Mr. CROCKETT. How much did we pay for it?

Mr. KASS. Two million.

Mr. MONAGAN. Where is that located?

Mr. CROCKETT. Do you have a map? It is shown on the map here. This property runs across both streets. We have built a new office building on one side of it and still have all the garden.

Mrs. KELLY. Would you keep the entrance where it is?

Mr. KASS. The idea is not to destroy the entrance or the front of the building.

Mrs. KELLY. What would you have to do with it———

Mr. KASS. It needs a little renovation.

Mrs. KELLY. You would tear down the buildings inside of that? Mr. KASS. I wouldn't tear it down completely. It is still beautiful. Just to renovate it. It has been rundown in the last 5 years.

Mrs. KELLY. As you go into that entrance there were many walks around. Would you be able to keep all of that?

Mr. KASS. If we don't get a permit to build this building soonthis is what they call reserved for parks and greens, it is the most beautiful site between the property and the Rothschild property— they will most likely change and not allow you to build on any part of it. If we don't build at the present time I doubt a year from now they will allow us to build any building at all.

Mrs. KELLY. Are they changing the zoning in that area?
Mr. KASS. They don't have zoning-

Mrs. KELLY. You said they wouldn't permit buildings.

Mr. KASS. At present we can do it. In future time they have been threatening to withdraw the permission. Over in France they do it automatically. They don't have to call for meetings and whatnot. They just go ahead.

Mr. ADAIR. How old is this Rothschild residence or building, would you say?

Mr. KASS. I would say close to 50 years. I can remember in 1919 I was a veteran and the Rothschilds entertained our American troops over there.

Mr. DEL FAVERO. I would say around the turn of the century. (The Department subsequently supplied the following information:)

AGE OF ROTHSCHILD PROPERTY IN PARIS, FRANCE

The Rothschild property at 41 Rue de Faubourg Saint Honore is about 125 years old. Records indicate the property was purchased in 1836 by the wife of Baron Joseph Xavier Celestin de Pontalba and, except for the Gate House, was completely rebuilt about 1840.

Mr. KASS. The structural part is in good condition.

Mr. HAYS. Where did we get the idea this building had to be gutted and rebuilt? Somebody has been telling us that for years.

Mr. DEL FAVERO. You mean the Rothschild property? We would

have to do quite a bit of renovation of the residence.

Mr. CROCKETT. We did get one report that it should be gutted. Mr. DEL FAVERO. What they are talking about is to replace all the plumbing, electrical, and mechanical items.

Mr. KASS. That has to be done but I wouldn't call it gutting. Mr. HAYS. We were told it would have to be done like the White House, that the floors weren't safe. Are they or aren't they?

Mr. KASS. This is perfectly safe without major repairs.

Mr. HAYS. You could remodel it for how much?

Mr. KASS. At the top, $400,000.

Mr. HAYS. That compares very favorably with the $5 million that they were telling us it would cost.

Mr. KASS. Not the office building.

Mr. HAYS. I understand that. At one stage around here it was going to cost $5 million to renovate the Rothschild building.

Mr. DEL FAVERO. The cost we came up with, Mr. Chairman, was $12 million to rehabilitate that building. That was an estimate given to us by an architectural firm.

Mrs. KELLY. What year was that?

Mr. DEL FAVERO. About 3 or 4 years ago.

Mr. CROCKETT. Did they include the furnishings?

Mr. DEL FAVERO. NO.

Mr. HAYS. If you can do this for the price you are going to get out of this other property, you don't need an appropriation, do you? Mr. CROCKETT. No, sir.

Mr. DEL FAVERO. We need $400,000 over and above

Mr. CROCKETT. It depends on what it is going to cost. If we need more money than we get out of the building

Mr. DEL FAVERO. If we sold, as Mr. Kass says, the present Embassy residence we ought to get a million dollars to a million and a half for that

Mr. KASS. You have the warehouse, too.

Mr. DEL FAVERO. We wouldn't need any funds.

Mr. HAYS. Forget about the office building and let it stand on its own two feet. If you can sell the present Embassy residence for twice as much as it will cost to renovate this, why aren't you doing it right now?

Mr. DEL FAVERO. The cost of rehabilitation, our estimacte is one and a half million dollars.

Mr. HAYS. He said $400,000.

Mr. DEL FAVERO. That is a net price, isn't it, Mr. Kass?

Mr. KASS. Renovation of the building, as I see it, would cost about $400,000. The idea is to build this office building in connection with

Mr. HAYS. I understand that, Mr. Kass. I am trying to get the Rothschild property to stand on its merits, forgetting the office building. If we can renovate that for a half million dollars and can sell the other property for a million, we would be better off to renovate it and take a profit if we never built the office building.

Mr. KASS. I agree with you.

Mr. DEL FAVERO. I would like to read from Mr. Kass' report just to clarify the record:

It is anticipated that approximately $400,000 would be needed over and above the sale of the present Embassy residence at No. 2, Avenue d'Iena * * *.

Mr. HAYS. He is proposing to build an office building for $2 million. I read his report. He is saying that he needs over and above the sale of the warehouse and the Avenue d'Iena property $400,000 to build a $2 million office building and renovate the property. I read the report very carefully yesterday.

Mr. KASS. Part of that warehousing to be moved in the cellar of this building.

Mr. HAYS. I understand that.

Mr. CROCKETT. On the total cost, you were talking about $5 million, I think this was a constructive cost, saying if we paid so much for the land, that the land was really worth at that time something like $31⁄2 million. If you take the $32 million and put another million and a half, as they were first figuring, into the building, that makes a $5 million residence, constructive cost, not actual out of pocket, that this would be what the constructive cost of the residence would be. I think that is the way he gets up to the $5 million figure. Mr. HAYS. I don't think that has anything to do with it.

Mr. ADAIR. There is a great deal of difference here. Mr. Kass says $400,000. Mr. Del Favero says $1.5 million. Are we doing the same kind of job, or is there a great difference in the repair proposed to be made? What would $400,000 produce in the way of renovation, and what would the $1.5 million produce? Have we any comparison on that basis?

Mr. KASS. As I understand it, the office building to be built next to the Embassy or the Rothschild property is to be in connection, and the idea is to bring employees, make it a better working proposition for our Embassy to have this building next to our Embassy.

Mr. HAYS. I understand that. I am all for that. What we are talking about now is just the house itself.

Mr. KASS. The house itself could be done-in my opinion, you can spend a lot of money in decorations-could be remodeled and put in good shape for $400,000.

Mr. ADAIR. What would we get for $400,000? What type of work?

Mr. KASS. I am figuring on first-class work.

Mr. ADAIR. Plumbing, new walls?

Mr. KASS. The wall itself doesn't have to be touched. Some of the operation of the Embassy could be transferred to the next building that is to be built. It should be in conjunction with each other. To make a real first-class job, the Embassy and office building should be built as one unit.

Mrs. KELLY. I remember going to this building two or three times, twice with Mr. Hays and another time. To me it was pretty dilapidated. I have no idea of renovation figures, but considering the cost of renovating even in my own home, what you are saying seems too little, when you think of the walls, the peeling off and the repaint job needed. This is so far out of line in my thinking that I would like a little more discussion of it. You are going to keep part of this building for the Embassy, is that correct?

Mr. KASS. The whole building.

Mr. CROCKETT. For a residence.

Mrs. KELLY. When you see all those rooms where USIA was and the others overlooking the lawn, they were in pretty bad shape.

Mr. KASS. Yes. Structurally the building is in good shape. Even the plumbing and heating

Mrs. KELLY. Is the heating good?

Mr. KASS. Yes; and no criticism.

Mrs. KELLY. What kind of heat is in there?

Mr. KASS. Hot water heat.

Mr. HAYS. They are heating the building now. working in it.

There are people

Mr. KASS. There are no complaints that they gave to me when I was inspecting the building about the heat. There was no complaint about this building. The idea is to bring the building back to the old condition; $400,000 would do a lot.

Mrs. KELLY. Look at what we did to the Capitol here.

Mr. HAYS. Even a half million dollars-this is a house
Mrs. KELLY. That costs more.

Mr. ADAIR. Mr. Del Favero, what would you get for a million and a half, what type of job would be done?

Mr. DEL FAVERO. We had a detailed estimate made several years ago, Mr. Adair, broken down for mechanical, electrical, plastering, et cetera. There has to be some reinforcement in the second-floor beams and the joists and the refinishing that has to be done after you chase all these pipes through the walls. Our estimate ran a million and a half. I don't doubt

Mr. HAYS. Was this to tear the interior out and completely reconstruct the building?

Mr. DEL FAVERO. I wouldn't say tearing it all out, but we would have to do quite a bit of stripping on the second floor to look at those joists and beams. We may have to do some replacement in there, which means tearing out all the ceiling and all the flooring above it.

We have got to get into the walls to see what the pipes look like. It means tearing out quite a few of those walls. I don't mean tearing the whole wall down, but the plaster and other wall finishes. don't know what there is behind.

This is an old building. Our engineers in Paris looked it over and they did punch into some of the walls and quite a few of those pipes are rusted. The plumbing and wiring, of course, the heating pipes, radiators, the floors-a lot has to be replaced.

Mrs. KELLY. Would you send Americans over there to do the work or use the French?

Mr. DEL FAVERO. This would be done by the French.

Mrs. KELLY. That is the way you planned, based on French labor costs?

Mr. KASS. Yes.

Mr. HAYS. Who made this estimate for you?

Mr. DEL FAVERO. Mr. Riordon. He is our regional director in Paris.

Mr. HAYS. Did he do it himself or did he have experts?

Mr. DEL FAVERO. He had experts and he himself coordinated it. Mr. HAYS. Is he competent to do this?

Mr. DEL FAVERO. Yes, sir; he has been a regional director for us since 1947 in many parts of the world and has done a lot of this. Mr. HAYS. What was his background before he became a regional director?

Mr. DEL FAVERO. He was in the contracting business with his uncle. He has worked on construction in New York State.

Mr. CROCKETT. I suspect, Mr. Chairman, there is a difference in degree of renovation between the two. What I would like to do, with the committee's permission, is to get a new appraisal from an outside group. Perhaps Mr. Kass could help us get an absolute firm estimate of cost.

Mr. HAYS. Why don't you send an American architect over there to look at it and tell you what needs to be done?

Mr. CROCKETT. Didn't we do this?

Mr. DEL FAVERO. We sent over a Mr. Bellushi for a feasibility study.

Mr. KASS. Mr. Chairman, Mr. Riordon, as mentioned, is a very capable man. All the figures I have in my report, we worked them together. We brought them up to date. These figures that we did, we went over the plans with Mr. Riordon and we agreed on this figure.

Mr. CROCKETT. I am sure it is a difference of degree of renovation. Mr. ADAIR. Did you have access to this million and a half estimate when you made your estimate, Mr. Kass.?

Mr. KASS. Yes.

Mr. ADAIR. Where is this difference then?

Mr. KASS. I never knew about this idea. I went in this proposition fresh with Mr. Riordon.

Mr. ADAIR. Then you do not have the million and a half estimate? Mr. KASS. Of the job that we are doing here

Mr. ADAIR. Renovation.

Mr. KASS. I never saw that.

Mr. ADAIR. I think, Mr. Chairman, it might be interesting to have Mr. Kass' comment upon that million and a half, to try to bring these figures someplace into line.

Mr. KASS. It is surprising to me, sir, that Mr. Riordon didn't tell me about this. We worked 2 weeks on this. I also had a contractor over there to look over the things that we were supposed to do. He agreed it would be around $400,000, a French contractor.

Mr. CROCKETT. What I would like to do, Mr. Chairman, is to get a firm-get a specified list of things that we are going to do and get a firm contract relating to it.

Mrs. KELLY. One person do the whole thing and not piecemeal? Mr. CROCKETT. Right.

Mr. KASS. I think our engineer and architect part of it are capable men and I think they could give us those figures.

Mrs. KELLY. You mean the total overall? On this other it wouldn't be piecemeal

Mr. CROCKETT. We could give a total plan on the renovation.

Mr. KASS. We could get our Paris office, Mr. Riordon, under Mr. Crockett to give us an actual inventory or estimate of what it would cost to do the improvements that we have suggested in this report here.

Mr. HAYS. I think that is about as far as we can go with it today. Mr. CROCKETT. Would you like to have the whole report as part of your record?

Mr. HAYS. Yes; we will make the report, without objection, a part of the record.

(The report above referred to is as follows:)

Memorandum to: Mr. William J. Crockett.
From: Garfield I. Kass, consultant.

Subject: Embassy building program, Paris.

Reference is made to my report of August 26, 1964, concerning the Embassy building program in Paris wherein it was recommended that we acquire a vacant site at Porte Maillot, near NATO, for the purpose of constructing an embassy