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91–174 PDF 2014

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A MORE EFFICIENT AND EFFECTIVE GOVERNMENT: 

THE NATIONAL TECHNICAL INFORMATION 

SERVICE 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL AND 

CONTRACTING OVERSIGHT 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON 

HOMELAND SECURITY AND 

GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

JULY 23, 2014 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.fdsys.gov 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security 

and Governmental Affairs 

( 
(II) 

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware Chairman 

CARL LEVIN, Michigan 

MARK L. PRYOR, Arkansas 

MARY L. LANDRIEU, Louisiana 

CLAIRE MCCASKILL, Missouri 

JON TESTER, Montana 

MARK BEGICH, Alaska 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

HEIDI HEITKAMP, North Dakota 

TOM COBURN, Oklahoma 

JOHN MCCAIN, Arizona 

RON JOHNSON, Wisconsin 

ROB PORTMAN, Ohio 

RAND PAUL, Kentucky 

MICHAEL B. ENZI, Wyoming 

KELLY AYOTTE, New Hampshire 

GABRIELLE A. BATKIN, Staff Director 

JOHN P. KILVINGTON, Deputy Staff Director 

KEITH B. ASHDOWN, Minority Staff Director 

LAURA W. KILBRIDE, Chief Clerk 

LAUREN M. CORCORAN, Hearing Clerk 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL AND CONTRACTING OVERSIGHT 

CLAIRE MCCASKILL, Chairman 

CARL LEVIN, Michigan 

MARK L. PRYOR, Arkansas 

MARY L. LANDRIEU, Louisiana 

MARK BEGICH, Alaska 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

RON JOHNSON, Wisconsin 

JOHN MCCAIN, Arizona 

MICHAEL B. ENZI, Wyoming 

KELLY AYOTTE, New Hampshire 

MARGARET DAUM, Majority Staff Director 

LYDIA WESTLAKE, Minority Policy Director 

KELSEY STROUD, Chief Clerk 
(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Opening statement: Page 

Senator McCaskill ............................................................................................ 1 

Senator Coburn ................................................................................................. 3 

Senator Carper ................................................................................................. 3 

WITNESSES 

WEDNESDAY, JULY 23, 2014 

Valerie C. Melvin, Director, Information Management and Technology Resources Issues, U.S. Government Accountability Office ................................... 4 

Bruce Borzino, Director, National Technical Information Service, U.S. Department of Commerce ............................................................................................... 5 

ALPHABETICAL LIST OF WITNESSES

Borzino, Bruce: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 5 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 40 

Melvin, Valerie C.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 4 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 27 

APPENDIX 

Letter submitted by Gene Dodaro .......................................................................... 50 

Chart referenced in the hearing ............................................................................. 51 

Letter submitted from Department of Commerce ................................................. 53 

Responses to post-hearing questions for the Record from Mr. Borzino .............. 56 

(1) 

A MORE EFFICIENT AND EFFECTIVE 

GOVERNMENT: THE NATIONAL TECHNICAL 

INFORMATION SERVICE 

WEDNESDAY, JULY 23, 2014 

U.S. SENATE,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL AND CONTRACTING OVERSIGHT

OF THE COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY

AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS,

Washington, DC. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:29 p.m., in room 

SD–342, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Claire McCaskill, 

Chairman of the Subcommittee, presiding. 

Present: Senators McCaskill, Carper, and Coburn. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR MCCASKILL 

Senator MCCASKILL. This hearing will come to order. 

We are here today to examine a little-known government agency, 

the National Technical Information Service (NTIS). Like many government agencies, NTIS began with very good intentions. During 

World War II, President Harry Truman created NTIS to distribute 

captured enemy scientific and engineering documents to American 

industry. In 1950, Congress authorized NTIS to collect our government’s scientific, technical, and engineering reports and disseminate it to industry and to the public. 

From the beginning, Congress intended that the cost of this service be borne by its users rather than the taxpayers, and so NTIS 

covered its costs by selling these reports to the public. Having a 

permanent, publicly accessible library of the government’s scientific 

research is a sensible idea and one that has proven useful to historians, scientists, and researchers since NTIS was created. 

Today, however, someone seeking a government report usually 

does not have to go to a clearinghouse or even a library to get it. 

They go to the Internet. Government agencies now make many of 

their most recent technical reports available on their own websites 

and they offer them free of charge. For example, an engineer could 

find a report called ‘‘Modular Electronics for Flash Memory Production’’ online by just entering the title into a search engine, and she 

could download it for free. But, if she wants the same report from 

NTIS, she will have to pay $30, even for an online copy. 

For reasons that we will explore further today, NTIS has also 

been trying to profit by selling documents that have little, if anything, to do with scientific or technical information, like the 

‘‘Armed Forces Recipe Book,’’ and even my colleague, Dr. Coburn’s, 
2 

1The letter referenced by Senator McCaskill appears in the Appendix on page 50. 

‘‘Waste Book,’’ which actually includes NTIS as a prime example of 

wasteful government. Both of these documents are, of course, available for free online and easy to find with a quick search. 

I understand that the Government Accountability Office (GAO), 

who will testify at today’s hearing, has recently asked NTIS to stop 

charging for GAO reports and just provide the link to GAO’s 

website. I would like to make part of the record today a letter from 

Gene Dodaro,1 the Comptroller General of the United States, dated 

July 18, 2014, specifically directing the Secretary of Commerce to 

provide a link to GAO and to cease and desist from selling GAO 

reports on their website. 

The questions these examples raise, of course, are why would 

anyone buy publications from NTIS when they are available for 

free elsewhere on the Internet. Partly for this reason, NTIS’s own 

parent, the Department of Commerce, attempted to dismantle 

NTIS during the Clinton Administration. 

Not surprisingly, NTIS has lost money consistently over the last 

decade on its repository. In order to remain financially afloat, the 

agency began offering services to other government agencies, including web hosting, e-training courses, and database management, 

for a price. NTIS does this by using a particular provision of its authorizing statute, which allows the agency to enter into joint ventures to conduct its business. 

How this works is that a Federal agency who wants to obtain 

web hosting services, for example, will enter into an interagency 

agreement with NTIS to provide that service. Meanwhile, NTIS enters a joint venture with a private company that actually provides 

the service to the agency. NTIS collects a fee from the other agency 

for providing these services and all parties get to avoid the scrutiny 

and regulations that apply to most other Federal contracts. 

I have questions about how and why NTIS is providing these 

services. First, Congress established NTIS to serve as a permanent 

repository of information, not to duplicate the functions of the General Services Administration (GSA) or to serve as a contractor or 

pass-through entity for other government agencies. 

Second, it appears that the other government agencies are using 

NTIS’s services not because it is offering a better value than the 

GSA schedules or another competitively awarded contract, but because it allows those agencies to avoid complying with the requirements of the Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR). 

I recognize that NTIS does serve an important function as a repository and a catalog. There are many reports NTIS holds that are 

not available elsewhere. The Internet is not an archive, and search 

engines can only search for what is currently on the Web. And, if 

a government agency removes a report from its website or runs out 

of space on its servers, that research could be more difficult to find 

without NTIS. 

Our country’s most prestigious research universities have said 

that the collection and catalog is valuable. In fact, they would be 

willing to pay in order to maintain its existence. 

But, we have to make sure these reports are archived and made 

available to the public in the most effective and efficient way pos-
3 

sible. If there are core services, like collecting, archiving, and disseminating government information that only the government can 

do, then we may need the government to continue to perform that 

service. But, it is not clear to me whether the service needs to be 

performed by a separate agency in the Department of Commerce 

rather than the Library of Congress (LOC), the Government Printing Office (GPO), or some combination of the two. 

If there is a legitimate need for these services, let us consider 

paying for it directly and more efficiently rather than using gimmicks, like selling web hosting or document management to hide 

the real cost of providing those services. 

There are important questions to discuss about NTIS and its future, but they represent even more important questions about our 

government. Can we, as a Congress, come together and cut bureaucracy when it is obsolete and duplicative? 

I am hopeful, because Dr. Coburn and I have come together—and 

he is a champion on this topic, relentless, like a dog with his 

bone—we have come together to cosponsor bipartisan legislation, 

the Let Me Google That for You Act, which would begin to address 

some of these problems at NTIS. I know Dr. Coburn, like me, has 

hard questions about why we need an NTIS authorized in 1950 in 

a 2014 world. 

I thank the witnesses for being here and I look forward to their 

testimony. Dr. Coburn. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR COBURN 

Senator COBURN. Well, first of all, I do not think I could have 

said it any better than you did. I may be a dog after the bone, but 

at my age, I am starting to forget where I left the bone. [Laughter.] 

So, I look forward to the witnesses’ testimony and being able to 

ask questions. Thank you. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Thank you. 

And, we are honored to have our Chairman here today. This is 

special. Thank you, Senator Carper, for stopping by. Would you 

like to make any comments for the record before we begin the testimony? 

OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN CARPER 

Chairman CARPER. I love bipartisan cooperation, and I love it 

when two of the most thoughtful Members of our Committee collaborate, and I am happy to be here to witness this and thank you 

for inviting me. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Thank you. 

We will begin with you. Let me introduce the witnesses. 

Valerie Melvin is Director of Information Management and Technology Resource Issues within GAO’s Information Technology (IT) 

Team, where she is responsible for work examining IT issues 

across the Federal Government. Ms. Melvin has directed reviews of 

Federal IT management modernization programs at various agencies, including the Departments of Veterans Affairs (VA), Defense 

(DOD), Health and Human Services (HHS), Labor (DOL), as well 

as the Social Security Administration (SSA) and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). 
4 

1The prepared statement of Ms. Melvin appears in the Appendix on page 27. 

Mr. Bruce Borzino is the Director of the National Technical Information Service. Mr. Borzino has 31 years of government service 

with the United States Army, General Services Administration, 

and the Department of Commerce. Mr. Borzino is also a retired 

Army Lieutenant Colonel. Thank you for your service. 

I would like to thank the witnesses for appearing before us 

today, and it is the custom of this Subcommittee to swear in all 

witnesses that appear, so if you do not mind, I would ask you to 

stand. 

Do you swear the testimony you will give before the Subcommittee will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the 

truth, so help you, God? 

Ms. MELVIN. I do. 

Mr. BORZINO. I do. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Thank you both. 

We will begin with you, Ms. Melvin. 

TESTIMONY OF VALERIE C. MELVIN,1 DIRECTOR, INFORMATION MANAGEMENT AND TECHNOLOGY RESOURCES ISSUES, 

U.S. GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE 

Ms. MELVIN. Good afternoon, Chairwoman McCaskill, Senator 

Coburn, and Chairman Carper. Thank you for inviting me to testify 

at today’s hearing on the National Technical Information Service. 

At your request, my testimony will summarize a report that we 

issued in November 2012, which addressed NTIS’s operations, the 

age of and demand trends for reports added to its repository, and 

the extent to which these reports are readily available from other 

public sources. 

In this regard, our work noted that NTIS offers a variety of products and services, as you have noted. Moreover, it charges fees for 

these products and services and is required by law to be financially 

self-sustaining to the greatest extent feasible. In fulfillment of its 

basic statutory function, NTIS established a researchable repository of over 2.5 million scientific, technical, engineering, and business research reports, which it makes available individually as well 

as through subscriptions to its reports library. 

However, our work highlighted the need for attention to NTIS’s 

basic statutory role of collecting and disseminating technical reports and the fee-based model upon which it operates. In particular, we found that from fiscal year (FY) 2001 through 2011, 

costs for NTIS’s reports and other products exceeded revenue for 10 

of the 11 fiscal years and the agency was financially sustained during this period by services it offered to other Federal agencies that 

were less directly related to its basic statutory function. 

More importantly, we estimated that about 74 percent of the reports added to NTIS’s collection from fiscal year 1990 through 2011 

were readily available from other public websites, and of these, we 

estimated that approximately 95 percent were available for free. 

These included reports available from the issuing organization’s 

website, the Federal Government’s official web portal, USA.gov, 

among other sources. Most often, these reports were readily located 
5 

1The prepared statement of Mr. Borzino appears in the Appendix on page 40. 

at another website through the Google.com search engine that we 

used. 

We concluded that the increasing availability of the technical reports from other public sources, and often at no cost, coupled with 

the decline in revenue associated with this basic statutory function 

called into question the viability and the appropriateness of NTIS’s 

fee-based model for disseminating the reports that it collects. 

Accordingly, we suggested that Congress consider examining the 

appropriateness and the viability of this model to determine whether it should be continued, given that many of the reports overlap 

with similar information available from the issuing organizations 

or other sources for free. 

For its part, NTIS acknowledged that the increasing use of the 

Internet to disseminate information posed a challenge to its mandate as a self-financing repository. However, the Department of 

Commerce did not indicate whether it had any plans to propose 

changes to the fee-based model. 

Nevertheless, Chairwoman McCaskill, the legislation that you, 

Senator Coburn, and others have recently introduced aimed at 

streamlining the collection and distribution of government information can provide an important vehicle for reassessing this model. 

This concludes my oral statement. I would be pleased to respond 

to any question that you all may have. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Mr. Borzino. 

TESTIMONY OF BRUCE BORZINO,1 DIRECTOR, NATIONAL 

TECHNICAL INFORMATION SERVICE, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF 

COMMERCE 

Mr. BORZINO. Good afternoon, Chairwoman McCaskill, Chairman 

Carper, Dr. Coburn. Thank you for your invitation to testify today 

on NTIS’s mission and the value it provides the Federal Government and the American public. 

The NTIS’s mission is twofold: One, promoting American innovation and economic growth by serving as the Federal Government’s 

central means of collecting and widely disseminating scientific, 

technical, and engineering information to the public and industry; 

and, second, by providing innovative information management solutions to assist other Federal agencies in managing and disseminating information to their users and constituencies. This mission 

aligns with the mission of Commerce and the Administration’s goal 

of promoting shared services to Federal agencies. 

The National Technical Information Act of 1988 and the American Technology Preeminence Act of 1991 provide NTIS with its 

unique authorities to serve the public and industry, which ensures 

permanent public access to Federal technical reports. Since Federal 

agencies are not required to make these reports permanently available to the public, that permanent repository function is the responsibility of NTIS and is as critical today in the Internet age as 

it ever has been. 

NTIS is a self-sustaining agency and it relies solely on fees from 

the provision of products and services, but does not receive an annual appropriation from Congress. 
6 

NTIS has amassed a collection of 2.8 million Federal publications, covering more than 350 science technical and business-related subject areas. These items are perpetually available, and approximately 30,000 new titles are added annually. 

NTIS is a significant source of Federal technical and science information and associated bibliographic metadata for Worldwide 

Web search engines. Search engines can more easily find reports 

and documents that have had the underlying bibliographic 

metadata coding created by NTIS. 

The GAO has reported that up to 45 percent of Federal technical 

reports in any given subject category within the NTIS collection are 

only findable and available from NTIS. NTIS also ensures public 

access to the 26 percent of the reports entered into the NTIS collection since 1990 that GAO determined were not available from any 

of the four public sources searched by GAO. 

NTIS’s joint venture authority permits NTIS and its joint venture partners to work directly with a Federal client agency to meet 

specific requirements of the agency. In fiscal year 2013, NTIS provided $64 million in information management services to other 

Federal agencies, and as a Federal Shared Service provider, completed 103 separate service projects for 39 Federal agencies and departments. My written testimony enumerates many of them. In fiscal year 2014, Federal services revenue is projected to increase to 

$88 million. 

NTIS also performs other valuable and unique functions for Federal agencies and the public, such as distributing the Death Master 

File (DMF) required by insurance agencies and Federal institutions, providing distribution of sensitive Drug Enforcement Agency 

(DEA) controlled substance data for medical and pharmaceutical 

service firms, unlimited access to approximately 2.8 million technical reports for libraries, and access to one of the most comprehensive collections of federally funded science and technology documents for the American public. 

As NTIS moves forward, we will continue to adopt business processes and technology needed to achieve NTIS’s mission in the most 

effective and efficient manner, including NTIS is proactively engaged with its advisory board, academia, and industry partners to 

develop a business model to facilitate free U.S. public access to 

electronic scientific and technical reports through its library. NTIS 

is developing this service to allow free and open access to electronic 

technical reports, associated bibliographic records, other selected 

research services, and linkage to report data. This new program 

will be launched in October 2014. NTIS advises the public of free 

ways in which to receive a report before processing a request for 

a technical report. 

Thank you for this opportunity today, and I am pleased to answer any questions that you may have. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Thank you, Mr. Borzino. 

Mr. BORZINO. Yes, ma’am. 

Senator MCCASKILL. I want to start with, on your website, there 

is now a banner that says you might be able to get the reports that 

you are going to get here for free other places. When did that banner go up? 

Mr. BORZINO. That banner went up last week, ma’am. 
7 

Senator MCCASKILL. After this hearing was announced? 

Mr. BORZINO. Yes. It went up after this hearing was announced. 

However, it is part of our program that we have been working on 

the past 15 months in order to announce the public access National 

Technical Reports Library (NTRL). 

Senator MCCASKILL. Why is it so small, and why is there not a 

large box before you pay to say, have you checked to make sure you 

cannot get this for free? 

Mr. BORZINO. It is there on our public front page. It is there on 

our search pages when you go search. And, it is there before you 

go pay. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, I look on the pages, for example, on 

your ‘‘Shipping and Fulfillment Services’’ page. The movie about 

how you can buy these services is much larger than the advising 

that you can get this stuff for free. I mean, let me give you one example. 

You have the Wage Determination Online. You guys host the 

wagedeterminationsonline.gov site for the Department of Labor. 

Mr. BORZINO. That is correct. 

Senator MCCASKILL. This site provides Federal contracting officers with appropriate Service Contract Act and Davis-Bacon wage 

determinations. You are aware the Department of Labor offers that 

information for free? 

Mr. BORZINO. They provide it to us to offer to the public. 

Senator MCCASKILL. That you can get it for free directly from 

them. 

Mr. BORZINO. I am aware of that, yes. However—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. And you charge $4,000 for a single user 

subscription for that information. 

Mr. BORZINO. That, I am not sure, ma’am. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, you should be. 

Let me ask, your staff does manual Internet searches for agency 

websites to find reports to download? 

Mr. BORZINO. I would like to go back to that previous question. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Mm-hmm. 

Mr. BORZINO. We do the WDOL as a service for the GSA’s Integrated Acquisition Environment. I am not aware that we charge 

any fees associated with that program. 

Senator MCCASKILL. To get a single user subscription to the database, our research shows that you charge $4,000. 

Mr. BORZINO. That, I am not aware of, ma’am. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. The Government Printing Office disseminates Congressional and agency papers to the Nation’s Depository Libraries. The Government Printing Office considers your 

agency to be the largest source of, quote, ‘‘fugitive reports,’’ end of 

quote, meaning reports that they never receive and, thus, cannot 

distribute. Why can we not combine your depository function with 

the Government Printing Office depository function? 

Mr. BORZINO. Well, we do provide reports to the Government 

Printing Office, so I am surprised that they would make that claim 

that we do not provide them. We provide them to the Library of 

Congress—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Why do you both—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. We provide them to—— 
8 

Senator MCCASKILL. Why do all of you need to exist? Why can 

we not have one repository? Why do we need three, with the 

chance that something gets missed one place or the other? Why do 

we not just do it one place? Would that not make more sense? If 

you were in business, would you not say it should be in one place? 

Mr. BORZINO. We should do it in one place, and we do. We do 

it at NTIS and that is the mission that the Congress has been 

granting NTIS, and it has been doing that since 1950. And, we provide the permanent accessibility. We provide associated metadata 

with all the records so that they can be filed and searchable by our 

public search engines through the Internet today. We provide the 

most comprehensive centralized collection which is available. We 

provide all these services, and that is why the American public 

comes to us. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, I do not think they would come to you 

if they realized how many times you are charging them for things 

they can get for free. I think it is completely inappropriate that we 

are having a government agency provide the public with free information in one place, and then the government is trying to charge 

someone in another place for the exact same information. These are 

taxpayers. They own the government. We do not own the government. They own the government. And, the notion that depending 

on where you are lucky enough to click is going to decide whether 

or not you pay for something is wrong. It is just flat wrong—— 

Mr. BORZINO. And that is why we—— 

Senator MCCASKILL [continuing]. And we have to stop it. 

Mr. BORZINO. And that is why, ma’am, we are implementing the 

public access NTRL program, which—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Why can you not put up there tomorrow, 

‘‘You can probably get this for free’’? ‘‘Chances are 50–50 you can 

get this for free.’’ 

Mr. BORZINO. It is on the Internet. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Very clear. 

Mr. BORZINO. We will go back, ma’am, and take a look at it. I 

will guarantee you that it will be much larger by the end of this 

week—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Are your reports going to be free beginning 

in October? 

Mr. BORZINO. The reports that we have, electronic reports and 

the associated metadata with all 2.8 million records within our collection will be available free to the public with a simple registration—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Why can you not make it free tomorrow? 

Mr. BORZINO. Because we have to put in place the infrastructure 

to be able to do that. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, it is pretty simple. All you have to do 

is just link over to the website where it is located. 

Mr. BORZINO. That is very difficult to do. We tried to do that 10 

years ago by having persistent URLs that attempted to link to all 

these documents that were available, just like USA.gov and other— 

science.gov and other agencies have attempted to do that. However, 

every time an agency takes a report down, moves it, we lose that 

URL link. It was very upsetting—it was very demanding for us to 

do that. It was very upsetting to customers when they came on the 
9 

site. And, there was no effective automated way to do it at that 

time. 

Senator MCCASKILL. They are customers, sir, but they are taxpayers. So, I think, looking at them as customers is part of the 

problem here. They are taxpayers. They are entitled to the government’s information for free. 

Mr. BORZINO. I look at them as taxpayers, ma’am. I am a taxpayer and I understand that. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. 

Mr. BORZINO. I would say—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. You are a part of the Department of Commerce—— 

Mr. BORZINO. That is correct, ma’am. 

Senator MCCASKILL. And, how much did you charge the Department of Commerce last year for information that you hold? 

Mr. BORZINO. I do not know how—if we charged the Department 

of Commerce for information that we hold or that we charged the 

Department of Commerce for services. I believe last year that we 

charged—or we provide services to the Department of Commerce 

for about $2.6 million. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, here is what we believe, and I need 

you to correct the record if our—it has been difficult for us—it is 

not transparent whether you are a middle man, whether you are 

just hooking people up with private contractors and just charging 

a middleman fee. That is what it looks like. 

Mr. BORZINO. I will be happy, ma’am, and we are here today—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Our records show—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. To discuss it, and we will be happy to 

come to you—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. And with your staff Committees or to 

show a full accounting of NTIS and how we operate. 

Senator MCCASKILL. I have a document here that indicates that 

in 2013, you charged the Commerce Department $288,000 for access to your Technical Reports Library. 

[Pause.] 

Do you think that is what Congress intended when they wanted 

you to be self-sufficient, that you would charge the agency where 

you are located $300,000 a year to access the information that you 

hold? 

Mr. BORZINO. Ma’am, I believe that is not true. We will have to 

come back with you. I do not believe we do not charge the Department of Commerce access to NTRL. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, it is circled, Technical Reports Library, and under it, it says Department of Commerce, $288,000. 

And, this is your document. 

Mr. BORZINO. Then the document—I believe the document is in 

error, but we will go back and certainly check. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. Doctor—we got the document from you. 

Mr. BORZINO. I am not disputing that, ma’am. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. Dr. Coburn. 

Senator COBURN. Well, thank you for coming and testifying. I 

have a lot of questions. 

First, for Ms. Melvin, how long has GAO been reporting on this? 
10 

Ms. MELVIN. Our earliest report was in 2000. 

Senator COBURN. OK. So, 14 years. 

Ms. MELVIN. Yes. We reported again in 2001 and then in 2012. 

Senator COBURN. OK. Thank you. And, Mr. Borzino, what percentage and how many of your 2.4 million reports have never been 

requested? 

Mr. BORZINO. I do not have that information, Senator. We will 

have to get back with you. 

Senator COBURN. OK. Ms. Melvin, have you all ever charged for 

your reports? 

Ms. MELVIN. Our reports are available online for free, the electronic versions. 

Senator COBURN. Yes. 

Ms. MELVIN. There are instances where we have reports that we 

do deliver and we charge the normal cost of recovery in terms of 

shipping and handling and printing, but not for any—— 

Senator COBURN. But, all your reports are available online? 

Ms. MELVIN. Yes. 

Senator COBURN. All right. You cannot think of a good reason, 

since your reports are all online, why NTIS would charge for your 

reports, can you? 

Ms. MELVIN. No. We do have a concern about them charging for 

reports. We do not believe that the Federal Government, and NTIS 

in particular, should be charging for the reports that can be obtained online for free. 

Senator COBURN. Yes. One of the things I have tried to do with 

Senator McCaskill is to eliminate duplication. What I am struck by 

as I read the Financial Performance 2009 through 2013, is how 

much of the services revenue has grown outside of the actual 

charge for this agency. We are now up through June 30 of this year 

to almost 85 percent of the revenue is outside of the original 

charge. It is in services. 

The interesting thing—and I think this should be put in the 

record. It comes from NTIS and I would ask unanimous consent to 

put it in the record. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Without objection. 

Senator COBURN. This chart shows what they have done since 

2009 to June 30 of 2014. Here is the point I would make, is the 

vast majority of the revenue comes from things that are outside 

their charge, which means—government programs never die. They 

just morph into something else. But, their services revenue in 2009 

was $14 million. Through 9 months of this year, it is $71 million. But, the interesting thing to me is their costs in 2009 were $27 million and through 9 months of this year they are $78 million. So, 

their costs have gone up. They have tripled in the last 5 years. 

And, most of that cost, I assume, is associated with the services, 

not with being a repository for the Federal Government. 

So, the question really comes is—and you are not making significant more amounts of money than you have over past years. In 

other words, your goal is not to make money. Your goal is to cover 

your revenue, I would presume—cover your costs. How do you explain that? How do you explain all this additional services business 

that you have gotten into that is obviously offered by other people? 

How is it that you have done that? 
11 

Mr. BORZINO. First of all, Senator, we are authorized to provide 

these services. We are an Office of Personnel Management (OPM) 

Shared Service Provider for e-learning and for knowledge management, in one area—— 

Senator COBURN. Is there nobody in the private sector that does 

any of this other stuff that you offer? 

Mr. BORZINO. We partner with over 50 private sector companies. 

Senator COBURN. That was not the question I asked you. Is there 

not anybody in the private sector that has the capability to do what 

you do? 

Mr. BORZINO. In some of these areas, there is—no, there are 

not—— 

Senator COBURN. In some, they are not. But, in the vast majority, there is a private sector business that you are actually competing with. 

Mr. BORZINO. No. We are not competing with the private sector. 

We are complementing the private sector. We are not competing 

with them—— 

Senator COBURN. Well, you are generating $78 million worth of 

revenue—— 

Mr. BORZINO. And, out of that—well, let us take last year’s rev- enue. Senator, of the $75 million that we had, approximately $50 

million of that revenue went back to Joint Service Partners and to 

contractors supporting us. Fifty-million dollars’ worth of that revenue, approximately, was returned to the American economy because we had those hundred-and-three or nine projects that we performed last year for other Federal agencies. 

We provide services to other Federal agencies. We are not a GSA 

or a—what, when I was in industry, we called a body shop. We just 

do not provide contracts to them. We bring together the parties, 

both on the Federal side and also from the private sector, in order 

to provide a cost-effective solution to meet the needs of the Federal 

agency. If we were not providing that cost-effective solution—the 

years that you talked about are sequestration years. They are 

years when discretionary funds are very tight in all Federal agencies. But, yet—— 

Senator COBURN. Two-thousand-nine was—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. Or, yes, we are providers. 

Senator COBURN. Two-thousand-nine was not a sequestration—— 

Mr. BORZINO. Eleven, 12, and 13, Senator, were—— 

Senator COBURN. Yes. 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. And that is where our major growth 

is. In 2009, the major growth was because the Department of Education had a distribution program for its Federal Student Aid products, and they decided after 9 years that they were paying a private contractor too much. They opened it up for competition. We 

applied. They selected us to do that service. From that the time we 

began that service in fiscal year 2010 to today, we have lowered the 

annual cost for that program more than 40 percent, or $4 million 

per year as of today. 

Senator COBURN. OK. On the—— 

Mr. BORZINO. Now, these services that you are talking about, and 

also Madam Chair, were clear services that are recognized and au-
12 

thorized by the National Technical Information Act of 1988 and the 

American Preeminence Act of 1999. We do not do anything that is 

not authorized by or within our programmatic and statutory authorities. They are all involved in providing information management support to other agencies. 

We have two levels of legal review. Even after I make the ultimate decision that we might go in and do a project, it goes to NIST 

and their legal department looks at it from a programmatic review 

perspective. It then goes to the Department, to the General Law 

Division, and they look at it from the statutory review perspective. 

And, if they come back and say it is not within our statute, then 

the work does not get done. 

Senator COBURN. All right. So, I have some other questions—— 

Mr. BORZINO. And I would just like to clarify—— 

Senator COBURN. Let me ask my questions, because I have limited time. What percentage of the 30,000 add-ons in this last year 

are available on the Web? 

Mr. BORZINO. The 30,000—— 

Senator COBURN. You testified just earlier that you added 30,000 

pieces of unique information this past year. That was in your testimony. And, my question to you, of the 30,000 additions, how many 

of them are available on the Web? 

Mr. BORZINO. That, I do not, Senator, because they may be all 

available because they are probably mostly electronic today. 

Senator COBURN. OK. 

Mr. BORZINO. Now, they may not come from this fiscal year. 

They probably came from previous fiscal years. But, yes, I would 

grant that they are probably all available on the Web and that is 

why we are moving to the public access NTRL program. 

Senator COBURN. So, that raises my next question. Why in the 

world are you all—if you are good at what you do, why are you 10 

years behind everybody else in this country of moving stuff to the 

Web? You have this big plan that you are going to introduce, you 

are going to put on, you are going to develop. Why was it not developed 10 years ago? 

Mr. BORZINO. Because we did not have the resources to do it 10 

years ago because we had to put in place—we had to go from our— 

in 2007, 2008, 2009, where we lost terrible amounts of money because we were a printing-based and paper-based and microfiche 

distributor to get to the point today where we are able to have this 

online capability of doing it, like through the National Technical 

Reports Library in 2009, our Federal Depository Services. 

And, if I can go back to an earlier statement, the reason why 

we—the past couple years, we do not have a lot of profit that shows 

is because in the past 2 years, we have made almost a $4 million 

investment in our infrastructure. So, last year, we put $1.7 million 

into the infrastructure. This year, we put $1.3 million in the infrastructure, and that has taken the profit down, which in, I believe, 

fiscal year 2012 and 2013 was about $2 to $3 million each year, 

down to where we are this year. 

That is the investment we are making in order to continue to 

provide the mission that you have provided to us, a mission of 

which we—yes, we agree, we cannot cover the cost to do the repository mission, yet NTIS still goes ahead and does the mission, and 
13 

we also provide very good Federal services that are desperately 

needed and desired by these other Federal agencies, not skirting 

contract or procurement law, because we do hundreds of contracts 

a year. 

Senator COBURN. I will come back for a second round. 

Mr. BORZINO. Ma’am, could I clear up—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Sure. 

Mr. BORZINO. We have an answer to your question. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Absolutely. 

Mr. BORZINO. That is called the Iraqi Science and Technology Information Repository, which is a joint program between the Department of State, the Department of Commerce, and NTIS as the partner, along with a private partner in Tennessee. The purpose of that 

program was to provide the Iraqi government a repository service 

that they could use to have their central repository, which they do 

not have currently, within the Ministry of Science and Technology. 

That is what the $288,000 of charges were for. So, it was that service project, of which I just received an announcement this morning. 

Next week at, I believe, at the Iraqi Embassy, it is going to be unveiled, if you will. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. Let us get back to a couple of questions. 

On the NTIS website, you advertise a bunch of services, from 

shipping and fulfillment to government web and system hosting. 

For example, some of the language on your web team is, ‘‘We can 

create your order processing website or link to your existing site to 

provide your clients with the ability to order your publications and 

outreach materials online.’’ Now, is this being directed to government? 

Mr. BORZINO. Well, we provide a number of agencies, out of 

our—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. No. When you say—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. Of services—— 

Senator MCCASKILL [continuing]. ‘‘Provide your clients,’’ are you 

saying you are advertising to government agencies that you will do 

this for them. You are not advertising to the private sector. 

Mr. BORZINO. That page is, yes, where the service pages are is 

for the Federal agencies to know about how the services that we 

can provide for them. That is correct. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. So, the services that government provides, it is weird to call taxpayers ‘‘clients.’’ That implies a paying 

relationship. ‘‘We can create your order processing website or link 

to your existing site to provide your clients the ability to order your 

publications and outreach materials online. Plus, our customer 

service team supports your customers’ calls and inquiries on the 

phone or via e-mail,’’ which is just pure answering the phone for 

government agencies. 

Mr. BORZINO. No, it is not, ma’am. Well, first of all—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, wait—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. That is—— 

Senator MCCASKILL [continuing]. Plus, let me read it again. This 

is what your website says. ‘‘Plus, our customer service team supports your customers’ calls’’—those are taxpayers calling into the 
14 

government—‘‘and inquiries on the phone or via e-mail.’’ So, it appears you are selling customer service to other agencies, correct? 

Mr. BORZINO. No. The customer service that we provide, if we 

provide it—first of all, we do have a Customer Service Center and 

that is to support NTIS and the repository functions. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Right. 

Mr. BORZINO. Let us take an example of what—first of all, that 

is a poor choice of words, and I agree. It should be American taxpayers. It should be something. But, it should not say ‘‘client.’’ You 

are absolutely right there. 

Let us take the Education Department. The Education Department is a distribution program that we do for the Federal Student 

Aid Program for them and for all their distribution across their 28 

offices. We provide that entire service to them from the point of the 

matter of putting up the website, which is branded for the Department of Education, to the point that the public comes in and orders 

it. If the public wants to discuss a publication, they call an NTIS 

Call Center, which is located in the facility that provides the service, our warehouse in Brandywine, Maryland, and we then take the 

order. We provide the entire service for the Department of Education. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. That is the point I wanted to make. So, 

how much of these services that you are providing—like shipping 

and fulfillment and distribution—how much of that are you providing and how much are you the go-between with a private contractor? 

Mr. BORZINO. The services, I would have to get back to you in 

each case. But, for example—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. I need a ballpark percentage—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. In the distribution—— 

Senator MCCASKILL [continuing]. You have to know what per- centage. You will bring in $75 million in a year on this type of 

stuff. Of that $75 million you brought in last year, how much of 

that is a fee you are getting for connecting a government agency 

with a private contractor? 

Mr. BORZINO. No. We do not connect them, ma’am. We are the 

program managers. We provide—for example, the distribution program that I talked about for Education, pretty much all the distribution programs that we have in the list there—Department of 

Education, PBGC, the other information I gave when I briefed your 

staff—that is all done by NTIS with contractor support as part of 

NTIS. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. Well, that is what I am trying to get 

at—— 

Mr. BORZINO. There is no—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. I want to get at the contractor support. 

Mr. BORZINO. There is no partnership—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Here is what I cannot figure out. I mean, 

I am sorry I sound so impatient, but I spend a lot of time on Federal Acquisition Regulations. Dr. Coburn and I have worked on a 

lot of hearings where there are not very many people in the audience talking about Federal Acquisition Regulations and what is 

good about them and what is bad about them and reforming them. 

GSA offers most of the services that you offer, agreed? 
15 

Mr. BORZINO. GSA offers contracting services, of which, when I 

was in the private sector, I used. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Right. 

Mr. BORZINO. They do not offer the services that we talk 

about—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. We cannot find any IT services you offer 

that GSA does not offer. They offer web hosting. They offer fulfillment. They offer all of those things. What IT services are you providing that—— 

Mr. BORZINO. They only provide the contract vehicle, ma’am—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. To get to a contractor, a vendor who 

can provide those services. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. 

Mr. BORZINO. We provide a partnership with the agency. That is 

the unique thing. It is a Joint Service Partnership. That is what 

the law says. It says, we provide this partnership. We provide this 

Joint Venture Partnership. We provide these unique solutions. We 

go to the Department of Agriculture (USDA) right now and they 

wanted a system, a talent management and knowledge management system that they could put across all 28 or 29 bureaus. They 

had a vendor-provided system, but it was just a learning management system. It did not meet the needs for what they want. 

Now, if you wanted to do that through GSA, you would have to 

scope out this whole program. You would have to have all your requirements definitized. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Yes. 

Mr. BORZINO. Under the partnership program that we have, we 

work with the partner to best find the solution. It is more flexible—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. And, you are more expensive than GSA. 

Mr. BORZINO. No, we are not, because—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Yes, you are. 

Mr. BORZINO. No, we only charge for the services that we provide. GSA provides—yes, we charge a fee on our labor that you are 

probably referring to that is 10 percent. That is the only fee we 

charge. GSA provides a fee, depending on the contract size, I believe, or at least when I used them 10 years ago, between 2 to 4 

percent, and all they do is provide you that contracting service. We 

provide you the program management. We are in the game. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. But, you do not have to go through 

FAR. 

Mr. BORZINO. We follow the legal—we follow the joint venture— 

we follow all statutes and law within the U.S. Government. When 

we contract, we follow the FAR. 

Senator MCCASKILL. You are setting up your own—— 

Mr. BORZINO. Now—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. You are setting up your own contracting vehicle outside of the Federal Acquisition Regulations, yes or no? 

Mr. BORZINO. No. It is not a contracting vehicle, ma’am. It is a 

Joint Venture Partnership. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. You—— 

Mr. BORZINO. It is authorized underneath both—— 
16 

Senator MCCASKILL. You are managing a contract that the services are being provided by a private vendor. 

Mr. BORZINO. We are managing a program, a joint venture. It is 

a public-private partnership—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. What percentage of the labor—of the $75 

million that you got in revenue last year, the labor that was provided, the services that were provided for that $75 million, what 

percentage of those services did you, in fact, perform? How many 

employees do you have? 

Mr. BORZINO. We have 101 employees currently, ma’am. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. You cannot sit there and tell me that 

101 people are providing all of these services on shipping and fulfillment and answering the phone and providing documents. You, 

in fact, are connecting Federal agencies with private vendors and 

not using the FAR. 

Mr. BORZINO. That is what GSA does, ma’am. What we do is we 

provide the detailed program management and support if that is all 

we are doing in that particular program. In many of those programs, we provide much more than that, including the web 

hosting, the other services that we have within our capabilities. 

That is the greatness, if you will, the advantage of using this public 

partner capability that we were granted by Congress. And—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. Well, we—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. In 1989, when we were granted that, 

we put it in the Public Register on how we were going to do it, and 

we follow it to this day. 

Senator MCCASKILL. I think I have common sense, and I think 

I understand what is going on here, and if it is as opaque as it appears to be, that just means we need to do more work. I need to 

see all these service contracts. I need to understand the scope of 

what you are performing and I need to figure out how 101 people 

can do it, because it looks like this is a work-around the FAR, plain 

and simple and that agencies are flocking to you even though 10 

percent is higher than what they are getting charged at GSA because they can avoid the FAR. 

Mr. BORZINO. That is 10 percent on the labor that we provide. 

That is the only fee that we normally charge. 

Senator MCCASKILL. But, you cannot tell me what percentage of 

the labor you provide. 

Mr. BORZINO. I have to go back and look at the individual programs that we have. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Dr. Coburn. 

Senator COBURN. What percentage of your total costs are labor 

costs? 

Mr. BORZINO. Approximately, this year, about $10 million, just 

for Federal labor costs. 

Senator COBURN. And you have how many contractors? 

Mr. BORZINO. We have a correlate of about 75 contractors. 

Senator COBURN. And what percentage of that is labor costs? 

Mr. BORZINO. I think it is around $5 to $6 million, but I am not 

sure. It may be a little bit higher than that. 

Senator COBURN. So, on these numbers that you have for us in 2013, less than 25 percent of your costs are labor costs, of the $64 

million? 
17 

Mr. BORZINO. I would have to go back and look at that, Senator. 

Senator COBURN. Well, I would like for you to answer that for 

the record, if you would. 

Mr. BORZINO. As I mentioned, Senator, the $50 million is what 

I do know that came out of the cost that we distributed, so—— 

Senator COBURN. Of the $75 million that you are going to have 

this year in terms of services, what percentage of this will be paid 

by Federal agencies? 

Mr. BORZINO. All the service revenue comes from Federal—— 

Senator COBURN. All right. And, what percentage of the revenue—— 

Mr. BORZINO. I would take that—yes, all the Federal services 

revenue that we define that way, yes, comes from other Federal 

agencies. 

Senator COBURN. All your services revenue comes from Federal 

agencies. Is that your testimony? 

Mr. BORZINO. Last year, I know the service revenue was $64 million. 

Senator COBURN. That is not my question. All your service revenue comes from Federal agencies, is that true or not true? 

Mr. BORZINO. I believe it is true. 

Senator COBURN. OK. What percentage of your service revenues 

come from the Department of Education? How big is the Student 

Loan Program? 

Mr. BORZINO. Senator, I do not have that information—— 

Senator COBURN. Well, you all should have—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. In front of me—— 

Senator COBURN. Somebody in your staff knows that answer. 

Mr. BORZINO. Well, we gave it to you, Senator, because we broke 

out in the information that we gave to you—the Department delivered to you a couple of weeks ago had it broken out. And, also, in 

the information that was given yesterday to the Subcommittee, it 

was all detailed and broken out for at least the last three fiscal 

years. We are very transparent. Please come down and look at 

what we are doing. We are not hiding anything. 

Senator COBURN. Well, for 2013, it shows that you billed the Department of Education $328,000, is that right? 

Mr. BORZINO. It cannot be for services, Senator, because the Education Distribution Program alone is about $5.5 million. 

Senator COBURN. All right. So, what you sent us, in terms of 

your total—this is the nature of Federal agency services provided 

in 2013, and I think this is your sheet. That shows the Department 

of Education. And, then, in answer to our questions, the latest fiscal year available, the name of each Federal agency, and how much 

they spent. So, 10 percent of your revenue is coming from the Department of Education, correct? And, 20 percent of your—well, it 

is $6,323,000. And, the Department of Agriculture, $14 million. The 

Department of Justice (DOJ), $4 million. Office of the Secretary of 

Defense and Defense agencies, $12 million. And, the Social Security Administration, $10 million. I suppose that is the Death Master File for Social Security? 

Mr. BORZINO. No, that would not be the Death Master File. That 

is the SSA’s special notice option. We actually pay SSA in order to 
18 

get the Death Master File from them. We pay them a fee in order 

to get that. 

Senator COBURN. And, do they give you the Death Master File? 

Mr. BORZINO. They do not give it to us. We have—— 

Senator COBURN. You buy it from them. 

Mr. BORZINO. We pay them a fee, yes, even though we distribute 

it for them. 

Senator COBURN. It is interesting. We cannot get them to give 

the Death Master File to other agencies so we can be accurate on 

what we are doing in other agencies, yet you are buying it from 

them? 

Mr. BORZINO. It is a weird relationship. However, you asked for 

the last 24 years. I do not know if we bought it from them all the 

time, but, yes, we do provide them—I believe that is correct. Can 

you affirm that? Yes. We do provide them a fee—— 

Senator COBURN. Can other agencies come to you and get the 

Death Master File? 

Mr. BORZINO. It is a preparation of what they do in order to deliver it to us. 

Senator COBURN. OK. 

Mr. BORZINO. It in the raw data that we can distribute to other 

agencies—— 

Senator COBURN. Can another agency come to you and get the 

Death Master File? 

Mr. BORZINO. Other agencies do come to us and get the Death 

Master File. 

Senator COBURN. All of them? Is there any agency of the Federal 

Government you will not give the Death Master File to? 

Mr. BORZINO. No. Well, let me clarify that. I know that there are 

five or six agencies that get it directly from SSA. 

Senator COBURN. I know, but is there any Federal agency that 

cannot get the Death Master File from you? 

Mr. BORZINO. I want to be clear to answer your question. The 

agencies do get it from us, correct? They pay a fee to do it. So, we 

do not distribute it for free. 

Senator COBURN. OK. But, the question I am asking you—— 

Mr. BORZINO. Yes. 

Senator COBURN [continuing]. Is there any agency that cannot 

come to you and pay a fee and get the Death Master File? 

Mr. BORZINO. We would be happy to make it available for every 

Federal agency. 

Senator COBURN. OK. And, what do you pay for that Death Master File? 

Mr. BORZINO. It depends whether it is a raw data file or it is—— 

Senator COBURN. Well, give it to—I do not care which way. 

Mr. BORZINO. I do not—— 

Senator COBURN. Somebody knows. What do you pay? 

Mr. BORZINO. We will get back to you on that, Senator. 

Senator COBURN. OK. How much revenue will you lose starting 

in September when you do not charge for reports that are available 

electronically? 

Mr. BORZINO. We are definitely at a risk of some revenue, but 

the basis of the model which we are going to is we are going to a 

model, if you will, like the Wall Street Journal, the New York 
19 

Times, where you have a section which is available for free and 

then you have other services which are available for a subscription. 

Senator COBURN. But, I thought your testimony was is the things 

that are online and available—— 

Mr. BORZINO. They will be. 

Senator COBURN. So, you have no idea how much revenue you are going to lose off that? You have $7,688,000 already this year 

off of reports, product revenue. What percentage is that going to 

decline? 

Mr. BORZINO. We are still working on the business numbers, if 

you will, Senator. 

Senator COBURN. So, you have made the decision to do that, even 

though you do not know the business numbers associated with it? 

Mr. BORZINO. We have some costs associated with it. Unfortunately, the Associate Director who manages this program has been 

out the last 5 weeks because of sciatic nerve program and he just 

came back. 

Senator COBURN. OK. So, you will get that to us? 

Mr. BORZINO. Yes. But, we are at risk, if this model does not 

work, of losing some additional money within the technical products line. However, we feel it is very important—you have spoken, 

OK. We have heard that you would prefer us to make things available for free and we are responding to that. We started 5 years ago 

moving in that direction and we have come to this point, and I will 

tell you, and I could show you in the minutes, that we started with 

our advisory board more than 15 months ago to look at this—— 

Senator COBURN. Yes. 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. Based on the administration’s open access, open data plans, wanted to make more available. We got the 

GAO report—— 

Senator COBURN. Actually, you have not—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. So, we—— 

Senator COBURN. You have not heard from us, because our goal 

is to eliminate you as an agency. That is our goal. 

Mr. BORZINO. I see. 

Senator COBURN. And, what cannot be found available somewhere else, put it in a small closet in the Department of Commerce—— 

Mr. BORZINO. I would just—— 

Senator COBURN [continuing]. And, that is my goal, because—I 

took three interns and asked you for your top 20 requests and we 

found all but four of them, which were manuals, Federal Government manuals, available online within 30 minutes. 

Mr. BORZINO. OK—— 

Senator COBURN. So, the fact is, 75 to 80 percent of everything 

that you supply in terms of reports or products is available online 

today, and your biggest costs have nothing to do with supplying 

that. Your biggest costs have to do with all these other programs 

that you are running in conjunction with contractors outside of the 

FAR Regulations that we see as very important. 

Our biggest problem in the Federal Government is acquisition. 

This lady has been a dog on that, and it is a mess. And, my message to you is not about offering it for free. My message is, how 

do we shrink the size of the Federal Government so that the kids 
20 

that are following us will have a standard of living equivalent to 

the average pay of your organization, which they are not anywhere 

else. 

Mr. BORZINO. Can I respond, please, Senator? 

Senator COBURN. Sure. 

Mr. BORZINO. Or, Doctor. If you look at last year, we provided 

103 or 109 service projects to the 39 agencies and departments I 

talked about. You are implying that they did not get anything of 

value out of—— 

Senator COBURN. No, I am saying they could have done it another way inside the Federal Acquisition Regulations and got it 

done. 

Mr. BORZINO. In some of those cases, they may not have, because 

they would not have been able to come up with the unique partnership and the methodology that we have put in place. Public-private 

partnership. It is a sharing. It is a sharing on both sides. 

Senator COBURN. You are telling me—— 

Mr. BORZINO. There is a risk on both sides. 

Senator COBURN [continuing]. That other agencies cannot do 

public-private sharing and partnerships? They do it all the time. 

Mr. BORZINO. Well, I do not know that they do it all the time—— 

Senator COBURN. Well, we do. We have hearings here all the 

time where we see the Federal Government contracting with private to do private-public partnerships to accomplish goals for the 

Federal Government. So, it is you may have some unique areas associated with the data that you have. The most amazing thing coming out of this hearing today is they have the Death Master File 

and four agencies in the Federal Government cannot get it from 

the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). 

Mr. BORZINO. Well, we will be happy to provide it, Senator. 

Senator COBURN. I yield. 

Mr. BORZINO. We do everything, Senator—if I can close—in the 

fact that we are not skirting acquisition regulations. We are not 

trying to put a process that does that—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. I do not think—— 

Mr. BORZINO. We are trying to provide a service within our capabilities—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. I think you are. 

Mr. BORZINO. It so happens, we are doing a good job in the last 

5 years that more and more agencies want to come to us, and they 

come to us during times of sequestration and times of reduced 

budget. And, we are offering them that ability in a different manner, because, as you know—and, I was an acquisition officer. That 

was part of my responsibilities. I was in the Acquisition Corps in 

the Army and that is what I did. So, for the last 10 years of my 

career, I was in research and developing information systems, and 

I understand the acquisition community both as a user in DOD and 

also in the private industry, because, as I mentioned before, I used 

the GSA acquisition vehicles in order to do business. I understand 

that. 

I am telling you that it is not the same. I will be happy to sit 

down and explain to you how we do it and make it very transparent that we are not skirting acquisition rules. Maybe we have 

a new model that you might want to consider. 
21 

Senator MCCASKILL. That may be true, and this is not personal. 

This is about duplication. This is about charging taxpayers for information they can get for free, and this is about one part of government not having to live by the same rules that another part of 

government has to live by. It is just that simple. And, no one is ascribing evil motives here. I am sure that you are a fine American, 

and everyone who works with you and works in that agency, all 

101 of them, and probably even the contractors that all work there 

are great, because I think there are some great contractors out 

there. 

This is about whether or not this is the way we should be doing 

business, and let me ask you this. You referred to your statutory 

mission. Your statutory mission was very clear, that it is supposed 

to be a clearinghouse of scientific, technical, and engineering reports. That was Harry Truman’s idea, that the scientific information that we had developed through an enormous sacrifice by the 

American people through the war would be able to be translated 

into commerce. Great idea. Do you think Harry Truman envisioned 

that you would be offering the Air Force Recipe Cookbook as part 

of that? 

Mr. BORZINO. The Air Force Recipe Cookbook was offered because at a time when DOD did not have the capabilities of making 

it available and there was a demand for it by the restaurant and 

services industries—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. I do not know which is more scary to me. 

Mr. BORZINO. So, in any event, we did it at that point. Under 

this new program, it will now be available free. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Did you just say the Department of Defense 

did not have the capability of providing a cookbook? 

Mr. BORZINO. The Department of Defense, as you know, through 

DTIC did not normally provide their publications to the public. You 

had to be either a military member, a dot-mil address—and this is 

anecdotal because, I was there, so it may not be true today. My 

staff tells me that we were asked specifically at one point by the 

Department of Defense to make that available because it allows 

restauranteers and others to do large recipes and that—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, that makes—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. That is why it is available. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Who decides—— 

Mr. BORZINO. That is why we have it. However, now, under the 

current program, since it is electronic, it will be made available 

free. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Right. 

Mr. BORZINO. You can look at the 2.8 million documents that we 

have in the collection. Certainly, Senator, there is a number that 

you would say do not meet today’s requirement of science and technical. I do not doubt that. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, but that is to your mission. How did 

you get off your mission? 

Mr. BORZINO. And we are going back to make sure that those 

things—first of all, we have—ensure that what we bring into the 

collection now firmly meets the scientific, technical—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Who is making that decision? 
22 

Mr. BORZINO. My staff here is making that decision by ensuring 

that the catalogers and indexers who go out and bring things in follow specific guidelines that we have had in place but maybe have 

not been followed at all times. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Have you included reports acquired from 

private sector organizations? 

Mr. BORZINO. Private sector—excuse me? 

[Off microphone conversation.] American Library Special Library 

Association, I guess, cataloging and indexing. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. That is also not within your mission, 

correct? 

Mr. BORZINO. My staff is telling me it is in science and technology. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. I did not realize that this was supposed 

to be a repository for private documents. I thought this was just 

supposed to be government documents. 

Mr. BORZINO. I will have to get back with you. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. 

Mr. BORZINO. I am not—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. That would be great, if you would. 

Mr. BORZINO. I am not sure, Senator. If you can pose that question—I am not sure exactly what the question is—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, the question is whether or not you all 

are out harvesting documents in the private sector in addition to 

harvesting documents from the public sector. And, if so, where did 

you get the authority to do that as part of this agency? 

Mr. BORZINO. No. We are not doing that. 

Senator MCCASKILL. OK. I need a definitive answer about what, 

if any, private entities you are, in fact, archiving or keeping a repository of private documents and how that came about—— 

Mr. BORZINO. None that I am aware of, ma’am. If we have harnessed by mistake a private industry or private sector document, 

then that is incorrect. Then, we should not be doing that. Do we 

do it as a service for anybody else or in order to try to add things 

to the collection outside what we are supposed to be doing by statute? No. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Part of me is proud, in a way, because you 

all have shown a private sector mentality. I think somebody sat 

and figured out that there was going to be dwindling revenue to 

support a government agency from the original mission that was 

designed because of a change in technology. The very technology 

that drove the entire purpose of your organization was going to 

make you obsolete. So, in order to sustain the existence of your 

agency, you had to find a new source of revenue, and in order to 

find a new source of revenue, you had to figure out a way that you 

would bring in money for providing other services besides documents that people could get for free. 

And, so, to do that, you have used the euphemism, ‘‘a public-private partnership,’’ when, in reality, with a staff the size of your 

staff and a budget the size of your budget, that is facilitating Federal contracting, whether you all want to call it that or not. You 

all are not doing the work. You cannot do the work with 101 people. You are contracting with private industries, and you call it a 
23 

public-private partnership. At GSA, they call it FAR. They call it 

acquisition. You call it a public-private partnership. 

And, what I need you to do, for the record, is I need you to give 

me examples of some services you are providing Federal agencies 

that they can get nowhere else, not your, oh, it is a public-private 

partnership because, somehow, because you guys are acquiring the 

private entity that is doing the work that that makes it a publicprivate partnership. When GSA acquires the private entity that is 

doing the work, you are calling that just straight acquisition. To 

me, a duck is a duck is a duck. It is walking like a duck. It is 

quacking like a duck. I think it is a duck. 

And, therefore, I need you to explain in very transparent terms, 

what are the services you are providing that a Federal agency can 

get nowhere else, because I think that is your only shot of holding 

on to this agency long-term, because more and more people that 

are getting elected are realizing we cannot continue to have payrolls without a purpose. We just cannot do it, and especially since 

your customers are, in fact, the taxpayers. 

The ones who are paying you, the agencies, that is all taxpayer 

money. The people who are buying reports from you, those are all 

taxpayers. So, it is almost like it is this weird agency that is getting money from the public on one end and getting money from the 

public on the other end and pretending that, somehow, you all are 

providing a model that is the ultimate efficiency. 

Mr. BORZINO. May I respond? 

Senator MCCASKILL. Yes, you may. 

Mr. BORZINO. OK. First of all, we are authorized to enter into 

these private sector partnerships by law. So, Congress passed a 

law, the National Technical Information Act of 1988, as well as the 

American Technology Preeminence Act of 1991. Yes, there is a base 

statutory the GAO referred to, I guess, 801799, whatever it is, from 

1950, that authorized the Secretary of Commerce to establish a 

clearinghouse. 

In 1988 and 1991, and by other changes to the law, you authorized us to enter into Joint Service Partnerships. These Joint Service Partnerships were to provide innovative information solutions 

to other public agencies, to come up with these solutions and then 

to provide them to other public agencies. We started doing that in 

1989 and we have a history since then of the past 25 years. 

We provided FedWorld, which was one of the first websites of the 

Federal Government, in the early 1990s. We provided the IRS tax 

site for—the first IRS tax site in the middle 1990s. In the late 

1990s, we developed, with a joint partner, we developed the Department of Defense Defense Acquisition University (DAU) first 

learning management system, and for that reason, it was why in 

2004 OPM came to us and designated us an e-training learning— 

knowledge management service partner. 

Senator COBURN. But, here is the question—— 

Mr. BORZINO. So, we have storied history—— 

Senator COBURN [continuing]. That follows up on that. 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. Of doing these services. 

Senator COBURN. Could none of those have been done without 

your agency being in existence? That is the question we are asking. 

They all would have happened through regular acquisition process. 
24 

Mr. BORZINO. Can I give you another example, since the Senator 

asked, the Chair asked? Specifically, I would like to give you an example of the Social Security Special Notion Option (SNO) program. 

This was a program which was mandated to SSA by court order 

in San Francisco, I believe, that they were to provide all their notices that they had been providing to sight-impaired individuals 

just regular printed and then you could call up and they would 

read it to you. The court said that that is not good enough. You 

need to provide them in different formats, such as Braille, 508 compliant CDs, large print, and audio. 

Senator MCCASKILL. But, there is no reason another Federal 

agency cannot provide that. There is no reason that the—— 

Mr. BORZINO. No. A Federal agency does not have the capability 

because it requires the Braille, it requires the audio to be able to 

do that. It requires these expertise. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, the GSA—— 

Mr. BORZINO. Now, we happen to have two partners—— 

Senator MCCASKILL [continuing]. Could have contracted for that 

with a—— 

Mr. BORZINO [continuing]. We have had two partners that happened to be Small Disadvantage Business owned by blind gentlemen who were doing scanning and digitization—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. But, they not have done business with the 

GSA, Mr. Borzino? Why would they not have done business with 

the GSA? Why could they not, through the Federal Acquisition 

Regulations and acquisition processes, they would have put out a 

contract. By the way, this is what they do at the Department of Defense. This is what they do in Homeland Security. They put out a 

scoped contract. We need somebody to provide Braille information. 

We need somebody to answer phones. We need somebody to provide—this is the point. 

The point is not that you are not doing good work. No one is here 

to malign you in terms of the work you are doing. This is about 

duplication, about a drifting mission that went from providing reports that were not easily available to realizing that, now, these 

are easily available. We are going to have to start web hosting or 

we are going to have to start shipping or we are going to have to 

get into big wholesale printing operations, most of which you are 

contracting. 

Mr. BORZINO. Ma’am—— 

Senator MCCASKILL. That is the point. 

Mr. BORZINO. No, I would like to clarify the point that we just 

did not start this 3 years ago, 5 years ago. I gave you examples, 

and we can show you, I think, breaking out the revenue, to show 

you that we have been providing these services since as early as 

1989. 

Senator COBURN. But, it has increased 69 percent since 2009. 

Mr. BORZINO. Principally because of some large programs that 

came in, such as the Department of Education, at that point, about 

$9 million. The SSA SNO program comes in. It has been floating 

somewhere between $9 and $12 million. Yes, there were some large 

projects that came in that certainly increased the revenue. But, 

also, we went from about maybe 20 projects to 30 projects up to 

over 100 projects. 
25 

Senator MCCASKILL. Well, the one thing we are going to do is we 

are going to drill down on those large projects and we are going to 

look at the contracting process. We are going to look and see if FAR 

was complied with. We are going to look and see who those contractors are and if they are doing business doing the same thing in 

other agencies and if the price that is being paid is the same, because I am willing to bet, before all the dust settles, that there is 

an upcharge to avoid the FAR, and I am willing to bet the Federal 

agencies realize they can avoid the upcharge for avoiding the FAR 

by using your agency. 

That does not make you bad guys. That makes you providing the 

service outside of the Federal Acquisition Regulations. Now, I 

might be wrong about that, but we are going to drill down and figure it out. We are going to look at the large contracts you have and 

the services you are providing and the private contractors that are 

providing those services and we are going to drill down on the 

costs, and I guarantee you those services are being provided somewhere else in government, very similar, and we are going to look 

at the cost there and we are going to try to figure out apples-toapples why it is better that you are doing this rather than GSA. 

And, if, in fact, your model is better, if all the contracting procedures are being followed, if, in fact, you are crossing the ‘‘t’’s and 

dotting the ‘‘I’’s and scoping your contract, if you are doing performance measurements on your contractors, if you are not giving 

them bonuses when they do not deserve it, if you are doing things 

better than GSA, then I am all for you guys taking over the whole 

kit and caboodle. I have no problem with that. I have no problem 

with blowing you up big time and shutting down GSA. But, we cannot have two, because it is not fair. And, frankly, it is not transparent, and that is the problem. 

So, I want the people who work for you to know, we are not after 

you because you are bad guys. We are after you because this is not 

a good way to run a government. It is duplicative, it is not transparent, and it is not clear why your mission has drifted to the extent it has and why it is necessary that it has. That is the bottom 

line. 

Senator COBURN. I just want to get on the record GAO’s recommendations of what they think should be done. 

Ms. MELVIN. We had issued a suggestion to Congress to revisit 

the model for the fee-based system. We continue to believe that 

looking at that model and reassessing whether it is the right way, 

the appropriate and viable approach to handling and having NTIS 

do its business, is necessary. So, we stand by that recommendation—that matter for consideration. 

Senator MCCASKILL. I am through, too. 

I want to thank you. I know this has not been fun, but this is 

called oversight and it is us trying to get to the bottom of something that is really—I mean, between Dr. Coburn’s staff and my 

staff, we are pretty good at getting in the weeds, and it is harder 

at your place to get into the weeds, and that is why we want to 

understand it better. 

We will continue asking questions. The record will remain open 

for 15 days. We will specifically start asking some questions about 

those large contracts and whether or not your agency is the right 
26 

place for them to be positioned, and we want to thank GAO for 

your continuing great work. 

Senator COBURN. I have one other thing. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Sure. 

Senator COBURN. I am going to put these questions for the 

record, but I want to read them into the record. These are constituents that have questions. One is from Pete. The Federal Government penalizes contractors when audits show unfair pricing. Why 

should not the NTIS be held to the same standard, and especially 

on pricing on a lot of this product? 

What is NTIS’s most requested report and how much does it sell 

for and how many times has it been requested? 

Who are NTIS’s customers? Who is ordering and paying for reports? Which agencies? You gave us that information, provided it. 

Here is the one that gets me, and I think that started all of this. 

How can we pay with our taxes for another department for something that is free online? That is the real bug that gets the American taxpayer. 

And, where does the money go? Well, I think you have answered 

part of that, but the vast majority of your revenues are going to 

decline on actually selling the reports, and so you are going to be 

more impaired to go do more of the services that you will need to 

do to run your organization. 

So, I thank you for being here, and we will submit these questions for the record. 

Senator MCCASKILL. Thank you very much. 

[Whereupon, at 3:42 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 
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