Director, Office of Mental Retardation Coordination, Department of Health, Education and welfare Executive Vice Chairman, Secretary's Committee on Mental Retardation Public Health Advisor, Planning and Evaluation Management Intern, Public Health Service Clergyman, North Carolina Conference, Methodist Awards and Publications Recipient of National Institute of Public Affairs Fellowship to Princeton University, 1969 - 1970. Award included a year of study in the field of public administration at the Woodrow Wilson School of International and Public Affairs. Publication of articles on legislation with Wilbur J. Cohen, Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, 1968. Other articles have been published in journals and magazines in the field of the handicapped. Certificate of Appreciation for participation in Department of Health, Education and Welfare 1965 lcgislative program. Member of American Association on Mental Deficiency and Council for Exceptional Children. Senator RANDOLPH. Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask two questions and that will be all. We are talking about figures, tentative figures, so that we can be better able to cope with these problems. You have said here today that you have 165 personnel in the Rehabilitation Service Administration, or you have said in the headquarters. I do not know whether you have said that today or some other time. What I would like is to break that down between professional and clerical. I just want to have that in the record later, if you cannot provide it now. Dr. ADAMS. I could probably have it right now if I can call upon my Assistant Commissioner for Information-may I? Senator RANDOLPH. The record will be agreeable. [The information subsequently supplied is included in the "DHEW Answers to Questions Raised Orally," at the end of the hearing on p. 81.] Senator RANDOLPH. We have a job to do with you, as you know, of making the most effective use of personnel in the headquarters of the Rehabilitation Service Administration. Now, Mr. Secretary, Senator Stafford and I have an interest in the architectural and transportation barriers problem. Now, a Board was created, of course, by the legislation. I think it might be good for the record to have a report filed with us as a part of our hearing, so that we would know what progress is being made on the activities carried on by the Board. I would like to know about staffing and whether you anticipate a request for the $1 million a year which we had authorized for this job. As I understand it, you have only used $300,000 in this effort. Is this correct? Mr. CARLUCCI. Senator Randolph, we would be pleased to provide a full report on it, to date. The Acting Chairman is sitting to my right, Assistant Secretary Thomas, and I will ask him to comment generally on what has happened. Mr. THOMAS. The Architectural Barriers and Transportation Board has had three meetings. We have had a hearing, Senator Cranston, in San Francisco, where we invited members of the general public and others to come and comment on the problems. Senator RANDOLPH. Did you check out BART? Mr. THOMAS. We took a trip on BART. Senator RANDOLPH. Senator Cranston and I did that, Bob, in connection with our hearing in San Francisco, and last year in Los Angeles. Mr. THOMAS. We are going to be providing Congress, as we are mandated to do, in July, with a report of the activities of the Board. We have initiated certain kinds of activities which related to the study of barriers to the design of landscapes and housing for the elderly. Also, each member of the Board has been providing us with their existing policies with regard to compliance on the architectural barriers, and the current status of their compliance investigations. Our appropriation for this fiscal year was $300,000 and we will spend most of that, even though we have gotten started very late in terms of trying to initiate various activities and we anticipate in fiscal year 1975 budget that it will be about the same amount that will be used by the Compliance Board. Senator RANDOLPH. I am particularly interested, and I know my colleagues are, in what you are doing about staffing now. Can you be a little more specific on that staffing situation? Mr. THOMAS. Yes. As interim chairman, I appointed a special committee composed of members of the Board to look specifically at the amount of staff needed, based on our objectives and workload. That committee has not reported back to me yet. I expect to hear from them within the next week or two, at which time, the full Board will have to look at that recommendation and determine the most judicious way of attracting that staff. Senator RANDOLPH. Will we have the advantage of a copy of the recommendations; would that be proper for us to receive in our subcommittee? Mr. THOMAS. Certainly. [The information subsequently submitted is included in the "DHEW Answers to Questions Raised Örally," at the end of the hearing on p. 92.] Senator RANDOIPH. I think it might keep us more abreast of what you are doing, as we have a responsibility also to keep them abreast of what we are thinking. I constantly want that situation understood. At this point, I think it is well for us sometimes to take a look at ourselves. For 100 to 150 years, the structures here on Capitol Hill have had barriers. We are finally correcting that situation, and we are glad, Dr. Adams, that you are able to enter our buildings. Mr. CARLUCCI. The Sweitzer Building, which houses SRS, is now being remodeled and will be a model of barrier-free office buildings, perhaps one of the first of the old buildings in Washington to be remodeled along those lines. Senator RANDOLPH. The final thought I have is: how many handicapped persons are being hired within the program for handicapped? Mr. CARLUCCI. We are presently, as I indicated earlier, working on that whole issue, Government-wide. Are you talking about HEW, RSA? If you are talking about the specific organizationSenator RANDOLPH. HEW. Mr. CARLUCCI. I would be pleased to submit for the record those figures on handicapped employees. My recollection is that our efforts in that area are improving very substantially. [The information subsequently submitted is included in the "DHEW Answers to Questions Raised Örally," at the end of the hearing on p. 94.] Senator RANDOLPH. Mr. Chairman, I would also like to join you in commendation for the presence of the House staff members who are here today. I think there is no area, perhaps, in which we can produce more objective and constructive efforts than in working with handicapped individuals and through this close cooperation of the staff. Thank you for having done it, sir. Senator CRANSTON. Thank you. Senator STAFFORD. Before you get to further questions, I think we ought to commend some of the staff members who were at a conference which lasted until 4-something this morning and are still here helping us with these hearings. Senator CRANSTON. Right. I agree. Senator RANDOLPH. Off the record. [Discussion off the record.] Senator CRANSTON. Mr. Secretary, if the House approach were adopted regarding reorganization, that is, if RSA were placed in the Office of the Secretary, would that agency be placed under the Assistant Secretary for Human Development, Mr. Thomas? Mr. CARLUCCI. In all probability, Mr. Chairman, we would go that route, yes. Senator CRANSTON. Thank you, very much. I would like to ask Mr. Thomas some questions. The Office for the Handicapped is charged, as you well know, with preparation and submission of a long-range planning document which the Congress intends and hopes to use as a projection of needs for the provision of services and related programs. Can you tell us exactly what has been done regarding this document, what programs and areas you are surveying, other individuals the office is working with, and what areas you expect the report to cover? Mr. THOMAS. Yes. I would be delighted to attempt to answer that, Senator. As you have mentioned, the Office for the Handicapped's major mission will be to develop long-range plans for the handicapped. The Office for the Handicapped was established in the Office of Human Development, February 20, and we printed a functional statement in the Federal Register on March 29, and as noted, Mr. Babbington was selected as Director of the Office on June 17. We have also recently hired on the staff the director of that element in the office that will be concerned with the specific planning activity. We have recently recruited someone for the clearinghouse. Key people have been designed as liaison persons to the Office for the Handicapped from each HEW agency. This group of people from all over the Department have met to discuss the roll of the Office for the Handicapped and its relationship to the operating agency. The Inter-Agency Committee on Handicapped has been established and will hold its first meeting the first week of August. The committee will be composed of representatives from programs related to the handicapped, such as maternal and child health, the SSI program, the Bureau of Education for the Handicapped, the Office of Human Development, and the Office of Child Development, and we anticipate that there will be 17 staff involved in the development of that plan. The responsibility for its formulation will be as a result of that staff's activities, involving an analysis and projections of the programs from other elements of the Department. I do not know how much more specific you would like for me to get, Mr. Chairman. We are, basically, going to be utilizing our internal capability within the Department to analyze our existing program, and develop projections. We are also going to be interacting and communicating with organizations and groups, external to the Federal Government, in terms of helping us prepare that particular paper or plan. Senator CRANSTON. That report is supposed to be completed by March 1975. Are you on schedule? Mr. THOMAS. Yes, we are on schedule. Although, the fact that we only assumed responsibility for it, really, in March, we were hoping that that date might be extended somewhat to the end of fiscal year 1975, but if Congress holds us to the original due date, we hope to have the report to you by that time. Senator CRANSTON. I will check out the committee's need for this, and get back to you. We are counting on having it as soon as possible, at the beginning of next year, to do the work we have to do in connection with it. The office is also charged with encouraging coordinated and cooperative planning for programs and services throughout the Department, and other programs which serve handicapped individuals. Will you describe exactly what activities you have undertaken in this area, and what you expect will be your priority targets? Mr. THOMAS. Yes; I can. As I noted before, we have also developed a liaison person from almost every major agency that is concerned with the problem of the handicapped to the Office for the Handicapped. They have already met and discussed their role and the role of the Office for the Handicapped as it relates to them, and the Interagency committee. Again, it will be composed of all the people from all the elements of the Department that work for the handicapped. We have, in the Office of Human Development, put great emphasis on the long-range planning process, and the Office for the Handicapped will be, as are other elements for the Office of Human Development, very much involved in the development of long-range projection and what the Department, as a whole, can be doing for the handicapped, as well as clearly articulating special needs of the handicapped. We will, obviously, be in consultation with the Interagency Committee on Employment of Handicapped. There will also be a relationship between this activity and the Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board, and will also be working closely with Social and Rehabilitation Service on their analysis of the special needs of the severely handicapped. Senator CRANSTON. Can you describe exactly what you have done thus far in carrying out the clearinghouse function and establishing a coordinated and comprehensive data information system applicable to the needs and specific problems of handicapped individuals? Mr. THOMAS. Our first initiative, in terms of the clearinghouse, was to obtain an analysis, Mr. Chairman, on exactly what information currently is available within the Department. As the Under Secretary noted, one of the serious problems we have within the Department of HEW is having a good fix on exactly what our current information needs are. So, our first initiative has been to go to each one of the programs that are concerned with the handicapped and ask them: What are your current information resources, as far as information on the handicapped is concerned? As a result of that, after we have achieved that, we will then be talking directly with groups and organizations that provide services or undertake research with respect to the handicapped, and we already have someone who is going to be responsible for running the clearinghouse office. The ultimate determination of how we will keep this information is one that we are paying particular attention to. We are not confident that the most appropriate information system will be one in which we, within the physical confines of the Office for the Handicapped, keep all the information. What we are most concerned with is insuring that we know where all the information is, and that we know that it is carefully and well disseminated, because we find there is a problem in terms of communication, between various elements that are concerned with the handicapped people. Our first initiative is analysis and then consultation with other groups, in terms of what we are doing, on the designing of a credible information system and |