in charge of all of our buildings overseas, which is about $3 or $4 billion in real estate, and many of the problems that GSA has domestically, the Department also experiences in servicing our overseas facilities.

Nevertheless, Mr. Chairman, I think there are some service and maintenance problems here in Washington which GSA must deal with.

Mr. Chairman, I am accompanied today by Mr. Charles Baquet, Director of Facilities Management and Administrative Services Division of the Department of State, and Mr. Roland Gahn, Chief of the General Services Division. We would be pleased to answer any questions your committee may have.

Mr. FARY. You stated that other GSA regions are more responsive to your needs than the National Capital region. In what way? Does the National Capital region operate in a different manner?

Mr. TRACY. There is one important difference between the National Capital region procedures and that of other regions. As you will recall, in 1978, GSA uncovered a pattern of misconduct in its field offices in this region. The central focus of that problem centered around the misuse of authority granted to GSA managers. It is our view in the Department of State that as a result of that misconduct, GSA procedures were tightened up and authority centralized so much that we now have a rather inefficient and too highly centralized system.

Mr. FARY. If the National Capital region relaxed the present rules and granted more authority to its building managers, do you feel service would improve?

Mr. TRACY. Yes, we do. Certainly to some extent the decentralization process works in the other GSA regions. However there are some other problems. For example, the GSA building manager at State does not have sufficient craftsmen to maintain the secondlargest Government building in the metropolitan area, along with several other buildings, both Government-owned and leased, that we occupy. His current allocation of employees have too large an area of responsibility for the resources that they control. We understand that GSA recognizes this problem and is studying proposals to reduce the number of buildings each building manager must maintain.

Mr. FARY. You stated that the Department of State had previously asked for authority to maintain their own buildings. To what extent do you envision this authority?

Mr. TRACY. Let me say that one of the reasons we did this, Mr. Chairman, is because we do, in fact, maintain $3 or $4 billion worth of buildings and embassies overseas, so we feel we have some expertise. However, the Department requested authority to maintain the main State building at C Street, on the basis that we had a proprietory interest in the upkeep of that building. We initially requested authority only for the housekeeping and maintenance areas. We offered to continue the payment of SLUC, less the costs required to maintain the building. We did not request authority to issue contracts for modification or alterations to space at that time. However, a large backlog has developed since then, altering our previous stance so that we may have to request such authority, we

83-536 0-81--34

do not see that GSA can provide the backlog of services without some changes in their operational procedures.

As I stated earlier, we are still interested in any arrangement that GSA might be considering which would grant us more authority to protect what we see as our investment in the State Department building.

Mr. FARY. You pointed out long delays in obtaining needed space for your operations. Your present space assignments seem quite adequate with respect to employee levels. Is the delay in obtaining additional space that serious?

Mr. TRACY. By and large, all GSA regions, including the National Capital region, have been very responsive in meeting our space needs. The present delay is in obtaining space for expansion of our Foreign Service Institute, and it is a serious situation, since that facility serves not only the Department of State, but many other Government agencies as well. The space is for a student population unrelated to employee levels. The delay in obtaining that space is affecting other operations that will benefit from acquisition of space for FSI.

We are acquiring space in Rosslyn. We are attempting to reduce space requirements elsewhere, both in Washington and in various cities around the country. I would comment that our increases in space have been small in view of the many new responsibilities we have had to assume in recent years.

We periodically review all space requirements in main State to insure we have maximum utilization and also to meet in-house needs without requiring additional space.

In 1978, we began a systematic remodeling of the main State offices, that increased space utilization by as much as 25 percent. Subsequently, we have had to abandon that remodeling because of its high cost and the lack of adequate GSA work force to do the work.

Mr. FARY. How much space does the State Department have in Rosslyn, Va.? Do you have any other large concentrations of space outside of the District of Columbia?

Mr. TRACY. If I may, I will turn to Mr. Gahn to answer that question.

Mr. GAHN. Mr. Chairman, in addition to the main State building we have large amounts of space in New York City and in Rosslyn, Va. The largest amount of leased space that we occupy is in Rosslyn, Va. and it is approximately 300,000 square feet. The other location that has a large amount of space occupied by State is New York City, which consist of 70,898 square feet and includes the U.N. Mission.

Mr. FARY. Do you have any plans to move out of Rosslyn?

Mr. GAHN. We have for several years tried to project in our 5year housing plan some solution to the scattered locations of all our annexes. We are currently looking at the possibility of consolidating those annexes into one single location.

Mr. FARY. Do your regional offices make direct requests for space to their regional GSA counterparts, or do they have to come to Washington first? Who decides to go ahead with a space request? Mr. GAHN. We receive the space requests in Washington. From Washington, we negotiate with the regional GSA offices for the

space. The decision to acquire the additional space is usually justified by the requesting office and verified by Department management prior to presentation to GSA.

Mr. FARY. Do you have a plan to recoup underutilized or vacant office space as personnel reductions occur under President Reagan? Mr. TRACY. Mr. Chairman, if I may answer that, the Department of State is fortunate in that the reductions of Department personnel have been quite small. We are basically considered a foreign affairs or a national security-type agency. Though there will be some reductions, we are not completely aware at this moment of the exact number of reductions we will be asked to take by the administration.

I would note, however, that the Department of State provides services to a great many other Government agencies-for example, the Foreign Service Institute which provides language training to DOD, CIA, Agriculture, and Commerce, and training of our consular officers and of administrative offices for all foreign affairs agencies-AID, ICA, and so forth. So we think we will be less affected by the reductions than most of the domestic agencies.

Mr. FARY. When you go to OMB for your budget requests, does OMB ever question you about your budget for office space?

Mr. TRACY. Mr. Chairman, we have to justify to OMB the amount of space in square footage which we are requesting. We do not have to justify the cost of that space, because it is obtained from GSA.

Mr. FARY. What is your budget for office space, including people to manage it, and what proportion of your total budget is that?

Mr. GAHN. Mr. Chairman, our total SLUC for fiscal year 1983, which is the figure I have here, will be $31,295,824, which includes all space occupied.

Mr. FARY. Does that include personnel?

Mr. GAHN. I am sorry, I do not have the figures for personnel. Mr. FARY. Could you provide it for the record?

Mr. TRACY. We certainly shall, Mr. Chairman. We will have to break those figures up, but we can get them for you, and we will provide them for the record.

Mr. FARY. Please do so.

[The following was received for the record:]

DEPARTMENT OF STATE SUBMITTAL

There are 8,496 employees occupying 1,729,993 square feet of office space. The employee figure includes 1,100 AID employees in the Main State Building and at 515 22nd Street as well as 250 ACDA employees at Main State and at 1701 N. Lynn Street in Rosslyn, Virginia.

The 2,511,975 square feet of all space occupied by the Department is managed by the Bureau of Administration's General Services Division in liaison with GSA. The Division has 9 employees dedicated to management of space and building services. The annual cost of salaries for those 9 employees is $268,285.

In addition, all bureaus and major organizations of the Department have general services officers (GSO's) who spend a part of their time interrelating with the General Services Division. We estimate that these GSO's spend a total of six staff years annually in buildings management.

Mr. FARY. Do you have any longstanding problems with GSA, any office space you do not use, that you get charged for?

Mr. TRACY. No, Mr. Chairman, we do not.

Mr. FARY. Does your Department perform space utilization surveys to see if space it occupies is properly utilized?

Mr. TRACY. Yes, sir, we do, and very regularly.

Mr. FARY. Counsel, do you have any questions you wish to ask at this time?

[No response.]

Mr. FARY. That will conclude our hearings for today. The subcommittee will recess subject to the call of the Chair.

[Whereupon, at 1:37 p.m., the subcommittee recessed.]

SPACE NEEDS OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 1981

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON PUBLIC Buildings and GROUNDS,
COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC WORKS AND TRANSPORTATION,

Washington, D.C.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10 a.m., in room 2253, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. John G. Fary (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Mr. FARY. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
This subcommittee will please come to order.

We are pleased to have with us today representatives of two agencies with very large amounts of space under their control-the Department of Interior and the Department of Defense.

The first witness is the Department of Interior. We have with us Mr. Richard R. Hite, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Policy, Budget and Administration of the Department of Interior. I understand he will be accompanied by Mr. Joseph E. Doddridge, Jr., Director of the Office of Administrative Services, and Patrick A. Reams, Chief, Division of Space Management, Office of Administrative Services.

Gentlemen, will you take your seats at the table and proceed.

Mr. Hite, the full text of your prepared statement will appear in the record at this point.

[Statement referred to follows:]

STATEMENT OF RICHARD R. HITE, PRINCIPAL DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY, POLICY, BUDGET AND ADMINISTRATION

Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, it is indeed a pleasure to appear before you this morning on behalf of the Department of the Interior. I am pleased to have the opportunity to testify on the space requirements of the department. With you permission, I would like to briefly summarize some of the major facts relative to our program.

The Department of the Interior occupies 17 million square feet of space nationwide, 18-20 percent of which is in the Washington metropolitan area.

The department is highly decentralized, with varying regional structures from bureau to bureau. The Office of the Secretary has direct space management responsibility for 24 cities-11 GSA regional cities, plus 13 other areas with major Interior activities. In other areas of the country, bureaus acquire space direct from GSA. The Office of the Secretary has policy oversight for space management nationwide.

To control space costs, we perform space utilization surveys annually. For example, by compressing organizational units in the main Interior building, we achieved cost savings of approximately $62,000 in fiscal year 1981.

For several years, standard level user charges (SLUC) have increased while services have declined. Until recently, the physical condition of the main Interior building had deteriorated in several areas such as painting, elevator service, cleaning, and exterior maintenance. We also experienced serious roof leaks which caused extensive damage to inside walls, ceilings, and floors.