EXPLANATION OF DISTRIBUTION BY OBJECTS Personnel compensation and staffing.-$85,700 for 11 positions, all in the central office, as follows: (1) $6,700 for personnel benefits, including $5,600 retirement contributions, $800 health benefits, and $300 group insurance. (2) $2,000 for 87 days' travel at $23 per day. The remainder of $4,600, or 5 percent of total estimate, includes (3) $1,500 communications; $500 other services. (4) $600 supplies; $2,000 equipment. 2. Planning and engineering Provides for telecommunications requirements determination, system planning, design and testing, equipment layout, facility standardization engineering, rates and estimates, emergency planning and telecommunications security planning under U.S. communications security plan, and contractual costs of planning and engineering services. These services would include installation of pilot models of service centers and systems, testing of transmission facilities and equipment, testing of supporting equipment for management processes, standardization studies, and preparation of training aids and guides. Services would be obtained from other Government agencies and independent commercial concerns. EXPLANATION OF DISTRIBUTION BY OBJECTS Personnel compensation and staffing.-$442,800 for 53 positions, all in the central office, as follows: Other objects.-$238,200 provides (1) $34,000 personnel benefits, including $28,800 retirement contributions, $3,800 health benefits, and $1,400 group insurance. (2) $14,000 for 609 days' travel at $23 per day and $1,000 for motor pool travel. (3) $165,000 for installation of pilot models of service centers and systems, testing of facilities and equipment, etc. The remainder of $24,200, or 4 percent of total estimate, includes (4) $2,500 communications; $2,000 other services. (5) $4,700 supplies; $15,000 equipment. Covers direction, coordination and planning of system operations, operations control, traffic control, security control, procurement and leasing circuit management standards and procedures, agency services, directory services, training, and coordination of automatic data processing. Personnel compensation and staffing.—$116,500 for 29 positions, all the central office, distributed as follows: (1) $9,200 personnel benefits, including $7,600 retirement contributions, $1,200 health benefits, and $400 group insurance. (2) $1,000 for 43 days travel at $23 per day. (3) $50,000 for printing of operators handbooks, directives, and training materials for operating personnel. The remainder of $28,300, or 14 percent of total estimate, includes― (4) $2,000 transportation of things; $7,000 communications. Provides for staff at the regional office level to supply immediate supervision of operations and maintenance, procurement of local facilities, and local coordination with Public Buildings Service and other Federal agencies. Personnel compensation and staffing.-$305,900 for 40 positions, all in the regions, as follows: (1) $24,000 for personnel benefits, including $19,900 retirement contributions, $3,100 health benefits, and $1,000 group insurance. (2) $4,500 for 196 days travel at $23 per day and $500 for motor pool travel. The remainder of $15,100, or 4 percent of total estimate, includes— (3) $4,000 communications; $3,500 other services. (4) $3,600 supplies; $4,000 equipment. This supplemental estimate for administrative support is to provide for expanded financial, legal, and other services in support of the new system and is based on cost experience related to the telecommunications activity previously carried out under the Public Buildings Service. Mr. THOMAS. I believe you are looking for a goodly sum of money here $900,000. You have 56 employees now and you need a total of 133, so you are looking for 77. You are not going to handle only your own business now, but you are going to take over all the civilian agencies; is that correct? Mr. BOUTIN. If I may speak to this very quickly, this all started in 1958 when they had an alert test and they found there were some very grave deficiencies in the telecommunications system. Mr. THOMAS. Is civilian defense a part of this? Mr. BOUTIN. We would take over much of the telecommunications responsibilities. Mr. THOMAS. Is the Department of Defense involved in this in any way? Mr. BOUTIN. We would have a working relation with them and there would be interconnections in the system. COST OF PROGRAM Mr. THOMAS. What is this going to cost us, now? You have a total budget here of $1,470,000, and the $900,000 you are seeking herein the regular bill you had $570,000 tucked away in there; is that correct? Mr. BOUTIN. We propose to transfer $523,000 from the Public Buildings Service; $47,000 from the Transportation and Public Utilities Service. Mr. THOMAS. How are you going to transfer that $500,000 out of there? Mr. BOUTIN. We are transferring the empolyees too. We are transferring all but five of the central office employees in Public Buildings who have been working on telecommunications. Mr. THOMAS. How are you transferring your employees? Mr. BOUTIN. By centralizing responsibility. Four employees were assigned to the study that was conducted Mr. THOMAS. You never were given that much money for this specific project, if my memory serves me correctly, so how did you transfer it out of the building fund? AUTHORITY FOR TRANSFERS Mr. TURPIN. There is authority under section 106 of the Federal Property and Administrative Services Act whereby the Administrator can shift functions between organization units. Mr. THOMAS. But you are creating a new function here. Mr. TURPIN. Well, those people who were transferred were doing a supervisory and planning function with respect to the existing communications system that GSA operates. Mr. THOMAS. It has nothing to do with that which you are going to take over from other civilian agencies. So what you have done is, you have created a new agency here and you took out of your big revolving fund $500,000 to do it with. Mr. TURPIN. Actually, Mr. Chairman, GSA operates a communications system now which serves other agencies that it does not Mr. THOMAS. Partly. Mr. TURPIN. Partly; that is correct. And under the system that is proposed and which is being developed it would be a single system to serve the communications requirements of Mr. THOMAS. That is where you really spread your wings. That is what I am talking about. Just what you repeated. Anyway, you are going to have an expenditure here in round fig ures of $1.5 million this year. How much money are you going to save by it? ANTICIPATED SAVINGS Mr. BOUTIN. We think we are going to be able to save substantial money, Mr. Chairman. The bill for communications for the civilian side of the Federal Government was $80 million for fiscal year 1961. This year, with the program in its infancy, we hope that we are going to be able, not only to improve the service, but also to save in the vicinity of $500,000. Mr. THOMAS. By an expenditure of $1.5 million you are going to save $500,000? Mr. BOUTIN. We are talking about a net saving. Is that correct, Mr. Mundy? Mr. MUNDY. That would be right, sir. There is a new tariff offering known as Tel-Pak which provides for the bulk ordering of communications on a private line basis. By actually regrouping circuits under this Tel-Pak offering you can save substantial amounts of money. For example, right now you are paying $3 per mile per month for a private line circuit. By going into Tel-Pak which is providing for four offerings: No. 1, the 12-channel offering Mr. THOMAS. Did your utilities division originate this idea? Mr. THOMAS. Yes. Mr. MUNDY. From what standpoint, sir? Mr. THOMAS. Your rate people, and utilities, sir. Mr. MUNDY. No, sir; they did not. This was an offering afforded from the standpoint of the common carriers. Mr. THOMAS. Do you mean they didn't help you figure this out? Mr. THOMAS. Yes. Mr. MUNDY. I do not follow you, sir. In other words, the offering Mr. THOMAS. Did you ever hear of a little division over there called the Utilities Division? Mr. MUNDY. In GSA; yes, sir. Mr. THOMAS. I am asking you now, did they help you figure this out? Mr. MUNDY. No, sir. |