35-533 - 79 - 7 (Pt. 2)

Ordering Source

74-099

1972

Senate Foreign Relations

Title

Hearing Psychotropic Substances

Mr. BENJAMIN. How about other than the security aspects of it with the State Department?

Mr. BOYLE. Very seldom.

Mr. BENJAMIN. Do you have these outstanding obligations for Congressional work? Can anybody answer that?

Mr. DEVAUGHN. Yes, we do have those continued obligations. Mr. SONNTAG. It would be on some publications.

DESCHLER'S PRECEDENTS

Mr. DEVAUGHN. Can you come up with an example now?

Mr. SONNTAG. It doesn't really go back that far, but one that will probably continue is the Precedents of the House, or Deschler's Precedents. We have only completed the second volume in 2 years. I understand they anticipated 8 volumes. At the pace we are receiving copy right now, it could take 3 or 4 more years.

Mr. BENJAMIN. Perhaps the better thing for GPO to have done then is to ask for appropriations for the volumes in the correct fiscal years instead of asking for a total appropriation that would extend over these numbers of years.

Mr. BOYLE. But we would have to go to whoever had authority over this job and get their estimate of how much work is involved. Mr. BENJAMIN. That is what you have to do anyway. Mr. BOYLE. I know, but they can't tell us.

Mr. DEVAUGHN. It would increase the appropriated amounts. We would be releasing funds that had already been appropriated. For instance, those eight volumes would come in in one year, then we ask for that money and then we obligate it. If we had released that back to the Treasury, then the following year we would have to come in and ask for a new obligation authority from the appropriation committee. We would do that every year, and if you added up our appropriations, they would be higher.

Mr. BENJAMIN. Let me see if I understand you, as our fine people tell us here.

On a macroeconomic scale, let's say you have $1 million in obligations that you haven't spent, and since the Federal Government is in a deficit position, that has to be financed. Someone has to go out and sell some type of government note at 10 percent or above now, so as a taxpayer I am paying $100,000 for you keeping those funds.

Mr. DEVAUGHN. No, sir. The financing is done on a cash flow estimate rather than obligation. All we have is the authority to obligate. There are no funds set aside in the Treasury for us for these amounts, and they sell their bonds at 10 percent on a cash flow basis, and we give them estimates on that.

Mr. BENJAMIN. Let me ask one more question on that.

What if the initial obligation was 10,000 copies of a document, and when they finally come to you for the outlay, it turns out to be 25,000. What do you do?

Mr. DEVAUGHN. We would charge the difference against the current year's appropriation and then come to you, as we are now, on a deficiency for that prior year.

Were those dollars you were using?
Mr. BENJAMIN. Yes.

Mr. DEVAUGHN. Yes. Whatever the excess was, we would ask for the deficiency appropriation, just the way we are doing here.

Mr. BENJAMIN. Incidentally, is this $3,819,000 deficiency appropriation after the 5 percent obligation has been withheld?

Mr. DEVAUGHN. No, sir.

Mr. BENJAMIN. Then if I understand you, we are not only looking at the possibility of not withholding the $5,431,000, but we are also looking at an addition to the 1979 appropriation of $3,819,000.

Mr. DEVAUGHN. There are two other appropriations available to us. We are not conceding complete defeat yet. This is only the Printing and Binding Appropriation. We also have the Congressional Printing and Binding, and we have the Superintendent of Documents' Salaries and Expenses.

REPROGRAMING POSSIBILITY

Mr. BENJAMIN. Is the GPO in a position to reprogram instead of requesting a deficiency appropriation?

Mr. DEVAUGHN. No, sir.

Mr. BENJAMIN. That is a flat no?

Mr. BOYLE. We don't have any funds to reprogram.

Mr. DEVAUGHN. We lack authority.

Mr. BOYLE. We are totally dependent on saying yes to the Congress and delivering the amount of work they require at the cost that is required to do it, and we don't have any control over the volume. We don't have any money to reprogram. We also can't reprogram on the basis of an executive agency by saying, we are going to stop printing bills because we have more hearings than we anticipated or vice versa.

Mr. BENJAMIN. Let's look at it this way. If I understand what you are saying, this deficiency appropriation comes up because of orders that were submitted and completed in a following fiscal year. You then program what the costs are originally estimated to be, and obligate the funds. You never liquidated the funds, or you only liquidated a part of that obligation. That would mean that you would have jobs started now in fiscal year 1979 that conceivably would not be completed in fiscal year 1980, so consequently you are not going to liquidate those funds. Apparently, you may come back to us in 1981 for fiscal year 1980 or 1979.

You are telling me that those funds could not be reprogrammed? Mr. DEVAUGHN. I am not sure I know what you mean by "reprogramming."

Mr. BENJAMIN. I say to you in all candor that I don't think we are going to get a supplemental.

Mr. DEVAUGHN. I am not sure I know what you mean by "reprogram."

Mr. BENJAMIN. Where you have obligated the funds you say at this point you are going to use it as an outlay for jobs actually done.

Mr. DEVAUGHN. Yes, sir.

Mr. BENJAMIN. I think somebody had better look at that, because I don't visualize, and I could be absolutely wrong, that there is going to be a general supplemental.

Mr. BOYLE. We will take another look at it.

OFFICE OF SUPERINTENDENT OF DOCUMENTS

Mr. BENJAMIN. Office of Superintendent of Documents. You are requesting $23,037,000 for 1980, a decrease of $163,000 from the 1979 appropriations enacted to date.

How many positions does this request include?

Mr. LABARRE. 383. That is on page IV-2, sir.

Mr. BENJAMIN. We will insert the budget schedule and justification material (IV-1 through IV-5 and supporting statement) in the record at this point.

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