top of grade 15. On a per diem basis this amounts to $92 a day. We cannot provide the experts that we really need.

Senator PROXMIRE. You can't do what the Defense Department will do or what some of the other agencies will do. As I understand it, they will bring in some Kinsey efficiency experts or some of the other top efficiency agencies-Booz-Allen.

Mr. STAATS. We can.

Senator PROXMIRE. Even though the appropriation would be more than grade 15?

STUDY CONTRACTS

Mr. STAATS. That is right, under a contract with a firm. We would prefer to pay whatever we have to, say, to get one or two individuals who can work during the course of the study which would not involve a contract. A contract is intended, in my opinion, in cases where you are relying on a firm to back up and give you the best judgment that firm as a whole in the name of that firm can give you.

We are making two contracts on the study we are making of the poverty programs. We feel that it is not only appropriate, but was intended, in fact, in the language of the act which asks us to take on this responsibility. But by and large I think we have more flexibility and we can do more with less money if we had additional authority with respect to consultants rather than go the contract route.

But we can't really use our consultants very extensively, limited to the $92 a day.

EXPERTS AND CONSULTANTS AUTHORITY TO HIRE

Senator PROXMIRE. Have you recommended a change that would enable you to pay more than that?

Mr. STAATS. No; we have not.

Senator PROXMIRE. Why don't you? You more or less know about it. I think we can make a strong case. Anybody who is really interested in efficiency and economy, it seems to me, would have to give very serious consideration to any recommendation you made as to getting more competent people to help you on this kind of thing and, as you say, from every standpoint it would be economical because you feel you can get the people you want and have them work for a month or 6 weeks a lot more sensibly than hiring somebody and training them for years and then by that time the problem may have disappeared. Mr. STAATS. Or bring in, say, an individual on leave from a university.

Senator PROXMIRE. Or to make a very expensive contract with one of these big efficiency firms. If the Chair would permit, I think it would be helpful to ask you, don't you, to give some indication.

Senator BARTLETT. Well, yes, in terms of

Senator PROXMIRE. Going above GS-15.

Senator BARTLETT. Yes; and in terms of how many people you could usefully employ in the next fiscal year over and above those you have contemplated in the budget now submitted. I would like to ask this question, Senator Proxmire, in relation to what you have been talking about.

EFFECTIVE USE

When you call in an individual consultant or a consultant firm, does it take some little while to educate him or them as to your methods? Do you have to do a lot of teaching before this person or these persons become effective?

Mr. STAATS. I am aware that in some cases this has been the situation. My own experience indicates that there have been cases of this kind. However, it seems to me that the value of bringing in a consultant or a contractor, either one, is to get individuals or firms who have already had experience in the field. In other words, there is no point in bringing them in at all if you are going to have to educate them before they can help you.

CONTRACT NEGOTIATION

Senator BARTLETT. I think that is very well put. I have long had a question as to this. I know of more than one incidence where a department in a particular section of the country, for example, certainly adequately equipped within itself with experts to reach a decision on a particular problem, has let out a contract to one of these private firms which knew nothing about the matter at all and had to assimilate a lot of information already published or otherwise available, and I have just long doubted the efficacy of any such arrangement, but stated the way you state it, it is quite a different matter because this is a negotiating process always, is it not?

Mr. STAATS. It is.

Senator BARTLETT. And if you had a firm come in or an individual come in who is completely unacquainted with the problem you face, then you wouldn't want to consider them very favorably?

Mr. STAATS. The whole purpose of our contracting on the study we are making of the poverty program is to get a firm who had already done work in this field and who therefore were able to bring knowledge and experience, background, to our own people. Otherwise, we would have not gone outside at all.

We would have done the entire job with our own staff.

AUTHORITY TO HIRE EXPERTS AND CONSULTANTS IN LEGISLATIVE REORGANIZATION BILL

Senator PROXMIRE. I understand that the Reorganization Act that passed the Senate changed that $92 a day to $200 a day.

Mr. STAATS. Yes; but that is limited to the cost effectiveness work that we would be asked to do for the Congress under that act.

Senator PROXMIRE. But your feeling is, and I think is a realistic feeling, that that bill may not pass the House and if it doesn't, that improvement which was I guess unanimously recommended by all of the Republicans and Democrats, House and Senate, on the Reorganization Committee, the Monroney-Madden committee, is going to die! Mr. STAATS. There certainly hasn't been much optimism on this point in the House. However, I would like to make it clear that that authority extends only to the work we would be doing with the Congress in the area of cost-effectiveness studies. This is my understand

ing. It would not extend to anything beyond that, or other work being done under that part of the Legislative Reorganization Act.

Senator PROXMIRE. And you feel that it should be so you are going to let us know what kind of legislation you would prefer?

ADDITIONAL AUTHORITY

Mr. STAATS. We would be glad to. We had not come to this hearing this morning with

Senator PROXMIRE. I understand, but I understand the Chairman suggested that, among other things, that we would like to know about. Mr. STAATS. We would be glad to do that.

LANGUAGE, RATES AND PERSONNEL

Senator PROXMIRE. We want to cover not just cost effectiveness studies, but right across the board.

Mr. STAATS. If it meets with your approval we will suggest language and the amount of money and, if you wish, even a limitation on numbers of people who would be brought in for that work.

(The information follows:)

Hon. E. L. BARTLETT,

COMPTROLLER GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES,

Chairman, Legislative Subcommittee,
Senate Appropriations Committee,
U.S. Senate.

Washington, D.C., April 24, 1969.

DEAR MR. CHAIRMAN: With the growing of advanced, sophisticated technical problems encountered by the General Accounting Office in its continuing examinations of the affairs of Federal agencies, I am requesting authority to engage individuals who can provide highly expert consulting assistance. This is in addition to our current authority to hire consultants under 5 U.S.C. 3109 at rates not exceeding $92 per day. Such additional authority is requested for not more than 25 such individuals in any one year to be paid at rates not in excess of $200 per day. This purpose can be accomplished by inserting immediately following reference to "services as authorized by 5 U.S.C. 3109" in our appropriation language the phrase ", but not more than 25 individuals in any one fiscal year may be paid at rates not to exceed $200 per diem".

Increasingly, the audit work of the General Accounting Office is extending into such technical areas as space technology, atomic energy, research and development, and various kinds of social programs which require from time to time expert assistance from individuals outside the Government who are specialists in these fields. It is considered important to have such individuals available to assist us as needed in connection with the conduct of our audit work and in the final processing of our audit reports.

Recognition of the need for this expert assistance has already been included in S. 355, entitled the Legislative Reorganization Act of 1967, which has passed the Senate but is still pending in the House. That bill authorizes the Comptroller General of the United States to obtain the services of individual experts and consultants in accordance with Section 3109 of Title 5 U.S. Code, at rates not in excess of $200 per diem.

I appreciate your assistance in this matter.

Sincerely yours,

(Signed) ELMER B. STAATS, Comptroller General of the United States.

INCREASED BUDGET

Senator BARTLETT. We wish you would.

Well, off the record.

(Discussion off the record.)

Senator BARTLETT. I want to say for the record that really an amazing development took place here this morning, and I hope you realize the importance of it, when Senator Proxmire suggested that you hadn't perhaps asked for enough money for fiscal year 1969.

This was truly a unique decoration on his part and I doubt very much whether he has ever informed an agency before that it should try out for a larger budget and I think this is perhaps a historical morning, is it not, Senator?

Senator PROXMIRE. Mr. Chairman, you are absolutely right. I have great faith in this wonderful agency and in Mr. Staats. As I say, I think I was very conservative when I said it will pay back 10 to 1. I think it will pay back probably 100 to 1. The pay-back is very, very great and we are just missing an awfully good bet for the taxpayer if we don't urge Mr. Staats to come in with a big and an imaginative program for efficiency in view of the massive job we have.

Mr. STAATS. I appreciate very much the statement that both of you have made with respect to the GAO. I feel very strongly that GAŎ is a highly important agency which can provide even greater assistance to the Congress in the exercise of its responsibilities. All of our activities are not in any sense designed to save money, or even to improve the efficiency and economy with which Government programs are carried out. We have many activities which don't relate to that at all. They are more in the nature of direct assistance to the Congress and its committees. It will be my policy and my program to strengthen the GAO in any way which will improve our capability to

do this.

Senator PROXMIRE. Assisting Congress is trying to do the same thing, however.

Mr. STAATS. Fifteen to 20 percent of our entire effort is now directed to meeting specific requests from committees of Congress or individual members of Congress. Work done at the request of members doesn't show up in any way as GAO accomplishments except numbers of reports, you see, so that I guess what I am really saying in summary is that we want to find ways to make the GAO a more effective organization.

FUTURE GROWTH

We have difficult internal problems. We are trying to deal with those problems. I think GAO should expand in the future, but we want to grow in a way in which we are sure we are going to make the maximum use of our staff. But I do appreciate what you say.

Senator PROXMIRE. The fact that you are smaller now than you were is another indication that maybe there is more you can do. Heavens knows, with the Federal Government your job isn't smaller.

INTERNAL AUDITS IN AGENCIES

Mr. STAATS. I think we can extend our effectiveness throughout the Government in another way which we are emphasizing at the moment, namely, strengthening internal audit in the agencies, and what can be done to strengthen the agencies' own capability to perform a similar function within the agencies themselves. We have in process or have made approximately 15 reports to Congress in which we are setting forth our judgment as to ways in which the effectiveness of internal audit in these agencies can be increased and we have had some

success.

Some changes have been made as a result of our work. In this way we think we can extend the influence of GAO throughout the Government.

DEVELOPING BROADER CAPABILITY

Mr. WEITZEL. I think the record ought to show at least two other things, Mr. Staats has done to, in our opinion, greatly increase the effectiveness of the General Accounting Office.

One, to increase the breadth of the staff by recruiting people from other disciplines than the accounting and auditing which has traditionally carried on in the work of the GAO, and the legal, from other areas, such as business administration, public administration, statistics, mathematics, even engineering, which is giving us a broader basis for dealing with the agencies in appraising their programs. Then especially there is the work he has done in the last year or two of getting started on developing a systems analysis capability which we hope will help the Congress in its evaluation of planning, programing, and budgeting activities in the executive branch and, when requested, will furnish assistance to congressional committees, as contemplated by the reorganization bill, which hasn't become law yet, so that we can help Congress get the benefit out of these techniques.

Senator BARTLETT. And I want you to know, Mr. Staats, here and now despite my questions I am very much in favor of replacing that old crock, as some people have been so rude as to designate my relatively old car, with a newer one more suited to your requirements.

Mr. STAATS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think I should say we have included in here only the standard provision that GSA provides. We have not reviewed any thought as to what kind of car we will get. Senator BARTLETT. We understand.

Mr. STAATS. We are trying to be very modest.

Senator BARTLETT. Off the record.

(Discussion off the record.)

Senator BARTLETT. Thank you, Mr. Staats, and your associates, for a very clear presentation.

SUBCOMMITTEE RECESS

The subcommittee will be in recess until 2 o'clock today when we will hear from the Public Printer.

(Whereupon, at 12:15 p.m. the subcommittee recessed, to reconvene at 2 p.m., the same day.)