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CUTTING OUT THE WASTE: AN OVERVIEW OF H.R.

5766, THE GOVERNMENT EFFICIENCY ACT; AND

H.R. 3282, THE ABOLISHMENT OF OBSOLETE

AGENCIES AND FEDERAL SUNSET ACT OF 2005

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON

GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

ON

H.R. 5766

TO PROVIDE FOR THE ESTABLISHMENT OF FEDERAL REVIEW COMMISSIONS TO REVIEW AND MAKE RECOMMENDATIONS ON IMPROVING

THE OPERATIONS, EFFECTIVENESS, AND EFFICIENCY OF FEDERAL

PROGRAMS AND AGENCIES, AND TO REQUIRE A SCHEDLE FOR SUCH

REVIEWS OF ALL FEDERAL AGENCIES AND PROGRAMS

AND ON

H.R. 3282

TO PROVIDE FOR THE PERIODIC REVIEW OF THE EFFICIECY AND PUBLIC NEED FOR FEDERAL AGENCIES, TO ESTABLISH A COMMISSION

FOR THE PURPOSE OF REVIEWING THE EFFICIENCY AND PUBLIC

NEED OF SUCH AGENCIES, AND TO PROVIDE FOR THE ABOLISHMENT

OF AGENCIES FOR WHICH A PUBLIC NEED DOES NOT EXIST

JULY 19, 2006

Serial No. 109–165

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/index.html

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM

TOM DAVIS, Virginia, Chairman

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

DAN BURTON, Indiana

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

GIL GUTKNECHT, Minnesota

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio

DARRELL E. ISSA, California

JON C. PORTER, Nevada

KENNY MARCHANT, Texas

LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia

PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina

CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania

VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina

JEAN SCHMIDT, Ohio

BRIAN P. BILBRAY, California

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

TOM LANTOS, California

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

DIANE E. WATSON, California

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts

CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland

LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California

C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

———

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

(Independent)

DAVID MARIN, Staff Director

LAWRENCE HALLORAN, Deputy Staff Director

TERESA AUSTIN, Chief Clerk

PHIL BARNETT, Minority Chief of Staff/Chief Counsel

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on July 19, 2006 ............................................................................... 1

Text of H.R. 5766 ..................................................................................................... 2

Text of H.R. 3282 ..................................................................................................... 21

Statement of:

Brady, Hon. Kevin, a Representative in Congress from the State of Texas 70

Horney, James R., senior fellow, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities;

and Charles M. Loveless, director of legislation, American Federation

of State, County and Municipal Employees [AFSCME] ............................ 99

Horney, James R. ...................................................................................... 99

Loveless, Charles M. ................................................................................. 105

Tiahrt, Hon. Todd, a Representative in Congress from the State of Kansas .................................................................................................................. 56

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:

Brady, Hon. Kevin, a Representative in Congress from the State of Texas,

prepared statement of ................................................................................... 72

Cummings, Hon. Elijah E., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Maryland, prepared statement of ............................................................ 113

Davis, Chairman Tom, a Representative in Congress from the State of

Virginia, prepared statement of ................................................................... 42

Horney, James R., senior fellow, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities:

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 102

Written paper on sunset commission proposals ...................................... 91

Lantos, Hon. Tom, a Representative in Congress from the State of California, prepared statement of ...................................................................... 54

Loveless, Charles M., director of legislation, American Federation of

State, County and Municipal Employees [AFSCME], prepared statement of ........................................................................................................... 107

Porter, Hon. Jon C., a Representative in Congress from the State of

Nevada, prepared statement of .................................................................... 45

Tiahrt, Hon. Todd, a Representative in Congress from the State of Kansas, prepared statement of ........................................................................... 59

Watson, Hon. Diane E., a Representative in Congress from the State

of California, prepared statement of ........................................................... 85

Waxman, Hon. Henry A., a Representative in Congress from the State

of California, prepared statement of ........................................................... 48

(1)

CUTTING OUT THE WASTE: AN OVERVIEW OF

H.R. 5766, THE GOVERNMENT EFFICIENCY

ACT; AND H.R. 3282, THE ABOLISHMENT OF

OBSOLETE AGENCIES AND FEDERAL SUNSET ACT OF 2005

WEDNESDAY, JULY 19, 2006

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM,

Washington, DC.

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:03 a.m., in room

2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Tom Davis (chairman

of the committee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Tom Davis, Gutknecht, Porter, Dent,

Foxx, Schmidt, Waxman, Lantos, Maloney, Cummings, Kucinich,

Watson, Lynch, Ruppersberger, and Higgins.

Staff present: Ellen Brown, legislative director and senior policy

counsel; Mason Alinger, deputy legislative director; Rob White,

communications director; Teresa Austin, chief clerk; Michael

Galindo, deputy clerk; Kristin Amerling, minority general counsel;

Michelle Ash, minority chief legislative counsel; Krista Boyd, minority counsel; Mark Stephenson, minority professional staff member; Earley Green, minority chief clerk; and Jean Gosa, minority

assistant clerk.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. The committee will come to order. Good

morning. I want to thank everybody for coming. The purpose of today’s hearing is to discuss two specific legislative proposals that

have been introduced to this Congress to improve the operation

and effectiveness of programs and agencies in the Federal Government. The first bill H.R. 5766, the Government Efficiency Act,

which was introduced by Representative Tiahrt earlier this month,

the legislation would authorize the establishment of a bipartisan

Federal Review Commission to study whether a specific aspect of

Federal Government operations would function more efficiently and

effectively if some or all of the relevant Federal programs and

agencies were reorganized, consolidated, abolished, expanded or

transferred. Legislative proposals drafted by the bipartisan commissions would then be considered in Congress pursuant to expedited procedures.

[The text of H.R. 5766 follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. The second bill, H.R. 3282, the Abolishment of Obsolete Agencies and Federal Sunset Act of 2005, introduced by Representative Kevin Brady, this legislation would establish a bipartisan Federal agency sunset commission to review and

evaluate the efficiency and public need for every Federal agency on

a periodic basis and report its recommendations to Congress. The

legislation would require the Federal agency to be abolished within

1 year of the commission’s review unless Congress either reauthorized the agency or extended the deadline for abolishment.

[The text of H.R. 3282 follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. This will be the eighth hearing conducted

in the committee in recent years to discuss the need for a legislative tool that would authorize limited reorganizations of the executive branch intended to improve the operations and effectiveness of

the Federal Government. Three hearings having been held to discuss the need to develop legislation to address overlap and duplication governmentwide; four case study hearings have been held to

assess the extent of overlap and duplication in specific areas of

Federal operations.

After spending the last 3.5 years exploring various approaches to

eliminating the overlapping duplication, we are here today to discuss the merits of two particular proposals aimed at addressing the

specific issues and to pose questions to the bill sponsors about the

specifics of their proposals. The purpose is to give members in this

committee an opportunity to ask their questions and raise their

concerns before we reconvene tomorrow morning to conduct a business meeting to consider these two proposals.

I would now like to introduce our witnesses. Our first panel, Representative Todd Tiahrt and Representative Kevin Brady, have

long championed the need to reduce waste, fraud and mismanagement in the Federal Government, and I applaud the witnesses.

The second panel of witnesses includes James Horney, senior fellow from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities; and Charles

Loveless, legislative director for the American Federation of State,

County, and Municipal Employees.

I want to just welcome all of the witnesses to today’s hearing,

and I look forward to hearing their testimony. Any other Members

who wish to speak.

Mr. Ruppersberger.

[The prepared statement of Chairman Tom Davis follows:]

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Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. First, I want to acknowledge Mr. Tiahrt

and Mr. Brady. You are focussing on issues of fiscal responsibility

and accountability. I might not agree exactly with your bill, but I

applaud you for moving ahead.

Mr. Chairman, let me first thank you for having the hearing. I

support efforts to seek to evaluate programs on their merits and increase government efficiencies. However, I have concerns about the

two bills before us today. The lack of a truly nonpartisan commission leads me to believe that recommendations made by the commission could be politically biased and therefore result in program

determinations that are not based on necessity or merit.

Some supporters argue that these sunset commissions would operate like the BRAC commission which has been successful in consolidating our military bases. However, BRAC commissioners,

while appointed by the President, must be confirmed by the President—or by the Senate. This is a congressional check that is lacking in these two bills before us.

In addition, I have concerns about who is the most appropriate

person or group of people who set policy and evaluate some very

highly technical and sensitive Federal programs. While commissioners might have some expertise, they would certainly not be experts in all Federal programs. This is why we have a committee

system here in Congress.

Committees allow Members to develop expertise in issues and

programs that fall within their committee’s jurisdiction. The question becomes, do we want people who may not have any expertise

in any particular issue evaluate the usefulness of a certain Federal

program? And whose role should it be to do oversight of Homeland

Security and intelligence programs in the agencies? And I know

Mr. Tiahrt is on the Intelligence Committee. I believe the answer

to both is, Congress. I am looking forward to hearing your discussions, but unfortunately, I have to go to an Intelligence hearing.

Thank you.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Any other Members wish to make opening

statements?

Mr. Porter.

Mr. PORTER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, appreciate you having

the hearing today.

And to our colleagues that are here sponsoring the bills, as you

know, as subcommittee chairman, I have had a number of hearings

myself on some duplicate programs, and I don’t remember the

exact details, but it seems to me there are six or seven different

agencies looking at frozen pizzas across the country. One looks at

pepperoni. One looks at cheese. One looks at hamburger. And as

we had these hearings, these different agencies would defend their

right to inspect those pizzas, and it really amazes me that we have

so many duplicate programs. And I believe a lot of our Federal

agencies are convinced, in fact, that we need duplications. And

maybe there are times when that should happen, but after numerous hearings, listening to the arguments for and against, time and

time again, there would be examples of programs that are duplicate and should not be removed entirely from our system, but those

that are duplicated should be consolidated and certainly will do a

better job serving the public.

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One of the areas, if I recall, is 70 or 80 programs in our school

system that are administered by three or four different agencies

that are duplications across the country. So I could go on and on

and on and on, and I just appreciate having this opportunity, and

I would hope that this Congress would not let the perfect get in the

way of legislation. There are those that agree and disagree with

some of the process and procedures, but we owe it to the taxpayers

of this country to make sure that we run our government as efficiently as possible. So I thank you for this hearing, and look forward to the testimony. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Jon C. Porter follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Our distinguished ranking member has arrived.

Mr. Waxman.

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

This hearing is on two legislative proposals that have back door

assaults on the laws that protect the health, safety and security of

American families. The first bill introduced by Representative

Brady, H.R. 3282, would automatically abolish every Federal agency within 12 years. It would—it just would—it is so amazing, it is

worth repeating: It would automatically abolish every single Federal agency. The title of the bill is, Abolishment of Obsolete Agencies Act, but it doesn’t identify obsolete agencies for abolition. It

sets an extermination schedule for every Federal agency. Is the

Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which runs the Medicare and Medicaid programs that provide healthcare to millions of

seniors, children and the disabled, obsolete? Is the Environmental

Protection agency, which protects Americans from air and water

pollution, obsolete? Is the Social Security Administration obsolete?

Or the Occupational Health and Safety Administration, the Department of Veterans Affairs or the Department of Education? The answer is obvious. These Federal agencies aren’t obsolete. They play

a vital role in protecting the welfare of all Americans, yet all of

them would be eliminated under the Brady bill.

I know there are Republicans who want to eliminate the EPA.

The House Speaker, Newt Gingrich, said he wanted Medicare to

shrivel on the vine. President Bush proposed cutting Social Security and eliminating important veterans’ benefits, but none of these

proposals could ever pass Congress. The public support for the programs is simply too strong, and you simply need to look at the Department of Education. I think the Contract for America—or as we

call it, the Contract on America—called for the abolition of the Department of Education, and yet now that the Republicans have the

majority and control over all the branches of government, I haven’t

seen any proposals to abolish that department. So the Brady bill

is a clever effort to achieve the same results through the back door.

Today we are going to hear a lot of rhetoric about streamlining

government and reducing waste, and we are going to be told that

passing this bill is part of a Republican effort to make government

more efficient. No one in Congress has done more than I have to

rout out waste, fraud and abuse. Just last month I released a report identifying 118 Federal contracts with over $750 billion that

are rife with waste, fraud, abuse and mismanagement, but not a

single Republican has approached me about the study or suggested

working together to eliminate this pervasive squandering of taxpayer dollars.

The real agenda here isn’t wasteful spending. It is an effort to

hold a legislative gun to the head of a number of important government priorities. If that bill passes, Republicans will say to Democrats, either you agree to weaken the environmental protections or

privatize medical—Medicare and Social Security or slash veterans’

benefits or we will sit back and allow the agencies that run these

programs to expire. It is harder when you have a bicameral legislature to get a bill passed, which is what would have to happen to

keep these agencies alive. A minority of a minority can often

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threaten a filibuster, block action, and that would mean that there

would be an automatic expiration of these agencies.

The Tiahrt bill, H.R. 5766, is less extreme, but its objectives are

the same. Under this bill, there is no sunset. Instead, unelected

commissions are created that can recommend abolishing or changing the function of Federal agencies. Then the recommendations

must be voted on by Congress under fast-track procedures. The

tiered bill is a massive transfer of power from the legislative body

to the executive branch, and like the Brady bill, it puts key health

and safety programs in constant jeopardy.

Mr. Chairman, I believe these bills are badly flawed, but I am

glad we are having this opportunity to explore their consequences.

While the bills are flawed, the two gentlemen who offered them are

very fine gentlemen, and I have a high regard for them, so I

wouldn’t want them to take my comments in any way personally,

but I do disagree with them on this legislation. And I am especially

grateful that you accommodated our suggestion about the witnesses for the second panel, and I do want to correct—because I

think credibility’s important—I am not sure that abolishing the Department of Education was a contract, but it might have been one

of the priorities for Speaker Gingrich and other——

Chairman TOM DAVIS. It was a subcontract for some people.

Mr. WAXMAN. Subcontract. It was a contract out, a contract on

the Department of Education. But, Mr. Chairman, that outlines

why we feel as strongly as we do on this issue.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Henry A. Waxman follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Waxman, you have been consistent in

that, and we appreciate all your support on both pieces of legislation. I think we could have a spirited debate.

I would say to Todd and Kevin, you have a lot of convincing to

do in your opening testimony to bring Mr. Waxman over. We are

trying to build this by consensus. I am not sure we will be able to

do it on this issue, but I look forward to working with you on the

other matters that you brought up.

Do you want to say anything, Tom? We will introduce Mr. Lantos

very quickly for an opening statement.

Mr. LANTOS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Today this committee is going to hear from some of our colleagues about legislation that would create commissions to abolish

or reorganize Federal agencies and programs. And there is no

Member of Congress for whom I have higher regard and more personal affection than my friend Kevin Brady. Opening statements

will be made about trimming fat from the Federal budget, but the

sad truth is that these bills are nothing more than the outsourcing

of the work of the Congress, and it will deprive this body of its constitutional role as lawmaker and the check on the executive

branch.

Instead of zealous oversight by Congress, the two pieces of legislation before us aim to create an unelected board to decide which

agencies or programs within agencies are to be terminated. The

system our Founding Fathers created over two centuries ago would

give way to something that Kafka would like, a faceless body of

unelected and unaccountable hatchet men working under the cloak

of darkness.

I recognize, Mr. Chairman, that we in Congress have many obligations and never seem to have enough time to do all the people’s

work. After all, today is the 200th day of the calendar year, and

despite that, under the present management, we have been in session only 62 days. Mr. Chairman, I am a professional economist,

and I am sure that you will agree that a schedule that has us out

of Washington so much of the time is not very efficient or economical in terms of the use of our resources. But I do not believe that

a potentially unconstitutional delegation of our jobs is necessary to

fix this inefficiency. I believe it is absurd to assume that a shortlived commission charged with reviewing multiple programs will

have either the reach or the expertise of a standing congressional

committee and its staff.

After reviewing this legislation, I was disturbed to think about

the programs that have had such a profound impact on my constituents and yours could be cut in secret by an unelected and unresponsive board. For example, Head Start education program

could be terminated, and not by the Education and Workforce Committee but by an unelected commission without public input and

bypassing regular order.

Supporters of these commissions often liken them to the Base

Realignment and Closure Commission or the Greenspan Social Security Commission of the 1980’s. Unfortunately, there is no resemblance between these important and necessary commissions and

this unnecessary and probably unconstitutional usurpation of congressional oversight which we are hearing about today. This proVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:20 Oct 05, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00056 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\29331.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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posal may create a sunset commission, but it should really be

called a midnight commission because it would work in the dark

of night to eliminate programs which some Members of Congress

despise but lack the political will to change. This legislation is

nothing more than the outsourcing of congressional oversight, and

I hope my colleagues will see through this charade and turn the

lights out on these proposals.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Tom Lantos follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you for your statement. I will just

note, Congressman, that the Congress did outsource the 9/11 Commission, which came back with a number of recommendations that

were then enacted, and on Katrina, the other side wanted to

outsource that. We felt that was congressional. I guess it depends

on the issue and where you stand on this. We will have a very spirited debate on this.

Mr. Gutknecht.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Chairman, thank you. Where you stand depends largely on where you sit. And let me just say—and I suspect

I may be stealing some of their thunder—I believe it was Mark

Twain who once observed that the closest thing to eternal life is a

government program, and we have tried a number of occasions to

try to figure out how we can eliminate some of these unnecessary

and duplicative programs, programs that have do have a constituency but, in the broader picture, really serve very little in terms

of public purpose. And so I want to congratulate both my colleagues

for being here today.

I think these are issues that deserve serious consideration, and

I certainly do not agree with my colleague from California that this

is going to be done in the dead of night. This is going to be done

with plenty of input from lots of people. But by going outside the

political arena only slightly, it gives us an opportunity to succeed

where heretofore, since 1995, 1996, we really haven’t had a whole

lot in terms of victories in the way of eliminating some of these

programs that have probably outlived their usefulness. So I congratulate my colleagues for bringing this forward, and I thank you,

Mr. Chairman, for having this hearing.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much.

Mr. Tiahrt, we will start with you. At least you can convince me

and Mr. Gutknecht. We are here.

STATEMENT OF HON. TODD TIAHRT, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF KANSAS

Mr. TIAHRT. I am looking forward to the opportunity to convince

not only Mr. Waxman and Mr. Lantos but other members of—those

who are in adversary to this concept. I would like unanimous consent to submit testimony for the record.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Without objection, so ordered.

Mr. TIAHRT. Mr. Chairman, over the past 12 years, my time in

Congress, I have looked at several different methods of trying to

gain supplemental help for Congress to do its job of oversight.

When I review my schedule on an annual basis, I realize that I

have a very full schedule, and I know that it is true for each and

every Member of Congress. We have trips to our home districts. We

have instances that arise unannounced. We have legislation that

carries us well into the night. We have opportunities to run for reelection or get rehired every 2 years, and it keeps our schedule

very full. And what is sacrificed with this busy-ness that goes on

in our daily schedules is the ability to do proper oversight. There

are many examples within the Federal Government of why there

is a need for supplemental help in the oversight process. We heard

earlier the gentleman from Nevada, Mr. Porter, talk about how

many different people inspect pizzas across the United States. We

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had for over a century somebody who was assigned to the Federal

Government to do nothing but taste tea, and certainly as the chairman has pointed out, we have had, since Katrina, attempts for

oversight of FEMA that have yet to be I think as productive as we

would like. Certainly, if you look at FEMA and all of the problems

that were addressed that came out of that event, we realize that

FEMA had no idea where all their supplies were or what procedures were in place or what was needed at the time, and there are

materials that they purchased to date that are still unused because

of one reason or another. When I think of how the private sector

has advanced, FedEx and UPS. If you send a parcel with them, you

can go online and check to see the position of that parcel any moment in time and know whether it has been delivered or whether

it is en route and where it is en route. FEMA couldn’t even find

out how many bottles of water they had. If you look at Ocean

Spray, they can track a bottle of cranberry juice across the Nation.

They know how many are in stores, what stores they are. They

know when it is time to refill an order. FEMA hasn’t kept track

of all the trailer houses they have purchased yet. There is a need

for oversight. Congress simply doesn’t have the time to do it. So the

need is very real.

This is a structure. This bill is a structure to set up the ability

for us to have supplemental oversight. It consists of three members

appointed by the President, four members that are taken after consultation with the majority—the Speaker of the House, the minority leader in the House, and the majority leader of the Senate and

minority leader in the Senate. So there is congressional input on

the selection of the committee. In addition to that, there is an opportunity for four ex officio members to attend the hearings, be

part of the process, that are Members of Congress. For example, if

it had to do with government oversight, the two ex officio members

from the House could be Chairman Davis and Ranking Member

Waxman who could be part of the process. Again, congressional

input in the process.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Does it pay anything?

Mr. TIAHRT. No. These are not—but you could put in for overtime

as we do when we vote late.

This committee would exist for up to a year, depending on the

time necessary. They would be awarded staff, but these are voluntary positions. These are nonpaid positions. The staff, of course,

would be paid, but extensions would be picked up for those members who are serving on this commission. It would be given the

time and the authority to investigate properly any of the agencies

or programs that they are looking at. These programs, by the way,

are selected by either an Executive order from the President or

they can be selected by a resolution from either the House or the

Senate. Once that is put into place, the commission is formed. They

are selected. They spend a period of time investigating the program, and then they would return to Congress with a recommendation.

This recommendation would then go back through the congressional process of going through a committee for a specific amount

of time. It could be amended, or it could not be amended. It will

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ommendation from the committee. But, again, Congress is involved

in this process.

Some of the criticism I heard this morning is outsourcing Congress. This is not outsourcing Congress. This is entwining Congress

in the supplemental effort to have oversight of Congress. Another

comment I heard was massive transfer of power. This is not a massive transfer of power. Nothing gets off the floor of the House unless it receives a majority vote. Nothing gets out of committee either with or without a recommendation or with or without amendments unless it has a majority vote in the committee. So it very

much inserts Congress in this process from the time it is formed

until the time it is passed onto both houses and to the President’s

desk.

So I think what we have—and again, this is a structure. It is

something that can be applied for different ideas or different problems that Congress faces over the next period of time. It is a framework. It is an ability for us to assist our job in oversight. It gives

us necessary tools, and I would hope that the committee can successfully pass it onto the floor.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Todd Tiahrt follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much, Mr. Tiahrt.

Mr. Brady.

STATEMENT OF HON. KEVIN BRADY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS

Mr. BRADY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Cummings, Mr. Gutknecht, for the opportunity to testify today.

I think this is the third opportunity I have had to testify before

this committee over the past 10 years.

I spent a considerable amount of time visiting with Members

about the sunset commission, educating about how it works in the

24 States that use it, and we are always looking for opportunities

to improve it, and I, too, would like to have consent to submit my

written testimony.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Without objection.

Mr. BRADY. So I can be a little more brief. If there is an area

where both parties can agree on, it ought to be that we can make

this government run more efficiently. The programs ought not duplicate themselves. Our taxpayers ought to get the best bang for

the buck, and it is not a Republican issue or a Democrat issue but

a bipartisan issue to try to get the most out of our precious tax dollars.

The sunset commission is a bipartisan approach that seeks to do

that year after year to trim this government, to streamline it, to

make it work better for the taxpayers. This is not a crash diet. It

is, take off pounds sensibly month after month, year after year,

until we make this government run; make it just as healthy and

just as fit and just as efficient as we in a bipartisan way can do

it. Sunset commission is proven. It is thoughtful, and here is how

it works. Sunset commission is comprised of 12 members appointed

by the majority, the Speaker and the majority leader of the Senate

and equally divided with the consent of the minority. These 12

members must be equally bipartisan, not with the recommendation

of the minority; the consent, the agreement of the minority. And

that is because when Congressman Jim Turner and I, and Congressman Lloyd Doggett and I, and a number of us worked on sunset issues in the State legislature and in looking at the 24 States

that already do it, creating a truly bipartisan commission made up

not just of outside members, but in this case, 8 of the 12 will be

legislators themselves, Congressmen themselves, we know that is

the best way long term. We want the sunset commission to work,

regardless of who is in charge around here, regardless of who is in

the White House.

The commission sets a schedule with the consent of Congress,

puts a sunset date on every Federal agency that we deem. Our belief is that there ought not be any sacred cows. No agency runs as

efficiently as it ought to. We want a model to justify its operations,

its programs and how it serves the people. There ought not be sacred cows. And that is in truth how it has worked on the State

level as well as very effectively. For the period that the agency is

up for sunset review, the commission examines it. It looks at key

issues: How efficient is it? What is the public need today, not the

need 80 or 100 years ago? What type of public service are we providing? What type of customer service are we providing? What type

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of public input do they regularly bring to their operations? Let’s examine and measure how effective they are in responding to the

Freedom of Information Act; how effective they are in providing

equal opportunities to its workers; what type of programs they

have that they duplicate for themselves; all of these, again, looking

to a means to streamline, to identify duplication to make things

run better.

I keep saying this is a proven method because it has worked in

24 States for more than three decades. States like California, like

Texas, and it is sort of hard to describe as extreme or radical a program that has worked for more than three decades in governments,

Republican and Democrat State governments across this country,

and it has proven its value.

Texas, what I saw firsthand, Texas runs a good sunset commission. Over the years, it has abolished 52 State agencies, saved a

little less than $1 billion and is strongly bipartisan. In fact, before

this committee, Mr. Chairman, we have had both Democrat and

Republican leaders of that sunset commission come here to testify

as to its value. And at the Federal level, where on average every

Federal program duplicates five others, we are simply at the time

with this deficit and with this war, with the need to reduce the tax

burden on American families, we just may need to make sure that

we are running as efficiently as possible.

And so I will conclude with this: Some people say we ought not

make agencies justify their existence, but the truth of the matter

is that every Member of Congress on this dais is sunset every 2

years. The President is sunset every 4; the Senate every 6. As we

speak, there are hundreds of State agencies across the country justifying their existence, and each day in America, thousands of

small businesses go out of existence because they did not serve

those that they sought to serve and have a need for it. I believe

this will be the first time that, in a bipartisan way, we can say to

ourselves, let’s put up or shut up; produce or leave; let’s put money

toward the programs that truly serve the taxpayers and then not

a dime to the programs that don’t. The sunset commission is proven.

I would urge support, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Kevin Brady follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Kevin, let me just start out by asking you, Mr. Waxman’s assertion that, in 12 years, all these programs get abolished. Can you

explain that?

Mr. BRADY. Yes, well, in truth, it doesn’t work that way at all.

What you want to do is set up a thoughtful schedule where you can

look at each agency and not just by itself, which Congress tends to

do, but grouping agencies by function so that you can group agencies across a broader field. That is what really that schedule drives

at. The reason for a sunset date isn’t so Congress will act. The

truth of the matter is, we have had a lot of different studies both

by Members and by agencies, but what do we do with those studies

that help identify efficiencies? Rarely do we pick them off the shelf.

The sunset date forces Congress in a sense to make sure we are

looking at these key issues; that is all.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. To both of you, I mean, these ideas—to

give Mr. Waxman’s arguments some credence—I mean, these are

really born out of frustration of Congress’s inability and the administration’s to work regular order to try to cull out ineffective programs; isn’t that correct? So we look at extraordinary circumstances that maybe will work because we haven’t been able to

do the job.

Mr. TIAHRT. Well, the ship of state is a very large vessel. It is

like an aircraft carrier. Members of Congress are like people in

rowboats. And to get it to change direction means an awful lot of

rowboats. This is a way for us to sort of increase the size of our

vessel and get a little more help in trying to change the government to be a little more efficient.

If you look at our track record over the last generation, Congress

has done very poorly at oversight, and it is just a simple fact that

we don’t have the time to do the oversight we need to do. These

are supplemental tools that will help us with that, and I think it

has risen out of a sense of frustration because many efforts have

gone forward. We have had the Grace Commission; we have had

other commissions that haven’t had the ability to get things done.

Both these proposals have some ability to get things done by imposing some form of milestone to accomplish that task. So I think

there—a good step in the right direction. I think they will be used

by both sides regardless of who is in power to help this government

save money and use it where it has a higher priority.

Mr. BRADY. To mix metaphors, Mr. Chairman, I am convinced

that, if Congress were a manufacturing plant, we would manufacture spending; that is what we are designed to do. If we want to

manufacture savings and efficiency, we have to retool the plant a

bit, and I keep stressing this. We have to do it in a bipartisan way,

long term, over the years. We just can’t be building mini vans and

then hope that we can build a more energy-efficient car. You actually have to take steps, and in the design of Congress, we tend to

look, as you know on this committee, we tend to look at the trees

because that is our jurisdiction. Sunset gives an opportunity to look

at the forest as well.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Now, to be candid, only 39 percent of Federal spending is in the area that would be looked at. Is that correct? You have another 61 percent, at least under today’s budget,

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interest on the debt and entitlement programs that we don’t look

at here. Is that——

Mr. BRADY. Yes. And one thing about the sunset commission is

that, again, I would encourage to hold all agencies under sunset review because you also look at how those services deliver. Are we

delivering them to the people when they need them on time, efficiently, and that is key.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Just to try to get a scope. We are not after

entitlements here. That is another problem and issue that is going

to have to be faced.

Mr. BRADY. Exactly. This is not the services. This is how well we

provide these services.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Tiahrt.

Mr. TIAHRT. The Government Efficiency Act that I am proposing

here does have the ability to look at some areas of government that

are mandatory that are not doing well. For example, in the State

of Kansas today, one out of four Medicaid payments goes to the

wrong address. It is in some fashion incorrect. Many aren’t getting

to the people that need to be paid. So that is something I believe

we should be looking at. Why is the State of Kansas or other States

so inefficient in distributing Medicaid funding? It should be, if we

have somebody who qualifies, they should receive payment, and it

is not happening today in my State, and so I think that would be

one area where we could move forward in an area that quite often

is protected by parochial interest, but this would allow us to be

more efficient even in areas that are considered mandatory.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Cummings.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, I will read my statement, and then ask questions

if I have time. I want to thank you for holding this important hearing on these two legislative proposals. The Government Efficiency

Act and the Abolishment of Obsolete Agencies and Federal Sunset

Act, and I am going to ask Mr. Tiahrt and Mr. Brady to comment

on one of my comments. They have been touted by the office as a

way to oversee the work of the executive branch. I thought that

was our job. Supporters of these so-called sunset bills present this

as a good government issue. Pointing to jurisdictional overlaps in

the Federal Government, they claim that commissions could be

used to inform Members of Congress of the inefficiencies that exist.

As a member of this committee, I have consistently supported efforts to make sure government runs as effectively and efficiently as

possible, but I am not in the dark when it comes to the true intent

behind the sunset legislation. Under both proposals, no Federal

program or agency is exempt from investigation. That means programs that have consistently been the targets of overzealous reforms, programs such as TANF, Social Security, Medicare and

Medicaid, are incredibly vulnerable. I think that there is no coincidence in the fact that the same Members who support sunset legislation are the ones who have consistently worked to gut or completely obliterate these programs through reorganization, underfunding and privatization efforts. The reality is clear, sunset legislation is just another way for a group of determined lawmakers to

black out our Nation’s great social programs. Efforts to do so

through traditional legislative means have sometimes failed. So we

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are now seeing an attempt to bypass the democratic process by

ramming these bills through Congress.

For the record, I am not opposed to setting up independent commissions that advise the work of the Congress, but the commissions

that are being proposed here would not be independent and not

really advisory. To the contrary, under H.R. 5766, commission

members would be appointed by the President, and under H.R.

3282, they would be appointed by the majority party. If either bill

passes in this session, the commission obviously would lean heavily

Republican, likely creating a built-in partisanship and bias.

Even more troubling though, however, is the power that these

commissions would have to fundamentally change Federal agencies

and programs. Under H.R. 5766, commission proposals would be

fast-tracked to the floor, bypassing the traditional legislative process. We do enough of that now. And under H.R. 3282, agencies

would be abolished 1 year after being reviewed unless they were

specifically reauthorized by Congress. These bills go far beyond an

advisory capacity, cutting into the constitutionally mandated responsibilities of Congress. My 674,000 constituents gave me a certain level of power, and I don’t want to lose one single bit of it. The

work of Congress falls into three basic categories: making laws,

conducting oversight and levying taxes. As an oversight committee,

the Government Reform Committee is charged with identifying and

addressing the areas where government is not running as effectively and efficiently as it should. For the most part, I think we

have done a good job so far of putting partisan politics aside and

evaluating Federal agencies and programs in a fair way. We may

not always agree in our assessments, but dissent is a natural part

of the democratic process. There are no compelling reasons for why

we would hand over our oversight responsibility to a handful of

partisan lawmakers or a Presidentially appointed commission. I

hope that my colleagues who I know are well intentioned and who

are supporting these bills would rethink their positions and listen

to what the American people and their representatives are saying.

Let’s cut the waste, but let’s not pretend that we are doing so by

allowing allegedly independent sunset commissions to eliminate

the vital programs which serve the neediest Americans.

And let me—and only just one question. Mr. Brady, you said

something that I found very interesting when we talked about how

effectively the State folks were working with sunsets; 36 States implemented sunset measures, for instance, in the 1970’s and 1980’s,

but by 2002, almost half of those abandoned the concept and no

longer have active laws. How would your bills differ from the failed

sunset initiatives we have seen across the country?

Mr. BRADY. Mr. Chairman, if I may?

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Go ahead.

Mr. BRADY. A couple of things. For one thing, I think you have

gotten some bad information. The sunset commission is not an

independent commission. It is made up of 12 members, 8 of whom

are lawmakers or Congressmen or women themselves. It is not

merely appointed by the majority. It is appointed by the majority

with the consent of the minority. It is an exactly equally bipartisan

commission for a reason, because the States that have committed

to be more efficient and to streamline have discovered the only way

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to do it is to walk hand in hand in a bipartisan way and to do it

over the years.

It is true; 36 States have used sunset; 24 still do today. In examining those, what I discovered was, some say governments simply

weren’t committed to trying to streamline their government effectively over the years. They did it one time and said, this is too hard

or we don’t like this. It is too hard to work. And so they abandoned

them. This is a budget tool that doesn’t happen by itself. We actually have to decide to do more than talk the talk about efficiency.

Everyone around here, as you know—you have seen them—they

like to talk about efficiency and waste and fraud and abuse, but

the truth of the matter is, we do a miserable job in a bipartisan

way trying to make this government run more efficiently. We have

350 different economic development programs. I confess, I don’t

know what they all are or how effective they all are. We have almost 500 different urban aid programs. I bet we can probably help

inner cities better if we tried to look at how efficiently they are

doing. For early development, which is a key I know for you, helping children get up to the right level before they start their school

years, we have in early development 50 programs spread out over

eight different agencies. I am not convinced we can’t deliver those

services better to those kids, and the only way we could in my view

and the way this commission was designed was that if Republicans

and Democrats have to work together over a long period of time regardless of who is in charge around here and regardless of who is

in the White House, if we want this to be an effective budget tool,

we are going to have to commit to it ourselves, and we always talk

about, some day we are going to do it, but why not do it now?

Chairman TOM DAVIS. OK. Thank you very much.

Mr. Gutknecht.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

And again, I want to congratulate both of you because I have sort

of been involved in this battle before. When I was in the State legislature, I took it upon myself to eliminate a number of State programs, and I found out how difficult that really, really is. And I

just want to remind our colleagues of something: When this country was founded, the President of the United States, the government was so small, the Supreme Court only met about 2 weeks a

year. The President of the United States was given the responsibility of also being the superintendent of the schools here in Washington, DC.

The government and the country have grown enormously in the

last 200 and some years. As a result, it isn’t just that we don’t have

time; it is just that the government has become so big that there

is no way we can give adequate oversight to every single agency.

And we have seen, as in the IBM ad that they ran for a number

of months, where they had King Arthur and he was sitting around

with some of his advisors, and they had hired this consultant, and

the consultant throws a big bag into the center of the table, and

King Arthur says, are you saying we should throw money at the

problem? And the consultant says, precisely. And if you look at

what we do, and I think Mr. Brady said it——

Chairman TOM DAVIS. I think that consultant is still alive in

Washington.

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Mr. GUTKNECHT. In fact, he has multiplied. There is a number

of them out here. And that is basically the advice we get, whether

we are dealing with the scourge of drugs or whether we are dealing

with poverty programs or whether we are dealing with VA benefits

or FEMA, all that, and so I know that this concept will have its

critics, but I hope people will at least take a little bit of time and

step back and say, look, the government has grown enormously in

the last 200 years, and the idea that Congress has the time or the

focus to really look at all of these programs objectively I think is

hopelessly optimistic. And we have been throwing money at problems for a very long time, and some of those problems have actually gotten worse. And so I just congratulate you, and I don’t particularly have a question. I mean, I understand what you are trying to do. I support what you are trying to do. I understand there

will be lots and lots of critics, but I hope you will persist because

I think, in the end, once the American people understand this debate, and understand this argument, I have to believe that the

overwhelming number of Americans, even recipients of these programs, can perhaps be our best source of information in terms of

the enormous inefficiencies that you see in the delivery of the services that many Americans do desperately need. So my hats are off

to you, and I will help in any way I can to advance the cause.

Mr. TIAHRT. Mr. Chairman.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Yes, Mr. Tiahrt.

Mr. TIAHRT. I want to thank the gentleman from Minnesota, Mr.

Gutknecht, for his comments, but I would also want to address

some of the things Mr. Cummings brought up if I could take some

time. There is one area that I want to bring up, but I think it is

being overlooked in the Government Efficiency Act, and that is the

congressional involvement in the process. All the critics seem to

think we are avoiding our responsibility or usurping our responsibility to oversight. But in this process, from the very beginning,

the selection of the issue or oversight program comes from either

Congress or the President. Congress has the opportunity through

a resolution of either the House or the Senate to have something

presented to this framework, this efficiency commission. There is

also a congressional involvement in the appointment process, three

appointed by the President, two with consultation of the House,

ranking—or minority/majority, two from the Senate majority/minority. There is also the opportunity for ex officio congressional

members to be a part of the commission. Four positions, two from

the House, two from the Senate, and again, as I said earlier, if it

was oversight, it could be Chairman Davis and Ranking Member

Waxman. There is also—after the study is done by the commission,

it then goes back to the Congress through the committee process.

There is an amendment process; there is a recommendation process. Then it goes to floor vote of both the House and the Senate.

There is deep involvement by elected Members of Congress in this

process of oversight that is laid out by the Government Efficiency

Act. And I just want to make that point for the critics.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much.

We will move to Mr. Lynch.

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Mr. LYNCH. Thank you Mr. Chairman. I want to thank the members for coming before us with this initiative. I understand some

of what you are trying to do, and I agree with some of it, but there

are some serious questions here that I have. This looks a lot like

the old Grace Commission, the Grace Commission was established

by President Reagan basically to improve government efficiency,

and it is funny how that worked out because the Grace Commission

itself instead became a model of inefficiency, waste and corporate

corruption. The commission had 2,000 staff members and cost the

taxpayers about $75 million, and you know, it was laughable actually. The commission recommended cutting military retirement

benefits, similar to what the President has proposed, eliminating

wage fairness protections and also a lot of regulatory protections

for the environment. And as it turned out, the chairman of the

commission, Peter Grace was later indicted, and his company WR

Grace was found guilty of violating the very regulations that he

was trying to dismantle. And so that is clear in my mind, and I

am very concerned about this.

It appears at least—the way these bills would work—and there

are several versions, and I am going to talk about that in a

minute—we would have to basically reconstitute government on a

continual basis. We would have to revisit every single decision we

have made and pull it up before Congress and both the House and

the Senate and then give the President another chance to veto

every prior decision of every prior Congress, and that just seems

to me to create a tremendous burden on us, and I think it will really slow down the efficiency of government rather than enhance it.

And I have enormous respect for both of the gentlemen that are

here today testifying. I really do. I know you, and I know your

work, and I appreciate what you are trying to do. But I am very

concerned about—the President has suggested cutting veterans’

benefits and eliminating COPS grants, and much of the work that

we used to do in Congress we now dole out in community development block grants to the cities and States, and we ask them to do

it. Now after we have given them the responsibility for doing the

work we used to do, now we are suggesting cutting the money that

we normally used to give them. And so it is just—I just think that

it is a good idea to, you know, to get rid of waste, fraud and abuse.

I don’t think these bills necessarily have focused on that.

I do notice that, on a couple of earlier instances, both of the gentlemen, Mr. Brady and Mr. Tiahrt, before us have suggested similar bills but with some exemptions for certain programs that were

deemed to be too important to subject to this process. And I am

just wondering, for instance, Representative Brady, in addition to

the bill before us today, H.R. 3282, you also introduced H.R. 3277,

except in that case, it exempts certain regulations from abolishment regarding environmental health, basic health and safety, civil

rights protections and those regulations that enforce those activities. Am I to assume that because the current bill before us doesn’t

have any exemptions that you no longer support those type of exemptions?

Mr. BRADY. No, I do. I think those are very important. Those

came about because of discussions we have had with members over

the years, and should this committee choose to mark the sunset

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commission up, we will ask Mr. Porter to offer an amendment, who

has worked with us as well, to insert those because the goal of the

sunset commission is not to boss regulations on environment, education, civil rights, all that, that is not it. It is a way for you and

me to, over time, over the years, very thoughtfully, Republican and

Democrat, try to make this run more efficiently. And one of the

reasons, again, Congressman Jim Turner and I, who served together in the Texas Legislature; Lloyd Doggett, who created our

sunset commission; the wide range of philosophies that believe in

accountability. Here is my other key point. We live in a time where

we don’t really trust each other up here, and so everything is seen

as a partisan bill.

Mr. LYNCH. That doesn’t apply to me. And I don’t think it applies

to you either. But——

Mr. BRADY. But it is a fair question. We have tried painfully to

create a commission that will work regardless of who is in charge

here, regardless who is running the House, Senate or the White

House, so it will work over time because, in looking at the States

that have used this, some not very well, some very well, it is that

bipartisan approach that works.

Mr. LYNCH. Fair enough. If I could just, just reclaiming my time.

Also Representative Tiahrt, you also, at one point, you introduced

a bill, H.R. 2470, similar to the one we are considering today. However, H.R. 2470 expressly exempted entitlements, certain entitlements, and focused on nondefense discretionary spending. Now, I

understand that Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security would

have been exempted in the earlier version as well as, I guess, Defense. Now, given the fact, you know, the other subcommittee that

I serve on here proudly is investigating Halliburton, we have about

$9 billion missing over in Iraq, No. 1, do you still think that, you

know, in light of all the waste, fraud and abuse that is going on

in the Middle East and the huge numbers we are talking, should

we still exempt the military? And do you think that Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security should be similarly protected?

Mr. TIAHRT. Thank you for the question, Mr. Lynch. And CARFA

was designed—the first one you referred to was the Commission on

Accountability and Review of Federal agencies, CARFA. It did set

aside Defense because it was a BRAC-like process, a Base Realignment Commission process, that was being done in the Department

of Defense. I set it aside. I didn’t think we had time to look at other

mandatory spending. But in talking with others about what is

going on, certainly we need to look at what is going on with Halliburton and other contractors in Iraq and see if there is justification

for how the money was spent or if it was—what happened to the

money. I think that is a valid thing to look at. What made me open

my eyes to other entitlements was the State of Kansas where I am

from. I represent the Fourth District of Kansas, and I found out

that in Medicaid payments, one out of every four Medicaid payments done by the State of Kansas is incorrect. It either goes to

the wrong address, it has the wrong amount, or it doesn’t get there

at all. And I talked to Ways and Means about this. Ways and

Means doesn’t have time to do it. Somebody has to be able to go

look at these issues that pop up where there is a problem, where

people are not properly being served, and this is an issue that

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could have been generated by me through a resolution on the

House, and I think you would have supported me on trying to

straighten out this process because people of need are not being

served properly. So this is just a framework to address defense,

mandatory spending and discretionary spending that says, if an

issue pops up that we believe needs to be looked at with some leverage and with some additional tools, here is a framework to do

it, and that is what the Government Efficiency Act is about. It involves Congress along the process. We can even initiate the issues

like I would like to do with the State of Kansas, and I think you

would join with me, and that is why I am trying to set up this

framework for us to reach out and make this more efficient.

Mr. LYNCH. Well, I appreciate that, and I appreciate the spirit

in which it is offered, but looking at this, you know, it seems to me

that—and I will conclude my remarks—it just seems to set up a

conveyor belt that every single regulation that we visit and settle

on is going to be continually sent back to us, and we are going to

have to revisit all of these on a continual basis. I think it is going

to cause a tremendous amount of work here, and it is actually

going to hurt the efficiency of government if we are reviewing programs that we are all in agreement that work. I would rather just

focus on those problem areas, as you suggested. So it is not a question of what you would like to do. It is really a question of how best

to do that. Thank you. I yield back.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you. Ms. Schmidt.

Mrs. SCHMIDT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you Congressman Brady and Congressman Tiahrt for this legislation.

When I was in the State legislature, we had situations where we

really had duplicative agencies, and it was very difficult to get one

of them removed because the bureaucracies that were created with

those agencies didn’t quite frankly want to lose their job, and I

wish we had a provision that would automatically review the necessity of all of those agencies on a timely basis so that we could

have better utilized the money that we were spending from our citizens in Ohio. It appears to me that this is what you are really looking at doing in this legislation; am I correct in assuming that?

Mr. TIAHRT. I think Kevin probably would want to address it. Periodically, the Government Efficiency Act was designed to set the

framework that we could look at anything. There are three ways

that an issue or a program or an agency could be looked at. One

would be an Executive order from the President. The other one

would be a resolution that was generated in the Senate. Another

one, resolution generated in the House. Those things all would

have to have congressional approval before anything was done, but

it is a way for us or each Member to have the opportunity to bring

forward some agency program or issue that needs to look—be

looked at with more detail and more leverage.

Mr. BRADY. Congresswoman, tell me again the question on the

regular——

Ms. SCHMIDT. The question was, on a regular basis, would this

set up a mechanism that these agencies, these programs would be

reviewed in sunset—there would be a sunset provision to see the

necessity for these programs and the agencies that provide the

framework for the program?

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Mr. BRADY. Your examining on a regular basis is really key to

identifying efficiencies. If agencies know that they are going to be

examined on a regular basis, if Congress knows that they will be

examining on a regular basis, and you continue to do it so that you

never allow them to drift out, that we are always looking at better

ways to deliver our government services, in the States that have

really had success, that has been a key part of it. Those who stop—

some States have stopped after one round of sunset, and then the

efficiencies just sort of grow back. They trim the tree; they get it

down a little healthier, and it goes away. The States that have continued to do this have the best results. And I will tell you, Congresswoman, I believe in sunset so much that agencies ought to

justify their existence just like you do every 2 years that I sunset

the sunset commission so if this thing doesn’t work, we will send

it back in 2.

Mrs. SCHMIDT. And the followup, sir. There is—what would the

cost for this commission, and would we just be creating another unnecessary bureaucracy but albeit with a sunset just in case it didn’t

work to be eliminated?

Mr. BRADY. Thank you. The sunset commission, because it is

made up of 12 members, equally divided Republican/Democrat, 8 of

them Members of Congress, so that we have impetus within our

ranks to continue this savings and efficiency. I don’t have an estimate for the cost. At the State level, they are not huge commissions at all. And I know that, in Texas, we have this fairly sophisticated—does a good job I think, but for every dollar that they have

spent in the commission, they have saved about $36 for taxpayers.

So their return on investment is pretty solid. But even dollars

aside, I actually think the best benefit of it, it has forced Republicans and Democrats throughout decades to work together on how

we can make things run better; that to me has been even the greater benefit.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Ms. Watson.

Mr. WATSON. Yes, I would like to read my statement because it

contains the concerns that I have and questions, too. And I am very

concerned.

And thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing and for

the two witnesses who have come forward with their own proposals. But I am very concerned about ensuring our constituents that

our government indeed is free of waste, fraud and abuse. And I

don’t think it really gets to it because I see that we spend $8 billion

per month in Iraq, and there is $9 billion, as has been mentioned,

is missing, and we haven’t had the kind of in-depth oversight hearings that we should. The Federal Government has a very important

role to play in meeting the public’s needs, and I want to make sure

that our resources are serving those goals.

I am troubled by the sunset commission bills because I fear they

will end up stripping away the programs we need to adequately

serve the public. Since I myself was a State Senator, I have always

been concerned about important public health issues, such as cardiovascular health, diabetes, obesity, and how these health issues

lead to community health disparities.

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Our State and local governments, and our nonprofit allies, are all

doing good work to meet these needs, but they need help. There is

too much work for them to be going and doing it alone. That is why

we need Federal programs to help them out and put national resources into these national health issues.

Programs that could help meet these needs have been put on the

chopping block. For example, the Rural and Community Access to

Emergency Devices Program is a program to make grants available

to areas that cannot otherwise afford the technology that can bring

life or death for people experiencing sudden cardiac arrest. Rural

areas and low-income communities need to close this gap in their

public health resources.

The demand is great, but the resources are now insufficient: Between 2002 and 2004, less than half of the grant dollars requested

by the States for this program were awarded.

The White House tried to eliminate this program entirely in the

last budget, and Congress has been able to save this program from

the chopping block. But if these sunset commission bills pass, Congress will have its hands tied.

So, Mr. Chairman, these bills do not represent what I feel the

authors’ intention might be; and I feel they would have significant

impact on the poor and disadvantaged communities, who already

suffer intense disparities. Neither of these bills has any exception—

and if I am wrong, please correct me—and no program or agency

is off limits from scrutiny; and I feel, from a national perspective,

this is unacceptable. So I urge my colleagues to take a deep look.

I don’t think these bills are ready to go forward, and I would like

the two authors to come together with their bills and make it real

clear what the exceptions and the exemptions are, what would be

protected. I think we ought to look at the military programs as

well, because I feel that is where a lot of the waste and probably

fraud and abuse might rest, and I think just the social programs

and environmental programs could come under the knife.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Diane E. Watson follows:]

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Ms. WATSON. So my question to the two of you, do your bills currently have exemptions and exceptions for health safety, civil

rights and environmental protections.

Mr. BRADY. Let me tackle that. Because I agree with you. Those

are important regulations. Those are important to be protected. In

one of our previous bills we intend to add that language that has

come from discussions with Members of both parties.

Let me make one point very clear. The sunset bill in my view

should not decide which agencies are exempted. Congress should

decide that. The first order of business for the bipartisan sunset

commission is to submit back to you and me, Ms. Watson, the

schedule of the agencies when they come under review. If we feel

some agency shouldn’t or the timing is wrong or there is some motive we don’t like, then we ought to move to exempt them and

change that schedule.

Now I will tell you my view. I don’t think we should exempt any

agency. I think they should be held equally accountable. Because

whether they are the Pentagon or Health and Human Services or

whomever, I think we ought to be examining, as Republicans and

Democrats, how well they do their job. And I don’t believe looking

at the State level, as you have in California with your sunset commission, what you are really looking to do is identify efficiencies,

do it in a bipartisan way and deliver those services better.

And the Department of Education has been raised by Mr. Waxman, a great issue or agency to raise. At the State level, no major

agencies have been abolished, but they’ve always examined how

well they delivered their services. This is an opportunity whether

it’s the Pentagon, whatever agency it is, for us as lawmakers to

look across a broader range of services, their public service, their

programs, to find ways where we can do—where we can deliver

those services better.

So the answer is, yes we are going to add those provisions. I

think we will give you comfort.

Second, I think Congress will, in the separate legislation, approve the schedule so that you and I and Stephen and whoever else

wants to have a say in what agencies are reviewing and what time

table will have that final say.

Ms. WATSON. If we still have time, I’d like Mr. Tiahrt to respond.

Mr. TIAHRT. Ms. Watson, thank you for the question.

I think it is important to note that the Government Efficiency

Act is not a policy driven act. It would not abolish any of our policies set forward like civil rights or health care.

Health care, though it would allow us, if we choose or if the

President thinks it needs to be looked at for efficiency reasons, we

could look at how Medicare is being delivered in Kansas. Now it

doesn’t eliminate Medicare by any means, but it could give them

a more efficient way to present or to pay for and to provide health

care to people who are poor in Kansas.

Something that I would like to do but I cannot get the help from

the Ways and Means Committee, I don’t have time myself to go

back to the State and go through all of the system and try to get

a more efficient delivery method, but if I could get a regulation

through the House as an example and a commission was set up

with congressional input, I would like to be one of the ex-officio

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members so I could see how health care is being delivered to those

who are living—who qualified for Medicaid in the State of Kansas;

and I would like to help improve that process.

This would give me a means to do that in leverage, also. I could

use the commission to help me find efficient ways of making sure

that health care is properly delivered in Kansas. Right now, today,

only three out of four attempts of getting a payment made properly

in Kansas occurs. One out of four is incorrect or doesn’t reach the

proper person.

So I think we need some help. I think, if we admit it, we do need

some help with oversight. This is a way of allowing Congress’ input

in this process to leverage on or process in oversight.

You also mentioned defense. Defense should be included. It is included in the Government Efficiency Act.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. I think what we need to do is move to the

next panel. If you have one more question, I’ll let you go ahead.

Ms. WATSON. My question is, is there a possibility that we can

merge these two bills and, Mr. Chairman, bring a singular bill back

that addresses the concerns that we have stated today and then go

through it? Is that possible?

Chairman TOM DAVIS. I think we are on a time line where this

comes next week.

Mr. Tiahrt, go ahead.

Mr. TIAHRT. We tried to merge the two bills for a long time. Stephen and I worked together for a long time to do it. I think it was

a collective decision that we were supposed to merge them together. We wanted to merge them together. It was a collective decision not to. It was based on timing, and at some point I hope that

we do have the ability to merge them because I think that the Government Efficiency Act provides the framework to carry out a sunset commission if it’s chosen, and I think it should be. So we do

try to merge them and thanks for the idea. It was a good idea.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. It is a long process here as we go through

here and get to rules and the floor and who knows. But I appreciate your comments. Thank you.

We will take a 2-minute recess before we move to our next distinguished panel.

[Recess.]

Chairman TOM DAVIS. We have our next panel: James Horney,

senior fellow, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities; and Charles

Loveless, the legislative director, American Federation of State,

County and Municipal Employees. Thank you both for being here.

I look forward to your testimony.

Raise your right hands.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Chairman TOM DAVIS. As with our previous speakers, the entire

testimony is in the record. If you can keep it to 5 minutes, the

green light will go on, then the orange after 4, right after 5. We

are having a vote sometime. Let’s get through testimony, and we

might get through questions.

Thank you.

Mr. Horney, we will start with you.

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Mr. HORNEY. In addition to my written statement, I would like

to submit for the record a paper that I have written that goes into

some more detail about.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. That would be great. Without objection, be

so ordered.

[The information referred to follows:]

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STATEMENTS OF JAMES R. HORNEY, SENIOR FELLOW, CENTER ON BUDGET AND POLICY PRIORITIES; AND CHARLES M.

LOVELESS, DIRECTOR OF LEGISLATION, AMERICAN FEDERATION OF STATE, COUNTY AND MUNICIPAL EMPLOYEES

[AFSCME]

STATEMENT OF JAMES R. HORNEY

Mr. HORNEY. Thank you very much for having me, allowing me

to testify today.

I want to start off by saying that I agree completely with Mr.

Brady’s main point, which is there are improvements in the government operation, greater efficiencies that be can be achieved that

should be able to—and I think would—gain broad support from the

public and broad bipartisan support in the Congress.

In fact, I think he’s correct, that the only way you are really

going to deal with these reorganization issues and Government Efficiency Acts is through long-term, bipartisan cooperation in the

Congress. Unfortunately, I don’t think the commission procedures

that are in this two bills that are before you today are likely to lead

to that result. Let me explain why.

The combination of the composition of the commission, the rules

governing how the commission can report out recommendations

and then the special procedures that allow either the elimination

of the program or changes in the program or agency without legislation going through the regular legislative process is more likely

to lead to partisan kinds of efforts that in the long run are not

going to be successful.

First of all, the commissions established would have strong partisan majority case of 57–66. It would be 5–2 partisan, depending

on who is the President at the time.

In the case of Mr. Brady’s bill, he’s absolutely correct, that the

way the bill was introduced there would be eight Members of Congress and they would be four Democrat, four Republicans. But the

way I read the bill as it was introduced, there is no requirement

that the other four members who are not Members of Congress be

from different parties; and it would allow the Speaker and the Majority Leader of the Senate, I believe, to appoint members that are

all from the same party. It’s possible that there would be an understanding now that is not how it worked, but since this is an ongoing process that would not necessarily keep.

So I believe in fact you would be likely to end up, if not now, at

some point with an eight to four partisan majority split in that

commission that would be established under H.R. 3282.

Second, the commissions that would be established can report

recommendations with a simple majority vote. There is no requirement for having super majority, which means there is no requirement to get any support from the minority party members of the

commission, no incentive for the members of the commission to

search for a broad consensus on the commission.

I also need to point out here I think that in fact the legislation,

both bills as drafted, really do not limit what the commission can

recommend except in the case of H.R. 3282 which says specifically

they can’t recommend levels of appropriations. But in fact I believe,

both bills, the commissions would be within the light set forward

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in the legislation to report—recommend changes in entitlement

programs and how they operate programs such as Medicare, farm

programs and so on.

That may be not the intention of Mr. Brady, although Mr. Tiahrt

said he thinks they should look at entitlement programs, but I

think in both cases they could do that.

Then, under H.R. 5766, the legislation comes up and it could be

considered under procedures that would be fast-tracked, allow very

limited debate, no more than 10 hours on the House floor and no

amendments on the House floor. As written, if the committee of jurisdiction over the particular proposal were to reject the proposal

or report it with an amendment, then it is considered under regular rules of the House. But if it doesn’t take either of those two

steps, then the bill goes directly to the House floor for only 10-hour

debates, no amendments. If the chairman of the committee of jurisdiction over the proposal declines to have a committee mark-up on

the proposal, there wouldn’t be any chance to have amendments in

committee. This does not seem like a process, it seems, designed to

encourage broad bipartisan support.

H.R. 3282 does include those fast-track procedures, but it does

call for automatic sunset programs. The problem there, of course,

is that a minority in Congress could block the reauthorization. In

fact, if they have the support of the President, it would take just

over one-third of either of the House or the Senate to prevent that

legislation from going through.

Given the makeup of the committees, the way the commission

would operate and the procedures that happen, I think it’s more

likely these procedures would encourage a partisan approach. I

think that the leaders who would appoint the members of the commission and the members of the commission themselves would be

under tremendous pressure from the most partisan members of

their party to use this process to try to get things through that

those members, both parties members, have been unable to achieve

by convincing Congress that this is something that should be done

through the regular process.

It’s in stark contrast to the Greenspan Commission, people who

have talked about as an example of a commission that worked that

had an eight to seven split and no fast-track procedures, and it did

encourage—brought bipartisan support. They had brought support

across the commission and in Congress.

One last thing I would like to just note is it’s not clear to me

from H.R. 3282 what happens if an agency is abolished. Unlike the

President’s proposal, which says that agencies in the programs

within the agency are abolished, it simply says programs, but it

doesn’t say what does that mean. What does it mean if the tests

for Medicare-Medicaid services are abolished and no provisions are

made in legislature for Medicare to be operated by another agency?

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A similar proposal was offered on the House floor in 2004. One

of the cosponsors, then Congressman Jim Turner of Texas, offered

assurances to Members that no programs would be abolished; and

he said there was specific language. But I can’t identify any language in either that amendment or H.R. 3282 that makes that

clear.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Horney follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Loveless, thank you.

STATEMENT OF CHARLES M. LOVELESS

Mr. LOVELESS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Gutknecht. It’s a

pleasure again to see you again.

I am testifying this morning not only on behalf of my unit but

on behalf of the 14 million men and women who come from the

AFL/CIO, and I want to make it very clear that we are fundamentally opposed to both of these bills. We are strong advocates of improving government accountability to the public. If we have time

later, we can talk about some of our ideas in that regard, but we

do not think that either of these bills is going in that direction. In

fact, in the name of improving government efficiency, we think

these bills are going to trample basic democratic processes and

principles.

At its essence, sunset commissions—that sunset commission

process is designed to further enhance the power of the executive

branch, we think, over the legislative branch and to further exclude

the public from decisionmaking. And this is because of the way

that the commissions are composed under both of these bills, how

they are to conduct their business and how the legislative process

will unfold once a commission issues its recommendations.

Under the bill that’s been introduced by Mr. Tiahrt, commissions

would be established through appointments which are made by the

President. Certainly the views of the executive branch are going to

dominate commission recommendations, and the fast-track procedures that have been set forth for congressional consideration

under his bill give precious little time for Congress to evaluate the

recommendations of the commission.

We also think that executive authority significantly strengthens

under the bill that is introduced by Mr. Brady. Because of the

President’s veto authority, agencies could be abolished even when

you have a solid majority of both Houses of Congress who have

acted to reauthorize an agency; and because a failure to reauthorize an important agency would really be a catastrophic outcome, we

think that the leverage of the President is going to be really major

and massive in that process.

There has been a recent disturbing trend noted by a number of

observers of Congress that Congress has failed recently to live up

to its oversight responsibilities, and these bills we think are going

to codify a secondary role for Congress if the over—it is reached.

We think it resolved for itself.

I have never quoted this man, but I am going to do it today.

Former Speaker Gingrich I think said it well. He was at a—participated in a program I think during the last week, and he said clearly that Congress has failed effectively to respond to crises at home

and abroad. He said—and I am quoting him—it is important to

have an informed, independent legislative branch coming to grips

with this reality and not sitting around waiting for Presidential

leadership.

We do not need a new rigid, automatic process as imposed by

these bills for Congress to meet its basic constitutional responsibilities. We have the budget, the appropriations and the authorization

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processes whereby Congress can make any changes that it deems

appropriate in programs and agencies.

The key point that I want to make this morning is that, in our

view, these bills inevitably are going to be used to hurt programs

that benefit working families. To get an insight into this, just look

at the President’s most recent budget submission where he targeted a number of education, social service, law enforcement and

other programs and agencies that we think that benefit working

families; and, of course, tax cuts that in recent years have overwhelmingly benefited the high-speed people in our country have

been totally taken off the table.

But a substantial harm we think could also be caused by recommendations to change programs and agencies, including programs that eliminate worker productions, weaken enforcement, undermine the missions of programs and agencies through consolidation.

One example is a commission calling for the abolishing of the

OSHA, our safety and health administration, but it could weaken

its enforcement capacity and, therefore, it would be incapable of enforcing the regulations that have been set out for its responsibility

to enforce.

I agree with Jim we have no doubt that the commissions established by either bill are going to be used to advance an agenda to

severely cut back on Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. We

definitely think entitlements are covered in one way or another

under these two bills.

Let me just conclude, Mr. Chairman, by saying that we believe

that both bills are essentially undemocratic. They do not serve the

public interest, and we think they should be rejected by this committee.

Thank you.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Loveless follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Let me start, Mr. Horney, with you.

If we were to make the procedural changes that you suggested,

which I think are very constructive, by the way, we still wouldn’t

be convinced that this is probably the way to go.

Mr. HORNEY. My gut reaction, it is better for the Congress to do

its own work.

But I have to say there have been times when a properly constructed commission has helped. I think the 1983 Greenspan Social

Security Commission is a good example, where you had a problem

that everybody agreed had been solved. It was political and difficult. You had brought support. You had the President, you had

the Speaker of the House, you had Republican and Democrat leaders who all got on board and said, let’s do it, put a commission together to help us come up with something and generate public support and support in Congress.

So my first instinct would be I don’t think it is time to do that

here. I think that Congress can address these issues. It has done

some, not enough.

It was interesting Mr. Tiahrt mentioned the tea tasting that has

been eliminated. Congress has responded when it was

identified——

Chairman TOM DAVIS. We bagged it.

Mr. HORNEY. Exactly. So when an egregious example was identified, Congress got rid of it. So my preference would be to do it

through the regular process. If you need a commission I think with

some changes, significant changes be both on the commission and

not having the fast-track procedures, it could be useful.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. I mean, I think, Mr. Loveless, you put it

well. You are skeptical of the whole agenda at this point.

Mr. LOVELESS. I think so. And I just—you know, we heard a lot

about the experience of States—varying States are used to these

commissions, but in fact it’s been a very mixed record at the State

level. A number of States have eliminated their commissions in

this area. Even in the State of Texas, it’s been a subject of some

controversy.

But the fundamental difference between the States and the Congress is you are in year round. You are paid on a yearly basis. We

are in all the time now. It seems like the Congress never goes

home. You can’t even take a vacation any more—let’s be blunt

about the whole thing—except for an August recess.

Most State legislatures are in for a very small amount of time,

and they operate every other year, what have you. So we can even

argue the need for these commissions at the State level. I think it

is a very different situation when you talk about the Federal Government and the role of Congress.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Let me ask you, it seems to me, as you

take a look at trying to get spending under control, I think that is

something everything should agree on. We can argue whether you

have enough revenue and does it reduce economy. Everybody understands we want to operate and try to get spending under control

and all have different priorities.

But it seems to me when government needs to lose weight, the

tendency is to chop off fingers and toes. When in fact the fat, if you

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will, is layered just throughout the way government does business

and the way we procure goods. It is the way we react to things.

If we would settle more on some of the business process—the

GAO has a lot of reports just showing programs that are not getting—you know, people that are getting mispaid, the systems that

aren’t working, that there is probably more money in that and are

knocking out a few programs that you could reach a consensus on

or consolidating programs.

Mr. LOVELESS. I don’t disagree with that. I mean—and there are

a number of what I think are very positive, constructive suggestions that are out there. I know that Congressman Tanner has recently introduced a resolution that would require committees of jurisdiction to hold hearings, at the minimum, when the Inspector

General or the GAO issues a report critical to the way programs

are being administered by agencies. That seems to me to be a very

sensible thing.

We have another proposal—maybe I think this is too extreme—

by Congressman Cardoza that would require reconfirmation of

agency heads when agencies fail basic audits 2 years in a row.

There are a number of things that can be done, but what I object

to is this automatic mechanical process that is fast-tracked that I

do not believe is going to give you, the authorizing committees who

should know the most about the programs under their jurisdiction,

the kind of time that they need to make the kinds of assessments

that need to be made.

Mr. HORNEY. If I could, one thing you noted, GAO, I think that

in fact illustrates one important difference between the Federal

Government and State governments. I think in some instances

States may think that the commissions are useful because they

need to get together people who can look at this and come up with

ideas. They don’t have the Office of Management and Budget that

is running the part assessment program. They don’t have the Government Accountability Office which, as you said, has enormous

numbers of suggestions. They don’t have a Congressional Budget

Office that every other year publishes a budget options book with

a lot of options. So there is a lot of information that is currently

available about things that can be done to improve the operation.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. A lot of this is also congressionally driven.

When you get right down do it, jurisdiction drives this place and

you get programs under different agencies duplicating everything

else and you are asking for help.

Look, I think you have given this a lot of thought. You give us

some room on this. I am not sure we are going to get it worked

out tomorrow. I think over the long term, as we get real on this,

your comments are appropriate and I think give us a lot of food for

thought when we get down to if this thing is going to happen or

we get into conference. I appreciate you being here. I want you at

the table should this come about. I think you represent a point of

view and a constituent that needs to be there as well. I thank you

for being here.

Mr. Gutknecht.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. I want to thank the witnesses and for the

record to note that two Republicans were here to listen to your testimony. I think that should be noted.

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And I want to thank you for your testimony. I think there are

philosophical differences we might not be able to bridge, but I do

agree that we have fallen down on congressional oversight. But I

do hope you understand there are limits to how much we can do,

and there are all kinds of problems out there, and we don’t pay

enough attention to GAO and some of the agencies.

Mr. Chairman, I do want to make this statement publicly. Having just come back from Iraq, I think there is one area that is absolutely crying out for congressional oversight hearings and that is

that these contractors that we have hired for reconstruction and

other efforts in Iraq—we have spent hundreds of millions, if not

billions, of dollars, taxpayer dollars; and the results I saw were not

what I expected to see. And it seems to me we have an obligation

to the American taxpayers and to the Iraqi people to have some

oversight hearings in terms of the contractors.

Incidentally, just for the record, I was told by some of the people

on the ground over there that, actually, Halliburton has been one

of the good actors. They’ve actually done most of what they said

they were going to do. It may have been at inflated costs, but some

of the other contractors have taken a lot of money and we see almost no results. If there is one area where Congress should take

very swift action and that is to have some oversight hearings on

the contractors that have received enormous amounts.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. We have done four, and we are going to

do more this year; and we can do 30, and it probably wouldn’t be

enough.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. I am much more interested in that particular

issue. But I am not sure we will bridge this philosophical divide.

Some of us believe—here’s what I believe. If you see what is happening in the private sector today, every single company that I deal

with in my district every day is trying to become more and more

efficient. Why? Because the marketplace demands it, the pressure

of the marketplace. They have competition.

In fact, a classic story there is a little company in Redwing, MN.

It makes boots. And the president of Redwing tells me—he said,

every day I spend part of my day trying to figure out how to put

more value in every boot we make here in Redwing, would be minimum at less cost. He said, do you know why I do that? I said, no,

I don’t. He said, because if I don’t, my competitor will.

The difference between us and the private sector is we have no

competition, and there isn’t that tension and that pressure every

day. I think these two bills are an attempt to bring some of those

outside tensions or pressures to force the Congress to do what it

should be doing every day.

So I thank you for your testimony. We have a slightly different

philosophical viewpoint of this, but we would welcome any of your

help in trying to make us more accountable to the taxpayers who

pay the bills.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Mr. Horney, I’ll read what you have put in the record in addition,

which—you didn’t have to give this. But I appreciate both of you

being here and look forward to hearing from you again.

[Whereupon, at 11:35 a.m., the committee was adjourned.]

[The prepared statement of Hon. Elijah E. Cummings follows:]

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