Chairman GLENN. I am glad to hear that, and that is exactly what I think your predecessor did, because he did not have control over the setting up of the Commission. I cannot say that was the problem, I am not quoting, I can only quote out of Dr. Mayberry's letter, as I did earlier, that he felt that the one thing he was willing to answer to all the questions that we submitted to him-he did not want to respond to these things, except he did say that one thing that he felt strongly about was that the chairman should be able to make an input to the selection of the commissioners, and I think that is very fundamental. It makes us be a little suspicious as to what is going on when a chairman is called in to do a certain job and is not given that kind of courtesy, at least, and the Commission was there when you came on board. There have been a couple of people added since then. Did you have an input as to their selection after you came on board?

Admiral WATKINS. It is really not appropriate, Mr. Chairman, for me to take on the selection process from the White House. They have asked that I not discuss the White House selection procedures, even if I were to know them, and I do not know all of the processes followed.

Chairman GLENN. The White House has asked you not to testify on that or the attorneys have told you not to?

Admiral WATKINS. The White House says it is their business on how they select the people for the Commission, and so I respect that and so I do not want to start putting words in the mouths of those in the White House as to what their selection process is.

Chairman GLENN. OK. And to be absolutely fair about this, it is the President's prerogative, if he wants to, to select the people he wants. That is in the law also. But it also means that when that is done without the chairman of the Commission being party to that process, it seems to me that we are quite within our rights to look at it very, very carefully and make certain that the law is being complied with and to make certain that the people selected, and yourself in particular running the program, are going to operate in an independent manner and really try to bring to bear the very finest talents we have to get control of this thing. It is that important.

Do any of the staff have additional questions? We have staff here representing other Senators today. Does anyone have anything burning on your soul here?

[No response.]

Chairman GLENN. OK. Unless you have something else to add, I think we will move on. We may ask you to answer additional questions, and just for the public record here I do firmly now and herewith, as Chairman of the Committee, accept your offer to have you come back up again for future testimony once you have gone a little further with this. And if there is anything you see, Admiral, and I say this with every bit of sincerity, this is so important for the country, the job that you are doing, that anything you see that you need help on from us or you find your independence being impinged upon or anything at all that you need, let me know, privately, publicly, a phone call, a letter, whatever, and I can assure you that we are going to be responsive to what your needs are in doing the job that you are commissioned to do. It is that important to us.

Admiral WATKINS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman GLENN. We have one more panel, and that is Mr. Paul T. Weiss, Associate Administrator for Administration, General Services Administration; accompanied by Mr. James L. Dean, Director, Committee Management Secretariat, General Services Administration.

Mr. Weiss and Mr. Dean, welcome. We welcome your testimony in its entirety or in part, in either event the entire statement will be included in the record.

TESTIMONY OF PAUL T. WEISS, ASSOCIATE ADMINISTRATOR FOR ADMINISTRATION, GENERAL SERVICES ADMINISTRATION, ACCOMPANIED BY JAMES L. DEAN, DIRECTOR, COMMITTEE MANAGEMENT SECRETARIAT

Mr. WEISS. Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to testify today on actions taken by the General Services Administration to implement the Federal Advisory Committee Act within the executive branch. My comments this morning will summarize my prepared statement which has been provided to the Committee.1

Accompanying me today is Mr. James L. Dean, Director of our Committee Management Secretariat. The Secretariat, mandated by section 7(a) of the act, is responsible for the direction of GSA's activities to provide governmentwide oversight of all Federal advisory committees.

As we have heard here today and know from our own experience, advisory committees play an important role in assuring that Federal officials have access to information and advice on a broad range of issues affecting government policies and programs.

The Federal Advisory Committee Act is designed to fulfill two important objectives: On the one hand, it provides for a process to monitor the amount of Federal resources devoted to the use of advisory committees, and, on the other hand, provides for the maximum participation possible by the public in committee activities.

These objectives are bound together by the Act's emphasis on the provision of information to the Congress by the preparation of an annual report on Federal advisory committees, and to the public, through provisions calling for advance notice of committee meetings.

In addition, the Act provides that meetings of Federal advisory committees may be closed to public participation only through formal determinations by the heads of executive branch departments and agencies based upon exclusions provided by the Government in the Sunshine Act.

I am pleased to note that since the transfer of the Committee Management Secretariat to GSA in 1977, the costs associated with maintaining advisory committees within the executive branch have increased at an average annual rate of only 2.8 percent. This is graphically displayed in the chart presented to you at this point.2

At the spike you see on the left, it is interesting to note, we have about a 25 to 30 percent increase in costs for that 1978-79 time period. It is related primarily to four or five major committees es

tablished, having to do with world hunger, Three Mile Island, Social Security, coal, and a couple others of major interest to the Federal Government. They accounted for the bulk of the costs for that time period.

At the same time, as shown on our next chart, the total number of such groups have declined by 26 percent. As you noted earlier, Mr. Chairman, the number of committees has declined from a total of 1,343 in 1977, to 997 in 1986.

The next chart shows that during 7 of the past 10 years, the number of Federal advisory committees terminated has exceeded the number of those established by all types of authority. In addition, as the next chart shows, the amount of resources devoted toward compensation of Federal and non-Federal members have been reduced by 79 percent and 7.5 percent respectively during the past 4-year period.

Chairman GLENN. What is your basis for these? Did you discount these for inflation, so we had a comparison in constant dollars here-

Mr. WEISS. No, sir, actual dollars.

Chairman GLENN [continuing]. Because this chart covers periods of inflation, it gives a slightly distorted view of things.

Mr. WEISS. That is right, those lines would be a lot more scaled downward if you factored in the-

Chairman GLENN. Yes, I gave some figures in opening this morning. We have a whole series of charts, about 15 of them, I think, that had drawn up on a basis of discounted dollars so they are discounted for inflation. They give us a little better picture of things.

It comes out where we have had a rather constant picture, surprisingly enough, since we made the big reductions back in 197778. I think you have a break on your charts there on that also, on your first one there. Does it not go back to the seventies or wherever it was?

Mr. WEISS. Yes, 1977 was the first big spread.

Chairman GLENN. That is when the numbers came down, when we had the reductions, but then the amounts spent per person, per committee, numbers of committees, taken in constant dollars, have been fairly constant.

Mr. WEISS. That is exactly the case

Chairman GLENN. It has been reasonably steady.

Mr. WEISS [continuing]. In today's dollars relative to 10 years ago.

Chairman GLENN. Go ahead.

Mr. WEISS. Reflecting the highly dynamic environments within which committees operate, the composition of the Federal advisory inventory has changed dramatically. For example, in 1977, the majority of the advisory committees were established by the executive branch. However, as you can see in this chart, and as the Chairman pointed out earlier today, beginning in 1979, the number of such groups established directly by congressional action increased substantially and now accounts for over 50 percent of the total inventory of our committees.

Another important change that has affected the costs of Federal advisory committees is reflected in the increased use of blue ribbon panels to address issues of complex national concern. Such commit

tees have been established by the Congress and the Executive Branch, to provide advice and recommendations on such matters as the space shuttle Challenger accident, the Three Mile Island incident, efforts to combat organized crime and pornography, the basing of the MX missile, and many others.

Although representing only 2.5 percent of the total inventory in 1984, for example, the resources devoted to the activities of such committees accounted for approximately 31.3 percent of the total reported costs.

Recognizing these changes and the need to emphasize the quality of contributions rendered to the Federal community by advisory committees, GSA has undertaken a number of initiatives to strengthen the capacity of the Committee Management Secretariat to fulfill its role.

During 1987, the Secretariat completed a final rule on Federal advisory committee management and that rule was published in the Federal Register, coincidentally, on December 2. It provides for improved guidance on the implementation of FACA, streamlines the consultation process between GSA and departments and agencies sponsoring committees and clarifies the roles played by the Secretariat and committee management officers in the establishment and management of Federal advisory committees.

GSA also has taken steps to increase the resources available to the Secretariat, despite overall resource reductions which have taken place within GSA. The number of professional staff was increased last year from three to five, and the unit will soon receive an enhanced in-house computer support, consisting of state of the art hardware and software. In addition, the Administrator has approved the establishment of a new Inter-Agency Committee on Federal Advisory Committee Management to address the full range of the Secretariats statutory responsibilities.

We also look forward, in concert with this interagency committee, to drafting a handbook to provide guidance to committee management offices throughout the Government.

While we believe these initiatives will result in enhanced oversight of Federal advisory committees, we are also looking forward to working with Congress to identify other improvements which might be effected by amendments to the act.

To summarize our thoughts on these issues contained in my prepared statement, Mr. Chairman, GSA believes that any such proposal by Congress to amend the FACA should at a minimum clarify the definition of an advisory committee as it relates to the actby the way, you have heard many of these before by earlier witnesses and by yourself-provide increased flexibility to terminate committees created by statute-at the present time, legislation is required to terminate such committees-redefine the requirement for regular review of Government-wide committee management activities to reflect cyclical rather than annual analyses; and clarify the requirement for balanced membership relative to the creation of advisory committees, review the deadline for the submission of the "Annual Report to the President on Federal Advisory Committees" to the Congress for consistency with the congressional calendar; and delete section 7(e) of the act, providing for the provision of budget recommendations relating to advisory committee activities,

which we believe is a role to be properly carried out in concert between the individual agencies in the Office of Management and Budget.

Mr. Chairman, this concludes a summary of my prepared statement. I will be pleased to answer any questions you might have. Thank you.

Chairman GLENN. OK. Thank you very much.

You have testified that Congress should clarify FACA's requirement for balanced membership. GSA's final rule on advisory committees instructs agencies to consider for membership persons or groups with certain qualifications, but this rule does not "compel the selection of any particular individual or group to obtain divergent points of view."i

Last May, when GSA first proposed this rule, it did not contain that language and there was not any explanation before the change in the final rule. Why was that change made and why was that not explained in advance?

Mr. WEISS. Jim, I will ask you to respond to that question.

Mr. DEAN. I think the basic purpose of that is to recognize the final authority of the agency to establish an advisory committee and to compose its membership. We felt that the issue of balance, as it is addressed in the act, should be handled by the agency in terms of constructing the committee.

So, what we are saying is that, when you consider balance, you are not compelled to place someone on the committee solely because he/she has a divergent view point but, on the other hand, I would add that you are certainly not barred from doing so.

One of the problems of sitting in a central management agency like GSA and administering a program of this nature is that we do not have the detailed and technical knowledge, for example, in the AIDS Commission or any other commission set up by the President or an agency, and we look to the head of that agency to certify to us that there is balanced representation on that particular committee.

Chairman GLENN. Yes, but you are the ones that-they have to file with you in order to form a commission like this. What you are doing with the rule I quoted from, you are setting out the final rule that guides them on how they in turn set the commission up. Granted, you do not have expertise in all of these areas, but your directions to them are used when a commission is set up, and one of the guidelines prior to this new rule was that there would be balance on this.

Now, this new final rule would appear to undercut the previous rule. What was the reason for this change?

Mr. WEISS. The final rule still provides that agencies shall provide balanced membership. I think that what we do is to give them more latitude-we do not have such a heavy hand in defining what those outward limits of balance or boundaries of balances are.

As we have heard this morning, you can balance a committee to extremes. I think what GSA's point was to let the agency make the

1 See p. 239 for text of rules.