"800" number improvements to permit SSA to handle more calls with available

teleservice representatives, thus reducing busy rates and providing better public access to SSA;

Ensuring adequate computer capacity to meet growing beneficiary workloads and increased online transaction volumes;

Modernization of SSA's core accounting system so that better financial

management and use of fiscal resources can be achieved; and

Investments in office automation, to give SSA employees the tools they need

to do their jobs effectively and to enable them to meet the demands of

growing workloads in the future.

Limitation on Administrative Expenses

and

Supplemental Security Income

Introduction

Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee, I am pleased to be here today to present the supplemental appropriation requests of the Social Security Administration for fiscal year 1991 for the Limitation on Administrative Expenses and for the Supplemental Security Income account. These requests are necessary to provide administrative resources with which to carry out the additional work required as a result of the Supreme Court decision in Sullivan v. Zebley. Funds were not included in the regular appropriations for this purpose, and the regular appropriations are not large enough to absorb the additional work.

The request for the Limitation on Administrative Expenses is for $232,000,000 from the Social Security trust funds to finance directly the work required by the Supreme Court

decision. The request for the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) account is for $232,000,000 to reimburse the trust funds from general revenues, as provided by law, for the cost of this work. We are requesting that the funds remain available through September 30, 1993.

Background on Sullivan v. Zebley

On February 20, 1990, the Supreme Court affirmed the Court of Appeals decision in the class action of Sullivan v. Zebley, ruling that SSA's regulations implementing the law for evaluating disability in children did not reflect Congressional intent. This ruling required us to rewrite our regulations so that we take into account the functional limitations of a child when determining the severity of the child's impairment, in order to decide whether the child is disabled for the purpose of establishing eligibility for SSI benefits. Using these new regulations, which were published in the Federal Register on February 11, 1991, we must reevaluate thousands of childhood disability claims which have been denied because we did not consider these functional limitations. The funds requested in these supplemental appropriations will provide resources to carry out these reevaluations.

The SSI benefit costs resulting from the Zebley case have been included in the regular appropriation estimates for the SSI program. We expect that retroactive benefits to those who are found eligible may total some $1.4 billion, while ongoing monthly payments will cost several hundred million dollars a year.

Workloads to be Processed

Under the Zebley ruling, SSA will need to carry out the following work:

Make a new disability determination for Zebley class members who request one;

Obtain information about the income and resources of those Zebley class members who are determined to be disabled, and make a determination as to whether they meet the means test of the SSI program;

Reevaluate the new disability determinations of those class members who are denied and who appeal the new decision; and

Using the newly published regulations, reevaluate all childhood disability claims that we have denied under the interim standards for determining childhood disability, which we put into place after the Supreme Court decision.

Although the district court has yet to rule on the effective date of class relief for the Zebley case, we have based our estimates for these appropriation requests on the assumption that nationwide class relief will go back to January 1980. Under this assumption, SSA would expect to make new disability determinations for 237,000 Zebley class members and to reevaluate 60,000 childhood disability claims denied since the Supreme Court decision.

Under current processing assumptions, the entire workload resulting from the Zebley case will require about 1,800 Federal workyears and $232 million, including $120 million for the State Disability Determination Services. We expect to begin processing these claims in the spring of 1991, and that we will completely finish all the work, including administrative appeals, within about three years. To provide SSA with flexibility in processing these anticipated workloads, the timing of which cannot be pinpointed, we are requesting that these supplemental funds remain available until the end of FY 1993. Costs for start-up and planning activities incurred prior to enactment of the supplemental will be charged back to the supplemental.

38-711 0-91-11

Relationship of the Supplemental Security Income account

and the Limitation on Administrative Expenses

SSA administers the Social Security trust fund programs and the SSI program on an integrated basis for the purposes of economy and efficiency. The Social Security Act authorizes advances from the Social Security trust funds to pay the administrative costs of the SSI program through the Limitation on Administrative Expenses. The advances are fully repaid from the SSI appropriation. Thus, we are requesting a supplemental for the Limitation on Administrative Expenses to carry out the SSI work related to the Zebley case, and we are requesting a supplemental for the SSI account in order to reimburse the trust funds for the cost of this work.

Conclusion

The ruling of the Supreme Court in Sullivan v. Zebley mandates additional work for SSA, for which no appropriated resources are available. Enactment of these supplementals will enable SSA to carry out the work required of it, and to properly serve needy disabled children.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF GWENDOLYN S. KING

Gwendolyn S. King was sworn in as the 11th Commissioner of Social Security August 1, 1989, by Health and Human Services Secretary Louis W. Sullivan, M.D. She was nominated by President Bush on July 14, 1989, and confirmed by the Senate on July 26.

As Commissioner of Social Security, she administers the nation's Social Security programsOld Age Survivors Insurance and Disability Insurance-as well as the means-tested Supplemental Security Income Program for low-income elderly, blind, and persons with disabilities. These combined programs provide monthly income to more than 44 million people at an annual cost of about $282 billion.

Before taking the top post in the Social Security Administration, Mrs. King had worked since April 1988 as Executive Vice President of the Washington firm of Gogol and Associates.

Mrs. King is a veteran of White House, Capitol Hill, Federal and State government service. From 1986 to 1988, Mrs. King served as Deputy Assistant to the President and Director of the Office in Intergovernmental Affairs at the White House. In that capacity, Mrs. King had the primary responsibility of working with the nation's governors, mayors, and State legislators to keep the White House lines of communication open to elected officials.

While on the President's staff, Mrs. King was appointed to the additional posts of
Commissioner, Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations; Member, Interagency
Committee on Women's Business Enterprise; and Director, White House Task Force on
Puerto Rico. Three months after her departure from the White House, the President nominated
her to membership on the board for International Food and Agricultural Development.
Mrs. King was appointed in 1979 by newly elected Governor Dick Thornburgh to direct
Pennsylvania's first full-time, professionally staffed Washington, D.C. office, a cabinet level
position she held until April 1986.

From 1978 through 1979, Mrs. King served as senior legislative assistant to U.S. Senator John Heinz, R-Pa., and advised the senator on aging, education, health, human rights, and environmental issues. She also was the principal staff person for the senator on health care finance (Medicare and Medicaid), Social Security, and disability matters before the Senate Finance Committee.

During 1976-1978, Mrs. King was director of the newly established Division of Consumer Complaints at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

From September 1971 to March 1976, Mrs. King was with the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare where her duties included coordinating health policy matters for then-Secretary Casper Weinberger.

A cum laude graduate of Howard University in 1962, she taught school in Niagara Falls, New York, and Washington, D.C., before doing graduate study in public administration (1972-1974) at the George Washington University and starting her 18-year career in public service, In June 1990, she was awarded an honorary doctorate of public service degree by the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Her other awards include-the 1990 Drum Major for Justice Award from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the 1990 Denver Urban League Special Recognition Award, and the 1991 Howard University Alumni Award for Postgraduate Achievement.

Mrs. King was born in East Orange, New Jersey, and now makes her home in Washington, D.C. She is married and has three children.