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75–253 PDF 2001

AMERICA’S MAIN STREET: THE FUTURE OF

PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON

GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

MARCH 21, 2001

Serial No. 107–6

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpo.gov/congress/house

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM

DAN BURTON, Indiana, Chairman

BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York

CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, Maryland

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

STEPHEN HORN, California

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

JOE SCARBOROUGH, Florida

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

BOB BARR, Georgia

DAN MILLER, Florida

DOUG OSE, California

RON LEWIS, Kentucky

JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

DAVE WELDON, Florida

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida

C.L. ‘‘BUTCH’’ OTTER, Idaho

EDWARD L. SCHROCK, Virginia

——— ———

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

TOM LANTOS, California

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

PATSY T. MINK, Hawaii

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, Washington,

DC

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

JIM TURNER, Texas

THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

——— ———

——— ———

———

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

(Independent)

KEVIN BINGER, Staff Director

DANIEL R. MOLL, Deputy Staff Director

JAMES C. WILSON, Chief Counsel

ROBERT A. BRIGGS, Chief Clerk

PHIL SCHILIRO, Minority Staff Director

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, Maryland, Chairman

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia,

JOE SCARBOROUGH, Florida

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, Washington,

DC

——— ———

——— ———

EX OFFICIO

DAN BURTON, Indiana HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

RUSSELL SMITH, Staff Director

HEEA VAZIRANI-FALES, Counsel

MATTHEW BATT, Clerk

JON BOUKER, Minority Counsel

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on March 21, 2001 ............................................................................ 1

Statement of:

Dole, Hon. Robert (Bob) J., president, Federal City Council, accompanied

by Dr. Sparks, president, Federal City Council; Anthony Williams,

Mayor, District of Columbia; and Linda W. Cropp, chair, Council of

the District of Columbia ............................................................................... 26

Monteilh, Richard, president, District of Columbia Chamber of Commerce; John M. Kane, chairman, Transportation & Environment Committee, Greater Washington Board of Trade; Albert Butch Hopkins,

Jr., president, District of Columbia Federation of Citizens Associations;

J. Guy Gwynne, president, District of Columbia Federation of Citizens

Associations; William N. Brown, president, Association of the Oldest

Inhabitants of D.C. ....................................................................................... 110

Sloan, James, Acting Under Secretary for Enforcement, U.S. Department

of Treasury; Brian Stafford, Director, U.S. Secret Service; John Parsons, Associate Regional Director of Lands, Resources, and Planning,

National Capital Region, National Park Service, Department of Interior; Richard L. Friedman, chairman, National Capital Planning Commission; and Emily Malino, member, Commission of Fine Arts ............... 62

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

Brown, William N., president, Association of the Oldest Inhabitants of

D.C., prepared statement of ......................................................................... 133

Cropp, Linda W., chair, Council of the District of Columbia, prepared

statement of ................................................................................................... 42

Davis, Hon. Thomas M., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Virginia, prepared statement of .............................................................. 16

Dole, Hon. Robert (Bob) J., president, Federal City Council:

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 30

Prepared statement of Hon. Patrick Moynihan from press conference 59

Friedman, Richard L., chairman, National Capital Planning Commission,

prepared statement of ................................................................................... 90

Gwynne, J. Guy, president, District of Columbia Federation of Citizens

Associations, prepared statement of ............................................................ 129

Hopkins, Albert Butch, Jr., president, District of Columbia Federation

of Citizens Associations, prepared statement of ......................................... 125

Kane, John M., chairman, Transportation & Environment Committee,

Greater Washington Board of Trade, prepared statement of .................... 118

Malino, Emily, member, Commission of Fine Arts, prepared statement

of ..................................................................................................................... 96

Monteilh, Richard, president, District of Columbia Chamber of Commerce, prepared statement of ...................................................................... 113

Moran, Hon. James P., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Virginia, prepared statement of .............................................................. 23

Morella, Hon. Constance A., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Maryland, prepared statement of ............................................................ 5

Norton, Hon. Eleanor Holmes, a Representative in Congress from the

District of Columbia, prepared statement of .............................................. 10

Parsons, John, Associate Regional Director of Lands, Resources, and

Planning, National Capital Region, National Park Service, Department

of Interior, prepared statement of ............................................................... 84

Sloan, James, Acting Under Secretary for Enforcement, U.S. Department

of Treasury, prepared statement of ............................................................. 65

Stafford, Brian, Director, U.S. Secret Service, prepared statement of ........ 73

Williams, Anthony, Mayor, District of Columbia, prepared statement of ... 37

(1)

AMERICA’S MAIN STREET: THE FUTURE OF

PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 21, 2001

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA,

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM,

Washington, DC.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in room

2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Constance A. Morella

(chairwoman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Morella, Platts, Davis of Virginia,

Knollenberg, Norton, and Moran.

Staff present: Matthew Batt, clerk; Robert White, press secretary; Heea Vazirani-Fales, deputy staff director; Russell Smith,

staff director; Howard Davis, professional staff member; Marianne

Adezio, legislative assistant; Jon Bouker, minority counsel; and

Jean Gosa, minority assistant clerk.

Mrs. MORELLA. Good morning. I want to welcome everyone to our

hearing on ‘‘America’s Main Street: The Future of Pennsylvania

Avenue.’’ This is the first hearing of this subcommittee in the 107th

Congress, and I am pleased to welcome our Members, some of

whom have worked with us before and others with whom we look

forward to working.

As you know, Mr. Tom Davis, who is here, was the former Chair

of the Subcommittee on the District of Columbia for three terms.

Not only is he knowledgeable on Washington, DC, issues, but he

is intently interested in the sound economic and financial health of

the city. He conducted two hearings on the closing of Pennsylvania

Avenue, June 1995, and then a year later.

I also want to acknowledge and welcome Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton, the ranking member of this subcommittee. Ms.

Norton served on the Subcommittee of the District of Columbia

with Mr. Davis and with me, and we all know of her special interest and expertise on Washington, DC issues. I look to her advice

and counsel as we move this subcommittee ahead in continuing to

revitalize the District of Columbia.

Mr. Scarborough has also served on this subcommittee, and he

will be at some point joining us, but he will be a member of this

subcommittee.

I also want to introduce Congressman Todd Platts from Pennsylvania. Though he is the newest Member, Mr. Platts is also vice

chair of the subcommittee. I’m sure he is going to be a great asset

to the subcommittee, as he has already shown, on District of CoVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:48 Dec 04, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75253.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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lumbia issues. As a matter of fact, he was at the Anacostia Waterfront Initiative Kickoff, so I appreciate his being with us.

It is also a special pleasure to welcome Chairman Knollenberg,

Joe Knollenberg, who is Chair of the Committee on Appropriations,

a very important committee to this subcommittee. He’s very knowledgeable about the District of Columbia. He has attended many

events, visited schools, has made it his special effort to know our

Nation’s capital full-hand and totally.

Also, we will have—he hasn’t joined us yet, but Mr. Fattah is the

ranking member of this Subcommittee on the District of Columbia

on the Committee of Appropriations.

I want to also welcome my colleague, Jim Moran, from the great

State of Virginia, who, up until this year, was the Chair of the Appropriations Subcommittee on the District of Columbia, so thank

you for being here, too, Jim.

Chairman Burton, who has shown great interest in the issue of

Pennsylvania Avenue would have been here, except for scheduling

conflicts, and I do want to acknowledge his interest and thank him

for his support on this issue.

I also want to greet our witnesses, all of whom have had a long

history regarding the closing of L’Enfant’s grand boulevard. I want

to thank them all for their interest. For some of you it is a passionate interest, and preparations you’ve made to share with us today

are appreciated.

Senator Dole, we welcome you as a witness. You have been

placed first on the first panel because we know that you have an

extremely busy schedule and could be called by the President for

a sensitive assignment at short notice. We are, indeed, grateful to

you for giving us your time. We acknowledge your deep interest in

the subject.

We also want to recognize the time constraints of the mayor, who

just came in via the red eye, and the Council Chair. We really appreciate your presence, Mayor Williams and Councilwoman Cropp.

Just to get a few administrative duties out of the way, first, you

may be aware that the full committee procedure requires all witnesses to be administered the oath. Second, I’m going to encourage

that opening statements and witness statements to be presented in

about 5 minutes so that we will have time for questioning. All

statements will be included in their entirety in the record, and

there are some others who have submitted materials for the record.

I’m going to start off with an opening statement of my own and

then we’ll hear from other members of the subcommittee.

The purpose of our hearing today, as you all know, is to reexamine the blockading of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White

House that took place nearly 6 years ago. We want to know how

and whether the safety and security of the White House has been

enhanced by that closure, and whether the Secret Service still believes keeping the avenue closed is necessary. We’re going to look

at the various negative aspects of the avenue’s closing, the adverse

impacts on the District of Columbia—on traffic flow, air quality,

business activity, revenue loss for the city government. For the first

time today Congress will formally be presented with several alternative plans for reopening Pennsylvania Avenue to traffic, while ofVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:48 Dec 04, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00006 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75253.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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fering protection to the President, the First Family, and those who

work in and visit the White House every day.

A four-block stretch of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the

White House between 15th and 17th Streets, NW., was closed to

vehicular traffic on May 19, 1995, under orders from then-Treasury

Secretary Robert Rubin. In closing the avenue, the Secretary cited

his powers as head of the U.S. Secret Service and those given to

him under title 18, section 3056 of the U.S. Code.

A subsequent Justice Department opinion stated that the code, ‘‘grants the Secretary broad authority to take actions that are necessary and proper to protect the President,’’ including the temporary closure of any roads of the District of Columbia.

Well, here we are nearly 6 years later, and that temporary security measure remains in place. A lot has changed in that time. The

District of Columbia, thanks to the steady hands of Mayor Anthony

Williams, Council Chair Linda Cropp, and the congressionally created Financial Control Board has undergone an economic and social rebirth. Congress, under the watchful eye of this subcommittee

and its past chairman, Mr. Davis, and ranking member Congresswoman Norton, has addressed in a positive way its financial and

oversight responsibilities for the Nation’s Capital.

In the White House we have a new President, one who campaigned to reopen Pennsylvania Avenue as a symbol of ‘‘freedom

and greatness of America.’’ To be sure, the threat of terrorism that compelled Secretary

Rubin and the U.S. Secret Service to close the avenue has not disappeared, and under any circumstances the mission of the Secret

Service—to protect the President and his family and the White

House complex—is challenging and demanding. It is the responsibility the Secret Service exercises diligently and without peer in

the world.

But it has become clear to the District’s political community and

the business leaders and to many of us in Congress that the blockading of Pierre L’Enfant’s grand boulevard was a too-severe overreaction to the fear that engulfed many of us here in our country.

This all happened following the tragedy of Oklahoma City.

This temporary measure continues to present significant problems. From the economic and environmental standpoints, the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue has done real harm to the District of

Columbia. By physically dividing the city, the closure has curtailed

business activity downtown, forced commuters and tourists to

spend more time on the road, and placed additional financial burdens from lost parking meter revenue to higher Metro Bus subsidies on the District government.

While the Federal Government has reimbursed the city for at

least some of the cost, I’m sure that Mayor Williams and Chairwoman Cropp would agree that the restitution hasn’t gone far

enough.

As we will hear in a few minutes, Mayor Williams, Chairwoman

Cropp, and the City Council strongly favor reopening the avenue,

and just last week the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments, which represents every local government in the greater

Washington region, unanimously passed a resolution urging the

President to return this vital east-west link in the District of CoVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:48 Dec 04, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00007 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75253.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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lumbia to the use of District residents, to the use of commuters

also, and the use of visitors.

At my request, COG’s transportation staff has provided this subcommittee with statistics showing that levels of dangerous ozonedepleting vehicle emissions rise when cars and trucks are forced to

travel at slower speeds, which, of course, is the daily consequence

of stalled traffic around Pennsylvania Avenue.

The Washington metropolitan area continues to be a non-attainment area under the Clean Air Act. I have some documents that,

without objection, I would ask be included in the record in that regard.

From a larger perspective, however, we must be vigilant in ensuring that the goal of responsibly protecting the White House and

the lives of those who live, work, and visit there remains in balance

with the aims of a free and democratic society. In closing Pennsylvania Avenue, I wonder what values we have compromised.

The city, the White House, our national monuments stand as

proud symbols of America’s freedom, but the present state of Pennsylvania Avenue which makes the Nation’s capital resemble a city

under siege, a city devoid of the vitality of freedom, is an affront

to our traditions of openness and accessibility, so it is time to reassess that decision. We need to take a look at other options and see

if we can find a better solution.

I would now like to yield to the very distinguished ranking member of this subcommittee, Ms. Norton, for her opening statement.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Constance A. Morella follows:]

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Ms. NORTON. Thank you, Madam Chair. May I welcome you,

Mrs. Morella, to your new post as Chair of this subcommittee and

say how much I appreciate that Pennsylvania Avenue is the first

hearing under your leadership.

I’m also pleased to welcome my colleagues who have taken such

a special interest in what the closure of Pennsylvania Avenue has

done to the city and to the region.

And, of course, I especially welcome today’s witnesses.

This is the first hearing of this session on Pennsylvania Avenue,

but it is the fourth on this important subject. I am tempted to say

we must stop meeting like this and do something about Pennsylvania Avenue; however, I believe the subcommittee must continue

to meet and hold hearings until we find a way to return Pennsylvania Avenue to normal, downtown city life, as the founders intended and as a big, complicated city requires.

I am particularly grateful for the bipartisan support the reopening of Pennsylvania Avenue has received. Each year since the avenue was blockaded, both the Senate and the House have agreed to

appropriations language I originally requested in 1996 that keeps

the Park Service from converting the avenue into a park, as it

originally intended. That final solution, of course, would have obliterated even the possibility that ingenuity, technology, and other

state-of-the-art improvements could lead to greater access.

I also appreciate the provision adopted by the Republican National Committee in its year 2000 platform calling for the immediate reopening of Pennsylvania Avenue, and I particularly appreciate the willingness of the Bush administration to remain open to

lifting the barricades.

As important as all of the testimony we receive today will be, I

expect that most of it will differ largely by degree from past contributions to our hearings. The longer Pennsylvania Avenue has remained closed, the worse the burden has been on residents, businesses, commuters, and tourists. Environmental pollution has also

been a notable casualty.

What makes today’s hearing different from our previous efforts

is the recent development of a viable plan. The Federal City Council and the D.C. Building Industry Association have done what the

Federal Government should have done. In the midst of the most serious fiscal crisis for the District of Columbia in 100 years, the Government closed down a vital artery of a great city. It is the Government that should have commissioned studies seeking alternatives.

However, Government officials have apparently ceded authority to

their least-objective agency, the Secret Service, which had tried to

close Pennsylvania Avenue for decades, long before the genuine security risks that have emerged in recent years.

However, faced with the Oklahoma City bombing of the Alfred P.

Murrah Federal Building, the worst and most tragic terrorism in

American history, I did not call for the reopening of the avenue

until a plan by respected security experts responded to the concerns of the Secret Service, as stated when the agency closed the

avenue. Instead, I worked with White House Chief of Counsel Erskine Bowles, the Department of Transportation, and the National

Park Service to get E Street widened and opened to two-way traffic

at Federal expense. We are very grateful that the two-way traffic

9

on E Street has brought welcome if incomplete and inadequate relief.

The most important thing this hearing can do today is to center

its inquiry on the strengths and weaknesses of the Federal City

Council plan. The fact is the Government has isolated security concerns and left the Secret Service and similar agencies to their own

devices. Unaided by a broad array of assistance from the best

minds in the society and state-of-the-art innovations from the private sector, the Secret Service has been left to use the same barricades it would have used in 1865 when the Service was established.

As critical as I have been of the closed minds of the Secret Service and the Treasury Department, however, they are not the root

cause of the problem before us. Our Government has allowed our

country to become increasingly vulnerable to 21st century international terrorism, while leaving those responsible with only 19th

century tools.

The most important recognition that needs congressional and

Presidential focus is that the problem we face is not merely Pennsylvania Avenue in the District of Columbia. The fundamental

question America faces is how to maintain an open society when

the threat from international terrorism is palpable.

I will shortly introduce a bill intended to help us find an answer

to one of the largest unsolved questions that has emerged to confront our society today: how to maintain the precious democratic

value of openness while safeguarding our society from the forces of

terrorism.

Fortunately, I believe we can solve our Pennsylvania Avenue

problem in the District without resolving the more-fundamental

question it raises for our country. As we see the great capital of the

United States being systematically closed down before our eyes, it

is clear that Pennsylvania Avenue is only the tip of the proverbial

iceberg. Let us demonstrate that we are capable of taking on the

entire problem by first showing that we can safely open America’s

Main Street.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Congresswoman Norton.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Eleanor Holmes Norton follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. I would now like to recognize for an opening

statement our guest today, Congressman Joe Knollenberg, who

chairs the Appropriations Committee for the District of Columbia.

Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Thank you very much, Chairwoman Morella,

for giving me the opportunity to appear on the dias—not on the

dias, but whatever you call this thing up here—and I do appreciate

very much the opportunity.

We do have in the audience and on the panel some very distinguished people. We want to hear from them.

I, as the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, have been

early on advised of the concern about the closure of Pennsylvania

Avenue and would I do something about it very quickly. Well, I see

in the audience that we have a great number of others that have

an interest, I think, that is probably somewhat similar.

I think we have to balance what we hear here today—the idea

of national security, the protection of the President. I know that it

is imperative that the needs of the District of Columbia be recognized and responded to.

Pennsylvania Avenue is clearly a vital artery servicing the city’s

downtown area, and one of the things I talk about frequently when

I meet with some of the people that I see in the audience is one

of the things that I would like to see as a goal in my chairmanship

is to increase the economic development in this city, along with

education and public safety.

Now, you’re talking about traffic. This traffic situation affects so

many interests. It affects the business community, tourists, people

who live and work in the District, and, of course, it impacts the

President.

We’re going to hear today, I believe, several proposals, and I

would encourage everyone to continue to work together to reach a

consensus resolution.

I am not going to ask any questions, but I am going to rhetorically pose—or not expect an answer, at least, from the panel before

they have a chance to testify, but I am going to make at least a

couple of rhetorical questions that I believe to be questions that are

on the minds of everybody in this audience—and I see some faces

that, as I said, I’m very familiar with.

I appreciate very much Director Stafford and the time that he

gave to us a short time ago to go over some of these points and the

concerns, and I think that I still believe strongly that an alternative solution needs to be found to ease the traffic dilemma, with

the economic consequences—and that will be talked about, I think,

at some length—particularly for the people who live and work in

the District of Columbia.

I feel that options to exist which should be explored further.

We’re going to hear today, I think, something about a tunnel.

That’s one such option, and that, obviously, would do something

about connecting traffic flow. What does it do, though, overall in

terms of lessening the siege mentality of the White House being off

limits for anybody within the range of a few hundred feet.

The traffic flow, as I say, has to be—it is a concern right now,

and whatever is done in the end, there has to be, I think, some balance suggesting that the White House is not off limits, that the

White House is viewable, that traffic still moves, that economic

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harm is not done in terms of some of the traffic flow interruptions

we have today. There’s the issue of terrorism. I know that’s on the

rise and we talk about that in a number of ways. When I say it

is on the rise, others would refute that there aren’t as many incidents, but they seem to be larger and more-devastating when they

do occur, and that is, of course, the concern I know that the Secret

Service has.

A couple of questions I would just raise. Here’s a question I think

might be appropriate. Do the leaders of the other law enforcement

and intelligence agencies agree with the threat assessment? I’m

talking about the FBI, the NSA, the CIA. And does everybody believe that a tunnel could be a viable compromise to restore traffic

flow, as well as ensure security considerations? Has there been an

accurate measurement of the economic loss? I’m sure that the

mayor would respond and others that the economic harm has been

substantial and the revenues that are lost by virtue of the rerouting has been substantial. And how will you all feel about a tunnel

and the park situation after the conclusion of today’s hearing?

As I said, I do not want to see the United States and this city

become a Nation under siege. It is naive to think that we can continue without making some security adjustments, but I do believe

we have to move forward and we must compromise to reach an

agreeable solution for all parties involved.

I look forward to the testimony.

Chairwoman Morella, thank you very kindly for allowing me to

speak this morning.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you. We look forward to working with you.

Appropriations and authorizations should work together, and it is

a pleasure to have you chairing that committee.

In the spirit of bipartisan and regional camaraderie, Mr. Moran,

who is here as a guest because he cares about this area, has allowed Mr. Davis to give his opening comment now because of his

schedule.

Mr. Davis.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Thank you very much, and to my friend,

Mr. Moran.

For 6 years I was honored to serve as chairman of this subcommittee. Though I am now pleased to Chair the Technology and

Procurement Policy Subcommittee, I am delighted to be continuing

as a member of the D.C. Subcommittee, and as a member of the

area delegation I will continue to maintain a very activist interest

in the District of Columbia and its connection to the Washington

region.

Thank you, Congresswoman Morella, for providing such outstanding leadership as Chair of this subcommittee and for holding

this hearing. I look forward to working with you as we strive to

maintain our momentum for the Nation’s Capital.

This subcommittee has always taken a proactive approach to

issues, and I’m certain that will continue. Of course, I’m also looking forward to working with the ranking member of the subcommittee, Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton. We addressed many

tough challenges together on this subcommittee, and we were always able to work together in a spirit of bipartisan cooperation. I’m

confident we will continue to build in progress which we made.

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Pennsylvania Avenue is America’s Main Street. It is appropriate

that on this, the first full day of spring, we look at the issues surrounding Pennsylvania Avenue with fresh eyes. The need for Presidential security and for temporary arrangements to effect that security is not questioned. Let’s look at the record.

On May 19, 1995, an order was signed by then Secretary of the

Treasury Robert Rubin prohibiting vehicular traffic on portions of

Pennsylvania Avenue and certain other streets adjacent to the

White House. In that order, the Secretary of the Treasury delegated to the Director of the U.S. Secret Service all necessary authority to carry out such street closings.

This subcommittee held hearings on June 30, 1995, 1 month

after Pennsylvania Avenue was closed. We held another on June 7,

1996. In addition, I testified before the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee on June 26, 1996. I was also a sponsor, along with

Delegate Norton, of H. Res. 458, which corresponded to a similar

sense of the Senate resolution regarding the reopening of Pennsylvania Avenue.

Congress has repeatedly gone on record in opposition to efforts

by the National Park Service to make permanent changes to Pennsylvania Avenue that would preclude its eventual reopening. We

succeeded in preventing permanent changes from being made.

Recently, there have been positive initiatives, and we thus have

the option now to take a fresh look at the entire matter.

Pennsylvania Avenue is a major arterial road for the District of

Columbia. It was part of the L’Enfant plan for the development of

Washington, DC. Any closing or reopening of this historic street

has enormous symbolic as well as practical impact.

We are well aware that the Secret Service may temporarily close

streets to traffic, detain private citizens, and engage in various

other security practices in accordance with its mission, but it is

also clear—and this was brought out by our hearings—that the Secret Service may not make permanent changes to city streets in the

District of Columbia. That is very much the business of Congress

and the District, working within the executive branch. That’s why

we are here today.

The closing of Pennsylvania Avenue has cut the east-west link in

the Nation’s Capital. The disruption created is enormous. It continues to grow. The city has never gotten used to this disruption, to

the divisions and loss of revenue which resulted. Residents, commuters, visitors, and the entire Washington region have been seriously impacted by an action they had no part in creating.

The status of Pennsylvania Avenue is a very important regional

issue as well as a national issue. This is so not only because of mutual concern about traffic and the health of the economic, but because of the environmental impact, as well. The District is part of

a region-wide serious ozone non-attainment area. Our hearings

confirmed that the horrendous and ever-expanding gridlock created

by the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue has an adverse impact on

our air quality.

All regional jurisdictions in Virginia, Maryland—not just the District—are compelled by Federal law to take actions to bring the region into Clean Air Act compliance.

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It has been my view from the outset that the Federal Government has a responsibility to help the District of Columbia deal with

the adverse impacts of the unwanted Federal action in 1995 in closing Pennsylvania Avenue. It is my hope this hearing will serve to

demonstrate the wisdom of working together to reopen America’s

Main Street.

Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Mr. Davis. I’m delighted you’ve continued to stay on this committee, because I look forward to your

continued leadership in the past and in the future.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Thomas M. Davis follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. Now I recognize my colleague from Virginia who

was up until this time the ranking member of the Appropriations

Subcommittee on the District of Columbia, Mr. Moran.

Mr. MORAN. Well, thank you very much, Madam Chairwoman,

and particularly for conducting this hearing. I compliment the persistence and dedication of so many people within the Washington

metropolitan area who never gave up on the idea that Pennsylvania Avenue could 1 day be reopened.

Since its closure, we’ve learned of other possible avenues terrorists could use to attack the White House, from the air with a plane,

by hand-held rockets and grenades from nearby rooftops, to an assault rifle by approaching the White House on foot. We respect the

fact that the Secret Service has the daunting responsibility of protecting the President, the First Family, and the guests who visit

the White House. No one would expect us to turn back the clock

and reopen Pennsylvania Avenue as it operated before 1995.

I think, however, the Secret Service should be receptive to proposals that address the primary threat posed by terrorists—a suicide truck bomb—while allowing appropriate vehicle traffic to cross

in front of the White House.

I’m persuaded by the recommendations of the RAND study, as

well as other proposals that involve gates, the realignment of the

avenue, the use of barriers to block trucks, and circles that, all

combined, slow down vehicle traffic and inhibit larger vehicles from

approaching the White House.

I think these recommendations should be reviewed and given

very serious consideration by a panel of experts who can then judge

them on their merits and weigh the level of risk each proposal

might address.

I defer to their judgment, but I think there is a way a redesigned

Pennsylvania Avenue could be reopened to smaller vehicles without

placing the First Family, their guests, and thousands of tourists

who visit the White House at risk.

Putting a barrier inside the city’s urban core continues to have

an intolerably adverse impact on residents and businesses in the

Nation’s capital. There are 29,000 drivers—which is the number

that crossed in front of the White House prior to its closure—that

have had to find other ways to get across town, adding time and

additional cost to their daily commute.

Some businesses have been inconvenienced. Others have been

forced to relocate because they can no longer make deliveries or get

from their offices to other locations around town in a convenient

manner.

I, H, and K Streets have become even more congested because of

the additional traffic they have been forced to carry, and an added

concern has been the additional response time emergency services

and ambulances have encountered as they are forced to detour

around the White House to deliver patients to George Washington

University Hospital.

These concerns are valid, but as important is the symbolic message we have sent around the world with the closure of America’s

Avenue. I think we sent the wrong message—that we are too willing to restrict our freedom—namely, our public access and open

space—in response to any potential terrorist threat. We have alVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:48 Dec 04, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00025 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75253.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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lowed this threat to seriously disrupt our way of life within the

very heart of the Nation’s Capital.

No one wants to do anything to jeopardize the White House, but

I’m hopeful that this hearing can be the beginning of a process

where we review and implement security measures that will protect the President while reopening Pennsylvania Avenue.

And let me just say, as a post script, I know that the Secret Service doesn’t get compensated for their aesthetic sensibilities, but

whoever is responsible for those cement jersey barriers and the

chain link fence there on H Street along LaFayette Square, that’s

a dump. It is a disgrace. All the littering and so on piles up there.

We should all be ashamed of that. There’s got to be a better way

that people can see the front entrance of the White House in a way

that they want to remember and that we can be proud of, and that

doesn’t exist today.

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Mr. Moran. I agree.

[The prepared statement of Hon. James P. Moran follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. I would now like to recognize the new vice chair

of our committee, Mr. Platts, for any opening statement he may

make.

I want you to know I’m pleased to have you on this subcommittee.

Mr. PLATTS. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. I certainly greatly

appreciate Senator Dole, Mayor Williams, and Chairwoman Cropp

for appearing here today and preparing to offer testimony.

As a new Member, my role today is very much to be an active

listener and to gain knowledge of how we can balance the threats

to the First Family and to the President while achieving the important priorities of reopening Pennsylvania Avenue, America’s Avenue, for economic reasons, for transportation reasons, general quality of life reasons.

I think, as has been already expressed, reopening Pennsylvania

Avenue in an appropriate fashion will send again a message to the

world that we won’t be intimidated by terrorism, but, rather, we

are a Nation that stands tall against such threats and I hope will

once again allow us to have that avenue embody Abraham Lincoln’s historic premise that we are a government of the people, by

the people, and for the people, and not one that is going to be

under siege from anyone.

I look forward to your testimony and to working with you and

Chairwoman Morella and all the members of the committee in finding a way that we can protect the President and First Lady and

First Family, but in a way that reopens such an important avenue

of our Nation.

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Mr. Platts.

Now we on the dias will do some listening, so I’d like to swear

in the first panel, if you would stand, and Senator Dole, if there

are any others who might be making comments, please stand.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mrs. MORELLA. The record will indicate affirmation.

I know, Dr. Sparks, that you are accompanying the Senator as

executive vice president of the Federal City Council, but I will start

now with Senator Dole, and then we will go to Mayor Williams and

Councilwoman Cropp.

Again, we are very, very honored. We appreciate your waiting to

testify. We are very honored to have your presence here.

Senator Dole, if you would commence.

STATEMENTS OF HON. ROBERT (BOB) J. DOLE, PRESIDENT,

FEDERAL CITY COUNCIL, ACCOMPANIED BY DR. SPARKS,

PRESIDENT, FEDERAL CITY COUNCIL; ANTHONY WILLIAMS,

MAYOR, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA; AND LINDA W. CROPP,

CHAIR, COUNCIL OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

Mr. DOLE. I want to thank you, Congresswoman Morella, and

others of the subcommittee and Ms. Norton, who does a good job

in the District—we’ve had a few differences of opinion on the World

War II Memorial, but otherwise we get along fine.

And it occurred to me that if you get this finished you could deliver the tax cut more quickly to the President, too. That would be

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another advantage in getting this done, but without getting stuck

in traffic.

But I am here today in a totally nonpartisan capacity. I finally

got to be president of something, and it’s called the ‘‘Federal City

Council,’’ and we don’t have any agenda. There are 170 members.

They are men and women who live in the District or who have interest in the District, who the sole purpose of the Federal City

Council is to make the Capital City, Washington, DC, the greatest

capital in the world, and so we are here in that spirit. We don’t

have any—I have great respect for the Secret Service. I—they’ve

worked—I’ve worked with them and they were very good to me in

1996. I hoped to keep them longer, but, you know, they left.

[Laughter.]

But, having said that, I think it is—I think, as everybody has indicated up here, we are not going to go back and do—open it as

it was in 1995. We know there has to be a different way to do it.

And we obviously have plans, and the plan we’d like to present just

very quickly would be the one that we think has some merit.

Maybe there are some ways we could improve it.

But I don’t want to—I think you recognized Ken Sparks, who is

the director of the Federal City Council; David Perry, who works

with Ken; and also Gary Haney with Skidmore Owings; and Harvey Joiner with Parson’s Co. will be here if there are any technical

questions on what we hope to submit.

I would ask that my—I think you’ve already asked that the

statement be made a part of the record, and I’ll skip some of the

information because it has already been mentioned by members of

the committee and other guests.

But we understand, of course, the importance of protecting the

President, those who work in the White House, those who visit the

White House, but it seems to me that now, more than 5 years later,

it is clear to us that the continued closure of Pennsylvania Avenue

not only has cut the city in half, the Nation’s Capital in half, but,

more importantly, has—I think Ms. Norton said it—become to symbolize that we are giving in to the fear of terrorism, and nobody

knows when it will happen, when it will strike, but we’ve come a

long way from the days when Presidents used to open up the White

House and greet all the visitors, nobody had to have a pass.

We understand their reasons for security, but we also understand there is a reason, where possible and where it is consistent

with security, to open up the place as much as you can.

We’re a lot of good people. We’re self-confident people. We don’t

want to be held hostage to the threat of terrorism, and we believe

there is a responsible, reasonable way in which Pennsylvania Avenue can be reopened.

And I want to make it clear, as I said, we’re not saying go back

and just open her up like it was in 1995.

Our work—as part of our work, the Federal City Council commissioned the RAND Corp. to examine security measures currently in

place in the District and how they relate to the actual or perceived

threat, and let me just sort of skim over RAND’s principal findings.

First of all, they noted that we spend more money, that we have

better technology, we’ve strengthened the country’s counter-terrorism capabilities because of that, and, because of the steadily worsVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:48 Dec 04, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00031 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75253.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ening situation, there are far fewer terrorist activities now because

of all the things we’re doing. That’s No. 2.

And we’ve seen, in contrast, the forward thinking that characterized the Clinton administration’s overall approach to the terrorist

threat. The issue of physical security around the White House was

treated in a way that was both static and one-dimensional.

I think that now we also—they find in the study that the justification for continued closure now extends beyond the original explanation of assuring the safety of the President and his family,

and I think that is important.

There have been a number of measures. How do you protect the

President? What happens when he leaves the White House, when

he leaves the grounds, when he goes to another city, whatever, and

we understand all this is very important and certainly must be

paramount. We’re not here to dispute that at all.

So just let me sort of summarize what we believe and what— again, our proposal is certainly open to amendment or change or

whatever, and it is based on not just members of the Federal City

Council, but experts who have given their input.

First of all, we would narrow the configuration from six lanes to

four lanes, two lanes in each direction, without adversely affecting

the avenue’s capacity to move traffic.

If you do that, the stand-off distance—and I wonder if we might

just point that out there—the stand-off distance from the south

curb of the avenue to the White House under a narrowed east-west

alignment would be greater than the length of a football field, or

more than three times the stand-off distance applied to U.S. Embassies overseas to protect them against vehicle-borne explosive attacks. It’s about, what, 300 feet—385 feet. That’s a pretty good distance.

Second, we favor curbing the roadway to the north between

Madison Place and Jackson Place. And this idea wasn’t suggested—it was suggested a long time ago by Thomas Jefferson back

in 1802, and it is referred to as the Jefferson Bow. Now, that’s the

original back in 1802. You sort of see the bow there, and then move

it—let’s see the latest, how it would look there.

In comparison, the current east-west alignment of Pennsylvania

Avenue, the introduction of the Jefferson Bow would have the further benefit of moving the roadway an additional 60 feet away from

the White House, increasing the stand-off distance. I think with

this it is 385 feet with the Jefferson Bow. Without it, it is about

325.

So we recognize there also is a relationship between the size of

any vehicle and what they might be transporting and what damage

could occur, and we would bar any large vehicles in the portion of

Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House.

And to achieve this goal we recommend a number of measures,

beginning with enhanced visual and electronic surveillance of the

entire White House precinct, and next we recommend the placement of attractively designed manned kiosks at both 15th and 17th

Street. Would you point those out? The intersection of Pennsylvania Avenue—and we also are recommending that two pedestrian

bridges be constructed slightly in-bound of the intersections with

Madison Place and Jackson Place, and these bridges would have a

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vertical clearance of approximately 7 feet, 6 inches. The bridges

would permit pedestrians to move easily between LaFayette Park

on the north side of the avenue and a larger landscaped area on

the north side of the White House fence. That would be right there.

The pedestrian bridges would be structurally capable of stopping

any large vehicle in its tracks and could be designed so that they

could be picked up and removed by a flat bed truck for the inaugural parade. I’m not certain that’s very practical, but that could

be done.

The pedestrian bridges, the manned kiosks, the enhanced surveillance, combined with the physical changes in the configuration

of Pennsylvania Avenue, itself, would permit the controlled reopening of Pennsylvania Avenue while providing an appropriate level of

security for Presidents.

I was asked—in fact, I asked, myself, how long would this take?

And we’re not talking about next week or next month. It would

probably take, if I understand it, maybe a couple of years. That’s

a long time to wait, but if we’re going to combine the security with

other aspects I think that would be some—maybe it could be speeded up.

And we don’t have to keep it open 24 hours a day. You could also

close Pennsylvania Avenue to all traffic from, say, 10 o’clock at

night to 6 o’clock in the morning, and I don’t believe that would

greatly impair the movement of traffic in downtown Washington.

So it seems to me, Madam Chairman, that this is not the only

developed scheme, plan, but this is a plan that we believe deserves

careful attention, and we would hope and we know the Secret Service will—knows the plan and may address it in their testimony.

But our—we appreciate this opportunity. We are available for

consultation. We are available at any time to meet with the mayor

and chairman of the Council, members of this committee, members

of the Secret Service, and people in the White House we hope to

have a meeting with later on. But we thank you very much, and

we look forward to hearing the rest of the testimony.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Senator Dole.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Bob Dole follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. We appreciate the fact that this is the first hearing where we have heard those recommendations and appreciate

the work of the Federal City Council.

Mr. Mayor, Mayor Williams, we are delighted to hear from you,

sir.

Mayor WILLIAMS. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you

today on the reopening of Pennsylvania Avenue.

I’d also like to acknowledge President Dole, otherwise known as

Senator Dole, for his continuing support in so many ways for the

District, from supporting our voting representation in Congress to

testifying today on our behalf. He is a champion for our city and

we appreciate it, and I want him to know that.

I’d also like to thank Council Chair Linda Cropp for her support

in this important endeavor. I think the fact that this is a panel of

local and national officials speaking with one voice, speaking with

one bipartisan voice I think speaks loud and clear and speaks volumes about the importance of striking the right balance between

transparency and openness and protecting the security and safety

of our First Family.

Members of the committee and Senator Dole have spoken eloquently on that point, and I’m just going to shed some light and

offer some brief comments to try to complement and augment the

testimony and remarks already given, particularly as they relate to

commercial impacts and traffic and environmental impacts.

Downtown Washington is the third-largest commercial office

market in the United States after New York and Los Angeles. This

office market includes the area from the base of Capitol Hill

through our west end. With the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue

and the limited west-to-east access on E Street, the heart of our

city has become literally two separate downtowns, adding up to 20

minutes in a cross-town rush-hour commute.

The only way drivers can travel from east to west is by navigating the eight-block barricade around the White House, a barricade

that has turned westbound I Street into a rush hour zone from

morning until night. And all of us have been on I Street. We all

know I Street is an example of the gridlock that has been created

by this closure.

Commercial activity in a downtown thrives in a connected environment, particularly in this knowledge-based economy, when people move to the District because of our assets—the Federal presence, the museums, the Library of Congress, the National Geographic, a well-educated work force. These are all assets in a

knowledge-based economy. All this requires and demands an interconnectedness and an interdependentness [sic] to a degree we’ve

never seen before. We’re actually retreating with closing Pennsylvania Avenue, because by closing Pennsylvania Avenue and disconnecting our city from its center, we’ve experienced untold financial impact on downtown business development.

Well, consider the eastern end of our downtown. The Interstate

395 tunnel right now is a natural blockade to the eastward expansion of our downtown growth. Commercial development is virtually

nonexistent on the eastern side of the 395 tunnel, a problem to

which all of us are trying to address in our downtown action agenda.

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But our downtown action agenda is going to be for naught and

our efforts are going to be for naught if we continue to have this

barricade around the White House which is cutting this organism,

if you will, this community ecosystem, if you will, in half, this barricade—our residents, our commuters, our business leaders all cutoff from the city’s core.

If you are on one part of the city and you are working with another part of the city, yes, we have an Internet, yes, you can communicate, but you can’t fax lunch, you can’t fax a fire truck. I

mean, you need to move goods and services and equipment, and

that’s why it is so important to have this avenue open.

Long and short is, for this city to continue to grow, we must be

able to move people and goods from downtown to the corners of the

District, and that means a reopened Pennsylvania Avenue, the

same way it means an open 5th Avenue, an open Michigan and

Chicago, an open Market Street in San Francisco. This is our main

thoroughfare that’s got to be open.

Which brings us to traffic—in addition, the closure of Pennsylvania Avenue has further congested our downtown streets and

added to the daily stress of navigating our city. The change from

two-way to one-way streets and from eastbound to westbound circulation has increased gridlock and stalled the growth of adjacent

businesses in the city.

Prior to the closure, the U.S. Department of Transportation designated Pennsylvania Avenue as a thoroughfare on the national

highway system. With the closure, traffic progression was diverted

to adjacent streets like H and 9th Streets, NW., which were already carrying 27,000 vehicles per day, and today the increase in

traffic has left more vehicles sitting in idle, emitting carbon monoxide and other toxins into the air.

The District is already a non-compliant zone with the EPA, the

Environmental Protection Agency, for ozone. By opening the avenue, we’re going to reduce emissions and air quality will improve.

All of us have traveled through the District. We all use our

streets, just like our residents, commuters, and visitors, to get to

work, attend social events, meet family and friends for dinner, and

go home. We’ve all been late, too. We’ve all missed events because

we couldn’t continue up Pennsylvania Avenue. That’s a fact, practical aspect of this. We all have firsthand knowledge of how important access to Pennsylvania Avenue is to those who drive and work

in the District.

The closure has literally—and this is what I want to emphasize

in complementing the other remarks that have been made—this

closure has literally cut one-half of the city off from another. In a

city that has already got the same social tensions of other cities in

terms of class tensions, racial tensions, to add another physical dimension to this divide is overloading the camel, if you will.

I think as we continue to re-knit the city, reunite our city, build

one city, our Nation’s Capital—one union, as President Lincoln

would say—our ability to use Pennsylvania Avenue is fundamental

to our social unity and our economic viability.

All of our citizens in our city understand the need to protect the

President and the First Family, but we believe that the plan that

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is put forth by the Federal City Council does a brilliant job in making a balance between these two primary concerns.

The long and short, Madam Chair, is that the citizens in every

great city have free access to their most important monuments. In

London you have free access to the monuments there. In Philadelphia you can drive past Independence Mall and the Liberty Bell.

And, as Congressman Morella will tell you, our Chair will tell all

of us, in Annapolis you can park your car on the brick street next

to the State House.

We are the living, breathing symbol of a strong, self-determinant—Senator Dole said self-confident—democratic Nation. It is

the embodiment of all that can be good about government. We are

the capital of the world. People should be able to drive past the

people’s house, the White House in Washington, DC.

Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Mayor Williams. We appreciate your testimony.

[The prepared statement of Mayor Williams follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. I would now like to recognize for comments

Councilwoman Cropp.

Ms. CROPP. Thank you very much, Chairman Morella, Congresswoman Norton, and other members of the subcommittee. I am

pleased to testify at this oversight hearing on the impact and status of the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White

House. I am happy to be joined in partnership with Senator Dole

from the Federal City Council and our Mayor Anthony Williams.

Let me express my deep appreciation to you, Madam Chair, for

convening your very first hearing as Chair of this subcommittee on

a subject matter that is so important to the citizens of the District

of Columbia and also in the region, and this is one that also impacts the Nation, as a whole, as visitors come to their Nation’s

Capital.

District of Columbia residents, businesses, and visitors have suffered for nearly 6 years with constant traffic gridlock that you’ve

heard about, the uncompensated economic costs, and loss of freedom symbolized by the vehicular barricades that have been imposed between the east and west ends of America’s Main Street

and our downtown.

I am here to reiterate the Council’s support for reopening Pennsylvania Avenue to vehicular traffic.

I also wish to reiterate our previous request for Federal dollars

to pay for a comprehensive study which would quantify and compensate the District for each adverse effect of this street closing

upon the District’s economy and our environmental, historic, transportation, and parking resources.

We are appreciative of the action taken by the 106th Congress

of the United States in wake of the National Park Service proposal

to create President’s Park on Pennsylvania Avenue to restrict the

use of appropriated dollars toward planning, design, or construction of any permanent non-street improvements to Pennsylvania

Avenue in front of the White House.

The District is also appreciative of the recent restoration of the

two-way traffic on E Street behind the White House. We never

quite understood how the expectation was that some kind of disaster would only go from west to east. Two-way traffic is an appropriate approach, and it certainly has alleviated some of the problems.

We remain hopeful that President Bush will fulfill the Republican party platform position to reopen Pennsylvania Avenue by ordering the U.S. Treasury Secretary and the Secret Service to restore this most important of public streets to its historic use as

soon as possible.

Madam Chair, I would like to submit for the record a copy of the

resolution which was adopted just last week by the Board of Directors of the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments

Chaired by my colleague, Carol Schwartz, in which representatives

of jurisdictions in our entire region have urged the Bush administration to reopen Pennsylvania Avenue to vehicular traffic.

With your permission, I would also like to submit into the record

excerpts from two resolutions on the Pennsylvania Avenue issue

which were unanimously approved by the D.C. Council as early as

1995 and 1996, because the provisions expressed then by the CounVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:48 Dec 04, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00044 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75253.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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cil are still applicable today and will be until Pennsylvania Avenue

is reopened.

Mrs. MORELLA. Without objection, both resolutions will be included in the record.

Ms. CROPP. Thank you. And the Council of Governments.

Mrs. MORELLA. Council of Governments.

Ms. CROPP. Thank you.

The Council clearly understands the need to protect the President and the First Family; however, it makes the following findings

and recommendations regarding the Federal Government’s temporary restriction of vehicular access on Pennsylvania Avenue: that

it affirms the safety of the President; these restrictions have resulted and will continue to result in significant adverse impacts on

our residents and our businesses.

You have heard how this has just really bifurcated the city. It

has had complete and total gridlock—H Street, I Street, K Street,

down almost to the monuments, it is traffic, a traffic congestion

nightmare. It is a parking lot. The only thing that would possibly

be beneficial, if we could just, since it is a parking lot, put up parking meters and at least get some revenue from it, but outside of

that it has had a terrible, horrible impact on the District of Columbia.

Let me also state that we appreciate the Federal Cities Council’s

presentation of a plan. That is one option. There’s another option

that another architectural firm has done, McCrery and Lohsen, I

believe it is, where they also have a bow in front of the White

House. There are gates there where, if necessary, at certain opportune times there is a need for some restriction, that could happen.

If you do not have that, I would submit that.

I think there are many options that we could take to try to secure the White House and the President and the First Family.

In closing, let me just suggest—picture this: 9 through 6 p.m., 7

p.m., all of a sudden a four or five-block stretch of Rockville Pike,

Wisconsin Avenue, or King Street in Virginia is closed down. That

is the same impact that we have had in Washington, DC, with

Pennsylvania Avenue closed down. It is a major artery in this city.

It connects the east side to the west side. It helps residents of the

District of Columbia to move through. It is a business section. It

has an economic impact with the streets being closed. If Wisconsin

Avenue was closed, it would severely hamper that particular area

of Maryland. If King Street was closed, Route 7, it would severely

impact in a negative way Virginia. The same thing has happened

to the citizens of the District of Columbia, the businesses within

the District, and I say those who even come to visit the Nation’s

Capital.

Madam Chair, thank you so very much for this hearing. We look

forward to positive action and outcomes from this hearing.

Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Ms. Cropp, for your testimony.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Cropp follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. I appreciated the fact that you tried to make it

all so close to home with your analogy, but I can tell you that the

Rockville Pike may not be officially closed, but with traffic sometimes it appears to be closed.

Thank you.

I thought what we would do is each of us take 5 minutes in asking questions, then go back for another round if you all have some

time to respond to the questions.

I guess I’ll start off.

Again, Senator Dole, I appreciate your testifying. I appreciate the

fact that you are president of the Federal City Council.

Mr. DOLE. Right.

Mrs. MORELLA. And the fact that the RAND report that you commissioned gives some, I think, alternatives that we should look at

very seriously.

You know, we’re going to hear testimony also from the National

Capital Planning Commission, and they are going to tell us about

a task force that they are establishing now to look at, I guess, I

call it ‘‘security streetscape,’’ and I wondered if you—I wonder

whether there is a response from the Federal City Council with regard to supporting that kind of task force. I think it will take, san,

4 months.

Mr. DOLE. I wouldn’t have any problem with that, but I might

ask if it is OK to have Ken Sparks come.

Mrs. MORELLA. Indeed.

Mr. DOLE. He deals with this on a daily basis and has more information.

Mrs. MORELLA. Great. Thank you.

Dr. Sparks.

Mr. SPARKS. We are pleased to have the National Capital Planning Commission looking at this. We’ve briefed the commission on

our plan at a previous session, and they’ve set a short timeframe

for looking at it, and we think it is something that could be very

constructive.

Mr. DOLE. I think that’s a point. We don’t want to start studies,

task forces out into the future with—because, as the mayor pointed

out, the problem is immediate, and it is going to take some time

in any event.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes. So you would be assured that they would

not be duplicating the report that you have—— Mr. DOLE. Right.

Mrs. MORELLA [continuing]. Submitted to us, and that maybe

they would be utilizing you also in terms of the work that they do.

Mr. DOLE. But, as we know, I mean, certainly no plan is perfect.

It may be other people with their input may have some ideas that

would improve our plan or someone else’s plan, or maybe even

what the Secret Service may propose.

Mrs. MORELLA. I would also like to hear from the Mayor and

from Ms. Cropp, too, with regard to your response to that report

that the Federal City Council has presented, as well as what the

National Capital Planning Commission is looking to do with their

task force.

Mayor WILLIAMS. I would welcome, Madam Chair, we welcome

the task force, National Capital Planning Commission, but I would

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echo what Senator Dole has said. I would look to the NCPC conducting as quickly as possible a report that would augment and

complement the work already done by the Federal City Council, as

opposed to plowing over the same ground and just adding additional delay.

There are some areas that would warrant some work, and we

welcome them looking at them, but I don’t think we need another

redundant report.

Mr. DOLE. I understand they are going to limit their review to

4 months, so that’s fairly quick in this town, 4 months.

Mrs. MORELLA. You’re right. Maybe it could be done even faster,

too, since so much has been done for the last 5 years.

Ms. Cropp.

Ms. CROPP. Yes. I join with the earlier speakers that speed is extremely important. We have the Federal Cities report. NCPC will

be looking into it. We have suggestions and plans by other entities,

also, that I believe NCPC has available to them. They can look at

the Federal Cities report, they can look at the Lohsen McCrery report and other reports that are already available and tweak each

one of them and hopefully very quickly come up with a recommendation.

Mrs. MORELLA. Mayor Williams, have you—and this would be for

Councilwoman Cropp, too—have you heard from residents, local

residents, with regard to the opening or the closing of Pennsylvania

Avenue? Have they been apathetic? Have they felt strongly about

it? Has it come to your attention in many ways?

Mayor WILLIAMS. I have been—and I’m sure Chairman Cropp

would say the same thing—at hundreds of community meetings,

and the reopening of Pennsylvania Avenue is taken as a given. I

mean, it is taken as a given in our platform, it’s taken as a given.

It’s part of our mission, my mission for office. And, while it is not

stated again and again explicitly by citizens during meetings, the

mere mention of it brings acclimation. I mean, there is this widespread support for it in the city because there is the transportation

impact. In speaking to business groups, there is widespread recognition of the negative economic impact it has had on our local

downtown business community, because they recognize something

really important. Again, you take two ingredients of a great city—

a great downtown and open, vibrant, beautiful corridors and boulevards—and you are harming both of them with the status quo that

we have right here. You’re cutting in half one of our major thoroughfares. You’re cutting in half our downtown.

Ms. CROPP. I concur with that, and the citizens really would like

to see a difference.

We tend to think of Pennsylvania Avenue only having the impact

in that 15th Street say may to 20th Street area, but, quite frankly,

in downtown we are feeling it as far back as 11th Street because

you get that backup down at 8th Street, and in downtown New

York Avenue at 11th Street, so that’s our central business district

in the downtown area.

So even those citizens who may not need to go on the other side

one way or the other from downtown 11th Street it has had a negative impact on our traffic, so the citizens just wait anxiously for it.

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My e-mails are full. We hear it constantly when you go to public

meetings.

Mrs. MORELLA. My 5 minutes are up. As we go through the questioning, I will be back with other questions after we hear from our

other two members.

I am pleased to recognize our ranking member, Ms. Norton.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Senator Dole, let me just say that if you were determined to be

president of something, I am pleased that you decided it was going

to be the Federal City Council, because the job you—I can’t say

that I wanted you to be President of the United States, though I

regard you as an American who has made inestimable contributions to this country, and now for you to continue to make those

contributions by making them to the capital of the United States

is something that every citizen of this city greatly appreciates very

much. Thank you for your work on the Council.

May I ask you if you have had the opportunity to brief anybody

associated with the White House on the Federal City Council plan

or if anybody associated with the plan has had that opportunity.

Mr. DOLE. We’ve made a request that we have an opportunity to

meet with the chief of staff and hopefully others at the White

House, and that request is pending, so we think it will happen, and

we believe that, consistent with what you mentioned in your earlier

testimony, the Republican platform, there should be a willingness

to talk to us and have us at least present our plan, present the

RAND plan with our experts, and then let the White House people

make recommendations.

Ms. NORTON. Well, we were able to meet at the highest levels of

the White House in the last administration. I very much regret

that the last administration did not move on this plan. And I will

continue to press this plan, because you have done a public service,

a service one would have expected the Government to do, as I indicated.

Mayor Williams and Council Chair Cropp, when this avenue was

closed precipitously, I was very concerned at the fallout of expense

to the District of Columbia. Now, as I understand it, the District

was compensated for a few weeks for the expenses of police who

had to redirect traffic; is that true?

Mayor WILLIAMS. That’s my understanding that for a few weeks,

but that there is now no real general reimbursement for the closure, nor has there been a systematic analysis of the economic impact, although I think it is apparent even to adherents of its closing that there is an economic impact.

Ms. NORTON. Yes. You say in your testimony untold costs, and

it is very difficult to get an economic model that can somehow calculate the costs of business not done, of business turned away, the

cost of property values, the cost to commuters, the cost in time lost.

That’s a heavy challenge.

I do note—thank you, Federal Government—that the Federal

Highway Administration apparently allowed the District of Columbia to use its own highway funds to cover the cost of traffic control

devices that had to be put up. Do you have any figures, other than

the figures that we were given a few years ago of $750,000 annually in the loss of parking meter and parking fine revenue because

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parking has been restricted on the streets surrounding Pennsylvania Avenue?

Mayor WILLIAMS. I can look and see whether there has been an

update to that and get that information to you. I’m not aware that

there has been.

Ms. NORTON. We’d very much appreciate receiving that information.

Senator Dole, perhaps some of your experts could step forward.

I’m particularly interested to question some of the RAND security

experts. I’d like to know, for example, whether they believe that

closing down a high-profile part of a city shifts the risk to other

high-profile areas. For example, if you close down—if you are a terrorist and they close down your ability to get to the White House,

does that raise the profile of the House and the Senate theoretically, at least?

Mr. DOLE. That is a good question.

Mr. SPARKS. Congresswoman Norton, we do not have a RAND

representative with us this morning.

Ms. NORTON. Oh, my goodness, I’m sorry you do not.

Mr. SPARKS. But I don’t know that they addressed that particular

issue, that the barricading of the White House shifted the risk to

elsewhere in the city.

Ms. NORTON. I know they didn’t address it. That’s why I wanted

to examine some experts who might have the background—— Mr. DOLE. Maybe we should get that information.

Ms. NORTON. I would appreciate that.

We lack independent expert evidence, and so does the Federal

Government. It relies on its own experts, and its own experts have

a mission. They’re not supposed to advise them anything except

what they’d advise them. That puts us at a disadvantage.

I have been briefed by the Secret Service and they have changed

their stated reason for closing the avenue. They were real clear

they closed the avenue because of the threat of truck bombs. Now

they say we should leave it closed because there could be some

cars. I suppose if we take care of the cars through the ingenuity

of groups like you, that somebody in the Secret Service will find

that if you rode a bicycle past the White House you could possibly

damage something there. I mean, they really do leave the impression that the goal post is being moved here.

I’d like the view or the view you may have from having spoken

with your experts about whether your plan poses a risk from smaller vehicles that are not trucks but perhaps are cars.

Mr. DOLE. You know, we made the observation—I did in my

statement—that we thought there had been a change in Secret

Service policy, going from trucks to small cars. And I think our

study does include reasons that we believe that you can still have

the small cars and protect the safety of the White House and the

President and others who work there.

Mr. SPARKS. Ms. Norton, our expert witness today from Skidmore

Owings and Merrill has been responsible for doing buildings that

require a fair amount of security, and his name is Gary Haney, and

I suggest that maybe he respond to your question.

Ms. NORTON. We’d appreciate it.

Mr. HANEY. Thank you, Ken.

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The portion of our plan that addressed the issue of vehicle size

was the two bridges, the addition of the two bridges—not that we

have any great love of the notion of bridges over Pennsylvania Avenue, but it seemed to be a passive way to limit—by ‘‘passive,’’ I

mean a non-mechanical way—to limit the size of the vehicle.

We chose the height of about 7 feet, 6 inches, as Senator Dole

mentioned in his testimony, as the maximum height for typical

passenger vehicles. It also happens to be the typical height of a

standard garage door, residential garage door.

So that was our intention of using the bridges, picking that

height, and limiting at least to that size vehicle.

Now, there could be stretch limousines or other things that

would increase the carrying capacity of a vehicle that size.

Also, we, with the increase of the stand-off distance, we are not

privy, as I think is appropriate, to the measures that currently protect the White House from blast, and I think a comprehensive

study would have to be a combination of those measures that exist

today with the increased stand-off distance relative to the size of

vehicle that could pass beneath the bridge.

Ms. CROPP. Madam Chair, if I could add, I had a briefing by individuals who also looked into this issue, and I would like to be able

to get that information to you.

One of the issues that they had raised was the bow shape, the

idea the bow shape would increase the distance away from the

White House, and, additionally, if there was something like even

a gate that would have the same type of restriction—in other

words, a truck by a certain height wouldn’t be able to get under

the gate, and it may not have the bridge that would impede the

vista somewhat, and it would have the car-type traffic going

through, and the idea that they had looked up was that with cars

a bomb of—it would limit the size of the bomb, which would then

limit the potential blast possibilities, and that would somewhat

curb it.

I had asked if they had met with the Secret Service on that.

They were going to. And I would like to be able to also present that

information to you.

I think the gist of your question is, if there were automobiles,

there is a possibility that the safety and security of the inhabitants

of the White House would be protected.

Mrs. MORELLA. We’d appreciate having that information.

Ms. NORTON. Yes. That’s the question I’m getting at, and I can

understand that without experts here it is hard to relate to that

question.

To the extent that your experts could provide for the record an

indication of whether they think that cars could carry explosives

sufficient to do significant damage to the White House, it would be

helpful for our record.

Ms. CROPP. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. DOLE. We’ll do that.

Mrs. MORELLA. The gentlewoman’s time has expired. We gave

her a little longer because the questioning was so good and it was

important to have it responded to.

Mr. Platts, pleased to recognize you, sir.

Mr. PLATTS. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.

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Again, I just want to first thank all three of you for your testimony and your efforts, not just in this issue, but with numerous

issues across the spectrum of trying to have our Nation’s Capital

be a wonderful place to live, to work, to visit.

In reference to the chairwoman’s question or comment about citizens raising concerns, with a brother and his family who live and

work here in the District, I can tell you personally I have been lobbied by a resident of the District, even as Congressman from Pennsylvania, about the importance of reopening up Pennsylvania Avenue.

Two comments, and then one question. One is I appreciate the

Federal City Council’s approach and your testimony, Senator Dole,

in being willing to even put forward and consider options such as

it being reopened, the avenue being reopened, but perhaps not from

10 p.m., you know, during the night hours to lessen the challenge

for the Secret Service, as something, although you are not advocating, you’re willing to consider as one of the balances to be made,

and I think that’s an appropriate approach in finding a consensus

on the issue.

And also, Mayor Williams, on your analogy to Ten Downing

Street and Parliament, I think they are excellent examples. Having

lived in London and stood probably 40 feet from the—50 feet or so

from the front door of Ten Downing Street, it is, I think, another

good example of free countries standing tall to whatever threats

are out there, as we need to do here in America.

My one question is actually, Senator Dole, on the RAND Corp.

study, and I guess it maybe has been addressed a little bit by the

previous questioning about the inclusion of Secret Service. They, I

gather, were not consulted in the security review that was done?

That was an independent review, kind of making recommendations

to bring forth to the Mayor, to the Council, and to the Congress,

and the Secret Service was not included as far as their estimates

for distances; is that correct?

Mr. DOLE. I think they do have a different view. I haven’t heard

their testimony, but, again, I’d say that the Federal City Council

is a nonpartisan, bipartisan, group of people, and we do have the

District’s interests at heart. We are trying to help the District, but

we are not—certainly we are concerned about the safety of the

White House, the President, the occupants there.

Anything you want to add to that, Ken?

Mr. SPARKS. Just that the RAND people did talk to security people and law enforcement people, not on the record, but they did

talk to people.

Mr. PLATTS. OK. So there were consultations as part of the recommendations from the law enforcement community?

Mr. SPARKS. From the law enforcement community. Yes.

Mr. DOLE. I think if anyone from Pennsylvania might want to

lead the effort here, you have the name Pennsylvania on this avenue that has been closed. [Laughter.]

Mr. PLATTS. We appreciate that name.

Mr. DOLE. Right.

Mr. PLATTS. And all the more so my interest. We want Pennsylvania to be regarded in an open and free sense in all regards.

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And just, if I may, on a personal note, Senator Dole, thank you

for your inspiration to me in your record of public service. The first

campaign I became involved in as a volunteer was as a 14-year-old

in 1976 when you were campaigning with President Ford on the

ticket, and it was my predecessor’s first re-election and your, unfortunately, unsuccessful effort with President Ford, but I was delighted to have been able to volunteer as a ninth grader at the local

level in a Presidential campaign, and it helped to spur my interest

as to why I’m here today, so I appreciate your tremendous record

of public service.

Mr. DOLE. Thank you.

Mr. PLATTS. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you.

You have been an inspiration actually to all of us, Senator Dole,

as has your wife.

I just wanted to pick up on some questions.

I’m curious about whether or not there has been any account of

what the expenditures to follow through with the recommendations

of the RAND report would be.

Mr. DOLE. Anything on the cost?

Mrs. MORELLA. Anything on the cost. I mean, I realize in asking

this kind of question, you know, when we talk about traffic and we

talk about this symbol and we talk about pollution that obviously

there is not going to be a—the benefits are going to far outweigh

the cost, but I was curious about whether—nothing at this point?

Mr. SPARKS. We do not have cost estimates for that particular

plan. We were assured in the briefing that we had with the Clinton

administration from OMB and from the chief of staff that cost

would not be a determinant of whether this avenue should be reopened or just what would be done to protect the President; that

these were all things that could be managed.

And this particular plan would not be amongst the more-costly

alternatives. If, for example, we were to get into a tunnel or something that would be much more expensive.

Mrs. MORELLA. Right, right. Yes.

We are going to have a vote. Too bad Eleanor won’t be able to

join us for that, but maybe she could finish questioning if she had

any, but I thought I would finish the questioning of this first panel

with Mr. Platts before we do go over to vote.

I’m curious. Mayor Williams, have you found that there are some

other streets in the District of Columbia that you think would have

the—kind of the threat of assaults or security would be needed?

You’ve got a lot of embassies in this area. Obviously, all the embassies are here. I’m just wondering about the extrapolation of guarding the White House in terms of what it means to these other

monuments, to the embassies, to other areas where you may sense

the need for even greater security or great security.

Mayor WILLIAMS. I know that we on a daily basis have a very

close working relationship with the Secret Service, and I want to

commend them, because I think every American citizen commends

them for the work that they do in protecting the President——

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

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Mayor WILLIAMS [continuing]. And the First Family and other

important officials and their other elements of their mission. We

work closely with them.

To me the most compelling part of the Federal City Council’s

particular, as it was stated here, is that if you look at their plan,

the set-off from the White House exceeds the requirements or the

criteria for U.S. diplomatic missions overseas, so, you know, we’ve

already stated what we believe security criteria ought to be for important U.S. compounds, and this plan exceeds those same criteria.

I think that’s, to me, the best kind of common denominator to compare what is happening at the White House with other important

facilities.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Senator Dole, did the Federal City Council look at other residences of heads of state? I’m just curious, because—— Mr. DOLE. I asked. I don’t think we did. I think it would be a

good idea if we did do that.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Mr. DOLE. And I’d also like to include a statement in the record

from Senator Moynihan that he made at a press conference. He has

sort of been the leader in this effort, and he has done a lot of work

on it. He had a press conference, I think, with the Mayor a couple

of months ago. If I could include that statement, I’d appreciate it.

Mrs. MORELLA. Indeed, without objection, that statement will be

included. That’s very helpful.

[The information referred to follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. I guess my final question before I turn it over to

Mr. Platts for his final questioning is: have you had any consultation with the President, Mayor Williams or Councilwoman Cropp,

about this, President Bush? Maybe President Clinton if you want

to go back to—— Mayor WILLIAMS. Well, as Congresswoman Norton mentioned, all

of us have had discussions with the previous administration on this

at the highest levels, and I have personally discussed this with the

President, told him our strong feelings of our community or the

Federal City Council to reopen the avenue, and that we were going

to be pressing forward on this issue, and he seemed to be open to

sitting down with officials and going more deeply into the pros and

cons of it. But seemed open—how to put it—sensitive to our concerns about traffic impact, circulation, economic impact, and all the

symbolism that has been discussed here.

Mrs. MORELLA. I know he has had a lot of other things that he

has been looking at in terms of issues and timing and appointments, but we hope that the results of this hearing, that we will

be able to meet with him and to convey what we have learned in

this reexamination.

Well, as I leave you to vote, I want to thank this first panel and

hope that we can continue to work with you, consult with you so

that we can have the reopening of America’s Main Street.

Do any of you have any final comments you would like to make?

[No response.]

Mrs. MORELLA. OK. Great.

Mayor WILLIAMS. I just want to commend the Chair, Congresswoman Norton, and the committee for conducting this important

hearing and putting us on the national agenda.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes. Thank you. Thank you all very much.

Mr. PLATTS. I think we can let them go.

Mrs. MORELLA. Splendid. Thank you. Then we will reconvene

within 15 minutes.

[Recess.]

Mrs. MORELLA. I’m going to reconvene the hearing on ‘‘America’s

Main Street: The Future of Pennsylvania Avenue.’’ Again, thank you for your patience. I think because you are veterans and understand the ways of Congress, you recognize the

intervention of votes and other things that may occur, like meetings happening simultaneously and various voting sessions and

committees, and so I appreciate panel two and panel three for

being so very patient.

It is a pleasure to proceed with panel two: James Sloan, the Acting Under Secretary for Enforcement, U.S. Department of Treasury; Brian Stafford, the Director of the U.S. Secret Service; John

Parsons, the Associate Regional Director of Lands, Resources, and

Planning, National Capital Region, in the National Park Service

under Interior; Richard Friedman, who is the chairman of the National Capital Planning Commission; and Emily Malino, whom I

know as Emily Schryer, who is a member of the Commission of

Fine Arts.

May I ask you, in accordance with the committee, that you stand

and raise your right hands.

[Witnesses sworn.]

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Mrs. MORELLA. The record will show that you’ve all responded

affirmatively, and so we might now commence. Again, trying to

maintain, like, a 5-minute time connection would be appreciated.

Mr. Sloan, you can start us off, sir.

STATEMENT OF JAMES SLOAN, ACTING UNDER SECRETARY

FOR ENFORCEMENT, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TREASURY;

BRIAN STAFFORD, DIRECTOR, U.S. SECRET SERVICE; JOHN

PARSONS, ASSOCIATE REGIONAL DIRECTOR OF LANDS, RESOURCES, AND PLANNING, NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION, NATIONAL PARK SERVICE, DEPARTMENT OF INTERIOR; RICHARD L. FRIEDMAN, CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL CAPITAL PLANNING COMMISSION; AND EMILY MALINO, MEMBER, COMMISSION OF FINE ARTS

Mr. SLOAN. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.

Before I begin, I’d just like to say that it is—I think, important

for me to comment on the fact that perhaps by the end of my testimony I will still be—and I know I will be, agreeing with the Secret

Service’s recommendation that for at least the time being, Pennsylvania remain closed, but I think, in response to some of the early

testimony, I’d like to at least leave you with the impression we

don’t have a closed mind about the issues that we are discussing

here today. I think that is important to note.

Mrs. MORELLA. You just have a closed avenue.

Mr. SLOAN. That’s right.

Mrs. MORELLA. That’s what this is about.

Mr. SLOAN. Madam Chairwoman and members of the subcommittee, thank you for inviting me to testify today about this important

matter. As the Acting Under Secretary for Enforcement at the

Treasury Department, I have oversight responsibility for Treasury’s law enforcement bureaus, which include the Customs Service,

ATF, the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center, the Financial

Crimes Enforcement Network, and the U.S. Secret Service. I would

like to offer some general remarks and then introduce Director

Stafford to provide more-detailed analysis of this issue.

As indicated earlier, in 1995 former Secretary of the Treasury

Rubin directed the Secret Service to close a segment of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House to vehicular traffic. The

decision was, in part, based on recommendations of the Advisory

Committee of the White House Security Review, which was the

most extensive review of security of the White House ever conducted.

Other factors influencing this decision included the loss of life

and injury suffered in the bombings of the U.S. Marine barracks

in Beirut, the World Trade Center bombing in New York City, and

the Murrah Federal Building bombing in Oklahoma City.

The conclusion of the White House security review was clear that

closing Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House was the

only alternative available that would protect it from the devastating impact of a vehicle bomb detonated in the avenue in front of

the complex.

The White House security review was initiated following several

security incidents at the White House. In addition to the review

staff, Secretary Bentsen appointed a nonpartisan advisory commitVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:48 Dec 04, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00066 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75253.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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tee composed of six distinguished Americans to ensure that the review’s work was thorough and unbiased. These advisors were: Robert Carswell, former Deputy Secretary of the Treasury; William

Coleman, former Transportation Secretary; Charles Duncan,

former Secretary of Energy and Deputy Secretary of Defense; General David Jones, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Dr.

Judith Rodin, president of the University of Pennsylvania; and

Judge William Webster, former Director of the FBI and the CIA.

The review examined several security-related incidents that occurred in the vicinity of the White House.

The review was an extensive, 8-month study involving interviews

and briefing of more than 300 individuals from over 10 Government agencies and analysis of more than 1,000 documents. Experts

from eight foreign countries were also consulted, as well as three

former Presidents, in order to bring additional perspective to the

review.

The review resulted in the issuance of a classified report of more

than 500 pages, as well as a shorter public version of the report.

Treasury’s outside panel of distinguished experts concurred with

all of the recommendations, including the closing of Pennsylvania

Avenue.

Before recommending to close Pennsylvania Avenue, the White

House security review explored a wide variety of options in an effort to provide an appropriate level of security at the White House,

yet minimize the public impact.

After its extensive information gathering was complete, the review concluded that ‘‘There is no alternative to prohibiting vehicular traffic on Pennsylvania Avenue that would ensure the safety of

the President and others in the White House complex from explosive devices carried by vehicles near its boundaries.’’ Since that decision, numerous studies have been undertaken and

many proposals offered for alternative ways to ensure the safety of

the President and reopen Pennsylvania Avenue to traffic. The Secret Service continues to monitor all proposals and new technologies to determine whether there are any alternatives that

would adequately ensure the safety of the White House complex.

After careful analysis, the Secret Service has concluded that

opening Pennsylvania Avenue directly in front of the White House

would increase the threat to the White House complex posed by an

explosive-laden vehicle. We do not believe that the closure of Pennsylvania Avenue has affected the public’s access to the White

House. The White House complex is still visited by thousands of

people each day, and the area in front of the White House has remained open to pedestrian traffic.

There are several designs that have been proposed that would

make the segment of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White

House a beautiful and inviting pedestrian area.

Our job is to protect the President, the White House, and the

people who work in the building, and the people who visit it. The

closing of Pennsylvania Avenue is a real public safety issue that affects not only the safety of the First Family, but of all those who

visit and work in the area around the White House.

The Oklahoma City bombing, for example, damaged over 300

buildings, including 10 structures that collapsed. Any discussion

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about reopening Pennsylvania Avenue should and must include an

objective assessment of risk.

I’m aware that the National Capital Planning Commission has

convened a task force to review the impact of security measures

around the White House. It is my understanding that this panel is

comprised of representatives from the administration, Congress,

and the District of Columbia who will work with the Secret Service

and other agencies to review security and look at ways to make

Federal security less intrusive.

There may be other independent studies ongoing. I can assure

you that the Department of the Treasury will continue to monitor

the issue carefully, and we will assess new developments as they

occur. The Department of the Treasury remains fully committed to

the recommendations of the Secret Service regarding security

measures at the White House.

Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Mr. Sloan. I appreciate

your being here and the work that you have done.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Sloan follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. It is a pleasure to introduce Brian Stafford, who

is the Director of our Secret Service, with the statement also again

that I have great respect for the dedication to the work that you

do and want you to know that.

Yes, sir?

Mr. STAFFORD. Madam Chairwoman, thank you, and thank you

for your ongoing support of the men and women of the Secret Service. I’d also like to thank the ranking member, who was here earlier, Representative Norton, and other members of the subcommittee for providing a forum for me to speak to Pennsylvania Avenue

issues.

I appreciate the opportunity to address the national security reasons that underscored the 1995 decision to close a portion of Pennsylvania Avenue to vehicular traffic. With your permission, I’d like

to submit my full statement for the record.

Mrs. MORELLA. Without objection, so ordered.

Mr. STAFFORD. On May 19, 1995, then Secretary of the Treasury

Robert Rubin directed the Secret Service to prohibit vehicular traffic on Pennsylvania Avenue and contiguous streets surrounding the

perimeter of the White House. This decision followed an extraordinary consultation process among the President, Secretary of the

Treasury, Attorney General, regarding the vulnerability of the

White House and, consequently, the life of the President to explosive-laden-vehicle attacks. Their support for this decision was overwhelming and unequivocal. The reasons supporting the restrictions

have not changed.

This decision was not based on speculation or alarmism. It was

made on the recommendation of a nonpartisan, blue-ribbon panel

of prominent Americans assembled to objectively study White

House security. This was an 8-month study, and the most comprehensive ever done.

In April 1995, this advisory panel and the Secret Service concluded, based upon a scientific analysis of the vulnerability of the

White House and intelligence data, that no alternative to closing

Pennsylvania Avenue to vehicles was available. Their recommendations were unanimous in that restrictions were the only way to protect the White House from catastrophic damage or complete destruction inflicted by a vehicle bomb.

Having said that, opposition to the restrictions by some is understandable. The closure did impact the city and has made all of our

lives a bit more inconvenient; however, the absence of traffic has

made pedestrian access to the White House safer and more enjoyable for over 5,000 people who visit the White House on average

every day.

The Secret Service has been in the forefront of advocating urban

design and traffic study mitigations that would comprehensively resolve the impact of the restrictions on our city and its citizens, but

I emphasize that any plan that would permit vehicles within the

currently established security perimeter will not protect the President and the White House complex from a catastrophic vehicle

bomb attack.

The Secret Service’s longstanding recommendation regarding

Pennsylvania Avenue was formulated by applying the same methodology and standards that we consistently apply to all of our

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threat and vulnerability assessments. I assure you that our decision to recommend these restrictions was not cavalier, but the result of years of in-depth research, analysis, and consideration by

the most knowledgeable and experienced technical experts in this

country.

We have, together with our colleagues in the intelligence community, collectively evaluated the threat environment. We have looked

at the explosive materials and delivery systems available. We have

diagnosed our own vulnerabilities, and in the end the Secret Service drew decisive conclusions about the likelihood of a violent and

destructive attack and what we could do to prevent it.

Let me also note that I have discussed our position with Director

Tenet of the CIA, Director Freeh of the FBI, and General Shelton,

the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staffs. All continue to support

our position on vehicular restrictions on Pennsylvania Avenue between 15th and 17th Street.

Madam Chairwoman, we have witnessed a decade of wellplanned and well-executed attacks, both at home and abroad,

against Americans and American symbolic targets—the World

Trade Center, Oklahoma City, Al-Khobar, Saudi Arabia, the U.S.

Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, and the USS Cole. The mass

casualties associated with many of these bombings is staggering

and provides sobering evidence that devastating bomb attacks can

and do occur.

Since 1995, the Secret Service has worked closely with the National Park Service and the Federal Highway Administration to reconfigure the two west-bound lanes of E Street, NW., from 15th to

17th Streets. The restoration of two-way traffic on E Street has significantly relieved the traffic impact created by the original 1995

decision.

Congress has also recently authorized a $500,000 grant for the

D.C. Department of Public Works to examine traffic mitigation

around the White House in order to develop a long-term solution

to traffic patterns. These solutions include examining the viability

of an east-west tunnel. We strongly support this initiative.

As you know, the National Capital Planning Commission has

empaneled a task force to further examine security designs within

Washington, DC, including those currently in effect on Pennsylvania Avenue. The Secret Service has joined the Commission on

this important review, and the task force is scheduled to deliver its

recommendations later this summer. I assure the members of this

subcommittee that we look forward to the perspectives the other

members of the task force will provide.

In conclusion, I strongly believe the original decision to close

Pennsylvania Avenue to vehicular traffic was the correct action.

Furthermore, I will continue to recommend that the portion of

Pennsylvania Avenue in question remain closed to vehicular traffic

at the present time.

Madam Chairwoman, thank you again for this opportunity to

speak in this forum, and I’m willing to answer any questions you

have.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Mr. Stafford. I, again, appreciate your being here. You must feel kind of like the Lone RangVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:48 Dec 04, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00075 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75253.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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er, but you have done it very well and I look forward to asking

questions.

Mr. STAFFORD. I’d just like to comment on the first panel—again,

Mayor Williams. We have a long history of working with the Mayor

and will continue to do so. Senator Dole I have a great amount of

respect for. We have been on the road a lot together. Right now we

seem to be going down two different roads, but he is a wonderful

American and I can’t say enough about his efforts, also, so thank

you.

Mrs. MORELLA. The respect is reciprocal.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Stafford follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. Mr. Parsons.

Mr. PARSONS. Good afternoon, Madam Chairman. I want to

thank you for your leadership in bringing these hearings to fruition, and also providing us the opportunity to express the views

of the Secretary of Interior.

Pennsylvania Avenue is certainly among the world’s most famous

streets. It’s 200-year history began with Pierre L’Enfant, who was

appointed by George Washington to plan the Nation’s Capital.

L’Enfant’s plan connected the two most important buildings in

the Nation—the U.S. Capitol and the White House—each in view

of the other, with a broad diagonal boulevard which was named

‘‘Pennsylvania Avenue’’ by Thomas Jefferson in 1791.

While Pennsylvania Avenue serves the city of Washington as a

major east-west transit route, it is known the world over as the

heart of the Nation’s Capital. On this avenue of Presidents we celebrate the election of a President every 4 years with a parade down

the avenue and honor other national heroes and foreign leaders

there, as well.

Also known as ‘‘America’s Main Street,’’ the avenue has been the

parade route of many of our Nation’s most famous public gatherings—the place where Americans from all over the country have

come together throughout our Nation’s history to commemorate our

triumphs and tragedies or to try to influence their President and

Representatives here in Congress.

While it is truly more than just another city street, Pennsylvania

Avenue also became Washington’s first downtown street in 1801

with the establishment by the commissioners of the District of Columbia of city’s first market at the location still known as ‘‘Market

Square’’ between 7th and 9th Streets.

The Center Market was followed by the city’s first financial district, part of which survives as the Sears House and former Washington National Bank Building at 7th Street and Indiana Avenue.

Attracting myriad of businesses since the early 19th century,

Pennsylvania Avenue has been the key element of ordinary life and

commerce in the District of Columbia throughout its history.

The National Park Service is proud to administer parkland along

the entire length of Pennsylvania Avenue between these two structures. LaFayette Park north of the avenue and the White House

and its grounds south of it have been under the stewardship of the

Park Service since 1933. We have managed the tree-lined sidewalks, parks, plazas, monuments, and memorials of Pennsylvania

Avenue, national historic sites, since their creation by PADC, or

Pennsylvania Avenue Development Corp., as a result of President

Kennedy’s inspiration as he traveled along the avenue route of his

inaugural parade.

After the Department of Treasury restricted public vehicular

traffic on Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House, former

President Clinton’s chief of staff, William Panetta, charged the

Park Service with developing a design for the closed portion of the

avenue between 15th and 17th Streets for pedestrian use.

Using a broad public involvement process and a design group

composed of experts in architecture, landscape architecture, urban

planning, and historic preservation, we released our proposed design for public review in spring of 1996. The Park Service has

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taken the planning process for the surface treatment of the avenue

between 15th and 17th Street as far as we can at this point.

As you may know the Interior Appropriations Act for the past

several years have contained language prohibiting the Park Service

from doing any planning, design, or construction of improvements

of the avenue in front of the White House without the advanced approval of the House and Senate Committees on Appropriations.

However, as the steward of the parkland on either side of the avenue in this location, we stand ready to assist in the planning and

design for the area with the approval of Congress. In that context,

you already heard that the NCPC has established an interagency

task force to examine designs in the Nation’s Capital, security designs in the Nation’s Capital.

I’m pleased to represent the Secretary of Interior on that task

force, and the task force is engaged in examination of security designs not only around the White House but along all of the Federal

buildings on Pennsylvania Avenue, as well as the monuments and

memorials in the monumental core.

The National Park Service clearly recognizes the security considerations of the Secret Service with respect to the closing of the avenue, as well as our challenge to protect such icons of democracy as

the monuments and memorials to Presidents Washington, Lincoln,

Roosevelt, and Jefferson.

Madam Chairwoman, that concludes my statement. I’d be

pleased to answer questions you may have.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Mr. Parsons, and for the work that

is done by the Park Service and Interior.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Parsons follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. Mr. Friedman, I’m pleased to recognize you. You

have been referred to very often throughout our hearing so far, particularly because of the National Capital Planning Commission’s

plan which you will be presenting to us now. Thank you for being

here, sir.

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman and members of

the subcommittee. My name is Richard Friedman. I am from Cambridge, MA, and I’m chairman of the National Capital Planning

Commission.

The Commission is the Federal Government’s central planning

authority in Washington, DC, and the surrounding region. We are

responsible for preserving the historic urban design that has made

Washington one of the most admired capital cities in the world. I

am delighted to have the opportunity to report to you on our current efforts to ensure that security installations in the city’s monumental core do not continue to diminish the unique beauty and

character of our Nation’s Capital.

Earlier this month, the Commission established an interagency

task force to evaluate the impact of Federal security measures

around the White House, including Pennsylvania Avenue between

15th and 17th Streets, and around national monuments and Federal buildings in the city’s core. We initiated this effort because we

believe that we must find creative ways to ensure that our public

places are respectful of the city’s historic streetscapes, and are, at

the same time, accessible and safe for those who live, work, and

visit the Nation’s Capital.

Good security and good urban planning are not incompatible.

Our goal is to make the monumental core of Washington a beautiful, friendly, and well-designed urban space, while ensuring that

the safety considerations are not unduly compromised.

The messages to Washington’s workers, residents, and visitors

must be of a city reflecting a Nation where freedom and openness

are valued and a police state mentality is not implied or conveyed.

All of the stakeholders concerned with security, urban design,

economic development, and traffic management need to be at the

table as we examine these issues in a comprehensive way. For this

reason, we have made every effort to be as inclusive as possible in

selecting task force members. Serving on the task force, which I

will personally chair, are: Interior Secretary Gale Norton, General

Services Acting Administrator Thurman Davis, Mayor Anthony

Williams, and City Council Chairperson Linda Cropp. Heads of

other Federal agencies will be invited to join the task force at critical stages of its work. These may include the Attorney General, the

Secretaries of State, Treasury, Defense, and Transportation, as

well as Directors of the Secret Service, the FBI, and the Bureau of

Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms.

Additional participants may include the Architect of the Capitol,

the chairman of the Commission of Fine Arts, and the executive director of the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation.

In establishing the task force, we have been working closely with

Secret Service officials and are particularly gratified that they have

agreed to participate in this effort. The excellent NCPC professional staff, augmented by outside consultants where necessary,

will support the efforts of this task force.

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The Commission has already engaged a nationally recognized security consultant, John R. Smith of U.S. Security, to assist in the

task force work. Mr. Smith is a former senior Secret Service official.

We are also pleased that, in recognizing the Commission’s ‘‘unique statutory role in planning for the Nation’s Capital, including the White House,’’ the House and Senate Committees on Appropriations recently authorized the Commission to examine security

designs along Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House.

The task force plans to evaluate all existing proposals, including

the Department of the Interior’s proposal for the development of a

permanent President’s Park, and the Federal City Council/RAND

proposal that would open the avenue to vehicular traffic through

the use of protective pedestrian bridges.

We will also develop and/or be receptive to any newly developed

approaches to this complex problem which involves issues of image,

democracy, traffic circulation, and, obviously, security.

I should note that, while the efforts of the task force will first

focus on Pennsylvania Avenue, our interests will extend beyond the

avenue to open space, public buildings, memorials, and monuments

throughout the city’s monumental core. Nowhere has the value of

planning been so clearly demonstrated as in the development of our

National Capital. We should do everything we can to preserve the

magnificent legacy of Washington’s historic L’Enfant and McMillan

Plans.

We expect the task force to be concerned with all aspects of security procedures that affect our public domain. This includes not

only street closings, but the availability of curbside parking; the installation of security bollards, walls, and other barriers; security

barriers; and the hardening of public buildings and monuments.

We also expect to develop standards for beautifying security installations that we intend will serve as a benchmark for security

designed throughout the Federal City—a clear guideline for various

architects and agencies to use so that the city has a coordinated

look and feel instead of a hodgepodge of divergent attempted solutions which have no sense of planning or continuity.

Examples of security projects that the task force may examine in

the near future include the permanent perimeter security for the

Ronald Reagan and main State Buildings, the construction of physical perimeter and security throughout the Federal Triangle, and

the design of security features for the new ATF Building at the

intersection of New York and Florida Avenues.

In addition, the task force is asking the Architect of the Capitol

to join it in looking at the security for the Senate and House office

buildings and the exterior of the Capitol, itself, to develop strategies for security planning.

Although this is an area under the jurisdiction of the Architect

of the Capitol, it is important for the design of the city that we

adopt measures that are compatible for all of our important civic

monuments.

We’ve been gratified by the support we’ve received from decisionmakers throughout the city for this effort. Congresswoman Morella,

you’ve shown outstanding leadership and courage on this subject by

your past actions and by convening this hearing. Congresswoman

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Eleanor Norton, chairman of the Federal City Council, and Mayor

Williams have all hailed the establishment of the task force as a

much-needed and welcome step.

I recently met with former Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, a

long-time champion of renewal along Pennsylvania Avenue, who

has praised the task force initiative and has indicated that the National Capital Planning Commission is the most qualified and appropriate organization to undertake this effort.

The task force has committed itself to an aggressive work schedule and expects to make its preliminary recommendations to President Bush and the Congress by July of this year.

I appreciate your invitation to be here today. I look forward to

your continued support of the task force as it works to help ensure

a safe and open national capital that is worthy of our great Nation.

That concludes my formal remarks, and I look forward to any

questions you may have.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Mr. Friedman. We appreciate your coming here also from my home State of Massachusetts

and the work you’ve done as the chair.

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Friedman follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. I would now like to recognize with great fondness

Emily Malino, who is a member of the Commission of Fine Arts.

Ms. MALINO. Thank you, Madam Chair. It is a real pleasure to

be here today and to be part of these exploratory hearings on the

impact of the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue, as well as possible

alternatives for reopening it.

I am a member of the Commission of Fine Arts. The Commission

appreciates the opportunity to join your discussion on the status of

Pennsylvania Avenue just north of the White House.

Since 1910, the Commission has been involved in all of the major

planning and design issues affecting our national capital, including

the White House and surrounding area. Most recently, this agency,

along with the National Park Service, the Treasury Department,

and the National Capital Planning Commission, has spent a considerable amount of time reviewing the current master plan for the

development of the White House, and we have given much thought

to the future treatment of Pennsylvania Avenue.

It is a source of increasing concern that not only the White

House but many of our great civic buildings and monuments are

taking on the look of a city under siege. The effort to protect our

people and the buildings they work in and visit is understandable

because the threat of terrorism is real; nevertheless, we cannot

allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by fear. No matter how many

measures are adopted to harden a building, or how many barriers

we erect, or how apparently thorough the attempt, we can never

guarantee 100 percent invulnerability to acts of violence.

What we need above all else is to achieve some balance between

these potential terrorist acts and the preservation of our sense of

freedom and national pride, while allowing us access to our Government in an environment that is not derived from fear.

With respect to the design of security measures throughout the

monumental core, we have been working with many Federal and

local agencies on measures that can afford increased perimeter security without destroying the architecture of the buildings or their

setting. We have found that the introduction of passive landscape

elements such as terraces and low walls can provide excellent barriers against vehicular intrusions without appearing overly aggressive.

Hedges on either side of vehicle-proof fences can also provide a

degree of protection and are more user friendly than bollards.

Sometimes even commonplace elements—light fixtures and park

benches, for example—can be reinforced for protection.

Careful study on a case-by-case basis would be more appropriate

than using uniform devices and techniques and would certainly be

indicated in any study of this stretch of Pennsylvania Avenue.

Regarding Pennsylvania Avenue, we realize that we must find a

realistic way to deal with the threat of terrorism, which is here to

stay. Therefore, a completely unregulated flow of traffic so close to

the White House is unacceptable. After much study of this matter,

we are convinced that there are reasonable ways to improve security without totally isolating the building and grounds from passing

motorists.

Reduced widths of right-of-way, a possible realignment of the avenue, the introduction of circles or other control points to modify

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the speed and volume of access are all measures that are feasible

and can be introduced.

Such measures in varying degrees would guarantee a much safer

environment than existed previously, but would not shut off the

White House entirely. The act of approaching the White House and

experiencing that special nearness to the Presidency is something

all of us ought to strive to preserve.

As an architectural design consultant to the National Park Service, I redesigned the interiors of the three contiguous buildings on

Jackson Place for the Bicentennial in 1976, and I grew to love the

transparency and the elegance of the approach to the White House

across the gardenscape.

The Commission of Fine Arts occupied one of those buildings for

20 years, and commissioners and staff could sense the importance

of the Office of the Presidency, as well as its approachability. This

is the house of the President, not a palace. I can think of no more

worthwhile goal than to preserve, protect, and improve the connection of the American people to their Government.

The Commission is prepared to work with other Government

agencies and the public to explore ideas for doing that.

The views provided in this testimony are those of the Commission of Fine Arts and do not represent the views of the administration.

That concludes my written testimony.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Ms. Malino. We very

much appreciate that.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Malino follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. OK. I’m going to ask some questions. I’m going

to start off with a preface from some articles.

Starting up with the Washington Times, in its Wednesday,

March 7th, issue this year carried an article in which Jonathan

Turley, who once worked for the National Security Agency, said,

‘‘The unfortunate thing about Pennsylvania Avenue is that we have

significantly altered one of the country’s most important symbols to

address the most crude terrorist attack in the form of a truck

bomb.’’ Bruce Hoffman, chief author of a RAND Corp. study last year regarding the reopening of Pennsylvania Avenue in the same article

was quoted as saying that the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue

‘‘only affects one particular category of risk,’’ a truck bomb like the

one that ripped through the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in

Oklahoma City in 1995.

And Gary Aldridge, a 26-year veteran of the FBI who also

worked for 5 years at the White House and authored the book,

‘‘Unlimited Access: An FBI Agent Inside the Clinton White House,’’ has said that, ‘‘The White House is already well protected and does

not need a road closed in front of it to be safer.’’ Bearing that in mind, I guess I would first of all ask Secret Service: is there anything that you would allow in terms of opening

Pennsylvania Avenue other than just the beautification of a pedestrian way? I mean, would you legitimately be open to other suggestions?

Mr. STAFFORD. Very much so, and we have been since the closing

in 1995. As you know, Madam Chairwoman, we have been looking

at and concerned with this issue since 1983, when the suicide

bombings happened in Beirut and 241 of our American Marines

were killed. We started studying the vulnerabilities that existed at

the White House at that time and continue to do so up until this

day.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Would you like to comment on that, Mr. Sloan?

Mr. SLOAN. I am familiar with the comments of Messrs. Turley,

Hoffman, and Aldridge, and I think it’s—and each one of them are

obviously coming at this issue from a different perspective.

I think that the Secret Service, the Treasury Department, and

perhaps everybody at this table, every stakeholder that Mr. Friedman talked about really desires to safely open Pennsylvania Avenue. I think that obviously the dispute is how do we achieve that

safely.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Mr. SLOAN. And I think it is safe to say that once technology has

caught up with the threat to the degree that we can feel comfortable in opening the street, I think we are still going to be engaged in this debate, to include the comments from the gentlemen

that you referred to in the Washington Times article.

Mrs. MORELLA. And then, as you look at the fact that most security breaches at the White House have occurred by individuals who

have scaled the 8-foot fences, have brandished guns or fired guns

near the White House, so far there have been no incidents of a

bomb-carrying vehicle on Pennsylvania Avenue, neither a truck nor

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vania Avenue to vehicular traffic when the facts show that security

breaches have been performed by pedestrians, that there is no—

there has not been any need demonstrated except that you look to

Oklahoma City and you look at the World Trade Building? You are

protecting against one kind of truck, one kind of obstacle.

Mr. STAFFORD. Well, the closing——

Mrs. MORELLA. You’ve got airplanes, it could be any number of

things.

Mr. STAFFORD. You’re correct. I mean, the closing of that portion

of Pennsylvania Avenue on the north side of the White House does

primarily address one threat that is a huge concern to us, and that

threat is an explosive-laden vehicle. It does not necessarily have to

be a truck or a large vehicle.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Mr. STAFFORD. It can be a number of small vehicles, it can be

a small vehicle, it can be a pickup truck, it can be an SUV, all of

which can do catastrophic damage to the White House and the

President and its occupants.

So the truck is not an issue here, which is one of the problems

we had with the RAND Commission report. It can be anything

much smaller than a truck.

During the White House review, there was an incident in December 1994 when an unstable person parked their vehicle on the

south side of the White House and said it was full of explosives.

He was arrested and ultimately it was not full of explosives.

Back in 1974 there was an individual who rammed the gates and

actually got to the north portico with explosives strapped to his

body in the car.

So there have been incidents of explosives in and about the

White House, and it is a huge concern to us. It is just one threat,

but we attack them individually. We have counter measures in

place to tactically respond to just about—not just about, we could

tactically respond to every threat, including the air.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes. That RAND report gives a number of suggestions, including one that would say go from six lanes to four

lanes, and in all instances you are increasing that distance from

the White House to Pennsylvania Avenue and task force reducing

any destructive quality. Have you looked at those Rand

recommendations——

Mr. STAFFORD. We have.

Mrs. MORELLA [continuing]. Individually and analyzed them?

And you do not find—see any promise in them?

Mr. STAFFORD. With that particular recommendation, no. I mean,

what they’ve done is by the Jefferson Bow they’ve gained about 80

feet, which isn’t very much, of stand-off distance. Will it help? A

bit, but basically it is all determined on the amount of explosives

and also the structural integrity of the target, in this situation the

White House.

The White House is a 200-year-old sandstone structure. It is not

a newly built Federal building built to new blast standards.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Let me kind of share the questioning with some of the other witnesses.

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Mr. Friedman, it appears as though an awful lot of work has already been done in putting together your task force, and it seems

to be exceedingly well represented from different areas, but, you

know, your scope and your mission is so vast—I know you just read

it, and I know I marked it in the book here because I was very impressed with what you were planning to do. Maybe you can tell me

while I find that—but you’re going to go through all the monuments, you’re going to be going through other streets. There’s so

much that you are going to be looking at. Tell me about why you’re

doing all of it, how long it would honestly take, and do you have

the resources to do it.

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Well, those are very good questions. We have an

aggressive schedule, but we think—I think we do have adequate resources on a preliminary basis. I think, Madam Chairwoman, the

question is there are many proposals out there that have not—our

view is that these proposals have not been looked at in a comprehensive way. One architect comes up with one proposal, one corporation comes up with another, etc. We want to try to bring all

the parties together at a table or at a series of tables to try to look

at the body of information that is out there and see if some consensus can be built out of that.

We do have an aggressive schedule. We said we would report

back, but not to say that in July we will have a definitive answer

as to what exactly should be done, but I think we will be in a position to make preliminary recommendations or to recommend next

steps.

Mrs. MORELLA. I don’t know what you mean, the entire scope of

what the task force would do, but I did find my spot where you say,

‘‘Examples of security projects that the task force may examine— ’’ maybe you mean may. Maybe the stress is on ‘‘may’’ and it would

be on definitely with regard to Pennsylvania Avenue, because you

are saying, ‘‘The permanent perimeter security for the Ronald

Reagan and the Main State Buildings, the construction of physical

perimeter security throughout the Federal Triangle, the design of

security measures for the new ATF Building at the intersection of

New York and Florida Avenues, and then also going into the working with the Architect of the Capitol, looking at security for the

Senate and the House office buildings and the exterior of the Capitol, itself.’’

Are we going to end up being a walled city, or do you just see

this as kind of a continuing responsibility that you have as the

Planning Commission? And would you look at Pennsylvania Avenue first and focus on it?

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Obviously, I think we will look at Pennsylvania

Avenue first, and it hasn’t been said here but clearly the White

House—and I’m not a professional security person, but the White

House has a different category of risk and attraction, if you will,

to a terrorist than some other targets would have, so it is sort of

the crown jewel of what we are trying to deal with.

But I do think that it is an ongoing process. Obviously, when this

city was originally designed terrorism was not a factor, and this is

a—so we now are faced with retrofitting the city for the current environment that we live in, and I don’t think we are going to necessarily reinvent the wheel, but I do think that these temporary—

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so-called ‘‘temporary solutions’’ of jersey barriers and bollards and

guard booths and fences are really sending the wrong message, and

that we can put together, if you will, sort of a guideline so that various agencies—there are so many jurisdictions that exist—that various agencies—the GSA, the Architect of the Capitol, the Park

Service, and others—can have, if you will, a catalog of acceptable

ways, generic ways to deal with these issues.

So it is a complicated problem, but I think it is very much worthy of understanding.

Also, I think that technology is an area which we certainly don’t

have the resources inside our agency to deal with the technological

answers, but at some point it may be apparent that high-tech approaches or innovative technology will have some answers here,

and we may need to ask Congress or some other source for funding

for certain—maybe a Manhattan-type project with the best brains

in the country to sort of solve this problem, because in my view

this present situation is fairly intolerable.

Mrs. MORELLA. You’ve looked at the RAND report, then?

Mr. FRIEDMAN. I have only looked at it. Yes, I have. We are convening our first meeting of our task force on Friday, and I believe

that RAND is going to make a presentation to us on Friday of this

week, 2 days from now.

Mrs. MORELLA. I have a grave concern about paralysis by analysis and that, you know, maybe we’ll never get anything done because we’ll keep setting up task force or groups to study and look

at it, and in the meantime, as I have mentioned before, we’ve got

all these other Federal buildings, too, that have not had the barricade that Pennsylvania Avenue has had.

I was going to ask you about the technology. You think that it

is not here now, then. And I would also ask the Secret Service if,

Mr. Stafford, you would like to comment on that, on the technology.

You know, yesterday somebody handed me—I wish I brought it

with me—it looks like a piece of wallpaper, and it is bulletproof.

It just seems to me technology is moving so fast that there are all

kinds of possibilities that may be out there, if either of you would

like to comment.

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Well, I’m not a technical person and I’m not a security person. I do think that there are—that we hope that comes

out of this, and maybe publicity would help this. Some of these programs that are less obtrusive than—somebody said an 1850’s solution.

By the way, with respect to your paralysis for analysis or by

analysis comment, or whatever, that’s not our goal here. We really

want to be quite expeditious.

Mrs. MORELLA. We certainly want you to be and look forward to

working with you on it.

Again, I’d like to certainly find out when you think you would

have the Pennsylvania Avenue facet of that task force report that

would be completed. I don’t know whether you want to give me any

kind of a date for the record or not.

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Well, we’ve said we would report back in July.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Mr. FRIEDMAN. And, by the way, in addition to—one of the other

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bent upon us to study, to the extent that we can, the possibility of

making the White House or other buildings less susceptible to

bomb-laden attack by strengthening those buildings in some manner, so I think that’s another area that we should be looking at.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes. Right.

Mr. Stafford, I didn’t give you a chance to comment on technology.

Mr. STAFFORD. Yes, Madam Chairwoman, we’ve looked at every

technology that exists today. We have engineers, we have chemists,

we have physical security specialists that sit on every interagency

technological group in this country, and nobody has yet come forward with any technology that will mitigate the concerns that we

have.

We continue to look. We hope that there will be something some

day that will, but to date we have not found anything. We’ve contracted with outside laboratories and, again, nobody has found any

technological fix to this situation.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes. Well, this is supposed to be a temporary fix,

the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue, and that’s one of our concerns,

and the reason for this hearing is to make sure that ‘‘temporary’’ does not translate into ‘‘permanent,’’ and it is time, with our advances, to—— Mr. STAFFORD. Well, if I could respond to that just briefly—— Mrs. MORELLA. Please.

Mr. STAFFORD [continuing]. On the temporary portion, you know,

I think Ms. Malino would corroborate this. If you go back into the

1700’s with L’Enfant’s original plan, that plan did not call for a

road in front of the White House. It called for a pedestrian plaza.

If you look in the early 1960’s a famous architect that designed LaFayette Square was commissioned by Jacqueline Kennedy. He recommended to close Pennsylvania Avenue and to create a pedestrian park to give American citizens actually more access to the

White House. He also proposed a tunnel underneath to accommodate the traffic issues. We would very much support that.

Mrs. MORELLA. That’s going back, and not back to the future. I

can—you know, there are people who could tell you when the Rockville Pike was not a pike, was not even a road, was simply a place

where adventurous people might walk to go out into the wilderness. But I appreciate your comment.

Let me ask you about what would happen with this commission,

Mr. Friedman. How are you going to arrive at conclusions? What

is going to be the method that you’re going to arrive at decisionmaking, consensus decisionmaking, the process?

Mr. FRIEDMAN. I think that it is not so complicated. I think that

we are going to have—going to spend 20 days as you are spending

today hearing every idea that we can hear, with a diverse group

of people representing every interest group in this particular issue,

and hopefully there will be dialog and some clarity that will come

out of this.

There are a lot of people who independently have looked at this,

at these things, but I don’t think there has been, at least in my

perspective, a coordinated view. So I think what we hope to do— maybe it is a fantasy, but my hope is that, by having a series of

intensive meetings, as many as we have to have, convening as

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many experts as we need, and listening to every idea, that there

will be bits and pieces and things that come out of various ideas,

and some people will see some flexibility in their pre-conditions

and we’d come at this with a completely open mind. And we may

have a deadlock at the end of 4 months, but hopefully we’ll have—

we’ll shed some more light on the issue and be able to come up

with some clear recommendations. They won’t be perfect, but they

will be as good a job as we can do professionally.

Mrs. MORELLA. Let me just ask Ms. Malino, you are looking at

the concept of opening Pennsylvania Avenue, too, aren’t you? It’s

not just beautification and making sure that it is artistically arranged or configured?

Ms. MALINO. Exactly. What we are hoping is that—there are several plans, as you are aware, and all of them try to preserve security primarily, but within the challenge to make the security measures really un-terrifying to pedestrians and drivers of small vehicles.

And we’ve looked—at the Commission we’ve looked at a great

many technological improvements that would enable us to do just

that. Technology is really racing along and giving us a lot of really

helpful suggestions on how to combine security with good design.

For instance, surveillance devices can now be encapsulated in

flagpoles or signs, building signs, so that nobody would ever know

that they are there. They are actually the size of a playing card.

There is increased efficiency in lighting systems that enable you

to throw huge beams of light in a very discreet and finite way that

don’t just flow out all over the landscape but pick out what you

want that beam to illuminate.

And, of course, improved computerized communications that

make it possible to verify credentials of people at check points, just

through flashing a scanner across their license plate, for instance,

or across their driver’s license.

So that I think that there are many ways that the technology

could be improved to lessen the threat of terrorism at the same

time as acting together in a coordinated way to improve the design

of any anti-terrorist security provisions.

Mrs. MORELLA. Very good points with regard to technology, and

I know that, you know, we’re all considering it. It just seems to me

that the barrier on Pennsylvania Avenue is geared toward massive

truck with massive explosives, and not really other kinds of threats

over which we have no real control at this moment.

There is also a concern about it being kind of a self-fulfilling

prophecy. I mean, if you start having people fearful of Pennsylvania Avenue, perhaps you might even inspire in a sick mind the

idea that something should be done, rather than keeping it open

as is true democratic spirit.

Well, I’m going to give you each one moment if you would like

to make any final comments.

Other members of the committee are submitting questions. Some

have been submitted to me to put into the record for them, and so

if you do get questions I hope you would be willing to respond.

Thank you.

Mr. Sloan, would you like to make any parting shots?

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Mr. SLOAN. I think the hearing is clear. In fact, I intend to stick

around for the next panel. I’m anxious to hear first-hand of the impact that the panel members I anticipate will be discussing.

But I think all of this points out and helps us to recognize the

dilemma that we face in law enforcement all the time, and

that’s—— Mrs. MORELLA. Yes.

Mr. SLOAN [continuing]. The issue between security and when security bumps up against the concerns that the first panel, this

panel, and the third panel are going to articulate. It is a dilemma

we all face in law enforcement every day, and I think the hearing

has pointed out that it is not a dilemma easily overcome.

Mrs. MORELLA. I thank you Secretary Sloan. I thank you for your

presentation, your attitude.

Mr. Stafford—Director Stafford.

Mr. STAFFORD. I would just like to add, Congresswoman, that the

Secret Service is and always has been extremely sensitive to the

inconveniences, in this case to the District of Columbia. Every day

we look for balance in what we do between total access and total

isolation to the person or the facility that we are trying to protect,

and it is a balancing act for us.

I would very much agree with many here today that said that

it is unsightly. It is. I don’t like the way it works, the way it looks

as a Secret Service agent. I don’t like the way it looks as an American. But there is a fix to that, and I think there is some evidence

that it can be very attractive.

We’ve looked and we’ve worked well with the District and with

Federal Highway on the south side of the White House. It is starting to become a bit more appealing. Within 18 months it will be

extremely attractive and look a lot like what Ms. Malino has described.

I have one other comment. There was a comment mentioned.

Congressman Knollenberg mentioned something about economic

loss in his original comments. And, again, I can’t speak to the economic loss nor do I think too many can speak to what that loss is

to the District. What I can speak to, though, is what the loss would

be if a bomb goes off at Pennsylvania Avenue. And if you use Oklahoma City again as an analogy, there were 300 buildings destroyed, 10 devastated, 168 men, women, and children killed, and

over $700 million lost. That’s not a guess. That’s what happened

in Oklahoma City. That can happen on our Main Street, also, if it

is opened back up.

Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. Have you discussed your point of view with the

President?

Mr. STAFFORD. I have.

Mrs. MORELLA. You have? You have. Yes. What did he say?

[Laughter.]

Mr. STAFFORD. On which occasion? [Laughter.]

No, he listened and was noncommittal and said he would continue to listen to all the issues before he made a decision.

Mrs. MORELLA. Splendid.

Mr. Parsons, I didn’t ask you any of the questions. I just know

that the Park Service does a terrific job, and you do.

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Mr. PARSONS. Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. And if you’d like to offer any comments—— Mr. PARSONS. You know, I think we should look at this whole

thing in a historical perspective. I’m sure we’re all aware of the obsolescence of so many of the defense systems that we’ve generated

in this country over the centuries. The Civil War forts that protected this city are now parkland. The fortifications that laced the

East Coast during the civil war, those stone forts like McHenry and

brick forts like Pulaski were rendered useless.

I mention that only in the context that this is, too, a temporary

situation. ‘‘Temporary’’ is the wrong word to use in Washington,

but I think we ought to be very cautious that we do not overreact

and build something or create something that deals with this particular threat. I think that is your point as to the fact that we’re

dealing with these explosive-laden vehicles at the moment and in

20 years it may be something very different.

I think that’s the import of the task force, that it will be looking

at solving this in a temporary way, a sensitive way, an aesthetic

way, but not precluding options for future generations.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Parsons. I appreciate that.

Mr. Friedman, I hope we didn’t put you under fire. I wanted to

ask you those questions about the task force and appreciate the

thoroughness of the plan.

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Thank you.

I have a fear that there is an existing great polarity between

sides here; that there are people who say, ‘‘Open it,’’ people who

say, ‘‘Leave it as it is.’’ I think that what we’ve got to do is to encourage everybody to

stay flexible and to stay open-minded about this for the short term.

I don’t think that at the end of this process there’s going to be any

absolute black and white answers. Obviously, any solution has

tradeoffs. But I do believe that any—almost any—solution is better

than the present situation. The present situation, in my view, is intolerable. It is undemocratic, and gives the wrong message.

So that whether we end up with parks or streets or whatever the

solution is, we’ve got to get there, get there fast, and get there—

you know—because this debate could go on forever and ever, and

I think that would be very destructive.

Thank you, Madam.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes. I agree with you. When you talk about the

polarity, it is very heavily weighed on one side in terms of opening

Pennsylvania Avenue, but try to achieve what Mr. Stafford has

said, that word ‘‘balance.’’ But I think everybody wants to open

Pennsylvania Avenue.

Thank you.

Ms. Malino.

Ms. MALINO. I’d just like to say, in sum, that the White House

is really more than a Federal office building in the eyes of the public. It is more than a monument. It is really so symbolic. It is

unique. Therefore, I think that we have to use the considerable talent that has already been assembled to consider this, to come to

a conclusion that perhaps will never be replicated in any other situation. It will be a unique solution to the security problem, not just

reviving our old or even current ideas about security, but looking

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ahead to find the best possible ways to secure the White House, but

within the boundaries of keeping it intact as this wonderful symbol

of our Nation for everyone who comes to visit us here in the District.

Thanks.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you.

Mr. Platts, I recognize you, sir, for any questions or comments

you’d like to make.

Mr. PLATTS. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.

I just want to actually apologize. As a new Member, I’m trying

to still learn how to be in six places at once and working at it, and,

although I missed your testimony, I do appreciate your appearing

here and will certainly be looking at your written statements for

your insights into this issue and the importance of us doing a good

job by the American people and by the President and the First

Family and how we find a balance on this issue.

Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Mr. Platts.

Again I want to thank the panel for waiting, going through our

three votes, the questioning, for being here, being prepared, and for

the work that you have done and for the work that you will be

doing to open Pennsylvania Avenue.

Thank you all very much.

The full committee will actually be getting copies of the hearing

testimony, so they will be able to peruse it. Thank you.

Now the third panel. This is the panel that should each get medals for waiting so long, although I think you are all pros so you

know what happens here in Congress about length of time from the

first panel to the last.

We have Richard Monteilh, president of the District of Columbia

Chamber of Commerce. Thank you for being here, Mr. Monteilh.

John Kane, who is actually my constituent, who is chairman of the

Transportation and Environment Committee of the Greater Washington Board of Trade. Thanks, John, for waiting around, too. Albert Butch Hopkins, Jr., who is president of the District of Columbia Building Industry Association. We appreciate your presence.

And J. Guy Gwynne, president of the District of Columbia Federation of Citizens Associations. Thank you, sir. And William N.

Brown, president of the Association of the Oldest Inhabitants of

D.C., and he’s no example of that when you look at him. He’s not

one of the oldest inhabitants. It has to do with, I guess, five generations, or whatever.

It is interesting, because you’re all, like, presidents, and so I am

very impressed. So if you would stand and take the oath for the

record, raise your right hands.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mrs. MORELLA. All right. And the record will show an affirmative

response.

Again, proceeding, Mr. Monteilh, although you waited a long

time you did hear all the other testimony, so you can respond and

refute in any way that you desire.

Thank you.

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STATEMENTS OF RICHARD MONTEILH, PRESIDENT, DISTRICT

OF COLUMBIA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE; JOHN M. KANE,

CHAIRMAN, TRANSPORTATION & ENVIRONMENT COMMITTEE, GREATER WASHINGTON BOARD OF TRADE; ALBERT

BUTCH HOPKINS, JR., PRESIDENT, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

FEDERATION OF CITIZENS ASSOCIATIONS; J. GUY GWYNNE,

PRESIDENT, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA FEDERATION OF CITIZENS ASSOCIATIONS; WILLIAM N. BROWN, PRESIDENT, ASSOCIATION OF THE OLDEST INHABITANTS OF D.C.

Mr. MONTEILH. Thanks for the opportunity, Chairwoman

Morella, and for the opportunity to appear before you today.

I am president Richard Monteilh, president of the District of Columbia Chamber of Commerce. It is my pleasure to appear before

you today to testify concerning the importance of opening the District’s business community, the importance to the District’s business community of opening Pennsylvania Avenue.

The D.C. Chamber of Commerce is a primary representative of

the Washington, DC, business community. Our 1,200-plus members

include both K Street corporations and neighborhood corner stores.

The market these businesses serve may be within walking distance

or may be worldwide, but they share a need for the city to be open

for business.

For this reason, the D.C. Chamber strongly supports the reopening of Pennsylvania Avenue. The District of Columbia is working

hard to earn a reputation as a city which is open to business. The

business community has worked in support of the D.C. Council’s efforts to rework our tax structure to bring the District into tax parity with surrounding jurisdictions. The District’s new Economy

Transformation Act creates incentives to attract high-tech startups

to the center city, and a spate of legislation last summer aims at

making the city a center for the insurance and financial services

industries.

The mayor has launched major initiatives, both along Georgia

Avenue Corridor and east of the Anacostia River, intended to bring

new enterprises and residents to those sections of the city. Efforts

to return major retailers back to the District are also bearing fruit.

The success of these initiatives is reflected in the city’s new economic vitality. Last year the District added 19,000 jobs, according

to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the highest number ever in a single year.

Our downtown class A vacancy rates hovers under 2.8 percent.

New commercial construction startups during 1999 in office and retail space, alone, topped 2.5 million square feet.

While this new vitality owes much to the careful stewardship of

Mayor Williams and the re-energized D.C. Council, it is built on effective use of the District’s natural assets. Important among these

facts, that we are the hub of the metropolitan area. As traffic conditions in the suburbs have worsened, we here in the District have

promoted our central location. Businesses which locate in the District have ready access to the Federal Government and to other key

institutions housed here. If the District’s current economic vitality

and growth is to be sustained, it is critical that this city become

more, not less, accessible. The closure of Pennsylvania Avenue significantly undercuts freedom of movement in central Washington.

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It is difficult to argue downtown convenience to prospective enterprises willing to locate to our town.

The closing has harmed the District in another way—by sending

out an image of the city as an armed camp. Hospitality and tourism is one of the city’s core industries. We attract more than 21

million visitors each year. It is critical to the economic health of the

city that we continue to build tourism; yet, images of concrete barricades and guardhouses send the message that Washington, DC,

is not safe or a hospitable place to visit.

The Washington business community fully supports adequate

safety precautions for Federal Government centers located here,

but we do not believe that any valid policy purpose can be obtained

by building a fortress around 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue or shutting down whole areas of the city in hopes of guaranteeing 100 percent security.

It is the Chamber’s position that, with proper reconfiguration, it

is possible both to open America’s Main Street and to preserve the

high-level security in this area.

As a spokesperson for the local community, let me first correct

the notion that Washingtonians and others who use the city have

gotten used to the inconvenience that Pennsylvania Avenue disruption has caused. Some who argue for continuing the avenue closing

suggest that, given how bad the Washington area traffic is, one

more street closing won’t make a difference. I assure you that

Washington businesses continue to feel this inconvenience sharply

on a daily basis.

Data collected by Washington, DC, Federal City Council demonstrate the problematic impact of the street closing, which has

separated our oldest central business district west of the White

House from the new offices, restaurants, and cultural centers on

the east. The data shows that before 1995 closing, nearly 29,000

vehicles a day crossed Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White

House. The closing has displaced this traffic to H, I, and K Streets

on the north or Constitution Avenue on the south. This has resulted in increased traffic volume on these routes of between 30

and 50 percent. Needless to say, this has significantly worsened the

flow of east-west traffic in our downtown, increasing travel times

and congestion.

In addition to cost to businesses, such as the disruption of customer traffic, increase in delivery charges, or loss of employee productivity due to longer commuting times, the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue has imposed real costs on District government. Direct losses resulting from reduced parking meter and ticket revenue, as well as higher Metro Bus capital expenses due to service

rerouting, are estimated in the Federal City Council study at more

than $460,000 a year. The same study cites $728,000 in parking

meter losses since 1995.

An additional $1.5 million is the cost to the Metro Area Transit

Authority to reconfigure some of its sites.

The Chamber has reviewed some of the suggestions which are

before you today, namely those presented by the Federal City

Council for re-engineering Pennsylvania Avenue. If implemented,

these plans will both provide security for the area and permit the

reopening of the street.

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So long as it remains closed, Pennsylvania Avenue imposes significant cost to the Washington business community and on the

local government. It sends the wrong message about the kind of

city we are, the kind of Nation we are committed to be.

The success of this subcommittee in formulating a plan which

will permit Pennsylvania Avenue to reopen will be a significant

contribution toward strengthening the relationship between Congress and the local community to benefit the city, as a whole.

The Chamber strongly supports your efforts to implement this

plan.

Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Mr. Monteilh. We will be

asking you questions after we hear the testimony from the others.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Monteilh follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. It is a pleasure to recognize Mr. Kane for his

statement on behalf of the Board of Trade.

Mr. KANE. Thank you, Chairwoman Morella and members of the

subcommittee.

My name is John Kane. I am chairman of the Greater Washington Board of Trades Transportation and Environment Committee.

Founded in 1889, the Board of Trade is the regional chamber of

commerce for the greater Washington area. We have a long history

of working to improve our region’s quality of life. In fact, one of our

first projects was to resurface the dusty roads in the District of Columbia.

I also, during my day job, run numerous transportation businesses which have lot of those nasty trucks, limousines, and buses

that were referred to earlier. I’ll speak to that later during the Q

and A session, if I may.

I’m here to speak in support of reopening Pennsylvania Avenue,

America’s Main Street, and its symbolism of freedom, openness,

and access to Government. Closure of Pennsylvania Avenue has adversely impacted the mobility of District residents, suburban commuters, tourists, and visitors who either work or visit sites in the

surrounding area. Unfortunately, these same vehicles are now diverted to other city streets, impeding traffic and burdening these

streets with additional congestion.

We recognize the transportation needs being generated by the

ongoing revitalization of the District of Columbia. There is now

new construction. There is now renovation to existing buildings,

and there are revitalization of neighborhoods.

The Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments forecasts

that employment in the District of Columbia will increase by

74,000 between 2000 and 2010. Additionally, the District will add

40,000 new residents over the same period. The declines witnessed

during the 1980’s and 1990’s have clearly been reversed.

Keeping closed one of the major arteries in one of the District’s

major employment corridors will only exasperate our existing congestion problem.

The business community recognizes that the safety of the President must be the top priority. We believe, however, that there are

more appropriate alternatives under study that would sufficiently

mitigate potential security risks without shutting down the Nation’s Capital piece by piece.

Finally, at the broader symbolic level the prudent reopening of

Pennsylvania Avenue is needed to maintain the openness of our

Government and institutions. The continuing slide toward a fortress of fear witnessed over the past decade is contrary to what

America stands for. Well-known Washington architect, Arthur Cotton Moore, commented, ‘‘We have just delivered the terrorists their

first victory’’ when the White House was ringed by sand trucks and

large concrete planters following threats from Libya.

The Bush administration has indicated its support for reopening

Pennsylvania Avenue. Congresswoman Norton has introduced a

resolution urging its reopening, as has the Council of the District

of Columbia and the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments. The Greater Washington Board of Trade joins these bodies

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and representatives here today in urging your support for reopening Pennsylvania Avenue.

Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Mr. Kane. I will give you a chance

during the Q and A to respond to the trucks and dirty roads and

whatever.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Kane follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. Mr. Hopkins, Albert Butch Hopkins, Jr., delighted to have you here, sir. We recognize you.

Mr. HOPKINS. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

Good afternoon, Madam Chairperson and congressional personnel. I’m Albert ‘‘Butch’’ Hopkins, Jr., president of the District of Columbia Building Industry Association. Our membership includes

more than 350 companies and organizations engaged in all aspects

of real estate development and construction in Washington, DC.

I am testifying today to express the strong support of our association for a thorough, even-handed re-evaluation on the closing of

Pennsylvania Avenue. As early as June 1996, our association testified before this subcommittee urging that a task force be established to ‘‘find alternate means of providing adequate security for

the White House.’’ With such a panel now in place, we look forward

to public discussion of the issues involved and the hope that Pennsylvania Avenue will soon be restored as America’s Main Street.

In our view, the security threats which led to the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue in 1995 are real. The responsibility to ensure the

safety of the President, his family, and the White House staff is

clear to us, as it is to all Americans. We feel, however, that those

threats can and should be addressed at lower cost to the District

and in a manner more befitting the ideals of our Nation.

The economic costs to our city of closing Pennsylvania Avenue

are difficult to quantify with precision, but they are, nevertheless,

real. In blocking this major east-west corridor, the closing has effectively split downtown D.C. Cross-town access has become so difficult that many simply avoid the attempt. The result, the convenience of proximity and doing business in the city has been compromised.

Over the years, since the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue, the

MCI Arena, the Ronald Reagan Building, and other major downtown developments have come on line. A new convention center is

now under construction, but the full promise of those developments

for a revitalized District I would submit is also compromised by a

divided downtown.

Beyond the tangible cost to our city, there is another larger cost

that applies, one also difficult to quantify, perhaps, but also very

real in its impact. I refer here to the symbolic cost we pay as a society for installing concrete barricades across Pennsylvania Avenue

in front of the White House.

In one sense, that cost represents a tribute to be paid to terrorists, but is a payment, therefore, we should make only reluctantly

when no responsible alternatives exist.

We believe the proposals put forth by the District’s Federal City

Council to reopen Pennsylvania Avenue with restricted access for

larger vehicles and with increased separation from roadway to

White House offer a practical and responsible alternative for White

House security. Other architectural plans have been proposed to

achieve the same purpose. Taken together, they would seem to provide a very useful starting point for considering responsible approaches to reopening Pennsylvania Avenue. They would also seem

to provide an opportunity to reduce that larger symbolic but important cost to our society.

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Our association, task force, urges the Congress, as participants

in the White House security review process, to take a broad view

of the issues involved, one that adequately addresses security risks

but also fully considers all the practical options for managing the

risk.

Obviously, the final decision on the status of Pennsylvania Avenue is the President’s. The security review now underway will

hopefully help the President make the right decision.

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Mr. Hopkins.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Hopkins follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. Now I recognize J. Guy Gwynne, president of the

District of Columbia Federation of Citizens Associations. Mr.

Gwynne.

Mr. GWYNNE. Thank you, ma’am.

In addition to the D.C. Federation of Citizens Association, I’d just

like to observe here I am a retired Foreign Service officer, and I

have seen my share of terrorism and raids. These are problems of

modern-day life that one deals with. I think we can do it.

And then, before I start my remarks, I would like to request that

the record include a proposed Pennsylvania Avenue improvement

design of the prominent D.C. architectural firm of Franck Lohsen

and McCrery. It takes the excellent Pennsylvania Avenue study of

the Federal City Council and RAND Corp. one step further, in that

it is for beautification as well as the security of the avenue. And,

for the committee’s information and at its discretion, one of the

partners of the firm is here today and is available for comment and

even a demonstration.

Mrs. MORELLA. Without objection, I will have that included in

the record, and we on the committee have all been given a copy of

it, also.

Who is the representative?

Mr. GWYNNE. Mr. Art Lohsen is here at your service.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you.

Mr. GWYNNE. I’m here today on behalf of the Federation to add

that organization’s voice to the many that are calling for the reopening of the closed sections of Pennsylvania Avenue. Closing of

the avenue was, in our view, an exaggerated reaction in the first

place, following the unfortunate close-range bombing attack on the

Federal building in Oklahoma City 5 years ago.

Residents of the District, as well as the Federal and city governments, have had ample time now to critically evaluate the hasty

closure of the avenue between 15th and 17th Street in front of the

White House to all but foot traffic. This effectively isolates the Nation’s house. Basically, the closure solution doesn’t wash.

This assessment and line of reasoning has been tried, and, as we

have seen today, has been convincingly superseded, I submit, by

proposed practical alternative solutions and by different points of

view on how to approach Presidential and White House security.

I would like to emphasize briefly two main elements in the situation surrounding the possible reopening of Pennsylvania Avenue,

severed as it is. The practical element of correcting disrupted traffic patterns for an important part of the Nation’s Capital and the

inconvenience that current detours have engendered, and the

equally practical proposition of the national symbolic importance of

a reopened and freed-up national main street.

Regarding the traffic disruption, the estimated 29,000 cars that

normally used the three closed blocks in front of the White House

have been forced onto H, I, and K Streets inefficiently and inconveniently. Anyone who has experienced the present crowding, maneuvering, and gridlock of rerouted traffic on these streets longs for

the normal, orderly, as well as scenic flow of traffic on Pennsylvania Avenue.

Commuting patterns, delivery routes, and the movement of clients and customers has been profoundly altered. At a time when

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the city is doing its best to attract new businesses and tax-base

permanent residents into the city, the last thing we need is a permanent major cross-town traffic impediment.

Businesses have suffered. My own bank, the major Riggs Bank

at 15th and Pennsylvania Avenue, is a skeleton of its former self.

Impeded customer turnover is a principal problem in the downtown

areas served by this stretch of Pennsylvania Avenue.

District government sources have estimated that the city has

lost—and I heard a different figure here today—an estimated

$700,000 to $800,000 in revenue from parking meters now removed

from H, I, and other streets. Metro reportedly has charged higher

subsidies to the District because it has had to reroute its avenue

buses. These instances scratch the surfaces of the negative impact

continued closure has on the city.

In addition, continued closure is an embarrassment to the country. The statement that the closed national avenue and the withdrawn White House conveys is the wrong one. The present situation creates an impression of apprehension and a bunker mentality

and arguably is a standing encouragement, itself, to prospective

terrorists. Rather, the White House and its surrounding routes

should project America’s longstanding commitment to openness.

The Executive Mansion should be the people’s showplace, not the

people’s bunker.

There are several objective plans already produced by the nongovernmental community for reasonable, safe, and even enhanced

attractiveness for the reopened avenue. The Federation cites especially the excellent RAND Corp. study commissioned by the Federal

City Council. Also, I want to note for the committee’s attention an

interesting schema that I’ve just mentioned to you of Franck

Lohsen McCrery.

In closing, the Federation endorses the earliest possible reopening of Pennsylvania Avenue in the areas surrounding the White

House.

Two, it agrees with the submitted proposals to reconfigure the

avenue as necessary, including the Jefferson Bow, to reduce traffic

volume and control possibly dangerous vehicles.

Three, it agrees that traffic-calming devices and overhead barriers may be necessary, as well as other security devices, to control

large vehicles.

And, finally, it recommends that this subcommittee respond positively to what we believe will be an overwhelming sentiment for

the reopening of the Nation’s Main Street.

That concludes my remarks, Madam Chair.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Mr. Gwynne, and thank

you for your service in our Foreign Service.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Gwynne follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. Now I am pleased to recognize Mr. William

Brown, president of the Association of the Oldest Inhabitants. People have asked me about that. You’ve got to explain it.

Mr. BROWN. Congresswoman Morella, esteemed committee members, and ladies and gentlemen, I am William Brown, the current

president of the Association of the Oldest Inhabitants of the District of Columbia. Founded on December 7, 1865, the AOI is the

District’s oldest continually active civic association. It was founded

by 31 prominent citizens and businessmen in an effort to restore

the capital’s dignity immediately following the Civil War. At a time

when the post-war population was growing with Government workers, returning soldiers, and refugees, the city was plagued by lingering and divisive sectional loyalties. These 31 citizens were determined to come together to keep alive the reminiscences of the

past history of our city and to emphasize respect for local government authority and national patriotism above these sectional differences.

I have with me today Nelson Rimensnyder, who is a member of

our board and the historian for the AOI. Today, nearly 300 members strong, the AOI meets monthly to continue our tradition of

providing our members an opportunity to share reminiscences of

their lives in the District, together with hosting distinguished

guests and scholars who inform of us important historical facts and

future developments likely to impact the heritage and the heritage

value of our wonderful city.

Since the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White

House more than 5 years ago after the devastating destruction of

the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City, the AOI has continued to

go on record to help seek solutions to restore America’s avenue to

its original open status.

We recognize and appreciate the U.S. Secret Service’s concern

and action to take immediate steps to better secure the White

House; however, we now believe the time has come to reexamine

this action and strive to restore the avenue to its original condition.

Several unfortunate events demonstrated that threats to the

safety of the President exist even with the avenue closed to vehicular traffic. The AOI has been a staunch supporter of the reopening

efforts, and our past president, Harold Gray, testified before the

National Capital Planning Commission on this matter at their

hearings this past May.

The AOI has supported past efforts which sought to restore the

L’Enfant and McMillan Plans for the city of Washington. These

have included the reopening of G Street in front of the Martin Luther King Memorial Library, and areas near the new MCI Center,

which both had suffered from years of neglect since being closed to

vehicular traffic.

Those same sad consequences can be seen emerging in the areas

immediately adjacent to LaFayette Square since the closing of

Pennsylvania Avenue 5 years ago as this area becomes less vital

because citizens find fewer opportunities to be there.

The members of the AOI have followed with great interest the

efforts of the Federal City Council, together with those of the Federation of Citizen Associations, Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes

Norton, and Mayor Anthony Williams. Architectural firms have

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proposed several solutions to address the reopening of the avenue,

while taking steps to preserve security features sought by the U.S.

Secret Service.

The AOI would like to see the avenue restored to its full open

grandeur. We believe that whatever steps are taken to minimize

risk, solutions should be sought which do not limit the reopening

to automobile traffic only. Charter buses and Metro buses provide

the means by which many tourists and residents view and enjoy

the heritage resource which is the White House.

A reconfiguration of the avenue as proposed by the architectural

firm of Franck Lohsen and McCrery would provide this opportunity

while simultaneously providing increased security. While truck

traffic should certainly be prohibited, we believe to deprive tourists

this view of the White House would be unfortunate. But please

know that the Association of the Oldest Inhabitants of the District

of Columbia continues in its efforts to seek the reopening of this

major transportation artery, even if it represents less than the

AOI’s ideal.

Many of our members can still recall the days when they used

the White House grounds as a shortcut between their Foggy Bottom neighborhoods and the commercial enticements of the 1400

block of F Street and other areas east of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Its reopening may not restore fully our sense of security and

community to those days 70 years ago, when children frolicked on

the White House grounds, but it will demonstrate our determination to not be held hostage to fear, or, as Columnist George Will

observed in May of last year, ‘‘Present to the world the clenched

face of a bunker amid a hideous jumble of concrete barriers that

close the avenue.’’ Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, for this opportunity for the Association of Oldest Inhabitants of the District of Columbia to testify

before your committee today. We look forward to the reopening and

restoration of this grand avenue.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Mr. Brown.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Brown follows:]

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Mrs. MORELLA. You know, I was looking at this new Pennsylvania Avenue plan that Franck Lohsen McCrery Architects have

presented. Could I have the representative from that company very

briefly, briefly explain it to us?

May I swear you in?

Mr. LOHSEN. Yes, you may.

Mrs. MORELLA. Would you raise your right hand.

Mr. GWYNNE. This is Mr. Bud Lohsen.

Mrs. MORELLA. Mr. Lohsen, do you swear the testimony you are

about to give, comments are the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

Mr. LOHSEN. I do.

Mrs. MORELLA. Fine. Simply looking at the diagram here, I can’t

quite figure it out, so if you would just briefly——

Mr. LOHSEN. Our proposal was a reaction to the Federal City

Council’s plan which we’ve all seen presented here today. It picks

up on some of the key issues, including reopening the avenue to vehicular traffic, but it adds other features, as well, which will allow

increased security over even the existing conditions there today. It

also takes the premise that by reopening the avenue it should be

made a more beautiful place, even if possible, than it was before

the avenue was closed. So we see it as an opportunity to do beautiful design and extremely high security in the same aspect.

Our proposal includes guard houses at 15th and 17th Streets,

traffic circles in front of the Treasury Building and the OEOB,

which slow traffic and reduce the lanes from three down to two. In

addition, the traffic circles allow rejected vehicles to exit back to

15th and 17th Streets without having to back up, which they would

have to do without those traffic circles.

Rather than the pedestrian bridges which have been proposed,

we propose gates and gatehouses. That allows, we believe, even

more flexibility. The gates can be closed or they can be opened. In

addition, there are vehicular gates as well as pedestrian gates. The

Secret Service would be able to close the entire perimeter from pedestrian as well as vehicular traffic, a feature which they don’t

have now.

The gates would have decorative steel trusses at the top of them

which would prevent larger vehicles from being able to penetrate

in an assault.

In addition, the gatehouse provides staff. We don’t think any solution that relies on a static security feature or a single layer of

security is going to be viable. We see this as a series of manned

checkpoints—the gatehouses, parking spaces where Secret Service

Suburbans can be parked, and the guardhouse. At each level, the

Secret Service has the ability, through telescoping bollards which

would pop out of the street, to stop traffic instantaneously. We believe that’s the only way of opening the avenue, but giving the Secret Service the security the control that they need to be able to

do their job.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much. It would take a long time

to go on Pennsylvania Avenue though, wouldn’t it, by the time you

go through the circles and the gates? But I very much appreciate

that explanation.

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Well, my questioning is going to be a little different. You are the

final panel. You’ve waited through this whole hearing. You have

had an opportunity to hear Senator Dole and the Federal City

Council and their plan, the RAND report. You’ve heard the Mayor

talk about the adverse consequences. You’ve heard the Counsel

president talk about the resolutions that they passed to open the

Pennsylvania Avenue. You’ve heard the acting Secretary of Treasury give you a little bit of the history and why it is necessary that

we have adequate precautions which would consist of keeping it

closed. You’ve heard from the Director of Secret Service, John Parsons of the National Park Service, Richard Friedman, who is setting up a task force to look at Pennsylvania Avenue closing but

would go beyond that with the security streetscape plan. And

you’ve heard Ms. Malino of the Commission of Fine Arts.

I would like to ask you—this is your chance to get in your comments with regard to—I have your testimony. It is in the record.

We’ve all looked at it in advance of your speaking and appreciate

your comments. I’d like to get your reaction to what has happened

today, any reaction you have or any response you might have. You

have all talked about—I appreciated the fact that mention was

made of no such thing as 100 percent security. I have always felt

that way, that we can’t have a fortress around the White House,

America’s Main Street, what has happened throughout the world

at places of international significance that have affected the United

States, and what this symbolizes.

So if you would just like to kind of in a brief, little fashion, tell

me what is your gut reaction to what you have heard today.

Mr. MONTEILH. I was pleasantly surprised that the issue appears

to be open in the minds of the Secret Service and the Treasury Department about alternatives. They are not stuck on this plan to

keep it closed. They’re open to options, and that was very encouraging. The 4-month time span that the National Capital Planning

Commission says they are going to put on the recommendation for

opening Pennsylvania Avenue is, likewise, encouraging. I think we

had a chance to tell them that the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue

is very onerous on the businesses, both large and small, in conducting their business because of the barricades that have been put up

on Pennsylvania Avenue. It has impeded the productivity of companies. It has cut into their cost of doing business. It affects them in

a deep way.

There are lots of complaints, Chairwoman Morella, from businesses, large and small, about the inconvenience of the street opening on their daily activities.

So what I picked up today is that we’re going to get some movement. There is some openness there on the part of the Secret Service, and that’s encouraging.

Mrs. MORELLA. Yes. Thank you. We’ll keep reconfirming with

them their openness.

Mr. Kane.

Mr. KANE. My observations are that, one, when you’re on the

third panel you’re probably going to have lunch here. [Laughter.]

It wasn’t a bad meal.

Mrs. MORELLA. Sorry we didn’t have it ready for you.

Mr. KANE. You guys do OK.

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I, too, was intrigued by the commonality of belief that the avenue

should be opened, it’s just to what degree.

I appreciate your comment of paralysis by analysis, and I’m

afraid that’s where this may head if the Secret Service—is he still

here, by the way—don’t mess with the Secret Service. They do

great work. But I also think that it is in their best interest to keep

that road closed. I know that President Clinton did not want it

closed. They basically came to him and said, ‘‘This is what we

should do for your safety and the safety of your family.’’ I know that President Bush has an open mind to it. I still think

he will listen to what the Secret Service wants. He would be foolish

not to do that.

So I think if we can—as Richard said, I am intrigued to hear

that the Secret Service is open to some adjustment to it that would

prohibit vehicles that were mentioned earlier, so I’m, I think, intrigued.

Mrs. MORELLA. What do you think about the National Capital

Planning Commission’s task force?

Mr. KANE. I think if you want to put something into a paralysis

by analysis you create a task force, and then when they come back

you create a blue ribbon panel, and then when that doesn’t work

you refer it to another committee for study.

I would guess that they certainly need to weigh in. They are talented in their observations. But I would urge that that be done in

a quick manner and not have it drag out.

Mrs. MORELLA. I can see you know the ways of Washington, and

we must be careful of those barriers.

Mr. HOPKINS. Well, Madam Chair, I, likewise, was encouraged

somewhat to hear that the Secret Service had sort of changed their,

I guess, position on this matter over a period of time. I’m not convinced, however, that they would be willing to do anything other

than consider a tunnel to move traffic east and west, so I’m not— I kind of look toward—I’m a native Washingtonian, and I remember my father driving me past the White House at night so I could

see how beautiful it was, and then, as I got older, I used to roller

skate by there during the day.

Mrs. MORELLA. You can still do that now.

Mr. HOPKINS. I can still do that. Right. And I kind of looked at

the Statue of Liberty as you come into New York with the grand

lady holding her arms open and welcoming people to our shores,

and then they see the White House where we seem to have, all of

a sudden, had that siege mentality, and we sort of seem to be giving up that pioneer spirit that Americans have had.

Once you start chipping away at what we feel is what makes us

uniquely Americans, you never know how we may eventually

evolve as a people and as a culture.

I think that makes certainly all the sense in the world to strive

to open the avenue, and I think the RAND study accomplishes that

and this latest presentation that I’ve just seen today probably has

some good points.

And I don’t necessarily feel that the NCPC thing is going to get

too bogged down, but my other job on a full-time basis is heading

up the Anacostia Economic Development Corp., and we’ve certainly

seen plans and plans and plans that get on the shelf and nothing

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ever happens, so I’m certainly leery about it to some degree, but

if we can put some kind of firm time table on this, I think what

they’re proposing to do in terms of bringing all parties to the table

and have them work openly to resolve this has merit, but I don’t

want to see it dragged out, just as John has spoken to.

Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Mr. Hopkins.

Incidentally, the three of us who are here were all at the Anacostia Waterfront Initiative kickoff, and it was just very, very exciting. Maybe finally that is moving. I know Congresswoman Norton

had been involved with that, also, from the beginning.

Mr. Gwynne.

Mr. GWYNNE. First of all, thank you, Ms. Norton, for your initial

comments. Those were right on the money, and thank you.

And, Mrs. Morella, I would invite you, just as Ms. Norton has

come by one of our federation banquets, you will be getting an invitation, as will Mr. Platts also. Being on this committee—I’d like to

digress just a little—I hope you all will take more of an interest

in the District of Columbia on the civic side, also. We cordially invite you to—and you’ll find that it is interesting. This is the most

fun group perhaps because of their reminiscence times.

But I would just like to close my remarks with there’s no such

thing as complete security, for our embassies abroad, for the Nation’s Capital, itself, as we see, or for the Capitol Building, that is,

or for the White House. We have to just proceed with good sense

and mitigate the danger as much as possible, but continue with our

natural or with the normal national life.

I think there is no alternative. Thank you.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you.

Mr. Brown.

Mr. BROWN. I think two themes that were apparent through all

the speakers’ comments today were, No. 1, not to be held hostage

to fear and, of course, the symbolism or the negative symbolism

that is portrayed by this area being closed down and a type of—

how that might affect somebody as far as an achievement in trying

to force us to become a more closed society.

Another thing that I thought was interesting was the beautification aspects of how tawdry the area looks now and how some of

the recommendations have included beautification aspects of it, as

well.

I think if you will remember, down near the—and I mentioned

this in my remarks—by the Martin Luther King Library F Street

or G Street was closed for a number of years and it became a terrible eyesore down there when that area was limited to—it had full

access to pedestrian traffic, but it was closed to vehicular traffic

and it became very run down.

Another interesting thing is that Nelson Rimensnyder, who is retired from Government work here in the city, has some interesting

historical perspectives on previous, I’ll just say conflicts between

the U.S. Secret Service and the building, buildings and permits and

all in the White House area, and he has that summarized in a document that I would like to share or provide to the committee for

the record, as well, if you would accept that.

Mrs. MORELLA. Without objection, so ordered.

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Mr. BROWN. You know, our group—I appreciate Guy’s comments

about our group being a fun group. I’m very sincere when I say we

do have members that used to frolic and cut through the White

House grounds. We have members of our group that used to exercise with—was it President Harding’s dogs and be fed ice cream

and cookies in the basement of the White House. These are terrific

stories. We know that we’ll never go back to those days of openness

and all, but we think there are some plans that will reopen Pennsylvania Avenue.

I would suggest that if you are concerned—it has been almost 6

years now since these temporary measures were put into effect. I

would suggest that if you are concerned about paralysis by analysis—unfortunately, I think we may be sitting here 5 years from

now after, you know, the one group studies it and provides their

comments to another group and they are studied and shelved and

restudied.

I think one thing that might spur this on is if this committee

would recommend to President Bush the immediate reopening of

Pennsylvania Avenue with whatever temporary measures restricting truck traffic to begin with, and I think that might provide some

impetus for the NCPC and other groups to work more quickly to

come to some resolution.

Thank you, Madam Congressman.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you very much, Mr. Brown.

I’m now going to defer to Mr. Platts—and Ms. Norton has agreed

to that—for any comments he wants to make.

Mr. PLATTS. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and thank you,

Ms. Norton, for allowing me to jump in here. I apologize—running

off to yet another meeting.

Three quick questions, and actually, Mr. Lohsen, on your presentation, the checkpoints you envision, you don’t mean every car

being stopped, but just being the opportunity for more scrutiny as

they come through; is that correct?

Mr. LOHSEN. That is correct.

Mr. PLATTS. And is there a cost estimate for the recommendations, your design? Is there any ball park figure on cost?

Mr. LOHSEN. Not at this point, but I would submit that it is coming out.

Mr. PLATTS. And on the design, itself, is there—the radius, you

bring it in inside of Madison and Jackson Place on each side to line

up with the driveway from the White House before you begin the

Jefferson arch or radius. Is there a reason you didn’t begin at Jefferson earlier to get a wider, larger distance?

Mr. LOHSEN. Aesthetically we considered the White House gates,

which will be used for vehicular entry and exit to the White House

grounds as part of the solution.

Mr. PLATTS. Just seems like from a security sense there would

be an even greater distance if we began as soon as you got to Madison and—— Mr. LOHSEN. Well, as I described, our solution is a blend between

security features and aesthetics, and we—the other aspect, which

I neglected to mention, is the fact that our gates and gatehouses

and lighting fixtures are all derived from the existing White House

fencing and gates. We strongly feel that whatever solution is apVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:48 Dec 04, 2001 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00143 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\75253.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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plied, it should be completely appropriate with the surrounding

buildings. It should look like it has always been there. And we feel

that a design such as we’ve proposed has the ability of doing that.

Mr. PLATTS. OK. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and all the

participants for your testimony as we try to find a workable solution to the issue.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thanks, Mr. Platts, and thank you for your interest and involvement.

Congresswoman Norton, I recognize you.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you, Madam Chair. Let me apologize that

I was called off of the campus of the House of Representatives altogether and had to miss entirely the second panel. I’m certainly

pleased that I was able to at least return for part of this panel.

In a very real sense, you personify what worries me most about

the closing of the avenue, if you look at who it really affects. It has

had an untold effect—and the Mayor used the word ‘‘untold’’ because I think it still is untold because it is very hard to quantify

it. It is very hard to characterize it on businesses, residents that

use the area.

The interesting thing is I would bet that the greater effect has

been on people from Virginia. Of course, this is the District of Columbia and if you are a resident of the District of Columbia on any

day of the week you may find yourself in this area, but if you come

in here over the 14th Street Bridge or over the Memorial Bridge,

you may have to find your way into this area just to do work, and

we’ve not found a good way to understand what this does.

I am very interested in understanding what this does because we

are doing it with no forethought. An incident occurs and you just

shut it down. You don’t think about alternative methods. The Secret Service comes through and says, ‘‘We are always looking for

alternatives and, of course, we never find any.’’ As I understand it, while I was gone you didn’t attempt to quantify—and I can understand why—what the effect has been economically on the District or on business. I would ask—I would like our

record to show more, at least anecdotally, of what it means to have

the street closed down, more than what I hear from residents, more

than what I hear from businesses.

For example, do any of you have any information on the effect,

for example, on the value of property in that area and rents in that

area compared to rents elsewhere in the District of Columbia? That

happens to be important to us. We cannot tax people from Maryland and Virginia. We can only tax people who do business in the

District of Columbia or who live in the District of Columbia, so if

the Federal Government wants to—and most of the people who use

that area come from around Virginia—if the Federal Government

wants to shut down the avenue and depress property values relative to what you might expect them to be, we need to know that.

I don’t have a basis to go to the Federal Government today and

say, ‘‘Look, this is at least in the ball park of what we have lost.’’

So I would first ask if, at least on the basis of knowing businesses and knowing residents, you have any sense of what the inconvenience amounts to—and I don’t mean simply from a quantity

point of view. What does it mean to a business to be located where

people simply went across Pennsylvania Avenue to get there before

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and now find it hard to get there from here? I need to hear what

you may have heard, but I also need you, if you would, to ask— perhaps to do a survey of your own members so that we can vivify

what this means in terms that we can make the President and

other decisionmakers understand.

Do any of you have any information that would lead us to understand what it means to an individual, what it means to a business

to have that kind of change occur right from under them?

Mr. KANE. Congresswoman Norton, I do, and I can give you a

couple, three different examples.

I would tell you that St. John’s Church and probably Tom

Donahue at the U.S. Chamber are quite happy, because they are

like the folks that were one house back on the beach, and the beach

came in and washed them out, so now they own the real estate

closest to the water, because you basically have taken out all of the

real estate between that H Street corridor and the White House

that used to be there.

There is no longer a center city, at least not from our perspective.

One of our businesses is a commercial moving and storage business. There is not the vibrancy that is associated with the east end

or the west end in that center part of the city any longer. People

don’t want to be there. It’s just not as lively an environment.

I would take—I would argue the point it affects people in Virginia more. We send probably 500 people a day into different assignments, whether it be driving trucks, buses, limousines, staff vehicles, vans, that kind of stuff, and it’s pretty much split up a

third, third, and a third—a third originate from Washington within

the city, a third come from Virginia, and a third come from Maryland.

By the bifurcation of the city, or splitting it in half, as they have

done, it certainly does affect people in Maryland as to how they get

to that other side of the city. Sitting on those one-way streets that

used to be two-way, that used to have parking meters, it does impede their traffic.

I would tell you that we’re doing a—this may sound like an offshoot, but it is realistic. Jobs that we do now in the center or in

Washington, DC, where before we used to charge a 1-hour travel

fee, whether that be for limousine, or a bus, or a truck to get there,

we now charge an hour and 20 minutes. It just takes 20 minutes

longer to go through that city. I mean, you just cannot appreciate

the delay and the cost that businesses like ours incur.

I would also say that, relative to the flow of traffic, when you—

we normally spend about $100,000 a year, and someone mentioned

earlier that $750,000 that they’ve lost in meter revenue and ticket

fines. I know UPS spends about $1.2 million a year in tickets in

the city. We spend about $100,000 a year. From 1996, when that

road was closed, our ticket cost went up 15 percent. Now, a lot of

that is the cost of doing business and it is just from unloading and

a loading standpoint, but when you begin to put barriers up to

commerce—and I’m not talking about putting trucks on Pennsylvania Avenue, I’m talking about taking trucks off of H Street from

the delivery standpoint because it is just almost impractical to

make deliveries there. It does affect how we do our business.

And it’s not just a Virginia issue. It is a regional issue.

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Ms. NORTON. Do any of the other panelists have any stories from

their members that they could tell us?

[No response.]

Ms. NORTON. I would ask you, if you would—and I would be willing to work with you to conduct—some of you have newsletters,

some of you have employees, but it would be helpful, as we try to

make the powers that be—it turns out really to be the President

of the United States—I’m trying to look at whether or not this decision can be made collectively by the Congress, because I think part

of the problem is that nobody wants to take the rap for opening it

once it gets closed. But we’re certainly not going to convince people

to open it if they think, ‘‘Well, so what’’ if they don’t know the real

cost on real people. So I would be willing to work with your offices

on designing your own organizations or yourselves on designing an

appropriate survey, just so we get some sense of what the personal

cost is to businesses and to residents.

Madam Chair, I simply want to thank the members of the panel.

Some of them have been waiting throughout this testimony. It has

been a longer day than we usually have in the District Committee,

and I certainly want to thank you for your testimony. I apologize

that I did not hear more of it, and to assure you that I will continue to work on this issue until we get it done. We just cannot say,

‘‘Well, so be it.’’ We are going to get it done.

You can help me if you go back and agree to work with me on

ways to vivify this issue so that we all understand the harm that

is done. When we understand the harm that is done, we will help

find ways to get around it all. If you don’t know what the problem

is, then it is harder to think of a solution. If we need a better solution, you can help us get to that solution.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you, Ms. Norton. I agree, we have to get

it done.

I am now pleased to recognize Mr. Davis.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Thank you all very much for being here.

The closing has a lot of ramifications on the region and, of

course, on the city. One is the transportation ramification, which

you’ve discussed. That has air pollution ramifications. It has just

a lot of issues that are addressed by it. But I am concerned about

the economic ramifications to the city at large, and I wonder if anybody has put a price tag on this in terms of the economic development loss for the city and the region, tax base, ripple effects. Are

there any—do you think there are any businesses that maybe decided not to come down because it is a little bit longer commute

now? Has it hurt parking? I know the Riggs Bank issue. Anybody

have any either anecdotal or scientific information on that?

Mr. MONTEILH. Congressman Davis, you know the city is doing

well right now. We have a low vacancy rate downtown. We are not

losing companies any more. There is, in fact, companies that want

to move into Washington now, and it is a question—— Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. No thanks to closing of Pennsylvania Avenue. That has nothing—I mean, if anything, that has been a deterrent.

Mr. MONTEILH. But what has helped us, to be honest with you,

helped the city to revive itself is the fact that, relative to Maryland

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and Virginia suburbs, Washington, DC, is a good place to commute

in. I mean, it is a good place to do business in because you can get

around, and the fact that the roads are clogged up outside of Washington, DC, has revived—has a lot to do with reviving our city, to

be honest with you.

The fact that Pennsylvania Avenue is closed is something that

we have to sell around. We have to sell Washington as a place

where you can come and get out of 3 hours worth of commute time

if you lived here or your put your business here, because eventually

you’ve got to come into the city.

It is not necessary that everybody who lives here has to go out

and go to Fairfax and do business, but everybody has to come into

Washington, DC.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Right.

Mr. MONTEILH. So it presents an obstacle to us trying to sell the

city that there are some places you just can’t get around in, and

that’s very difficult for a town that is trying to revive itself right

now.

It is so important for us to have the advantage of being able to

offer people 3 hours off their commuting time on a daily basis to

be in the city, to have their business here, and to even live here

as a selling point for Washington, DC, quite aside from the fact

that the government is turning itself around, the mayor has now

energized the government, and all that.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Well, let me ask this. Is there any—do

you have any feel for what this has done to tourism? I mean, in

the old days the tourist buses could go by and point at the White

House. If you were lucky enough to get in a tour, you could get out

and stay in line. Now you have to park off where you don’t get the

direct view. You can let them off in one end and spend 20 minutes

and probably go around to the other end of the White House if

you’re driving. A lot of people could walk across it. Any idea what

this——

Mr. MONTEILH. We heard testimony earlier that it could actually

help the White House tours office in terms of pedestrian traffic.

That’s what we heard from an earlier testimony in terms of——

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Yes, but that’s not economic. I mean,

that’s—— Mr. MONTEILH. No, it’s not helping the city at all.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. Exactly.

Mr. MONTEILH. What we’re trying to do is get people off the mall.

The city has a tourist operation in the Ronald Reagan Building.

Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. I’m glad that it is easier for the White

House and more convenient for maybe people working there, but in

terms of the economic impact——

Mr. MONTEILH. It doesn’t help the city because most of those people who do the mall don’t do the rest of the city, and that’s—we

want the people to see the White House, but when they see the

White House or the Capitol then they generally leave because all

the—and leave very little money on the table because most of the

museums are free, as you all know, and so is the White House. The

whole aim was to get people in other parts of the city, and that

doesn’t do anything for us. The closing of Pennsylvania Avenue

does nothing to facilitate tourists coming to other parts of the city.

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Mr. DAVIS OF VIRGINIA. But basically this just makes it tough

for—I know, from my commute, this just makes it tougher for people to get through the city and it just clogs up roads that really

were not built for that purpose, and that, of course, has a deterrent

effect on a lot of air pollution ramifications and the like.

Let me just say I am grateful for the fact that you aren’t just

here whining and criticizing the decision, but are actually putting

forward some plans into the record that ought to be explored, and

I am moved by the cooperative attitude earlier that you’d like to

solve this problem. Whether we can get there or not at this point

and what the timing will be I think will depend on all of our collective determination to try to do that and move this forward as an

agenda item.

I appreciate all of you taking the time to be here today. I’m sorry

I wasn’t here for all the testimony. I have other committees going

on. But I appreciate the chairman holding this hearing and all of

you coming out, as well, and hopefully we can find a satisfactory

solution.

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.

Mrs. MORELLA. I want to thank you, particularly this third panel

for being here almost all day, spending your time with us. We very

much appreciated your testimony and all that went along with it— the experiences that you have reflected.

I think it is time now to go beyond the words and go into the

actions, and that’s what we hope to do on this subcommittee with

your help, so continue to keep us posted.

Again, I thank you very much.

I wanted to acknowledge some staff people that have worked

very hard on this hearing. Subcommittee staff: Russell Smith, Rob

White, Matthew Batt, Heea Vazirani-Fales, Mr. Davis’ staff, Howard Denis and Melissa Wojak. On the minority side with Congresswoman Norton, Jean Gosa and Jon Bouker. Thank all of you.

I want to thank the person who has done our transcripts, which

has not been very easy to do.

As is tradition, we will keep the record open for other testimony

that may come in within the next 2 weeks.

Thank you very much. The subcommittee hearing is adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 1:40 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned, to

reconvene at the call of the Chair.]

[Additional information submitted for the hearing record follows:]

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