ministration on Aging should be considered and taken into account. To do this, we thought it was necessary to give access to funding resources over and above those now available under title IV of the Older Americans Act. To accomplish this AOA has been asked to spell out objectives for older Americans and the knowledge constraints which need to be overcome to achieve these objectives. We expect that it will be possible to design projects which will furnish the necessary knowledge we need to achieve those objectives. In our method of operation I become, in effect, the program manager for all projects having to do with the demonstration of improved service delivery systems for older people, whether under the provisions of title IV of the Older Americans Act or other SRS authorities, such as the Social Security Act. I determine who will be directly responsible for each project, where the project will be, which ones will be approved or disapproved, working collaboratively with the Office of the Administrator." All projects which are up for continuation awards, that is those initiated in prior years, require my approval. Additionally, it is expected that not only will I determine how those projects will be monitored, but upon their completion, how the methods and techniques demonstrated by those projects will be integrated into on-going service programs so as to improve the wellbeing of older persons in their everyday living. While the technical research competence rests in the Office of the Administrator, the major program designs and applications are made by the Administration on Aging. Just as an illustration of what has happened during this year, which may serve to assist in this regard, while $800,000 was available for new starts in fiscal year 1971 under title IV of the Older Americans Act, under our new arrangement if was possible for the Administration on Aging to "tap into" other sources of SRS support amounting to more than an additional $1 million for the support of projects and programs dealing with the elderly. It is our expectation that by managing our money in this creative way we can maximize the use of Federal funds to meet the multiple needs of our Nation's people, expecially the needs of America's older citizens. With respect to the central Office of Research and Demonstration, all research technicians in SRS have been transferred to that office, including those in AOA. A division on aging is an important unit in that office. The director of that division remains my research liaison to the office and I confer with him daily. The major function of this central office is to take the expressed program problems and objectives from each administration and develop a coherent research and demonstration strategy that combines overlapping interests. Thus, AOA will have a direct input not only on title IV activity, but on all other research activities that affect the aging, including research and demonstration projects for medicaid, income maintenance, social services, and rehabilitation. The research professionals specializing on the aging will have a better opportunity to interchange ideas and knowledge with other researchers and to stimulate their thinking concerning the application of other SRS programs to the needs of the aging. 60-329-71—2 With respect to training activities under title V, the relationship of AOA to the Office of Manpower Development and Training is similar to that in research except that the training specialists are retained in AOA to manage directly those grant programs unique to AOA's interest. Overall manpower development strategy and standard setting for SRS-related State agencies will be coordinated by the SRS Office of Manpower Development and Training. Mr. Chairman, we have attempted to answer directly and honestly the specific questions you raised in your recent letter. (The letter did not contain any reference to the White House Conference on Aging, but I am prepared to answer such questions as you may have in that regard.) Yet, in doing so, we feel we may not have addressed the underlying issue and the real purpose in your calling this hearing: What is the future of the Administration on Aging? Considerable energy has already been devoted to the redesign of the direction of the Older Americans Act and we expect to devote more to it before a bill is forwarded to the Congress for a renewal of its charter. We anticipate that when this process is completed a product will be transmitted in the form of proposed amendments to strengthen the effectiveness of the Older Americans Act. Throughout the development of all the Nixon administration's legislative proposals, we have given considerable attention to the problem of how to stimulate general purpose government at all levels to be responsive to those groups whose needs are to some extent special in character-the preschool child, the delinquent, the nonEnglish speaking and, of course, the aging. How do we at the Federal level assure that the needs of older persons for improved transportation, for more recreation, for useful activities in which to serve the community, for group dining programs, for alternatives to long-term care, are met? We believe that part of the answer is found by having a strong advocate in the Federal Government with an across-the-board responsibility for input into all programs affecting aging people. There is a good case to be made for the proposition that the advocate must not be burdened with the administration of individual programs after they have become established. After all, the individual programs by themselves, are only, at best, small pieces of a much larger picture. Advocacy, of course, takes many forms. It means strengthening the capacity of the Administration on Aging to develop programs for operation by others, to furnish technical advice on how to improve the circumstances of the elderly, to call to the attention of policymakers the implications for older persons of proposed policy changes, and to design the best possible models for the delivery of specific services for the elderly. It is our hope that by expanding the purchasing power of older people on the one hand and by attempting to make functional units of government at all levels responsive to their needs for certain special services on the other, we can reduce the need and rationale for categorical programs. Reasonable men, to be sure, can differ and debate the merits of this approach. We believe, however, that is a reasonable way to proceed. Mr. BRADEMAS. Thank you very much, Commissioner Martin. As you already observed, the bells are ringing, but we might as well go ahead and then at some point we can recess and return. Commissioner, let me thank you again for your statement, and put two or three questions to you, if I may. There are two or three principal issues as I see it in respect to what you have said. First of all, let me be to the point. It is my own judgment that the transfers that you have been engaged in, both taking away research and training and now taking away RSVP and Foster Grandparents, represents a clear violation of the intent of Congress as expressed in the legislative history of the establishment of the Administration on Aging in 1965. I call to your attention the language in the House report that year: The Administration on Aging would have coequal status with the Social Security and Welfare Administrations. Thus the older population would be meaningfully represented in the upper echelons of the Federal Government. The proposed Administration on Aging would establish a high-level agency with responsibility to take action. I call to your attention on March 31, 1965, when the bill, the Older Americans Act was passed, that Members of the House of both parties interpreted the bill as requiring that the Administration on Aging be separate from and coequal with the Social Security Administration and the Welfare Administration. Indeed, it must be obvious, Mr. Commissioner, from the fact that you are a presidential appointee, that we in Congress of both parties felt very strongly that the needs of older Americans should have the highest visibility possible and that you were not to be buried and overwhelmed and cast and relegated to one side. You will recall, Mr. Commissioner, that on the 24th of September at a hearing before this subcommittee, I said at that time that the administration was busily engaged in putting you out of business. Go back and read that. I hate to have found myself so accurate a prophet because they were slowly strangling the Administration on Aging then and are proceeding apparently with some success. I realize that it is apparently happening in the OMB. I would regard that as a new acronym, "Older Man Bad." That seems to be the new meaning as we live in this town, in a world of acronyms, and it would seem that the OMB has got itself very busily engaged in trying to put the AOA out of business. So the structure, the programs that you are proposing seem to me to militate in the direction of my first point. And, second, the budget cuts which are really quite savage, seem to me to underscore that point also. They are taking away some 30 percent of your budget for title III community programs. You are being subjected to a cut in Foster Grandparents from 10.5 to 7.5 million, with a cut of 2 million in research and training. Yet you tell us that all these moves are wonderful. They are just giving you new strength, new vigor for the Administration on Aging. I don't want to ask you if you really believe all that, Mr. Commissioner, because I have great regard for you, but I would be grateful if you could make any comment on what I have said. How can you possibly justify what you are doing if the people in OMB can read the English language and have any respect for what the legislative branch of Government has written? Mr. MARTIN. Let me say first I am very familiar, of course, with the history of the act and very much concerned that it be carried out as far as we are able to carry it out. The present location of the Ad ministration on Aging, however, was established some years ago, back in 1967, when SRS was created. SRS, and the present administration, does not have direct responsibility for that particular act. Mr. BRADEMAS. I am just as critical of that act as I am of the present one. Mr. MARTIN. So far as the present situation is concerned, I may say that we have found a great number of opportunities in SRS to work on behalf of older people by working closely with the other commissioners of the other SRS bureaus. I think this is a real advantage, a real plus for us in that regard. So far as the budget cuts are concerned, as I indicated in my presentation, you have to view them in relation to other budget increases. The cut in title III money has to be considered in relation to the increase in areawide programs, and the cut in Foster Grandparents has to be considered in relation to the much greater increase in the RSVP programs. Mr. BRADEMAS. Are you suggesting you can now do a lot of things under the new proposed change that you could not do before? Mr. MARTIN. I am suggesting that there is some redirection of effort here and that we think that in both long and short run-and I am reminded of your quote to me the last time I appeared that "in the long run we are all dead"-we will be able to get a bigger output, or a bigger reward, for the expenditure of the money which is appropriated. Mr. BRADEMAS. I also said last time when you predicted passage last year of the welfare program that yours was a touching, childlike faith, and I would have to reiterate that observation with respect to the point you just made. Mr. MARTIN. We are coming back to Congress with a revised program, and I may have some comment at that time, but for the moment that would be my response to your question. In order to understand the changes in the budget you have to look at the whole budget. With the exception of the reduction in research and training money, which was general throughout the agency and more heavy in other parts of SRS than in the aging section, the reduction is only about $350,000. Mr. BRADEMAS. What is your total fiscal request for AOA for the next fiscal year? Mr. MARTIN. Our total request is $25,850,000. Mr. BRADEMAS. That is less than one-tenth of the amount of money that is presently being lobbied for by the administration for simply developing the two SST prototypes. I only make that observation in respect of what is wrong with this country these days, that we cannot even come up with a mere pittance for programs that affect the destinies of 20 million Americans where we seem to be quite anxious to come up with 10 times and more that amount of money for other programs. I have taken 5 minutes and would yield to the gentleman from New York who, I may say, is the initiator and the principal sponsor of the RSVP program, Mr. Reid. Mr. REID. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Martin, Mr. Cohen, Mr. Twiname, and Mr. Cardwell, I am delighted that you are with us today and I appreciate the explicity of your testimony thus far. I will ask one question, and then we will recess. Let me start on a positive note by saying I am delighted that you recognized RSVP by putting $5 million back behind it. I think this is one of the most potentially creative areas. I know you felt this for some time. However, I note this will only permit about 30,000 volunteers. As you and I know, it is possible this program could reach 1 to 2 million volunteers. So I take this as an earnest indication of things to come, and I am glad that at last there are funds in the pipeline. I am frank to say, however, that when I look at the total budget here in relation to the fact that we have not only 20 million senior Americans, but in fact another 20 million in their fifties-so we are talking about almost 40 million Americans-that the cut in the budget fills me with total lack of enthusiasm. It seems to me that the senior citizens in America for many years have been very badly short-changed. For example, I hope the day will come when there will be no earnings limitations on social security. Also, I think it has been impossible for many senior citizens to live under social security, and I hope the administration will support a 10- or 15-percent increase as well as remove all income limitations. But beyond that what I would like to ask you to focus on, when we come back, Mr. Chairman, if we may, is the basic concept of what you see in the future for the Administration on the Aging and the kind of budget priority that you are going to fight for to start meeting one of the very clear needs. Rather than address myself to some of the specific interchanges I think the important thing is the character of the commitment for the future. If you will forgive us, we will recess and come back to that point. Mr. BRADEMAS. The subcommittee will recess and come back just as soon as we have voted. (A recess was taken from 3 to 3:15 p.m.) Mr. BRADEMAS. The subcommittee will resume. Mr. Reid was putting questions, when we recessed, to the Commissioner. Mr. Reid, do you wish to resume? Mr. REID. Let me restate in part the last question, which was to ask you to address yourself to the basic concept relative to the Adminstration on Aging, to the kind of priorities you are going to fight for, to what your plans are on new legislation for extension on the Administration of the Aging and to the kind of priority you think ought to be attached to this. If you look at this program here, you see some elements that are being transferred. You see some amounts of money that are being cut. I think this subcommittee is interested in the forward planning and the magnitude of the effort that will be forthcoming. Mr. TWINAME. May I take a turn at this? I am John Twiname, Administrator of Social and Rehabilitation Service. I want to express my own concern here and commitment in this field. It is not our intent, the Secretary's, nor mine, to downgrade the Administration on Aging, to phase out or dismantle. Sometimes, in either making changes or in the transfer of a program, we have a tendency to look at it in a simple form, as somebody losing power. |