
CBO has become so much a part of this institution that we
may take it for granted, but we should remember what a key role
CBO plays in helping Congress effectively exercise the power of
the purse assigned to us by the United States Constitution.
Before CBO was established in 1975, Congress largely
depended on the executive branch for budget and economic
analysis and for estimates of the cost of proposed legislation.
With CBO, Congress has its own independent source of cost
estimates for legislation, assessments of the President's
budget proposals, and projections of the future path of
spending, revenue, and deficits. We need to protect and
strengthen that capacity.
The CBO budget request we are discussing today calls for a
$2.8 million, 5.6 percent increase above fiscal year 2019.
Virtually all of that is for personnel costs. In addition to
covering normal pay raises, the requested increase would allow
continued modest growth in staffing levels to help keep up with
CBO's heavy workload, strengthen analytic capacity in key
areas, such as healthcare, and continue efforts to make CBO's
work as transparent as possible.
This subcommittee has highlighted the need for transparency
in CBO's estimates and analysis, and I believe CBO shares that
objective. For example, in recent years CBO has been making
more underlying data and details of its economic and budget
protections publicly available. It has been publishing more
information about its models and methods and more analyses of
the accuracy of previous projections.
These all are welcome developments, and I expect we will be
hearing more today about future plans in this area.
I should note that the Appropriations committees are the
source of some of CBO's heavy workload. We need CBO's help in
making sure our bills add up to what they are supposed to, and
we need CBO cost estimates at each stage of legislative action.
I am told that our committee gets great support from the people
at CBO who do appropriations scorekeeping, including work on
nights and weekends and on short notice. We appreciate that,
and I am certain other committees similarly appreciate the
people at CBO and the work they do.
Our witness today is Dr. Keith Hall, who was appointed CBO
Director in 2015. Previously, Dr. Hall has held a number of
other positions in government and economics, including as chief
economist at the International Trade Commission and at the
Department of Commerce, and as head of the Bureau of Labor
Statistics. He holds a Ph.D. in economics from Purdue
University. As an Ohio guy, we won't hold that against you.
Before Dr. Hall testifies, I want to first say thank you.
This is my 17th year here, and CBO in modern debates has been
tossed into the middle of the pit, and unnecessarily so. But
even when there are disagreements, I think what you have done
in the past few years to open it up and have a level of
transparency has been extremely helpful in the process.
Not that you won't take political arrows. We are all living
in D.C. in 2019. But I want to personally say thank you for
that. I think it is an important step, and I look forward to
hearing your remarks here.
But before we go to you, I want to turn to my ranking
member for her opportunity to make an opening statement, Ms.
Herrera Beutler.
Opening Statement of Ranking Member Herrera Beutler
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And I, too, want to welcome you, Dr. Hall, and look forward
to hearing your testimony.
The CBO has been a part of a lot of my legislative work
since I got here. This is my fifth term. So I look forward to
getting a chance to sit down and hear your testimony about
needs that you have and hearing a little bit about what goes
into your cost estimates.
And I know that you are requesting an increase this year
for additional staff. I know that in the previous years you
have been focused on being responsive to Member requests and
making sure that you are able to get through analysis quickly.
And so I welcome you. I have questions for you about
probably some issues that you are going to be familiar with,
and look forward to hearing more about how we can help you as
you serve the institution.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
Testimony of Dr. Keith Hall
Dr. Hall. Chairman Ryan, Ranking Member Herrera Beutler,
and members of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity
to present the Congressional Budget Office's budget request,
and thank you also for your longstanding support of CBO. That
support has allowed us to provide budgetary and economic
analysis that is timely, thoughtful, and nonpartisan as the
Congress addresses issues of critical importance.
The primary purpose of my testimony this morning is to
request an appropriation of $53.6 million for 2020. That amount
is an increase of $2.8 million, or 5.6 percent, from the amount
provided in 2019. The increase is largely aimed at
accomplishing two main goals.
The first goal is bolstering responsiveness and
transparency. Last year, the Congress increased CBO's budget to
put in place a multiyear plan to increase our capacity to make
its work as transparent and responsive as possible. As a
result, we are increasing staffing in high-demand areas, such
as analyses of healthcare and immigration. In addition, we are
continuing to hire analysts to expand our use of team
approaches, in which work on large and complicated projects is
shared.
In 2020, we propose hiring additional staff who would
increase our expertise and modeling capability in several
areas. CBO's goal is to have more staff with overlapping skills
within and across teams. In some cases, those skills will
consist of expertise related to particular programs, such as
transportation. In other cases, they will be more technical,
such as the ability to design simulation models. Increasing the
number of staff with overlapping skills will allow us to be
more nimble when responding to requests for information.
Building on the strong foundation we have established over
many years, and with added resources, CBO will undertake many
different activities to make its analysis transparent. For
example, during the next two years, we will:
Testify about our projections and analytical
methods and will work to resolve issues raised by the Congress;
Publish more overviews and documentation of some
of our major models and more detailed information, including
computer code, about key aspects of those models;
Release data in many forms, including an
interactive product to help users obtain information about our
estimates of the distribution of household income;
Use a new format for our cost estimates to
highlight key parameters as well as information needed by the
Congress for budget enforcement procedures;
Continue to evaluate previous estimates, when
possible, in order to improve future ones;
Publish several reports about uncertainty in our
estimates;
Experiment with creating visual summaries of some
of our major reports, as we did in our most recent budget
outlook report; and
Interact daily with Congress to explain our
estimates and obtain feedback and continue to regularly obtain
advice from outside experts.
The second goal is to continue our high volume of output.
In 2018, we published more than 900 formal cost estimates;
we completed cost estimates for nearly all bills before a floor
vote occurs. We also provided the Appropriations committees
with numerous summaries and account-level tabulations for
appropriation bills; provided technical assistance to
congressional staff as they developed thousands of legislative
proposals and amendments; and published many reports about the
budget, the economy, and related issues.
Those reports included our assessment of the 10-year budget
and economic outlook, a report on the long-term budget outlook,
an analysis of the President's budget, a 300-page report
describing more than 100 options for reducing the Federal
deficit, monthly budget reviews, and a variety of analytic
reports that examined particular Federal spending programs,
aspects of the Tax Code, and budgetary and economic challenges.
Most of those reports were written at the request of the
Chairman or Ranking Member of a committee or subcommittee or at
the request of the leadership of either party in the House or
Senate.
But we know that Members would like us to do even more. So
to achieve our two goals--to continue a high level of output
and bolster responsiveness and transparency--CBO requests an
increase of $2.8 million.
About $1.5 million--a little more than half of the proposed
increase--would go toward funding for a full year 14 additional
staff members that we will be hiring during fiscal year 2019,
as well as 6 additional hires in the fiscal year 2020. That
would boost our total FTEs from 255 planned for this year to
264 next year. The other $1.3 million would cover a small
increase in our employees' average salary and benefits to
provide merit-based pay raises and keep pace with inflation.
With your support, we look forward to continuing to provide
timely and high-quality analysis to the Congress.
I am happy to take your questions.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Hall follows:]
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WORKLOAD CHALLENGES
Mr. Ryan. Thank you, sir.
I believe you guys shrank a bit earlier in the decade, and
I know you are trying to rebuild, and that is part of the
request.
What was the distribution of the workload when you guys
were squeezed? We hear these stories of weekends and nights and
all of that to try to get things done, and we are very
appreciative of that. Can you tell us how you dealt with that?
Dr. Hall. Sure.
We always have a problem with peak load issues. A topic
becomes hot, a bill becomes active, and we only have so many
experts we can throw in on it. So lots of times folks have to
expect to work over the weekend and et cetera.
The thing we try really hard to do, and I think we do this
very well, is sort of do our due diligence. We take the time to
think something through, we talk to experts, and et cetera. And
sometimes that can be frustrating for folks that are waiting
for us and it can push our work over weekends, but we are sure
to do that.
And now that we are trying to be more transparent and more
clear in our writing, the writing up of things, that, again,
takes more time. And we can anticipate some of it. We are
trying to add people in certain areas.
The past year or 2 our healthcare team has just been
working flat out and had way more workload than we could
possibly do. And those folks, it is unusual to give them the
weekend off at times.
Mr. Ryan. Wow.
Dr. Hall. But we deal with it, we try our best to
anticipate, and that is part of what we are trying to do now.
Mr. Ryan. Are these straight salary people, so they come in
and work, they are not getting any overtime?
Dr. Hall. That is right. That is right.
Mr. Ryan. I didn't even need you to answer. I saw
everybody's face, everyone's expression behind you. They are
not good poker players, I will tell you that.
Ms. Herrera Beutler.
WHEN ARE COST ESTIMATES MADE PUBLIC?
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
In response to your comments about being responsive, I
wanted to ask a question about H.R. 1, and this is something
that I have had several colleagues weigh in with me on and ask.
It was introduced on the first day of this Congress, which
was about 7 weeks ago, and has 227 cosponsors, and the Speaker
has publicly stated her intention to schedule a floor vote on
this legislation later this month. I think it is being marked
up this afternoon.
And you were sent a letter by Ranking Members Davis and
Womack last week that in part read, quote: All Members of the
House are very familiar with elections law, procedures, and
regulations. Members on both sides are obviously interested and
concerned about this encompassing legislation and what it could
mean for their individual districts and States, from the six-
to-one taxpayer donation matching system to the My Voice
Voucher Pilot Program. There are numerous provisions identified
that could easily have long-term implications.
So my questions are: When is CBO going to release a formal
cost estimate of H.R. 1? And has your team shared with Congress
a preliminary cost estimate for H.R. 1, just given the
implications here?
Dr. Hall. Sure. I do think we are going to be able to meet
demand and have things ready for the vote. That was the topic
we were working on this last weekend, as a matter of fact. We
have spent a lot of time on it.
One of our challenges almost always is, and it is with this
bill, is the language changes.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. As it is going.
Dr. Hall. As it is going along. We really spend more of our
time sort of with informal discussions and talk about changing
language, which I guess I will call technical assistance, and
we have done quite a lot of that, even if we don't have a
formal estimate yet.
And so getting the language sort of finally nailed down and
narrowed down is sort of always a challenge for us in getting
that done, and I think we should be able to do that.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. When you say informal conversations,
who have you had those conversations with?
Dr. Hall. I don't know offhand. It is almost always--it is
the committee of jurisdiction, the committee or the leadership
that is drafting the language. I don't know off the top of my
head.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So the ranking members on the
committees of jurisdiction, have they been privy to some of
these? Have you been able to informally brief an update?
Dr. Hall. Right. Yeah, a lot of that depends upon the
committee staff, whether they want us to work confidentially or
not because it is sort of work product. So a great deal of our
work is done confidentially.
And we have a practice of once specific legislative
language, it all becomes public, and we make all our estimates
after that public. And once we get the formal language and get
a formal estimate, we will be sure that we get the information
around and tell folks.
We have probably had some real conversations back and forth
with the committee majority as they craft the language, though.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. And I understand there is a
sensitivity to if I am working on legislation with my leg
staff, you want to get it as ready for primetime as you can
before you release it out to the public.
Dr. Hall. Sure.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I completely understand the need for
discretion.
I think my concern is that when you are asking for help
with manpower to do these enormous herculean tasks, this has
obviously been probably going on for 7 weeks, I don't doubt
that you picked it up 2 weeks ago and were like, ``Oh, this is
huge. We have to work over the weekend.'' I am sure your team
has been dedicating a lot of time to this.
It is hard then to come back and think, well, so you are
saying on one hand you want to be responsive and you want to be
helpful, but if we aren't going to have any information about
this until it is being marked up, you can imagine why CBO gets
put into the middle of political fights, to be totally frank,
right?
Dr. Hall. Right.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Because it kind of feels like, well,
this is all taxpayer money.
Dr. Hall. Right. Well, we are somewhat at the mercy of
Congress, you know.
If we are doing work for a committee and they ask us to do
it confidentially, we do it confidentially, but with the
understanding that if language becomes public, we can't do
that.
So we are trying our best to create a level playing field
while at the same time doing a lot of confidential work, and
that is what I get phone calls about sometimes.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So can I ask--and this will probably
be my last before the chairman moves on.
Mr. Ryan. Take your time.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. With that, so the language itself and
the proposals, they are public. That is where I think I am a
little hung up. It is not private information that someone
waited to release. This has been part of press releases. It has
been part of talking points. It has been heralded as a
political shift, right, which is the prerogative of any
majority. That is not what I am debating.
What my question is, is once those proposals have been made
public, as you just said, why then isn't it open to all Members
of Congress in terms of the financial estimate? That is my
issue.
Dr. Hall. Sure. And it is a matter of specificity. We have
to make a judgment as to whether the language that is public is
specific enough and really is what we are working on, and then
we make that sort of pivot.
So lots of times you will hear discussions of aspects of a
bill that are being considered, but they don't make it into the
final language, and so we aren't necessarily even----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Which means you can't obviously
provide a full, comprehensive, formal review. I understand
that. But I think that would also give you the opportunity to
have informal conversations over major titles that you know
have been released, that are publicly available, that are not
being kept confidential.
I can flip open and go through, like, seven titles, and
probably all of it won't be in there, but I can tell you, there
are probably some pieces that have been part of talking points
at press conferences that are going to stay in there.
And I would ask that you would consider that once it has
been made public, by whoever is sponsoring it, I am not asking
you to do something inappropriate that you are at least having
those informal conversations with the ranking members as well.
I think that would be my request.
Dr. Hall. Okay. Yeah. Well, we will see what we can do. But
we are still, like I say, sort of caught in between a little
bit.
And I get calls from Members who are upset about not
knowing what we are working on or why we can't pivot to their
work because we are busy. We can't even tell you what we are
busy on.
So I have heard this before, and I would love a way out of
the trap, sort of.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Well, I think it is a good precedent
to say, if whoever it is is going to talk about it and put it
in open source, and if it is something that taxpayer dollars
are being funded for you to do, then I think it does behoove
you to be open with the Members of Congress who ask you about
it. I don't think you then have the opportunity to gatekeep
that.
You can say, this may end up in it, it may not, when
someone says, ``Hey, this is open source, this has been brought
forward.'' In terms of transparency, I can see why that would
frustrate someone.
Dr. Hall. Sure.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. To say, well, people are using it in
press conferences, can't you provide at least the information
you have? I mean, I am sure to date you have information about
it. You can say, ``Well, full disclaimer, this might not end up
in the final bill, but I will give you what I got.'' Does that
make sense?
Dr. Hall. It does, but it is a little bit of a danger to us
to have us----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. It is.
Dr. Hall [continuing]. Quoted back on a number that we have
changed----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Yes.
Dr. Hall [continuing]. In the middle of the process. And
parts of bills interact with each other in unexpected ways
sometimes. So it is not always----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I am familiar.
Dr. Hall. But I understand your concern, and we will
continue to try to do what we can to create a level playing
field and talk about our estimates when we can.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. All right.
HOW CBO PRIORITIZES ITS WORK
Mr. Ryan. Is this a straight chronological, ``We got this
request on this date and we start moving on it,'' versus the
Speaker of the House is prioritizing, this bill is H.R. 1? Does
that trump--to continue with my card playing references here--
does that trump the chronological request?
Dr. Hall. Well, it kind of does. We set our priorities. We
talk to the committees of jurisdiction and ask them, ``Well,
what should we be spending our time on?'' And so we do let them
do that, and sometimes they do change priorities in the middle
and that sort of thing.
And to be honest, it is hard to just sort of say, we get a
bill and we start working on it, because we could be talking
for years about pieces of this legislation and talking about
how we view this and that. So we have a sort of foundation of
work over time.
That is part of why I emphasize that so much of our time
probably--more of our time is probably spent with this sort of
informal technical assistance just talking than it is on the
formal estimates where we get that language and here it is
final and that sort of thing.
STAFFING STRATEGIES
Mr. Ryan. Around campaign finance, how many people do you
have working on that? It seems to me you are talking about
healthcare, you are talking about immigration, you are talking
about the economy, you are talking about taxes. I can't imagine
you have many people----
Dr. Hall. Well, we will have a team. I would guess it is at
least three or four main people. But one of the things that we
do is we have assistants who help. And then we have a review
process where things get touched by a lot of people to make
sure we are being objective, we have been complete.
So the number is probably larger who will touch that
eventually on its way out. And everything passes by my desk as
well. So if you think about even something fairly simple, a lot
of people wind up having some impact on it.
But we can't, as I am sure you know, we can't just sort of
create expertise. We have got to have those people there. And
it takes our analysts a couple of years to become really expert
in their areas.
And so this is part of what we are trying to do, we are
trying to create more overlap, so rather than get caught with
one person carrying all the weight on something, we have
several people who are helping and we have some assistance.
Mr. Ryan. In that regard, let me ask one quick question
before I go to Mr. Newhouse. With the budget request, who would
you hire with regard to topics? Do you know?
Dr. Hall. Yeah. We try to have a broad range of topics.
Eighty percent of our folks have advanced degrees. So our
budget analysts typically have master's degrees in public
policy. And we will bring them in, for example, somebody fresh
out of school, and they will specialize in an area and learn
the legislation, learn who to talk to, that sort of thing.
But we have 80 budget analysts covering the entire
waterfront. So it seems like a lot of people, but when you
consider all the topics, it is not a lot.
And we just try to anticipate. We have to have everything
covered because we never know what is going to happen. But if
we anticipate there will be more things on immigration, we
might try to add some.
Mr. Ryan. So you are just adding bodies, not necessarily
saying, ``Okay, of the full-time employees, we want 25 percent
to go to healthcare.'' You just want bodies and then you will
figure out where they go based on what the demands are.
Dr. Hall. Right. Well, that would be true for budget
analysts, yes. We also have a large number of Ph.D. economists
who have an expertise that is not so fungible. So we will have
areas that are covered, and they will be helping out with
developing the modeling and doing some of the----
Mr. Ryan. And that is part of the request?
Dr. Hall. Yes.
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
Mr. Newhouse. I like your gray hair, by the way, just for
the record.
Mr. Newhouse. It wasn't always this color.
Mr. Ryan. I know. I know the story.
Mr. Newhouse. I am still trying to get my head around you
being here 17 years. You started when you were 12, obviously.
Mr. Ryan. Pretty close.
TRANSPARENCY AND ACCURACY
Mr. Newhouse. Well, welcome, Dr. Hall. Appreciate you being
here and bringing your team with you to talk about your budget
needs for the year.
CBO is one of those organizations, if the numbers come out
with something that you are in favor of, everybody loves them;
if they don't, well, maybe the opposite could be true. So it is
a tough position to be in. I think you guys are in the position
of--I think, you tell me if I am wrong--just calling balls and
strikes, right? It is a very impartial place to be. So take my
questions in that light. I want to help you improve that.
You talked about transparency. I appreciate your efforts
there, and maybe we can talk more about those things to improve
transparency so Members feel as though everything is available
to them when they need it and all those things.
I would like to know a little bit more about some of the
specific reasons, the models that are used in decisionmaking,
what that process is like, would it not be a factor when you
analyze a bill.
And let me give you an example of what I am trying to get
to. And the chairman said you have been thrown into the pit,
and that is absolutely accurate, you are at the center of a lot
of the arguments.
When you analyzed the House version of the American Health
Care Act last year, your estimate included people who would be
willing to choose to forego the coverage that they were
mandated to purchase under the Affordable Care Act even if they
couldn't afford it.
In the total number of people who would lose insurance
under the new bill, it also included individuals on Medicaid
that would voluntarily leave the free coverage that they were
receiving due to the repeal of the individual mandate. So the
bottom line is, and I am sure you know, your study deduced that
the healthcare bill would cause 23 million fewer people to have
health insurance, including that number 14 million who would
not buy the insurance if the government stopped fining them for
it.
Since the repeal of the individual mandate in the Tax Cuts
and Jobs Act, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
released their own estimate for insurance coverage reduction:
Not 23 million, it was 2.5 million people in 2019. Of those,
the majority are expected to be somewhat younger and healthier
than those who retain coverage.
So this is, obviously, a drastically different number than
your original estimate. And on top of that it comes after an
overestimated number of individuals who would sign up for
coverage under the Affordable Care Act in the first place.
So given all of that and the unique role that you have of
just calling balls and strikes, but you can influence, through
what your work is, policymaking, it is certainly important that
the numbers are reliable.
So I would like to just ask about that, some of the reasons
specific models were used, what led to the analysis to be, I
guess you could characterize being so inaccurate, and what
steps are you taking to ensure that going forward that models
are going to be more accurate so that we can all have
confidence and all feel that we are getting a fair shake here.
Dr. Hall. Sure.
Well, first of all, there is a little bit of an apples-and-
oranges comparison because our 23 million was over a 10-year
period, and a lot of that change in coverage came from Medicaid
expansion ending. So it wasn't just the mandate.
Also, a few things. We were working on a 2017 baseline. The
Budget Committee asked to use that instead of the more recent
baseline. So there is a fiction already going on a little bit
because we were using a little bit of an old baseline.
We fundamentally differ, I think, from the CMS in thinking
that the mandate affects Medicaid enrollment. We think the
mandate does encourage people to look for coverage and then
they discover that they are eligible for Medicaid where they
didn't know before. So we do fundamentally differ with them on
that. They don't seem to see much of a Medicaid impact.
I could go on a bit about our differences in estimates, but
keep in mind the mandate penalty has been gone for only 2
months. So we are going to see this year exactly how many
people do drop coverage now that the mandate penalty is gone.
So in terms of our accuracy, well, we will see how that works
out.
Mr. Newhouse. The jury is still out, you are thinking?
Dr. Hall. The jury is still out, and it will take a while
to get that data in.
We have changed our thinking on it a little bit. We did
lower our estimate of the effects of the mandate at some point.
The modeling that we have done has been--let's make one
important distinction. We do use models, but the most important
thing is our analysts. We have people who think this through
very carefully, they talk to people, et cetera. The model is
just sort of one tool that they use. So we are not just all
dependent upon the model. But that is something that we pay
attention to.
For what it is worth, we have just finished updating the
healthcare model, first time since it has been created. The
model we have been using is something called HISIM. We have got
something now that we are calling HISIM 2.0. It is just now
online. So we will see what sort of difference that makes.
I think certainly the new modeling will make us more
flexible and more able to do different estimates faster going
forward.
But you are right, projecting stuff, we have differed with
other folks. We have been more or less accurate over times with
this.
Part of the issue certainly with the mandate, to be honest,
is things change, and a lot of things change, publicity
changed, the news changed, and that affects people's view of
things, and their willingness to go and sign up for healthcare
changes, and we can't always predict that.
But we don't want to be wrong on things. We do assess how
we are doing and try to correct things. We do it every year. We
adjust our baseline. So we take it seriously when we are off,
and we do try to correct it. We have been adjusting our
healthcare estimates all along.
DIFFICULTIES IN MAKING PROJECTIONS
Mr. Newhouse. What would you say to some that have been
critical of the CBO, even going as far as to say that they
should no longer exist?
Mr. Ryan. Keep your language clean when you answer that,
okay.
Dr. Hall. Well, I will just say, projecting things is hard,
right. Projecting the future is hard. As much as we can, we do
it in an objective, nonbiased fashion. I think we are very good
at it on the whole. There are instances when sometimes
projecting things is very hard, and when it is hard we are not
as accurate.
I think healthcare, the ACA was very hard. It was something
new. Other things are less hard. I think we do as well or
better than anybody in a lot of things. I certainly don't think
we have done a bad job on the healthcare, but I do think that
has been a really tough lift to forecast that accurately,
because there are just so many things that make it complicated.
This is part of why transparency is important to us.
Mr. Newhouse. Yeah, that is sort of what it kind of boils
down to. So that we understand the processes you are using and
maybe even understand the weaknesses and the strengths of those
processes so we know where to have more or less confidence in
the outcomes.
Dr. Hall. Yeah. And we have done reports, we have done a
few presentations at CRS about exactly how we estimate
healthcare and do our healthcare estimates. We have done that
for staff a couple times, at least once, maybe twice.
So we are going to try to keep doing that work. We are
going to try to communicate about uncertainty. When we say 23
million there is a lot of uncertainty in that. And that is just
our best estimate. It could be higher. It could be lower. We
try to communicate that.
But that is a challenge for us. And to use a terminology,
it is not just a matter of unknowns, there is unknown unknowns
sometimes in your forecasting. And we don't get to beg off. We
don't get to say, ``Oh, that is too hard.'' We try to give you
our best estimate and try our best to communicate about it.
Mr. Newhouse. But you footnote that, too.
Dr. Hall. Yes.
Mr. Newhouse. Kind of recognizing the unknown unknowns,
right?
Dr. Hall. Right. Now I would say, one of the things that we
did, which really should be noticed, is we have redone our
healthcare model. We have made probably a dozen presentations
to experts on our model as we are developing it. So there are
now a lot of people who understand exactly what our new model
does, how it works. We have had input from a lot of people. So
this has been a very transparent process in arriving at a model
which will be a tool for future things.
But this is sort of the challenge of dealing with an
uncertain future, trying to be more transparent about it and
taking the time to do that.
I can tell you, for example, when we did the healthcare,
the ACA estimates, we would have been working on a new model if
we hadn't been working on those estimates. We had all hands on
board working on those estimates. So it has delayed things
because we have been busy doing the work as opposed to setting
aside and redoing the modeling. So it is this balance that is a
challenging thing.
Mr. Newhouse. That sounds like the lumberjack that doesn't
have time to stop and sharpen his saw.
Dr. Hall. Yeah, yeah, I think that is a fair analogy. That
is right.
And we have probably, what, 40 people in total who deal
with healthcare, but that is a lot of topics in healthcare, and
we are working all out. We do our best to actually talk to
outside experts and get their views on things.
Mr. Newhouse. Well, obviously, there is a lot of interest
in having confidence in the CBO numbers. And I think that
transparency, people understanding the processes you are using
and, like I said, maybe understanding more the relative
strength or the confidence that you have in particular
predictions would be helpful, too.
Dr. Hall. Right. And we are looking for input.
When we talk about transparency, we are doing a lot of
things in transparency. We like to know what works and what
doesn't work, what Congress finds helpful and not so helpful.
That is part of what we are doing. We are trying to make
business decisions about which axes to sharpen and that sort of
thing as well. But it is a process. We don't crave the
attention on this.
Mr. Newhouse. It is inherent in your job, I am afraid.
Dr. Hall. It is inherent in our job. And we know we do work
that Congress relies on and it is important work. So we are
looking for whatever help we can get in helping us focus on
what we should be doing.
Mr. Newhouse. All right. Good. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Ryan. You got it.
FEASIBILITY IN SHARING SUPPORT DATA
Along those lines, there is a bill that would require CBO
to publish all the data, models, computations, assumptions used
in preparing each cost estimated issue and do so in a way that
would allow outside experts to replicate the cost estimate. Is
this feasible?
Dr. Hall. It just isn't, unfortunately. We have taken a
track where transparency is a lot of things. We understand some
of the focus on the modeling, but that is just one aspect of
transparency.
And one of the problems is analysts do the work. We are not
slaves to the modeling. So there is only so much help models
can give.
But second is, we have lots of models. If we had to put up
every model we used--we have got 200-plus models--we would have
almost no time for anything else. So it is a matter of
priorities, which is sort of why we have taken this track of
rather than focusing just on the models, we are focusing on a
number of things and trying to make good business decisions
about which things will be more useful to Congress.
Not to say we are not producing some code from our models,
it is the models that are used a lot and that we will likely
use again in the future. We are trying to focus on that sort of
thing.
And then another aspect of this bill which would be really
a concern for us, we use all sorts of confidential data. We are
calling up people. Sometimes it is even business confidential
data. And if we made that public every time, we would have real
problems getting the data in the future. So we have lots of
constraints on something like this.
You know, I agree, I have always agreed with the idea that
transparency is important. We want to be more transparent. We
just want to do it, like I say, with some smart business
decisions. This feels a little like being overregulated if you
are a company where it is going, in my mind, too far with the
modeling and not enough in some of the other aspects.
ESTIMATING SAVINGS FROM PREVENTION
Mr. Ryan. One of the issues that came up earlier was the
healthcare bill. And I remember back when we did the Affordable
Care Act one of the issues was the inability to project cost
savings around prevention.
Dr. Hall. Right.
Mr. Ryan. That was a pretty frustrating time. You know, we
are going to have more screenings, we are going to have more
birth control, we are going to have more this, we are going to
have more that. And, obviously, an ounce of prevention is worth
a pound of cure, but we couldn't find that information out. Can
you tell us why?
Dr. Hall. Well, first of all, the easy part, or the easier
part, is knowing how much the government is going to spend on
it. We can get that down. The part about how much is saved from
prevention, we do try to take that into account.
What gets frustrating is we look at research, we look at
evidence, we don't want to just assume that. And so when we do
an estimate, we really do try to make an estimate of the net
cost. So we do try to take into account the effects of
prevention, that sort of thing.
One of the frustrations, I think, for people is a lot of
things seem like they would save more money than they do. You
can treat a lot of people, and for the ones that the treatment
works on, there are savings, but you are treating a lot of
people. So the cost is still there. So we have to net all that
out.
And we are constantly looking for evidence. If we get some
good evidence, some research that is relevant and shows some
savings, we will take that into an account.
I think part of it as well is we can take the savings from
prevention into account, and it still doesn't mean that
something pays for itself. That is a pretty tall order, for
something to actually pay for itself even if it does have some
savings involved.
One example I can think of, it was a while back, that
something actually paid for itself was some anti-smoking stuff.
That actually paid for itself because of the prevention. But
there are very few other things we have encountered since then
where the prevention has such an impact that it outweighs the
spending cost to the Federal Government.
Mr. Ryan. So you are doing screenings, but you are doing
screenings for everybody.
Dr. Hall. Yes.
Mr. Ryan. And maybe a lot of those people weren't going to
get anything anyway.
Dr. Hall. Right.
Mr. Ryan. And you are catching it for a certain cohort once
you are able to----
Dr. Hall. That is exactly right. That is almost always an
aspect of trying to take this into account. If treatment helped
somebody with opioids, for that person really there can be a
lot of savings. But what percentage of the people get reached
by that, we have to take that into account, and that gets to be
a hard lift sometimes.
Mr. Ryan. So you do have the information. You just can't
really project the savings.
Dr. Hall. We try to.
Mr. Ryan. If this particular treatment works, you know.
Dr. Hall. Right. But our starting point has to be, yeah, it
works for how many people versus how many are treated. So we do
look at that and try to take that into account.
One of the things, I think, that can be frustrating a
little bit, too: So much medical research is helpful but it
isn't always directly applicable to our issues.
We have actually now done a few things which I really think
we should continue to do more of. We put out blogs now talking
about where we could use some more research that would help us
take this stuff into account.
We did one on obesity a few years ago, for example. We talk
about what the evidence is and why we aren't able to give more
credit towards programs that help with that. And the idea is to
try to encourage research. And we like to hear about research.
If there is some research that you think we should take into
account, we will listen and talk to those folks and see what
we----
Mr. Ryan. I don't want to jump ahead of H.R. 1, but I do
have a couple of requests. I mean, one that I think is coming
more and more online is the adverse childhood experiences and
how these ACEs have a significant impact on long-term health,
addiction, all of the anti-social behavior.
Dr. Hall. Right.
Mr. Ryan. And I think we have got to get our arms around
that because it is going to take some early investments to try
to prevent some of that. So we may be coming at you with that.
CREATIVE FINANCING FOR CAPITAL PROJECTS
Last question I have, that we talked about a little bit
with the Architect of the Capitol, is trying to find ways to
fund the legislative branch, especially the bricks-and-mortar
projects, with some level of creative financing. We had a
couple of examples around cogeneration with the power plant and
more of a PACE program where you get some upfront money from
the gas company to put in the retrofits and all of that and
then you yield the savings in the long run.
I don't know if you have any ideas on how we would be able
to creatively finance some of these. Renovating the Longworth
Building is going to be over a billion. The Rayburn renovation
is going to be over a billion dollars. The longer we wait, the
more it is going to be.
Dr. Hall. Right.
Mr. Ryan. I don't know if you have any ideas. I am just
kind of tapping into your expertise here. Or if you have any
money, I mean.
Dr. Hall. I didn't expect that.
Mr. Ryan. You know, I am not going to let you just ask me
for money. We are going to ask you for money.
Dr. Hall. Well, the budget generally is done on a cash
basis, and there are some things we do on an accrual basis,
credit programs we do that way. But for the most part it is a
cash basis.
And when something like what you are talking about, if
there is a commitment, even though the government may be
renting something, if there is a commitment to rent it, we have
to treat that as a commitment. So when we do a budget estimate
that all gets wrapped into the cost. So it doesn't necessarily
look all that different with the different creative financing
things.
But we can certainly talk to you a little bit, if you like.
Mr. Ryan. We could get the money upfront, right. We could
get the project. That is what I am concerned about, is getting
these projects done and then, fine, paying rent, lease,
whatever, down the line. I don't know how you do that with the
Rayburn Building.
Dr. Hall. Right. No, I mean, in our cost estimate we would
reflect that, we would reflect it. You know, when we do an
estimate we do it over 10 years, so we would characterize the
upfront money. We would talk about it on a cash basis, when the
money goes out, that sort of thing.
As to whether that winds up saving money or not, I don't
know.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. Well, I mean, my estimate--well, I don't
know if it would or not, but it would get the projects done. I
would think it would save money in the long run because if we
wait, the longer we wait, the more expensive everything is,
labor, material, all of that.
Is there anything in the budget--this will be the last
question. This is a very elementary question. We, the Federal
Government, owns all of this property. We own these buildings.
They are the Federal Government's property.
Dr. Hall. Right.
Mr. Ryan. The Capitol, Longworth, Rayburn, Ford, all of
these. But there is no--we don't get any--I mean, is it just
general assets? Are they counted as assets into the Federal
Government? Is that part of what we borrow off of in general?
Dr. Hall. Yeah, you can do it that way, that is right. If
you just own them, since they don't have that much of an impact
on the budget, because there is no cash going in or out.
Mr. Ryan. Right. But if I had a house I owned, I would get
home equity, and I would go out and borrow money and redo my
house or add something on. But, I mean, we can't do that,
right? I mean, if we sold the Longworth Building to a
developer, what would they pay for that property?
Dr. Hall. Right.
Mr. Ryan. I am exploring this with you. I don't have an
answer. But I would imagine it would be a lot of money.
Dr. Hall. Right. And that would have budgetary impacts, and
we would make an assessment of the incoming money when that
happens on a cash basis.
I don't know, we don't do it, but there are probably some
estimates out there about the value of what the government
owns.
Mr. Ryan. I mean, we probably wouldn't look as poor as we
are now or the deficits wouldn't look as bad or the debt
wouldn't look as bad if we took into account the assets of the
Federal Government.
I am just trying to understand if that is even counted.
Does that even factor into our own budget or the long-term debt
of the country?
Dr. Hall. No, it doesn't really play into what we do.
Now, one of the things that we do when we talk about the
debt and the deficit, we do it as a share of GDP to put context
in it, right, because GDP gives you some idea of the ability of
the economy to generate income that the government could rely
on. We do that and we try to put that into context and not just
talk about the raw numbers.
But we don't do a lot of talking about the value of the
assets of the Federal Government until they are sold.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. I am glad there is no press in here saying
the Congressman wants to sell--the chairman wants to sell off
all the assets. We will be cleaning that one up.
Mr. Newhouse. It is already tweeted.
Mr. Ryan. You tweeted that out. There you go. I thought you
were my friend.
You are never getting 30 minutes to ask questions again, I
am just going to tell you.
Well, we appreciate you and your team. Thanks for coming up
and showing up here. And we will take a very close look at your
request. We have got a lot of demands this year, and your
requests are part of the challenges we have got to struggle
with.
But we do want to say thanks to you and your team. And
please let everybody know that at HQ we are very thankful for
all their work and we rely on you.
And I just think, lastly, that this whole idea of having a
strong legislative branch that is independent from the
executive is essential for us, and you are a big part of that.
So happy to yield.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. And I don't want to extend the
hearing. But I may want to connect with someone further. In the
last number of months I have gotten a lot of different
information about modeling, like you use a lot of different
models and analysts use it. I don't know that our answer can be
back to the public, well, they use a lot of different models so
then we can't make it open, open and transparent. That doesn't
sell.
Dr. Hall. Right.
MAKING CBO METHODS PUBLIC
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So there probably will continue to be
more interest in that. And the bill that the Chairman mentioned
I have a lot of interest in as well.
And to that, we talked a lot about healthcare, the economic
outputs and where we are at, and the projections I am seeing
out of CBO based on--and they are revised slightly. But if you
look backward and then you look forward you have underestimated
economic growth at times, right? And so we are seeing with the
big piece of legislation that passed 2 years ago, the tax cuts
bill.
I am just curious, as you are putting out updated
forecasts, because I assume you are, because GDP is continuing
to grow, incomes are continuing to grow, the revenue forecast
is changing, while it is a delicate dance for you and it is not
a perfect science, the more that you can make your methods
public, the more we are going to be able to trust and rely on
the hard work that I know your smart folks are putting into
this.
You know, part of my challenge is I get into an issue and
there are so many different competing. So the economy is
growing or it is not growing? It is hard to even answer that.
And we are reliant upon CBO to give us good information. And
then when you have another, even a quasi-government
organization contradicting that, you guys are the economists,
you said the Ph.D. economic forecasters.
So it is really, I think, for the future of this
organization to continue to do and serve your mission, you are
going to have to find a way to become more transparent. It is
going to have to be demonstrated. It just will, I think.
And so that is one of the things that as you are asking for
budgets to grow, we want to provide that because we want you to
do your work.
Dr. Hall. Let me just say, we do a fair amount of self-
assessment, how have we done, how accurate we were last year.
And I can say, maybe it is worth mentioning, our budget outlook
we just produced, 10-year, in there we tell you exactly why we
have changed our forecast, how much of it was economics, how
much of it was new legislation. We give an economic forecast,
we tell you what everybody else is forecasting as well. So we
put it right into context.
So we try very hard to be transparent, and a lot of that is
sort of buried in the report.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. It is, and it is really fun to read
through there with a highlighter trying to find it.
Dr. Hall. But we are always willing to come and talk about
this.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Great.
Dr. Hall. I have never turned down an offer to come talk
with a Member.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Right.
Dr. Hall. And we will come and talk about everything if you
like.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Wonderful. Well, I appreciate it.
And I thank you, Chairman.
Mr. Newhouse. Mr. Chairman?
Mr. Ryan. Yes, Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir.
Mr. Newhouse. Do I have 30 minutes like----
Mr. Ryan. You have got 30 seconds.
Mr. Newhouse. I just wanted to follow up. Dr. Hall said he
would be willing to come and talk to any Member at any time.
Dr. Hall. Absolutely.
Mr. Newhouse. I would like to talk to you more about the
use or the non-use of dynamic scoring. I have got an article in
front of me about the President's budget last year, and it
makes some assumptions on the economic growth due to tax
changes whereas CBO doesn't necessarily take those into
account.
So it comes up with different outcomes, and so I would like
to have a longer conversation about that if we could.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I would like to.
Dr. Hall. Sure.
Mr. Newhouse. But also in your testimony, one of the topics
is analyzing the accuracy of the CBO's estimates. You are
coming out with some reports analyzing your hits and misses
apparently. I am certainly interested in seeing that, and I
think that would be interesting for a lot of people to see.
Mr. Ryan. I am happy to adjourn this hearing.
[The following questions were submitted to be answered for
the record:]
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Wednesday, February 27, 2019.
GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE
WITNESS
GENE L. DODARO, COMPTROLLER GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES
Opening Statement of Chairman Ryan
Mr. Ryan. The committee is in order.
Today we have two hearings. First is the GAO, and the
second is the Government Publishing Office.
We are pleased to welcome Mr. Gene Dodaro, the esteemed
Comptroller General of the United States, along with his team
to testify on the fiscal year 2020 budget request for the
Government Accountability Office.
Congress needs your agency's neutral expertise these days
more than ever. With the complexity of Federal programs and tax
policy threatening to overwhelm Congress's capacity to perform
adequate oversight, we know we sometimes overtax you with our
constant requests for reports, but GAO and the agency IGs are
really our principal source of analysis that are needed for
responsible policymaking.
Your budget request is an ambitious $58 million increase or
almost 10 percent above your fiscal year 2019 level. We will
have to hope that we receive a healthy enough 302(b) allocation
to be able to address it.
Mr. Dodaro, before we ask you to proceed with the summary
of your written statement, I would like to ask our ranking
member, Ms. Herrera Beutler, if she has any opening remarks she
would like to make.
Opening Statement of Ranking Member Herrera Beutler
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And I would also like to welcome our distinguished guest. I
am excited to hear exactly what the Comptroller General of the
United States does. I have seen some information, but I am
interested in hearing this.
The GAO often--I have, myself, cited it as a watchdog in
many a hearing. We all do. We rely on what you do. And I think
what most of the public doesn't understand, you are tasked with
investigating how well or how inefficiently we do our jobs. I
mean, I feel like you are a very critical piece of what we do.
I have seen estimates from your office that say, for every
dollar invested, $124 of potential savings government-wide is
identified, which totaled over $75.1 billion in fiscal year
2018 alone.
So your budget request is $647.6 million, with a 9.78-
percent increase over last year's enacted. So we should see $80
billion in savings to the government, at least, based on the
numbers I was just looking at, will we see that $80 billion in
savings to the government based on that request?
And I look forward to hearing from you.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Ryan. The floor is yours, sir.
Testimony of Gene Dodaro
Mr. Dodaro. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Good morning to you, Ranking Member Herrera Beutler.
Good morning, Congressman Ruppersberger, Congressman
Newhouse. Good to see you again, everyone.
I appreciate the support that this committee has given us.
And I believe that we have provided a great return on that
investment. For the last 5 years, the GAO has returned over
$100 for every dollar invested in GAO. The last couple years,
as you cited, Ms. Herrera Beutler, it was over $124 for every
dollar invested in GAO.
So we provide, on a consistent basis, a sound return of
financial benefits to the government. But, beyond that, we also
produce other benefits for the government in public safety,
national security, and other areas, since our scope is the
entire breadth of the Federal Government's operations.
Last year, for example, based on our work, Congress gave
legislative direction to VA to improve its appeals process and
to retrofit facilities for women veterans who are in need. DOD
was directed to come up with a plan to improve military
readiness. I have been very concerned about military readiness.
GAO is required to monitor DOD's execution of that plan over
the next 5 years. Military readiness will be a big part of our
activities over this period of time.
Also, I was pleased that the Congress, based in part on our
work, passed the Disaster Response Reform Act, which allows for
more funds to be used for mitigation and resilience building
ahead of time, which is, we believe, a prudent way for the
Congress to go.
We have also pointed out a wide range of other things that
need attention. For example, VA needs to improve its suicide
prevention efforts. We have made recommendations there. States
need more guidance on how to deal with substance abuse-affected
infants, and, based on our work, we have encouraged that.
We also have done work that helped the Congress pass
legislation on elder abuse; to collect more data so the
government could come up with better prevention strategies in
the future to deal with elder abuse. Based on our work,
Congress directed ONDCP to come up with better measures to
gauge progress in addressing the opioid epidemic.
So our work touches everything from defense to healthcare.
GAO is asking for an increase for FY2020 to $647.6 million.
We believe that this will enable us to meet the highest-
priority needs of the Congress. We continue to serve over 90
percent of the standing committees of the Congress and most of
the subcommittees. We get, on average, about 800 requests a
year from the Congress.
We tackle them by priority, what is in statute or
conference or committee reports are priority one. Requests from
committee chairs and ranking members, same treatment, are
priority two. Priority three is requests from individual
Members of Congress, but we haven't had enough resources to do
that for about 15 years. Presently, in order to get access to
our services, it needs to be a committee, at a minimum, or
something in statute. I would like to do more, but we just
don't have the resources.
I meet on a regular basis with all the committee chairs and
ranking members to try to help set priorities for their
requests and to make sure we are focused on their priorities. I
have a clear sense of what they are, and they understand what
the tradeoffs are if they want something different, if an
emerging issue comes up for example.
FY 2020 BUDGET REQUEST
There are four areas that we are increasing our resources
but I believe need even more resources in FY 2020.
First, is science and technology issues. This is something
that we have been working on for a while now. We have just
created a new team to give it more prominence, to deal with
science, technology assessments, and technical assistance to
the Congress.
SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
Science and technology is evolving so fast that I think
Congress needs more help and more assistance understanding the
ethical, legal, and regulatory aspects of science and
technology issues, whether you are talking about artificial
intelligence, blockchain, quantum computing, brain
augmentation, or a wide range of other issues.
We have the capacity to do this, and we are building more
capacity to help the Congress in that regard.
CYBERSECURITY
Second, cybersecurity continues to be a huge risk. We
labeled this a high-risk area across the entire Federal
Government in 1997; we have been warning people for a while. We
have added critical infrastructure protection beyond the
Federal Government systems and there needs to be more effort
there.
We have also encouraged the Congress to pass a
comprehensive privacy legislation framework for the private
sector. Currently, only healthcare and credit reporting
agencies are covered. There is really no framework for
information reselling or other issues in this area.
DEFENSE
Third is defense. Congress continues to make huge
investments in the defense area, and we want to make sure that
we are on top of that. We get dozens of mandates every year in
the defense authorization and appropriation bills for work
requesting GAO's assistance, and so we spend a lot of time on
that.
HEALTHCARE
Fourth is healthcare. Healthcare costs, aside from interest
on the debt, are the fastest-growing portion of the Federal
Government. You know, about a trillion dollars was spent this
past year on Medicare and Medicaid alone. Both medicare and
medicaid have been on our high-risk area for a number of years.
The Congress needs to address this issue on payment
policies and try to come up with reductions in healthcare
expenditures because it is really not on a sustainable long-
term path.
I can talk more about the number of beneficiaries in Q&A. I
don't want to use up all the time. I could talk for an hour on
healthcare alone. The number of beneficiaries are growing
exponentially as our population ages. Right now, there are only
2.8 people working for every one retired person in the United
States. We are going to where it is going to be two people
working for every one retired person in the United States. The
models that we have for Social Security and for Medicare
indicate that we aren't going to be on a sustainable financial
path without attention from and reform by the Congress.
This is leading to a long-term unsustainable fiscal path
for the Federal Government. As the auditors of the Federal
Government's financial statements. I have been saying for years
that this is on an unsustainable long-term path.
INTEREST ON NATIONAL DEBT
The interest on the debt just in the last 2 years alone has
grown $120 billion. We are talking over $360 billion this year.
By 2029, within 10 years, interest on the debt alone, CBO
estimates, could be $928 billion.
We would be knocking on the door of a trillion dollars a
year just to pay the interest to service the debt. By then,
Medicare and Medicaid each will be a trillion dollars by
themselves. So that is $3 trillion. Social Security right now,
this year, hit a trillion dollars in spending.
Before you fund anything else in the Federal Government,
interest on the debt, healthcare, and Social Security is going
to be $4 trillion, just as an opening bid on those issues.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Four trillion?
Mr. Dodaro. Four trillion. Each one will be close to or at
a trillion dollars by that point in time. The Medicaid portion
includes State as well as Federal money.
STAFFING
At GAO, we take our job very seriously.
We are also rated as the best place to work in the Federal
Government. We are rated number one across Federal Government
for our commitment to diversity and inclusion. We have
tremendous, dedicated, talented people.
We have no problem hiring people. I spend a lot of time
going around to colleges and universities, and we have a
national recruiting program, and so we have no problem getting
top-tier talent in the Federal Government.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Do you think you would consider running
for President with all that?
Mr. Dodaro. No. I like my current----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. He said he liked his job.
Mr. Dodaro. I love my job.
I am here to ask for your continued support. I believe we
will provide a great return on investment.
OFFICE OF TECHNOLOGY ASSESSMENT
I know there has been a debate in the past about whether to
reinstate OTA, Office of Technology Assessment, or provide more
resources to GAO. I am here to assure you that we are prepared,
if you decide to go that way, to handle those additional
responsibilities.
We have been doing technology assessments since 2002. We
have built the capability to do that at GAO and to do more work
in that area. I am very much looking forward, it is a high
priority for me. I believe we need to have more science
capabilities and technical capabilities.
Congress asked us to look at the new Columbia-class nuclear
submarine. I need people that understand that technology. The
Federal Government is spending over $300 billion to refurbish
our nuclear arsenal. I need people who understand how to do
that, particularly sophisticated computer modeling.
As Congressman Newhouse knows, the disposal of radioactive
waste, is complicated and we do a lot of work in Hanford. We
have a site there we do so much work. Healthcare, is another
area we are doing work on antibiotic-resistance bacteria and
other vaccines that need to be done.
This is an area where GAO has been and will continue to
grow to meet our full range of services, but we can also meet
the technology assessment and technical assistance to the
Congress.
We have a plan due to the Congress next month that was
required by this committee last year, a plan on how to expand
our technology and assessment work in the future. We will be
submitting that plan on time next month and look forward to
your consideration.
I know you will give careful consideration to our budget
request, and I thank you for that. I am prepared to answer
whatever questions you may have.
[The prepared statement and biography of Gene L. Dodaro
follow:]
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Mr. Ryan. I just want to say thank you to you. From our
meetings in my office and the hearings I have been here with
you, I just want to say thanks. It is unbelievable, your team
and your ability to communicate to us what we need to do. And
when we are looking at the trajectory of the country, with the
spending and the programs that need to be reformed and updated,
you are really providing the roadmap for us. So we appreciate
that.
I am going to yield to my colleague here. I know she may
have to step out at some point early, so I want to give her an
opportunity to ask some of the first few questions.
And take as much time as you need.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate
that.
Well, you know, I could listen to you talk about healthcare
for an hour. I would love to dig deeper. And so I will ask a
few questions along that route and along the debt service and
kind of some of the debt issues that we are looking at.
But I would ask that you would come in and spend some time
with me in my office to go over those a little bit more in
detail so I can not belabor--you know, I ask a lot of
questions.
Mr. Ryan. I am down for it too. I will come to the meeting.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I just think it would be very, very
helpful. And that is ultimately--you know, some of these other
things that I think are critical I think you laid out very
well. I was sitting here going, science and technology, like,
what does he do there? And then you give us a couple examples;
okay, that makes sense.
But I think in terms of just overall fiscal policy for us,
I would like to talk a little bit about the tax bill, I would
like to talk about CBO and assessments. And I saw their 2029
projection with regard to debt service. I had some questions
there that I am sure you can answer. And then, in addition, the
Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security pieces.
So I just wanted to put that on there, that I would like to
do that, so someone back there, I am sure, is writing it down.
Mr. Ryan. I think all of them did at the same time. Very
good team. And they are all happy. Look at them.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So, with that, I did want to ask,
along the lines of disaster funding--another small topic.
Fourteen million was provided to GAO in the hurricane
supplemental to help prevent fraud, waste, and abuse and to
evaluate overall Federal response and recovery efforts.
And, obviously, our rating, our grade on how well we have
responded to some of these disasters is still very much in
question.
So I am curious what the status of GAO's work on the 2017
disasters is, and what can you share with us so far?
DISASTER FUNDING
Mr. Dodaro. I would be happy to.
We, so far, have issued eight reports on the disaster-
related assistance that was provided for 2017, both the
hurricanes as well as the wildfires in California.
We have issued reports on the Federal Government's initial
response to affected areas. We have issued a followup report on
Puerto Rico in particular and some of the challenges the island
faces. Just 2 days ago, we issued a similar report on the
Virgin Islands in terms of its status as well.
We have issued a number of reports on contracting for
assistance. First, there are a lot of advance contracts that
are to be used by the Federal Government to help move quickly
in those areas, so you wouldn't have to put things out for bid.
You have contractors already lined up. There are improvements
that they could make. We made nine recommendations in these
areas.
We are looking at the post-contracting areas for disaster
assistance. We will have a report coming out soon with 10
additional recommendations to improve contracting. It addresses
how the Federal Government uses the money, whether it is used
in a wise manner in the contracting area and meets all the
requirements.
We have over 25 other audits already underway because there
is a long tail to disaster recovery. There is the initial
response, but recovery takes many years, as you know. Sandy
just finished up not that long ago.
We are looking at the electricity power grid in Puerto
Rico, and the housing issues, particularly in Texas, in the
area where they were hit. And we are looking at the Small
Business Administration and what they have been doing to help
small businesses. There is a wide range of other audits.
So far, we have used $5.6 million of the $14 million. We
expect that we will use the remainder of that by the end of
next year.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So fiscal 2019?
Mr. Dodaro. Fiscal 2019. [Correction: Fiscal 2020]
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Okay.
Mr. Dodaro. But we are well on our way in that area. And we
are happy to take on additional responsibilities to look at the
2018 disasters as well, both Florence and Michael. Because they
were different types of issues, will have different types of
effects. We have done a lot of work in Disaster Response and
Recovery.
We have on our high-risk list a related issue, which is
limiting the Federal Government's exposure by better managing
climate change risk. I put that on in 2013. We have encouraged
the government to do more in terms of mitigation and resilience
building up front, because many of these things could be
avoided.
Our report this year on initial governments' response
showed that Florida was better positioned than anybody else.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. That would make sense.
Mr. Dodaro. Because they had worked to change building
codes and standards. Whereas you had Puerto Rico on the other
end of spectrum that wasn't prepared at all.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Well, I am reading the history on
Katrina. I was watching something on Florida's preparedness and
just the different planning, to say nothing of Puerto Rico.
So when you mentioned the climate change piece, though, I
wanted to ask about mitigation with regard to forest management
and if that is a piece of what you are looking at.
Because I live in the West, I am actually downstream of
that nuclear power plant, so very interested in that as well.
But our Federal forests and what happened in California, in
Paradise, and then what we see as possibly happening in and
around just even my region. And we see with regard to the
difference between State lands, DNR lands, private lands----
Mr. Dodaro. Right.
Ms. Herrera Beutler [continuing]. And Federal lands. I have
had Fish and Wildlife and Chief Forester, everybody from the
Feds has come out and walked through those three different
landscapes in the same area, and you just know that we are ripe
for a horrible disaster. And I am curious about that piece.
FOREST MANAGEMENT
Mr. Dodaro. We have done work in the past on the controlled
burns and trying to get rid of the underbrush. I am not sure
whether we are currently----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Selective harvest?
Mr. Dodaro [continuing]. Focused on that. But we will go--
go back and make sure we are focused on that area.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I just think, if you are talking
about, we live and breathe it and it is a part of our heritage,
we want to protect it, climate change isn't the only piece. It
would be silly to think it was. You recognize that, once man
has touched a forest, it is never going to go back.
Mr. Dodaro. Right.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So then there is a responsibility for
a healthy ecosystem. And you really can see the difference in
the three.
Mr. Dodaro. Right.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So I would be curious to hear, too,
what your team is doing in that area, especially with kind of
your look at the climate piece.
Mr. Dodaro. We are looking at forest management.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. That might also be another area where
we could talk about.
Mr. Dodaro. So, when we get together----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Yes.
Mr. Dodaro [continuing]. We will talk about specifically
what we are doing.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Great.
Mr. Dodaro. The one thing I want to mention--you mentioned
the debt thing. Just one thing----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Oh, yes.
Mr. Dodaro [continuing]. I wanted to put on your radar
screen.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I am sure we could talk about that for
a while.
DEBT CEILING
Mr. Dodaro. The debt ceiling suspension period is off this
Saturday. This means the Treasury Department, as of March 2nd,
will not have enough money to pay the Federal Government's
bills on time unless it goes to what they call extraordinary
measures--which have, unfortunately, become all too ordinary.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. It is true.
Mr. Dodaro. They borrow against the government's pension
systems, and there are other measures they could take. CBO
estimates that, through these extraordinary measures, they will
have enough money to last maybe until the end of this fiscal
year in September. I urge Congress to take action.
I have also made recommendations that Congress change how
the debt ceiling works. Right now, it does nothing to control
the debt. When Congress may not raise it on time, the markets
get nervous. They demand an additional premium, and it costs
more in interest to borrow money during a period of time. The
markets now are distorted because they are avoiding purchasing
securities that might expire during a potential impasse period.
It is affecting liquidity in the secondary market. So there is
nothing to like----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. It helps no one.
Mr. Dodaro. It helps no one in this process. I have made
some recommendations on different ways that that could be dealt
with over time. I am very concerned that any actions never do
anything to affect the full faith and credit of the Federal
Government.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thanks. We could talk about that
forever.
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Chairman.
Mr. Dodaro. One approach is that the Congress could use the
budget resolution process to raise the debt ceiling.
Right now, the budget resolution process is mostly focused
on the annual appropriation figures. Two-thirds of the Federal
Government spending right now is on automatic pilot on Social
Security and Medicare. The congressional budget resolution
process ought to consider all the revenues coming in, just as
you do in your family, you figure out what are your expenses,
what your revenues are and how much you would have to borrow.
That could be number one option.
Number two option could be that authority be given to the
executive branch to notify Congress that it needs to borrow
more money to raise the ceiling and Congress could disapprove
it. In other words, Congress wouldn't have to proactively act
unless they disapproved that process.
Third would be to give the President the authority, because
Congress is appropriating the money. Right now, the debt
ceiling only deals with paying bills that Congress has already
appropriated. It is an after-the-fact measure. You could just
say, okay, Congress, in deciding appropriations, it decides by
de facto how much the government would have to borrow, and
authorize the executive branch to borrow that amount of money.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Do you have a paper on that?
Mr. Dodaro. Yeah, I have a report.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Could you send it to us?
Mr. Dodaro. Yes. I will send it to all of you.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Okay. Good.
[The information follows:]
This link will take you to GAO's most recent work on the
Nation's fiscal health, https://www.gao.gov/
americas_fiscal_future. We will be issuing an update to this
report in April and will provide a copy when it is completed.
Mr. Dodaro. We have been working with some Member offices
on proposals to deal with that, and I would be happy to talk to
you about it.
Mr. Ruppersberger. All right.
The two areas I want to get into are the technology policy,
and then I know you had--a couple years ago, you had an issue
with the intelligence community being involved. And, you know,
I have been involved with intelligence my whole career here.
And, you know, intelligence community is very sensitive about
their classified issues, and they don't want anyone else being
involved. And your issue is trying to find a way to manage it
and make sure it works better.
But I will get into that second.
Mr. Dodaro. Okay.
Mr. Ruppersberger. I want to get into this first. You know,
Congress can use help to better understand a lot of the
emerging tech policy, like privacy, cybersecurity, new space
threat, hypersonic weapons. These are some of the current
projects.
And you have the newly formed Science, Technology
Assessment, and Analytics team.
SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
Mr. Dodaro. Yes, that is under me, but I also have an
Information Technology and Cybersecurity team. There are two
teams to deal with the issues you are talking about.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Okay. Well, how is that working at this
point?
Mr. Dodaro. I think it is working very well.
Mr. Ruppersberger. What are you doing, then, with that?
Mr. Dodaro. We are doing a lot of work. We just issued
technology assessments on artificial intelligence. We have done
technology assessments on sustainable chemistry, detecting
explosive devices on passenger rail----
Mr. Ruppersberger. The biological----
Mr. Dodaro. Yes, biological technical issues we have the
capacity to do this. I have a lot of people with science
skills. I hired our first chief scientist in 2008. I have been
building this capacity for about 10 years now.
We have a standing contract with the National Academy of
Sciences, so we use a lot of their experts to help in peer
reviews and other activities as well.
In my prepared testimony, there is a list of all the
technology assessments that we have done and technology
assessments that we have underway. We also use these people to
look at a lot of different issues.
You mentioned hypersonic weapons. That is on our radar
screen. So a lot of the defense work we do----
Mr. Ruppersberger. My issue----
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Like, hypersonic I have been focusing on
for years.
Mr. Dodaro. Okay.
Mr. Ruppersberger. It is a very dangerous situation for us.
Mr. Dodaro. I agree.
Mr. Ruppersberger. And due to sequestration, we are behind
Russia and China. And there is an offense and defense.
Mr. Dodaro. The same thing on artificial intelligence.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Exactly.
And I actually represent NSA, so I deal with a lot of that.
And they are pretty good. But, on the other hand, you get
into the other side that has a lot of issues in Homeland
Security. You know, they don't have enough people, they don't
have the expertise, and they have a mission which is really
big. But I don't want to get into all that. I want to get into
the issue of our plan efforts. You know, your testimony talked
about over the next 2 years you have plan efforts, to include:
assessing the Federal Government's efforts to establish and
implement a comprehensive national cyber strategy; to evaluate
government-wide initiatives to implement continuous diagnostic
and monitoring capabilities; and establish effective risk
management processes at the Federal agencies.
Your testimony mentions the GAO's continued focus on the
public-private-partnership model. Could you go into more detail
on this model?
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Ruppersberger. And there needs to be, I think, an
emphasis on the importance of a clear and concise best-practice
guide for Federal agencies. And will this assessment include
the technologies used by Federal agencies who deal with
sensitive information?
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Ruppersberger. And you can throw in there too, I mean,
our dot-gov, we are a long way off. You have some departments
that are good, others that aren't. There hasn't been any--may
be trying, but ability to pull that together to protect
ourselves.
Mr. Dodaro. Yes I testified before Congress last summer on
all these issues. I will----
Mr. Ruppersberger. What committee was it?
Mr. Dodaro [continuing]. Be happy to provide my testimony.
It was the House Oversight and Reform Committee.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Okay.
Mr. Dodaro. Congressman Hurd had held the hearing. And
Connolly had been involved, as well as Congressman Meadows, and
Representative Kelly. It was a joint hearing of two
subcommittees.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Okay.
Mr. Dodaro. And so I will be happy to provide that.
[The information follows:]
This is a link to the 2018 testimony before Subcommittees
on Government Operations and Information Technology, Committee
on Oversight and Government Reform that Gene mentioned.
Subsequently, we issued a report that provides greater details
on the issue, High-Risk Series: Urgent Actions Are Needed to
Address Cybersecurity Challenges Facing the Nation, GAO-18-622,
Sep 6, 2018.
Mr. Dodaro. But on the partnership issue, the issue is that
the private sector has most of the computer resources, as you
know, for critical infrastructure protection. Right now, there
are standards out there, but they are all voluntary. The
Federal Government really doesn't have a good idea on how
implementation has gone of those standards, whether you are
talking about the electricity grid--we have done work on that--
financial markets, the election systems, telecommunications.
There are 16 different critical infrastructure sectors. Our
view is the Federal Government needs to know more about the
status of implementation of cybersecurity best practices in the
private sector in those sectors.
In some areas, the Federal Government has regulatory
authorities, like in the nuclear area as well, but in many it
doesn't. It is relying on the dialogue with the private sector.
The Federal Government itself has not acted with a sense of
urgency commensurate with the threat. I have encouraged them to
move faster. We made, in the last 10 years, 3,000
recommendations. Almost 700 of them are open. We issue more
regularly.
This is still a problem at virtually every Federal agency
across the government, in terms of protecting the systems
there. On a national level--we need a national and global
cybersecurity strategy.
Mr. Ruppersberger. We will probably be dead and buried
before that happens on the global side.
Mr. Dodaro. We need some cyber diplomacy. There are no
international norms in this area. This is an area that is
really very, very problematic.
On the privacy side, our privacy law was passed in 1974.
There was the E-Government Act in 2002. We are way out of date
in terms of protecting privacy. We have had recommendations
since 2013 for the Congress to pass a consumer privacy
framework for the private-sector area as well.
Mr. Ruppersberger. We are going to have a second round,
right?
Mr. Ryan. Yes.
Mr. Ruppersberger. All right.
Well, I would like you to get that information to me.
Mr. Dodaro. Sure.
Mr. Ruppersberger. The other thing, in my opinion, I
believe just like we are focusing on prioritizing space, we
need to prioritize cyber. And I would hope that we could have,
like, a special combatant command or something where you focus
strictly on cyber offense and defense. So if you have any
information on that----
Mr. Dodaro. Okay.
Yes, we just issued a report not long ago about the lack of
attention that DOD has been giving the cyber issue in the
development of weapons systems.
Mr. Ruppersberger. If you can get that to me.
[The information follows:]
Earlier this week, we also issued a report on DOD weapons
systems, Weapon System Sustainment: DOD Needs to Better Capture
and Report Software Sustainment Costs, GAO-19-173, Feb 25,
2019.
Mr. Dodaro. Yes. You will have all that today.
Mr. Ryan. Mr. Newhouse.
Mr. Newhouse. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Dodaro, thanks for being here with us. Thanks for
bringing your crack team with you.
NUCLEAR WASTE
I do want to compliment you on the work that you did on the
Department of Energy's efforts in the cleanup of nuclear waste.
I think that that is going to help us make sure that we are
spending taxpayer dollars wisely. That is a huge commitment of
the Federal Government. And I think shining the light that you
have on that will be helpful to not only get the cleanup done
but as efficiently as possible. So thanks. You guys came in and
helped explain that to me. And that is maybe not the message I
wanted to hear, but we have to face the reality of what we are
doing.
I am going to ask kind of a question that I should know--
you know, this is my third term in Congress--and I don't. But
you alluded to the fact that you work with committee chairs and
ranking members; you don't have time for Member requests.
GAO PLANNING
And so I got to thinking, well, you are our watchdog in a
lot of things we do as a government. And I am assuming that it
is very intentional, the things that you look into, that you
assign to your staff. But how does that happen? Do you guys sit
down in the morning over a cup of coffee at the table and say,
what are we going to look into today? Or is it by request only
from committees? How does all that happen?
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Newhouse. How do we intentionally look into things? And
how do you prioritize?
And with that, you talked about the enormity of all the
things that you are doing. Your to-do list isn't empty, I am
sure. There has to be a backlog here. And maybe talk about how
this request or increase in your budget will help along those
lines.
Mr. Dodaro. Okay.
Well, first, in terms of planning, deciding what we do, we
do a 5-year strategic plan for serving the Congress and the
country. We get input from a lot of the congressional
committees. I have outside advisers. We have experts in the
GAO, so we put that together. The last one we did was February
of last year, 2018, through----
Mr. Newhouse. A 5-year plan.
Mr. Dodaro. A 5-year plan, strategic plan, for serving the
Congress and the country.
Then we work with all the committees on this issue.
On average over the last 5 years, there have been about 800
requests. About----
Mr. Newhouse. From the committees?
Mr. Dodaro. From the entire Congress.
Mr. Newhouse. Oh, Members----
Mr. Dodaro. Yes, Members--well, there are some Member
request. Others come in the form of laws--``GAO shall do
this''--committee conference reports. That is priority one.
Priority two are requests from committee chairs and ranking
members. We treat both the same. We are a nonpartisan
organization. Those are our two priorities.
Then the third, I mentioned is individual Member requests,
but those, we don't have resources to do. Many of them get a
committee to sponsor their request, so they get resolved.
Of the roughly 800 we receive a year, I would say about 75
percent of them are already contemplated in our strategic plan
for serving the Congress.
I believe the vast majority of what we do, is a shared
agenda. Congress thinks it is important--they have either put
it in law or a committee conference report or sent a request in
from a committee--and we think it is important as well.
USING COMPTROLLER GENERAL AUTHORITY
Mr. Newhouse. So would you analyze things without the
request of Congress?
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Newhouse. You do.
Mr. Dodaro. Yes. I do have authority to investigate
anything on my own.
Mr. Newhouse. I see.
Mr. Dodaro. I use this selectively. The work we have done
on the debt ceiling, I did that on our own authority. That is
about maybe 5 percent of our resources every year, on average.
Areas on the high-risk area, like cybersecurity, I did that
on our own when we first put it on the list. Now it is
requested every year.
FANNIE MAE AND FREDDIE MAC
I authorized a study on the problem in housing finance with
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which are still under Federal
conservatorship 10 years after the global financial crisis. All
the risk now in the housing finance area has moved to the
Federal Government. Two-thirds of all individual mortgages now
are either directly or indirectly supported by the Federal
Government. You know, Ginnie Mae's portfolio has grown over $2
trillion. The Federal Housing Administration's portfolio has
increased. This is a big problem, and Congress needs to solve
this problem.
RETIREMENT SECURITY
Those are just two examples. We did one on retirement
security. I think we have a looming problem with retirement
security given the changes not only in the government programs
but also the private-sector dimension and individuals' own
savings accounts.
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
We did a special one on DOD. We listed out their top
priorities. I was very concerned, as I mentioned earlier about
readiness issues and cyber issues at DOD.
Mr. Newhouse. That was under your own volition?
Mr. Dodaro. Yes. That was on our own volition.
So I selectively pick things that I either think need to be
reviewed. Many of the issues span the various committees'
jurisdictions. Or I know nobody is going to ask us to look
into, because it is a hot-button issue and I think needs to be
dealt with.
So I think we get the top priorities of the Congress, but
we could do more with resources. Until the mid-1990s, we had up
to 5,300 people at the GAO. We were downsized about 40 percent
during that period of time, along with many other parts of
government, but particularly the legislative support agencies
for the Congress. That is when the Office of Technology
Assessment was defunded, during that period of time.
We used to be able to handle 1,000, sometimes 1,200
requests from the Congress in a year. We can scale up if the
Congress decides they want to invest in us. We can provide much
more assistance, and we are capable of doing that if----
Mr. Newhouse. It sounds like I should get in the queue
soon.
GAO STAFFING
Mr. Dodaro. There is a queue in some areas. Those are the
ones I am trying to increase. Healthcare in particular.
Everybody is interested in healthcare and DOD issues in
particular.
Cyber, and science and technology are becoming ubiquitous
issues in almost every Federal department and agency. Whether
we are talking about protecting electronic healthcare records,
it has become an integral issue. These things are coming up.
The only time we say no to a request is if we don't have
the authority to do the work. In most cases, we will say, if
you are priority one or two, we will accept it, but we might
have to wait 4 months before we can start it. That is the way
the queue works.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay.
EFFECTS OF SEQUESTRATION
Mr. Dodaro. So we eventually get to everything that is a
priority one or priority two request.
This happened when the sequester hit back in 2013. We lost
15 percent of our authorized staff during that sequester
because of the government-wide cut. Now, I didn't lay off
anybody. I didn't furlough anybody. We adjusted, I made
changes, but we couldn't replace people that left during that
period of time. We now are creeping back up the last few years
during that period of time.
To compensate, I went around to all the committee chairs
and ranking members, and I said: I am not going to sacrifice
quality of our work. What we need to do is agree on your top
priorities. We can't get to everything. This process has worked
very effectively.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay.
Mr. Dodaro. I think we are there but we can obviously do
more with more resources. I could have had a bigger request to
submit, but I understand, as the auditor of the government's
financial statements, what kind of fiscal position we are in. I
want to be prudent in submitting the request, which I think I
have been.
CONGRESSIONAL MODERNIZATION
Mr. Newhouse. So I am part of a special committee to
modernize the Congress. And I can anticipate that we might be
wanting to work together with you. Is that something that you
have the bandwidth to do currently? It would be helpful, I
would think.
Mr. Dodaro. Absolutely, we could deal with you.
CYBERSECURITY
Mr. Newhouse. A lot of those things that you talked about,
you know, the cybersecurity and technology and all the
different things that we need to be looking at and more.
Mr. Dodaro. We are looking at the request from the
Appropriations Committee on cybersecurity for the new Office of
Congressional Workplace Rights, for example. We have done work
within the legislative branch as well.
CONGRESSIONAL OVERSIGHT
One of the real challenges for you and your committee in
that regard is that the Congress has put itself in an
increasingly disadvantaged position in providing oversight over
the executive branch. Congress has reduced its own staff. It
also has reduced staff of the legislative support agencies.
In testimony before this committee over the years, I have
always said that I think that this is a mistake, to keep
reducing resources. Even at its height, the legislative branch
is so out-personed compared to the executive branch, it is hard
to conduct oversight.
Issues are happening more rapidly now in the development of
science and technology, in particular cybersecurity threats,
global issues, and other matters, that the Congress right now
needs to really look at modernizing itself. Also look at what
capabilities are really required in order to exercise the
oversight contemplated by the Constitution.
I would be happy to talk about any aspect of what you are
doing.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay. I appreciate that.
Mr. Dodaro. It is vitally important to our country that
Congress look at these issues, and I would be happy to do
whatever I can to support it.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay. Yeah, I appreciate that.
And I would just second the request for information that
you are going to send to other offices----
Mr. Dodaro. Okay.
Mr. Newhouse [continuing]. About our debt and the budget
process. I would be very interested in that.
Mr. Dodaro. I would be happy to do that. We will get a
package around to everybody on the committee.
Mr. Newhouse. Very good. All right. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. I would recommend, too, if you want to go down a
rabbit hole, go on their website. The reports cover a lot of
ground. I mean, the scope of the work is incredible, and the
detail is incredible. So you can get lost just reading reports
about what is inside his brain.
It got so bad that when I read the reports I hear them in
your voice.
Ed Case.
Mr. Case. Thank you very much.
I just wanted to follow up on my colleague's line of
questioning. And there are two parts to the question.
First of all, you say that you do have the authority to be
proactive in terms of initiating reviews, that you primarily
use that discretion for debt and the budget ceiling--which, by
the way, I completely agree with your exercising discretion in
that department. But you are mostly reactive to requests.
So the question there is, what would you want somebody from
Congress to ask you to do? What is on your list that you want
somebody to prioritize?
And let me back on to that question by asking--you made a
comment right at the very end there about Congress increasingly
deferring to the executive branch. And I think many of us have
been concerned about that.
I recall being in a briefing with several of my colleagues
by CRS on a major issue. I think it was healthcare, if I am not
mistaken. This was a couple of months ago. And there was a key
set of assumptions in the briefing. And so somebody asked the
obvious question, where did those assumptions come from? And
they said, they came from the administration. And that person
said, well, how do you know those assumptions are correct? And
CRS said, we don't. We are taking the administration's word for
it. We don't have the capability to independently----
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Case [continuing]. Independently verify those
assumptions, but it made me think, are we in government
deferring too much to the executive branch?
And I say this on a nonpartisan basis. It is just our job
to check and balance them, right? They could be----
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Case [continuing]. The best people in the world; we
would still want to look over their shoulders.
So, big-picture question, what do you think we should be
looking at, whether anybody has asked you or not?
And related, where do you think in the areas of the
executive branch, basic assumptions that policy is being built
on, where are those areas that we should be looking more
closely at?
AREAS FOR CONGRESS TO GUIDE GAO
Mr. Dodaro. Yes. There are a couple things. First, I don't
want to leave the impression that we are reactive to most
requests. Most of the requests, of the 800, three-quarters of
them are things we suggested to Congress. The committees asked
us----
Mr. Case. Well, I was trying to be polite. I assumed you
had a way of suggesting----
Mr. Dodaro. We do. Maybe I was too nuanced in my
explanation.
Mr. Case. Okay.
Mr. Dodaro. On those, we say, "We think this is important,"
they agree, and so then they request it.
So most of the big-ticket items that I think Congress
should be looking at we are looking at. Then I fill in the gaps
with our own authority.
HEALTHCARE
In terms of areas that need more scrutiny and looking at
assumptions, there are several I would point to. One is the
healthcare issue. I increased our actuarial support at GAO, so
I have now three actuaries, including a chief actuary. Many of
the assumptions in terms of the actuarial assumptions that the
government is making need more scrutiny, whether it is in the
healthcare area, or whether it is in the pension area, which
includes VA. They made a big mistake in their actuarial
assumptions that we caught through our financial audits.
NUCLEAR WASTE
I think the other area is in the assumptions on what to do
with all this radioactive waste that is stored. The Federal
Government doesn't have a final disposal site at this point in
time. It is growing. The environmental liability was added to
our high-risk list in 2017. It is almost half a trillion
dollars right now. And this is understated. Nobody really knows
what the full cost of mitigating, both at the Energy Department
and DOD, really is. So much more needs to be done in that area.
PENSION BENEFIT GUARANTEE
Much more needs to be done in the pension benefit guarantee
area. In fact, in that area, the multi-employer portion of that
program is going to be potentially insolvent--a high degree of
likelihood it will be insolvent by 2025-2026 period of time.
QUESTIONING ASSUMPTION
Mr. Case. These are policy judgments to be made. I am kind
of going----
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Case [continuing]. One level down----
Mr. Dodaro. Okay.
Mr. Case [continuing]. And saying, do you think we have
questions or legitimate reasons to go after the assumptions on
which those policy judgments are being made?
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Case. Nuclear waste or----
Mr. Dodaro. Right.
Mr. Case [continuing]. Pollution, I think you have already
said, actuarially, I think you have said, we need to look at
some of those actuarial assumptions.
Mr. Dodaro. Yes. There is no question about it. I can give
you a long list of those things for the record. If you talk to
our guys back at the GAO, they would give you a long list of
all these things that need to be looked at at that sub-tier
level. And it would span most of the departments and agencies
in the Federal Government.
Mr. Case. Okay.
NATIONAL DEBT
Mr. Dodaro. I think, the other issue you mentioned was
debt. We are at $22 trillion now. We are going to be close to
adding a trillion a year and then go over a trillion a year for
the next 10 years. What are the assumptions about who is going
to lend us the money and at what rate and what mix of bills,
the type of debt instruments that should be used--and how we
should go about paying down the debt at some point in time.
There is no plan right now to pay down the debt.
Mr. Case. Is that a pending study on your part?
Mr. Dodaro. No, we are not currently looking at this. We
are planning to look more on the debt management issue.
Mr. Case. Okay.
Mr. Dodaro. I have that on the agenda.
CHEMICAL SAFETY
The other area we need to look more at the assumptions is
at EPA. There are a lot of assumptions about the safety of
chemicals that are without a lot of made scientific
underpinning. They are way behind in doing the scientific
studies.
Congress has given them new authority now to get more
information from the chemical industry than they had before.
Before, they had to prove something was bad that was on the
market as opposed to pre-approve it beforehand.
They make a lot of assumptions that I think should be
looked at with a lot more scrutiny, because they have a lot of
safety implications for the American public, both short-term
and long-term. Some of these issues you can't turn around
overnight. This is another area that comes to mind.
Mr. Case. Thank you.
One more, or do you want me to----
Mr. Ryan. Go ahead.
GAO RECRUITMENT
Mr. Case. So I am going to switch gears to recruitment.
Because your biggest request is $33 million for 100 FTEs, which
is $330,000 per, which I assume is a standard unit of FTE
salary and benefits, so those folks would be at Federal wage
classifications, or congressional wage.
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Case. And I guess my question there is, although it is
really good news that you are very highly sought after as a
place to be employed, we are talking about AI, machine
learning, cyberspace. I was just at DOD the other day, and they
said one of their toughest challenges is recruitment in these
exact areas, because there is an incredibly high demand for
incredibly highly specialized people that can command a high
salary.
Somebody can want to work for you really badly, but if they
are offered twice that or more in the private sector, how do
you handle that? Are you able to recruit at the very top
expertise, given that we need the top expertise to be able to
exercise our oversight function, or is there something
different we should be looking at?
Mr. Dodaro. I don't have any problem with that. I was at
Carnegie Mellon University; I was at Arizona State recently;
the University of Maryland, they have quantum computing. I
brought some of their professors in to meet with our people. We
just hired 30 cybersecurity people. Now, they are not all
experienced people, but they are educated in cybersecurity,
part of the cybersecurity corps.
What I sell about GAO is the importance of our mission and
the ability to make a difference, a good work-life balance and
a good place to work. It is a learning environment. You have to
sell these things. I go out personally and I do a lot of
selling about GAO and about the importance of working with us.
I also use search firms to hire more senior talent in
certain areas. I hired our Chief Scientist from the
intelligence community, using this vehicle. We are looking now
for data science people and engineers. We have engineers, we
have chemists, we have physical scientists and people who have
nuclear engineering backgrounds.
I look for people also who work in the private sector who
might get paid more money but they are not as satisfied, in
some cases----
Mr. Case. Right.
Mr. Dodaro [continuing]. With the type of work that they
do, so I target those people.
I don't need huge numbers, but I need the right people. If
you market yourself properly and you target people who are
likely to want to do public service, to work in a good,
professional, nonpartisan environment, that is a big part of
what we stress.
Mr. Case. I get that. I am sure that is your number-one
concern, to include the quality of the workplace, and that
comes through loud and clear in your testimony.
But I just realistically am asking you the question, do you
have the expertise? And I am not so much thinking about the
recent Carnegie Mellon grad, although those are important
folks, but maybe the person 15 years out----
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Case [continuing]. Who is, you know, really at the top
of their game. Because I don't know what the Carnegie Mellon
people do or don't know in their first couple of years.
Mr. Dodaro. We have those people, too, at GAO. I am not
Pollyannaish about it. I have all these people, but to
supplement what we are able to do in that area, I have a
standing contract with the National Academy of Sciences. If I
want to look at nuclear waste disposal. NAS will put a panel
together of the top experts in the country. And sometimes they
will even go abroad and bring people in.
So we have access and use all these technical resources----
Mr. Case. I see. So outside.
Mr. Dodaro. Outside help. We use that on all our technology
work. We have access to all the top people in whatever field we
are looking at----
Mr. Case. Okay.
Mr. Dodaro [continuing]. Through this means, to augment our
own staff at the GAO. This is a very important component.
Mr. Case. I should have asked whether you do that. Thank
you.
Mr. Dodaro. You're welcome.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you, sir.
Just a couple of quick questions.
PLAN TO INCREASE CERTAIN CAPABILITIES
We know you were directed by the CRS to contract for the
National Academy of Public Administration study.
Mr. Dodaro. CRS was.
Mr. Ryan. CRS was. And then they were going to get the
report and then--but the report is not in yet.
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Ryan. And you guys are moving forward. So the question
I have is----
Mr. Dodaro. Okay.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. Without the report in hand yet--
because that is, what, end of the year?
Mr. Dodaro. I don't know when it--the CRS one is in the
fall, but----
Mr. Ryan. So that is going to come in the fall. You are
kind of talking about moving forward.
Mr. Dodaro. Right.
Mr. Ryan. Can you just talk to us a little bit about what
the complications are with moving forward without that report
in hand?
Mr. Dodaro. Yes. First of all, I am moving forward with the
resources Congress gave us last year. We are increasing--our
Information Technology and Cybersecurity team from 140 to 175
people by the end of this year. We also will have 70 people in
the Science, Technology Assessments, and Analytics area. I
eventually want to grow that to somewhere between 100 and 140
people as well, down the road.
While Congress asked CRS to do this study of what
congressional needs were, it also required us to make our team
more prominent and to submit a plan to increase our
capabilities. Our plan is due to be submitted to you and the
committee next month. You will have our plan too.
My belief is, regardless of what you decide on whatever the
study CRS produces through NAPA, we need to do this at GAO
regardless, to provide proper service to the Congress. Now, we
can go further, but what I am building to right now we need----
Mr. Ryan. Anyway.
Mr. Dodaro [continuing]. Anyway.
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
INTELLIGENCE DATA SHARING
We heard last year from public witnesses who urged the
subcommittee to pass legislation to force the national
intelligence agencies--I know Mr. Ruppersberger kind of touched
on this--to share their data with you.
And we would like to ask you about that issue. You
confirmed that your access was improving a bit but that you
really needed Congress to pass legislation requiring the
intelligence agencies to cooperate.
So we have tried this once before, in the intelligence
authorization bill a few years ago, but backed down due to
White House pressure. I am assuming there will be White House
pressure again. Do you have any hope of a different outcome if
we try to pass it?
Mr. Dodaro. Yes. Well, a couple things.
One, I believe we already have the statutory authority to
do the work in the intelligence communities. What we need is
the support from the Intelligence Committees and the
cooperation of the intelligence community.
Now, that has been steadily improving since the directive
came out a few years ago. I worked with General Clapper and his
team to produce that directive. I have met with Director Coats;
we are moving forward.
We are looking at contracting issues right now in the
intelligence community, onboarding of staff in the intelligence
community, and whistleblower complaints in the intelligence
community and how they handle them, among other issues.
So we are getting more support from the Intelligence
Committees. I think that is key to us moving forward in the
area. Is work there as smooth as it is in other parts of the
Federal Government? No. It takes more time. They don't have as
much experience working with us as other departments and
agencies of the Federal Government. We are getting in a rhythm
with them.
I could always use more support from the Congress in that
area, but I don't think we need statutory authority. We just
need support from the committees and the Intelligence
Committees.
We have more difficulty if the requests come from non-
Intelligence Committees.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah.
Mr. Dodaro. If we get it from the intelligence communities,
generally we can work it out. In some cases, it takes longer to
do that, to work out the issues with them. I would welcome
whatever additional support----
Mr. Ryan. We should have a conversation about that. I know
Mr. Ruppersberger and I both sit on the Defense Subcommittee of
Appropriations, and there may be an opportunity for us to at
least have that conversation.
Mr. Dodaro. Okay.
Mr. Ryan. I look at your reports and I see the work that
that you are doing and I hear your testimony and your team's
analysis of all of this generally and in particular and just
think, with regard to the intelligence community, how valuable
it would be for us to have your eyeballs on that. It think it
would be very, very helpful.
Mr. Dodaro. I think we could do more, particularly in the
management area and the investments that are made in that area
and whether there is good return on the investments in all
cases.
Part of the resource request we have this year is to help
get our people the necessary classification and clearances to
be able to work in that area and increase the number of people.
If we move in that area, a lot of technical people that I have
also will need to help, depending on the scope of the request.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah.
A few more questions.
MODERNIZING CONGRESS
I know you talked about modernizing--or Mr. Newhouse talked
about modernizing Congress. And I have been of the thought for
some time now that the institution of Congress is not keeping
up. You look at what is happening in the private sector with
information flows and just the speed of things happening, and
then you look at Congress.
And it was designed to be a slower process. That was just
inherent in the Constitution. Six years in the Senate, 2 years
in the House; you know, the initial reaction from the public
versus the slower, longer view of the Senate. And an executive
that should be limited in their capacity to do things. And yet
that design is not keeping up when you talk about cyber and AI
and being economically competitive with what China is able to
do and focus on.
And even the way our schedules are set up, to come here 3
days a week. And I am glad you brought up the fact that staff
has been cut--committee staff, Members' staff, pay, the whole
nine yards.
And do you have any recommendations, not just with that,
but you also mentioned cross-jurisdictions and how difficult it
is, one, to just get a committee to develop some level of
expertise, let alone three committees that may have, as you
know, cross-jurisdiction. Do you have any initial
recommendations?
Mr. Dodaro. First, I think the effort to look at this issue
and to look at modernization is a good effort that is long
overdue. I think it is encouraging that you would do that.
With regard to jurisdictions, I would note, many of the
high-risk areas we are putting on the list in the most recent
years are ones that involve multiple agencies in the Federal
Government and would therefore also cross committee
jurisdictions. I think that the Congress needs to look at
having more flexibility in dealing with major issues that cross
committee jurisdictions. Right now, there is not an easy way
that I see to deal with that.
The other thing is I think the Budget Committees have even
too narrow jurisdiction over the budget side of things. Because
you have the revenue functions in the different committee, then
you have expenditures.
So I think there is a need to look at what are the major
issues and how Congress can deal with the major issues that
cross committee jurisdictions. Sometimes we won't get asked to
look at an issue that everybody agrees is important but it is
not in anyone's particular area.
I did a study, one that I did on my own authority. I was
concerned about children in poverty. One in five children in
the United States is in poverty, and what is the Federal
Government doing holistically. It crosses all the committee
jurisdictions. I got a little pushback on doing that study, and
it was because of jurisdictional concerns that somebody had. Of
all the issues I study, how could somebody complain that I am
looking at children. It is important.
I think that, if you really want to deal with the big
issues, Congress is going to have to be more flexible.
The same problems in the executive branch, because they
have trouble, part of what we do at GAO is look at the fact
that executive branch agencies that should be working together
aren't working together very well. This has been a steady
stream of work for us in those areas.
This problem in the executive branch sometimes gets
mirrored in the committee structure in the Congress, and it
prevents our government from being fully responsive in those
areas. You need to develop the expertise in the individual
areas, but you also need to have something in addition that
would supplement that for big-ticket items that cross
jurisdictions.
KEY GUIDING PRINCIPLES
Mr. Ryan. So you have a lot of detail in all of these
reports, and each sector or each topic has multiple
complexities that you have dug into.
Help us understand, from a big-picture viewpoint, a
principle or two that you have pulled out of all of this work
that you have done to help us maybe think about what we do
differently, not just on this committee but as we all go off
into our other committees. Are there a couple principles that
we need to start thinking about with regard to how we manage
this bureaucracy?
I mean, I am just so concerned generally about our
inability to deal with the challenges at hand. I mean, it is
cyber, it is China, it is weapons systems, it is 5G, it is
diabetes, it is 51 percent of our kids in public schools live
in poverty, and all the adverse childhood experiences. And we
just seem incapable of pulling together a strategy that all
feeds into solving these problems.
And I don't know many people in government right now that
have the breadth of knowledge that you have. Can you enlighten
us and----
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. Say a couple things that you would
want us to know?
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Ryan. You have 30 seconds to do it.
Mr. Dodaro. I can do it.
Mr. Ryan. We are still Members of Congress. Give us the top
line here.
Mr. Dodaro. Well, the first thing----
Mr. Ryan. Take your time, because I would be very
interested.
Mr. Dodaro. Well, the first thing I would say, the most
difficult part of my job is getting someone either in the
executive branch or the Congress to focus on a problem before
it comes to a crisis proportion, to plan ahead. We are not very
good as a government in doing strategic planning and thinking
about things that are going to happen.
It has been clear for a couple of decades that we are going
to have this fiscal problem because it is driven by
demographics in the country, but yet we haven't done anything
to really deal with that problem. We could have taken action a
long time ago that would have been less painful than what it is
going to take at this time.
The Federal Government's ability, both executive and
legislative branches, to identify emerging issues and to put in
place actions to prevent these things from occurring is in need
of change. That mindset doesn't exist as much as it needs to
exist.
It is further exacerbated by constant turnover. In my job,
I have already met with four different VA Secretaries for
example. There is a lot of turnover there in the executive
branch, there is a lot of turnover in the Congress too, but
there is no institutional way to do planning.
That is why GAO really becomes the default for the Federal
Government because they have the long-range view, the
continuity of time, with the 15-year appointment for
Comptroller Generals. I am only the eighth in about a hundred
years. And so----
Mr. Ryan. How many more years do you have left?
Mr. Dodaro. I have 7.
Mr. Ryan. That is not a bad gig, my goodness gracious.
Mr. Dodaro. Yes.
Mr. Ryan. Why don't you propose that, Newhouse? Fifteen-
year terms for Congress.
Mr. Newhouse. I will get right on that.
Mr. Dodaro. That is one thing.
The second thing is I don't believe there is enough
engagement with congressional oversight over the executive
branch agencies on a sustained basis as there needs to be.
HIGH RISK LIST
I will be testifying next week on an update on our high-
risk list, which we do at the beginning of each new Congress,
and we are going to take a couple areas off the high-risk list.
Invariably, it has been due to congressional help in forcing
the agencies to implement our recommendations, and staying with
these issues over time to deal with them. We only put the
biggest-risk on the list, and they are not easy to solve. So it
takes some time and persistent effort.
Wherever we see big progress, congressional intervention
usually is the key. It doesn't happen on a consistent basis
across all these areas. There needs to be more dialogue. It can
involve not just hearings but followup with agency officials
later, more detailed legislative directions to the agencies.
Congress, in the appropriation bill that just passed
recently, the larger one that covered agencies, gave some
direction to the three areas on our high-risk list, for the
first time. That is 3 out of 35. It is NASA, DOD, and DOE. That
is helpful, for Congress to do this.
These two things, are the most important. One is long-range
view. It doesn't have to be real long-range. I am talking about
within 5- to 10-year horizons.
A lot of these things you can see coming. Earlier I raised
cybersecurity as a high-risk area in 1997 across the Federal
Government. It was the first time I ever said anything across
the Federal Government is high-risk. I am still having trouble
getting people's attention to cybersecurity 20-some years
later. That is just one example of the type of difficulty.
So strategic view, mid-, long-term on these issues and then
more diligent and rigorous oversight would be my two top
recommendations.
Mr. Ryan. Well, thank you. We are going to have to wrap it
up, but I appreciate your time.
Mr. Dodaro. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you for your leadership. Thanks to the
happy warriors behind you and all their good work. Please let
everybody know how much we appreciate it.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. They do seem happy.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. I mean, when you have an Italian American
leading the charge, they are going to be happy and well-fed,
right?
Mr. Dodaro. This is true.
Mr. Ryan. The hearing is adjourned. Thank you.
[The following questions were submitted to be answered for
the record:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Wednesday, February 27, 2019.
GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
WITNESS
HERBERT H. JACKSON, JR., ACTING DEPUTY DIRECTOR, U.S. GOVERNMENT
PUBLISHING OFFICE
Opening Statement of Chairman Ryan
Mr. Ryan. We are now ready to begin our second hearing of
the morning where we will hear from the Government Publishing
Office about the budget request. Until 5 years ago, this
organization was known as the Government Printing Office,
reflecting its historic mission of communicating information
through the printed word. As technology for disseminating
information has changed from ink on paper to digital media and
online access, GPO's role has changed as well and, hence, the
name change.
There will be a continuing role for printed material in the
conduct of government business, and GPO will therefore be doing
printing for a long time to come. But GPO is now distributing
more and more information by digital means, such as through its
upgraded and steadily growing website now called govinfo.
Whatever the format, GPO's fundamental function is making
information about the operations of government, particularly
the Congress, readily available to the public. That is a
crucial function in a democracy.
GPO's appropriations request for 2020 is $117 million, the
same as its appropriation for 2019, and substantially less than
it received 10 years ago. This is a case where technological
advances have produced real cost savings as typesetting and
printing processes have become more efficient, and as the rise
of electronic documents have greatly reduced the volume of
printed material produced.
Here to tell us about GPO's budget request and its work is
Herb Jackson, the acting deputy director. Mr. Jackson is
representing GPO today because the position of GPO director is
currently vacant. He has more than three decades of experience
at GPO, including service in various management, procurement
and administrative positions.
Before we hear from Mr. Jackson, I will yield to our
ranking member, Ms. Herrera Beutler.
Opening Statement of Ranking Member Herrera Beutler
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I want to say welcome to Mr. Jackson, who is both acting
deputy director and chief administrative officer at the GPO;
GPO's important mission of keeping us informed, keeping America
informed really. And you do that by providing permanent access
to the Federal Government information at no charge to the
public through your Federal Depository Library Program, which
partners with over 1,140 libraries nationwide and govinfo. They
produce and distribute products for services for all three
branches of the Federal Government, including U.S. Passports,
which I did not realize, and official publications of Congress
and the White House. And you operate distribution centers to
fill orders for government publications.
I would like to recognize the Government Publishing Office
for receiving your 22nd consecutive clean audit opinion, that
is no small feat, and made possible in large part by the
outstanding work of GPO's finance team, which is under the
leadership of Bill.
Boesch. The current acting CFO, who has been a dedicated
public servant at GPO for a very long time. Thank you, Mr.
Chairman. I look forward to hearing GPO's testimony.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
The floor is yours, sir.
Testimony of Herbert Jackson, Jr.
Mr. Jackson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Ryan, Ranking Member Herrera Beutler, and members
of this subcommittee, thank you for inviting me here today to
discuss GPO's appropriations request for fiscal year 2020.
With me at the table today are Lyle Green, who is our
managing director for GPO's official journals of government;
Bill Boesch, who you have met, who is our acting chief
financial officer; and Ric Davis, who is our acting chief of
staff and chief technology officer.
I have been at the GPO for 38 years and have served since
July of last year as the acting deputy director. It is these
gentlemen, along with John Crawford, seated behind me, who will
form the nucleus of GPO's leadership following my pending
retirement on March 31 of this year.
Mr. Ryan. What?
Mr. Jackson. I can think of no finer team of professionals
to lead GPO while we await the confirmation of a new agency
director. I am confident that the GPO will be in good hands.
As you know, GPO is responsible for publishing
congressional publications and for making them known to the
public. Our mission derives from the requirement in Article I,
paragraph 5 of the Constitution which says: Each House of
Congress shall keep a journal of its proceedings and from time
to time publish the same.
The Government Printing Office, as we were named until
December 2014, was established to carry out that publishing
mission on Congress' behalf. For most of our history, we did
this by printing and distributing congressional publications.
However, for the past quarter century, we have deployed digital
technologies to carry out our mission. As a result, we are now
named the Government Publishing Office, where printing is just
one of the many publishing technologies we employ.
Today, for the House and Senate, we produce congressional
documents, the daily Congressional Record, bills, reports,
hearings, committee prints, and other documents in digital and
print, providing official information to the forms and formats
that Congress needs to carry out its constitutional legislative
mission, while providing public access to these documents
nationwide.
Our use of modern publishing technologies has significantly
reduced the cost of GPO's operations. Computerized typesetting,
for example, and related technologies have cut the cost of
congressional printing by more than 73 percent since 1980. In
addition to reducing the cost of disseminating congressional
products and other government information, digitization has
dramatically expanded our ability to provide public access to
these important materials. Last year, our online services
provided access to more than 2.5 million items. The service
averaged more than 31 million document retrievals a month.
It has also enabled us to scale down our workforce. Today,
the GPO employs approximately 1,690 men and women across the
country, compared to over 6,400 men and women that the agency
employed when I first started in 1980. I am very proud that we
were able to achieve this streamlining through natural
attrition and by dramatically enhancing our productivity
through diligent management and prudent investments in
information technology.
As a result, our total appropriations request of $117
million for fiscal year 2020 is the same as last year's
request, and is tied for the lowest overall number in the past
16 years. That request consists of three distinct component
accounts. Our congressional publishing account, where we are
requesting $79 million for fiscal 2020. Funding for this
account has been flat since fiscal year 2014. For the public
information programs of the superintendent of documents, we are
asking for $31,296,000, to expand our efforts to bring more
digital products into the Federal Depository Library Program,
which averages approximately three libraries per congressional
district nationwide. Our business operations revolving fund
account, we are seeking $6,704,000, to continue development of
our online system called govinfo and to pay for necessary
cybersecurity measures.
The investments that this committee--this subcommittee has
made in govinfo are paying rich dividends for the American
people. Just this past year, we were able to retire our older
website called FDsys as the more modern and dynamic govinfo was
brought fully online. Less than 1 month after FDsys was
officially retired, govinfo recorded a significant
accomplishment by securing ISO trustworthy digital repository
certification, becoming the first organization in the United
States and just the second organization in the entire world to
achieve this distinction.
We also enjoyed several other milestones this year, which
marked the tenth anniversary of our secure production facility
in Stennis, Mississippi. And GPO has produced more than 21
million secure identification credentials for the Department of
Homeland Security and other Federal agencies.
As someone who has worked at the GPO for many years, I have
witnessed, as you might imagine, a remarkable transition into
the digital age. And I am extremely proud to report, as you
have indicated, that once again for the 22nd consecutive year,
GPO has earned a clean or unmodified opinion on its finances by
the independent outside auditors who perform our annual audit.
And as you have stated already, that is attributed directly to
the work that Bill Boesch and his team does.
Before I conclude, Mr. Chairman, I want to say what an
honor it has been for me to work at GPO alongside such
committed public servants like those joining me here at the
table, those seated behind me, those located at our
headquarters office in D.C., those in our regional offices, and
those in our other facilities across the country.
For 38 years, I have been proud to serve with some of the
most dedicated employees in the Federal Government. Regardless
of the demands of the legislative schedule and regardless of
the conditions under which they have to work, whether there is
inclement weather or a government shutdown, the men and women
of the GPO will be there to support you in carrying out your
mission.
So, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member Herrera Beutler and
other members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to
testify today, and I am happy to answer your questions at this
time.
[The prepared statement of Herbert H. Jackson, Jr.
follows:]
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Mr. Ryan. Thank you, Mr. Jackson. Appreciate your years of
service, and congratulations on your retirement. I am sure you
have a calendar up in your office with a red pen----
Mr. Jackson. Yes, sir.
Mr. Ryan. I am sure that is exciting. Thank you.
Ms. Herrera Beutler, any questions?
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
This past year--so we talked a little bit about some of the
accomplishments, and I too want to commend you on your years of
service. Must feel good to be almost done, right?
Mr. Jackson. Yes, ma'am.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I wanted to bring up a couple of areas
where I see that there could be improvement and ask you about
it.
Mr. Jackson. Yes, ma'am.
CYBERSECURITY
Ms. Herrera Beutler. The first one has to do with
cybersecurity. So February 4 of this year an article was
published on nextgov.com, titled ``GPO Has No Disaster Recovery
Plan for Its Tech, Watchdog Says.'' And obviously, we just
finished a hearing about the need for a taxpayer watchdog.
The article goes on to summarize some of the IT findings
outside auditors KPMG observed. And it goes on to say that the
number of IT issues were first identified a number of them in
2011, including GPO's unpreparedness and emergency planning and
for IT--in terms of access control.
So it is now 2019, and I want to understand why these
issues haven't been resolved, and give you a chance to speak.
Mr. Jackson. I will start and then I will ask our chief
technology officer to chime in.
The issues have been resolved, and the account management
procedures will be provided to the IG by the 15th of March of
this year. GPO is now tracking separate accounts, so accounts
can be closed as soon as they are reported. For example, HR
accounts when employees leave, one of the citings was that
there was no way of knowing that that employee left because
their information was still in the system. There is a new
tracking system, I understand, now that is in place that will
help alleviate that issue.
Another automated control is now to place--automatically
disable inactive accounts, so that when people leave and the
account, for example, has not been used for a number of days or
so, it will automatically disable.
Ric, do you want to add to that?
Mr. Davis. Thank you, Herb.
As Herb mentioned, I am the chief technology officer at
GPO. The IT infrastructure falls under our chief information
officer. We recently brought on board a chief information
officer in the past year or so, who by the way has a very, very
strong background in IT security, which is helping us
tremendously.
To add to what Herb mentioned about access controls which
are being addressed, I also want to note that there is an IT
contingency plan that is being developed by our new CIO that
will be completed by the 15th. But prior to that, there are
detailed procedures that have been in operation apart from a
plan that guides us on failover to a COOP site as well as
security measures.
So while I believe that report was very factually accurate
to a degree, I think it left out some details about procedural
controls that are in place. We do monthly testing, we do
failover and failback, and we do a lot of tabletop exercises as
well. In addition, we do a lot of COOP activities also with
congressional offices that have been performed successfully. So
we can definitely do things better in this regard, but I think
we are doing some things very well right now.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I think that was part of my concern
was the need for a carefully documented contingency plan. The
contingency plan I think is the bigger issue. Yes, I also think
making sure that you are closing accounts and revoking security
clearances so that former employees have access on the outside.
So I think that is critical.
Mr. Davis. Yes ma'am.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. But I will look forward to seeing that
March 15 contingency plan.
Mr. Jackson. Yes. And we can make sure that you get a copy
of that contingency plan as soon as it is released.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. That would be great.
Mr. Jackson. Ric and I met recently with the CIO, and he
assured us that we would have that plan then, and we will make
certain that you get it.
CENSUS CONTRACT
Ms. Herrera Beutler. One more question. In the last year,
GPO had entered into a contract to procure printing contracts
for the Census with a company who went bankrupt, forcing the
government to spend $5 million to end a contract, so that we
could move on to a more financially stable vendor.
I just want to hear what the learning curve was, what plans
are in place that can help avoid a $5 million problem.
Mr. Jackson. That $5.5 million settlement was an agreement
between Justice, Census, and the vendor to get the vendor out
of that contract.
Yes, there were a number of things that should have
happened that possibly didn't happen. One, we could have done a
better job with what we would call a preaward survey in terms
of looking at the financials of that particular company. The
company was doing business for GPO and was successful in all of
its dealings with us. However, when it came time for this
particular award, some of those things were not fact checked.
What we have done----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Meaning someone who was in the process
of overseeing the account, letting the award, didn't do their
due diligence?
Mr. Jackson. The due diligence was not done.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. And double-check the financials of
someone.
Mr. Jackson. Exactly, correct. But there are some other
things that I think are prudent to this as well to ensure that
that doesn't happen again. One, we have revised our contract
review board policies in terms of contracts of this magnitude
need to go through a certain process of review so that there
will be a senior person that reviews those contracts, that
legal will have a review of those contracts prior to an award
being made.
Since that time, once we terminated that contract or the
contract was terminated, we began to----
Mr. Ryan. Go ahead, finish up.
Mr. Jackson. What we did was we took the time to work with
Census. We let a new contract, award has been made of the new
contract, and RR Donnelley is working well with us now.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Good. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you. We are going to be adhering to the 5-
minute rule too, so, Mr. Case, you are up.
FUNDING SOURCES AND PUBLIC USAGE
Mr. Case. A couple of questions all going back to the
general theme of general public usage of GPO, what are the
trend lines on general public usage. So to get to that, I am
trying to track the money here. So you have got this
appropriation accounting for somewhere around 13 percent, which
is to Congress, of your total budget. So if you were to look at
your total budget, that usage comes from obviously Congress,
you have general public usage of your publications and you have
agencies of government. I mean, do you have a figure of that
total budget, how much of that is spent on actual agencies
versus direct congressional usage, congressional needs versus
how much is the general public out there actually, accessing?
Mr. Jackson. Bill was saying that that is about 86 percent.
Approximately 14 percent of our revenues are appropriated. The
86 percent that Bill is referencing is earned from reimbursable
work for agencies and sales to the public.
Mr. Boesch. That 86 percent is used for the purchased
printing that we buy on behalf of the executive agencies and
also for the sale of passports and other smart card type
documents, 86 percent of our revenue approximately.
Mr. Case. Okay. That is bigger than I thought. So the
general public usage is 86 percent. But that includes passports
also, right? So that is huge, right? I mean, most people have
to get a passport--or half of the people get a passport.
Okay. What about just general public access to your digital
product, to your publications? What are the trend lines in
terms of the general public usage? Let's say a standard citizen
out there that wants to know something, and they know to go to
your site and they know to access it; what is happening there?
Is the trend line up, down? What are you doing to facilitate
it?
Mr. Jackson. You are referencing govinfo, our system of
record?
Mr. Case. Yes.
Mr. Jackson. Yes. Ric, do you want to take it?
Mr. Davis. So I have had the good fortune of being around
since we originally launched GPO access back in 1993, so I have
seen GPO access transform to the Federal Digital System to now
govinfo. So we started out literally making three government
publications available online, and now we have hundreds and
hundreds in different collections. We are averaging, as Herb
mentioned, about 31 million retrievals of information a month.
Those are not hits; those are actually downloads of discrete
units of content.
Mr. Case. How does that measure in terms of the trend line
over time? Is it going up or down?
Mr. Davis. It is going up significantly.
Mr. Case. People are getting to it and they are accessing
it?
Mr. Davis. People are getting to it. And our goal right now
is to add more content, particularly more historical content.
So we have tons of day-forward information but working through
the superintendent of documents and making use of that salaries
and expenses appropriation. We are also working with Congress
as well as library partners to digitize more historical content
and enhance that collection.
Mr. Case. Okay. And then does the congressional
appropriation itself, which is what we are talking about today,
does that--do you allocate that in your own internal purposes?
Do you allocate that to general public usage versus
congressional usage? Do you slice it that way? Or is that just
all Congress?
Mr. Boesch. The information that we publish on behalf of
the Congress is funded by the congressional appropriation, and
then the data will be transferred over. For example, the
library programs will ride the congressional work and then the
S and E appropriation or the public information program
appropriation will reimburse the revolving fund for that. So
Congress is only paying for Congress', and other users pay a
different way, either through the appropriation or through
purchases of books through our sales program.
Mr. Case. Okay. I guess my conclusion from the answers is
that if you distinguish between Congress' needs for itself and
the general public, that the appropriation we are talking about
today stays with Congress, that is level funded, but in terms
of your additional funding, your general public usage is going
up. Is that right?
Mr. Davis. Yes.
Mr. Jackson. Yes.
Mr. Case. Thanks. Because he has got the gavel and he is
going down.
Mr. Ryan. I don't even have to hit it.
Mr. Newhouse.
CENSUS CONTRACT
Mr. Newhouse. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And welcome to all of you, and I appreciate you coming
here. It is always interesting to learn more about all of the
different facets of the Federal Government and their
responsibilities, and the things that we provide for not only
Congress, but for the general public. So thank you for coming
and sharing with us.
I guess--a couple of things, it is a two-edged sword. I
want to compliment you. In your written testimony, you talk
about the partnership that you have with a lot of small
businesses around the country, 10,000 different that you
contract with to produce a lot of the material that you are
responsible for. You know, those are small businesses in all of
our districts, or at least in a lot of them, I guess. So I
appreciate that very much. I think that speaks probably to the
efficiency of how you have been managing the GPO, as does some
of the numbers that you were talking about, Mr. Jackson, I
can't remember specifically, but your budget's been going down
due to efficiencies and a lot of different things driving that,
so kudos to you for that.
But one of the things that Ms. Herrera Beutler brought up
was this contract issue for the Census. So I just wanted to, I
guess, hear a little bit more about that. Sorry to draw
attention to that, but does that put into jeopardy your clean
audit, the 23rd one may be at risk because of that? Just give
me a little more confidence that when you have 10,000 different
agreements with vendors around the country, how something this
major could happen.
Mr. Jackson. Yes. Thank you. No, that does not put in
jeopardy our audit. In fact, I have asked the IG, our GPO IG,
to continue auditing or investigating that particular
procurement. So they are still looking at what went wrong there
and ways in which it can be improved, and I expect to get that
report hopefully before I leave.
We have been working very closely with Census since this
has--well, all the time, but especially since this occurred. I
met, during the shutdown, with the principals at Census and
with the new vendor to ensure that everyone was on the same
page and everyone was comfortable. They--the new vendor, which
is RR Donnelley, have been working on this contract. They have
already made at least one deliverable. And we have every
confidence, both Census and GPO, that there is not going to be
any further issues with the Census contract.
The other piece that you raised in terms of the ways in
which we will make certain that this doesn't arise again. I
think the protocols that we are putting in place, the SOPs have
been developed, the new contract review board directives that
we are putting in place for all of our contracts, not just on
the printing side but even on the regular procurement side, we
are doing this to ensure that we don't have a glitch like that.
This one happened, but it has not affected the way in which we
continue to do business and we continue to make certain that
our contracts are awarded promptly, timely, and efficiently.
Mr. Newhouse. It has not.
Mr. Jackson. It has not, no, sir.
Mr. Newhouse. It should, shouldn't it? There should be
lessons learned here.
Mr. Jackson. There are several lessons learned. One is that
we should never think that a junior person, I will use that
term, should not have some type of oversight of contracts. Two,
legal should be involved in looking at awards of contracts
prior to them being made. Our general counsel's office has
worked very diligently, both the general counsel at Census,
Commerce, and GPO, have worked very closely to ensure that this
current contract works and that there were no glitches as we
saw in the first one.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay. I appreciate that. And I suppose a
clean audit is measuring different performance levels?
Mr. Jackson. They are, but they did look at it, and they do
look at the contract vehicles there.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay. I appreciate that. And thanks.
Mr. Jackson. We can also make certain that once the IG has
completed their audit of that procurement, that you guys get a
copy of that so that you see what their findings were as well.
Mr. Newhouse. That would be helpful. Appreciate that. And
again, thank you for coming here. I appreciate the
enlightenment.
Mr. Ryan. Great. Thank you. Thank you so much, Mr. Jackson,
and your team. We have a retirement gift for you, and that is
we are going to end this committee hearing right now.
Mr. Jackson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Now I can breathe.
Mr. Ryan. Exactly. Maybe they can take you out to lunch or
something.
On behalf of the committee, thank you for your years of
service. We may not see you, enjoy your retirement. We will be
in touch. And thank you. We may have a few questions we may
submit for the record.
Mr. Jackson. Thank you very much.
[The following questions were submitted to be answered for
the record:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Thursday, March 7, 2019.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
WITNESSES
CARLA HAYDEN, LIBRARIAN OF CONGRESS
MARY B. MAZANEC, DIRECTOR, CONGRESSIONAL RESEARCH SERVICE
KARYN TEMPLE, ACTING REGISTER OF COPYRIGHTS, U.S. COPYRIGHT OFFICE
Opening Statement of Chairman Ryan
Mr. Ryan. All right. We are going to call this hearing to
order, the House Appropriations Subcommittee on the Legislative
Branch hearing on the fiscal year 2020 budget request of the
Library of Congress.
Welcome.
The Library is an incredible national and international
asset. It is the largest library in the world, with more than
168 million items in its collections. In addition to books,
there are maps, films, photographs, musical recordings, the
collected papers of historical figures, repositories of oral
histories, and more.
While the Library's buildings are here in Washington, an
important part of its work is making its collections and
resources available nationwide and beyond. The Library now has
numerous collections available in digital form through the
internet as well as programs for schools and other libraries.
And its Congress.gov website is a preeminent source of public
information about legislation in Congress.
The Library carries out several other very important
missions. One is the U.S. Copyright Office, performing a
service vital to creative efforts in literature, music, the
arts, and science.
Another is the Congressional Research Service, an
indispensable source of accurate, neutral, and timely
information for congressional Members, committees, and staff,
with much of that information now being made available to the
general public as well.
There is also the unique program of the National Library
Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, which
provides books and periodicals in audio and Braille form to
almost half a million people throughout Nation.
The Library's request is for a net appropriation of $747
million, an increase of $51 million, or 7 percent, above the
current year. That increase covers things like needed fixes to
the Library's IT systems, improvements to the legislative
information systems for Congress and the public, a strategy to
better exhibit the Library's treasures to visitors, and some
interesting new technology to make the written word more
readily accessible to people who are blind. We will take a
close look at the request and see what can be done.
I also bumped into former Chairman Yoder this morning, and
he wanted me to pass along his regards to you. He is doing
well, and I think he misses being a part of how special this
committee is.
So now I would like to introduce our principal witness
today. She is, of course, Dr. Carla Hayden, the 14th Librarian
of Congress. Dr. Hayden came to the Library of Congress in 2016
from the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore, where she was
CEO. She has also held a number of other positions in public
libraries throughout her career, a career which started as a
children's librarian in Chicago.
Dr. Hayden is joined at the witness table by Mark Sweeney,
the Principal Deputy Librarian. I understand a number of other
senior officers of the Library are here as well and available
to help answer any questions.
Did we check if we are violating any fire codes with all
the staff that has attended?
But before we hear from Dr. Hayden, I will yield to our
distinguished ranking member, Ms. Herrera Beutler, for her
opening remarks.
Opening Statement of Ranking Member Herrera Beutler
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And welcome, Dr. Hayden and Principal Deputy Librarian
Sweeney. Thanks for coming.
The Library of Congress, as was mentioned, is a national
treasure that hosts millions of in-person visitors each year
and even more visitors on the Library's ever-expanding internet
presence, which is pretty exciting.
Its impact can be felt beyond its facilities here in DC,
and the Library's online resources and educational programs
reach schools and libraries in my home district of southwest
Washington, which is almost as far as you can get. I guess
Hawaii, probably, always gets to claim a little farther. It is
the repository of our Nation's history, and it is our
obligation to preserve and expand the collection for future
generations.
So I would also like to mention the importance of the
Native American special collections and how important your role
in collecting and preserving the history, stories, and songs of
Native Americans is to Tribes and, really, for all the rest of
us. Your collaboration with the Smithsonian's National Museum
of American Indians has made possible significant gains in a
traditionally under-represented area.
So, before I conclude my remarks, I would like to extend an
invitation for you to visit my district. We would love to have
you out and see the impact of the Library in our region. And I
look forward to your testimony and learning more about the
Library of Congress.
I yield back.
Mr. Ryan. Dr. Hayden.
Opening Statement of Dr. Carla Hayden
Dr. Hayden. Thank you, Chairman Ryan and Ranking Member
Herrera Beutler and members of the subcommittee. This is a
wonderful opportunity to provide testimony in support of the
Library's fiscal year 2020 budget.
And in my third year as Librarian, I am very encouraged by
the advancements we have made in sharing more of the Library's
extraordinary collections and our staff's expertise with their
commitment to public service.
Last year, the Library welcomed nearly 1.9 million in-
person visitors; the Congressional Research Service provided
custom services to 100 percent of the Senate and House Member
offices and standing committees; more than 450,000 claims were
registered by the U.S. Copyright Office and nearly 10 million
preservation actions were performed on the physical
collections; over 20.9 million copies of Braille and recorded
books and magazines were circulated; and the Library responded
to over 1 million reference requests from Congress, the public,
and other Federal agencies. And the Library's website,
including LOC.gov, Congress.gov, Copyright.gov, and the CRS
site, among others, received 110 million visitors and 503.1
million page views. Quite a lot.
So I would like to start by expressing my gratitude to
Congress for supporting our efforts. And I greatly appreciate
the support you have given us for the high-priority needs, like
CRS staffing, restoration of the copyright examiner workforce,
support for the increased costs of hosting the Legislative
Branch Financial Management System, and librarians and
archivists to address a processing backlog in our special
collections.
We have also been able to have support for our library's
collection storage modules, particularly at Fort Meade, as part
of the Architect of Capitol's budget.
And, today, discussing the fiscal year 2020 budget, we are
focusing on the fact that in the past year we have completed
organizational changes that have streamlined functions and
support a more user-centered direction. Our strategic plan is
in effect, and we are going with a user-focused direction in
all of our units.
The largest part of the Library that Mr. Sweeney is
directly involved in has now become the Library Collections and
Services Group that serves the Law Library, the National
Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, and Library
Services, the largest group.
IT centralization, with significant, significant
congressional support, is in its final phase, with staff and
funding transfers from CRS, Copyright, to the Office of the
Chief Information Officer, Mr. Bud Barton.
The strategic plan that was launched in October had four
strategic goals: expand access, expand our services, optimize
our resources, and measure our impact.
Our first digital strategy, which complemented the
strategic plan, was recently released and is featured on the
cover--and we are very proud of this--of American Libraries.
For the first time in many years, the Library of Congress is on
the cover for our new digital strategy.
Mr. Ryan. No picture of you on the cover there?
Ms. Hayden. No, but our staff members are in here. It is
really wonderful.
And so, the fiscal 2020 budget, approximately $803 million,
represents a 6.8-percent increase over the Library's fiscal
2019 enacted appropriation. It does include $26 million in
mandatory pay and price increases.
And the balance of the increase represents critical program
investments necessary to fulfill the Library's role and move
forward. The two top goals in the new strategic plan--expand
access and enhance services--aim to make these collections,
these unique collections, and the experts and services
available to them move forward.
And so we are very pleased to be able to give what is a
first look into a major part of our focus, in terms of
enhancing the visitor experience in our flagship building, the
Thomas Jefferson Building. We recently provided a first look
into the visitor experience plan. And we have visuals here
today. We are very pleased that the appropriation in fiscal
year 2019 to have a $2 million master plan has allowed us to be
able to present these concepts:
One, an enhanced orientation experience going into the
Thomas Jefferson Building that will include looking at the
Thomas Jefferson collection and then being able to be inspired,
as you are in that area, to look up into the Main Reading Room.
Also, a treasures gallery, where, for the first time, the
Library will be able to showcase the wonderful collections on a
rotating basis. And, as was mentioned, I am a former children's
librarian, and one aspect is the youth center and the
possibility of inspiring young people to be more hands-on with
technology.
The information technology requests continue on the network
modernization begun in fiscal 2019 by supporting hybrid
hosting, a wireless network that is more robust, and enhanced
network capacity.
We also have funding for Congress.gov, the official website
for legislative data. And that will support Congress's requests
for more functionality and responsiveness of that very
important technology.
And so our requests in this year advance our strategic
goals, continue on the modernization efforts, and we are very
pleased to be able to present specifics about the request
today.
I look forward to questions and would be glad to discuss.
[The prepared statements of Dr. Carla Hayden, Dr. Mary
Mazanec and Ms. Karyn Temple follow:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Ryan. Great.
Ms. Herrera Beutler.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
SURPLUS BOOK PROGRAM
There is a lot we could talk about. There were a couple of
things, the visitor experience alone, I am sure, we could spend
most of the hearing on. But I would like to ask about a couple
of programs that aren't as well known that I think they are
really a way to get the Library, library services, out into the
hinterlands of the Republic, such as the Surplus Book Program.
And this is something I wasn't aware of this until this
last year and had the privilege of delivering a box of surplus
books to Centralia Christian School in my district. And it was
so awesome. Books in libraries and schools are the first things
to go, with regard to budgeting, and those get cut back. And
you walk into some of those libraries, and you think, ``My,
there's not a lot here to excite and inform.''
And I think electronics can be an amazing tool. I use my
Kindle; I read off that. But the ability to hold a book, to
look at the pictures, to take the time it takes to read or be
read to, in terms of attention and processing, you can't trade
that.
So I would love--just for the record, for other members
present, what is the Library doing to further promote the
program? Maybe explain it a little bit and what is available.
And how can we make this program better to ensure more schools
and libraries can benefit? Because you have the books. How do
we get them out?
Dr. Hayden. I was very pleased that you mentioned the
delight of the school that received the materials. Because they
are brand-new books; they are not used books of any sort. They
are available through the process of selection for the Library
of Congress, from deposits from the copyright program.
And so you have that opportunity to have brand-new books
that are available for schools, for libraries, and especially
if there are any extreme circumstances, tornadoes, things that
destroy a library or materials.
And so, with the program, we are making sure, for instance,
that all new Members of Congress and their staff members are
very aware of the program and that, in our listing of services
to Congress, we list and highlight the Surplus Books Program.
I have been able to go to certain States where those
presentations are made, and it is very heartening. And so we
want people to know that we are going to try to maintain that
interaction with, as you say, locations that are more remote.
And that is one of the things in terms of our strategic
plan and reaching out and using technology. And so we will be
doing more with the webcasts of authors that are here, that we
will be able to--we have tested that out, and we can have
interaction with the young people in your State, and they can
interact with a famous author right here.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Oh, great.
Dr. Hayden. We also are doing more to strengthen our
resources for teachers so they can download curricular
activities very easily. We have been told that we have to
remember that all teachers don't have color printers at home,
they have limited time. So we are really trying to strengthen
what resources we have electronically that teachers can use,
librarians can use.
TRAVELING EXHIBITS
And, also, traveling exhibits. As we expand the visitor
experience in the Thomas Jefferson Building, we are looking at
a traveling exhibit component and even possibly bringing back
the 18-wheeler truck----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Oh, yes.
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. Hopefully three, one on each coast
and one in the middle, to travel to locations and actually
bring the Library to communities.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. That is great.
Dr. Hayden. So outreach has been a major focus, and it
means a lot.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I think that is great.
Mr. Ryan. Fantastic.
I know--and we have talked about this, and Chairman Yoder
and I talked about it again this morning, about the enhancing
the visitors' experience initiative, which is an initiative I
have been very interested in and very supportive of.
And I would note, for my colleagues who are new to the
subcommittee, we provided an initial $10 million for the
initiative----
Dr. Hayden. Yes.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. In 2018, $2 million for the
strategic plan, and the--or the planning and design. And the
remaining $8 million was fenced until initial design work and
budget estimates are completed and approved, and we look
forward to getting that information this summer.
VISITOR EXPERIENCE
We will need to wait for the plans in the budget, but I
think it is very likely the subcommittee will be providing
additional funding for the visitors' experience initiative.
And, needless to say, the timing and amounts will depend on the
plans and cost estimates and also will have to be balanced with
other competing high priorities that this committee has to look
at and within the Library.
In the meantime, let me invite you to describe some of the
exciting projects you are envisioning. For example, what sorts
of things would be displayed in the new exhibit areas? How
would that differ from current exhibits at the Library? And I
am anxious to hear about the youth center too and your vision
for the youth center.
Dr. Hayden. We are very appreciative of being able to have
a master plan. We have worked very closely from the very
beginning with the Architect of the Capitol and also the U.S.
Capitol Police, because you are bringing more people in in
different ways, security issues.
So those two entities but particularly the Architect of the
Capitol has been involved in selecting a design firm,
Pure+Applied, that has conducted over 75 interviews with all
types of stakeholders, particularly Congress, conducted
research briefs, best practices. We had people coming in from
all over the world, really, talking about how they display
their collections.
And so, in looking at what would be possible in retaining
the historic and beautiful nature of this building, the
flagship building, the Thomas Jefferson Building, 1897
building, it was found that there are four entrances right now
that people enter the building. The bulk of the people, 60
percent of that 1.6 million that come into that building are
coming from the Capitol Visitor Center. That is remarkable.
That was one of the best things that could have happened to
that building. And 20 percent of the visitors that are coming
in total are under the age of 18.
So we had all of that information. What we found is that
people were not aware of what the Library of Congress does or
could be or that it had a Surplus Book Program or Veterans
History or all the treasures that it had. They didn't know how
it came to be.
And so, now, the first concept is to have an orientation
experience, that there would be two ways into the building
initially, the Capitol Visitor Center and the carriage
entrance, the ground entrance. And people would come in
together, and they would look down a pretty interesting hallway
that would let people know that famous authors like David
McCullough and Doris Kearns Goodwin and Alex Haley had used the
Library of Congress. And we will have quotes for them, coming
in.
And they will see at the end--and there is a circular area
there that is actually right under the Main Reading Room----
Mr. Ryan. I did not see those pictures up there, and I am
like, why is she looking out the window? Because the Library--
you are the Librarian of Congress. You should at least know
where it is, right?
Dr. Hayden. Well, it is sort of an oculus.
Mr. Ryan. I got you. Okay.
Dr. Hayden. We are going to talk about an oculus too, which
is also round.
So they are going to look down a hallway, if you can
imagine it, and they will see a circle that will have the
reinstalled Thomas Jefferson collection that currently is on
the second floor in a kind of corner and you really have to be
motivated to go see it. That is the foundation of the Library.
And so you will be surrounded by Thomas Jefferson's
library. And then you will look up into an orientation oculus.
And I must say, we have been very--we love saying ``oculus.''
Mr. Ryan. Yeah.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Did anybody know what the word meant?
Dr. Hayden. We looked it up.
Mr. Ryan. I was going to wait until after the committee
hearing to look it up, but----
Dr. Hayden. Right. And it is view. And it is the idea of a
look in and a look up.
Because what we found in the research, and we really
responded to that, is that people--initial thoughts of letting
people look into that magnificent reading room, we were going
to see if we could let them step in. But we heard, and the
feeling was very strong, that that might disturb researchers.
It really might be too intrusive.
And so the idea of still giving people an opportunity to
look up and be inspired, especially young people. Because you
start at a reader's card at 16, so you can't use that room
until you are 16. But to look up into the reading room.
And then you can go to a treasures gallery; I mentioned
that earlier. The first time that the Library has a true
treasures gallery that will rotate some of the collections, the
types of collections. Some things will be there forever. The
Gutenberg Bible will come--but if you make a return visit, you
will see different things from the collections.
VISITOR EXPERIENCE--YOUTH CENTER
And then the youth center. And, yes, we have talked about
that, how do we inspire young people. We are concentrating on
the ages 7 and up, because that is an age where they are very
interested in nonfiction and facts. And in that area--that is
on the carriage level--you will have learning labs and ways for
young people to interact with our collections in a more
meaningful way.
And so we are very excited about what types of things could
happen in these learning labs. We have an extensive map
collection, and young people would be able to create their own
GIS systems using technology.
We will be using technology quite a bit in each of the
areas. For instance, in the treasures gallery, there will be a
tabletop unit, that if you are visiting from Washington State,
you see the map of the United States, you will push that, and
the Library's resources about your State will come up.
You also will be able to take--and Mr. Bud Barton is here,
so if I get too technologically astray, he will help me with
that. But you will have a device--if you have a device, you
will be able to put it there and download some of the materials
to take with you.
And the whole idea is to turn those visitors into users, so
that they know about what the Library has for them. And when
they return home, they will be very aware.
So it is very exciting, because the Congress's support of
the master plan has been critical for us to have the expertise
and the time to do the research. And so they have also given us
a comprehensive view of other things in the future that could
be built onto these efforts as well.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. Terrific. Terrific.
Mr. Newhouse.
Oh, Mr. Case. I am sorry.
Mr. Case. Thank you.
First of all, I am not sure whether to declare a conflict
here, since I am the proud son of a children's librarian.
Suzanne Case got a master's in library science from the
University of Hawaii and went on to a career in children's
libraries after she had seven kids. So now I get to say she's
part of the congressional record, so thank you for that.
FTE, STAFF RESOURCES AND RETENTION
Let me just talk about your people a bit, your staff
resources. How many total in all of the Library of Congress? Or
if you want to talk FTEs, that is fine.
Dr. Hayden. FTEs are very good. I mentioned Library
Services has the bulk of the staffing, and I am just turning to
the exact numbers. It is 3,301.
Mr. Case. All services, right?
Dr. Hayden. All services.
Mr. Case. Okay.
Dr. Hayden. That includes Copyright, CRS, National Library
for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, and Library Services.
All support----
Mr. Case. Has that been pretty--I am sorry.
Dr. Hayden. It has been pretty stable. However, there were
significant--and Mark Sweeney, a 30-year veteran of the
Library, can talk about some of the declines in staffing that
happened, I believe it was in the early 1990s. So I will let
Mark take over that one.
Mr. Sweeney. Well, we have been very fortunate in the last
couple of Congresses to increase the staff expertise in the
Congressional Research Service--those are both Temporary NTEs
as well as permanent full-time positions--and reconstituting in
the Copyright Office the examiners, which are so important to
clearing our registration backlog.
And then, within Library Services, this year we will be
hiring additional staff to work through a backlog of primary
special collection material.
But the overall staff level, about 3,400 altogether.
Mr. Case. And has that been pretty stable for 10 years or
so?
Mr. Sweeney. Recently upticked a little bit.
Mr. Case. Okay.
Mr. Sweeney. When I first came onboard at the Library of
Congress 30 years ago, we had almost 5,000 employees. So we are
considerably smaller. But, of course, technology has enabled us
to extend our reach, you know, nationally and internationally.
Mr. Case. What is your retention rate? Pretty high? People
come and stay?
Dr. Hayden. Yes.
Mr. Sweeney. Yes, we average about 200 retirements per
year.
Mr. Ryan. Look. Look all around. Look at all these people.
Mr. Case. I was noticing that.
Dr. Hayden. And I have to jump in. There is one--the
average tenure is 25 to 30 years. And we have working staff
members who have been at the Library 50 years. And so, very
long tenure.
And one of our concerns, in particular, with certain areas,
for instance, the request this year for financial services and
to backfill retirements in that area is critical, because it is
changing over.
Mr. Case. Yeah, that was kind of my next question, was, are
there pockets where you----
Dr. Hayden. Yes.
STAFF RECRUITING
Mr. Case [continuing]. Are having difficulty recruiting? Or
do people just want to work here and they will work here
regardless?
I mean, the private sector is pretty tight right now. You
have some pretty highly specialized areas----
Dr. Hayden. Yes.
Mr. Case [continuing]. Where you are really depending on a
high level of expertise, which is sought after in the private
sector. Financial services is one; IT is another. Are you able
to recruit now fairly easily? Or are you having, trouble in
some areas that you foresee a need for down the road?
Dr. Hayden. The difficulties or challenges might be more in
having the positions to recruit people into. We are an
attractive--and Mr. Barton might want to just--I think he can
verify this. In terms of the IT component, we are an
interesting entity to work with for IT specialists and people.
We have a number--and that digital strategy. A lot of the
people who were featured in that article are coming into the
Library because we have interesting challenges. And sometimes
that helps balance out, and they have more freedom to design
and work with--so in recruiting in IT, we have been fortunate
in that.
The financial services is just starting to show its impact,
and that is where we have the request this year for being able
to recruit in that area. That is where--we are really concerned
about that. We want to maintain our unqualified audit record.
And with some strategic retirements in the last year, in fact,
we know that we have to be able to be competitive in----
Mr. Case. And are you able to be competitive, given that
this is a government salary as opposed to a private-sector
salary in these areas?
Dr. Hayden. I think that we are very aware of the
competition, and so we present our positions in a very
interesting way. We are very----
Mr. Case. You are good at marketing. Is that what you are
saying?
Dr. Hayden. We present the opportunities for people,
because this is the world's largest library. And we talk a lot
about how different this is. And a certain type of person might
be interested in that.
So we are aware that we are competing, but we are trying
to----
Mr. Case. Okay. Thank you very much.
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. Get in there.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you, Mr. Case.
Mr. Newhouse, hate to interrupt you, but it is your turn.
Mr. Newhouse. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Dr. Hayden, welcome. And welcome to all of your folks here
this morning. You guys are always so gracious to us when we
come to the Library or ask for assistance, so it is good for us
to be able to reciprocate the hospitality. So thank you for
being here.
And I have to tell you, almost every visitor that comes to
Washington, D.C., I tell them they have to go to the Library of
Congress. The Jefferson Building is the most beautiful building
in the city, as far as I am concerned. So I just wanted to get
that on the record too, Mr. Case.
VISITOR EXPERIENCE--QUANTITY OF IN PERSON VISITS
I would agree with you that all of these things that you
are planning in the strategic plan are going to be tremendous
additions to the Library to really open it up to people and
really explain what is available there.
I think you said--you keep statistics like baseball does.
You have all these things, which is great. But I think you said
1.9 million in-person visits----
Dr. Hayden. Yes.
Mr. Newhouse [continuing]. Last year?
Dr. Hayden. And 1.6 million actually are going to that
Thomas Jefferson Building.
Mr. Newhouse. Is that right? Wow.
Dr. Hayden. That is the bulk of the----
Mr. Newhouse. Busy place.
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. In-person visits, are in that
Jefferson building.
Mr. Newhouse. That is just tremendous. It really is.
But coming from the hinterland, like Ms. Herrera Beutler
mentioned, that leaves 330-some-million people that didn't
come.
We talked about this when you came to visit me in my
office, and I just wanted to give you an opportunity to help to
expound on some of your plans to bring the Library to the
country. Because a lot of people aren't going to be able to
come to Washington, D.C.----
Dr. Hayden. Right.
Mr. Newhouse [continuing]. Or if they do, it may be only
once, and they won't be able to spend the time it really takes
to see what is available there.
So I love the idea of your 18-wheelers and----
Dr. Hayden. Yes. The Library has them.
Mr. Newhouse [continuing]. That kind of stuff, but there
are just so many important things available at the Library that
Americans should be aware of, and we would like to share them
with as many as people as possible.
So could you talk about how your strategic plan will
address that and how we can help?
STRATEGIC PLAN--EXPANDING ACCESSIBILITY
Dr. Hayden. One of the main ways, in terms of expanding the
access and enhancing our services, is to use technology
effectively. And so making sure that we digitize as many of our
special collections as possible and make them available online.
We have the papers of 23 Presidents, going back from George
Washington to Coolidge. We just digitized the papers of
Theodore Roosevelt and also Rosa Parks.
And so we are looking at and prioritizing in the staffing--
and we want to use this opportunity to thank Congress for the
40 FTEs that we received last year to process these special
collections and make them available online. That is one of the
main ways that we can let people have access to the physical
collections remotely.
Also, being able to put things like our photography
collection--we have Dorothea Lange, and we have all of these
wonderful--and be able to download, as well, visual displays
that could be put into rec centers or community centers that
will be similar to what the Smithsonian does with their SITES
program, their traveling program.
COMMUNITY OUTREACH--LIBRARY PROGRAMS
Our special services Veterans History, we have already made
quite a few contacts with veterans history agencies or veterans
affairs agencies. And we are actually visiting States and
districts to help local communities with oral histories of
veterans, and we will be expanding that. So we physically go
out to communities and help and train volunteers with that.
We mentioned our teaching with primary resources. We have
grants that we bring teachers in from all over the country and
then have them go back and be part of that.
We are networking with the library associations, the State
libraries of each State. And we are revitalizing the Center for
the Book that is in each of the States, working with the
humanities councils to do more outreach in that sense.
The main thing that we are also doing is to tell more
people about us, what we do, and that marketing that we
mentioned, doing more of that and being very strategic about
that as well.
So there are all types of cooperative programs and
services. Our audio-visual and sound recording, we just had a
program where we are putting up what is called a movie
screening room of non-copyrighted films that are available
online as well.
And we are doing so much to advertise the National Library
for the Blind and Physically Handicapped. We just had a public
relations campaign, and we have seen an increase already in the
number of people who are aware of that service. And there are
television and radio commercials that talk about NLS----
Mr. Newhouse. Oh, is that right?
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. And the intergenerational.
So any way that we can physically visit as well as that we
can use technology has been very effective.
Mr. Newhouse. I think one of my constituents, a teacher
from West Valley High School, at least from the school
district, participated in your summer teacher institute----
Dr. Hayden. Yes.
Mr. Newhouse [continuing]. Which is--I think that is what
you referenced in----
Dr. Hayden. Yes.
Mr. Newhouse [continuing]. One of your programs, which is a
great way to allow teachers to know what is available. And you
are continuing to expand that?
Dr. Hayden. Yes. And we use private funding for that and
grant-making for that----
Mr. Newhouse. Oh.
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. And that also helps.
We also have literacy awards that we give to organizations
throughout the country. And we bring them in, and they are
awarded for their efforts here in D.C., and they get to visit.
So being able to fund people to come here, too, and experience
it has been something that has been very helpful.
Mr. Newhouse. And I should say, her name was Barbara
Kipperman, and she learned a lot about how to share what is
available here. So it is a very worthwhile program.
Dr. Hayden. Well, getting the word out is one of the
things. Most people don't even know.
Mr. Newhouse. I am probably over my time, but----
Mr. Ryan. Go ahead.
LIBRARY CAPITOL CAMPUS BUILDINGS
Mr. Newhouse. I should know this, but I think I do, the
only physical presence that we really have of the Library of
Congress is here in Washington, D.C.? As far as----
Dr. Hayden. Actually----
Mr. Newhouse. Or not? Is there more----
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. No.
Mr. Newhouse. Okay. Okay.
Dr. Hayden. And there is physical presence in terms of
operations, and then there is the public----
Mr. Newhouse. Well, that is what I mean, the public part.
Dr. Hayden. So there are three buildings here: Thomas
Jefferson; the Adams Building, 1938; and then the Madison
Building that has, for instance, the Manuscript Division and
Prints and Photographs.
Mr. Newhouse. Which was very interesting to tour, by the
way.
Dr. Hayden. Very interesting. And the music department----
Mr. Newhouse. In someone's office, if I recall.
Dr. Hayden. That is something else.
And then the Adams Building, the science and technology
collections are there.
And so those three buildings for the campus.
The Taylor Street location for the National Library for the
Blind, we really would like to have it here, closer to the main
campus.
Mr. Newhouse. It is in D.C. somewhere?
Dr. Hayden. It is on Taylor Street. It is a rental
property, renting for 50 years, in fact. So we really have been
working to see if we can get that service closer to the main
campus.
And then there is the David Packard Center for Motion
Picture and Audio----
Mr. Newhouse. Oh, right. Right.
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. In Culpeper, Virginia. And that is
a magnificent facility with a movie theater, with a pipe organ,
and all of that, and they show films. However, it is somewhat
remote for people. That is why we want to have a presence here
as well. In terms of the treasures that we have, we want to let
people know about those.
So those are the three. And then we have overseas offices,
but they are more operational, collecting materials. So they
are not public facilities.
Mr. Newhouse. And no other public facilities throughout the
country either?
Dr. Hayden. No. No.
Mr. Newhouse. Yeah. Well, thank you very much again for
being here.
Dr. Hayden. But the 18-wheelers.
Mr. Newhouse. Yeah.
Mr. Ryan. Ms. Clark.
Ms. Clark. Thank you.
I now have to recognize my mother, since Congressman Case
recognized his mother, Judith Clark. She was a school librarian
and then our town librarian.
And I remember going with her as she was taking courses at
Southern New England University for her MLS, which not only
made me an advocate for libraries but also for childcare for
our students. While fascinating to her, not a place a 5-year-
old found particularly great.
But she also, in Connecticut, was one of the first adopters
of computerized systems in our town. She was very cutting-edge
for someone who had only used a typewriter for most of her
life.
VETERANS HISTORY PROJECT
And we have had some issues out of our district office with
our veterans, who very much want their history to be part of
the incredible veterans history project that you run. But
having to submit a hard copy by fax or by DVD that has to be
done by FedEx because it gets ruined under the Postal Service
is very cumbersome. And our veterans outreach staffer has had
veterans say they are just not going to participate, it is too
hard.
Does the funding allow you in this budget to create the
ability to have digital uploads from our veterans?
Dr. Hayden. As part of our IT modernization, that is one
area where we have already been able to look at a pilot project
for using mobile devices. And now we are in the process of
developing the requirements for how that would work. We have
heard that quite a bit, in terms of being able to have that
capacity. So that is one of the projects that we are really
focusing on.
And then, also, I mentioned earlier that the staff will go
out to districts, as well, and might be able to facilitate that
type of local taping and help with those types of things. So I
would like to follow up with you on that----
Ms. Clark. Okay. That would be terrific.
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. Because I think we could do more
immediately to help with that.
But you should know that the prototype was actually a gift-
in-kind from women who were children of veterans and really
wanted to donate in that way. They were software engineers. So
it was very helpful for us to be able to have that to know what
would be required.
But that is the next step. We have to modernize that.
Ms. Clark. And do you have the funding within this budget
to take that step, or would that be----
Dr. Hayden. Part of the funding would be in terms of what
the IT modernization plans would be and what we were doing. So
that is one of the projects that they will be looking at.
Ms. Clark. Great.
Now, from my staff here in Washington----
Dr. Hayden. Ah.
CONGRESS.GOV
Ms. Clark [continuing]. Lots of anxiety about LIS going
away, because of the ability to get more information than is
available on Congress.gov--cosponsors, bill text, et cetera--
and really the speed that you are able to get information----
Dr. Hayden. Yes.
Ms. Clark [continuing]. From LIS. So if you could tell me a
little bit--and I am sorry I missed the beginning of this----
Dr. Hayden. That is all right.
Ms. Clark [continuing]. If this is repeating your----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. No, I didn't know that.
Ms. Clark [continuing]. Repeating your testimony, but there
is anxiety that the more modern, faster system is being retired
and the clunkier Congress.gov is being preserved, and how are
we going to blend the best features.
Dr. Hayden. Now, we do have a request for that,
specifically----
Ms. Clark. All right.
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. In this year, to speed up the
improvements to Congress.gov. And Mary Mazanec is here, and Bud
Barton, to talk about some of the specifics.
But we will make sure that Congress.gov has enhanced
functionality as we move forward. And that is the part that we
are really very aware of, and also the speed in terms of how
things are authenticated.
Ms. Clark. Yeah.
CONGRESS.GOV--LIS RETIREMENT
Dr. Hayden. That is where Congress.gov has more
authentication.
And the legacy system, LIS, about 20 years old, and so it
was a very specific system, and now we have merged something
that was called Thomas that was the public-facing government
information source into Congress.gov.
So I hope that people--and we will be doing more to work
with staff to reassure them that Congress.gov----
Ms. Clark. I appreciate that.
Dr. Hayden. And I will have Mary Mazanec come up in just a
little bit, but on her way up--
Ms. Clark. Yeah, because it is $3.6 million in this
budget----
Dr. Hayden. Right. And that is----
Ms. Clark [continuing]. But the retirement is looking at
this summer for LIS?
Dr. Hayden. Yes. And so, with that, just to reassure you
that we will be making sure that that functionality and
increased functionality will be part. So, in terms of the
request, it is people and, actually, technology----
Ms. Clark. Great.
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. For people, in fact.
And let me introduce Bud Barton, our Chief Information
Officer, for their technical----
Mr. Barton. We will also be able to respond to some of your
technical concerns, but thank you for this question.
Obviously, we don't want to retire LIS before you, the
congressional user, is comfortable with Congress.gov.
And as Dr. Hayden said, LIS is a legacy system. It was
created over 20 years ago over several years. And it is highly
customized, driven by the needs of Congress. But it is more and
more difficult to maintain.
Congress.gov is actually a newer system, and it leverages
the advancements in technology to present the information. And
there are two parts to it; there is the public face of
Congress.gov and the congressional face.
CRS works in partnership with the Office of the Chief
Information Officer--and also Law Library has a piece of this;
they deal with the public face--to build out Congress.gov. And
there is a lot of effort to gather input from the congressional
user so that, as we design and develop Congress.gov, it meets
your needs.
CRS also provides support to the congressional user on a
daily basis. We take in questions; we respond to concerns. We
are also helping--well, we do provide some of the content. We
do the bill summaries. We also have hired people to work with
OCIO to define the requirements and to make sure that they are
incorporated.
As Dr. Hayden mentioned on another topic, CRS will be doing
a lot of outreach. We already have started providing written
materials, doing trainings, and actually making sure that the
congressional user is comfortable with the new website.
Ms. Clark. Great.
Dr. Hayden. And I think I mentioned that it----
Mr. Ryan. Do you want to----
Dr. Hayden. Yeah, Bud. Bernard, Bud Barton, who has----
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. You are on the record five times. You need
to come up here and----
Dr. Hayden. Well, and I just have to say, as he comes up,
Mr. Barton has led the information technology modernization
effort of the Library. The GAO reports 27 of the 31 public
recommendations have been closed and implemented, with the
remaining 4 at GAO to be reviewed. The progress has been
substantial. And he has had to help with CRS, Copyright, NLS,
and Library Services. So I will put that on the record.
CONGRESS.GOV--CONGRESSIONAL REASSURANCE
Mr. Barton. Great. Thank you for the opportunity to address
this question.
I would like to reinforce that the job of the CIO at the
Library is to make sure that the Library efficiently and
effectively uses technology. Our number-one commitment is to
Congress, and my number-one commitment on the retirement of LIS
and integrating into Congress.gov is we will not be turning off
LIS until we have the equivalent functionality in Congress.gov.
We have worked very closely with many Members' staff on
both the House and the Senate side to make sure that, as
concerns are raised, we address them as best we can, realizing
that a lot of the modernization requirements are not driven by
the Library but by advances in technology.
Some of the data sources that we receive the content from
that goes into Congress.gov--GPO, both the House and the
Senate--they are modernizing their systems at the same time,
and LIS, in its current form, is unable to take advantage of
those new data streams. So we have to do the move in order to
make sure that we can keep current with the data that is
available to show to your constituents and to congressional
Members about what is available for your use.
So my commitment is we will not be turning off LIS until we
have equivalent functionality within Congress.gov.
Where we maybe could use some help is making sure that
staff is aware that we are doing this effort. We have some
communications that should be going out to each of the staff
offices showing, you know, what our desired turnover period is,
asking for input on any issues.
As Mary Mazanec mentioned, we are dealing with questions
every day on, you know, how do we get this particular text
updated; this isn't showing up in Congress.gov. And a lot of
that has to do with these changes in how data is being routed
for publication.
So we are committed to making sure that Congress has the
data that they need and committed to making sure that we
provide the education necessary or training necessary to show
people, here is the functionality that you are used to in LIS;
here is how you get to that in Congress.gov.
So I want to reassure everyone, we are not going to be
turning off LIS until you have equivalent functionality in
Congress.gov.
Mr. Ryan. We have that on the record.
Ms. Clark. That is great. Thank you so much.
Mr. Ryan. Let me just say thank you to, I mean, your entire
staff, Dr. Hayden. So often, we take for granted, as we move
around and do our thing here and go meeting to meeting to
meeting, we sometimes forget to say thank you to the people who
make all of this possible for us and our staffs. So we want to
just say thank you. Very much appreciated by all of us, as you
could tell from Ms. Clark's question. You know, something you
are doing behind the scenes, and nobody really knows who Bud
is, but now--until now.
Dr. Hayden. They do now.
Mr. Ryan. We may start calling every employee behind the
scenes ``Bud.''
But we appreciate it. And thank you for all your hard work.
I am sure it is a big challenge, so thank you.
Mr. Barton. Thank you.
NATIONAL LIBRARY SERVICES
Mr. Ryan. I have just a couple questions. And I would like
to actually ask about the National Library Service for the
Blind and Physically Handicapped. So could we get Karen
Keninger, Director of the National Library Service, to come up?
Dr. Hayden. Yes. And we are very pleased to be able to talk
about also the use of technology in advancing those services.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. Yeah.
Dr. Hayden. The e-reader project, the fact that we are
looking at moving to a digital platform for delivering talking
books and that. And so Karen has been working very diligently
on that.
NLS E-READER REQUEST
Mr. Ryan. Karen, thank you. First, thank you for coming up.
The budget request is $2.375 million to support purchase of
Braille e-readers for users of the NLS system. And I understand
these e-readers are a new-generation technology that can
greatly improve delivery and reading of books in Braille. Can
you explain what these new e-readers do and how they would be
used in your program?
Ms. Keninger. Certainly.
The Braille e-reader is a device that allows you to take a
digital Braille file that is a small ASCII-type file and it
will convert that file, similar to what you do with a
computer--like, the screen looks at an ASCII code and it gives
you an "A." This would look at the ASCII code and give you a
Braille "A" in pins that--I actually have one right here--that
pop up and down so that it changes the display.
Braille is a six-dot system, there are six dots per cell.
These little pins, they just pop up and down. And they change
this way. And you can read on them.
So we have a digital Braille program already, in terms of
making our Braille available for download from the internet for
anyone who actually owns a digital device, but a lot of the
people that we serve aren't able to purchase them and so aren't
able to take advantage of that.
The advantages are significant in terms of cost for
production of hard-copy Braille as well as for the shipping and
maintenance of the collections and the bulk that the actual
individual user has to address. You know, a good-sized Braille
book might be six or eight volumes that take up that much shelf
space.
So the advantages of going to a fully digital Braille
program by purchasing these devices over a number of years will
allow us, in time, to have a lot more content available and
also a much more modern way of reading and using Braille.
Mr. Ryan. How many will this purchase? Do you know?
Ms. Keninger. That----
Mr. Ryan. The $2.375 million.
Ms. Keninger. I'm not 100 percent sure, but I think
probably about 3,500. We are in the process of negotiating the
final contract, and I am not quite sure what the price is going
to be. But I think that is a good estimate.
NLS BRAILLE & AUDIO READING BY DOWNLOAD (BARD) REQUEST
Mr. Ryan. Tell them the chairman of the committee is very
cheap and he better give you a good deal on them, right?
The budget also requests $5 million for replacing a website
called BARD with a more modern and usable system. Can you tell
us what BARD does, why it needs fixing, and what the benefits
of the upgrade would be?
Ms. Keninger. Yes. BARD is a legacy system which was
intended as a download system so that people could download
both digital Braille and digital talking books. And it has been
in place for about 10 years. It is not scalable. It can serve
maybe 50,000 people right now, which is about what it is
serving, and the need to expand it so that we can serve a lot
more people is why we need to rebuild it.
The architecture of it needs to be changed so that it is
scalable, because we are anticipating that the population that
we serve is going to increase as we ease access to people with
other types of disabilities, such as reading disabilities,
dyslexia, and that sort of thing. And in order to do that, we
have to be able----
Mr. Ryan. Cool.
Ms. Keninger [continuing]. To serve them. And, at this
point in time, BARD is not sufficient to serve an expanded
patron base, and that is the primary reason that we need to
expand it.
Mr. Ryan. How many people use it now?
Ms. Keninger. About 50,000.
Mr. Ryan. And you think it will go to what?
Ms. Keninger. Oh, a million.
Mr. Ryan. Oh, wow.
Ms. Keninger. I mean, that is the capacity that we are
looking for.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. That is significant.
Ms. Keninger. Because it will be scalable. It is cloud-
based and scalable, so it will be able to go up and down with
the needs.
Mr. Ryan. Uh-huh. And is there a marketing plan attached to
this once you get it cranked up?
Ms. Keninger. Yes. We are----
Mr. Ryan. It sounds like it, if you are going to go from
50,000 to a million.
Ms. Keninger. Yes, certainly. We will be changing--we are
anticipating, anyway, that we will be changing as we are
requesting to change the legislation that is our funding
legislation and also the certification requirements. And then
we will market that to the education community and to other
communities that have people that would be eligible to use the
systems.
Mr. Ryan. Uh-huh.
I think you mentioned it in your testimony, Dr. Hayden,
about this particular program. How many--was it 20 million that
you said, people accessing the services for the blind?
Dr. Hayden. We had so many statistics----
Mr. Ryan. You had so many numbers in there.
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. We were very pleased. The
circulation is about--that was the circulation of the
materials.
And about, Karen, 450,000----
Ms. Keninger. At this point, yes, about 450,000.
Dr. Hayden [continuing]. People that are subscribing to
the----
NLS--NETWORK OUTREACH
Mr. Ryan. Let me ask this. How many blind people are there
in the United States? Do we know?
Ms. Keninger. Maybe 10 million.
Mr. Ryan. Ten million?
Ms. Keninger. That is blind and visually impaired. I think
the blindness number is maybe 2 million, and the visually
impaired number--these are hard numbers to get hold of, but the
estimate is somewhere in that range.
Mr. Ryan. Uh-huh. And the goal, obviously, is to try to get
as many engaged as possible.
Ms. Keninger. Yes.
Mr. Ryan. And so what are the networks you use to reach
out? You mentioned the education network. Like, when you are
reaching out and marketing the BARD program, what are the other
networks you will interface with to try to connect to that
population?
Ms. Keninger. There are disability organizations that serve
people with dyslexia and other reading disabilities. And we
will certainly reach out to those organizations as well, those
networks.
But the primary network for people, especially people with
reading disabilities, actually is the education system, because
that is where the reading disabilities are diagnosed and that
is where people are aware of this need.
There are adults with dyslexia, obviously, and, aside from
the disability organizations, there is not a way to identify
them readily. But we are working right now with the Gallup
organization to try to find better ways to identify them and to
get a better handle on that. We actually have a contract that
we are working on right now to gather that sort of information.
And we will also be reaching out just to the general public
through digital advertising, and right now we are also doing
television and radio advertising, just reaching out.
Mr. Ryan. Uh-huh. Great. Well, terrific. Well, thank you.
This is really exciting.
Ms. Keninger. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. This is the exciting part.
Dr. Hayden. And another example of the use of technology to
enhance services that we already have.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah.
Ms. Keninger. Exactly.
Mr. Ryan. If you have any questions about this, just ask
Bud, okay?
Ms. Keninger. Bud is onboard with us.
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
Dr. Hayden. He is part. And that is the behind the scenes.
Mr. Ryan. Mr. Newhouse.
Mr. Newhouse. Just real quickly, Mr. Chairman, if we could
get a demonstration of the device that Karen had, that would be
very interesting.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah.
Dr. Hayden. We could. We could do that today, actually, if
we have time afterwards, because it is very----
Mr. Ryan. Okay. Yeah. That would be great.
Dr. Hayden. So you have veterans, NLS, government
information, digitizing collections. Technology is really--that
infrastructure is really important to us.
Chairman Ryan's Closing Remarks
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. Great.
Well, thank you to--Ms. Herrera Beutler, any questions?
Thank you. We appreciate it.
Dr. Hayden. Oh, thank you.
Mr. Ryan. We are excited for everything that is happening,
and I look forward to having further conversations with you.
Dr. Hayden. Thank you. We appreciate it.
Mr. Ryan. All right. Thank you, Dr. Hayden. Thank you.
[The following questions were submitted to be answered for
the record:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Tuesday, March 12, 2019.
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
WITNESSES
HON. CHERYL L. JOHNSON, CLERK OF THE HOUSE
HON. PAUL D. IRVING, SERGEANT AT ARMS
HON. PHILIP G. KIKO, CHIEF ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICER
Opening Statement of Chairman Ryan
Mr. Ryan. I call the committee to order.
Good morning. Today, we gather to discuss the fiscal year
2020 budget request for the House of Representatives.
To begin, I would like to welcome the officers and
officials of the House to our subcommittee hearing.
Testifying before us are the Honorable Cheryl Johnson, our
new Clerk of the House; the Honorable Paul Irving, Sergeant at
Arms; and the Honorable Phil Kiko, Chief Administrative
Officer.
Ms. Johnson, welcome back to the House, and congratulations
on your new assignment.
Ms. Johnson. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. We are very excited to have you.
Ms. Johnson, you have joined a talented team of officers
and officials that work hard each day to ensure we have the
tools we need to legislate. These incredible teams provide
unmatched support in providing safety, security,
administrative/technical consulting, and legislative solutions
to all Members and their staff.
Congratulations again, and I look forward to working with
you during this legislative year.
Before we start with the testimonies, I would like to take
time to thank all the officers, officials, and their staffs for
the extraordinary work over the past year and especially during
the massive transition to the 116th Congress.
The transition of a Congress affects everyone in the House.
Each transition brings its own unique challenges, and even more
so when there is a change in majority. This transition was one
of the largest, and I applaud each of your teams' efforts in
making the 116th congressional transition seamless, quick, and
manageable, even if it maybe didn't seem seamless, quick, and
manageable to you. Just as long as it looks that way on the
outside, I guess, is all that matters. So thank you for your
hard work.
Now, let's get started with the work of this subcommittee.
The fiscal year 2020 budget request for the House of
Representatives is $1.4 billion. This request will allow us
Members an opportunity to retain and hire the best and
brightest. The work we do here is important, and it requires a
certain set of skills to negotiate legislation that will move
our country forward.
This request also includes funding that will help us to
maintain and grow our physical and cybersecurity postures, two
areas that remain a top priority for this committee. Later this
morning, we will hear from the Capitol Police.
Lastly, this request includes funding for the newly
established Offices of Diversity and Inclusion and
Whistleblower Ombudsman.
Overall, this request stands to provide Members and
committees the resources necessary for us to represent our
constituents by effecting policy and implementing laws that
will address our country's critical needs.
With that in mind, I look forward to each of your
testimonies today.
At this time, I will yield to my colleague, Ranking Member
Jamie Herrera Beutler.
Opening Statement of Ranking Member Herrera Beutler
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Welcome, Cheryl Johnson, the Clerk of the House.
Ms. Johnson. Thank you.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Congratulations on your new position.
And I appreciate you taking the time--I know we didn't get to
connect last week, but for reaching out to come in. I
understand this isn't your first stint in public service. In
fact, you have served in a number of different roles. But we
welcome you here in this role.
And welcome back, Paul Irving, Sergeant at Arms. I didn't
have the pleasure of connecting with you. Would love to do
that.
And, Chief Administrative Officer, Mr. Kiko, nice to see
you again.
The fiscal year 2020 budget request for the House agencies
is $1.356 billion, which is $123 million over the current
enacted levels. And this is the largest request for the House
since I got here, actually, in 2011--not 17 years ago.
I like to give him a hard time.
Mr. Ryan. Here we go.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Because someday someone is going to do
it to me, right?
Mr. Ryan. That is true.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So what goes around comes around.
Much of the work each of your offices do on a daily basis
is obviously behind the scenes, but collectively you are truly
responsible for keeping this place running, including the IT
network--which is never sexy, but it is so important--that
allows us to communicate, and the financial systems that pay
our bills and meet our payroll, and the voting system that
helps us authenticate the legislative process. Without the
services of the House officers, we would not carry out our
constitutional duties as Members of Congress.
So, with that, I look forward to hearing from each of you,
and I yield back the balance of my time.
Chairman Outlines Proceedings
Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
Without objection, each of your written testimonies will be
made part of the record. I ask each of you--the Clerk, the
Sergeant at Arms, and the Chief Administrative Officer--to
summarize your remarks and highlight your efforts of the past
year to the committee.
After opening statements, we will move to the question-and-
answer period. During the questions and answers, we will, for
this hearing, adhere to the 5-minute rule.
Ms. Johnson, we will start with you.
Testimony of Cheryl L. Johnson
Ms. Johnson. Good morning, Chairman Ryan, Ranking Member
Herrera Beutler, and members of the subcommittee. Thank you for
this opportunity. On behalf of the Office of the Clerk, we
appreciate your continued support.
The Clerk's Office is a nonpartisan organization that
provides the procedural support necessary for the orderly
conduct of the official business of the House and its Members
and Committees. Thanks to your support, our office can keep
House operations running at the highest standards.
CLERK PROJECTS AND PROGRAMS
I will begin with an overview of what we do.
The Clerk's Office supports the legislative process, from
introduction to engrossment and presentment. Bill Clerks
process all introduced bills and resolutions. Tally Clerks
record all floor votes. And Journal Clerks produce the
constitutionally mandated Journal of the House of
Representatives and handle Presidential messages.
When bills and resolutions pass the House, Enrolling Clerks
prepare the official text for transmission to the Senate or
White House. Along with announcing pending business on the
floor, Reading Clerks convey bills and messages to the Senate
or White House.
We are hard at work whenever the House is in session, day
or night. Our role extends beyond the House floor. We support
Committees and Members' offices.
And in January, recognizing the importance of sharing our
institutional knowledge, we worked with the Parliamentarian's
Office and the Congressional Staff Academy to hold three
training sessions for all Committee Clerks. Topics included the
new Truth-in-Testimony form, which we prepared at the direction
of this Subcommittee; filing Committee reports; submitting
remarks to the Congressional Record; and Records Management.
These sessions will continue during the year.
Our Office of Official Reporters provides reporting
services for all Committee markups, hearings, and depositions,
as well as for many investigative interviews. These services
remain subject to increased demand as a result of expanded
deposition authority and oversight needs.
The Office of House Employment Counsel provides House
employing offices with legal counsel and training on employment
matters, including anti-discrimination and anti-harassment
laws, family and medical leave, fair labor standards, workplace
safety, and other matters arising under the Congressional
Accountability Act and related reform measures.
We also manage Congressional offices that become vacant. We
work with remaining staff to continue the office operations,
oversee district office leases, and provide constituent
services until a successor is elected.
And as detailed in my written submission, we perform many
other services.
CLERK FISCAL YEAR 2020 BUDGET REQUEST
For Fiscal Year 2020, we respectfully request $32.8 million
to carry out our existing and new responsibilities to the
House.
Much of what is new in our request would support non-
personnel items, primarily mandatory equipment replacement and
a modernization of the Legislative Information Management
System, also known as LIMS.
LIMS is a critical part of the flow of legislative
information. In a very real sense, it is what enables the House
Committees and Members to conduct legislative business and
allows the public to follow that business. LIMS gathers bill
information, floor activity, Member and Committee information,
and executive communications from the House and the Senate;
then distributes that information to the Government Publishing
Office, the Library of Congress, Members, Committees, House
offices, and the public.
As always, the accuracy and reliability of our data is a
high priority. We would greatly appreciate your investment in
this critical project, which I believe strongly would enhance
the functioning and transparency of the House.
Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Herrera Beutler, and
Subcommittee Members, in my few short weeks, I have gained
immeasurable respect for the more than 200 employees who make
up the Office of the Clerk, many of them carrying out duties
that are required by the Constitution. Together, we support
this institution that we are privileged to serve.
Again, I thank you for your support, and I look forward to
any questions.
[The prepared statement and biography of the Hon. Cheryl L.
Johnson follow:]
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Mr. Ryan. Thank you for your testimony.
Mr. Irving.
Testimony of Paul D. Irving
Mr. Irving. Good morning, Chairman Ryan, Ranking Member
Herrera Beutler, and members of the committee. I appreciate the
opportunity to present the Office of the Sergeant at Arms'
budget request for fiscal year 2020.
It is an honor and a privilege to serve this institution,
and I look forward to working with the committee as the year
progresses.
Although I submitted my full testimony for the record, I
would like to briefly highlight and update the committee on a
few initiatives that are either in place or in a planned
implementation phase before I mention my fiscal year 2020
request.
SERGEANT AT ARMS PROJECTS AND PROGRAMS
The Sergeant at Arms, in conjunction with the Capitol
Police, has enhanced security services, to include screening
prior to entry of our buildings, developed an enhanced security
focus to assist Members in this increased threat environment,
expanded security services in district offices and district-
based events, and moving the Capitol complex closer to 100-
percent screening by bringing all of the buildings into the
secure perimeter.
As I have noted, many Members receive threats and direction
of interest communications that raise concerns for them, their
families, and their staff. In light of these threats and
concerning communications, my office interfaces with Members'
offices seeking security coordination for off-campus events in
the Washington, D.C., area, in their districts, or elsewhere
across the country.
My office works with the Capitol Police to provide a level
of protective support that is based on threat intelligence and
proactive criteria which may form the basis of an enhanced
level of support. Protective services can range from security
awareness briefings in the Member's district, to a request to
local law enforcement to support a public appearance by the
Member, or additional assistance in the Member's district by
the Capitol Police.
With regard to district office security, my office
continues to build upon the success of our District Office
Security Program that was launched in the summer of 2017. Since
its inception, the program has assisted 375 district offices
with the installation of intrusion-detection security alarms,
cameras, panic buttons, and coordinated local law enforcement
support of nearly 450 public events and townhalls across the
country. We have documented almost 13,000 outreach interactions
with Member offices.
Focusing on the Capitol complex here in Washington, D.C.,
we are working toward the implementation of House garage
security to ensure full screening into the House office
buildings and in line with the Capitol and Senate office
buildings.
SERGEANT AT ARMS FISCAL YEAR 2020 BUDGET REQUEST
Focusing on my fiscal year 2020 budget request, in addition
to my request for items required at the start of any new
Congress, my largest increase is a request for funding for the
Joint Audible Warning System.
This is a shared effort with the Capitol Police, Architect
of the Capitol, and the Senate Sergeant at Arms to replace the
aging wireless emergency annunciator system introduced as a
temporary measure following the events of 9/11. The system
components of these pager-like devices, located in all D.C.
offices, are beyond their end-of-life dates. Battery components
are no longer produced, and systems support by the vendor is
limited.
Seventeen years after implementation, the funding requested
will help procure a new, separate, non-cell-tower-based system
for emergency notifications throughout the House and replace
the system components, including 2,500-plus devices currently
in every office, meeting room, hearing room, and work area on
the House side of the Capitol and House office buildings, to
ensure that emergency voice notifications are transmitted via
secure radiofrequency to all offices and meeting spaces
throughout the campus.
As I have noted, my additional funding requests are more
fully contained in my extended testimony, such as an increase
in FTE to better serve those we support in the House, as well
as support for the 2020 nominating conventions, replacement of
GSA-rated safes for Members to store classified and sensitive
information, and Member and spouse identification pins and
congressional license plates for the 117th Congress.
I can assure the committee that my fiscal year 2020 budget
request has been prepared in the spirit of zero-based budgeting
without jeopardizing mission-critical services provided to the
House community.
Thank you once again for the opportunity to appear before
the committee. I am so appreciative of the committee's
unyielding support and partnership as we strive to maintain the
delicate balance between strong security and free and open
access to the Capitol complex. And I will be happy to answer
any questions you may have.
[The prepared statement and biography of the Hon. Paul D.
Irving follow:]
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Mr. Ryan. Thank you, Mr. Irving. We appreciate your
leadership.
Last but certainly not least, Mr. Phil Kiko.
Testimony of Phil G. Kiko
Mr. Kiko. Good morning. I want to thank each of you for
this opportunity to present the CAO's fiscal year 2020 budget
request.
The CAO is the largest House-specific organization, with
over 700 employees who provide a broad spectrum of services.
Our employees assist offices with purchasing, voucher
processing, logistics and asset management, technical support,
payroll and benefits, wellness, childcare, confidential
employee assistance, and legal representation.
CHIEF ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICER PROJECTS AND PROGRAMS
The CAO has recently taken on new service responsibilities,
such as administering in-person workplace rights education for
an estimated 16,000 individuals and standing up the new Office
of Employee Advocacy.
With the Chair's support and guidance, we have launched a
House-wide wellness program that provides proven offerings such
as mindfulness and stress management for our hardworking
employees. We have also started preparations to conduct a
comprehensive compensation analysis that will include diversity
data and better inform House employment decisions.
CHIEF ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICER STRATEGIC PLAN
In my written testimony, I go into great detail explaining
the CAO's implementation of its strategic plan, specifically
the progress made with respect to our customer, process,
stewardship, and employee goals. For me, the strategic plan is
essentially a wellness program for the CAO the services it
provides, new and old.
To provide exceptional services, the services themselves
must be closely examined, reevaluated, and revamped. We needed
to put a process in place to look inward in order to improve
the services we provide. Investing in our workforce is critical
to the CAO's success.
We still have a ways to go with regards to implementing the
strategic plan. Some Members and staff have indicated that they
have experienced improvements, through customer feedback that
we have received. I certainly hope that people here have seen
that as well. We are changing the way we approach service
delivery, adding greater emphasis to customer feedback and
greater consideration to this unique environment.
For example, we launched a totally revamped training
program for House staff through the new Congressional Staff
Academy. Training offerings include course on appropriations
law, official committee clerk training, House financial
systems, and leadership training for Chiefs and District
Directors.
We have responded to the overwhelming demand for food
service improvement. We recently opened a new &pizza and
regularly host multiple pop-up restaurants around campus. Au
Bon Pain is opening up at the end of this month, and we have
two additional branded sites we will open on campus the Tuesday
after Labor Day.
HOUSE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND CYBER DEFENSES
The CAO is modernizing, actively migrating House-wide
applications to the cloud, expanding internet bandwidth, and
improving data connections for D.C. and district offices, while
exploring ways to improve and modernize constituent engagement
platforms to meet the 21st-Century means of communication.
Last but not least, there is the paramount responsibility
of protecting the House against malicious actors constantly
seeking to gain access to House data. Every month, the CAO
blocks an estimated 1.6 billion unauthorized scans, probes, and
connections, including 300 million to 500 million cyber
attacks, and an average of 12.6 million questionable emails to
thwart phishing attacks.
In 2018, our cybersecurity office deployed nearly 615,000
patches and 3,000 malicious indicators to over 16,000 network-
connected devices. Investments in our IT infrastructure and
cybersecurity amount for nearly 60 percent of the CAO's budget
increase.
Just 2 months ago, in January, we witnessed a mass attack
against the German Parliament, the second one in the past 2
years. And with respect to Australia's Parliament this year,
investigators are looking into a massive, likely state-
sponsored attack. It is the cybersecurity threats that keep me
awake at night.
If you haven't already, I encourage each member of the
Subcommittee to visit the House's Cybersecurity Operations
Center. I think you would learn a lot. I think it would be very
beneficial.
The continued implementation of our strategic plan, the
hopefully noticeable service improvements and rollout of new
services, and, of course, information technology and cyber
defense remain our top priorities.
CHIEF ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICER FISCAL YEAR 2020 BUDGET REQUEST
In fact, if you exclude the requested increases associated
with mandatory initiatives, like Workplace Rights and
Responsibilities Education, the Office of Employee Advocacy,
anticipated COLAs and longevities, and critical information
technology and cyber infrastructure investment, the CAO's
request for fiscal year 2020 is less than a half-percent over
the fiscal year 2019 enacted funding level.
Of course, we realize we are competing with other offices
and the Committee hasn't received a mark. We would appreciate
your consideration, and we will move forward with whatever
amount we get.
The CAO will continue to strive for perfection. Nothing
less will do.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement and biography of the Hon. Phil G.
Kiko follow:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Ryan. We will begin the question-and-answer session.
Ms. Herrera Beutler.
WOUNDED WARRIOR PROGRAM
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
A couple questions, and I might skip around a little bit.
I will start with you, Mr. Kiko. The Wounded Warrior
Program.
Mr. Kiko. Yes.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So it is one of the House's, I would
say, most supported initiatives. In fact, we had a fellow who
participated in the program last year who has now moved on to
my staff full-time.
And I believe, last year, the subcommittee directed you to
report back on any recommendations to improve the program, and
I just want to know if there were any improvements or anything
new that you have discovered.
Mr. Kiko. We have been very aggressively attempting to
match up wounded warriors with Member offices. We are at an
all-time high of 55.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. We had tried for one, and the first
time I got one was last year----
Mr. Kiko. Okay.
Ms. Herrera Beutler [continuing]. And it has been amazing.
Mr. Kiko. Good.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So I think that is probably a result
of your aggressiveness.
Mr. Kiko. There is a process to get wounded warriors, and
we are aggressively pushing that process internally. And there
is room for more, so my only suggestion is continue to have
Members request, and we will comply.
LONGWORTH CAFETERIA ACCESSIBILITY
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Skipping over to a totally different
subject the Longworth cafeteria.
Mr. Kiko. Yes.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I just wanted to bring this to your
attention. I had a fellow colleague who mentioned it. And as
you are thinking about some of these other stations, there is
at least one place where you can order a sandwich, you go do it
on a computer, and then you go get in line.
I wanted to hear what you have to address customers who are
visually impaired or who are in wheelchairs. Because there is
no interaction with an employee when you order.
Mr. Kiko. I think that is a very good point, and we will
make sure that we will look into that. I know there are a lot
of disabled individuals that come up here, and I know that with
regards to people in wheelchairs we have in the cafeterias. But
I will look into that a little bit more--especially the
visually impaired.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. This is where you can only order using
a computer.
Mr. Kiko. Right.
I think it is, when you walk in, you can punch in your
order.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. This one was brought to me by one of
my colleagues, but I have been there when it was the sandwich
line. It is, like, you have to go order online, and I made the
mistake of getting in line, and that was a big problem.
Mr. Kiko. I will check it out. I will follow up, seriously.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. But, as you start thinking about
people advocacy groups come here all the time.
Mr. Kiko. Right.
DISTRICT OFFICE SECURITY
Ms. Herrera Beutler. And then I wanted to quickly, Mr.
Irving, discuss district office security. I know there are a
number of programs that you are expanding.
What do you offer for public events for Members at home, in
their home districts? What can they avail themselves of? So not
necessarily just securing the physical location of the district
office and the mail.
Mr. Irving. We coordinate very closely with all law
enforcement coordinators and ask each office, each district
office, to appoint a law enforcement coordinator to monitor and
coordinate security in the Member's district. And we do this as
a force multiplier because we don't have, you know, the Capitol
Police or staff to go to every district office.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Yes.
Mr. Irving. And we provide every law enforcement
coordinator with a booklet with information on--we provide
security awareness briefings. We provide templates on how to
set up district events.
And we do ask--if there is assistance required, we will
actually send people out. But we do usually leverage local law
enforcement and ask the law enforcement coordinator at the
district office to work with local law enforcement to set up
those events without us flying out. But, again, if we need to
fly out, we will certainly do so to provide assistance.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. And I assume you have a program for
outreaching to all the new Members who are unaware of where to
start on all this?
Mr. Irving. Yes. We have a very, very active outreach.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Good.
Mr. Irving. And almost every new Member now has a law
enforcement coordinator.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Great.
Mr. Irving. A lot of communication between our District
Security Service Center and those new Members.
GARGE SECURITY UPGRADES
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I have just enough time to ask about
garage security. The security renovation--the renovation wasn't
a result of your security request. Are you doing the security
upgrades because the renovation is happening?
Mr. Irving. They are really happening----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I am trying to understand the genesis.
Mr. Irving. Okay. The genesis was, right after I arrived, I
wanted to address a vulnerability that had been----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Yes. A very big one.
Mr. Irving [continuing]. Identified was the garages. So I
strove to implement security in the House garages so that
everyone in the House office buildings had gone through
security screening.
It just so happened that, as I was in discussion with
leadership and with the Architect of the Capitol on the
project, they said, we are undergoing--or we will be undergoing
a garage rehabilitation program in the Rayburn garage.
And I said, you know what, that is great. Because to add
security screening vestibules, it would be nice if we actually
built the vestibules out and the screening centers out a little
bit to provide and better accommodate the screening equipment--
--
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Versus retrofit. You are able----
Mr. Irving. Right.
Ms. Herrera Beutler [continuing]. To build in what you
need.
Mr. Irving. So the timing turned out to be perfect.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Okay.
Mr. Irving. And we are now in the process of working very
closely with the Architect and with the Capitol Police. For the
Architect, it is an infrastructure issue of building out and
adding certain things. For the Capitol Police, it was a
manpower issue. So----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. That was my next question.
Mr. Irving. Well, we have it all worked--since we have been
working this since 2013-2014 timeframe to build up Capitol
Police manpower to be able to staff all of the additional----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Got it.
Mr. Irving [continuing]. Screening areas and working with
the Architect----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Got it.
Mr. Irving [continuing]. So that, as they build out and
rehabilitate the Rayburn garage, we do both and they fall in
line.
And we are on track to implement garage security this year,
later part of this year.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Ryan. Great.
Mr. Ruppersberger.
HOUSE SERVICES FOR PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES
Mr. Ruppersberger. Sure.
Well, first thing, I think you all do a good job, and we
know you are going to do a good job. That is easy.
In my former job, I was a county executive to about 800,000
people, so I love coming back on this committee and seeing all
the things you have to do. And I really think, with all the
missions that you have, you have done a great job. And you are
responsive; you are dealing with issues. And, plus, you have,
at least the House side, 435 Members that are always looking at
you and having issues.
I want to bring up an issue that we had in our office,
only--and we have resolved it now, but I want to bring it up so
we can make sure that it doesn't happen again and we can set a
system.
I have a new staffer who has a rare disease, and so we
worked to address her disability issue to provide parking and
other accommodations. This was pretty challenging. When we
asked for help, we got a lot of pushback.
And the pushback on parking, you know, they were asking all
sorts of inappropriate questions. You know, they were not
very--they were not service-friendly. We got bounced around to
different contacts on a continued basis. And, eventually, we
were able finally to resolve it, but it took a long time. And
it was pretty frustrating for her, it was embarrassing for her.
And what I would think is that maybe we could have a little
bit of training or a point person, We have more people that
have disabilities. We need to really have a point person who
can get involved and not have to go through all the issues.
Look, parking is a tough area to manage. Everybody wants
parking; they come in and out. But when you have a legitimate
issue--and if you need doctors' reports, that is fine. Then we
will get them and whatever.
But I think we should develop a point person to make sure
that we could work this through and find out a way. It took a
long while and a lot of anxiety, and, you know, it was really
not the best service we could offer.
So I am just throwing that out, and any comments about it?
Mr. Kiko. I do believe that responsibilities for a disabled
person is diffuse. Somebody has this part, somebody has that
part, somebody has that part. I do think that somebody in the
House of Representatives, whether it is in the CAO or somewhere
else, should be able to figure it out and pass on the person
and then to make sure there is followup, to make sure whatever
issues there are with the Member's office should be followed up
on.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Yes.
Mr. Kiko. I am supportive of this.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Well, I just think we need a contact
person that has a little bit of training to deal with that.
Mr. Kiko. Yes.
Mr. Ruppersberger. That is all. And we have resolved the
issues, but it took a while.
Mr. Kiko. Right.
HOUSE CYBERSECURITY STATUS
Mr. Ruppersberger. Now, let's get back to the area of
cybersecurity. It is probably, other than nuclear weapons, the
most serious issue.
You said what keeps you up at night? Cybersecurity?
Mr. Kiko. Yes.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Yeah. How about spicy Mexican food? Does
that----
Mr. Kiko. Sir, it depends how old it is.
Mr. Ruppersberger. We have a dot-gov that, in my opinion--
and I do a lot in the area. I represent NSA, and I was on
Intelligence.
Mr. Kiko. Right.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Our dot-gov still has a lot of issues
that we have to deal with.
Are we starting to coordinate our dot-gov a lot better than
we were, say, a year or two ago? Can you explain where we are
on our cybersecurity issues?
Mr. Kiko. Well, I think that----
Mr. Ruppersberger. I know that is a broad question.
Mr. Kiko. All I would say is that in the last 2 to 3 years
there has been a heavy emphasis on upgrading our cybersecurity
capabilities. And it is always this conflict between security
and Members wanting to use devices and those kinds of thing
however they want to use them.
So we have been gradually making that better. And,
internally, are doing a lot of things to clear out a path.
CYBERSECURITY COORDINATION
Mr. Ruppersberger. What I am saying, you have all these
different areas and departments and whatever, and you have one
person in charge who might be more technically advanced than
someone else. Are we starting to coordinate that, the whole
dot-gov? And are we getting advice from other agencies, NSA?
Homeland Security, as an example, has a tremendous mission.
Mr. Kiko. No,
Mr. Ruppersberger. That is what I am talking about. Where
are we? Because we were really in bad shape years ago. Now,
have we started to improve? What are we doing about that? Do we
have a contact person who is going to be coordinating it who
has the expertise?
And where are we getting our people, too, who have the
expertise? Because everybody wants to hire them now too.
Mr. Kiko. Well, I know that Paul will have some comments on
that too. But we have periodic meetings with people from NSA,
the DOD, the Department of Homeland Security. They are very
involved in, even on our public networks, looking at things and
making us aware of intelligence.
The House of Representatives participates in Cyber Guard,
which is a red/blue exercise where you are being attacked----
Mr. Ruppersberger. Yeah.
Mr. Kiko. We have participated in that.
We actually have relationships with foreign legislatures
like Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand and European
countries on cyber issues.
And we share a lot of information with the Sergeant at
Arms, and they share information with us.
HOUSE CYBERSECURITY MANAGEMENT
Mr. Ruppersberger. I am looking at it from the management
perspective. Who is the contact? Who is in charge of this?
Mr. Kiko. We have a CISO. We have a Chief Information
Security Office. Catherine Szpindor is here, and she is the
head of it.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Great.
Mr. Kiko. And that is what it is. And it is fairly
rigorous.
Mr. Ruppersberger. And there are a lot of challenges there,
and----
Mr. Kiko. There are.
Mr. Ruppersberger [continuing]. It is changing all the
time, there is no question.
Do you have anything to say, Paul?
Mr. Irving. I was just going to echo, I think that Phil's
team does a great job. They work very closely with law
enforcement, with FBI, Secret Service, DHS, and others that are
sort of the cutting edge of a lot of the cyber issues.
So I will just echo that I think his team does a great job.
And I leverage my law enforcement contacts, as well, to assist.
But I think they are doing about as good a job as they can
based on the incoming threats.
Mr. Ruppersberger. I am getting the hook.
Mr. Ryan. The gentleman's time has expired.
The gentleman from Hawaii, Mr. Case.
HOUSE CYBERSECURITY STATUS (CONTINUED)
Mr. Case. First of all, I echo all the comments to all
three of you to thank you for your service. I have told you in
my office, the quieter you are, the better the job is, the more
likely we are to underappreciate you. So this subcommittee is
one place where we get to say that very directly, so thank you
so much for all the work.
You know, I would like to follow up on my colleague's
questions about cybersecurity, because, that was a lot of zeros
in terms of the number of attacks and kind of, like, along the
lines of a Federal budget, which is starting to be real big,
stuff. I actually had to look it up and see what was beyond a
trillion, and it is quadrillion. I forgot that, but, you know,
we are getting into that range.
You have a huge problem. I assume it is still accelerating
very rapidly. I mean, is the trend still upwards in terms of
the number of attacks? You know, this is across the board, but
I assume it is true with us as well, right?
Mr. Kiko. It is the number of attacks, and it is also the
sophistication of the attacks. People now have algorithms, you
know. And it is not just the number, but it is the intensity,
which is part of the number, but it is also how sophisticated
the attacks are. And many of the attacks are from nation-
states.
Mr. Case. Well, that is my next question, because you can
say that without qualification, that you believe some of those
attacks are nation-state----
Mr. Kiko. Yes.
Mr. Case [continuing]. Sponsored or -directed or actual
nation-state attacks?
Mr. Kiko. Yes.
Mr. Case. Okay. And those, obviously, are coordinated with
the rest of our government, right?
Mr. Kiko. Yeah, we do that. And part of our defense
mechanisms is just trying to figure out if they are from
nation-states or from hacktivists or whatever. But we are on
that, yes.
And we coordinate, like I was just saying, with a lot of
government agencies that help us to identify things too, in
advance. We don't want to be 2 weeks, 3 weeks late with
something happening. We want to have real-time information.
CYBERSECURITY BUDGET REQUEST AND OUTYEAR PLANS
Mr. Case. Now, knowing that this is obviously an incredibly
serious issue, as we saw with Australia, and knowing that they
are accelerating, knowing that the sophistication is
increasing, a very direct question is: Do you think you have
the adequate funding to maximize the protections that we need?
What is behind your specific funding request in this
department, in this area?
Mr. Kiko. Well, we are requesting $11 million for HIR,
House Information Resources. Most of that is related to
cybersecurity. A specific amount, $2.9 million, is for the
specific Office of Cybersecurity to increase contractors, and
those kinds of things, so we have the most up-to-date people
and resources.
And then, also, the other part of our request, while it is
for House-wide kinds of issues, it is to move into the cloud.
If we move into the cloud, then that is a lot more secure than
not moving into the cloud. And you can also have a lot more
security enhancements go right away to Members. Because a lot
of times we see malware and then we have to do a patch on
somebody's computer. And you want to have that done real-time.
So we believe that the request that we have is adequate,
but I am not going to say we couldn't use more. But I think we
are just not throwing money at it. Part of the issue is how we
use computers and software and hardware and devices on campus
as well.
Mr. Case. Is your funding request based on--I assume it is
based on some kind of a master plan for how to fully protect
the Legislative Branch from cyber attacks?
Mr. Kiko. Yes.
Mr. Case. And so you have a plan, and you have very
specific priorities in that plan. And those priorities are
priced out. And are all of those priorities priced out in your
budget?
Mr. Kiko. Well, in our plan--and it is not a plan just for
this year, but for the next 3 or 4 years. So we do have a plan,
and I don't know if it is totally priced out yet because the
threat changes. But we do have a plan, correct.
Mr. Case. As you understand it today, looking out into the
future, this appropriation request reflects your plan
priorities?
Mr. Kiko. That is correct.
Mr. Case. Okay. So you haven't somehow censored what you
are asking for based on an expectation or anything else. I
mean, this is what you think we need to get the job done.
Mr. Kiko. Right. And I had lengthy internal meetings on
this, and this is what people recommended to me. And I accepted
those recommendations. These are the professionals in this area
and this is what they thought they needed, so this is why the
request was put forward.
I didn't say, no, I only want this kind of increase or that
kind of increase. I said, tell me what you need.
CYBERSECURITY IN OTHER NATIONS
Mr. Case. Yes. Thank you.
So I think you said you are in touch with other
parliaments, et cetera, across the world. So, in the case of
Australia, which seems to be about the most egregious, direct,
good example of what can happen, are there lessons learned
there and incorporated into our plan?
Mr. Kiko. Well, they are still trying to assess it. So we
have visited Australia and we are in touch with them, but we
don't know what the lessoned learned are yet. Because I just
checked on this, and this only happened, like, 6 weeks ago, so
they are trying to figure out what happened and how they are
going to fix it. And we are still in touch with them on it.
Mr. Case. Okay.
Mr. Kiko. I do know last year that there was an incident in
Great Britain where there was a hack attack. And the fact that
they told us the day before that this is happening, we were
able to then stop the similar kind of attack that would have
happened against the House of Representatives.
Mr. Case. Okay. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. Thanks.
Just to follow that line of questioning, do we know who was
trying to do this in Great Britain and Australia?
Mr. Kiko. Well, I think in Great Britain----
Mr. Ryan. Was it state-sponsored?
Mr. Kiko. I don't--I am not sure. I don't think it was
state-sponsored.
Is that----
Ms. Szpindor. I think it was, but I don't think that it has
been divulged that much, as to who it is. We have ideas, and we
have had some private conversations with them, but----
Mr. Kiko. But it is not----
Ms. Szpindor. Public.
Mr. Kiko [continuing]. Clear.
Mr. Ryan. Uh-huh.
Mr. Kiko. I think they--you know, Australia has a pretty
good idea that it was state-sponsored, but----
HOUSE CYBERSECURITY STATUS (CONTINUED)
Mr. Ryan. Can you repeat those numbers in your testimony
about how often this is happening to the House?
Mr. Kiko. Let's see here.
I would just--because there is so much interest in cyber,
why don't we just pass this out too? I am sure you have seen
many of these, but this is something we shared at New Member
orientation.
[The information follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
HOUSE CYBERSECURITY STATUS (CONTINUED)
Mr. Kiko. Let me get these numbers. It is 300 million to
500 million cyber attacks each month.
And then we have 1.6 billion unauthorized scans, probes,
and connections. So if you are a sophisticated cyber person
that is trying to figure out what to do, you first probe, then
you scan, and then you try to connect. And so it is a very
structured kind of way in which to get in. Sometimes it is
brute force, you know, you just go after it with brute force,
but sometimes it is a lot more sophisticated.
And then we stopped 12.6 million questionable emails. That
is the phishing attempts. That is still the most popular way to
get in a network, is through phishing. People answer in an
email. But now it is even getting more sophisticated because
they copy an email and then they send it, and you are not even
sure if it is correct or not.
And we are actually working--because in the Members'
offices, there are scheduling people and press people. We are
trying to have software that we could develop that is more
sophisticated against phishing. We are trying to figure out
ways to more comply with the needs of the Members' offices
rather than just stopping. You know, you can't see that. We are
trying to figure out ways to do that.
Mr. Ryan. Uh-huh.
Mr. Kiko. Does that make sense?
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. No, that makes sense.
One of the things--I just read an article the other day
about the Chinese--we don't want to get into a bunch of
classified stuff here, but--having the ability to, I guess,
access our networks here. And some of the technology we are
using--not we, the House, but in the United States--using some
of their technology that may open the door for them.
One of the questions I have is with these, the ability for
someone to turn on our microphones, turn on our cameras, listen
to conversations. Is that something--because, obviously, a lot
of this runs through your office as well. Is that something
that you are exploring, on technologies that could help through
hardware to protect Members' privacy and some of the, you know,
discussions that we may be having?
Mr. Kiko. Yeah, we are. We are trying to--I mean, you are
thinking about it as an insider kind of threat because of how
stuff is used?
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. Just the ability for some nefarious actor
to hack into our speakers on our phones, our cameras on our
phones.
Mr. Kiko. Well, that is sort of the next wave, what they
are looking at now. The cyber threat now is emerging into
mobile devices. We also, even up here in the House, we are
trying to close off ports in committee hearing rooms so people
can't plug in the network when somebody is not here.
But we do have it. It is the future, what you are talking
about. And, of course, we are looking at that, and that is part
of our plan. We are trying to have a more secure mobile network
up here. We are working on that as we speak.
Mr. Ryan. Okay. I appreciate it.
You know, thank you for your leadership on this. I can't
imagine dealing with this day-in and day-out. Because we leave
this hearing and we try to help you as much as we can and then
we go about our business, and you and your team are dealing
with this day-in and day-out. So we appreciate it. So thank you
for your----
CYBERSECURITY STAFFING AND TRAINING
Mr. Kiko. I just wanted to also say, partially in response
to Congressman Ruppersberger's question, we do try to hire the
brightest and the best, whether it is contractors or we have
people that used to work in the intelligence community, you
know. And that is what we try to do.
And we have a lot of people that actually want to work here
in the House. They want to protect the House, because they have
this sense of duty. And so that is what we are trying to do. I
don't think we have had a problem in hiring these kind of
people.
And we are constantly trying to stay up to speed, I mean,
not be 5 years old in training and everything else. So that is
what I would say.
LEGISLATIVE INFORMATION MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. I appreciate it.
One last question before we go to the final round. I want
to ask Ms. Johnson, for your fiscal year 2020 request, it
includes $3 million for Phase 3 of the modernization, which we
talked about the other day in my office, for the LIMS system.
This is obviously important, critical for legislative
operations. It is my understanding the system is about 30 years
old and requires redevelopment to be reliable and strong.
Can you discuss the goals of Phase 3? And what is planned
to be accomplished in Phase 4 and then Phase 5?
Ms. Johnson. Phase 3 would make the system more nimble.
LIMS is a repository that is used by both the House and the
Senate, and Phase 3 would give us every aspect of a bill, from
enrollment to engrossment, and also help with the reporting of
the Committee reports, the floor reports, Senate action, as
well as executive action. And, as I testified, Phase 3 would
cost about $3.1 million for FY2020 and FY2021.
Mr. Ryan. And then how about the projected costs for Phase
4 and 5? Do you have an idea?
Ms. Johnson. The continuation of Phase 3 as well as Phases
4 and 5 would be another $3.4 million. The five phases should
be completed in 2024. The $3.1 million would be for fiscal
years 2020 and 2021. We would not ask for more money until
fiscal year 2022. And then Phase 5 would begin in fiscal year
2023 and be completed in fiscal year 2024.
Mr. Ryan. So it would be $3 million for 4 and 5.
Ms. Johnson. $3.4 million for the continuation of Phases 3
plus three for 4 and 5. Correct.
Mr. Ryan. Four and 5. Okay.
Ms. Johnson. LIMS will cost a total of about $7 million.
Mr. Ryan. Okay.
Ms. Johnson. We have already received roughly a half
million for Phases 1 and 2. We are asking for $3.1 million this
year, fiscal year 2020, and another $3.4 million in 2022, for a
total of $7 million.
Mr. Ryan. Okay. Great. Thank you.
We are going to do a little second round, a lightning round
with 3-minute time limits.
So, Ms. Herrera Beutler, you good?
Mr. Ruppersberger, do you have any followup questions?
HOUSE CYBERSECURITY STATUS (CONTINUED)
Mr. Ruppersberger. I just want to ask more on the cyber.
It is a massive problem, as we know. Just as an example,
China, who probably is the most aggressive with spies and also
with what they do in cyber, our Commerce Department estimated
that China last year stole from American companies, academia,
whatever they wanted, over $600 billion--not million, billion.
That is a lot. And, you know, it is something we are going to
have to deal with.
And, you know, Russia is as sophisticated as we are, and
they want to know what we are thinking and what we are saying
and all of that.
So, it is an issue that I think we have to keep talking
about. You understand it. You have expertise.
I am surprised you really have kept people, because I know,
even, like, at NSA, a lot of our millennials are leaving to go
with higher-paid jobs. And, you know, you have a lot of the key
people there in the mid-60s. So, you know, that is an issue
that we are going to have to really keep focusing on, as far as
the employees and the training and that type of thing.
My suggestion, and what you are saying, just keep working
what--your networking in law enforcement is really important to
keep dealing with this. Because other than nuclear weapons,
probably, you know, the most serious thing we are dealing with
is cyber attacks. And we have only have one destructive attack
in this country, and that is Sony. But once that gets started,
it could really be a disaster.
So, you know, I hope--and our committee will stand behind
you in whatever you need to do, as long as you are doing it
right----
Mr. Kiko. Right.
Mr. Ruppersberger [continuing]. In the cyber field.
Mr. Kiko. Right.
Mr. Ruppersberger. That is all I have.
Chairman's Closing Remarks
Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
Just as a wrap, Mr. Kiko, I am looking at all of the cyber
attacks, and I am thinking of the House wellness program as a
great antidote to, really, some of the pressure and stress. And
I want to just take a second to thank you for your leadership
and your team that you have developed.
I think my goal in this committee is really for the House,
the Congress to be on the cutting edge, as much as we can, on
how we handle ourselves, how we conduct our business, our
levels of efficiency, how we treat our employees.
And talking about being able to retain top talent and
staff, we have to compete with a lot of these tech companies
that are embedding wellness programs within the charters of
their organization as a component to being able to compete and
think creatively and not be living in a completely high-stress
environment.
So I want to say thank you to you and your team. You have
put together an amazing operation already in a very, very short
period of time with a very, very small budget. And I think it
is critically important, so I wanted to just take a minute to
thank you and your team for that.
Mr. Irving, thank you. We rely on you a great deal behind
the scenes. Although, once or twice a year, you are very famous
and in front of 50 million people. You are the most famous guy
that nobody knows, you know? But all the travel that Members
do, we know you and your team are behind the scenes there. So
we want to say thank you to you for everything you do and think
about when we are not thinking about it.
And, Ms. Johnson, we are excited to work with you as we
move forward here. We know you have a big job. And, as I said
the other day, we want to come down and take a look at the
operation. And we feel really lucky to have you, and
congratulations, and we will just----
Mr. Ruppersberger. And you have a good background.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. Keep moving on.
Ms. Johnson. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. It is great.
So this committee is adjourned. Thank you.
[Further prepared statements for the record follow:]
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Tuesday, March 12, 2019.
UNITED STATES CAPITOL POLICE
WITNESS
MATTHEW VERDEROSA, CHIEF, UNITED STATES CAPITOL POLICE
Opening Statement of Chairman Ryan
Mr. Ryan. I call the hearing to order for the United States
Capitol Police.
Thank you, Chief, Assistant Chief Steven Sund, Chief
Administrative Officer Mr. Richard Braddock, General Counsel
Gretchen DeMar, members of the Capitol Police executive team,
for joining us today to discuss the United States Capitol
Police fiscal year 2020 budget request.
The Capitol Police is an essential agency of the
legislative branch. Chief, your team is charged with keeping
Congress, its Members, employees, visitors, and facilities,
both here and within our districts, safe and protected from
harm's way.
The men and women of the Capitol Police put their lives on
the line each day to ensure Congress is able to operate
efficiently. You do your job so that we can do our jobs in a
safe, secure, but open environment.
Thank you, Chief, and all the officers and civilians of the
Capitol Police that work tirelessly to ensure the safety and
security of the Capitol complex.
The Capitol Police budget request for fiscal year 2020 is
$463 million, a 1.5 percent or $7 million increase over the
fiscal year 2019 enacted total. We appreciate your efforts to
develop a request with a plan to maintain operational
effectiveness while also considering the fiscal constraints
that we often face within the Federal Government.
Providing adequate resources to keep our Capitol complex
physically safe remains this committee's top priority.
That being said, thank you and the department again for
your service. I look forward to your testimony today.
Earlier today we heard from the House officers, including
two, the SAA and the CAO, which you have partnered with on a
few important initiatives that I hope you will mention.
And with that, I would like to yield to my colleague from
the great State of Washington, Ranking Member Jaime Herrera
Beutler.
Opening Statement of Ranking Member Herrera Beutler
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And thank you, Chief. Welcome.
I would like to take a moment to thank all of the officers
and recognize that you represent your team. You talked about
the guys and the gals in the field. We are so grateful to you
all for your service, truly. Your presence allows the visiting
public to come and experience their Capitol. And this really is
their Capitol. They have a right to be here, to see it.
As we talked about, this place attracts a lot of people who
may or may not have, mental health challenges and that may or
may not present a threat. That is a very real day-to-day
situation for you all and for your officers.
And I think sometimes we take it for granted. I certainly
think the visiting public probably takes it for granted, except
for when they stop to ask for directions, which guys are always
good about giving. But we just are very grateful for you and
for what you do and for what you stand for.
I know that you are asked to continually expand your role,
from securing the O'Neill House Office Building to garage
security, which we discussed previously, to more screeners, to
additional dignitary protection, and the list just goes on.
So we appreciate your leadership and your efforts in trying
to meet these additional responsibilities, as always under
fiscal responsibility, and at the same time making sure the
day-to-day operations of the department are not in any way
compromised but are not just adequate, but do a successful and
superb job.
So we look forward to your testimony today.
And with that, I yield back.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
Opening Statement of Ms. Granger
Ms. Granger, would you have some----
Ms. Granger. I will just be very, very brief. Thank you
both for putting this hearing together.
And Ms. Herrera Beutler said it beautifully, we all depend
on you. I have been here nearly 22 years, and it is always the
same, you are always there. You are helpful to all the
visitors, and that is really important to them, and to us and
to our staff. You do it in a very professional way, but just go
kind of the extra mile always.
So thank you very much for being here, and please tell all
your people that that is how we feel.
Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
Testimony of Chief Matthew R. Verderosa
The floor is yours, sir.
Chief Verderosa. Thank you.
Good morning, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Herrera Beutler,
Ranking Member Granger, and members of the subcommittee. Thank
you for the opportunity to present the department's budget
request for fiscal year 2020. Our collaboration with the
subcommittee and the Capitol Police Board has been key in our
success in achieving our mission.
I greatly appreciate the support that you all have given
the Department and for your inherent understanding of our
multifaceted mission to keep Congress and the Capitol complex
safe and secure.
I am joined here today by my chief of operations, Assistant
Chief Steve Sund, to my right; and the Chief Administrative
Officer, Richard Braddock, to my left; my General Counsel,
Gretchen DeMar; as well as members of my executive management
team. I am also joined by Inspector General Michael Bolton;
USCP Fraternal Order of Police Chairman Gus Papathanasiou, who
is truly a partner with us on many of our initiatives.
Overall, our mission is clear: to maintain the level of
protection necessary to balance access and security so that
Congress can fulfill its constitutional responsibilities. Over
the past year, our officers have screened over 11.2 million
individuals at building entrances and interior checkpoints. We
manage an ever-increasing number of permitted demonstrations,
which are approved for specific outdoor demonstration areas.
We secured and supported two lying-in-state ceremonies and
a lying-in-honor ceremony. And we managed responses to numerous
instances of prohibited civil disobediences occurring across
the Capitol complex. In addition, we investigated numerous
credible threats against Members of Congress.
Last October, our Hazardous Devices team safely contained a
pipe bomb at the congressional mail facility, 1 of 16 that were
sent to elected officials and public figures across the
country. The suspect was linked to several of the devices by
evidence obtained from the package sent to Capitol Hill. Our
work contributed to the identification of a suspect, which
assisted the FBI in apprehending him within days.
As law enforcement officers, we do not know what we may
face each day. We train and prepare so that we can respond to
any threat because the lives depend on it. Our daily reality is
that the Capitol complex remains an attractive target to
foreign and domestic terrorists. Each and every day we assess
all the potential risks and adjust our strategies to address
the various threats.
The Department continues to stay focused on ensuring that
we stay current on the latest issues facing law enforcement,
including new and emerging threats. We are working to align
these serious security realities with our strategic priorities
within the available resources.
Therefore, we have developed our fiscal year 2020 budget
request of $463.3 million, which is a 1.5 percent increase over
last year's enacted levels, with a focus on continuing to equip
and prepare our workforce to be agile and responsive to the
operations of Congress and to keep the Capitol Complex safe.
Our request includes base funding for 2,072 sworn and 442
civilian positions. The additional sworn personnel will be
utilized to enhance the Department's ability to detect, impede,
and address persistent threats that continue to increase and
evolve.
We are also requesting one civilian position for the Office
of Inspector General to conduct additional work related to
cyber infrastructure and financial audits. In addition, our
request includes funding for protective travel, the hiring and
training of new sworn personnel, new management systems and
technology upgrades, and required supplies and equipment.
This funding will also address increases in operating costs
due to the required protective services and travel needed to
secure the 2020 National Democratic and Republican Conventions,
as well as support the pre-planning and preparation for the
2021 Presidential inaugural ceremony.
Mr. Chairman, the type of policing that our officers engage
in is not typical of most police departments. Our officers
interact with thousands of people each day and do it in a
highly visible environment, and they balance this public
interaction with the need to be prepared at all times to
respond to potential threats and other emergency situations.
We understand that working for Congress requires both
maintaining an impeccable work ethic and accountability. In
this regard, I want to assure the subcommittee that my team and
I will continue to work closely with you and your staffs to
ensure that information about the Department and its operations
is provided in a timely and consistent manner.
I am honored to lead an organization that takes such pride
in our mission and great responsibilities that we bear. Mission
focus is key to our ability to be successful, to serve and
protect, and to ensure our employees go home safely every day.
Again, thank you sincerely for your support of our
department and our workforce as we carry out this important
mission. And I thank you for the opportunity to discuss the
2020 budget, and I would be pleased to answer any questions you
may have.
[The prepared statement and biography of Matthew R.
Verderosa follow:]
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Mr. Ryan. Great. Thank you, Chief. We do appreciate all the
time and effort you provide. So we are very thankful.
GARAGE SECURITY AND SCREENING
Mr. Ryan. Do you have any questions?
Ms. Granger. I just have one. There is a vulnerability that
I know you are familiar with and that is the garages. I noticed
the garages and staff can come in without really being properly
screened into those garages. I know it has to be an enormous
headache. But is there a plan? Or I know you are doing some
upgrading to the garages. Give me some assurance of what is
going on.
Chief Verderosa. Absolutely, ma'am.
This vulnerability has been known for many, many years.
Under the leadership of the Capitol Police Board, we have
designed a plan to mitigate those vulnerabilities, and in
conjunction with the Architect's renovation of Rayburn and
Cannon, we should have full security on board and running by
the end of the fiscal year at the latest.
We have already started garage security in the underground
garages, the Ford Building, and the O'Neill Building garages.
The two pieces that are left are Rayburn and Cannon, and we
have plans to implement that security. Part of the multi-year
security initiatives, over the last 3 years for the Capitol
Police Board has been to acquire and train those personnel to
staff that requirement.
Ms. Granger. Give me a little more information, because are
they going to be screened as they come in or you will have
security in the garages? That is very different.
Chief Verderosa. What will happen is that the vehicles
entering the checkpoint will be cursorily screened. Once the
driver of the vehicle parks their car they will be fully
screened at the lobby before entering the building, which will
match the screening you see at any access point. We have a
formula for screening. It is an x-ray machine and magnetometer
trace detection system. Before individuals can move beyond the
lobby they will have to submit to screening.
Ms. Granger. I recently took a trip to our southern border
having to do with the border security, and in one of the points
of entrance they had technology that they went through very
quickly with the cars. They were expecting 32,000 cars a day.
So it was something that was really good, but least intrusive.
Our staffs are so good and they work very hard, and so to
slow them down and all that, I hope that some of that
technology is considered, because it really was something that
they allowed all those cars to go through, but the screening
that was done was very professional.
Chief Verderosa. I appreciate that.
And I think you will find, and we experienced this with the
HUGs, the House underground garages, that we anticipated long
lines and a lot of congestion. But what we found was that
people typically come in in a staggered fashion and they don't
all come in at once. Now, granted the heaviest period of time
is generally 8:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m.
We staff, as you may know, at the corner of the Rayburn
Building at Washington and C Streets, facilitating vehicles
coming in. We engage in rush hour activities, which helps
facilitate the speed at which we do that first cursory check of
the trunk and the vehicle and the ID check.
Once they get to the garage, it is sort of a filtering
process where it staggers. We don't generally see a large
backup, though there are days where you will see a backup on
the freeway based on other issues, traffic and the load. But we
adjust our staffing levels, particularly during rush hour, to
help facilitate that.
Ms. Granger. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. Mr. Ruppersberger, the gentleman from Maryland.
HIRING CRITERIA
Mr. Ruppersberger. I just have a question. It is rare, and
I have been here for a while, that you get so much praise in
these hearings. So if you got it, take it.
Chief Verderosa. I appreciate that. I am well aware. I will
take what I can get.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Especially police, there are always
issues every day.
From an information point of view, what are your
requirements to be hired? Do you have to have a 2-year degree,
a high school degree, or college degree?
Chief Verderosa. The Capitol Police Board hiring standards
were recently updated, so now you either need to have prior
military, prior Federal law enforcement, or 60 credit hours to
be qualified to go through the process.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Okay.
Where is your office, over by The Monocle?
Chief Verderosa. Yes, 119 D Street. A large portion of our
department is also in the Fairchild Building, 499 South Capitol
Street. We divide the responsibilities and locations.
USCP VEHICLES AND K-9 PATROLS
Mr. Ruppersberger. All right. And how many vehicles do you
have?
Chief Verderosa. We have about 200 marked and unmarked
vehicles for patrol. We have about 56 K-9 vehicles alone just
so we can properly care for our K-9 partners. And the rest
are----
Mr. Ruppersberger. Sixty-nine K-9?
Chief Verderosa. Fifty-nine--56, I am sorry.
We have a vast ability. The K-9s are a force multiplier.
Last year I think we did over 200,000 searches with the dogs,
whether it is a fixed post or whether it is for a head of state
arrival where we are securing a room or an area.
We also have 14 person-borne dogs, which also are out and
about in the population looking for people, looking for
suspicious things on people. They breathe the air that people
leave behind as they walk by, and we are actively seeking to
find the bad guy out in the public.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Has it happened before with----
Chief Verderosa. We have identified issues with
individuals. To the extent that we found someone who may be
wearing a vest with some type of device, that has not happened.
UNIFORMED STAFFING IN BUILDINGS
Mr. Ruppersberger. Okay. And on a regular day like today,
how many uniformed do you have in House, Senate, and Capitol?
Chief Verderosa. It varies. We have got about 150 officers
assigned to the House Division alone during day shift. We work
``X'' number, about 120 fixed posts, which includes officers on
post and break personnel.
The Capitol, on any given day we may have approximately 400
to 450 officers working in the Capitol for over three shifts.
But this encompasses 24/7 operations, so there are doors that
are open 24/7, which includes coverage for the House and Senate
Chamber, the officers that screen at the CVC, the officers that
are walking patrol in the Capitol that handle the lines. We
also handle the committees. We also handle all those various
types of things.
The lion's share of the work occurs on day shift from 3 to
11. We also have a midnight team that is here overnight. We
also have patrol officers that are out patrolling the streets.
We put a various number of----
Mr. Ruppersberger. In what parameter?
Chief Verderosa. On Capitol Grounds. On the general
jurisdiction of Capitol Grounds proper we are the primary law
enforcement department.
In the extended jurisdiction of the city where we have
jurisdiction to traverse a few blocks off the Grounds, we will
do that if there is a violent crime in progress or as part of
our routine patrol, because we know where Members reside. We
know where we also have----
WORKING WITH LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCIES
Mr. Ruppersberger. And do you support other law enforcement
agencies when they need help?
Chief Verderosa. If they ask for assistance, we will
support the agency within reason, absolutely. We have a very
good relationship with the Metropolitan Police Department. We
work very closely because we are inside the first police
district of the Metropolitan Police Department. We monitor
their radios. They monitor ours. We also work very closely with
the United States Park Police, our neighbors across 3rd Street.
A lot of the issues that come up overlap. We will have a
suspect who is wanted for something downtown who traverses
Capitol Grounds. We monitor those lookouts.
We will enforce a lot of traffic in terms of flow around
the Capitol. And the primary reason for that is there are a lot
of vehicle-type threats. We spend a lot of time and effort in
securing the streets from vehicular trucks and buses. You will
see our officers at all of the main four checkpoints around the
Capitol.
It is really a team partnership in the District. We handle
our responsibility, the Metropolitan Police handles theirs, the
Park Police handles theirs, the Secret Service handles theirs.
We work very closely on a number of issues, including threat
cases. A lot of times we will have a threat that emanates from
a suspect we have or they have that involves threatening a
Member of Congress.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Now, do you have enough resources to do
the job from your perspective, equipment, resources, cars,
vehicles, ammunition, all of that?
Chief Verderosa. We do. I believe that we do. We do work a
significant amount of overtime, which I think is a fairly
regular occurrence. It is a balance between working with the
overtime and then with the opposite side of do we hire enough
people to maintain the regular workload on top of new mission.
There is a balance. We also have to consider the infrastructure
and our ability to train, house, and equip personnel.
I think we are at a balance right now. I think in future
years you are going to see the Capitol Police asking to reduce
that difference as soon as we complete our current requirements
for the new initiatives.
SWORN STARTING SALARY
Mr. Ruppersberger. And what is your starting salary?
Chief Verderosa. It is about $60,000.
Mr. Ruppersberger. And in 5 years what would your salary
be?
Chief Verderosa. I can get you that number. It is generally
about 68, I believe. You get regular increases based on your
tenure. As soon as you are out of the academy you get a raise
and then every----
[Clerk's note.--Chief Verderosa responded for the record:]
On the officer's 5-year anniversary she/he would become a
Grade 3 Step 6 ($76,181 on the 2018 pay scale). The only
exceptions would be if the officer fell behind their class
during training or was promoted to the rank of Sergeant within
the last 2 of the 5 years.
OFFICER ATTRITION
Mr. Ruppersberger. The final question, do you have a lot--
because you are well trained, you have a lot of people, I am
sure other departments are always trying to pick your people--
--
Chief Verderosa. They are.
Mr. Ruppersberger [continuing]. On a regular basis.
Chief Verderosa. They are.
Mr. Ruppersberger. What do you do? Shoot them?
Chief Verderosa. No. You know, it is one of those things.
Congress has been very generous in terms of starting pay, pay
and benefits. I like to think that the working conditions and
the leadership retains people. I think money gets them in the
door, benefits get them in the door. I think the history, the
things that we see and do, really keep a lot of people.
We don't have a huge attrition problem. We lose about 60 to
80 people a year to retirements. Some people go to other
agencies. We regularly fill for those requirements. Right now
we are filling on top of that to complete the garage security
initiative. We have already put the portal scanners up around
the Chambers, which is one of the other initiatives.
And then the final initiative outside of the O'Neill
staffing was to have pre-screeners at every door and have
overwatch increased at each access point so that we really are
secure at the places we need to be secure in the office
buildings.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Okay. Thanks.
MEMBER PROTECTION IN HOME DISTRICTS
Chief Verderosa. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Ryan. Mr. Newhouse.
Mr. Newhouse. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Well, welcome, Chief Verderosa and all your team.
Chief Verderosa. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Newhouse. And just let me echo the comments that have
been made. I appreciate everything you do to keep us safe
around here. It is a level of comfort that I think we tend to
take for granted that you really don't have to worry about
things when we are on the Capitol campus because of your
diligence. So thank you for that.
One of my questions has to do with the level of comfort, I
guess, that I, my colleagues, and our staffs can be sure of
back home in our districts. And I just wanted to ask you about
how you coordinate with our local law enforcement agencies to
provide that, as close to that same level of comfort that we
feel here in Washington, D.C.
Chief Verderosa. Sure. It is a great question.
We do have pretty extensive outreach. We work through both
the House and Senate Sergeants at Arms for the respective
Chambers in terms of how we coordinate activities. Obviously,
there is the quality of life every day, your district and your
State offices, where your staff come to work.
So a couple of things that we can do, that we work through
the Sergeant at Arms to do for your offices, we can do security
assessments of your facilities. We can do security assessments
and security awareness training for your staff. We can do that
either in person or we can do it through teleconferencing with
your D.C. staff. We are glad to do that.
We also can provide you with some training in terms of
active shooter response.
One of the things that we do do in our Investigations
Division is--and Mr. Irving probably spoke a little bit about
it at his hearing as it is something we talk about regularly--
is coordination with your staff. We ask the staff to appoint
someone as the law enforcement coordinator for the office as a
collateral duty.
Our Investigations Division, at the request of your
offices, will do a law enforcement coordination for any of your
public events. If you have an event, if you provide us with the
schedule and the venue, we will do a workup. We will look at it
both through open sources and through classified information to
see if there is any type of threat assigned or assessed. If you
have any particular individuals that you know of who could be
disruptive, we will certainly look at that as well.
And then we coordinate in terms of with the local law
enforcement to provide coverage, should you desire coverage,
and that could be either through the local city police, the
sheriff's office, State police.
If we develop the assessment for a particular event, and we
find that it really is at a very high or moderate level, we may
even assign Dignitary Protection agents to that based on what
we find. We coordinate that through the Sergeant at Arms.
We have worked with some Member offices. We did about 460
to 470 coordinations last year in 2018. It is both out of State
in your home district, and it is also for events that occur in
the National Capital Region as well.
Last year we did between 95 to 100 coordination events here
in the National Capital Region for events that Members have,
and this year we are well on our way to surpass that number
based on a lot of issues, the timing, the baseball games coming
up, we provide security for those, practices as well, and the
softball game as well.
We coordinate very closely through the Sergeant at Arms,
and there are a lot of things that we offer Member offices to
try to alleviate some of those concerns.
Mr. Newhouse. I have certainly found that our local law
enforcement agencies and State patrol sheriff's departments
have been--I can't say enough about how cooperative they have
been in working with you and providing assistance. Is that
common around the country?
Chief Verderosa. It is very common for us. We find that
most agencies that we reach out to are perfectly willing to.
They just need to know the information. They really want to be
responsive. They see it as one of their duties and
responsibilities. And we have gotten tremendous support. We
were doing assessments prior to the shooting incident, but it
really came to fruition after the June incident in 2017 where
there became a greater awareness and more Members were taking
advantage of that. And we encourage that.
We do community outreach within the buildings and stop by
your offices to try to just let people know what services we do
have that we can provide. Certainly, we can make the rounds and
make sure that everyone is aware of what we do so that you are
better informed and you can have more access to the things that
we offer.
Mr. Newhouse. You said something about 460 events that you
have done assessments for in the last year?
Chief Verderosa. That is right.
Mr. Newhouse. So is that--because there is 435 just of us.
Does that happen at our request or are you----
Chief Verderosa. Typically it is Member requests. In our
routine review of events and issues that are taking place, if
we find an event that is going to happen, if we see that there
is a demonstration that is going to impact your office, we will
reach out to your staff.
Mr. Newhouse. So you are being proactive about that?
Chief Verderosa. Unsolicited, yes. We proactively do it.
Most of the arranged Member security events at off-campus
events come through as a partnership between your staff and
through the Sergeant at Arms and the Capitol Police. There are
some Members that take great advantage of those services, and
there are others that have yet to take advantage of that, and
we are always striving to reach out to those Members.
AVERAGE SWORN LENGTH OF SERVICE
Mr. Newhouse. Okay. We need to get the word out.
Mr. Ruppersberger asked a record number of questions in a
short time, but one thing that he almost got to, I was going to
ask you, it is a unique service, the Capitol Police, and I
would think--you mentioned a lot of the different things that
attract and keep people here. But what is the average length of
service of a member of your force?
Chief Verderosa. Well, we have quite a few retirees. You
know, it is interesting, we have had some officers that have
been on the same shift for 30 years.
Mr. Newhouse. Really?
Chief Verderosa. They just love what they do.
Mr. Newhouse. It shows, too.
Chief Verderosa. Well, they like the people. I mean, this
is a job where you really have to enjoy dealing with people. We
deal with, between 10 million and 15 million people a year.
Those are just the ones who come in the building, and there are
millions more who just traverse the grounds.
And I think it takes a very unique sort of personality to
really enjoy that. I have been here for 32\1/2\ years or so and
I love the change that we afford troops. If you want to
transfer to another shift, you can do that. If you want to take
a promotional exam, you can do that. If you want to find a
specialized assignment, and are qualified, you take advantage
of that.
Sometimes you find someone and they really hit their stride
when they get to a niche that they really enjoy. One of our
most popular positions is the K-9 handler, and it is hard to
get those folks out of those jobs. They love the job. They love
the partnership with the dog. They love what they do. If it is
something you love so much, it is really not work. I think, if
you were to talk to any group of officers in our department,
they are probably the happiest ones that we have, the K-9
officers.
Mr. Newhouse. Just one other quick thought, too, Mr.
Chairman.
If you ever surplus any of your cool motorcycles, let us
know.
Chief Verderosa. Okay. I will. Mr. Braddock, please note
that.
I appreciate the kind words, and I will certainly pass
those on to the troops.
WELLNESS PROGRAM AND FLETC TRAINING
Mr. Newhouse. Thanks for being here.
Chief Verderosa. Yes, sir.
Mr. Ryan. Thanks, Mr. Newhouse.
We met last week and we talked a little bit about generally
the House wellness program, and we just talked about it with
Mr. Kiko, and that is up and running. And we talked about that
in the context of the Capitol Police.
And I know in that conversation you talked a little bit
about your relationship in collaboration with the Federal Law
Enforcement Training Center. If you could just talk to a us a
little bit about what that relationship looks like and some of
the----
Chief Verderosa. Sure.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. Get into some of the details as to
what that training looks like.
Chief Verderosa. Absolutely.
In terms of the wellness program, we do partner with Mr.
Kiko's staff and the wellness director. As a matter of fact, we
met with him yesterday. Mr. Braddock did.
Mr. Ryan. Good.
Chief Verderosa. In terms of the mindfulness and our
emotional and physical health and our financial well-being of
our employees, as we discussed, the goal for us, for me
personally, is to make sure that when our officers are on post
that they are focused on the mission as opposed to things that
will distract them, whether that is a problem at home or
whether that is a health issue or whether that is something
that is troubling them within the workforce.
We want to resolve that issue and take care of the
emotional, the financial, and all of those support things
through our staff with the CAO's office. I don't want people to
be worried about their health insurance. I want them focused.
We spend a lot of time and effort to develop those
programs. One of the things that we do, and Mr. Braddock was
instrumental in helping us, is we have redesigned how we look
at new recruits and applicants. We do a much more in-depth
analysis of where they are, their maturity level, the things
they bring to the table to be qualified to be an officer of the
Capitol Police. Part of that is through our psychological
examination and the wellness part of it and the mindfulness.
In terms of the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center,
Mr. Braddock, can you elaborate a little bit?
Mr. Braddock. Yes, sir.
The Federal Law Enforcement Training Center's leadership
division is working on a wellness and resiliency program that
they want to introduce. Our vision is much broader in terms of
what we are looking to do. There are a lot of things they are
working on, but there is also a tremendous resource in the
House Wellness Center, and we are looking to do an inventory of
all of that and see what else our workforce needs and build on
that.
So our idea is to have both a focus on the individual, and
a focus on the supervisor, so the supervisor can take care of
themself and be a resource to the individual, and then
holistically as the agency what are we doing to help folks.
As the chief said, there are four main areas we are looking
at. We are starting with our new recruits. We are looking at
emotional intelligence and critical thinking. As I mentioned to
you when we met, we have started to train our recruits in that
area to help give them extra tools to be able to take on this
mission and balance that with their work and their home life.
So there are a lot of initiatives that will be taken on. I
was very happy with our meeting yesterday, because there are,
as you had mentioned, there are some tremendous resources that
the House Wellness Center is doing. We are going to be
introducing a number of those to our workforce.
Mr. Ryan. Great.
Chief Verderosa. In terms of the Federal Law Enforcement
Training Center curriculum, they are looking to design a
curriculum that sort of mirrors the kind of thing that we are
doing in terms of how we treat our new employees when we bring
them on board. That has yet to be really fleshed out. It is a
fairly recent inquiry from FLETC. So as that develops, we will
be sure to keep you up to date on what we are doing,
absolutely.
Mr. Ryan. Okay. That is great. That is great. I think the
more collaborations we could build----
Mr. Braddock. Yes, sir.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. Context of the House, Federal, other
Federal training that is happening, I think this is the future.
I mean, we are looking at across the board with first
responders. We see it in Ohio with the opiate epidemic and the
level of exhaustion for all the way into the emergency room
workers to the coroner.
Chief Verderosa. Right.
Mr. Ryan. I mean, it is just system-wide exhaustion. And to
the extent we can give people the tools they need to be able to
deal with that the best they possibly can, I think, is our
responsibility here.
NATIONAL CONVENTIONS AND LAW ENFORCEMENT COLLABORATIONS
I have got one last question with regard to 2020 and the
conventions. We know that there is a lot of Secret Service, and
there is a lot of other law enforcement personnel that is
involved in that. How do you balance your relationship with
those other entities? And is it necessary for you to deploy and
dispatch? I mean, there are obviously a lot of Members there,
but there is also a lot of other security.
Chief Verderosa. Sure.
Mr. Ryan. So could you talk a little bit about that?
Chief Verderosa. Sure. And one final thought on the
wellness. You know, as I read up on it, and you talk about
clarity in critical response, one of the things we want to do
with our troops--and I think we have--I have never worried
about our operational response to critical incidents. I find
that we train people in incident command. We train people to
have clarity in thought.
But I think one of the things that--some of the techniques
that we can leverage are slowing the game down for people who
are responding, to focus in on key decision-making. Because at
the end of the day, some of the decisions we make are split
second. Some of them are more calculated if you have time, but
we are not always given that time.
That is the challenge when we are making split-second
decisions. So the more clarity of thought that you have and the
more that we can instill that resource in people to have the
ability to do it, I think we are way ahead of the game.
Mr. Ryan. Well, it is a teachable skill.
Chief Verderosa. Right.
Mr. Ryan. And I think we think, well, some people are Tom
Brady and can slow the game down and some can't.
Chief Verderosa. Right.
Mr. Ryan. But it is a teachable skill that you can learn,
same with the emotional intelligence where the most cutting-
edge education programs in the country right now, first thing
they do is focus on social and emotional skills, because it
gets your brain tuned up and then you are ready to learn. If
you don't have that, you are overreacting, you are escalating
situations, as opposed to deescalating.
Chief Verderosa. Right.
Mr. Ryan. So I can't think of a more important field for
that skill set to be implemented in this in 2019 than in law
enforcement.
Chief Verderosa. Oh, absolutely. I agree 100 percent. And
to the extent that you can focus, make good, coherent, smart
decisions. And you always hear about tunnel vision. You want to
fight tunnel vision. You want to take the information that you
have and make the most educated decisions based on rapidly
advancing information that is coming in.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah.
Chief Verderosa. And it is truly, I agree with you, it is a
teachable art, it is a skill, and the best leaders have it.
They display it. And I think that is the goal that we are
striving for.
In terms of the conventions, I realize that we have a
fairly large footprint in terms of the conventions. We look at
it from the perspective that it is half the Congress going to
one place. Our ability to reconstitute the Members that are off
campus at the convention and be able to relocate those Members
if necessary, to provide enough security where there are
obviously a lot of things that occur both within the perimeter
and outside the perimeter of these national conventions.
They are National Special Security Events. We are on the
planning committees, the subcommittees. We are truly a partner
with the Secret Service who have overall responsibility.
Our focus is mainly about providing security at these
venues, whether it is inside the perimeter or outside, whether
it is at a hotel or whether it is at an on-site event, to
provide the level of security that you would be required to
have where any group of Members are together.
And we do that here on a smaller scale in the National
Capital Region. We do that at your outside events. This is just
on a much greater magnitude.
We bring to bear our assets that we have here, whether it
is a suspicious package, the ability to detect and mitigate,
whether it is our SWAT team or our K-9 force multiplier,
whether we have K-9 to sweep an area where we are going to have
large Members of Congress, where it may not be inside that
perimeter that is provided by the Secret Service.
Mr. Ryan. Right. Gotcha.
Chief Verderosa. We work very closely. And we scrutinize
those numbers very carefully, and they really are to a point--
we want to have enough people to engage in the protective
operations necessary without jeopardizing security in another
venue, whether it is here at home, because obviously we have
the icon here and the Capitol Grounds to secure.
But I think we work very closely with the Sergeants at Arms
to make sure that we have the appropriate number. We have all
of those assets we need to be able to move Members safely and
to provide the level of protection, whether inside or outside
the perimeter, because no one is focusing on the Congress like
we are. And we don't want to rely on others to do that.
And, frankly, it is everyone who, if you look at Cleveland
and you look at the other convention----
Mr. Ryan. Philly.
Chief Verderosa [continuing]. In Philly, I think you will
find that they both had particular types of issues. And the
local law enforcement deal a lot--most of the time outside the
perimeter, demonstration activity, and all that kind of thing.
So our goal is to provide a safe environment for you to
operate, and because of the collective we want to be able to
reconstitute if we have to.
Mr. Ryan. Right. Right.
Chief Verderosa. And it comes with that, it sometimes comes
with a footprint.
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. Gotcha.
Well, thank you. We appreciate it, Chief, and your team.
Thanks for everything. We look forward to staying in touch with
regard to the training component. And maybe I will get out
there and check it out for myself.
Chief Verderosa. That would be great. That would be great.
And we will work with your staff on that.
Mr. Ryan. Okay. Terrific.
Well, thank you.
Chief Verderosa. Thank you. It has been an honor.
Mr. Ryan. This hearing is adjourned.
[Questions submitted for the record follow:]
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Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
MEMBERS' DAY
Mr. Ryan. I am going to call this legislative branch
hearing for members and public witnesses to order.
I am pleased to welcome the Members of Congress and outside
public witnesses to our hearing this afternoon. It is very
important that the subcommittee hear the concerns of our fellow
legislators and members of the public before we begin to work
on marking up our fiscal year 2020 subcommittee bill.
It is great to see some familiar faces on our witness list.
We hope you are pleased with the progress we were able to make
last year on the issues you raised in the past. We realize that
we have more work to do. We will look forward to hearing your
suggestions, and we will do our best to incorporate them into
the bill. I need to warn you, however, that we will be
wrestling with our other subcommittees for any new funding we
can get to finance these needs.
Before we start with our members' testimony, I would also
like to ask our ranking member, Ms. Herrera Beutler, if she
would like to make any opening remarks.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I am good, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Ryan. All right. Very good.
So let's get started with our first witness, the esteemed
member from California, chairman of the Veterans Committee, Mr.
Takano.
----------
Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
WITNESS
HON. MARK TAKANO, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF
CALIFORNIA
Mr. Takano. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Herrera
Beutler, and members of the committee. Thank you for the
opportunity to testify today.
I am here to express my support for restoring funding to
the Office of Technology Assessment, often referred to by the
acronym OTA. The foundation for good policy is accurate and
objective analysis. And for more than two decades, the OTA set
that foundation by providing relevant, unbiased technical and
scientific assessments for Members of Congress and staff.
But in 1995, the Office of Technology Assessment was
defunded, stripping Congress of a valuable resource. Congress
has an important role to play in making sure that the benefits
of advances in science and technology are distributed equally
throughout our society and that the potential harms are
mitigated. In order to do this, we need to strengthen our
capacity to understand emerging technology and its social and
policy implications.
Congress needs access to unbiased technological expertise
to weigh the pros and cons of policy questions surrounding
cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and
so many other matters.
In the ecosystem of legislative support organizations, OTA
plays a unique role. No other entity has the capacity or
expertise to provide in-depth and forward-looking analysis of
complex technical issues informed by an understanding of how
Congress works.
Last year, in response to the growing demand for technical
expertise in Congress, the Government Accountability Office
received funding to establish a new Science, Technology
Assessment and Analytics team, otherwise known as STAA. This
expanded capacity at GAO is an important step, but it really is
not sufficient.
A restored OTA would complement GAO, as well as CRS, by
combining deep technical expertise and robust forward-looking
reports with the ability to be responsive to immediate
questions and the needs of members and staff. Let me underscore
that. Responsive to the immediate needs--immediate questions
and the needs of members and staff.
These needs will inevitably continue to arise as Congress
responds to rapid changes in technology. As we continue to seek
innovative and new ways to modernize Congress, OTA would be an
important means through which we can ensure Congress has the
tools it needs to respond to the unique challenges of our time.
This is an important strategic investment in our institution's
capacity to create technology policy that protects our
constituents while encouraging innovation.
I urge you to support this request to restore funding to
the Office of Technology Assessment. And I yield back the
balance of my time.
[The information follows:]
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Mr. Ryan. Thank you, Mr. Takano.
How much did you ask for last----
Mr. Takano. Last year we submitted a letter asking for $2.5
million, just to get the office started. We ultimately think
that it is going to take up to $35 million to fully staff out
the office to give it a comparable capacity. But it doesn't
have to all come at once. It could be--you could ramp it up
over time.
But I think--and we are going to need to build credibility
and confidence, in this office, a nonpartisan, disinterested
group of analysts that give Congress advice. So we need time to
build it up.
Mr. Ryan. Give us just an example of, I am a member, I have
got an issue, what would the top two issues be that I would
need to make this call and ask for----
Mr. Takano. Well--okay. So I think a lot of members are
saying, well, we funded the GAO. Why isn't that enough? Well,
have you ever gotten a GAO report done, I mean, in your
experience? I mean, you know it is a process, right? And then
GAO is really set up to be an independent accounting--they
originally were an accountability office, an accounting office.
And they are kind of like the government CPAs to do stuff. They
come and look whether an agency is doing well.
But to get a GAO study, there is a lot of hoops you have to
jump through. You have to get a bipartisan letter and hopefully
significant Members of Congress to sign on the letter. And then
GAO makes--they do whatever they want.
We need something more immediate, more accessible. And I
will give you an example. The San Bernardino shootings, you
might remember those San Bernardino shootings, they happened
really close to my district. One of the perpetrators actually
went to my high school, many years after I did, but he was one
of the shooters.
The FBI got ahold of the iPhones. The Federal magistrate
judge was ordering those iPhones to be unlocked. They wanted an
Apple engineer to unlock those phones. Apple was saying, no, we
don't want to do this, for a variety of reasons. But this was
never resolved. It got kicked down the road.
But the policy decision for Congress was are we going to
make technology firms unlock the phones or produce backdoor
entries at the behest of the FBI. I mean, it is not going to be
what our policy is. You see the privacy concerns, the civil
liberties issues. Is this even possible? Could Apple devise a
phone that, technically, couldn't be backdoored.
Well, my thing is we have--as Members of Congress, we have
an interest in figuring out what the truth is. Do we believe
the FBI? Do we believe Apple? But we don't have an independent
group of people that we can go to fairly immediately.
Mr. Ryan. How about within CRS?
Mr. Takano. That is a good question. Well, my thing is
would you combine, say, the Congressional Budget Office into
the CRS? I mean, they kind of both--I mean, the CRS I think of
as a very specific agency. If I need----
Mr. Ryan. They give legislative----
Mr. Takano. If I need a briefing on Syria and the latest
update, I go to CRS and say, what are the options here?
I believe that technology assessment and understanding
scientific issues requires--it is its own discipline. It is its
own arena, and it needs to have its own staff director and
ethos and its own authority. It is like we go to CBO when we
want the Affordable Care Act scored, right? And I think we need
the similar sort of authority for technology issues. I mean,
people that can lay out a variety of policy options based on
what--another example is blockchain technology.
Mr. Ryan. Right.
Mr. Takano. Right? How many of us really understand
blockchain technology? I know that $500 million was lost in
Japan. I mean, do we know the extent--I mean, and blockchain
technology--people are coming to me with proposals to do
blockchain technology for voting systems. What do we know about
blockchain technology? Who do we trust?
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. No, I think you bring up some really good
points. That is the difference between your district and my
district. In my district, they are saying let's go back to
paper ballots. In your district, they are saying how do we do
blockchain technology?
Mr. Takano. As you know, my district is probably more like
yours. Like, don't make it so that only a few experts
understand it. We want everybody to understand. I mean, I am
just saying that--I just cite that as an example that
blockchain technology----
Mr. Ryan. No, I hear you.
Mr. Takano [continuing]. Is not relegated to financial
services.
Mr. Ryan. I got you.
Mr. Takano. But Congress needs to understand it.
Mr. Ryan. Ms. Herrera Beutler, do you have any questions?
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Other than what is blockchain
technology, but we don't have time for that.
Mr. Ryan. We are going to do a whole hearing on that one.
Mr. Takano, thank you. We appreciate your time.
Mr. Takano. Well, thank you.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you so much.
Congressman Casten from the great State of Illinois, the
floor is yours.
----------
Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
WITNESS
HON. SEAN CASTEN, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF
ILLINOIS
Mr. Casten. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Chairman Ryan. Thank you, Ranking Member Herrera
Beutler. Nice to meet you both. And I want to thank Mr. Takano
for his leadership on this one. This has been near and dear to
me for a long time, and I am pretty sure I am the only freshman
Member of Congress who made a campaign pledge to restore the
OTA.
Mr. Ryan. Well, that is convincing.
Mr. Casten. I am sure it drove my election. And that is a
true story.
This one is sort of oddly personal to me, that when I--
somebody asked me once, how do you become a politician? I said,
well, first you get a degree in chemical engineering. That is
the path that I took. In 1998, I got out of grad school, had a
master's in chemical engineering. And I went to work at Arthur
D. Little as a technology consultant, and was working in the
energy practice. We did projects for the U.S. Government. We
did projects for the Dutch government. We did projects for
utility consortiums. But in all cases, trying to develop and
advance various alternative energy technologies or to evaluate
existing ones.
In the course of my 2 years there, I did various
comparative analysis of emerging battery technologies. I
evaluated cost and emissions of a whole chain of alternative
fuel technologies. BP was a client. I am looking at if they
went beyond petroleum, what were the options to do. I was
advising government--State governments on changes in codes and
standards if we were going to get to a hydrogen infrastructure.
And I tried unsuccessfully to convince U.S. car manufacturers
that electric cars were really fun for acceleration and they
should market on that rather than their limited range. Twenty
years later, some of them have come through on that.
You know, as a young kid just out of grad school working on
that, you know, my job more often than not, we were all looking
at what was the existing state of literature and figuring it
out. And I increasingly relied on OTA reports that were really,
really good and gave us a really good sense of what is this
unbiased sense of what is out there so that we can at least
have a level playing field. And at one point it came to my
attention that I am sitting there, this is 1998, and I keep
seeing that there are no current reports. And I asked my boss,
you know, what is this OTA and how do I get more current
reports?
And my boss sort of laughed. He said, Gingrich killed it.
He said it is bad for policy, but it is good for us because it
means we get to sell more consulting assignments doing things
that the taxpayer used to pay for and now they have to hire us
to do them, but it is confidential, and we do them, and we just
get paid for it.
And we sort of joked about it. But it sort of stuck in my
head of here we were now going forward trying to figure out
what happens.
And, you know, so OTA was, what, enacted in 1972? I think
their mission was to provide early indications of the probable
beneficial and adverse impacts of the applications of
technology to develop other coordinated information which may
assist the Congress. I think they did a pretty good job of
that, and I can speak from experience.
A good friend of mine whom I worked with at the time who
now works for Cummins, and I said, what are you working on? He
said, we are looking at developments in hydrogen and fuel cell
technology. And he went through what he was working on. And I
said, this is the same stuff we were doing 20 years ago.
But the collective knowledge has fallen short, because now
the knowledge is done in these pockets that don't get shared.
And there were things that we knew and objective questions that
could be asked that are now no longer part of the collective
wisdom, if you will. And I would submit to you that that has
had the practical impact of making us dumber as a Nation. It
has caused a lot of people to duplicate effort that they
shouldn't otherwise duplicate. And there is really nothing else
that--there is no agency that does that.
You know, I look now as a freshman member who--I got a
degree in chemical engineering. I am not an expert in
everything, but I claim some expertise in energy issues.
And so I said, all right. Well, can CRS fill this gap? They
really don't. You know, CRS will opine of what other people
have said, and this is the nature of it. But CRS isn't really
set up to say, what are the thermodynamic constraints of a
hydrogen infrastructure? Has biomass gasification technology
advanced--does it continue to advance or is it basically stuck
where it was and can't go any farther? What are the limitations
to getting away from fossil fuels in the airline industry?
Those are objective questions, but CRS isn't set up to
answer them very well, and they don't really have the tools to
do that, and OTA did, and we relied on that.
Mr. Ryan. You obviously know this better than we do. So CRS
is a group of experts. We go to them, and they--we have a
certain question, and they send it to the experts in CRS,
wherever they are, whatever their expertise is in.
So what--like, from an on-the-ground standpoint--so there
aren't experts at CRS that can handle this, is what you guys
are saying?
Mr. Casten. So the sense I have from CRS in areas that I
understand--so there is a whole series--you know, the issues
Mr. Takano was talking about, I can only extrapolate into
there. But CRS is exceptional at saying this is what the energy
information administration says about issue X. This is what
public information is out there.
They really don't have the horsepower, the skills, or the
resources to do more sort of synthesis, if you will. As a
direct example of that, they were briefing all of us freshmen,
and they put this chart up that said, going forward, over the
next 50 years, here is what the mix of fossil and renewable
energy is going to be on the grid. And a lot of my colleagues
got pretty angry at that presentation because it basically said
that, over 50 years, there is going to be no meaningful
increase.
I looked at that coming from the world that I live in, and
I said, you guys, your analysis is dead wrong, because you are
using a chart from EIA that I have used before that measures
fossil resources based on the input fuel to fossil fuel plants
and measures renewable resources based on the electricity
output of those plants. So you are showing a model that
implicitly understates the acceleration of renewable energy,
because you take 1 kilowatt hour from a solar plant as being
one unit of sun when, in fact, there was a lot of units of sun
that went into that. You take 1 kilowatt hour from a coal plant
and ignore it and say I wonder how much coal went in.
And it is apples and oranges comparison. I don't think they
totally understood the point, and I don't say that as a
criticism of them. But their job is to say, well, this is how
EIA reports the data. I am saying, yeah, but I want an engineer
who goes in and says this is what I understand. Because if you
are going to advise Members of Congress about saying what is
the EIA saying about the changing energy mix in our future, you
would like that to be based on a consistent set of units,
right?
And I just use that as a narrow example, but they are
essentially reporters. They're not doing analysis.
Mr. Ryan. Got you.
Ms. Herrera Beutler.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So what you are talking about are
things that you studied and learned and acquired over your
experience both through specific study and then working in a
company where the expertise that was called. So you developed
expertise here.
The one thing I guess I would question is we are not
known--the Federal Government is not known for being the
quickest, you said pockets that don't share information that
should. You were referencing, I assume, the private sector at
that point. That is one of the biggest criticisms people have
over us. It is one of the challenges on appropriations. I am on
Labor H, and we met with NIH today talking about the different
institutes and how that cross pollinization has to take place
so that information is being shared.
And I wonder that--you will have an answer, would it be
better to write legislation to evoke this and incentivize this
from people who are in the field who are experts who move
quickly or is it better to have it in-house?
I just feel like we generally have challenges. People get
siloed, and we are not known for being quick. We are not known
for being the most technologically advanced, and we are
certainly not known for being the most customer friendly.
So what you are talking about is cutting edge stuff that is
information that we need. Are we the best place to incubate
that and grow that or is there a way that we can craft
legislation to get it from more wherever the experts are? Does
that make sense?
Mr. Casten. So I guess what I would submit to you is what
OTA provided and what I really valued from OTA was not their
speed. What I valued was their objectivity. And it is very hard
to get information from the private sector that is objective.
So, for example, if I am sitting there saying, I am, you know,
back in my job 20 years ago, and I am trying to tell a client
who wants to get into the battery space what are the range of
battery chemistries, what is the practical limitations on any
of them, which ones are going to be best for this application
or that application, your sort of standard technology
consultant stuff, I could get that information from OTA that
would say very specifically, for nickel metal hydride, this is
what is the pros and cons. For lithium ion, this is the pros
and cons. For this new flow battery technology----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. If we have that depth and breadth.
Mr. Casten. And they did. And they did, was my experience.
If, on the other hand, I go to get that from the private
sector--anybody who has got money tied up in one of those
technologies is going to give you a less-than-complete view of
their competitive technologies, right?
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Well, they are not always honest. I
have found that if you can ask the question, look, I get you
want to sell me something or push me in a direction, but, you
know, some of that is just the marketplace.
I guess my question is, do you really think we can--you
said it was--20 years ago you were in this role?
Mr. Casten. Yeah.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. And you were getting good information
from OTA?
Mr. Casten. Yes.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I guess I just don't know how soon we
can ramp up that kind of expertise to make it worth it.
Mr. Casten. Well, I guess what I would submit is that the
people who do that analysis, they all exist. I mean, it was--my
job was to sort of fill the gap that was there. In another
world, maybe I would have worked for OTA. But there are people
who know how to do that. And the challenge is that, in the
absence of that, you have--the cost is massive because of the
inefficiencies for people reinventing the wheel.
I think there are a whole lot of technologies that we are
focusing on--we as Congress are making decisions to invest in
research programs where I could look back to things I did 20
years ago and I can say I know that is a dead end. I know it is
a dead end for practical thermodynamic reasons. And I may have
the experience there to say that. And maybe I can be a forceful
advocate. But the list of things I don't know is much larger
than the list of things I know, right?
Ms. Herrera Beutler. No. I get it. I think the goal is the
pursuit of the information. How do we get there, the most
efficient, effective way. I guess my challenge is, assuming
that we are going to be able to produce the most efficient,
effective way, generally what we do--even with NIH. We are not
the ones creating, we are providing the money, and they are
going where the science leads. It is not necessarily that we
have a repository that we are building in--you know what I
mean?
Mr. Casten. Well, I think the closer analogy is CBO than
NIH, because OTA at its best was not trying----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. That is not a good one for me----
Mr. Casten. But, OTA at its best, and I think with its
mission, was not tasked with advancing the science or doing
fundamental research. They were tasked with providing an
objective analysis of what was out there. And so in the same
way that CBO, per its mission and at its best, is saying, you
know, you wouldn't ask Members of Congress to argue about the
cost a bill. We get an analysis----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. The irony is--that is exactly the
point, is we are having--I have challenges with CBO not even
providing information. So they are nonpartisan, right, supposed
to be straight down the middle, and they are not even always
able to do that. So I guess that is what I would submit to you
to consider is it is not a perfect solution, maybe it is the
best.
Mr. Casten. Well, nothing is perfect, but I would----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. What I understand is that is the best.
Mr. Casten. Well, nothing is going to be perfect. But I
would submit to you that we are vastly more effective as an
institution when we at least have a nonpartisan group giving
us--
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I think we need it.
Mr. Casten [continuing]. A number, and in the same way that
if we are sitting there and saying, to take the issue I started
with, what are the thermodynamic limitations of a hydrogen
economy. That is an objective question. Those of us on the
Science Committee argue about the thermodynamics, because those
laws are kind of fixed. Like, let's focus on the laws we can
change, not the ones we can't.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I just joined the Science Committee.
We are going to talk about it. Great.
Mr. Casten. Welcome aboard.
But what OTA gave us, again, in my experience, is, was an
objective set of truths. And we could say, okay, these things
are true. Now we may have creative ideas about how to deal with
that truth, but let's not start with arguing about them----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. No. I get it. I get the idea. I have
seen it work not quite as perfectly as that, unfortunately. But
I see the need.
Thank you.
Mr. Casten. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you. Very insightful.
I don't know if you heard, but when I gave the opening
remark, obviously, we are struggling to get some money for this
subcommittee, so it is going to be a battle royale for all
these different interest groups. But this is very interesting
and enlightening, so thanks. I appreciate it
Mr. Casten. Yeah. And I hope this was a small enough
dollar. It is hopefully an easy one to do.
Mr. Ryan. Got it. Thank you.
[The information follows:]
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Mr. Ryan. We are in recess, subject to the call of the
chair.
[Recess.]
Mr. Ryan. All right. We are reconvening.
And, Ms. Eshoo, you have the floor.
----------
Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
WITNESS
HON. ANNA G. ESHOO, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF
CALIFORNIA
Ms. Eshoo. Thank you, Chairman Ryan. I am delighted to be
here in this lovely room that I didn't know exists. Yet another
hideaway. I want to thank you for allowing me to testify.
I am here today to request that the subcommittee support
$250,000 in fiscal year 2020. And it is an appropriation for
the Chief Administrative Officer to administer the
Congressional App Challenge, which is an officially sanctioned
competition of the House of Representatives.
This is a fairly new program that was established in 2014.
And it was designed and established, I was there at the
beginning of it, which I am very proud of, to inspire high
school students to be drawn to the areas of STEM, science,
technology, engineering, and math.
And so the design of the program was to bring them forward,
challenge them, challenge all the high school students in our
districts, to design an app. And they have.
In my district, the winner this last year did an app on a
smarter insulin pump, an app that assists diabetics with
maintaining blood glucose levels. In your district, you had a
team of four NIHF STEM high school students that developed an
app allowing the students to anonymously report school safety
problems.
So these are just two examples, but they are excellent.
Last year, 5,000 students and teams of students
participated in the app challenge. So in just a handful of
years, this has really grown. They participated across the
country, 220 congressional districts across 47 States and the
territories. And the students come from every type of community
and region, whether it is rural, urban, suburban, all of those
communities.
What is important for me to set down today is that the
success and the growth of the Congressional App Challenge is
outstripping the capacity to administer it.
The Internet Education Foundation which is a nonprofit here
in Washington, D.C., they provide the materials, the support,
the staffing, and the databases so that members' offices can
host the contest for their constituents. And the Foundation
works closely with the Committee on House Administration to
execute the CAC every year.
Now, we are running very short in our country on the talent
that we need to produce for not only the jobs of today but the
jobs of tomorrow. China has 4.7 million recent STEM graduates.
Our country, the United States, has 568,000. Now, China
obviously is more populous, but we have fewer recent STEM
graduates on a population-adjusted basis. So we are really--we
are lagging behind.
Five of the 10 fastest growing occupations in America are
STEM jobs, including software developers. And the App Challenge
is creating a pipeline of skilled workers for the jobs of
tomorrow. So I just want to abbreviate--leave out some points.
You will have my written testimony.
I think it is important for the committee to know that
appropriated funding of the CAC will not be perpetual. I think
that is important for you to know. Because the App Challenge is
an officially sanctioned competition that has to be sanctioned
by House Administration Committee every Congress.
It is possible that, maybe in a decade, that apps will be
an outdated form factor. So I am not here to make sure that we
are on automatic pilot forever. But I think the program speaks
volumes about itself and how it has grown, how effective it is,
the potential for the future with these students. And that
$250,000 will go a very long way in funding for the CAO to
administer the Congressional App Challenge in fiscal year 2020.
We want to make sure that the program continues.
It has been a joy for me to be a part of the effort. And
you have participated in your district. 220 districts, that is
pretty good in a handful of years, I think.
So thank you for your attention to this. I don't know if
you have any questions. But I want to acknowledge the
Foundation whose representative is here today, because they
have done an outstanding job of assisting.
Members' offices can't start from scratch. It is really too
much work for them. But with the assistance of the Foundation,
they are able to get this up, running in the district. And
after you have done it once, it becomes an annual event. The
newspapers pay attention to it, the local media. And these
young people are made king, queen for a day, a week, a month, a
year. It is very exciting for them to have the recognition that
it is an approved congressional competition in our country.
So thank you.
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Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
This is a great program. I love it. Our kids love it. And
the idea, you know, northeast Ohio, northern California, it is
football, it is sports. That is the competition. And for us to
inject competition into these kind of things I think is really
essential. I love the program.
Do you have anything to say, Mr. Newhouse?
Mr. Newhouse. I will just add my two cents in support of
the program as well. We do it every year. And I think it is
certainly a great investment for all the reasons that you
stated.
Ms. Eshoo. Well, thank you for participating.
Mr. Newhouse. Oh, absolutely. I couldn't not participate
now.
Ms. Eshoo. Well, I think it has been made to attract itself
that way to members, that it is something that people
absolutely want to be engaged in.
Mr. Newhouse. So I probably missed this, and I apologize
for that, but you are asking that we provide $250,000?
Ms. Eshoo. $250,000.
Mr. Newhouse. What level of funding are we at now?
Ms. Eshoo. We are at zero. At zero.
Mr. Newhouse. It is zero. Okay.
Ms. Eshoo. And the reason that we are requesting it is,
going back to my comments, that the success and the growth of
the program is really outstripping the capacity to administer
it. And the Foundation does a great deal of work, but more is
needed because it has grown. And I think that this is like a
rounding off point in our national budget.
Mr. Ryan. Very rounded.
Ms. Eshoo. But these dollars dance. These dollars dance.
They are really an investment in our collective future.
Thank you. Thank you for your wonderful comments about it.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you, Congresswoman. You are always on the
cutting edge.
Ms. Eshoo. All right. Well, off we go.
Thank you, everyone. Thank you to all the staff. Thank you
to the Foundation.
Mr. Ryan. We are going to adjourn the first, and we are
going to call to order the public witness hearing. And we are
going to take about a 5-minute recess, and then we will be back
with the public witnesses.
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Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
TESTIMONY OF INTERESTED INDIVIDUALS AND ORGANIZATIONS
----------
BUDGET REQUESTS OF THE GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE AND LIBRARY OF
CONGRESS
WITNESS
FEMI CADMUS
Mr. Ryan. We are reconvening the hearing. We are going to
start with our first witness, the president of the American
Association of Law Libraries. The witness is Femi Cadmus. Thank
you so much for coming. The floor is yours. Zach Graves is on
deck. Daniel Schuman in the hole.
Ms. Cadmus. Good afternoon, Chairman Ryan. I am Femi
Cadmus, president of the American Association of Law Libraries.
I am honored to have the opportunity today to testify about
the essential role of the Government Publishing Office, the
GPO, and the Library of Congress in supporting a strong
democracy.
The American Association of Law Libraries is the only
national association dedicated to the legal information
profession and its professionals. AALL members who serve in our
communities rely on the GPO, the Library of Congress, and the
Law Library of Congress for access to and preservation of
official trustworthy government information. Adequate funding
for these agencies ensures access to information, which
supports access to justice and preserves the rule of law.
I will start with funding for the GPO. The American
Association of Law Libraries urges full funding for GPO's
public information programs account that supports the Federal
Depository Library Program, FDLP. The requested funding level
of $31.3 million will allow GPO to provide additional support
for locating and processing Federal information for inclusion
in the FDLP and the Cataloging and Indexing Program.
GPO administers the FDLP by providing Federal Government
information products in multiple formats to more than 1,100
participating libraries across the country and in your
districts. Approximately 200 law libraries participate in the
FDLP, including my very own institution, Duke University School
of Law, J. Michael Goodson Law Library.
The J. Michael Goodson Law Library is open to the public
and celebrated its 40th year as a selective depository library
in 2018. AALL also supports full funding for the congressional
publishing appropriation and revolving fund so that the GPO may
continue to publish legislative information and support the
development of govinfo.gov to add new collections and improve
accessibility.
Next I would like to discuss funding for the Library of
Congress. AALL is grateful to the subcommittee for its approval
of recent requests from the library for its physical and
technology needs. AALL naturally has a special interest in the
Law Library of Congress. The law library is a treasured
institution with an unparalleled collection of legal material.
AALL supports the law library's $18 million request for fiscal
year 2020 so that it may complete projects, including archiving
global legal research reports and continuing and expanding its
digitization efforts.
The American Association of Law Libraries also urges
continued investment in the development of Congress.gov. We
commend the Library of Congress for updating its information
technology operations and meeting nearly all of the
recommendations of the Government Accountability Office's 2015
report on the Library's information technology.
We also express appreciation for recent modernization
efforts in the Copyright Office. The Copyright Office has been
working in close coordination with the Library of Congress'
Office of the Chief Information Officer. We welcomed Dr.
Hayden's recent appointment of Karyn A. Temple as the new
Registrar of Copyrights, and we are confident the office's
modernization will continue under her able leadership.
In conclusion, I want to thank you once again for the
opportunity to testify before the subcommittee. The American
Association of Law Libraries urges you to approve as close to
full funding as possible for the GPO and the Library of
Congress.
Thank you, and I welcome any questions that you might have.
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Mr. Ryan. Thank you so much. We appreciate the testimony.
This is obviously a very important function for Congress and
the government, so we appreciate you coming up and giving your
voice and your testimony.
Thank you for being here.
Ms. Cadmus. Thank you.
----------
Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
GAO'S NEW STAA TEAM, HOW THIS RELATES TO THE DEBATE OVER REVIVING OTA,
AND WHAT WILL BE NEEDED TO MAKE GAO'S PROGRAM SUCCESSFUL
WITNESS
ZACH GRAVES, HEAD OF POLICY, LINCOLN NETWORK
Mr. Ryan. Zach Graves, head of policy from the Lincoln
Network.
Mr. Graves. Chairman, it is good to be back here. I came
before you last year to also talk about this issue of building
science and technology expertise in the Congress. And we have
just had two members come and talk about it. I am hoping to
pick it up from a little bit of a different angle.
Picking off from where we started in the fiscal year 2019
bill, which had two important provisions to, one, create a
study that is executed by the National Academy of Public
Administration, which is still in progress and set to be out in
October, and the other was the elevation of the GAO's STAA
office, which Chairman Takano mentioned.
And I know there is still some debate within the Congress
about which of these offices is best suited to take up the role
of building greater science and technology expertise in
Congress and doing technology assessment work in particular.
Rather than try and answer that question, I want to talk
about some history around the GAO's office and some features
that I think would be important to build in it should the
Congress decide to pursue that as the primary vehicle.
In particular, I think it is notable that, while there has
been a lot of talk of reviving the OTA recently, that this is
not a new idea or recent phenomenon. There have been efforts to
re-create OTA ever since they defunded it. In fact, in 1995,
the year it was defunded, there was an effort that was
successful in the House and came very close to passing in the
Senate to move its functions under CRS. And for a number of
years afterwards, there were also efforts to bring back the
OTA, either directly since its authorizing statute remains in
effect, or through various hybrid models.
And the GAO Technology Assessment Program goes back to 2001
when they decided to allocate $500,000 in dedicated funding for
a pilot. It did a first study on biometrics for border security
since security was a very big concern in that year. And this
was favorably received in an external evaluation which said
that GAO did a very good job on its inaugural assessment. But
the report also raised concerns that the program would face
significant challenges to build its own unique culture and
scale its capabilities to match the functionality of the OTA.
Nonetheless, this pilot was seen as successful. They
expanded its funding to $1 million, and it produced a couple of
reports each year for the next couple of years. Importantly,
there was an effort that came after that in 2004 when
Congressman Rush Holt, who is now the head of the American
Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the science
advocacy group, had a bipartisan bill to formally elevate the
GAO pilot program into an office that would have been called
the Center for Scientific and Technical Assessment, or CSTA.
This was a program notably in GAO that would have borrowed a
lot of the structural features of the OTA, including its
bipartisan bicameral technology assessment board, which
following up on Ranking Member Herrera Beutler's point earlier,
I think this is an important feature since it gave the Congress
broader buy-in to what OCA was doing and strong bipartisan
oversight so its activities couldn't be politicized or in one
direction or the other.
Importantly, although we are going back nearly two decades
talking about this bill that didn't go anywhere, it is
important to note it involves a lot of the same issues that we
are talking about today. It was a proposal that received a lot
of vetting and review by the GAO then-Comptroller General David
M. Walker. It was favorably received by members of civil
society and academia. They sent it out to review it. And while
the effort didn't move forward, I think this was largely
because of the very hefty budget requirements that it had.
Now, in the years that followed, GAO essentially kept
running it as a pilot program until it was elevated in last
year's appropriations bill. And as you know, this created the
STAA.
Now, I think there has been also a lot of criticisms of the
GAO program from people who want to revive the OTA saying that
it lacks the robustness and quality of OTA reports. And it also
hasn't produced nearly as many of them as the OTA did on an
annual basis. And I think while there is a fair criticism here,
it is worth remembering that the GAO program was at a fraction
of the OTA's budget and had relatively little structural
autonomy until its recent elevation.
Now, the primary challenge I think that has kept either OTA
or GAO's Technology Assessment Program from advancing has been
a lack of funding, and I think that problem has been largely
addressed thanks to the efforts of Comptroller General Gene
Dodaro and the efforts of this committee. Nonetheless, there
are a number of structural features it needs to consider that
were considered by this last effort in 2004 that Congressman
Holt considered. I outlined some of in these in my testimony.
And I would be happy to follow up and discuss them with you.
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Mr. Ryan. Great. Thank you, Mr. Graves. I appreciate you
coming. It doesn't often happen you get two members and some
outside witnesses on a particular issue. It shows how important
it is. And we are going to give it a lot of consideration. So
thank you for being here.
Mr. Graves. Thank you.
Mr. Ryan. I appreciate it.
----------
Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY, TRANSPARENCY, AND LEGISLATIVE CAPACITY IN THE
LEGISLATIVE BRANCH
WITNESS
DANIEL SCHUMAN, POLICY DIRECTOR, DEMAND PROGRESS & DEMAND PROGRESS
ACTION
Mr. Ryan. The next witness is Daniel Schuman, policy
director, Demand Progress and Demand Progress Action. And on
deck is Samantha Feinstein.
Mr. Schuman. Hi. It is good to be back.
Mr. Ryan. The floor is yours.
Mr. Schuman. Thank you, sir.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you again. What
you did last year was a home run. And I think that is a
testament to all the folks that are here. I mean, civil society
is--we are pleased with what you did. I mean, there has just
been a tremendous amount of progress.
So I want to talk about two issues. One concerns the
Legislative Branch Bulk Data Task Force, which this committee
created in 2013. I know that you guys hate hearing bad news. So
here is some good news, which is that this task force has been
resounding success in making legislative data more available to
everyone and, most importantly and the sort of difficult task,
is change the culture inside Congress. The task force has
successfully fostered collaboration across many of the support
offices and agencies that previously had been siloed. And, of
course, since I am here, it is not just good news; there is
always an ask. And the ask is, since it has been so successful,
we suggest that you expand its scope and mission a little bit
from the bulk data task force to the congressional data task
force.
The idea here is that an expanded mission would allow it to
look at how data is handled throughout the legislative branch,
and this could help Congress better manage its crushing
workload. And as a piece of that--so Congress recently passed
legislation, the OPEN Gov Data Act, that creates chief officers
throughout all the Federal agencies. And we think that it might
be time for Congress to have one too.
So our suggestion is a legislative branch chief data
officer that would help support the mission of the task force
and would look at access to information questions generally.
Our second request concerns the Library of Congress. We
recommend creating an advisory committee that focuses on how
the Library publishes legislative information. There is no
doubt that the Library of Congress plays an important role as a
legislative information source. Not everyone can travel to
Capitol Hill to see what is going. So, of course, we must bring
Congress to Ohio. And to Washington State. And all around the
country.
But, unfortunately, the Library, at least in our
experience, has not made innovating around access a legislative
information a priority. I think this is a real missed
opportunity. We believe the Library should be leading the
charge here. We know there are good people at the Library. They
are trying to support the Library's mission. I mean, librarians
are all about access to information. It is not surprising that
this would be something that they would care about.
We want them to be empowered. Dr. Hayden, when she was here
a couple weeks ago, testified about her commitment to
increasing access to the Congress' Library. I think that is
great, but it does require a change in how the Library does
business.
Fortunately, there is a well-worn model for agencies to
help transform their culture. And at its heart is improved
communication with stakeholders inside and out. Many
legislative and executive branch agencies routinely meet with
external stakeholders. There is more than a Federal advisory
committee, so this isn't exactly a new thing.
Inside the legislative branch, we have seen this work. We
were just talking about the bulk data task force. That is an
example of where internal and external conversations are
effective. There is the Advisory Committee on the Records of
Congress. That exists between the House and the Senate. There
is a Federal Depository Library Council in the executive
branch. There is the FOIA Advisory Committee. And the Archivist
himself meets regularly with civil society.
But when the Library participates in the Bulk Data Task
Force, its engagement is often limited, reflecting both its
internal silos and, at least for some folks, reluctance to
speak.
So, to our knowledge, the Library of Congress does not
regularly convene a wide range of tech-savvy stakeholders on
its role as a source of legislative information. We think that
should change. We believe that it is important to build a
bridge between the Library and civil society on innovation,
around access to information. This information, after all,
belongs to and belongs with the American people, wherever they
might be.
We believe that creating an advisory committee would be a
first good step. And included in this should be representatives
from inside the Library, as well as functional units, as well
as civil society. This is not just our recommendation. The
Lincoln Network, who just testified previously, GovTrack,
Sunlight Foundation, R Street Institute, POPVOX, PBC, Action,
and Quorum and many others have endorsed this recommendation.
I am so pleased to be back here. Thank you again for the
opportunity to testify, and I am happy, and looking forward to
our conversation.
[The information follows:]
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Mr. Ryan. Well, we appreciate it.
And, again, you were here last year, I believe with one or
two others.
Mr. Schuman. Yes.
Mr. Ryan. And I know Chairman Yoder and I had a lot of
conversations after your testimony. And we did what we did and
tried to follow through the best we can. So I just want to say
thank you. A lot of people think that these public hearings
don't matter and that we are not listening, but we are, at
least we are in this committee; I can assure you that.
And you being back here is important. I don't really know
how tough the budget will be. We just know it is going to be
tough. And this is a priority for the committee in a lot of
different ways. But it is competing with a lot of other
priorities too. So thank you for being here.
Mr. Schuman. Can I add just one quick thing?
Mr. Ryan. Sure.
Mr. Schuman. There was a letter signed by 38 civil society
organization and 10 former Members of Congress on the 302(b)
allocation question. And it is something that we will continue
to pursue because we think the work of this committee is
incredibly important. We think the legislative branch should be
appropriately funded.
Mr. Ryan. I appreciate that. Thank you.
We are trying to offset our power with the power of the
executive, and sometimes it gets really hard.
Mr. Schuman. So thank you so much.
Mr. Ryan. I appreciate your time.
----------
Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
HOUSE OFFICE OF THE WHISTLEBLOWER OMBUDSMAN--2020 APPROPRIATIONS
REQUEST
WITNESS
SAMANTHA FEINSTEIN, SENIOR LEGAL AND INTERNATIONAL ANALYST, GOVERNMENT
ACCOUNTABILITY PROJECT
Mr. Ryan. All right. Next up, senior legal and
international analyst, Government Accountability Project,
Samantha Feinstein.
Ms. Feinstein. Chairman Ryan, it is the nice to be back.
Thanks for having me. I am part of the Team Transparency, so I
guess I am the next batter up, Team Transparency.
Last year, I testified before this committee about the need
to establish an office to assist Congress in working with
whistleblowers in a secure way. And we appreciate all of the
tremendous work that you guys have done since then to raise the
profile of the importance of the need to protect congressional
communications with whistleblowers.
Since we last met, your committee directed the Government
Accountability Office to do a study on congressional
communications with whistleblowers. I believe that will be made
publicly available soon.
Also since then, in the 116th Congress, the House
established an Office of the Whistleblower Ombudsman. So I am
here today to request for fiscal year 2020 $1 million to allow
the House Office of the Whistleblower Ombudsman to hit the
ground running and have the support that it needs. The
ombudsman will be in charge of developing best practices for
communicating with whistleblowers and processing their intakes
when they contact your offices. And it will also be responsible
for training congressional offices in how to protect
whistleblowers and their confidentiality.
The funding would allow the office to support their staff
and expenses, develop and maintain a website, develop training
materials, develop materials on how to process whistleblower
intakes to their offices. And it would also allow them to
consult with subject-matter experts to help improve the quality
of their office services. We also request that you ask that
some of this funding be dedicated to exploring technological
developments as far as making sure that when whistleblowers
contact any office or committee, that that communication is
secure technologically.
And so we would like some of that funding to go towards
exploring that mechanism so that whistleblowers can trust that
their information will be safely handled.
As you know, whistleblowers are a vital lifeline to
information from Congress. They are witnesses firsthand of
waste, fraud, abuse, mismanagement, illegality, and other
corrupt nonsense. And no one else is going to tell you, so we
have got to protect communications with whistleblowers.
In recent years, under the False Claims Act, whistleblowers
have helped the government recover $3 billion to $5 billion a
year. So we think that it is really important to have a
robust----
Mr. Ryan. Federal Government?
Ms. Feinstein. Federal Government.
Mr. Ryan. Wow. That is real money even around here. Just
think what we could do in this committee with that extra money.
Ms. Feinstein. Well, so I think that Congress would receive
more disclosures if there were more protections for
whistleblowers. And this is just the first step in that.
And so we think that whistleblowers right now unfortunately
risk a lot when they come to Congress. They risk their careers.
They risk their personal life. It can really destroy their
career to come forward and get caught. And the level of
intensity of retaliation against whistleblowers can be directly
tied to the threat that their employer perceives them. So, if
they go public, it can be really risky business for them. We
don't want that to happen. And we think that this office will
really give whistleblowers the confidence that they need to
know that their communication is being handled responsibly.
So I also just wanted to mention that this request has been
put forth in consultation with the House Whistleblower
Protection Caucus and has received bipartisan support. You have
received a letter from Representatives Speier, Meadows, and
Rice in support of this budget.
So we thank you for your thoughtful consideration. And I
look forward to working with you to strengthen this vital
lifeline of communications to Congress.
[The information follows:]
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Mr. Ryan. Thank you. We appreciate the testimony. We have
seen over the last year or two how really important in this
kind of environment this is--and not just in the legislative
branch. I think when you talk about reforming government it is
so important to provide these kind of protections for people
who are really on the inside and really know how things work.
Sometimes when we have quick hearings, whether it is in this
committee or other committees, it is so hard to fully grasp the
intricacies of the bureaucracy. But somebody living in that
space for a while has the answers and can really help us. And I
think we are at a point where we do need to, on both sides of
the aisle, figure out how we reform this beast called the
United States Federal Government. This is obviously very
important. So thank you for taking the time to come and spend
time with us this morning.
Ms. Feinstein. Thank you for having me.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
----------
Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
NEED FOR IMPROVED ACCESS TO THE WORK OF THE LEGISLATIVE BRANCH
INSPECTORS GENERAL
WITNESS
REBECCA JONES, POLICY COUNSEL, PROJECT ON GOVERNMENT OVERSIGHT
Mr. Ryan. Next up is policy counsel for the Project on
Government Oversight, Rebecca Jones.
Ms. Jones. Good afternoon. I am also here as part of Team
Transparency, a card-carrying member. So thank you for the
opportunity to testify on approving access to the work of
inspectors general for the legislative branch.
Public access to the work of IGs is a critical facet of
government transparency. And publication of this work results
in both more accountability and more effective oversight.
I am here to request that the subcommittee adopt report
language that requires the inspectors general of the House of
Representatives and the U.S. Capitol Police to publish their
reports online.
Before I begin, I would like to quickly express our support
for the House Office of the Whistleblower Ombudsman and to echo
the testimony of Samantha Feinstein.
Founded in 1981, the Project on Government Oversight works
to strengthen the effectiveness and accountability of the
Federal Government through independent fact-based investigation
and analysis. We feel that the funding and publicizing the
independent work of IGs is paramount to achieving these goals.
Inspectors General conduct independent investigations,
audits, and inspections into waste, fraud, and abuse, and
provide recommendations to improve Federal programs. As a
result of this work, IGs claim an average return on investment
of approximately $17 for every dollar invested. In accordance
with the Inspector General Act, most do this while also keeping
Congress and the public apprised of their work and the problems
they uncover.
Under the Inspector General Act, as amended, most IGs are
required to publish on their website any audit, inspection, or
evaluation report they create within 3 days. By publishing
these reports, IGs keep the public, including groups like POGO,
informed of government waste, fraud, and abuse. This allows the
public to call out wasteful or illegal practices and to
increase pressure for swift change. In effect, publication
greatly increases the influence of IG's work.
But not all IGs are subject to these reporting
requirements. Two such IGs are those of the House of
Representatives and the Capitol Police. While these watchdogs
provide independent oversight of the operations of both
entities, they do not make the reports, findings, or
recommendations readily available to the public. In fact,
hardly any of their reports are available on their websites
and, therefore, are not easily accessible, even to some
congressional staff.
To rectify this lack of transparency, we ask that the
subcommittee adopt report language requiring these IGs to
follow the Inspector General Act's 3-day rule for posting
reports publicly on their own website and on the Federal
Government-wide website, oversight.gov.
Managed by the Council of Inspectors General on Integrity
and Efficiency, oversight.gov hosts reports from the vast
majority of Federal inspectors general, including four of the
legislative branch IGs, in a centralized and searchable
database.
POGO recognizes, of course, that due to classification or
privacy concerns, not all IG reports can be fully released to
the public. However, several executive branch IGs and other
oversight institutions have found ways to restrict access to
sensitive reports without keeping the public in the dark about
their report's existence.
For example, the Government Accountability Office, the
Department of Justice, and the Department of Defense inspectors
general currently provide basic information, such as report
title or report number, in cases where some or all of the
reports' content must remain nonpublic. While this is not yet
an IG-wide practice, if the Department of Defense, which
produces a large number of classified reports, and the
Department of Justice, which reports on law enforcement
matters, can provide this level of transparency, arguably any
IG should be able to. The House and Capitol Police IGs are no
exception.
The work of inspectors general should not be done in
secret. It is critical that lawmakers and the public have
access to IG reports in order to correct wasteful or abusive
practices. Further, because the legislative branch staff do not
benefit from the whistleblower protection that the executive
branch staff do and because the House of Representatives and
the Capitol Police are not subject to FOIA requests, these IGs
are the public's only option to measure the accountability of
these legislative branch entities.
POGO, therefore, asks that the subcommittee consider
including report language requiring these IGs to publish past
and future reports. We have prepared suggested written report
language to accomplish these goals, which is attached to my
testimony.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify. I look forward to
your questions.
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Mr. Ryan. And, again, thank you. We are lucky to have so
many people testifying today talking about these kind of
things, about transparency and all the rest, especially when it
comes to these reports. So we will continue the conversation
with you. This is important to us.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Can I ask a question?
Mr. Ryan. Sure can.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. So you are specifically honing in on
Capitol Police and leg branch IGs.
Ms. Feinstein. The Capitol Police and the House IGs.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. And the House.
Okay. I can kind of see how into gets murky, right, because
they can talk about, you know, FOIA stuff.
How does the Capitol Police fit under there? Is it just
something that has not been done, or are they claiming some
sort of a privilege?
Ms. Jones. So not----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Do you understand? The question is a
little fuzzy?
Ms. Jones. Why wouldn't they post their reports online?
I can't really say. I think that it may have something to
do with the fact that it is law enforcement. But, again,
because the DOJ posts their reports online, even if they are
classified, they will post at least a number or a title or
something----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. That something occurred.
Ms. Jones. Right. So, even if congressional staff 5 years
down the line want to look into these issues, they have no idea
that the reports even exist.
So we think it would be a relatively small ask for Capitol
Police IGs to----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Can I ask one more question? The "we,"
the transparency team, are you all with different
organizations?
Ms. Jones. We are. We are just saying transparency team to
be fun.
Mr. Ryan. They are branding themselves.
Ms. Jones. We are somewhat branding ourselves, but I know
at----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. They look millennial.
Ms. Jones. I will take it.
I know that several of our organizations are very
supportive of publicizing the work of IGs. And I know Demand
Progress has worked, at least for the House IGs, have reported
on their lack of publication.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Perfect. Thank you. I appreciate that.
Mr. Ryan. You know, I just want to add thanks generally to
all of you because you mentioned millennials. And I mean, it is
important to--it is important to have beliefs and come and
engage the government and make the change. And as we said to
someone who testified here a little before you, we actually
implemented it. I mean, that is how this is supposed to work.
We are all engaged in this endeavor in trying to create a more
perfect union. And sometimes it is in really small rooms
somewhere in the Capitol with nice views, that it actually
happens.
So we appreciate what you are doing.
Ms. Jones. We are so appreciative of the opportunity.
Thanks.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you, Ms. Jones.
----------
Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
LEGISLATIVE BRANCH APPROPRIATIONS FOR THE CONGRESSIONAL APP CHALLENGE,
AN OFFICIALLY SANCTIONED COMPETITION OF THE U.S. HOUSE OF
REPRESENTATIVES
WITNESS
JOSEPH ALESSI, PROJECT DIRECTOR, CONGRESSIONAL APP CHALLENGE
Mr. Ryan. Next up, program director from the Congressional
App Challenge, Joseph Alessi.
Mr. Alessi. Alessi. That is right.
Mr. Ryan. Is that Italian?
Mr. Alessi. Yes. Sicilian.
Mr. Ryan. Request granted immediately.
The floor is yours.
Mr. Alessi. Thank you. Chairman Ryan, Ranking Member
Herrera Beutler, thank you for allowing me to testify today.
I am the program director of the Congressional App
Challenge, which you did hear a bit about earlier. So I will
try to avoid being redundant.
But we are an officially sanctioned competition of the
House of Representatives. We are a coding competition for
middle and high school students that aims to create a domestic
pipeline of STEM talent in every district and in every corner
of the United States.
In 4 short years, this program of the House of
Representatives has grown exponentially. Student registrations
and functioning apps have tripled since 2015. Congressional App
Challenges were held in more than half of the congressional
districts in the United States last year. Both of you
participate in Congressional App Challenge. And your winning
apps from this year are actually a great example of the
diversity of the content that this contest brings about.
Chairman Ryan, your students coded an app called the
Anonymous Security Center, where students can anonymously
report security threats to school administrators.
And, Ranking Member Herrera Beutler----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. Ours is about fish.
Mr. Alessi. Yeah. Yours was fish.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. I am from the Northwest.
Mr. Alessi. The Fundamentals of Fish Care.
Ms. Herrera Beutler. They die--those pets die all the time.
The kids become----
Mr. Alessi. Yeah.
And so obviously those are vastly different apps. But that
is the beauty of the competition.
The students aren't bound by guidelines about what they can
code or where they can code or what the subject matter needs to
be. It doesn't stifle the creative instincts, and so it allows
a passion for STEM, for computer science, for coding to
flourish in these students.
As I mentioned, we are creating a diverse pipeline of
computer science talent. A full one-third of the Congressional
App Challenge was held in districts last year where they have
sizeable rural populations. So those are either districts that
qualify as pure rural or rural-suburban. Nearly 90 percent of
States hosted at least one app challenge in 2018. And, again,
Silicon Valley's best diversity metrics----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. We always--the girls always win.
Mr. Alessi. Against their best diversity metrics,
participants in the Congressional App Challenge are four times
as likely to identify as black, three times as likely to
identify as Latino, twice as likely to identify as female. And
3.3 percent of our participants last year identified as Native
American or Native Alaskan. And Silicon Valley's numbers are
low to the point that, last we checked, they were unable to
measure them.
And that really hammers on the point of how diverse of a
competition this is, both geographically, across the lines of
race, across every category that you can imagine.
It is also worth mentioning that 44 percent of our
participants from last year's competition described themselves
as beginners. So this is a bridge for students to learn more
about computer science and coding and potentially explore a
career path in the future. It is an opportunity to inspire
those students, not just highlight those who already have an
interest in the subject matter.
We are an inflection point both as a Nation and as a
program. I am not going to belabor the need for computer
science and STEM talent in the United States. I think
Congresswoman Eshoo did a great job of that earlier.
But I will mention, as she mentioned, the growth of this
program has outstripped our ability at IEF, the foundation that
administers it, to administer it. Serious investment in both
program infrastructure and outreach are needed to help this
program reach its full potential. Only a small investment is
needed. We are a full-time office of only two people, and we
currently rely on self-sourced private sector funding for 100
percent of our funds to make this contest possible.
I like to imagine what would be possible at this time with
critical support from this committee and from the House of
Representatives to own a program that is a program of the House
of Representatives. We are just scratching the surface of this
program's potential.
So, you know, to sum things up, I just want to say this
program really does--it deserves more than free solutions like
spreadsheets and Google forms daisy-chained together by a small
team of professional staff and interns. We have already seen
some of the talent that has come out of the Congressional App
Challenge, and I would like to imagine what we can uncover with
additional resources.
And thank you both for your time. I am happy to take any
questions.
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Mr. Ryan. Great. Thank you. Phenomenal. We love this.
Obviously, we have some challenges as far as trying to fund all
of these great programs. But this is something we are all, I
think, in love with. And if you could share those exact
statistics with us again, I want to make sure----
Ms. Herrera Beutler. It would be helpful.
Mr. Ryan [continuing]. Commit those to memory.
Mr. Alessi. Absolutely. I would be happy to do that.
Mr. Ryan. Thank you.
Mr. Alessi. Thank you very much.
----------
Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
NEED FOR CONGRESSIONAL INTERVENTION TO ENSURE THE ABILITY OF GAO TO
AUDIT AND INVESTIGATE INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY COMPONENTS
WITNESS
KEL McCLANAHAN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIONAL SECURITY COUNSELORS,
NATIONAL SECURITY LAW
Mr. Ryan. Okay. Next is Kel McClanahan--speaking of
Italian, Kel McClanahan is our next--I am half Irish too,
though, so we are good. Executive Director, National Security
Counselors.
Mr. McClanahan, you have the floor.
Mr. McClanahan. Thank you, Ranking Member and Chairman, for
inviting me here.
I am here to talk about what should be a relatively
noncontroversial idea, the idea that the Government
Accountability Office, GAO, has the ability to investigate all
agencies of the Federal Government. This is something that
should be the case but, unfortunately, is not. There is a large
portion of the Federal Government, the intelligence community,
that regularly refuses to cooperate. And this has gone back
decades that I won't go into. It is in my written testimony.
The gist of it is, in 2001, they came and testified that
they discontinued such work on an investigation they had been
asked to do because the CIA was not providing them with
sufficient access to information to perform their mission. This
was 2001. They had to make a conscious decision not to further
pursue the issue and, in fact, commented that, when they had
managed to get information, it was only through subterfuge
saying that they requested threat assessments so that the CIA,
quote, does not perceive our audits as oversight of its
activities, unquote.
And fast-forward to 2008. You have a fight again where they
say: We foresee no major change in limits in our access without
substantial support from Congress, the requester of the vast
majority of our work.
Well, the reason for this goes back to a 1988 Office of
Legal Counsel opinion that says that intelligence is the
executive discharge of its constitutional foreign policy
responsibilities, not its statutory responsibilities, and,
therefore, it is not, quote, a program or activity the
government carries out under existing law, unquote, which is
how they explained removing it from GAO jurisdiction.
So this has been tried to be fixed many times in the past,
most recently in 2010 when the fiscal year 2010 Intelligence
Authorization Act actually added in the House version language
that said that the Director of National Intelligence shall
cooperate with GAO and shall direct intelligence agencies to do
so.
OMB threatened to veto it citing the OLC opinion. And
Comptroller General Gene Dodaro wrote a detailed memo refuting
this analysis and saying that it has greatly impeded GAO's work
for the Intelligence Committees and also jeopardizes some of
GAO's work for other committees of jurisdiction, including
Armed Services, Appropriations, Judiciary, and Foreign
Relations, among others.
But Congress decided to give the executive another chance.
And they included a provision in the final bill that directed
the DNI to formulate a policy about this. And the DNI created
Intelligence Community Directive 114, which said that
intelligence agency shall only cooperate with GAO on matters
that don't fall within the purview of the congressional
intelligence oversight committees, which means that GAO can
only investigate things that the Intelligence Committees can't,
which is basically nothing, so we are back to where we started.
Well, this is a problem for a few reasons. Number one, it
is a logistical problem. In 2009, there were 199 staffers at
GAO with top secret clearances and 96 with sensitive
compartmented information clearances. In 2018, there were 35
Senate Intelligence Committee staffers and 37 House
Intelligence Committee staffers. There are more people at GAO
with SCI clearances than the entire staff of HPSCI and SSCI put
together.
And this isn't just us. Mr. Dodaro has come and testified
about this many times. I testified with Chairman Ryan and then-
Chairman Yoder last year. And after my testimony, Chairman
Yoder asked Mr. Dodaro about this and asked if they needed
additional support from Congress, a direction for the
intelligence agencies, and he said yes.
And then this year, Chairman Ryan, thank you very much, you
asked Mr. Dodaro again, has this improved? And he said that the
IC has gotten a little bit better when an Intel Committee is
involved but that they have more difficulties when the request
comes from non-Intelligence Committees. And that is an
understatement.
In fact, in the last 5 years, an intelligence agency has
refused to give information to GAO in two cases and given it
only after what Mr. Dodaro called excessive delays in 13 cases.
And those cases were both mandates and requests from committee
chairs from both Intelligence Committees, the Homeland Security
Government Affairs Committee of the Senate, the Homeland
Security Committee of the House, both Judiciary Committees,
both Appropriations Committees, the Foreign Relations Committee
in the Senate, and the House Foreign Affairs Committee. So
basically any committee that could conceivably have any degree
of jurisdiction over the intelligence community is being
rebuffed.
And the bottom line--These artificial restrictions on GAO's
authority are causing Congress to expend more financial and
manpower resources to accomplish less oversight. So, in effect,
I am not asking you for money. I am asking you to do something
through report language or statutory language that will save
you money that you could then spend on all of these other
worthy programs that people are asking you for money for.
And, with that, I am happy to answer any questions.
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Mr. Ryan. Kel, we appreciate your testimony here and all
your good work. Thank you so much. And on behalf of everyone
else here that may get the money from your savings, they thank
you as well. But we appreciate you sticking to this. It is
really important, so thank you so much.
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Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
STRENGTHENING INTELLIGENCE OVERSIGHT THROUGH PROVIDING ADEQUATE
CLEARANCES AND DESIGNEES TO PERSONAL OFFICE STAFF FOR KEY CONGRESSIONAL
COMMITTEES
WITNESS
MANDY SMITHBERGER, DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR DEFENSE INFORMATION AT THE
PROJECT ON GOVERNMENT OVERSIGHT
Mr. Ryan. Next up Mandy Smithberger, director of
information at the Project on Government Oversight. And on deck
is Gabe Cazares. All right. Where are you from?
Ms. Smithberger. Columbus.
Mr. Ryan. All right. Very good.
Ms. Smithberger. Thank you so much, Chairman Ryan and
Ranking Member Herrera Beutler, for allowing me to testify
today on behalf of the Project on Government Oversight and
Demand Progress on strengthening Congress' capacity to conduct
oversight on matters of national security.
We respectfully urge your committee to provide adequate
resources so that personal office staff for members of the
House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the House
Appropriations Defense Subcommittee, and the House Armed
Services Committee can receive the clearances necessary to
properly oversee intelligence and other national security
agencies.
Without personal office congressional staff with TS/SCI
clearances for Members on those committees, many of the Members
are overseeing the executive blindfolded. In addition, we are
urging the committee to require a public-facing report
detailing the cost of providing these clearances to one staff
member for every Member of the House.
Before I worked for the House, I was in the intelligence
community, and I appreciate how important it is to properly
protect sensitive national security information. I also know
that Congress needs more resources to perform its
constitutional oversight duties. We signed that letter that
Daniel was talking about on allocations.
The reform that we are talking about here particularly for
House Intelligence is already implemented in the Senate
Intelligence Committee. It is overdue to be adopted in the
House. Both the chair and the ranking member of the House
Intelligence Committee have expressed concerns about inadequate
resources. And the chair of the committee has said that he
finds the idea of designees appealing.
As this committee is well aware, the legislative branch
receives approximately 0.4 percent of the discretionary Federal
budget to oversee the entire Federal Government.
For comparison, the intelligence community requested about
$86 billion this year, or 18 times that amount. So you guys are
outgunned. And the more resources that you can have to make
sure that you are preventing waste, fraud, and abuse I think
the better and safer we are all going to be.
While we believe that every committee is underresourced,
that problem is particularly acute for the House Intelligence
Committee because we can't count on the press, civil society,
or other stakeholders to fill in the gaps to help Congress
uncover waste, fraud, and abuse.
History has shown that while Congress has curtailed its own
access to national security information, the number of
executive branch employees and contractors accessing this
information has exploded. The most recent public data showed
about 1.2 million people had TS clearances, and about half of
those were contractors.
While we don't know the full scope of how many legislative
branch staffers have this information, we would urge Congress
to track and publicly disclose that information. Even if our
proposed reform was adopted, the number of cleared staff is
unlikely to increase the total number significantly.
The costs are also likely to be minimal. The three
committees we are identifying here have fewer than a hundred
members. It is our understanding the cost for providing staff
with TS/SCI clearances is largely borne by the CIA, and the
cost of investigating and adjudicating those clearances is
around $5,000 for someone who has never held one.
We do anticipate that there would be some funding needed
for the legislative branch to maintain records of nondisclosure
agreements, to store classified documents, and track
individuals granted clearance. We urge the committee to
increase funds for the Sergeant at Arms accordingly.
But since most of the personal office staff with the
relevant committees likely already have TS clearances,
providing additional access should not be overly burdensome.
It is of paramount importance, though, to make sure that
increased access is handled responsibly. And so we would also
urge the committee to have increased counterintelligence
training, akin to what we see in the executive branch, and to
include in that training the reminder that congressional staff
have the same duties to protect the sensitive information.
As I describe in my written testimony, former members of
the committee from both sides of the aisle have described how
difficult it can be to target questions for agencies that are
naturally secretive. The answer to this problem is to ensure
that each member of these key committees has someone who will
primarily reflect their interest and their specificities and
act as a confidential sounding board. Empowering personal
office staff who will function as designees or shared staff is
the obvious and economic solution.
Most importantly, implementing a designee system can
increase the effectiveness of these committees. Former Senator
Saxby Chambliss, who served both on the House Intelligence
Committee and was the vice chair of the Senate committee, said
that the designee system increased bipartisan collaboration and
made the committee more effective because they could take on
more policy portfolio issues. Overall, providing designees or
shared staff to the Members of the House would increase both
the capacity and I think the credibility of these committees.
As you mentioned earlier, years of executive overreach by
both Democratic and Republican administrations have
unconstitutionally diminished Congress' role. We are really
excited about this committee making sure that you guys get the
respect and resources that you need. Congress must reassert
itself as a coequal branch, and that has to start with
providing sufficient support to Members to perform their
constitutional oversight duties.
Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.
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Mr. Ryan. Thank you so much. I sit on Defense
Appropriations Subcommittee as well, and----
Ms. Smithberger. And thank you for your work on----
Mr. Ryan. Yeah. So there is a perfect example of what
happens in the Department of Defense. And it goes back to the
whistleblower testimony that we had. And now your testimony,
obviously, critically important because--well, for obvious
reasons. I think you were very clear about it.
So thank you for bringing this to our attention.
Ms. Smithberger. Thank you so much for having me
----------
Tuesday, April 2, 2019.
LEGISLATIVE BRANCH APPROPRIATIONS FOR THE NATIONAL LIBRARY SERVICE FOR
THE BLIND AND PHYSICALLY HANDICAPPED
WITNESS
GABE CAZARES, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND
Mr. Ryan. The next witness, director for the National
Federation of the Blind, Gabe Cazares. Is that right?
Mr. Cazares. Yes.
Thank you for having me. I am your disability community
millennial.
Mr. Ryan. All right. There you go.
Mr. Cazares. My name is Gabe Cazares. I am the manager of
Government Affairs of the National Federation of the Blind. And
I appreciate this opportunity to propose two appropriations be
made to the National Library Service for the Blind and
Physically Handicapped, NLS. In order to fund their program to
distribute refreshable braille displays, or e-readers, to their
patrons and to enhance the capacity of the Braille and Audio
Reading Download, BARD, service.
The NLS is the primary provider of reading material for
over 800,000 Americans who are blind or have other physical
disabilities that make it impossible for them to read print. An
appropriation of $2.375 million over a 5-year period to NLS for
the e-reader program will save money and lead to the
proliferation of critically needed braille materials for blind
Americans.
Currently, there are hardcopy offerings, but new low-cost
displays, or e-readers, similar to the one I am actively using
at this moment to read my testimony, can produce electronic
braille, saving money, saving paper, and providing a small
device where formerly multiple and large volumes were required
for just one book.
Moreover, a 2016 GAO report titled ``Library Services for
Those with Disabilities'' indicated that the cost of embossing,
housing, and shipping hardcopy braille volumes was $17 million
annually. That same GAO report estimates that the refreshable
braille e-reader program and electronically distributed books
will incur an annual cost of $7 million. That is an annual
savings of $10 million over the current system.
In an effort to enhance and expand the availability of
braille and audio formats, the NLS launched the Braille and
Audio Download service, or BARD. BARD allows patrons to
download materials from the NLS catalog onto a compatible book
player, such as the NLS digital talking book player, onto their
personal computers or onto the BARD mobile application
available for Android and IOS devices.
According to NLS, 45,484 patrons are currently subscribed
to the BARD service, which holds 108,450 books in its
collection. Both numbers are expected to increase. However, the
existing infrastructure that supports the BARD service is at
capacity. In order to fully harness the potential of the BARD
service, both hardware and software upgrades are necessary. An
appropriation of $5 million over a 3-year period to NLS will
allow NLS to make the necessary upgrades that will enable the
BARD service to keep up with increasing patron demand. An
upgraded BARD service will also allow for seamless interaction
between the service and the NLS e-reader program.
On behalf of the 50,000 members of the National Federation
of the Blind, I strongly urge you to support these two
appropriation requests and thank you for your consideration,
and I am happy to answer any questions you may have.
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Mr. Ryan. Okay. And thank you so much for your testimony.
I am going to ask you to do something a little out of the
ordinary. Can you explain to us how that works? I know we have
done this offline, but I think it is an important technology,
and it is important for people to see how this works.
Mr. Cazares. Sure. So this is a machine that operates with
electronic pens. And as I am panning back and forth through the
document that I was just reading, I can read a line of braille
at a time. And every time I pan to the next line, the pins
reform into the new cell----
Mr. Ryan. So you hit those two little gray things on the
side there----
Mr. Cazares. Yes.
Mr. Ryan. And you hit those when you are done reading the
line, and it pops up the next line.
Mr. Cazares. That is right.
Mr. Ryan. Basically.
Mr. Cazares. And the memory is stored in an SD card back
here. And I can just plug this into the computer, put in my
file, swap out files. And this is how the system works.
Mr. Ryan. You are very fluent in it.
Mr. Cazares. Thanks.
Mr. Ryan. That is excellent.
Well, thank you for your testimony. Chairman Yoder last
year and I discussed, this very important aspect of what
happens at the Library of Congress, the National Library
Service, and for our country. So we appreciate you coming up to
the Hill and testifying and trying to make a difference here.
So we appreciate all your good work.
Mr. Cazares. Thank you. Thank you for your time.
Mr. Ryan. All right. Thank you.
All right. That is it. Thank you, everyone, for being here
and accessing and advocating to your government.
This hearing is adjourned.
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