(Mr. Jones' statement follows:)

STATEMENT OF WOODROW JONES, VICE PRESIDENT, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF ASC COUNTY OFFICE EMPLOYEES (NASCOE), REGARDING PROPOSED PAY RAISE FOR FEDERAL EMPLOYEES

Mr. Chairman, and distinguished committee members, it is a pleasure and a privilege to appear before you to express the views of ASCS county office employees on the proposed pay raise for Federal employees. In addition to serving as vice president of our National Association of ASC County Office Employees, I am also president of our Texas association which is the largest State Affiliate of Nascoe with a State membership of 1,437 which lacks only 16 being every fulltime eligible employee in the State. I know all these people join me in the petition of your favor today.

It is especially important that ASCS county office employees be specifically included since salaries in our agency are already far behind that of others in our sister government agencies. We provide service that we are proud of and know that through the farm programs formulated and provided for by the Congress a real contribution is made to American agriculture. Should we not be included, we could expect to lose many of our veteran employees to other fields, as has been our past experience, and thereby reduce efficiency.

We have never been recognized as civil servants by the Congress or the Department of Agriculture but we can assure you that our every function is Federal. All of our duties evolve from either congressional action or USDA administrative directive. Since we have not been recognized as civil servants, it is necessary that we petition you to make specific provision for us in any legislation that you recommend at this time.

In the event that this distinguished committee approves any pay raise for Federal employees, we beg you to provide that employees of county committees established pursuant to section 8(b) of the Soil Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act (16 U.S.C. 590h (b)) shall be increased by amounts equal, as nearly as practicable, to the increase provided by this act for corresponding rates of compensation in the appropriate schedule or scale of pay. We are asking that we be given the same consideration as was given in the enactment of Public Law 86-568 when we were first included in Federal pay legislation.

We need not remind you that the cost of living has increased but we feel that you would be interested in the fact that during the 1961 fiscal year, the average salary of the more than 14,000 full-time employees we represent was only $4,173. This is almost $2,000 less than enough to cover the minimum needs of a family of four. With our salaries already some 16 percent below those in other USDA agencies (fiscal 1961), unless you favorably consider our request to be included in your recommendations, a more acute disparity will result. Your favorable action toward us on this legislation will not close this salary gap but will prevent if from being widened. We hope we have provided sufficient and good reason for favorable action.

I wish again to express appreciation for the opportunity to explain our position on this proposed legislation.

STATEMENT OF CLYDE R. PAYNE,

SECRETARY-TREASURER,

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF ASCS COUNTY EMPLOYEES

Mr. PAYNE. Senator, I have said about the same thing the other two gentlemen have, but maybe in a little different manner, and with your permission I would just like to file my statement and save your time.

The CHAIRMAN. We will be glad to do that. We appreciate your interest in conserving the time of the committee. We have many witnesses to be heard.

Mr. PAYNE. Thank you.

(Mr. Payne's statement follows:)

STATEMENT BY CLYDE R. PAYNE, SECRETARY-TREASURER, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF AGRICULTURAL STABILIZATION AND CONSERVATION SERVICE COUNTY EMPLOYEES (NASCOE)

I am Clyde R. Payne, Hamilton County ASCS office manager, Jasper, Fla., and secretary-treasurer of the National Association of ASCS County Employees. As you know, the National Association of Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service Employees, commonly called Nascoe, is a voluntary organization of County Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service employees-hereafter referred to as ASCS employees. The sole purpose of this organization is to promote the welfare of its members. Each State of the United States, except Alaska and Hawaii, has formed a State organization of ASCS county employees, and each State organization pays into the Nascoe treasury $3 per member from their respective State. All officers of Nascoe and the State organizations are full-time employees and receive no salary and any time they are working on organization affairs they are on leave at no expense to the Government. Each State affiliated with Nascoe has two members on the board of directors of Nascoe. Nascoe has national officers and an executive_committee_representing the five ASCS geographic areas of the United States. They are: Don Rapp, northwest area; Ervin Duncan, southwest area; W. L. Jones, northeast area; Thelma Sutter, midwest area; W. P. Greer, southwest area; C. T. Norris, president; Woodrow Jones, vice president; and Clyde R. Payne, secretary-treasurer.

As stated previously, no member of Nascoe receives any salary, but each member does receive actual out-of-pocket expenses. Nascoe has on a retainer basis Dillard B. Lasseter, Post Office Box 381, Washington 4, D.C., and he keeps us advised on legislative activity and assists us in legislative work.

The Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service people carry out various Federal programs assigned to them by the Congress, Secretary of Agriculture, Executive orders, etc. The headquarters for ASCS is in the U.S. Department of Agriculture Building, Washington, D.C. Then, there are State ASCS offices and county ASCS offices all administering only Federal programs with county, city, or State governments having no connection with the National, State, or county level of ASCS.

ASCS employees on county level administer directly to farmers of the United States a great number of the gigantic USDA farm programs, such as, the soil bank, agricultural conservation, marketing quotas (tobacco, cotton, wheat, peanuts, and rice) commodity credit loans, wool incentive payments, sugar, feed grain, etc. This is practically all the action programs of USDA.

We are here today representing the ASCS county employees of every county in this great country of ours respectively requesting that you specifically include county ASCS employees in any pay raise that you may recommend and to the same extent that is granted other employees in the Federal service.

In previous appearances before this committee we have brought to your attention that you are the group we have to bring our problem to and request relief— and you have been most generous-as we are Federal workers and all benefits have to come through Federal channels.

Again, we respectfully request that any pay legislation proposed include specific wording to include ASCS county employees.

We thank you for the opportunity to appear before your committee.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you all for coming here.

Mr. NORRIS. Thank you very much.

Senator CARLSON. I would like to ask Mr. Norris a question. What are the fringe benefits that employees receive at the present time in the ASCS offices?

Mr. NORRIS. We now have civil service retirement, low-cost health insurance, and life insurance.

Senator CARLSON. Those are the three that you receive?

Mr. NORRIS. Yes, sir.

Senator CARLSON. That is all, Mr. Chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. Are there any further questions?

Senator JORDAN. No questions.

Mr. KERLIN. Your budget originates at the county level, does it not? The county budget is made up. Then the county budgets go

into the State and are combined into the State budget. Then they come into Washington where they are combined into a total budget within the Department of Agriculture, and that goes to the Bureau of the Budget and is approved in total or in part. Finally the appropriation is granted. Now, if that is to be changed, does not it require two actions, one to give you the pay increase, and second to adjust the budgetary requirements?

Mr. NORRIS. Actually our budget work is done a little differently from that. The budgets come down to the State and it allocates the money to the counties by programs making up your total budget. Then we make up an operating plan as to how we are going to use the money that has been allocated to us.

Mr. KERLIN. But that is after you get the money?

Mr. NORRIS. That is after we get the money.

Mr. KERLIN. I am talking about making up the budget initially in order to get the money.

Mr. NORRIS. We make up no prior budget on the county level in order to get the money. The allocation of funds from our State offices is the first notice we get of our operating funds.

Mr. PAYNE. I might add that in the last pay raise that was granted by the Congress, while I cannot say exactly how the moneys were appropriated and so forth, because I am not that familiar, thankfully we were included in that raise. I don't know whether it caused any undue hardships anywhere or not, but we were included.

The CHAIRMAN. Are there any other questions? We certainly thank you gentlemen for presenting your views on this legislation. Mr. NORRIS. Thank you.

The CHAIRMAN. The next witness is Mr. Thaddeus G. Bell, chairman of the Executive Board Association of Engineers and Scientists of the U.S. Navy Underwater Sound Laboratory. Mr. Bell.

STATEMENT OF THADDEUS G. BELL, CHAIRMAN, EXECUTIVE BOARD OF THE ASSOCIATION OF ENGINEERS AND SCIENTISTS OF THE U.S. NAVY UNDERWATER SOUND LABORATORY, NEW LONDON, CONN.; ACCOMPANIED BY HUGO J. WILMS, EXECUTIVE BOARD MEMBER

Mr. BELL. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I am Thaddeus G. Bell, chairman of the Executive Board of the Association of Engineers and Scientists of the U.S. Navy Underwater Sound Laboratory, at New London, Conn.

I am accompanied by Mr. Hugo J. Wilms, a member of the executive board.

Our association is an independent group with membership limited to scientists and engineers at the Laboratory. I am a GS-14, an electronic engineer, a graduate of the Yale University, and have had 15 years of experience in sonar design work in Government service.

We have a very brief statement.

The CHAIRMAN. Let me ask you a question before you give your presentation. You are a grade 14. What is your salary? Mr. BELL. My salary is $12,990.

The CHAIRMAN. What step is that?

Mr. BELL. This is the fourth-grade step. The maximum in the GS-14 grade is $13,510.

The CHAIRMAN. I just wanted to get that into the record. Proceed. Mr. BELL. We have a very brief statement here which we would like to present to you. It describes briefly our role in national defense effort and some of our problems in recruiting and retaining key personnel that we need.

The U.S. Navy Underwater Sound Laboratory in New London, Conn., is the Nation's only laboratory which is devoted exclusively to the solution of electromagnetic and acoustic problems associated with undersea warfare. As an integral part of the Navy Department's Bureau of Ships, the Laboratory keeps in close touch with the needs of the seagoing Navy. Two hundred and fifty scientists and engineers, out of a total complement of 700 persons, perform a large variety of scientific tasks.

The backbone of the Laboratory's program is the seagoing research. and testing in ocean areas extending from the tropics to the arctic, The specialized knowledge built up from over 20 years of such activity provides a capability to the national defense effort which is unavailable elsewhere.

In addition to our research activities, we insure that contract funds in our field are wisely spent by assisting Government contract administrators in writing specifications, by providing technical guidance to contract work, and by evaluating equipment delivered to the Navy. Many basic equipment designs originate at the Underwater Sound Laboratory; the primary sonar detection systems on all current submarines, for example, were designed by our technical staff.

All of these efforts go toward insuring that the Navy has the best in equipment for underwater detection, communication, and navigation. Such equipment plays an indispensable part in the following Navy missions: Firstly, in the defense of the continental United States against missile launching submarines; secondly, in the maintenance of oversea sea lanes in the face of a submarine threat; and lastly, in the deployment of Polaris submarines.

The increasing shortage of scientists and engineers coupled with the sizable pay differential in favor of industrial salaries, continues to raise acute problems in recruiting and retaining the scientific talents we require. The salary difference below industrial scales of more than $1,000 at the junior levels along with the differential of several thousand dollars and more at senior levels makes Government work financially unattractive to the young scientist, both in starting salary and in prospects of future advancement.

Our present senior-level scientists, despite their relatively low pay scales, are motivated by a feeling of responsibility to carry on defense work in which they are so greatly needed. However, these senior scientists also have responsibilities to their families which make it difficult to resist pressures to leave Government service. It is not unusual for our senior people to be offered pay increases exceeding 50 percent over their present salaries. Government recruiting to replace losses at the senior level is virtually impossible because of the great disparity with industrial salaries.

To rectify our present disadvantageous position in both the recruiting and the retaining of scientific personnel, we urge action which would bring Government scientific and engineering salaries into bal

ance with those paid in private industry. We further urge that a mechanism be provided where Government scientific salaries would be adjusted in a timely manner in the future to remain competitive with private industry.

To summarize, we have tried to establish that Government scientific organization such as ours have a marked influence on our national defense posture in our case in the field of undersea warfare. We feel, therefore, that it is an essential element of national security that Government scientific organizations be allowed to pay salaries competitive enough to attract and retain the scientific talents required. The CHAIRMAN. What was the percentage of your turnover in 1961? Mr. BELL. I am sorry, sir, I do not have figures on our turnover at the present time.

The CHAIRMAN. Senator Carlson, do you have some questions? Senator CARLSON. Mr. Bell, are you paid under Public Law 313, of the 80th Congress, at the present time?

Mr. BELL. No; I am not paid under a public law. It is not a public law position.

Senator CARLSON. Are you under strictly a civil service rating and paid under the civil service regulations?

Mr. BELL. That is right.

Senator CARLSON. There is some provision made for the payment of some of our people under Public Law 313, of the 80th Congress, which, if we approve the President's proposal, will remove that particular section of the law and I just wondered if you were one of those to be affected.

Mr. BELL. I believe we have one position, that of the Chief Scientist at the Laboratory, which is a public law position. There are no others, however, and this is one of our problems, that those public law positions are limited. We have tried to get more, but we cannot. The CHAIRMAN. The Senator from North Carolina.

Senator JORDAN. Mr. Bell, is your group a part of the Navy?

Mr. BELL. Yes, sir; it is part of the Navy Department under the Navy's Bureau of Ships. We are essentially a field organization of the Bureau of Ships. Our organizational setup is such that we have a captain heading up the organization. There are about 50 naval personnel there as part of the staff and the remainder, some 700 or so, are civilians.

Senator JORDAN. And are you in the civilian class that you are discussing here today?

Mr. BELL. I am in the civilian scientific department.

The CHAIRMAN. You are strictly under the Navy and do not have any connection with the Marines?

Mr. BELL. No; we are strictly under the Navy.

Senator JORDAN. That is all, Mr. Chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. I believe that is all, Mr. Bell. Thank you.

Mr. BELL. Thank you.

The CHAIRMAN. The next witness is Mr. John P. Snyder, president of the National Association of Postmasters. I think you have a couple you want to accompany you at this time, Roy North and Charles E. Puskar, so I presume you will identify yourself for the record and also the ones that are accompanying you at this time.