COMMERCE, JUSTICE, SCIENCE, AND RELATED 

AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2009 

HEARINGS 

BEFORE A 

SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE 

COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON COMMERCE, JUSTICE, SCIENCE, AND RELATED 

AGENCIES 

ALAN B. MOLLOHAN, West Virginia, Chairman 

PATRICK J. KENNEDY, Rhode Island 

CHAKA FATTAH, Pennsylvania 

C.A. ‘‘DUTCH’’ RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland 

ADAM SCHIFF, California 

MICHAEL HONDA, California 

ROSA L. DELAURO, Connecticut 

DAVID E. PRICE, North Carolina 

RODNEY P. FRELINGHUYSEN, New Jersey 

JOHN ABNEY CULBERSON, Texas 

HAROLD ROGERS, Kentucky 

TOM LATHAM, Iowa 

ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama 

NOTE: Under Committee Rules, Mr. Obey, as Chairman of the Full Committee, and Mr. Lewis, as Ranking 

Minority Member of the Full Committee, are authorized to sit as Members of all Subcommittees. 

JOHN BLAZEY, MARJORIE DUSKE, ADRIENNE SIMONSON, 

TRACEY LATURNER, and DIANA SIMPSON

Subcommittee Staff 

PART 7 

Page 

National Aeronautics and Space Administration ............ 1, 43 

Office of Science and Technology Policy .......................... 311 

National Science Board / National Science Foundation 455 

Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ................. 635 

Legal Services Corporation .................................................. 727 

International Trade Commission ........................................ 781 

Office of United States Trade Representative ................. 829 

( 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations 

U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 

42–708 WASHINGTON : 2008 


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COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS 

DAVID R. OBEY, Wisconsin, Chairman 

JOHN P. MURTHA, Pennsylvania 

NORMAN D. DICKS, Washington 

ALAN B. MOLLOHAN, West Virginia 

MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio 

PETER J. VISCLOSKY, Indiana 

NITA M. LOWEY, New York 

JOSE ́ E. SERRANO, New York 

ROSA L. DELAURO, Connecticut 

JAMES P. MORAN, Virginia 

JOHN W. OLVER, Massachusetts 

ED PASTOR, Arizona 

DAVID E. PRICE, North Carolina 

CHET EDWARDS, Texas 

ROBERT E. ‘‘BUD’’ CRAMER, JR., Alabama 

PATRICK J. KENNEDY, Rhode Island 

MAURICE D. HINCHEY, New York 

LUCILLE ROYBAL-ALLARD, California 

SAM FARR, California 

JESSE L. JACKSON, JR., Illinois 

CAROLYN C. KILPATRICK, Michigan 

ALLEN BOYD, Florida 

CHAKA FATTAH, Pennsylvania 

STEVEN R. ROTHMAN, New Jersey 

SANFORD D. BISHOP, JR., Georgia 

MARION BERRY, Arkansas 

BARBARA LEE, California 

TOM UDALL, New Mexico 

ADAM SCHIFF, California 

MICHAEL HONDA, California 

BETTY MCCOLLUM, Minnesota 

STEVE ISRAEL, New York 

TIM RYAN, Ohio 

C.A. ‘‘DUTCH’’ RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland 

BEN CHANDLER, Kentucky 

DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida 

CIRO RODRIGUEZ, Texas 

JERRY LEWIS, California 

C. W. BILL YOUNG, Florida 

RALPH REGULA, Ohio 

HAROLD ROGERS, Kentucky 

FRANK R. WOLF, Virginia 

JAMES T. WALSH, New York 

DAVID L. HOBSON, Ohio 

JOE KNOLLENBERG, Michigan 

JACK KINGSTON, Georgia 

RODNEY P. FRELINGHUYSEN, New Jersey 

TODD TIAHRT, Kansas 

ZACH WAMP, Tennessee 

TOM LATHAM, Iowa 

ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama 

JO ANN EMERSON, Missouri 

KAY GRANGER, Texas 

JOHN E. PETERSON, Pennsylvania 

VIRGIL H. GOODE, JR., Virginia 

RAY LAHOOD, Illinois 

DAVE WELDON, Florida 

MICHAEL K. SIMPSON, Idaho 

JOHN ABNEY CULBERSON, Texas 

MARK STEVEN KIRK, Illinois 

ANDER CRENSHAW, Florida 

DENNIS R. REHBERG, Montana 

JOHN R. CARTER, Texas 

RODNEY ALEXANDER, Louisiana 

KEN CALVERT, California 

JO BONNER, Alabama 

ROB NABORS, Clerk and Staff Director 

(II)


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COMMERCE, JUSTICE, SCIENCE, AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS FOR 

2009 

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 5, 2008. 

NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION 

WITNESS 

MICHAEL D. GRIFFIN, NASA ADMINISTRATOR 

CHAIRMAN’S OPENING REMARKS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Good afternoon, Dr. Griffin, and welcome before 

the Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee this afternoon to discuss the budget request for 

the National Aeronautics and Space Administration for fiscal year 

2009. 

As you know, there is a great deal of congressional interest in 

the portfolio of programs and activities that you oversee. So while 

I welcome you here this afternoon, the Committee looks forward to 

having you back again for a full day tomorrow. 

In less than a year, this nation will have a new President and 

whether he or she is Republican or Democrat, that new President 

and we, the Congress, must develop a consensus on what NASA 

should be doing and identify the level of resources that we are prepared to commit to NASA. 

Regrettably, since the enactment of the NASA Authorization Act 

of 2005, which established such a consensus and identified that resources need to meet that vision, funding recommended by this Administration has been too lean to meet that vision. 

When coupled with other costs that NASA has had to absorb 

since 2005, such as the space shuttle’s return to flight and the 

Hubble servicing mission, today’s mismatch between NASA’s tasks 

and responsibilities and its resources continue to grow. 

The budget and its five-year rollout contain annual increases, 

barely, if at all, that keep pace with inflation. And even the budget 

from which these inflationary increases are calculated is thin in 

many areas. 

For example, the budget contains no money for shuttle retirement and transition costs past 2010 despite assurances that these 

costs would be included in each of the last two budgets, leading one 

to conclude that other NASA programs will have to continue to absorb these costs. 

The budget contains no funding for replacing the aging deep 

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lion over the next 20 years and is vital to support the very space 

missions that we fund today and will be in orbit just over the budgetary horizon. 

The budget recognizes the gap in U.S. human access to space 

once the shuttle is retired in 2010, but does little to address it. The 

budget continues the perennial dance with Congress by cutting aeronautics research and development again this year by 25 percent. 

While the budget initiates new Earth science missions consistent 

with direction by this Committee and recommended by the National Academies in their recent survey, it fails to provide new resources for them. It simply shifts money within the overall science 

program. Science eats its own. 

The budget shorts the international Space Station’s utilization 

and operations needs and erodes the very research used to justify 

the Space Station itself. 

The budget reduces funds for education programs by over 20 percent, undermining the National Academies report that proposed 

broad recommendations to enhance K through 12 science and 

mathematics education and investment in STEM activities. 

While these shortfalls are not insignificant, and I am particularly 

concerned that the funds necessary to address the budget’s inadequacies may not materialize in this continuing protracted budget 

stalemate with this President, I am concerned that it is becoming 

nearly impossible to maintain an overall balanced portfolio in 

NASA in this budgetary climate. And I know that perhaps you 

agree with me in this regard. And though your budget request for this year is $17.6 billion, 

which is a lot of money in any earthly world, you are cash 

strapped. The budget has been characterized as staying the course. 

It does not seem adequate anymore. 

I know, too, that we do not have to convince you that investments in NASA’s programs are critical to our nation’s competitiveness, efficiency, and safety of our transportation system, our nation’s preeminence in the aviation industry, and ultimately affect 

the quality of our life and of our planet. The stakes are high as is 

the challenge. 

Welcome again, Mr. Administrator, and all those who you have 

with you. 

And at this time, I would like to recognize the Ranking Member 

of the Subcommittee, Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

RANKING MEMBER’S OPENING REMARKS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I thank the Chairman, and I join the 

Chairman in welcoming you today before the Subcommittee to discuss your 2009 budget request. 

As the Chairman stated, you are requesting 17.6 billion in new 

budget authority which represents an increase of 1.8 percent above 

the fiscal year 2008 level. 

The requested increase is modest and you are attempting to balance a number of important missions. It is a significant challenge 

to maintain healthy funding for science and aeronautics while trying to adhere to the schedules that have been established with the 

retirement of the shuttle, the completion of the international Space 

Station, and the development of the Orion and Ares capabilities. 


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The budget for space and Earth science is flat. But within that 

level, you have prioritized funding for the top-ranked missions of 

the recent Earth science decadal survey. 

The aeronautics research budget is again a significant reduction. 

The Committee heard testimony last week from GAO, extensive 

testimony on NASA’s role in the next agenda initiative to modernize the nation’s air traffic system. And I will have some questions about that NASA contribution to that effort in my time. 

In exploration, you face perhaps your greatest management challenge in developing the new Orion, Ares vehicles on schedule and 

on budget. We hope you can bring us up to date with the status 

of these important efforts. 

Last but not least, you have an enormous challenge in carrying 

out the remaining flight manifest for the shuttle through 2010 and 

to complete the assembly of the international Space Station. 

We appreciate your dedication and the dedication of your team 

supporting you here today, both the public team and the private 

sector, in carrying out these important NASA missions. 

I also appreciate the attention, and I am sure the Chairman 

does, to your dedicating so much time to the management of NASA 

and to fiscal accountability. 

And I look forward to hearing your testimony today. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Dr. Griffin, we invite you to share your opening 

comments with us. Your written statement will be made a part of 

the record. 

Before you begin with your comments, would you please either 

introduce or have those who are sitting at the table introduce 

themselves. And then when they speak, if they would identify 

themselves for the record. 

ADMINISTRATOR GRIFFIN’S OPENING REMARKS

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. Thank you for inviting us today. To my far 

left is Dr. Jaiwon Shin who runs Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate for NASA. Jai is formerly of the Glenn Research Center, 

but we have now captured him here at headquarters. To my immediate left is Mr. Bill Gerstenmaier who runs the Space Operations 

Mission Directorate. Broadly speaking, that includes the Space 

Shuttle, the International Space Station, and our Expendable 

Launch Vehicle fleet. Immediately to my right is Dr. Alan Stern 

who runs our Science Mission Directorate. Alan is a very wellknown and very well-established principal investigator in the field 

of space and planetary science. We were fortunate to attract him 

to NASA. And to my far right is Doug Cooke, Deputy Associate Administrator for Exploration Systems Mission Directorate at NASA. 

The Associate Administrator, Rick Gilbrech, could not be here. He 

is ill. Doug, however, has been with NASA since the early Shuttle 

years, has worked Shuttle, Station and then beyond Earth orbit exploration programs since we have had them. 

So I think you have the best that I can provide here at NASA 

today. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Dr. Griffin, and welcome everyone at 

the table. And if you would proceed. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. Thank you. 


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Mr. Chairman Mollohan, Ranking Member Frelinghuysen, thank 

you for having me here today to talk about the NASA program and 

to grant me the privilege of bringing my team. It is a good team. 

You mentioned, sir, that we are coming up on a Presidential 

transition and we are. Of course, every two years, we have a Congressional transition. So transition is nothing new to NASA, but 

this one will be particularly significant. I would like to spend a few 

moments and review the bidding on why. 

Give or take a few weeks and what I am about to say, five years 

ago, those who were sitting here and others of us who were asked 

to testify as private citizens to various hearings in Congress were 

reeling in the aftermath of the loss of Space Shuttle Columbia, trying to find out what went wrong, how it could have gone wrong, 

and what we would have to do to fix it. 

Four years ago this spring, we were dealing with the output, the 

outcome of that accident and the output of the Columbia Accident 

Investigation Board led by Admiral Gehman which resulted in 

sweeping changes to how the Shuttle program is managed and 

what we do with the Shuttle. 

It also resulted in the development of a new civil space policy by 

this President and this Administration which was put before this 

Congress four years ago. 

Three years ago, I had been nominated as Administrator to come 

back to the Agency and head up this new effort and to continue our 

existing efforts. Two years ago, this Congress had just approved by 

a very strong bipartisan vote the new civil space policy that the 

President put forth. The basic terms of that policy were that we 

would finish the construction of the International Space Station, 

keeping our commitments to our partners. We would use the Space 

Shuttle to do so, after which we would retire the Shuttle in 2010, 

recognizing the words of the Columbia Accident Investigation 

Board that space flight is difficult, dangerous, expensive, but for 

the United States, it is strategic and it should be continued. But 

if it were to be continued, it needed to have goals worthy of the 

costs and the risks and the difficulty. So we set about with that 

new space policy a plan to return to the Moon and eventually go 

on to Mars and other destinations. 

A year ago, barely a year into that new program as authorized 

by the Congress, we were dealing with the effects of a year-long 

Continuing Resolution to our program which immediately caused 

us to stretch out dates that we had prior commitments to. 

Today, I come to you in a year in which we have a Presidential 

transition, the first one now in eight years, and the need that we 

have at NASA, the greatest need that we have at NASA is for stability. 

We do not change space policy very often. Prior to the loss of 

Shuttle Columbia and the resultant changes proposed by the President, the United States had not changed the basic direction of the 

civil space program for 35 years. Following Apollo, the direction of 

the civil space program had been to build the Shuttle, fly the Shuttle, and develop, deploy and utilize the Space Station. We had 

nothing beyond that for 35 years. 

Now we have a plan that takes us out again beyond low Earth 

orbit for human exploration and robotic exploration. That is the 


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best plan that has been provided to NASA by a United States Congress in over 40 years. What we need now in the wake of the very 

wrenching transitions we have had over the past several years and 

in view of the transition yet to come, what we need is stability and 

a sense of purpose. 

The Columbia Accident Investigation Board (CAIB) commented 

that the United States space program had moved forward for more 

than 30 years without a guiding vision. Now we have it and it is 

the right vision. 

The Columbia Accident Investigation Board commented that if 

we were to replace the aging Shuttle, and they recommended that 

we do, that the approach could only be successful if our purpose 

was sustained and the funds were committed throughout the lifetime of the program. That, too, is covered in our budget and I ask 

you for that stability. 

So I will close by commenting that in my opinion what we at 

NASA need and what the nation needs from NASA now and from 

our Oversight Committees and Appropriations Committees who 

support us, what we need is the constancy of purpose recommended 

by the Columbia Accident Investigation Board. That will be a legacy that the crew of Shuttle Columbia could honor. 

Thank you. 

[Written statement of Michael D. Griffin, Administrator, National Aeronautics and Space Administration follows:] 


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U.S. LEADERSHIP IN CIVIL SPACE EXPLORATION

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Dr. Griffin. 

Speaking in the broadest terms, how does the vision and its 

funding address the competition we are now experiencing from 

other countries that are getting into and becoming increasingly sophisticated in civil space? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It provides us an opportunity to partner with our 

peers and I think it provides a threat to our leadership. The United 

States for decades has been the leader in all aspects of civil space 

exploration. It is a position that in part for the generations alive 

today defines what it is to be an American. It has gone without 

question that the United States reached the Moon and other nations had not, that the United States leads the coalition to build 

the Internatonal Space Station, others cannot, that the United 

States built the Hubble Space Telescope, others did not, and so on 

for many other missions. 

Today we are in a position where we must retire the Space Shuttle and because there will be a gap in human space flight capability 

between the retirement of the Shuttle and the deployment of Ares 

and Orion, its successors, we will face a four-and-a-half year gap 

at this point where in order to access the Space Station that we 

have built, we must depend upon Russian transportation systems 

for crew resupply and we must depend upon European and Japanese cargo transport, which is part of our existing barter agreements with them, so that is not a new relationship, and we must 

depend upon commercial resupply capability which has not yet 

been developed. 

Now, I am among the most forward leaning that you will talk to 

in my optimism that such commercial transport will develop, but 

it is still a bet. It is not a position that I would willingly see the 

United States occupy vis-a-vis our strategic competitors in the 

world and, yet, it is a position in which we find ourselves. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, given the current schedules and current 

funding levels, do we risk having our preeminence in space overtaken by other countries and, if so, does it matter? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I will answer the second question first. I do not intend to be in any way parochial or jingoistic, but I am an American 

and I will always be. I think that our country should strive to be 

preeminent in all things upon which the eyes of the world rest and 

space is one of those things. Space and space exploration is an activity that virtually every nation in the advanced world begins to 

undertake as soon as it is able. Most of them want to partner with 

us. They will not want to partner with us if we are not the leader. 

So I think it does matter. Clearly we have been a leader. Clearly 

when we are in a position where we are buying transportation from 

others to and from the Space Station that we took a leadership role 

in building, others will ask whether the United States is still a 

leader. I do not know what answers they will come up with. But 

during the period of time when we are not flying in space, Russia 

and China will be able to. And that bothers me. 

I have to add, for the second part of it, that I am glad that Russia is there as a Space Station partner to provide such transport 

because if they were not, we would not have a means of supplying 


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crew or rotating crew to and from the Space Station and we would 

not be able to capitalize on the investment that we have made. So 

while I dislike the situation in which we find ourselves, it is preferable to some others I can envision. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Frelinghuysen, I think I am going to go vote 

and I will be back in time for you to go vote and while you proceed 

with questions. 

Is that all right? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, sir. 

RUSSIAN AND CHINESE RELATIONSHIP WITH NASA

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [presiding]. Well, thank you for your testimony. Sort of keeping in line with the Chairman’s questions and 

your response, the whole notion that we would be beholden to the 

Russians to get where we need to get, could you expand on that? 

Obviously, we have a good working relationship with the Russians. It seems to me, and we have discussed this, that if the 

American people knew how beholden we would be to the Russians, 

you would get a far greater public demand for greater investments 

in NASA than what we have. 

The Chinese are to this lay person leap-frogging ahead. How 

would you characterize the Chinese program and does that represent a threat? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Let me answer again the second question first. I am 

very impressed with what China is accomplishing in human space 

flight. They are only the third nation to develop their own internal 

capabilities for conducting human spaceflight. I believe that they 

see it as I do, as a strategic matter for a great nation. I do not see 

it as a threat other than to our image of ourselves in the world. 

For other nations to be able to do profoundly difficult and daring 

things that we cannot do, in a period of time when we cannot do 

them, is not a position that the United States would wish to be in. 

I have been fairly clear about that. I think it has ramifications in 

the world of economics, in the world of soft power and I think 

we—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And military power. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It has implications for military power, and I think 

we ignore that at our peril. Now, with regard to Russia, I personally like the Russians that we work with on the Space Station program. I admire their capabilities and they have been good partners. 

We pay for that partnership and that is money which does not 

come back to American aerospace industry. But they have met 

their obligations. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. But at some point in time, we are going to 

be inherently dependent on them. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We are and let me—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. For access? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Let me not embellish it. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Let me not be rhetorical. Let me state specifically 

what our position is. After we retire the Shuttle in 2010, and until 


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and unless we deploy the U.S. Orion crew exploration vehicle or 

until an as yet unknown commercial capability becomes available 

for a period that we estimate currently to be four-and-a-half years, 

if we wish to have U.S. crew onboard the Space Station, we will 

be purchasing those seats from Russia. 

If we wish to meet our existing obligations to our European, Canadian, and Japanese partners to provide crew transportation for 

their astronauts, which is an obligation we assumed, if we wish to 

meet that obligation, we will be purchasing those seats from Russia 

between 2010 and 2015. Even into 2015, quite likely into 2016, we 

will be flying a new vehicle, whether it is commercial or whether 

it is government-built. Such a new vehicle cannot be initially counted on for crew rescue services and, yet, we must have crew rescue 

capability onboard the Space Station. 

Today the proven crew rescue capability is the Russian Soyuz vehicle. So until we have sufficiently flight tested our own vehicle to 

know that it can loiter at the Space Station for six months at a 

time and be capable of safely returning crew to the Earth in the 

event of an emergency, we will continue to be dependent upon the 

Soyuz system. Those are the facts. 

ADEQUATE FUNDING FOR NASA

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. It has become common, and I do believe it 

personally, to hear that NASA is not adequately funded to carry 

out its various missions or at least not carry them out well. 

As you know, there was an effort last year to provide a billion 

dollars in emergency funding as belated compensation for the costs 

necessary to return the space shuttle to flight after the Columbia 

disaster. 

You have clearly defined a set of tasks in front of you that you 

have described in detail in your testimony. Can you carry them out 

with the budget you have laid before us? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I believe that we can carry out the tasks which we 

have said we will do with the budget that the President has requested for NASA. The questions you have been asking so far are 

more in the vein of are we carrying out the right tasks, were we 

carrying out those tasks rapid enough. And on those matters, opinion may, of course, differ. 

But subject to some of the constraints we have discussed, the 

four-and-a-half year gap and the purchase of Soyuz services and 

those things, I believe that we can carry out the program that the 

President has requested NASA to accomplish with the funding that 

he has allocated. 

TRANSITION COST

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. One of the biggest uncertainties has to do 

with the transition cost as the shuttle program ends. I know we 

sort of indirectly commented on Presidential transition. Surely 

there are some good people that are, I assume, working overtime 

to prepare the next President with his or her portfolio, which certainly should include human space travel as a top priority. 

Do you have an estimate of the total transition cost and are 

those costs included in the budget? When we had quite a go around 

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ability Office, the view was that those costs were not adequately 

reflected in your projections. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. I understand. I will be direct. We disagree 

with the GAO on this matter. We do not wish to budget explicit 

values for transition costs at the present time because by so doing, 

we essentially lock in an expectation or an entitlement that those 

costs will be at least at that level. We have been assessing transition costs very carefully for the last two years and, every time we 

look at them and we continue to dig into the tail, they come down. 

We will, as part of our planning and budgeting process this coming year, budget for transition costs, but we are aggressively keeping those costs as low as we can, precisely because of the point you 

just mentioned, that transitions costs, which are not funded by the 

Space Shuttle program become a lien on the rest of NASA. 

Do you need to go vote, sir? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I sure do. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Let me withhold the rest of my answer—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. Until you return. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. No. But to some extent, you are dealing 

with those transition costs? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We absolutely are and they represent—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. But they must be reflected somewhere. I 

understand that if you—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. They are a—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. Put a marker there, then you 

sort of raise certain expectations. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. They are a lien on the Constellation Program if it should be needed. For that reason, it is in our interest 

to keep them as low as possible. Now, I understand that you need 

to go vote. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I do. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I would be happy to resume when you return, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So on the Chairman’s behalf, we are going 

to have a brief recess. I apologize. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. 

[Recess.] 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [presiding]. Well, we are back. 

Mr. Schiff. 

CONGRESSMAN SCHIFF’S OPENING REMARKS

Mr. SCHIFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Administrator, thank you for being here. I appreciate your 

spending a couple days with us. 

I had the wonderful experience last year for the first time to see 

a shuttle launch which was quite a phenomenal experience. I cannot imagine what it must be like to be sitting on top of that when 

that goes off and goes up, that is just amazing. 

I wanted to at the outset just reiterate my strong support for 

NASA, for both the human space flight as well as the robotic exploration. I realize that we will have a potential gap in terms of our 

schedule on the manned space flight. We need to make that window obviously as short as possible. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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But as I mentioned at these hearings last year, I view the NASA 

request as a floor and have supported and will continue to support 

additional funding for NASA. You have a very aggressive ambition 

at NASA which I applaud and I think we need to make sure the 

resources are there to follow through on that ambition. 

I do not think we can afford to concede our leadership in either 

human or robotic space exploration. And I think my colleagues on 

both sides of the aisle share that view. 

SPACE INTERFEROMETRY MISSION (SIM)

There are two issues I wanted to raise that I have some concern 

over and I know they will not come as any great surprise. One involves SIM. The other involves the Mars program. 

The big concern with SIM is we want to make sure that the program has enough money next year to allow for real progress before 

the new mission starts in 2010. We worked to get funding for that, 

as you know, in the omnibus last year. 

I am concerned that there is not a request, at least a direct request for SIM in the budget this year. Although I know there is 

some money in the other missions and data analysis for SIM. 

But the Congress has strong support for this effort and I appreciate the work that your staff has done to work with us and try 

to find a model of SIM that is within our capacity to afford and to 

do and move forward with. 

If you could in particular talk about the new money for SIM, 

JPL, I think, is going to need more than the $6.6 million to continue to have that ready to go, and I would like to work with you 

and our Chairman, our Committee members to try to augment that 

funding consistent with the agreement that we worked out on a 

new model for SIM. And I would love to have you share your 

thoughts and expectations on that. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, I will give you some top-level comments. I 

have Dr. Stern here who runs the Science Mission Directorate, and 

can provide some additional detail. We are, as you point out, this 

year looking at competing approaches for accomplishing the SIM 

mission, the task of finding planets around other stars. As we 

talked with you about it, when we feel that we have an appropriate 

approach to recommend that will accomplish the task and can be 

afforded, we will come back to the Congress and discus that with 

you. There is not a request in this year’s budget for SIM. The Administration did not request funding for SIM. The Congress has appropriated funding for it and we will, of course, spend that money 

as the Congress has directed. Whether there will be an Administration request for SIM in a later year depends in part upon the outcome of the analysis that we perform this year. Alan, would you 

care to explain in a little more detail about the mission? 

Dr. STERN. Sure. Absolutely. 

Good afternoon. I would just like to tell you that within our—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Identify yourself. 

Dr. STERN. Sure. I am Alan Stern. I am the Associate Administrator for the Science Mission Directorate. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Doctor. 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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I wanted to assure you, Mr. Schiff, that within our Astrophysics 

Division, in fact, within the Science Mission Directorate, the search 

for Extra-solar Planets, exoplanets as they are called, is one of our 

highest priorities. 

It has been ranked very highly by the National Academy in the 

Astrophysics decadal survey and we plan to continue to execute on 

that goal, including the next mission following Kepler, for which 

SIM is a candidate. We have put a great deal of resources into the 

development of that mission technology. It has gone very well. The 

challenge now for SIM, is for SIM to fit in the available budget 

wedge while all the other portions of the Astrophysics budget that 

are already underway are built. So, with the budget that has been 

provided by the Congress, we expect to be able to do that and make 

that determination this year or next year. 

Mr. SCHIFF. You know, I would just say we have had this sort 

of tug of war over the last several years on SIM. SIM has been in 

your glide path. Many of us want it in a quicker glide path. On a 

bipartisan basis, we expressed that sentiment for the budget last 

year. 

We have been working with you to accommodate and envision a 

more modest sized SIM that can be accommodated within the 

budget with all the other priorities that we have, and I want to 

continue to work with you all on that. I do not know what your 

time line is in terms of developing your broader policy of priorities 

in this area, but just looking at the course of this budget cycle, we 

would rather work with you in terms of shaping our appropriation 

in that area than work on it unilaterally. 

So I would invite you to give us your thoughts as quickly as you 

can on the kind of resources you think you need to keep this sort 

of new SIM concept on track so that we do not have big gaps in 

this. I look forward to working with you on that. 

MARS PROGRAM FUNDING

The second issue, because I know I do not have much time, at 

least in this round, and I will be following up on this in future 

rounds, is the Mars glide path has changed pretty dramatically 

from where it was last year in terms of the funding for Mars. 

I would like to ask you, because I think this has been really a 

cornerstone of our exploration program and has generated so much 

public support for it, I support the goal of a sample return from 

Mars by 2020, but the drastic cut in the Mars budget does not 

seem consistent with congressional direction, the broad support of 

the scientific community, and public excitement about the Mars 

missions. 

This is a drastic reduction from last year’s five-year plan for no 

apparent reason. I would like to work with you both to restore the 

funding for this program and ensure that this good science is also 

funded. 

If you could share your thoughts on what changed from last year 

to this year and how we can work together to try to restore that 

support for the Mars program. 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. Administrator Griffin has asked me to take 

this question. So let me start by saying that the Mars program has 

been very successful and we are very proud of the results that we 


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have obtained from it. We are looking forward to the Mars Science 

Laboratory (MSL) mission launching next year and a series of missions that we have planned and what you see in the budget request. 

However, the Mars mission does reside within the Planetary 

Science Division. As you know, there is a decadal survey for planetary sciences that speak to the needs in planetary science for the 

inner planet, the outer planets, for Mars, for primitive bodies, and 

other aspects of the field. So there are a variety of competing 

needs. 

At mid decade, which was just last year, the National Academy 

provided us with this report. This report was put together by a 

Committee chaired by one of my predecessors, Dr. Wesley Huntress. That report gives us grades, A’s, B’s, C’s, and D’s, for the different activities within the Planetary Science Division, grading 

them against the goals of the decadal survey. 

Our Mars program received an A. Our outer planets program received a D. Our Research and Analysis program received a C. So 

what you see in the President’s request consistent with this report 

card is an attempt to repair the major deficiencies of the program 

within the budget resources that are available. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I would add a comment that the Mars program, of 

course, has its own interest and own excitement, and it is funded 

today at a very high level because it is executing a flagship mission, the Mars Science Laboratory. 

There then becomes an expectation, almost an entitlement, that 

funding will continue at the level necessary to support flagship and 

that cannot happen because within the overall Planetary Sciences 

Division, there are other communities who want flagships. Indeed, 

the National Research Council of the National Academy has recommended an outer planet flagship. We cannot conduct Mars at a 

flagship level and also do an outer planet flagship mission. So the 

budgets for the individual communities within Planetary Sciences 

have to go up and down and have to phase properly in order to stay 

within overall guidelines while accomplishing a varied set of goals. 

What we are really doing is returning the Mars program to its average funding level. 

Mr. SCHIFF. If I could just interject because I know I am probably out of time already, but I understand all that is true. All that 

was true last year as well. But, nonetheless, the path that Mars 

was on in terms of its funding and support last year is drastically 

different than what is being proposed this year. 

So my question, is, what changed in all that calculus from last 

year to this year that accounts for such a dramatic decrease in the 

Mars funding? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We have reformulated the strategy that we wish to 

use in exploring Mars as compared to our other obligations within 

science. 

Mr. SCHIFF. What are those other obligations? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Some money has gone to Earth science. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Mr. Chairman, I look forward to exploring this further during the hearing. Thank you. 


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NASA’S BUDGET REQUEST

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Doctor, you have got a lot of things on your 

plate. You have got the shuttle and the Space Station operations, 

development of new human space transportation system. 

Your budget has to support aeronautics, space science and technology applications and these important activities and ambitious 

human lunar program will necessitate investment. 

Your budget request, I think, had an increase of about 1.8 percent which does not even keep up with inflation. And it just does 

not seem to fit. 

How do you sustain all that with that small an increase and 

would you not agree that that is inadequate? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I can only say that the President’s budget is adequate for the goals that the President has asked us to accomplish. 

Over the years of the Bush Administration, the NASA budget has 

kept pace with inflation. In this one year, it takes a bit of a dip. 

But broadly speaking, we do keep pace with inflation. A free variable, of course, in your question is the time frame in which the accomplishments are completed. I think we have a very good portfolio 

of activity within NASA and I have been very pleased that whenever we have a discussion as with the one we just had with Mr. 

Schiff, it is not about the question of whether an activity is worth 

pursuing. Everyone that I work with here on Capitol Hill seems to 

think that what we are doing are good things and the questions are 

always about the relative priorities among good things and the 

pace at which good things can be accomplished. Clearly if more 

money were allocated, more things can be done or things can be 

done faster. But the budget submitted by the President is adequate 

to accomplish what he has asked us to accomplish in the time 

frame that we claim we can do it. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, obviously it is not even a current services 

budget. Would you agree with that? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I am not sure what you mean by current—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, it is not enough money to fund the activities that you are funding in 2008. It is not enough money to keep 

up with inflation. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It goes slightly below the inflationary level this 

year, yes, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, my point is, what adjustments are you 

making at NASA to accommodate that reality, that fact? What programs are being, I guess, not funded or stretched out? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, no program is not being funded or stretched 

out that was otherwise planned to be done because we have seen 

this small dip coming for a while and our programs have been 

planned accordingly. The biggest recent dip in our program was the 

Continuing Resolution that we got a year ago this time and we 

have managed to adjust our programs to fit that. In fact, the primary way that we adjusted our programmatic flow to meet the demands of the Continuing Resolution was that we slipped the delivery date for Ares and Orion, the Shuttle replacements, by six 

months. In general, with ongoing programs, that is what we have 

to do when for any reason there is a decrement in funding. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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Mr. MOLLOHAN. And I guess the Mars program that you and Mr. Schiff were talking about is down $170 or so million. That is an 

adjustment you have made that was not—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That is true. That is a strategy adjustment we 

made since last year within Planetary Sciences. We have targeted 

money for an outer planet flagship. We have shifted other money 

to Earth science and the Mars program has a little bit less than 

it was once planned, but they would have—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So that is an example of an adjustment you have 

made this year which you did not anticipate making last year? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That is true. We have a new Science Mission Director this year, Dr. Stern, and he has a slightly different strategic 

view of what we should do than his predecessor. And I chose to accommodate that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yeah. That was the kind of example I was looking for. Are there other such examples? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. There are, but that was not in response to a budget 

cut. That was just in response to, as Dr. Stern indicated, we do get 

assessments of our efforts by the National Academy. This one is a 

new one. This assessment was not in evidence at this time last 

year. 

I am a little torn. It is sometimes asserted that we are not sufficiently responsive to the wishes of the National Academy, though 

I try to be. And, yet, when we are responsive to the wishes of the 

National Academy, it causes change. And change has always two 

sides. Those who are on the receiving end of the result of the 

change are always happy. Those who are on the giving end of a 

change are always unhappy. It is very hard to know what to do. 

We believe that our Science Program is not only responsive but 

very responsive to the priorities that the National Academy sets 

forth and—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. Sometimes that does result in changes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I was after an example as to how your program 

has changed not because of any academy’s recommendations but 

because of the budget realities that you were facing from OMB or 

Administration or otherwise. That is really what I was fishing for. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Our program has not changed as a result of any 

budget surprises from the Administration because there have not 

been surprises. The President’s requests have been very consistent. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Culberson. 

SHUTTLE RETURN TO FLIGHT COST COMPENSATION

Mr. CULBERSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Forgive me for running a little late. We had a vote and our hearing is going on at the 

same time. 

Dr. Griffin, thank you, all of you, for the work you are doing. You 

know how passionately devoted I am to you and the mission at 

NASA as everybody on the Subcommittee is. There are no party 

distinctions or labels here. We are all equally committed to help 

NASA achieve its goals. 

And I know that you are constrained by your position to defend 

the White House funding request, but I have noticed that while the 

White House laid out the vision, they have never in my opinion 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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adequately funded it or given you the resources you need to do everything on your table. 

And I know that perhaps this has been asked before about the 

billion dollars that the Congress tried to give you last year, to give 

compensation to NASA, for example, for the loss of the shuttle. And 

in a very real sense the Agency, NASA, our space program is selfinsured, the vehicle loss. 

We can never replace those astronauts who lost their lives, but 

the vehicle itself was never replaced as with Challenger, correct? 

We have never compensated NASA as we did for Challenger? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We are not replacing the Shuttle because the determination has been made to retire the fleet. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Right. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. So that individual Shuttle was not replaced, and 

NASA was not compensated for the $2.7 billion in return to flight 

costs. That is correct. 

Mr. CULBERSON. That was my point. It is a $2.7 billion cost is 

what I was driving at. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We assessed that cost a year or so ago in response 

to a question for the record. The Shuttle Return to Flight costs 

were about $2.7 billion and those came out of extant programs at 

NASA. 

HURRICANE KATRINA

Mr. CULBERSON. And on top of that, you had Hurricane Katrina 

damage, where you had the potential of flooding damage at one of 

your facilities—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That was Hurricane Katrina, sir. 

Mr. CULBERSON. That was Katrina. And a couple of NASA, I understand, employees stayed behind and ran the pumps and saved 

the facility. Is that fundamentally the story? There would have 

been even more damage but for the initiative and bravery of a couple of NASA employees. And who were they and what—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. They were actually Lockheed Martin employees. 

Mr. CULBERSON. What did they do specifically to save the facility? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, when others evacuated, there was a ride-out 

crew that was formed to stay behind and there were several folks 

who were on that crew. They drove out and walked out in hurricane weather conditions to a pumping station which needed manual intervention to keep the pump running. The Michoud Facility 

where we build Shuttle external tanks and where we will be building tanks for our new rocket fleet, the Michoud Facility is in a very 

low-lying area next to the water because we ship these tanks by 

barge. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Right. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is surrounded by levies which keep the water out. 

The water surge from Hurricane Katrina topped the levies by a little bit and so the internal area would have flooded had the pumping station not been able to keep up with the influx of water. 

Through the bravery of these employees, the area was saved. When 

I flew over it by helicopter a couple of days after Katrina, Michoud 

was an island of green in a sea of brown mud stretching 150 miles 


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long along the coast by about three or four miles inland. It was 

quite startling to see. 

NASA awarded to all of the employees who stayed behind, a 

‘‘NASA Exceptional Bravery Metal’’ for their service. We would not 

be flying a Space Shuttle today, we would not have completed the 

international Space Station if those people had not taken that risk. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Driven out there that night and turned on the 

pumps manually. It is a great story. And I wanted to reemphasize 

it here because those employees not only saved the shuttle program, allowed it to continue, but also saved—you suffered how 

much damage and then how much more would have been suffered, 

do you think? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I have misplaced in my memory the dollar figure for 

the Katrina damage that we assessed. I can get that for you for the 

record. It was many tens of millions of dollars, had we lost the entire facility, its replacement value, I do not know. 

[The information follows:] 

As of January 2008, the total cost of NASA’s response to Hurricane Katrina on 

the Gulf Coast, including operations, programmatic recovery, facility repairs, and 

risk mitigation efforts, was estimated at $385.1M. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Right. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. But it is enormous. 

ADEQUATE FUNDING FOR NASA

Mr. CULBERSON. Just to conclude, and you know how passionate 

I am, all of us are, we want to help. But I hope you can help us 

help you. 

And I see in the February 18th issue of Aviation Week a report. 

There was a meeting that took place at Stanford University to look 

at the current vision for space exploration, what NASA has got on 

its plate, how much money there is available. 

You know, it was a top-flight group of scientists and engineers 

hosted by the Planetary Society and Stanford University Aeronautics and Astronautics Department brought together about 50 

top U.S. space officials quoting from Aviation Week February 18th, 

including NASA industry and university personnel. 

But they point out in the article, and I want to, you know, point 

this out for the record because this is an indisputable fact, ‘‘The 

failure of the White House to secure the funding needed to initiate 

the vision has led us to a point where the nation’s space program 

is in peril,’’ says Scott Hubbard, Co-Chair of the event and a consulting professor at Stanford and former Director of NASA in its 

Research Center. 

NASA’s annual budgets are running $3 billion short of what is 

needed each year to fulfill even the Bush vision. You know, based 

on what you have told us of the $2.7 billion cost to return to flight 

that was not compensated, obviously the damage from the hurricane. 

I just hope you will help us help you find a way to get you the 

funding you need because the science programs have suffered. The 

Mars program has been whacked which is unacceptable. 

I have to say the operating plan that I have heard was submitted, I know that Mr. Schiff and I are arm and arm on this, with 

the cuts that have been instituted at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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and some of the other science programs, I just do not accept and 

we are going to need to work together. 

Mr. Chairman, I know Adam and I are arm and arm with making sure. We do not want the operating plan to go forward until 

these concerns at JPL and the other science labs, the other centers 

are addressed. 

I just see what you do, what NASA does, what we do in investing 

in scientific research in general in the United States is a national 

insurance policy. 

And I know you do not have enough money to do what you need 

to do, but I do hope you will help us help you by. Even if it is outside of the Committee hearing process, tell us what you need so we 

can help you get there. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Sir, JPL is fully funded. There are no layoffs coming 

at JPL. 

Mr. CULBERSON. I am concerned about cuts in the SIM program, 

for example. I am concerned about the outer planets program, the 

highest priority of the decadal survey of planetary scientists. 

Until recently, the last couple of years, it is an undisputed fact 

that NASA has always flown the missions designated by the 

decadal survey of planetary scientists. NASA has always flown 

those number one missions, whether it be the, you know, the inner 

planets, the Earth missions, or the outer planets. You have always 

flown them. 

Cassini was the last one we did and you know that the mission 

to your robot that we have talked about before is the highest priority of the decadal survey and you keep stringing that one along 

and whacking it and whittling on it. And it is just tragic. I just do 

not think it is—it is not acceptable. 

I am going to work with Mr. Schiff and the Committee to find 

ways to fix that. And that is money you are taking out of hide of 

these other science programs to fund inadequate recommendations 

from OMB. And I admire the job you are doing and support you. 

This is all said in a friendly way. I want to help. I just want to 

find a way to help and we just need you to help us help you. 

Thank you very much for the job that all of you are doing. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Ruppersberger. 

PROGRAM MANUFACTURING FAILURES

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Again, we all have different hearings. Sorry 

I was not here in the beginning. 

I want to talk about the satellite program generally, and specifically the manufacturing. Adam Schiff and I are both on the House 

Intelligence Committee and I am Chair of the Technical Tactical 

Committee. And we are focusing on some of the satellite failures 

that we have had recently. 

We have been having tabletop discussions for about maybe six 

months with the general contractors that work in conjunction with 

DoD and we are trying to find out where our successes are, our 

failures are, where we are in our space program presently and 

where we will be in the future. 

We have gotten a lot of good information. And I want to tell you 

what we have learned and how it compares to where you are. 


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We have had numerous failures within our satellite program. We 

have had manufacturing failures. We have had timing problems. 

We have had cost overruns. And it is to the point where we really 

have to look at where we are with respect to our satellite program 

generally. 

I think one of the main themes that has occurred here is that 

we have found that research and development is occurring once the 

contract is out instead of before a contract is in place. And what 

I mean by that is that we go out and, you know, the big hitters 

that do most of this manufacturing are in a position where they get 

the contract and then as they move forward with the contract, they 

are really doing the research and development. And, therefore, we 

have been having failures and cost overruns. 

What I think we are going to recommend is that we really need 

to refocus on our research and development before it even gets to 

manufacturing. There really should not be the failures that have 

existed in our program in the last ten years if the research and development is done properly. The mistakes are made in research 

and development. 

The other thing we are seeing, too, is that when you get a satellite built, everyone tries to pile on instruments. You know, a 

three-star General will come and say I have to put my program on 

it, I have to put my program on it. And because of that, we have 

not stayed focused on what our mission is. 

Now, these are some of the results that we are getting out of 

what we are doing on the Intel Defense side. How does that compare to where you think you are with respect to your satellite programs? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We think in recent years, our record of success has 

been extraordinarily high. I do not know what to say other than 

that. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Well, let me ask you this. I will ask you 

this. Has every program been on time? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, certainly not. We have had some delays. We 

have had some cost overruns. Right now we are experiencing a cost 

overrun on the Glory Mission because of the APS sensor, the Aerosol Polarimetry Sensor Instrument. So our record is certainly not 

perfect. But we have not had significant mission failures or crippling cost overruns or schedule delays in recent years. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Well, even though it might not be as severe 

as where it is on the other side that we are talking about, you have 

had problems with cost overruns. 

So what are the reasons for the cost overruns and for the delays 

specifically? Where I am heading, so I can tell you what I want to 

talk about, is that it is my understanding there is again more cuts 

in research and development in the Administration’s budget. And 

I think that is very dangerous in the area that we are dealing in. 

And I know that you have to stand by the President’s budget, but 

it is something that we as an Oversight Committee need to talk 

about. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. I do understand. Our budget this year almost, but not quite, keeps pace with inflation. So I cannot say that 

the budget has been cut. We have been given funds adequate to 

support the missions—— 


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RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT BUDGET

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. You cannot say that the research and development budget has been cut? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It has not been cut. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Okay. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. NASA’s research and development budget has not 

been cut. We have funds adequate to support doing the missions 

that the President has asked us to do. 

Again, we are in the business of developing one of a kind, first 

of a kind things. We do things for a living that no one has ever 

done before using the best contractors in the industrial base that 

the nation has. Things do not always go perfectly, but I have to say 

that for the last few years, our record of execution has been unmatched. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Do you feel that you need more resources 

in research and development? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I have the resources I need in the President’s budget to accomplish the program that has been set forth. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. You are a good soldier. I don’t mean that 

in a derogatory way. I mean, if that is what it is, and I think we 

are going to get—our staff is going to have to look more into this, 

because I am really surprised at the comment. And that doesn’t 

mean that I don’t agree with it. 

I just don’t have enough data to understand that you don’t need 

more research and development. That we have cost overruns and 

there needs to be a reason for it. And there needs to be a reason 

for time delays. 

ICE, CLOUDS, AND LAND ELEVATION SATELLITE (ICESAT)

Let me give you an example of a time delay. Let us discuss a program that the Goddard Space Flight Center is work on, the 

ICESat–II mission. You know the Congress has urged NASA to 

move more quickly in developing the next generation of needed 

Earth science missions and satellites due to the fact that many existing missions are near the end of our usable life in the coming 

years. Do you agree with that statement? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes. The decadal survey has urged us to put up 

more satellites. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. But our concern is—it is our understanding 

that this mission, the ICE—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. ICESat–II. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER [continuing]. Is going from 2010 to 2013. 

And the date now is 2015. This is an example of what I am talking 

about. Now let me tell you why I am concerned about this. 

First thing, we have an area of climate change. We are concerned 

that there could be an area where we won’t be able to get the information to really determine what is going on with respect to the 

issue of global warming. 

Congress I think specifically provided $33 million in fiscal year 

2008 to jump start several of the missions that were recommended 

by the National Academy of Sciences. And here we have a program 

that we thought was going online in 2010 to 2013. And now we are 

seeing 2015. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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There is an example of a program that I am concerned about 

where we are—we are going to be at 2015. When, in fact, what we 

thought would be 2010 or 2013. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, sir, the program is not experiencing an overrun or a delay. Alan, would you care to comment? 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Yeah. I would like to hear what Mr. Stern 

has to say. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. This is Dr. Alan Stern who runs our Science Mission Directorate. 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. In fact, you probably know that this year we 

have actually put more emphasis in the Science Mission Directorate on Earth science programs, just like the one that you described. And because of that initiative, which infused about 600 

million additional dollars into our Earth science program, we are 

actually able to start four decadal survey missions that were only 

recommended last year, including ICESat–II. We currently have on 

orbit ICESat–I with an operational capability expected to last several more years. So from our perspective, we have finally put 

ICESat–II on firm footing, along with other measurement needs 

like the soil moisture mission, which will be launching before it 

and other decadal survey missions that will launch concurrently 

after it as a result of the President’s budget. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. So you are basically saying that ICESat–I 

is in place. That we won’t go dark until ICESat–II is in place. 

Dr. STERN. Well, ICESat–I is in place. It is functioning nominally. I can’t promise you that it won’t go dark in the interim. But 

it currently has no anomalies. It has some life-limited items. But 

it is expected to last several more years. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. With the initial procurement or contract, 

what was the initial date that the ICESat–II was supposed to be 

completed? 

Dr. STERN. I would have to take that question for the record and 

get back to you on it. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. But was it before the 2013 date projected 

earlier? The date now that you are projecting is 2015. 

[The information follows:] 

ICESAT–II (ICE, CLOUD, AND LAND ELEVATION SATELLITE) MISSION

The President’s FY 2009 budget request, which was released on February 4, 2008, 

included the first assignment of funding for the Decadal Survey-recommended missions. The President’s FY 2009 budget request provided sufficient funds—as one 

component of the line of ‘‘Decadal Survey Missions’’—to begin formulation of 

ICESat–II, with a target launch date in FY 2015. 

NASA has not pushed back the launch date of ICESat–II. NASA has established 

an executable implementation plan that accomplishes the necessary ICESat–II mission and implementation development within the allocated resources. 

The Decadal Survey, released in January 2007, recommended an ICESat–II mission at a cost of about $300.0M. Throughout 2007, NASA conducted concept studies 

of all proposed Decadal Survey missions, including ICESat–II. These studies were 

intended to demonstrate the feasibility of, and challenges associated with, the mission concepts, and did not define baseline missions. One of the findings of the 

ICESat–II concept study was that a simple re-flight of the ICESat–I mission design 

would cost as much as 90 percent more than the amount estimated by the Decadal 

Survey. 

A launch date of 2015 was determined by NASA based on many considerations, 

including but not limited to: (1) technical issues uncovered during the current onorbit ICESat–I mission, e.g., laser limitations and the need to define and develop 

a reliable laser system; (2) necessity to define a clear and comprehensive trajectory 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
26 

of requirements from the mission science objectives to the measurement and mission 

requirements, including such issues as lifetime and reliability; (3) a detailed mission 

implementation budget profile leading to high confidence in the cost and schedule; 

(4) developmynt of appropriate risk reduction activities with appropriate 

redundancies; and, (5) the current maturity level of the mission definition and required measurement technologies. NASA has embarked on an expedited activity to 

select a Science Definition Team (SDT) through competitive proposals solicited 

through an Amendment to the 2008 NASA Research Opportunities in Space and 

Earth Sciences (ROSES). NASA, working with the SDT and others during the current pre-Phase A formulation stage, will define the optimal mission configuration 

compatible with allocated resources. This extended team will investigate partnerships with non-NASA organizations, study instrument and mission designs, and examine science requirements to identify significant cost and performance parameters. 

Dr. STERN. I will have to get that answer for you. The decadal 

survey that recommended ICESat–II, and I will admit to being new 

to the NASA program, was just released last year. Our response to 

it came the same year. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. You know, it is not about defending your 

program. It is about really doing—finding out the right way. Finding out the system. We need a good system in place. 

If we need more research and development—let us say that we 

do, especially in NASA. I mean, the reason we are doing so well 

in the world, that we control the world, we control basically the 

skies, is because of what NASA did in their research. And we have 

to continue to focus on that. 

But, you know, there have been some failures. And we have to 

admit some of our failures to make sure that we don’t do them 

again. And we do better, because we have a lot of competition out 

there with China, Russia. 

So I will stop there. But I would like more information on that. 

Thank you. 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. 

GLORY MISSION

Mr. MOLLOHAN. If I could follow up, Dr. Griffin, with—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Sure. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. Dr. Stern, a little bit on Mr. 

Ruppersberger’s questions about the satellites. 

It has been a huge issue with the Committee in dealing with the 

Senate. They have expressed great concerns about that about the 

satellite productions, the development, and the cost overruns. So in 

the spirit of you helping us look at this, us help you with regard 

to these issues, what should we be sensitive to? 

Take Glory, for example. What is happening there that resulted 

in the cost overruns and the delays that we should be looking at? 

What should we be concerned with? And what would you recommend the kind of oversight we have in order to help you get it 

done? Is there not a performance issue or something here that we 

should be very sensitive to? 

Dr. STERN. Well, that is an interesting example that you raise. 

And I will try to answer. We think we should be sensitive to it too. 

And we are. The Glory mission exists for the primary purpose of 

making these aerosol polarimetry measurements, because aerosols 

are a key component. The contribution of aerosols is a key component to climate research models in global warming. Aerosols have 

a cooling effect. Yet their exact influence is not well known. So we 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
27 

are making a measurement to try to refine the models for climate 

change research that NASA is responsible for. 

The particular sensor in question is being built by a contractor 

who moved and consolidated some of that contractor’s workforce 

from one location to another. It may well be that in the long run, 

that move and that consolidation of contractor workforce in this 

particular case could be helpful. I don’t know. I can’t foresee that 

future. But they obviously did it as a business, because they 

thought it was a good move. But in the period of time where they 

are building our sensor, work progress has slowed quite a bit. In 

fact, it slowed to about 60 percent of the rate that we had expected 

and that was matched with the funding that was provided. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You mean developing the sensor? 

Mr. STERN. Developing the sensor. Now it is a research and development sensor. I mean, that is what you passed to do. So it is 

a first of a kind type thing. It is going well. Technically the sensor 

is meeting its goals. But it is slow. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You mean now it is? 

Dr. STERN. Well, the sensors development progress is good. But 

it is slower than expected. I mean, so it is not encountering technical difficulties. It is just slow. Because it is slow, it costs more 

money. 

The total amount of money in question is a total of maybe $80 

million of which about $70 million of it is due for that sensor directly and its effects on the rest of the spacecraft, because it is 

showing up late. 

That is a development problem, which we are certainly not 

proud. The contractor is not proud of it. These things do happen 

from time to time. We are, I want to say in the vernacular, we are 

all over it. We are working with the contractor. The CEO of the 

contractor was in my office two weeks ago to discuss specific steps 

that they are taking to mitigate the damage. But the fact is that 

when the government undertakes development contracts like this, 

they are usually on a cost-plus basis. So while we monitor and direct their performance, we do have to pay the overrun. 

I believe we will eventually have a good satellite, and that we 

will make an important scientific measurement, which will contribute in a very significant way to our climate change research. 

But this particular example is an example of an overrun. And that 

is the reason why. 

VISIBLE-INFRARED IMAGERY RADIOMETER SUITE (VIIRS)

Mr. MOLLOHAN. We are also having problems with VIIRS. 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I mean is there something about the sensor development? And how can we do it better? And then I want to yield 

to Mr. Ruppersberger. 

Dr. STERN. NASA is not directing the VIIRS contract. I want to 

make it clear. That is a DOD contract. Although we are dependent 

upon VIIRS, because we are flying VIIRS on the in-post preparatory program. It is the predecessor to NPOESS. It is not a 

good news story. It is late, and it is having technical difficulties. 

We will eventually get it. I am sure there are a lot of lessons 

learned there for all of us. Now, you are right. You raised a very 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
28 

good point when you say that there are sensor problems. I do think 

that there is a need in the country, on the government side, for us 

to look at the industrial base for advanced sensor development and 

to take steps. We need to do something different, because we can’t 

keep having these problems. 

I was discussing this issue just last week with Admiral 

Lautenbacher of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. I think we are in agreement that we need to take steps to 

restore capability that once existed in our industrial base and that 

has managed to dissipate. That is not going to help us this year 

or next. We will just have to struggle through, but in the longer 

term, I think there is work we can do here. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Latham, if you don’t mind, Mr. 

Ruppersberger had a follow up. Mr. Ruppersberger. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Mr. Stern, get me more information if you 

could. And I am not sure of the time frame. But we have to, again, 

evaluate where we are, our successes, and our failures. 

It is my understanding, and I can’t give you the time frame, that 

we—NASA has had I think eight Nunn-McCurdy breaches, seven 

at 15 percent and one at 30 percent. If you could get me the information on those and get back the reason why. Again, I am focusing 

on the issue of research and development to see why we are where 

we are. To make sure that we can see where you are and also from 

our intelligence and defense side too. 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. We will provide you with just that information. 

[The information follows:] 

ICESAT–II (ICE, CLOUD, AND LAND ELEVATION SATELLITE) MISSION

The President’s FY 2009 budget request, which was released on February 4, 2008, 

included the first assignment of funding for the Decadal Survey-recommended missions. The President’s FY 2009 budget request provided sufficient funds—as one 

component of the line of ‘‘Decadal Survey Missions’’—to begin formulation of 

ICESat–II, with a target launch date in FY 2015. 

NASA has not pushed back the launch date of ICESat–II. NASA has established 

an executable implementation plan that accomplishes the necessary ICESat–II mission and implementation development within the allocated resources. 

The Decadal Survey, released in January 2007, recommended an ICESat–II mission at a cost of about $300.0M. Throughout 2007, NASA conducted concept studies 

of all proposed Decadal Survey missions, including ICESat–II. These studies were 

intended to demonstrate the feasibility of, and challenges associated with, the mission concepts, and did not define baseline missions. One of the findings of the 

ICESat–II concept study was that a simple re-flight of the ICESat–I mission design 

would cost as much as 90 percent more than the amount estimated by the Decadal 

Survey. 

A launch date of 2015 was determined by NASA based on many considerations, 

including but not limited to: (1) technical issues uncovered during the current onorbit ICESat–I mission, e.g., laser limitations and the need to define and develop 

a reliable laser system; (2) necessity to define a clear and comprehensive trajectory 

of requirements from the mission science objectives to the measurement and mission 

requirements, including such issues as lifetime and reliability; (3) a detailed mission 

implementation budget profile leading to high confidence in the cost and schedule; 

(4) development of appropriate risk reduction activities with appropriate 

redundancies; and, (5) the current maturity level of the mission definition and required measurement technologies. NASA has embarked on an expedited activity to 

select a Science Definition Team (SDT) through competitive proposals solicited 

through an Amendment to the 2008 NASA Research Opportunities in Space and 

Earth Sciences (ROSES). NASA, working with the SDT and others during the current pre-Phase A formulation stage, will define the optimal mission configuration 

compatible with allocated resources. This extended team will investigate partnerVerDate Aug 31 2005 00:38 Aug 03, 2008 Jkt 042708 PO 00000 Frm 00028 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 E:\HR\OC\A708P2.000 A708P2

bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
29 

ships with non-NASA organizations, study instrument and mission designs, and examine science requirements to identify significant cost and performance parameters. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Mr. Latham. 

CIVIL SERVICE WORKFORCE RETIREMENT

Mr. LATHAM. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and welcome. I serve on 

three Subcommittees. Government-wide we seem to have a problem 

with a whole generation of people near retirement, ones with institutional knowledge. 

Do you have this problem at NASA? Are you doing anything to 

address that problem? You know, basically the whole program 

geared up what 35–40 years ago. And you probably have a bunch 

of people who are on the edge of retirement. Is that a problem for 

you? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well it is a problem, and it is an opportunity, sir. 

The average age of NASA employees is right around 50. Demographically our statistics are such that within the next five years, 

about 25 percent of our civil service workforce is eligible for retirement. That doesn’t mean that they will necessarily take it. But 

they are. 

There is—— 

Mr. LATHAM. I used to think that was old by the way, 50. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I must say that I would—— 

Mr. LATHAM. So much has changed. 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. Kill to be 50 again. But leaving that 

aside—— 

Mr. LATHAM. Okay. 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. It is a concern, because in our business 

there is much that is not written in textbooks. And I have—— 

Mr. LATHAM. Right. 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. Written a textbook. There is an awful 

lot that is not in there. So we rely in this business on developing 

one-of-a-kind things, we rely on in many ways a master and apprentice relationship if I could use those words. Where folks who 

are older and more experienced pass on what they have learned 

and what they know to younger folks coming up. 

Of course, if we get a wave of retirements of more experienced 

folks, then we do chance losing some knowledge. Now we are very 

fortunate. Everybody who works for NASA is in one way or another 

a volunteer, because they could all make more money working 

somewhere else. 

We have very good access to our network of retirees and former 

NASA and industry employees. They do serve an awful lot of mentoring for our younger folks. But there is a concern there. We pay 

attention to it. It is also an opportunity, because the newer, younger folks who are 30 and 35 years younger than me coming out of 

school, know things I don’t know and that Bill Gerstenmaier and 

others here at the table here don’t know. So when we have an opportunity to bring new young folks in and put them to work on our 

programs. We love that, because our overall civil service workforce 

is capped at 17,900. We really only can hire new people through 

attrition of older people. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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So it really is, sir, in the spirit of your question, it really is both 

a problem and an opportunity. It is a problem to manage it right, 

so that the more experienced folks pass on their knowledge before 

they leave the agency. But it is also an opportunity to get the best 

and the brightest out of universities that teach stuff that sure 

wasn’t known when I was going to school. 

Mr. LATHAM. Well you kind of lead me to my next question. I 

have two universities in the state of Iowa that are members of the 

University Space Research Association. And they believe you 

should spend more on the programs that provide funding for 

hands-on training and research at the undergrad and graduate levels. And that would be about one percent of your budget. I just 

wonder whether you agree with that level or not and why? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I wish I could spend more on everything we do. I 

really do. One of the best things that we can do for young scientists 

and engineers is to provide small instrument design, construction, 

deployment, and operations experiences so that they can learn the 

business. We do have a robust Suborbital Program, where payloads 

are typically smaller, lighter, less expensive, and less consequential 

if lost, which is an important thing when you are dealing with 

young folks. 

Mr. LATHAM. Mm-hmm. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Also Alan Stern, to introduce Alan again, our 

Science Mission Directorate, just released within the last couple of 

weeks a request for information about the possibility of using commercial space transportation, which is coming along as rides of opportunity. That NASA could be an anchor customer for such commercial space transportation capabilities, so that the instrument 

and the principal investigator could ride on a suborbital space 

flight and conduct research that we now do on unmanned sounding 

rockets and suborbital projectories. So we are paying attention to 

that. I don’t think that I would want to allocate more money right 

now to that program, because anything I allocate to one program 

is money that must come away from another. It too has its proponents and adherents. 

Mr. LATHAM. Do you know about what level it is today? They 

talk about one percent. 

[The information follows:] 

RESEARCH TRAINING OPPORTUNITIES AT THE UNIVERSITY LEVEL

the university research community is essential for advancing NASA’s strategic objectives in science and for realizing the nation’s return on investment from NASA’s 

Earth and space science programs. Discoveries and concepts developed by the university research community are the genesis of scientific priorities, missions, instrumentation, and investigations. Although not always tied to specific missions, the 

tasks funded in the university research community add value to missions in the 

form of post-mission data analysis, observations required for mission design, mission 

observation support, and joint scientific campaigns. 

More than two-thirds of NASA sponsored Earth and space science research is conducted by the university community. Without this research, NASA’s expensive 

science missions would only yield a stream of ones and zeros from space. The university research community converts the data from NASA’s science missions into 

discoveries, knowledge, understanding, and more questions. Those new questions 

are what drive the research and development leading to the next generation of space 

missions. 

The university research community is also an essential partner in workforce development for NASA and the Nation. The university-based research and technology 

projects sponsored by Science Mission Directorate allow students and post-doctoral 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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researchers to gain invaluable NASA science program work experience as part of 

their education and professional training. The suborbital programs (airplanes, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), rockets, and balloons) and principle investigator-led 

missions enable students to participate in the entire lifecycle of a science mission 

from design and construction to flight and data analysis. These hands-on opportunities lead to experiences in problem solving and increased understanding of the systems engineering that is the underpinning of successful science missions. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I would have to—I would have to take that for the 

record. 

Mr. LATHAM. Okay. How are we doing on—Mr. Chairman? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I don’t know what our suborbital program is. 

Mr. LATHAM. Fine. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Our student program. But I will get it for you for 

the record. 

FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC SUPPLIERS

Mr. LATHAM. Okay. I think I am just going to do one more question. And then I have another hearing. The GAO has noted in the 

past, questions about the percentage of the resources spent on acquisition, supplies, and services from foreign suppliers. You had a 

problem tracking—the things that you were purchasing. Where 

they were coming from, etc. 

Have you made any effort in that regard so we get a better handle on foreign or domestic suppliers for NASA? It comes from the 

GAO. 

[The information follows:] 

FOREIGN CONTRACTS

In FY 2007, procurement obligations represented approximately 81 percent of NASA’s budget. NASA obligated $14.363B on the acquisition of supplies and services in FY 2007, of which $209.4M, or 1.5 percent, was related to foreign suppliers. 

NASA relies on information contained in the Federal Procurement Data System— 

Next Generation (FPDS–NG) to obtain information on Federal contracts. FPDS–NG 

provides data on place of performance and vendor addresses, allowing NASA to collect reliable information on prime contracts with foreign suppliers. 

Further, NASA continues to partner with the Office of Management and Budget 

and other Federal agencies in the development and implementation of a Government-wide subcontract reporting system. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I understand, sir. I understand your question. I will 

take it for the record, and answer it as closely and carefully as I 

can. I am not aware of a problem that we have in tracking whether 

or not we have 

Mr. LATHAM. The GAO said there is a problem. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. They may say that. We have failed for several years 

in a row to get an unqualified opinion of our audit from our independent auditor, because of property tracking difficulties with regard to mostly the Space Shuttle programs, older property. A lot 

of that equipment was bought and is still in service. It was bought 

in years in which property was not tracked as carefully as we do 

now. It is possible that some of that equipment was purchased 

from foreign suppliers. It may be that to which the GAO refers. 

We are working with our independent auditors to establish a 

means by which we will write down and allocate these properties 

as they are retired from the shuttle program in the next couple of 

years. Then going forward, we should have a very accurate property accounting method in place, because all of our new property 

is under our new system. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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Mr. LATHAM. Yeah. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. And we should be in good shape. 

Mr. LATHAM. All right. Thank you very much for the work you 

do. And very much appreciate it. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well thank you for the opportunity to do it. I love 

this stuff. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Honda. 

Mr. HONDA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And good afternoon, Dr. 

Griffin. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Good afternoon, Mr. Honda. Good to see you again, 

sir. 

STRATOSPHERIC OBSERVATORY FOR INFRARED ASTRONOMY (SOFIA)

Mr. HONDA. And you. Let me get back to the subject that we left 

on last year in 2007. We had some discussion last time around the 

SOFIA Project. And particularly about the project management, 

structure, and the home for the aircraft. And I was wondering 

whether you had an update on that project, its disposition right 

now? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, NASA has a fleet of research aircraft, of which 

SOFIA is one. We think the proper basing strategy for our aircraft 

to get economies across the fleet is to base the aircraft at Dryden. 

And I have not had a reason to change that view. The program 

management of the SOFIA aircraft is being accomplished at Dryden, because it is a major modification of a Boeing 747 Aircraft. We 

are doing that at Dryden. Now, that particular aircraft will be 

hangered in a rental hanger at Palmdale. 

Mr. HONDA. Right. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Which from an overall cost perspective made sense 

to do. I think we are running the program properly and efficiently. 

Science operations will continue to be orchestrated and managed 

out of Ames. But with SOFIA, we are not in the stage of doing 

science operations. We are in the stage of trying to build, if you 

will, an experimental aircraft. The place at NASA where we build 

experimental aircraft is at Dryden. So I think things are being 

done in the right order and in the right place. 

Mr. HONDA. Again, we had that discussion about—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir, we did a year ago. I am sorry, things 

haven’t changed. 

Mr. HONDA. But the efficiency of location of science and aircraft. 

The concern I had was that I had a communication that said that 

the facility was going to be not available in a couple of years. And 

I understand that plans are already being made to do—what to do 

with the space that they have right now. They are making other 

plans right now. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well that is why we rented a hangar in Palmdale, 

because the Edwards Air Force Base hangar facility would not be 

available in a couple of years. So we need to keep the aircraft close 

to the workforce, which is doing the modifications. So, Palmdale 

and Mojave Airport is in that general suite of airports that occupy 

that region of the Mojave Desert where we do advanced aircraft development and flight testing. So, it seemed the logical alternative 

for us to go there. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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Mr. HONDA. So the modification of the aircraft, that is the only 

place you can do that then there and—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Nothing is so absolute, sir. We—— 

Mr. HONDA. I was just trying to understand that. Our discussion 

last year was about the facility being appropriate and modified for 

the aircraft. And I didn’t remember that that was the case. 

And I guess I understand from what you are telling me is that 

the facility is modified. And it is appropriate. And it being placed 

there for the benefit of the aircraft, is something that cannot be 

done at Ames along with the science of the program for SOFIA program. And—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, I want to be careful. I mean, with enough 

time and money anything can be done. I could detail a bunch of 

folks from Dryden Flight Research Center where they are doing the 

aircraft modifications. They could be detailed up to Ames. But that 

wouldn’t be the most cost effective solution for NASA. The most 

cost effective solution for NASA to manage its money and accomplish the SOFIA program is to base the aircraft out of Dryden and 

to modify it there, work on it there, and maintain it there. 

Mr. HONDA. So are we coming along with that project? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, Alan—I am sorry, Mr. Honda, this is Dr. Alan 

Stern. I would like him to report. You have had several successful 

SOFIA flights this year, right? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. I run the Science Mission Directorate for 

NASA. And SOFIA began its in-flight testing just last year. It had 

a very successful flight test series, which we have now wrapped up 

that phase one series. The aircraft is now in modification for door 

open testing. As you know, this is a Hubble Space Telescope 

Class—— 

Mr. HONDA. Right. 

Dr. STERN. We have to open a door. It is two and a half meters 

across on the side of the 747. That has never been done before. But 

those modifications, as well as upgrades to the telescope pointing 

system and the infrastructure that it needs, are now in process for 

the open door flight testing that will begin later this year. That is 

on track. We expect by the latter part of next year, 2009, to begin 

science operations with the two first flight instruments. I would 

like to point out that we are very proud of that. That previously, 

just a year ago, had someone been here telling me that story, the 

first flight science operations would have been starting a couple of 

years later. We were going to wait for the entire suite of instruments to be ready before we began any science. We made a change 

to increase our productivity to begin when we had the first two instruments ready, so that we can start to become productive and 

learn how to use this phenomenal observatory. 

I would invite you to come out to California, Dryden, and take 

a look at the bird and see it. It is very impressive to see a telescope 

of that size in a mobile platform, the scale of a 747. No other country possesses anything like this kind of capability. We are really 

looking forward to turning it on. 

Mr. HONDA. So some of the concerns that were mentioned last 

year, I thought it was about its functionality and the aerodynamics 

of the aircraft, because you are going to be opening—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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Mr. HONDA. So that is all taken care of then or—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well we are in the middle of that. We have not 

flown it opening the door in flight. I mean, that is what Alan was 

just getting to talk to you—— 

Mr. HONDA. How well do you perfect that to be—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Pardon? 

Mr. HONDA. Nothing. I am just—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Okay. Well, right. I don’t want to fly in it either 

until we perfect that. SOFIA is years late. It was not well managed 

earlier on. Starting a couple of years ago we began to make 

changes in how we were managing the project, where it was being 

managed, who was doing it, and getting it on a more realistic 

schedule. That involved relocating the project from Ames to Dryden 

to get the engineering work in the right way and changing contractors. We made a lot of changes to the program. We have been severely criticized, because any time we move a piece of work from 

one area to another area, it creates a lot of angst in the area that 

it is being removed from. But I think the results that we have gotten out of the SOFIA aircraft progress in the last year justify the 

moves and the changes that we have made. It is going well. We 

think it is going to continue to go well. We are on top of it. 

We look forward to creating a world-class observatory here. This 

too was a decadal survey priority. We are years late in accomplishing it. We are proud of what we have done over the last year. 

Mr. HONDA. Yeah. I understand the problems. Just for the 

record, I am just trying to make sure that we keep mentioning it 

so that we can track it and meet the benchmarks. 

Mr. Chairman, do I have—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We are paying attention to SOFIA. 

NEAR-EARTH OBJECT (NEO)

Mr. HONDA. Okay. Thank you. 

Yeah, the other question, Dr. Griffin, at a hearing on the nearearth objects held by the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics 

in the fall of 2007, expert witnesses testified on the need for the 

planetary radar capabilities of the Arecibo Observatory, to characterize potentially hazardous near-earth objects in a timely fashion. 

I have been told that NASA officials have said that NASA does 

not need the Arecibo Observatory. And that optical telescopes can 

provide that necessary data. The language that accompanied the 

2008 Omnibus Appropriations states that, ‘‘NASA is directed to 

provide additional funding for the Arecibo Observatory.’’ 

Could you elaborate on NASA’s position on Arecibo? And has 

NASA met with the NSF on the future of Arecibo? And I think 

that—is it Cornell University that is part of that program also? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir, it is. It is Cornell. 

Mr. HONDA. Okay. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Obviously, let me start my answer by saying NASA 

will comply with the law. Now that said, the Arecibo Observatory 

is not a NASA facility, was never a NASA facility. 

Mr. HONDA. Right. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is a National Science Foundation facility. They 

have concluded they no longer want to maintain it. It is more than 

somewhat frustrating to have someone decide that simply because 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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the National Science Foundation has decided they no longer need 

it that NASA should now take care of it. We are not the Salvation 

Army. If we are directed to maintain Arecibo in law, then we will 

do so. But it is not our facility. 

Mr. HONDA. Is there other groups that NASA cooperates with to 

move along with projects, or is this one of them? 

Dr. STERN. I am sorry. I didn’t quite understand the question, 

sir. 

Mr. HONDA. Does NASA have contracts with other organizations 

on projects such as observation of near-earth objects and things 

like that? Is this a situation where we have a relationship with the 

university? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. I am still not quite sure I understand. But 

let me try to answer. You correct me if I am on the wrong track. 

Mr. HONDA. Okay. 

Dr. STERN. We do quite a bit of research with Near-Earth Objects. As you know, we have a goal set by Congress for 2008 to find 

90 percent of the kilometer scale or larger Near-Earth Objects that 

could overtime eventually impact the Earth and become hazardous. 

Mr. HONDA. Mm-hmm. 

Dr. STERN. We are on track for that goal. In fact, we are putting 

a little extra resources into that this year. The detection techniques 

by which we accomplish that goal are optical, not through radar. 

Radar’s primary use with regard to Near-Earth Objects is to refine 

their orbits when they just happen to come very close to the Earth 

where the radar can detect them. We have a radar at NASA that 

we use at Goldstone. It is a part of our deep space tracking network for that purpose. Arecibo is a National Science Foundation facility that can accomplish the same goals. Then Arecibo has a larger antenna, so it has some advantage. But for the purposes of our 

program to detect these Near-Earth Objects as mandated by the 

Congress, we need optical instruments, not radar instruments. 

That is why you heard that NASA is not requiring Arecibo as a 

part of its Near-Earth Object portfolio. 

Now in our science programs, we also have some researchers at 

various universities primarily, but also within the Agency itself, 

that are working on the characterization of near-Earth asteroids. 

They use a whole variety of different techniques, spacecraft missions. They do use radar from time to time. It is useful, spectroscopy, orbit determination, determining their spins, their masses. 

Many of their attributes so that we do better understand the objects once we have detected them. 

Again, radar is only one part of that equation and, frankly, a 

very narrow part of that equation in terms of the characterization. 

Mr. HONDA. Is there someone that I can sit down with and go 

over that, the whole program and the history of the project? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir, absolutely. We would be happy to put that 

together for you at your convenience. 

Mr. HONDA. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I know you are 

looking at that watch. I don’t blame you. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I am having a bit of trouble with my contact lens. 

I am sorry, sir, go ahead. 


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INTERNATIONAL PARTICIPATION IN SPACE STATION PROGRAM

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. No. We are going to have you here for a 

day and a half. I am sure I would like to get into the weeds. But 

I think we are all interested in American preeminence in space. It 

does bother me that even though we have a good working relationship with the Russians, I don’t like the notion that we would be 

beholden to them. 

I do have a specific question relative to how the Chinese are progressing. The European equivalent of our space program has 

been—that they have worked pretty well with us, haven’t they? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Europe and the European Space Agency and the 

United States are close partners. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Very close partners. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And we are working pretty closely with the 

Japanese in terms of their offering to the plate. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Very much so, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So our working cheek by jowl with these— 

with our European allies and those in the Pacific. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. As well as Canada, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. We have a lot of credibility on the line 

here. Not only on our own behalf, but to some extent we have 

promised them. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That is absolutely the case. The European, Japanese, and Canadian participation in the Space Station Program, as 

well as, many participatory activities in our robotic science program. Really is contingent upon the United States keeping its 

word, meeting its obligations and commitments to those partners 

for the things that we do together. 

CHINESE SPACE PROGRAM

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I don’t mean to mix apples and oranges 

here. But, you know, what comes to mind is, what is it, ‘‘Rising 

Above the Gathering Storm,’’ the Augustine Report. And I guess 

you are not specifically part of that. But to me you are part of that. 

You are part of, a very important part of, our scientific foundation. 

The thought that somehow we would be outflanked in space by 

the Russians on one hand and a very aggressive, you know, Chinese program. Can you talk a little bit about—you have been to 

China? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I have, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You discussed the general goals and 

achievements of the Chinese space program. Where do you see the 

Chinese at this point? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, China, with its first human mission back in 

2003, accomplished at one stroke all of the goals of the U.S. Mercury Program 40 years ago, which was six space missions. With 

their second human mission, they got through half of our Gemini 

Program of the mid-1960s. Their third mission will essentially accomplish most of the remaining Gemini Programs. So the Chinese 

are taking very careful steps, very carefully plotted, strategically 

plotted. They will be putting up a three-man crew after the Beijing 

Olympics as they have claimed. And I believe them. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And this in itself in the general sense is all 

about stature? The world view—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I think it is about strategic position in the world. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. They are doing to some extent I guess what 

the Russians are doing. They are partnering with a lot of countries 

around the world that may have, you know, minimal potential for 

space exploration. But they are giving them an opportunity should 

we say to put their flag in space. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. China is forging space partnerships with otherwise 

uncommitted nations. That is correct, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. How would you describe the power and the 

force of how they are getting into space compared with our our program? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well they are developing—is it—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Are they leap frogging in that sense as 

well? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I wouldn’t say leap frogging. I would say catching 

up. China is doing the things in space that you would expect a 

great power to do. They are developing as we speak, a new launch 

vehicle called the Long March 5. It will have essentially the same 

capability, maybe slightly more, as our Ares 1 and Orion vehicle, 

capable of taking Americans back into Earth orbit after we retire 

the shuttle. 

So they are developing that. They will have it available by 2013 

so they say. Again, I believe them. So they are catching up. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. It is interesting and important. Then if you 

tie in what I assume is a military aspect, which they don’t have 

I think the degree of separateness that we do, we are talking about 

a highly committed effort. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I would not be the one to comment on their military 

efforts. But certainly the Chinese space program as a whole, evidences everything you would want to see in—a program and they 

are very committed. They are very committed. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. What do you know about how much money 

they are spending? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I don’t know that figure. In response to several different requests I made at several different times in meeting with 

the Chinese space officials, here and there, they claim with great 

consistency that they have about 200,000 people working on their 

space program. 

And for reference, NASA—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Do they have a system of standards like we 

have? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. They do. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I assume they have—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. They do. And NASA—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. They have broken it down I assume. They 

have done a pretty good job of—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. If not—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. Think they have. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Doing their own innovation, they obviously 

have done some degree of their own, should we say, reverse engineering? And I suspect some degree of espionage. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well I don’t know about that. I see plenty of evidence that they are entirely capable of having created what they 

have done on their own. I mention the level of their support to 

their program, which they claim to include about 200,000 people. 

They have claimed that on several occasions. Our NASA budget 

supports about 80,000 people. 

So clearly they are focusing a very intensive effort on their program. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. See as we wrestle with your budget numbers if you frame it to the American people, the potential for us to 

be dependent on the Russians, and a very aggressive Chinese program, this is a whole issue of American preeminence. Maybe that 

is expressed in the President’s vision. But it is certainly inherent 

in what you are all about, making sure that we are second to none. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Certainly that is our goal. 

TRANSITION COSTS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I just want to get back to the transition 

costs issue. We started down that path. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. We are familiar with what the GAO says 

you should have been doing over the last couple of years, reflecting 

more of those costs in your budget figures. Is there something in 

the offing in future years? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, I am going to let Bill Gerstenmaier comment 

on transition costs. But broadly speaking, transition costs through 

fiscal year 2010, are captured in the Shuttle budget, because they 

form part of the current Shuttle program. After the Shuttle retires, 

it is our goal to keep those transition costs as low as we can keep 

them. We are not putting figures out there, which represent an entitlement. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. If we can’t put figures out there, because 

they represent an entitlement, and you are telling us that those 

figures are within your existing budget? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. They are a lien against the Constellation budget. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Okay. So the money is there. It is a lien against the 

Constellation budget. We obviously desire to keep the transition 

and retirement figures as low as possible. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And you are working to drive those costs 

down. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We are, sir. Bill, do you have any more comments? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. We had quite an extensive discussion with 

the GAO. And, we are not necessarily buying everything they say. 

But this is one of those issues that I think is worthy of some public 

discussion. 

Mr. GERSTENMAIER. Again, I would just say as Mike reiterated 

to you, through FY 2010, it is in the Shuttle budget. Then we have 

a lien for the transition activities beyond FY 2010. It is our goal 

to try to drive those down as low as we can. One thing that is nice 

about the way we are doing business is a lot of our systems will 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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hand over directly to Exploration. For example, our pads will go to 

Exploration, the Vertical Assembly Building will go to Exploration, 

our test stands at Stennis will go to Exploration. So the transition 

costs associated with those are really not very big. I mean, that 

hardware, those physical facilities, those personnel, they actually 

transition directly to Exploration. 

So what we have been doing is going through very methodically 

all our facilities, all our major areas, and trying to identify where 

there is a unique item that actually has to be retired or disposed 

of. Then we are looking at the most creative and most effective way 

to do that disposition of that hardware, that physical asset. We are 

looking at ways to reduce those costs. Several years ago, when we 

first had our cost estimates, they were fairly large. But we have 

those. In the first year, we will probably have them again. But now 

we are at the point, where I think, we have got that budget understood sufficiently through this next budget cycle to bring forward 

and resolve it with Exploration. But we are motivated to bring that 

down as low as we can, because for every dollar that we spend on 

transition costs—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Mr. GERSTENMAIER [continuing]. That is a dollar we do not get 

to spend on Exploration and doing the things that we really want 

to go do. So we didn’t want to create a program. We didn’t want 

to create a group whose responsibility was to go do that activity 

until it was absolutely—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. We don’t want to drag on your budget. But 

that is one of those issues. 

Mr. GERSTENMAIER. I think we may not have the budget defined 

as well as GAO would like, as it looks at us. But, if you look at 

the processes, the procedures we have got in place, the identified 

work, the amount of discussions, and activities that are occurring, 

I think it is a very sound program for transition that sits under 

there. 

INDEPENDENT AUDITORS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Just one last question, which may not be 

related. The independent auditors that somebody referred to earlier, what— those are independent auditors. I mean, they are, you 

know, outside auditors that take a look at the—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. They are external industry auditors 

that—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. These are auditors that are intimately familiar, obviously, with this industrial base, or how 

would you characterize who these people are? Are they firms? Are 

they contracts? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, I know who it is. I mean I didn’t necessarily 

want to say names. Ernst & Young are our—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. Independent auditors. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. No harm in giving them—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Okay. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. In making that public. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We have been working with them for years. Again, 

when I came to NASA, we were in a position where our financial 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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status, in terms of our quality of our audits, was red. We have 

worked over the past three years to improve that. The current position that we are in is that everything is pretty much okay, except 

for property management. Specifically in property management, 

the Space Shuttle assets that have been acquired over 35 years. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. This is a lot of stuff. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is an awful lot of stuff. As we write it off our 

books—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And it is all over the place. 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. Exactly right, sir. So it is all over the 

place geographically. It is an awful lot of stuff. It is three-and-ahalf decades old in heritage. Frankly, if it wasn’t book kept properly at the time, and it wasn’t, I can’t fix it retroactively. Even our 

auditors agree that we can’t fix it retroactively. So what we have 

to do, going forward, utilize the property management system that 

we have in place for all new assets. As we retire the Shuttle, we 

have to write these things off our books and dispose of it in that 

way. Then we will finally, finally have a clean audit opinion. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Great. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Schiff. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Mr. Chairman, I was wrong about the order. So 

please I defer to my Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. No, no, no. Mr. Schiff, go ahead. I insist. 

OVERALL BUDGET CUTS

Mr. SCHIFF. It is not good to supersede the Chairman. I had a 

couple of quick questions that I wanted to pose, and I know we 

have to run off to vote. 

This gets back in part to the Chairman’s comment about what 

cuts are necessitated by the overall size of the budget. I am sure 

that it wasn’t the intent of the National Academy in giving Mars 

Program an A and Earth Sciences a D, to bring all the programs 

down or up to a B minus by cutting funding for one to augment 

funding for another. I am sure that was not their intent. And I 

wouldn’t want to see us go in that direction. I do appreciate what 

you are doing in the Earth Sciences. I think it is necessary and desirable. 

I think it does get back to the Chairman’s point though that we 

need to make a broader investment so we can get A’s on everything, but I do want to compliment you on the Earth Sciences 

work. I particularly appreciate the investment in SMAP and the 

scheduled launch in fiscal year 2012, the other missions recommended for the Earth Science, and the CATO Review thereafter. 

PLUTONIUM AND THE IMPLEMENTATION OF HSPD–12

One of the two questions I want to ask is on the issue of plutonium. We are heavily reliant on the Russians to get our people into 

space, and we are also heavily reliant on them with plutonium. 

I am interested to know how much are we paying Russia for this. 

I also know there was a study commissioned in our last Appropriations bill to have the National Research Council conduct the review 

of what our nuclear power needs are for NASA missions, so if you 

could comment on that. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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The other issue that is quite unique—well, not unique to JPL but 

it is very significant in JPL. I know as you know many of the staff 

at JPL are concerned with NASA’s implementation of HSPD–12. 

Some have filed suit, and I am not going to ask you to comment 

on the litigation. 

I do understand that other federal agencies, including the Energy 

Department and the National Science Foundation have interpreted 

HSPD–12 in a way that doesn’t mandate contractors working on 

non-sensitive work to comply with HSPD–12. I would be interested 

to know why NASA is interpreting this directive differently than 

these other agencies. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I am sorry. I have to say that I can’t tell you why 

NASA or why other agencies are interpreting HSPD–12’s requirements as they are. 

NASA’s plan was carefully reviewed with Justice Department 

and OPM before going forward with it. So we think our plan complies with the law. Of course, you are aware there is a legal challenge ongoing at the moment to decide whether or not that is true. 

Mr. SCHIFF. I would assume those other agencies also—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I—— 

Mr. SCHIFF [continuing]. Conferred with Justice to make sure 

what they were doing was appropriate. I would like to follow up 

with you if I can and with the other agencies. I understand you are 

trying to comply with the law, but I think that we may be asking 

employees for information that we don’t need. We are working on 

matters that aren’t sensitive, and perhaps the other agencies have 

a more appropriate application of that directive. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Possibly. The matter is under litigation. What I can 

say is limited. But it would not surprise me if other agencies believed that what they were doing was not necessarily very sensitive. Whereas those who touch information technology facilities 

and aerospace facilities, as you know, aerospace technology is more 

carefully controlled than other technologies in this country. We 

have ITAR and export control limitations that specifically apply to 

aerospace technologies that do not apply to other sectors. 

So it would not surprise me that the details of working at JPL 

require a determination that employees are in more sensitive positions than might be the case for other agencies. 

We are not trying to impose any requirements beyond what we 

believe the law requires for HSPD–12. 

Mr. SCHIFF. I am sure that frankly there are people at the Energy Department that are working on sensitive national security 

issues that are of equal significance as those being done at JPL. 

I will follow up with you on that. 

If either of you have time to make a quick comment on the plutonium issue. Then I know we need to—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir, I can. In 1988, the United States made a 

conscious decision to stop producing plutonium 238. Now since that 

time, DOE has been able to maintain a capability to refine it but 

not to produce new stuff and to encapsulate existing plutonium 

that we get, for example, from Russia. Now under the Atomic Energy Act, DOE, not NASA, is responsible for producing plutonium 

for all Federal government users, including NASA, but for all government users. So we have been using so far the plutonium 238 in 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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the inventory. We are basically, you know, nearly out of that. It is 

not enough, after the Mars Science Laboratory, launches down at 

JPL, we are basically out of plutonium for—sorry, you are shaking 

your head. 

Mr. STERN. But we do have sufficient plutonium in the inventory 

for MSL, the stuff Dr. Griffin just mentioned, in addition for the 

outer planet flagship. For one additional small nuclear mission, 

Discovery demonstration of new nuclear technology. 

Mr. SCHIFF. If I could, I will follow up with you both on this tomorrow. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Okay. 

Mr. SCHIFF. I don’t want my Chairman and Ranking Member to 

miss a vote on my account. That is the last thing I want to do. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Oh, okay. 

Mr. SCHIFF. But thank you. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Anyway, looking ahead, plutonium is in short supply. We will talk to you about that tomorrow. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Doctor, we have four votes in a series of votes. 

That will take us probably until about—we couldn’t resume till 

about 4:30. So we are going to recess the hearing until tomorrow 

at 10:00. And we will reassemble at B–313 in the Rayburn— I am 

sorry, B–318 in the Rayburn Building. 

Thank you for your testimony here this afternoon. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Thank you, sir. We will see you tomorrow in Rayburn B–318. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So we are in recess. 


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THURSDAY, MARCH 6, 2008. 

NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION 

WITNESS 

MICHAEL D. GRIFFIN, NASA ADMINISTRATOR 

PLUTONIUM-238

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The hearing will resume. And we would like to 

welcome back this morning Dr. Griffin and the NASA panel, welcome. Thank you all for returning. 

Let me ask the Administrator if he will elaborate, if he needs to, 

on the question Mr. Schiff asked at the end of the hearing yesterday when we had to go for a vote regarding the availability of plutonium. I think you may have been in the middle of an answer, 

Doctor, and if you want to answer here before us or for the record, 

we would like to give you an opportunity to elaborate. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Thank you sir, yes, we were right in the middle of 

answering that question when the call for a vote came, and so I 

think we left you hanging. Let me tie a bow around that if I might. 

I will provide a full answer for the written record. But briefly the 

situation is that we shut down plutonium-238 production for space 

power sources in 1988 as a matter of national policy at that time. 

We had a substantial inventory in the United States. That inventory has been gradually depleted. We have made purchases from 

Russia, from their plutonium inventory. They have advised us that 

they are down to their last 10 kilograms of plutonium. So between 

U.S. and Russian inventories, we are now foreseeing the end of 

that production line. We, at this point, have only the capability in 

the United States to refine existing plutonium-238. We cannot 

make new material. NASA has enough available now for the next 

Discovery mission and the outer planets flagship that I spoke of 

yesterday that is a high priority for the Academy of Sciences. When 

those missions are allocated, we have no more. 

It takes about seven years to bring new plutonium-238 production on line from the day we start. I would remind everybody that 

plutonium production is not a NASA charter. That is a DOE responsibility. But we are told by DOE that it takes about seven 

years to bring capability on line from the start. So therefore, if we 

were to start sometime in Fiscal Year 2009, the earliest date we 

could have new plutonium for space power applications would be 

2016, around the time we would like to be starting Mars sample 

return or another Mars Rover mission, which would need such plutonium. And in any case, if we want to do any scientific missions 

past the orbit of Mars, we would need new plutonium. So the Planetary Science Program would be severely hampered if we do not get 

that production restarted. 


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Now again, I would remind everybody that NASA is a customer 

in this, not a supplier. It is not our facilities or our production or 

our production money; we would need, at the national level, to get 

DOE to restart that production. More of the details I would like to 

furnish for the record. So I think that finishes up Mr. Schiff’s question. 

[The information follows:] 

PLUTONIUM-238 

The Department of Energy (DOE) and NASA have worked closely together to assure that the missions identified in the FY 2009 budget request have adequate Plutonium (Pu-238) by using any domestically stockpiled Pu-238 and augmenting the 

supply with Russian produced Pu-238. 

NASA is currently using DOE’s contract with the Russians for the purchase of 

Pu-238. 

NASA relies on DOE’s contract with the Russians for the purchase of Pu-238. 

NASA is in the process of purchasing 10 kg of Pu-238 from Russia suppliers. Five 

kg will be purchased before the end of FY 2008 and five more in FY 2009, even 

though NASA will not use this supply for a number of years. By purchasing the Pu238 as early as possible, then NASA is comfortable with moving ahead with its 

plans for missions that will require Pu-238 heat-conversion power systems. 

NASA is evaluating the need for nuclear energy sources for the lunar surface. 

While it is still formulating its lunar architectural needs, NASA is considering that 

Radioisotope Power Systems may provide an important power source for enabling 

mobility for human explorers on the lunar surface. NASA Exploration Systems Mission Directorate will work with the Science Mission Directorate and the Office of 

the Chief Engineer to develop an overall Agency strategy to engage the DOE to acquire the Plutonium-238 that may be needed to meet NASA needs. 

NASA’s exploration technology development program also has a Fission Surface 

Power Systems project that is examining technologies that might enable the development of a nuclear fission reactor for potential use on the lunar surface. The fission surface power system project would utilize uranium, not Pu-238, as the nuclear 

fuel. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What are the timelines involved with that? You 

are able to do what you—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, the Outer Planets Flagship would fly when, 

Alan? 

Dr. STERN. 2016 or 2017 depending on the final choice of target. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. The next Discovery mission that we have completed 

would be 2013? 

Dr. STERN. 2013–2014. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. 2013–2014, right. So we would fly a mission in 2013 

or 2014, and another in 2016 or 2017 with the inventory we have, 

and after that there will be no more. Obviously that is an issue for 

our Science Program. 

AMERICAN COMPETITIVENESS INITIATIVE

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. You know, everybody understands 

that you have worked very hard to ration your resources in a way 

that allows you to do the vision and then to fulfill the other missions that NASA is charged with fulfilling. A lot of people would 

like to have more resources for NASA to spend more money, and 

not only on the exploration activities but on science and education 

and aeronautics, principally. But the requests forthcoming from the 

Administration do not seem to be responsive to that, so we have 

to conclude that the Administration does not agree with that. But 

certainly the Congress has, and the President has signed the America Competes Act. And it clearly states that NASA should be a full 


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participant in any interagency effort to promote innovation and 

economic competitiveness, which was the focus of that. 

Your budget request cuts aeronautics, cuts science, cuts education; I think I am right in all of that. And NASA Science Programs, am I wrong in that? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I do not think we cut Science, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Science is not cut? It is flat. It is flat out the 

next several years, yes. But the, so but NASA’s programs are not 

a part of the American Competitiveness Initiative. Is there any reason why NASA programs should not be a part of the American 

Competitiveness Initiative? Is there some intrinsic aspect to NASA 

science, NASA research, NASA technology development, that would 

justify its not being included? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. No sir, there is no intrinsic reason for that. In the 

end, since the President’s initiative must be enacted in legislation, 

it is a judgment that the Congress must finally make. But the rationale on the Administration’s part for leaving NASA out of it, and 

I did have this discussion, was two-pronged. The first was that the 

kind of science that we do at NASA is not immediately productive 

of the kinds of results that enhance American competitiveness. It 

is world class science, by any measure. But it does not result in 

near-term enhancements to our economic competitiveness as a nation. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Really? I mean—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, that was the view, sir. I mean, when we do 

planetary science, when we investigate the geology of Mars; when 

we study the physics of the sun, those things are extremely interesting and very important to know, but they do not speak directly 

to economic competitiveness. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You know, I do not have all the examples in my 

head but there are a lot of examples that NASA touts that get 

transferred, the technology that they develop gets transferred, and 

I know that is a real part of your actual statutory mission is to 

transfer that technology. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes sir, it is. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I would bet that NASA transfers, I do not know 

how you would measure this, but I bet NASA transfers more technology over the years than a number of the agencies that are a 

part of the American Competitiveness. Maybe that is not right, 

but—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. No, that is probably true. Yesterday, Mr. 

Ruppersberger referred to our research and development missions, 

and he is not wrong. We do one-of-a-kind things that have never 

been done before. In the process of inventing those things we invent new technology and new processes, and we do transfer that 

technology out. So that part does go to American competitiveness. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And all of the aeronautics activity. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Of course all of the aeronautics activity. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I mean that is, as I understand it, directly—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. But the other part of the rationale was that 

NASA is already being well treated within Administration funding. 

As I have pointed out earlier, NASA’s funding from the Administration has been essentially level with inflation, whereas broadly 


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speaking domestic, nonnational security domestic discretionary programs have actually been reduced across the board. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So there are two rationales. The first one we do 

not have to necessarily completely agree with. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Correct. And the second one is—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The second one is relative and—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is a matter of—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. It does not mean this funding is 

adequate. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Correct. The ACI, as proposed by the President, was 

intended to address those agencies where funding was perceived 

not to be adequate. Now, again, it is the judgment of the Congress 

as to what is adequate and what agency should or should not be 

included in the initiative, and we understand that. But if you ask 

why NASA was not initially included in the ACI, it was because 

of those two reasons. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I think it makes an additional very good argument, and a politically correct argument at this point in time, to 

talk about NASA’s contribution to American competitiveness and 

argue that it should be a part of the American Competitiveness 

Program. If not initiated from the Administration, a good argument 

is for the Congress to consider additional funding for that purpose. 

Mr. Frelinghuysen? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, good morning. 

GAO ACCOUNTABILITY

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Good morning, Mr. Frelinghuysen. As I mentioned yesterday, we heard testimony last week from the GAO on 

what they see as the highest areas of challenge and risk for NASA. 

I would like your reaction to what they had to say, and to summarize their overall assessment, which is not necessarily mine. I 

would like your reaction. I must say to be cooped up with them for 

a couple of hours and for them to go over your budget, I am not 

sure I would wish that on anybody. But it was an interesting exercise and I learned a lot. And so here we go here. Your large scale 

projects are costing more and taking longer to delivery than earlier 

envisioned. You are pursuing more projects than you can afford 

over the long term. And estimates for the Constellation Programs 

and International Space Station are highly optimistic and unreliable. How would you respond? Do you agree that those are the foremost challenges you are facing? And if so, what NASA is doing on 

addressing those challenges? 

I am not doing this to irritate you. And I understand, you embody risk taking, exploration. GAO embodies, and I am not knocking it, predictability, green eye shades, you know, supra analysis. 

I would like your reaction, overall reaction to their views. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Thank you, sir. I am sorry if my body language conveyed irritation. You actually have a constitutional right to irritate 

me, so feel free. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. No, no. These are questions that are out 

there. If you look at the GAO report, they are substantive. And we 

have sort of got, you know, the camel’s nose under the tent a little 

bit yesterday. And I think you should have an opportunity to respond and react. 


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Dr. GRIFFIN. Thank you. Let me try to do that. First of all, I flat 

disagree with those assessments. Specifically to Constellation, we 

are at the early stages of the Constellation Program with several 

goals. The first is to replace the Space Shuttle as a means of access 

to Earth orbital space by U.S. astronauts. Then from there, we proceed to the Moon. Now, obviously we are not into the lunar construction phase yet. We are into the phase of constructing systems 

to replace the shuttle. Yesterday, prior to coming to this hearing, 

I was in a budgetary and programmatic review on a piece of that 

system. It is going extremely well. Its contracts have now been let. 

Excellent progress is being made. We are a couple of years into the 

program. We are not seeing, nor are we forecasting, overruns. We 

are not having major technical problems. We are having minor 

technical problems that one expects in a development program. The 

programs are going as well as anything I have seen. I have been 

in this business for 37 years to this point. These programs are 

large programs, and at this stage of the game they are going very 

well. The early stages of a program are the most dangerous. The 

period of time when you are setting them up and beginning execution is when you sow the potential seeds for trouble later on. I 

think the folks who are executing them are doing very well. 

We are, at NASA, for the first time in NASA’s history, now using 

statistical budget estimation tools, and we are giving these estimates to Congress. We are giving Congress and our key appropriations and oversight committees schedule estimates that are budgeted at the 65 percent confidence level consistently across the 

board on Constellation programs, and that is a major improvement 

in the quality and predictability which the GAO seeks. We are giving you a major improvement in the quality and predictability of 

our budget estimates. We are telling your staff, and our other 

stakeholders, exactly how we are arriving at those estimates and 

what they mean. 

When it is said that our large programs are slipping and are over 

budget, there are two of those that I can think of that would fit 

in that category, but I do not regard either program slippage as 

fatal or even close to it. One is the James Webb Space Telescope. 

In my first days as the new Administrator three years ago, my 

management team was presented with an overrun for James Webb. 

The Program was originally scoped at $2.2 billion and we received 

a $1.4 billion increase. We budgeted within the NASA Science Program, we deferred some other missions to fix James Webb’s budgetary problems, which, I will emphasize, do not reflect a failure of 

execution on the part of the James Webb Telescope team. Phil 

Sabelhaus, one of the best program managers we have, works at 

Goddard. The Program is going well. It was under-budgeted. It is 

not being poorly executed, it was under-budgeted. We fixed that. 

The Mars Science Laboratory is experiencing a cost growth as 

they approach spacecraft integration. In Senator Nelson’s hearing 

yesterday I indicated the cost growth was about $175 million. If 

that changes we will let you know. It is a $1 billion program. It 

is a planetary flagship mission. It does things that never before 

have been done. The cost growth, while regrettable, is understandable. Again, I look at the project. The project is not doing anything 

wrong. The initial budget estimates, made years before my time, 


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may well not have been as accurate as they could have been so 

when the GAO talks about cost growth, what I want to talk about 

is obtaining more realistic estimates. 

REBASELINED PROJECTS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. They are critical of what they call your use 

of rebaselining and obviously there are appropriate reasons for 

that. Where is it appropriate? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. If we believe that a program has changed sufficiently in its budgetary estimates and schedule projections the old 

ones are no longer relevant, we try to explain to you what we are 

doing, then yes, we do rebaseline the program. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. They seem to feel that the practice of rebaselining is being overused to the point where it becomes impossible for them or anyone else to assess how much a project has deviated from its original estimate. And if you look at the original estimates, I mean in some cases they are minimal. Maybe they were 

underestimated. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I think that is often the case. I have worked very 

hard over the past three years to put a stop to the practice, and 

I think our team at NASA is fully subscribed to producing for you 

better estimates so that rebaselining can be reduced. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Could you talk a little bit—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. In any case, we are completely transparent about 

what we are doing. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am sure you are. Can you explain when 

and why you rebaseline projects? And what have you done to improve your original cost estimates and to improve the transparency 

of deviations from those estimates? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. When and why we would rebaseline generally comes 

to what I said just a moment ago. Let me expand on that a little 

bit. If we think in the course of execution, if a project has deviated 

sufficiently, and it is a soft criteria, but if it has deviated sufficiently from its initial ground rules and assumptions as to schedule 

and cost, or maybe technical content that it will deliver, then it no 

longer becomes productive to track deviations from the original 

baseline and we need a new plan. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well sometimes, when you have a new plan 

the original figure sort of goes off into history and it gets forgotten, 

except I guess by GAO. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I regret that. We keep track of it, and I regret it 

if that is regarded as a loss of transparency but that is not the intent. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, I serve on the Defense Committee. 

These types of things happen all the time for defense programs, 

that somehow GAO has a better way of tracking just defense programs and the development of different platforms than they do. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It actually happens less often with us. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Now, as to what we have done to try to get a handle 

on that, again, I think the adoption of probabilistic budget estimation techniques with delivery dates at a consistent competence 

level, as well as explaining that to Committee staff and working 

with folks, affords an entirely new level of transparency to our 


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budgeting process and cost control, which we have never had at 

NASA. 

INDEPENDENT COST ESTIMATES

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. When and under what circumstances do 

you get independent cost estimates? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. On the establishment of any new program, at any 

rebaselining exercise that is necessary, and we track programs continuously throughout their life cycle with independent cost estimates. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, GAO did recommend the adoption of 

new cost estimating best practices to you. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Which we are doing. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes, which you are doing. And are you including tracking the original estimates through the life of the program? Is that being done? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We certainly track the original program estimates 

through the life cycle. We absolutely do know internally how the 

programs have grown with respect to the original cost estimates 

and we try to understand why they have grown so that we can 

avoid whatever mistake was made in the future. Sometimes it is 

an execution mistake. I made reference yesterday to the APS sensor on the Glory Mission. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That particular sensor is very late and it is causing 

cost growth throughout the program. We have tracked that and we 

understand it. We are monitoring it and we are working with the 

contractor to fix it. Other times, no one has done anything wrong, 

but the original estimate was low. We want to understand that because it is our goal to produce better estimates. This is not a one 

size fits all—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I understand that. 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. Kind of a scenario. There can be different reasons for cost growths. For example, a year ago we got a 

Continuing Resolution, which meant that some programs which 

were counting on additional money, had to be delayed a bit. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. When you delay a Program you increase the cost. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You mentioned stability is so essential to 

your critical mass of all of these programs. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. One of the best examples of how NASA is able to 

control costs occurred more than 15 years ago on one of our largest 

efforts, when we replaced the Shuttle Challenger which was lost in 

1986. In the late 1980’s we replaced it with Shuttle Endeavor. The 

money for Endeavor was appropriated all at one time and the 

project finished ahead of time and under budget. When we have 

stability of requirements and stability of funding and stability of 

purpose, we are able to perform and we are able to perform well. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well those were the, I will not say the good 

old days, when there was more money available so now we are 

counting on you to do more, apparently, with a lot less. Thank you, 

Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Mr. Frelinghuysen. Mr. Aderholt. 


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ADEQUATE FUNDING FOR EXPLORATION

Mr. ADERHOLT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Administrator, for being here. Thank you for your time before the Committee. One thing that I wanted to just inquire about and you may 

have, you have alluded to it a little bit but I did want to follow up 

and maybe asked a little bit more about it, was the concern about 

NASA and its request for adequate funding for exploration to return to the expected launch date of Ares I in 2014. And it looks 

like the request for the funding for that was not as much as many 

of us would have liked to have seen. It appears that the requested 

funding for the fiscal year 2009 is the same as was projected over 

a year ago before the fiscal year 2007 CR reduced the funding by 

$500 million. Given that it is critically important to minimize the 

gap between the shuttle’s retirement and Ares beginning, I just 

wanted to know your thoughts and how you would respond to 

NASA’s not being increased to the amount, or the request being increased to the amount, to compensate for the lost money that was 

from the fiscal year 2009 CR. Or I am sorry, the fiscal year 2007 

CR. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes sir, I understood what you meant. Thank you. 

The only thing I can say is I serve the President and I support the 

President’s budget. Extensive discussions were held within the Administration on whether we would request the additional money to 

compensate for the delay introduced by the CR into the Exploration 

Systems development. The final decision was that the Nation has 

other priorities which outweigh that, so the request for additional 

funding to counteract the effects of the CR in 2007 was not made. 

So the Administration chose to accept the 6-month delay to the 

Shuttle replacement systems, Orion and Ares, rather than request 

the extra funding to compensate the CR. 

Mr. ADERHOLT. So basically this in no way minimizes the cut 

that happened in fiscal year 2007. The cut that did occur is something that is there and you are by no means saying it is not an 

issue that has to be dealt with, it is just this is the way that you 

all chose to move forward at this time? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That is correct, sir. The choice was made to accept 

the damage which was done. 

Mr. ADERHOLT. But still recognize the damage is there? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Still recognizing that it is damaging, yes sir, of 

course. 

U.S. PRESENCE ON THE MOON

Mr. ADERHOLT. I have heard that there are some rare minerals 

on the Moon that may provide further justification for building 

some kind of permanent outpost there. Just if you could take a second and talk about what a permanent presence on the Moon would 

mean, and would mining be a part of that, and I will just open it 

up to get your thoughts on that. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, certainly I am one of those who leads the parade in believing in a permanent U.S. presence on the Moon in the 

form of an initially small outpost. I would urge you to think about 

something like Antarctica back in the 1950’s, when we first returned people to Antarctica and had them stay for long periods of 


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time. So think about a scientific outpost, a research base, something small to start with. But, I think that that is important for 

the Nation, because our purpose with the Space Program is to take 

the range of human action, human thought and human experience 

outward into the Solar System. That is what we do with NASA, 

with our people and our robotic probes. 

Now specifically to the issue of lunar resources, lunar resources 

do not have economic value on Earth. The expense of transporting 

them back would outweigh any value they had. The value of lunar 

resources such as we might find there, is to reduce the dependency 

of such an outpost from shipping material up from Earth. For example, the lunar crust is, depending on where you are, 15 to 40 

percent oxygen by weight. So one of the first things that a crew on 

a lunar outpost would do, we would hope, would be to learn to extract oxygen from the lunar soil by heating it up and capturing the 

effluent. There are also other gases that they would capture that 

would be useful in lesser quantity, but oxygen is one of the main 

ones. 

The sooner that we start doing things like that, the sooner we 

can reduce our dependency on a logistics train from Earth to support such an outpost. So yes, an early focus on our Program would 

be learning to use lunar materials, not from the point of view of 

their value on Earth, but from the point of view of their value on 

the Moon in enabling more robust exploration and utilization of the 

Moon itself. 

Mr. ADERHOLT. Thank you. That is all I have, Mr. Chairman, 

thank you. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Thank you, sir. 

CORE VISIONS/CONSTRAINED BUDGETS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Mr. Aderholt. Dr. Griffin, how is 

NASA able to meet the time tables presented with in the President’s vision and meet its other core visions within these constrained budgets? Something has to give, does it not? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well sir, things have given. As I pointed out yesterday, this, of course, calls for a conclusion of the witness, but I am 

your witness and so I will give you my conclusions. I think with 

regard to our core programs—finishing up Space Station and utilizing it, building new systems to replace the Shuttle and then return to the Moon, our Science Portfolio with its four individual 

portfolios, and our Aeronautics Program—I believe that all of those 

are strategically going in the right direction. I do. So when you address the issue of funding, how is it possible to keep them on track? 

Well, they are on track. They are going in the right direction. They 

are doing the right things. People will quibble at the margin, 

things like we should be doing a little more Mars or a little less 

Mars, or a little more outer planets or less outer planets. Those 

will be quibbles that we should have. The community should debate one thing versus another. But broadly speaking, I think we 

are going in the right direction. We are on the right track. 

So now the question becomes how fast do you move down the 

track? That is funding driven. I cannot argue with you. When you 

say that, if more money were supplied, we could do more and have 

it more quickly, you are correct. But we also have within the NaVerDate Aug 31 2005 00:38 Aug 03, 2008 Jkt 042708 PO 00000 Frm 00051 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A708P2.000 A708P2

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tion many other priorities, and they also must be paced with the 

available funding. So this Administration has chosen a pace of accomplishment which we believe is acceptable. The funding that we 

are requesting in FY 2009 and beyond allows us to accomplish the 

things that the President is asking us to accomplish and that this 

Congress has authorized and approved, at a pace which is judged 

to be adequate. 

SPACE TRANSPORTATION GAP

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well you know, you have expressed considerable 

concern about the gap that is going to exist with regard to the 

transportation, unavailability of a transportation system to access 

the Station and otherwise. So I would like to talk about that just 

a little bit. We visited on that and for the record, let me read you 

a quote. This is out of a NASA document. The title of this is Resources to Implement the Vision Have Eroded. And it does a computation here, it all adds up to $11.7 billion and in a box it says, 

‘‘The cumulative effects of $11.7 billion in reductions and costs absorbed in NASA’s budget since the vision for space exploration was 

announced is the overriding reason why NASA cannot develop the 

Orion Ares I by 2014 and can afford only those robotic lunar missions absolutely necessary to support future human exploration activities.’’ Could you comment on that? This is your—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, it is a document with which I am familiar that 

was prepared by staff. I have mentioned on several occasions that 

we do have discussions within the Administration as to what the 

budget request should be and what we should try to accomplish 

with it. That was a document which was prepared to support those 

discussions and it does reference the fact that, if you will, the buying power available to us in the Agency has eroded over the last 

few years by that figure that you quoted. 

A substantial portion of that figure was manifested, when I arrived at NASA, and I noted that the Shuttle and Station programs 

had been underfunded to complete the President’s direction to finish the Space Station. We had place holders in the budget for Shuttle and Station, and the difference between the place holders and 

what was really needed was about $5.5 billion. Additionally, we 

lost some top line budget authority in the Fiscal Year 2006 budget 

submission and then there was the Hubble Space Telescope Servicing Mission, Hurricane Katrina, and a few other things, all of 

which added up to the $11.7 billion that is in the document. So 

that was a document prepared to support those discussions. Now 

in the end I am permitted to discuss, and I am certainly permitted 

to make my arguments, but I do not win every argument. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. No, absolutely. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. So the decision ultimately was made that the Nation has other priorities that are more significant than to restore 

that $11.7 billion in funding. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. This document was generated in house—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is an internal document. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. To justify your deliberations within? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It was an internal document generated to quantify 

what has happened over the last few years to support my deliberations within the administration, and that is all it is. 


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CONSTELLATION CONFIDENCE LEVEL

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yes, okay. Let me just use that to talk about the 

gap in the availability of Constellation and what timeline we are 

talking about. I believe you had some testimony on the Senate side 

just recently about that with Senator Nelson? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And you talked about if you had additional resources perhaps the confidence level of completing Constellation, 

getting Ares and Orion operational, could be accelerated with a certain level of confidence. Could you just discuss that? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. If you had additional funding and how much, 

could you accelerate its availability and with what degree of certainty? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. This is a question I have now been asked 

so often that I—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I am sure you are tired of answering it. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I probably have the answer memorized so I can give 

it to you fairly expeditiously. We are with 65 percent confidence, 

using our statistical budget estimating tools that I spoke of, more 

modern cost estimation methods that Mr. Frelinghuysen was talking about, with 65 percent confidence we believe that we will deliver Ares and Orion, the Shuttle replacement systems, for first 

flight by March of 2015. 

At that same confidence level, so apples to apples, I was asked 

by Senator Nelson what is the earliest that that could be delivered. 

In fact, the first time he asked that question, I believe, was last 

November in a hearing and then he asked it again in the recent 

hearing. I said, if things went well technically and we had all of 

the funding we needed, the system could be delivered by September 

of 2013, eighteen months earlier. Senator Nelson asked how much 

that would cost, and I said the total price tag for that was about 

$2 billion as closely as we can estimate it spread across, at this 

point, Fiscal Years 2009, 2010, and a little bit in 2011. Very roughly, we have estimated that it is about $100 million to accelerate 

schedule by one month. You reach a limit on that when you just 

cannot get things done any more quickly, and that would be the 

September of 2013 limit. 

Now we have recently reexamined that, to make sure that our 

figures were as accurate as we could make them and our estimates 

were as good as they could be, and we still stand by that estimate. 

So we have a technical limit that we can reach, and about 18 

months earlier than what we are planning today, and the cost of 

that is about $2 billion spread over three years. I am sorry, did I 

answer your question adequately, sir? 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You did. So if you were to be able to apply $2 

billion more to this program with a 65 percent level of confidence 

you could accelerate its availability by 2013? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That is our best estimate, yes sir. 

HUMAN EXPLORATION BEYOND EARTH ORBIT

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I understand that there was a conference at 

Stanford some time ago with industry groups, advocates for NASA 


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and academia to discuss whether the United States is on the right 

track in its plans to reach the Moon by 2020, build a long term 

lunar base there, and eventually send humans to Mars. You have 

been reported as saying that the questions asked at the conference 

have been asked, they have been answered, and that it is time to 

move on and support the program. Is that an accurate characterization of your views? And would you elaborate? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is, sir, and yes I can elaborate on that. I mentioned just a few moments ago, in response to Mr. Aderholt’s question, that I do believe that the Moon is very important, and the 

most important early target for human exploration beyond Earth 

orbit once we get the Space Station built. That’s not because I believe it, but, because before my time, that opinion was codified into 

the President’s Civil Space Policy for NASA, and the Congress subsequently adopted that goal in the 2005 Authorization Act. So the 

order is Moon, Mars, and then beyond. So Space Station, Moon, 

and Mars in that order. 

Not everyone shares the view that those are the proper goals and 

in the proper order. That debate was extensively had. So some of 

the organizers of that conference believe that the Moon is not interesting. That the Moon is old hat, that we have been there and done 

that. They would like to see a more expeditious program going directly to Mars. I understand their view. Many of them are old 

friends of mine. I just do not happen to share that view. Some of 

the organizers of the conference believe that the Nation’s exploration money would be better spent building large telescopes at 

what is called Sun-Earth L1 Point, the Lagrangian Point, where we 

can park large instruments and they will stay where they are 

parked. I, too, find that to be an interesting goal but not one that 

I would adopt instead of returning to the Moon. So there are differing opinions on what the goals should be, and in an environment 

of limited funding some goals can be afforded and others cannot. 

Now a goal that I share with that group is the goal that I believe 

that the near-Earth asteroids are an important target for exploration. But I would place them in a time place between the Moon 

and Mars, not instead of the Moon. So the conference was basically 

a discussion of whether the United States space policy has the 

right goals in the right order. I think, broadly speaking, we do with 

small modifications. Some of those folks would disagree. Again, the 

discussion has been held multiple times. I am sure it will be held 

again. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do we have any asteroid program going right 

now? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We have a, per Congressional legislation, a small 

program going to identify—Alan help me, 90 percent of the nearEarth asteroids by what year? 

Dr. STERN. This year, by the end of this year. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. By the end of this year. Ninety percent of the asteroids larger than one kilometer by the end of this year. You have 

recently put in some funding to increase that, right? To make sure 

we meet the goal. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. But that is just finding them and identifying 

them? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. How about accessing them? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. The Constellation systems that we are building 

today can access the near-Earth asteroids, should a subsequent Administration or a subsequent Congress decide that that is a good 

goal. The systems we are building today can get you there. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. When you said between Moon and Mars, is that 

what you were referring to? Would be accessing them? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes sir, that was. The reason is, it is fairly simple 

as an engineer. The Moon is three days away. We have a lot to 

learn. I would like to learn it three days from home. Once we set 

out for Mars, the first crews to go to Mars will be gone in excess 

of two and a half years, maybe more. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. If you were going to plan to do that—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. The asteroids are in the middle of that. They are 

months away from home, and so I think a stepped sequence of voyages from home, from days and weeks to months to years is the 

right way to go. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. That would be a reprogramming, that would be 

a change in your plans, would it not? If you were to put the asteroids? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It would. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What would you call that? Asteroid exploration? 

Asteroid visit? How would you talk about that? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I would just refer to them as destinations. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Asteroid destinations. That would cause a 

change in plans, would it not? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That would. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Would that affect the budget? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. Over a decade from now, but yes sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Would it affect the budget today—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. No. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. In terms of planning and—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. No. It does not affect anything today or for the next 

decade because, we are building systems with Constellation that 

are capable of accessing the inner solar system. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Would that be a good idea to look at that? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Would it be a good idea to do it, do you think? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Again, I do think the near-Earth asteroids are a legitimate scientifically interesting, productive destination for humankind. I would, on a personal basis, favor including them in our 

program. Now to actually do anything will be after my tenure. But, 

if you are asking do I think that that is a useful goal, I do think 

so. 

EXPLORATION ON ARCHITECTURE REVIEW

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you plan on any review of the exploration architecture prior to the arrival of the next administration to lay a 

groundwork for reviews by the next administration? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, I think our architecture is firmly in place and 

shows the right approach. It satisfies all the goals that were specified to us by the Congress and the Administration, and we picked 

it as the cheapest available approach with the lowest risk. So we 

think we used good criteria to select it and we think we are there. 


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Now, our progress in building the systems required by the new 

space architecture is something we review all the time. We conduct 

regular reviews of our progress in meeting the goals of that architecture, and, when a new Administration comes in and sends a 

transition team over to NASA to discuss how we are going, we will 

be ready, willing, and able to describe for them our progress on 

those systems. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Thank you, Doctor. Dr. Griffin, we are 

going to recess. We have two votes so we cannot go and leave some 

people here questioning. So we are going to take a recess probably 

for about fifteen minutes, and we will return after votes. Thank 

you all. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We are at your discretion, sir. Thank you. 

[Recess.] 

SPACE INTERFEROMETRY MISSION (SIM)

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The hearing will resume. Mr. Schiff? 

Mr. SCHIFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I wanted to follow up on 

a couple of questions that we discussed yesterday. First of all, I 

wanted to follow up on SIM. It is my expectation that a decision 

on how to proceed with the exoplanet research will be made in time 

for the fiscal year 2010 start. I expect, I think my Committee colleagues feel very much the same way, that SIM will be given every 

consideration as it meets all the scientific requirements of the last 

two decadal surveys. This is not just my opinion. It is a sentiment 

that was shared by appropriations committees of both the House 

and the Senate, and by your own advisory committee which believes that the astrometry mission is the way to go. The follow up 

question I want to ask is, what more do you contemplate that 

NASA will need to make a decision? And what is your timeline on 

a decision? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I am going to ask Dr. Stern to comment on that. 

Dr. STERN. Good morning. As you know, we are studying a variety of exoplanet experimental techniques that all are meant to 

achieve the same objectives, SIM being one that is quite mature. 

But over time, a number of other important contenders have come 

to the fore. Those studies are now in work, as you are aware, and 

will finish late next year. There is also the decadal survey currently underway in astrophysics, which will make a specific scientific recommendation from the National Academy as to which approach is preferred. 

Mr. SCHIFF. You know, the more that I think we are coalescing 

on something the more I hear that maybe we are not. We seem to 

be having the same debate we had last year and the scientific community has repeatedly expressed its support for SIM and in 

decadal after decadal survey, and then here we are waiting for another survey, another potential opinion. It just gives me great concern that we are going to be in another fight over this. I really do 

not know what more you are requiring, what more you want. Congress could not have been more clear on the subject. The scientific 

community could not be more clear on the subject. And I guess I 

am perplexed. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well sir, I certainly do not want to have a fight over 

SIM. If the Congress legislates that we do SIM, then we will do 


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SIM. Now the Administration has not requested it but I can ask 

them to do that. But I need to be honest. SIM was prioritized high 

in the last decadal survey, when it was assumed to be a $250 million mission. Today it is presumed to be a $1.6 billion mission. We 

do not have those funds in the budget. We have discussed this, 

those funds are not available without killing most of the rest of the 

astrophysics portfolio. 

When you say that the astrophysics community supports SIM, 

that is not the input that we are getting from the astrophysics community through the committees which advise NASA and the Congress. That is simply not the input that we are getting. They do 

not want to see this kind of damage done to the astrophysics portfolio in order to favor one mission. So we have been working with 

your office, and I will continue to do so, to find a way to accomplish 

the goals of exoplanet research without having to do the full SIM 

mission with all of the cost that that entails. Now, if that is what 

the Congress directs us to do then we will do it. But, this year we 

would like to study some alternatives to come back and talk to you 

about. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Dr. Griffin, this kind of hearkens back to your comments at a conference a few months ago. It is not support for SIM 

that is jeopardizing any other project. It is rather, in my view, coming in with a budget that is wholly inadequate to do the science 

that we want to do and that the President has set our goals to do. 

I do not think it is helpful to create an artificial competition over 

this issue. The scientific community has been very supportive of 

SIM. This Congress has been very supportive of SIM. I thought we 

had a concept of SIM that brought the cost down to $1 billion or 

less that was manageable within NASA’s budget. I thought that 

was the operating assumption we were acting on. If this is being 

completely revisited again then I think I and the other members 

of the Committee need to know about it. We are willing to work 

with NASA to scale down a version of SIM that is affordable, that 

can fit within the portfolio, but I need some sense from NASA that 

this is a priority of yours and that we are not simply throwing this 

open again to delay and having launch dates slip into the distance, 

and killing this with a thousand lashes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I am sorry the budget is not adequate to support 

the doing of all that folks would like to be done. I understand that 

you wish the Administration had requested more. When we look at 

SIM Light, the mission that you are referring to, the question logically arises, whether SIM Light would accomplish most of but not 

all of the goals of the full SIM mission. Given that that is the level 

of accomplishment we now strive for with this first exoplanets mission, would there be another technology which would do as well for 

less money? 

The question is not whether JPL will get to lead this mission. 

They will. The question is not whether an exoplanet mission is important to us. It is. The question is not whether it is a huge priority to us. It is. The question is whether the SIM technology is the 

best technology, given all that we know today, to accomplish those 

goals at JPL. I am trying as hard as I possibly can to do this on, 

an objective, impartial basis in a way that is affordable within the 

budgets that I am told that I can expect. If we implement SIM as 


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it stands today it will create a very substantial amount of collateral 

damage to other astrophysics missions in the portfolio, some of 

which are also of interest to JPL. So we are looking for objective, 

rational alternatives that we can share with your office. 

Mr. SCHIFF. And your analysis of the objectively rational alternatives will be completed in time for a 2010 start? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We will complete it in time for a 2010 start. 

MARS PROGRAM

Mr. SCHIFF. Let me turn while I have some time remaining to 

Mars. As I mentioned yesterday, I am concerned about addressing 

programs with a D by bringing down those that have received an 

A. 

I think there was a very effective op-ed on the subject of the 

Mars program by Robert Braun in the current issue of Space News. 

It is an article entitled ‘‘Future Of Our Mars Exploration Program.’’ 

I would ask that that be made a part of the record. 

[The Future Of Our Mars Exploration Program Article, Science 

News, March 2, 2008 follows:] 


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Mr. SCHIFF. Mr. Braun states that by removing all semblance of 

the continuous exploration program, NASA’s 2009 budget request 

puts the Mars program on a path toward irrelevance. He goes on 

to state that the program contemplated by the budget request will 

not produce the type of compelling science that has been achieved 

over the past decade. Rather, it is the beginning of the end of what 

has been a dramatic advancement in our understanding of the 

Mars system. 

I think many of us that have looked at the Mars budget are concerned that he is right. I am particularly concerned about the loss 

of expertise that we will have and I can imagine that those who 

are working on the program are already pretty disspirited by what 

looks to them as a significant abandonment of the program. 

I, Mr. Chairman, want to work with you and my colleagues on 

the Committee to make sure that we restore the Mars program and 

keep it the robust producer of good science and fascination with the 

space program. However, I want to make my concern about this 

very clear and want to reiterate today. You are more than welcome 

to comment on it if you think Mr. Braun’s point of view is somehow 

flawed, but it seems very credible to me. So I want to reiterate that 

concern. 

Dr. STERN. Mr. Schiff, I would like to say a few words about that 

op-ed which I am familiar with. It is Dr. Braun’s opinion. But let 

me actually explain our Mars program so you understand it. We 

are flying the Mars Science Lab, as you know. That is planned to 

launch in 2009. Very high priority from the decadal survey. We are 

continuing that unabated. In fact, we are supporting it in technical 

and schedule difficulties. The next mission on our plate is called 

Mars Aerology and we have two missions competing, one of which 

will go forward. It is in our plan. That is the number three priority 

of the Mars portion of the decadal survey. The other priority among 

the three is Mars Sample Return, which is the place that we have 

aimed our program subsequent to that aerology mission. So we are 

actually planning to accomplish all three, three for three of the objectives of the National Academies decadal survey. I do not know 

how Mr. Braun can refer to our program as deconstructing, or not 

going after high-priority objectives because we are checking them 

all off. It will take some time to do that, but we are accomplishing 

them and accomplishing them in the way that they were described 

in the decadal survey with the scientific content. 

MARS PROGRAM BUDGET

Mr. SCHIFF. What is the percentage cut you made in the Mars 

program, the projected Mars budget over the next several years, as 

compared to last year? 

Dr. STERN. In the current five-year plan, it is cut about in half. 

Over the next 10 years, which includes the large amount of funds 

needed for Mars Sample Return, it is actually not very different 

than it is right now. It goes down and then comes back. 

Mr. SCHIFF. If I could just interject. In the next five years, Mars’ 

budget, compared to what it was last year, is cut in half and you 

are saying that it will not affect the science, that it will not affect 

the loss of the talent pool during those five years, that those people 

will not go elsewhere and how can that be? 


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Dr. STERN. Let me speak to both parts of your question. First of 

all, it is very important to realize that Mars Sample Return, as 

called for by the Mars community, has to be an international endeavor. Our national partner in this is the European Space Agency. 

In order for them to be a partner in this mission, it needs to occur 

around the 2020 time frame, not earlier. So our funding and our 

plan for the Mars Program is what it takes to match our European 

partner and get the mission done. Were we to try to do it earlier, 

they would not be able to participate from a financial standpoint. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Why is that situation radically different this year 

than it was last year? I assume you had the same information 

about European participation last year. It did not seem to be a concern last year. Why has it changed from December to January? 

Dr. STERN. In fact, it is different for two reasons. The first is that 

last year, Mars Sample Return was back-burnered. We have moved 

it up in priority and gone to Europe, and spoken with the European 

Space Agency about that. They are as excited as we are to do it. 

But it is going to take some time to get it back into their budget 

plan just as it will for ours. The other point that I want to make 

is that the Mars budget reached a natural high because we are 

doing the Mars Science Lab, which is a flagship class mission. The 

Mars budget has varied quite a bit over the last 20 years, up and 

down. The budget was, in fact, to return toward an average level 

following the completion of the Mars Science Lab. Now, it has come 

down more steeply than earlier projections, but it was never 

planned to sustain at that level in perpetuity. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Mr. Chair, I know I am out of time, but one concluding thought on this is if you found a way to do all the science 

with 50 percent cuts, that will be remarkable for us in the history 

of NASA and probably the history of the federal government. 

That does not seem to me to be enhancing the priority of Mars 

or, frankly, acknowledging the success of the program. You take a 

program that has earned an A grade and you cut its budget in half 

and that ensures that you are going to take an A and turn it into 

a C. I do not know how you possibly can keep the talent pool alive 

during the five years and 50 percent cuts. 

I look forward to working with my Chair and fellow Committee 

members to try to deal with this because I think this has been an 

unmitigated positive in our science program, kept the public interest alive when there have been a lot of setbacks in man space 

flight, and I would hate to see us put our shining success in the 

glide path towards an obscure future. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

TRANSITION WORKFORCE

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Changing the location quite dramatically. I 

just want to say I ran into part of your NASA team in Antarctica 

in late January when they dedicated the new South Pole Station. 

I know the Chairman has been there. 

And I must say what a privilege it was to be there with the National Science Foundation at their invitation and run into quite a 

lot of your NASA people. We were sort of snowbound for a couple 

of days in a blizzard, so I got to see quite a few different groups 


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that are out there. Remarkable in many ways, pioneers and explorers in their own right. 

And I like the notion, and this sort of gets back to the issue of 

American preeminence, that you are trying to do the same type of 

work potentially on the Moon and that you are doing a lot of those 

same things with the international Space Station. That is a wonderful platform for the type of science we need for generations to 

come. 

I also had a chance to meet Cathy Sullivan, who is unbelievable. 

It is like putting your finger, wet finger, in a light socket. She is 

quite a remarkable person. So here I was with Neal Lane, Rita 

Caldwell, Arden Bement, and then you add in Cathy Sullivan, it 

was quite a group. 

And as the plane was pitching coming back from the South Pole, 

she was cool as a cucumber as our plane was going up and down. 

You know, she is one of your remarkable astronauts. 

Getting back to more general questions, you are on the brink of 

some pretty big shifts in your workforce needs with the retirement 

of the shuttle and the ramp-up of the new constellation system. 

Your budget shows the NASA workforce staying level at approximately 17,900 full-time equivalents for the next five years. 

What workforce planning have you done to support that request 

and how confident are you that you can manage the transition with 

current staffing levels? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I am very confident we can handle the transition 

with the current staffing levels because, as you know, with regard 

to Shuttle to Constellation transition, most of the change that occurs is among contractor employees who operate the Shuttle systems, and you are talking about a civil service level. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The largest fluctuations are in the contractor—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Right. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. Community. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. So I think our civil service employment will remain 

just fine. For Fiscal Years 2009 and 2010, we actually fully utilize 

all the folks we have and could use a few more, but that is okay. 

Then, as the out years approach, the planning for those gets firmer. So I think our Civil Service workforce planning is in pretty good 

shape. 

CONTRACTOR WORKFORCE

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The contractor community, can you give us 

an overview as to what sort of changes are in store there? Obviously, there is a lot of apprehension and concern, but what process 

are you using to sort of manage to do that? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Gerst, do you mind if I turn to you and let you work 

through this? This is mostly Shuttle and mostly in the area—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I know you have been doing, what do they 

call them, workforce mapping exercises and you are about to come 

up with a report. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Let me mention this just at the top level before I 

give it to Mr. Gerstenmaier for a couple more details. We owe you 

on March 24th, a report, and then an update every six months, of 

our workforce mapping progress across all of our Centers as we 


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transition from Shuttle to Constellation. You will have that. Now, 

we can give you a few highlights at this point. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I think that would be valuable—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Good. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. If you could do that. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Gerst. 

Mr. GERSTENMAIER. We have done a couple of things to try to 

capture our workforce picture and give employees a sense of the future. We have added some additional line items within our existing 

contracts that essentially provide another charge code for some of 

the workers that are going to be working on Constellation. For example, for our solid rocket motors built in Utah, we have a contract 

line item allowing workers to start doing some work for the Constellation activity ahead of time. So it is actually a transitional 

workforce. So when they have some down time on their Shuttle activities, they can actually charge to a different charge code that 

goes to Constellation and actually begin some of that work. So 

there is ability to do that. We have done a similar kind of thing 

with some of our processing contracts in Florida. Next year in April 

or so, we are going to fly the Ares 1–X demonstration flight out of 

Florida and the folks actually supporting that effort are United 

Space Alliance employees who are supporting the Shuttle activities. 

So the employees that actually stack the rockets in the Vertical Assembly Building will do that same work for this demonstration 

flight. They have a different charge code and a different aspect. So 

we are able to give them a sense of the future and let them actually start working on some of the new systems while they are still 

doing their current shuttle work. That has been very effective. 

We have also provided some schooling available for—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So there is schooling and retraining? 

Mr. GERSTENMAIER. Yes. We have also provided some schooling 

and retraining opportunities where, if a discipline is going away— 

for example, maybe some of the tile technicians we use that place 

the tile on the bottom of the shuttle—we have given those workers 

opportunities to go improve their skills in wiring, which will be 

clearly needed in the future. So we have given them some opportunities to go do things in other areas. 

So we have provided hands-on experience to gain future skills 

and we have also given them some training opportunities to go do 

that. So far, the workforce is very motivated about what we are 

doing. This is a very exciting time for us. The changes in Station 

and Shuttle programs are very dramatic during this period, but 

workers are also getting a chance to see the future. 

NEXT GENERATION

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I want to shift gears while we have Dr. 

Shin here relative to NextGen. We had a fairly lengthy discussion 

with the GAO on NextGen. 

Can you tell us where we stand relative to NextGen? I know we 

have this joint planning and development office and you are providing the basic research; is that right? 

Mr. SHIN. Yes, sir. Our contribution to JPDO is, as you accurately pointed out, particularly through research. We have made 

really significant progress last year working with JPDO and all the 


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member agencies there. Most notably, JPDO has released several 

seminal training documents. One of them is a NextGen research 

and development plan, and it identifies 163 research needs that 

need to be addressed. About half of the 163 research needs are associated with NASA. We are not leading all of them. JPDO has 

identified about 20 percent of them that can be led by NASA. 

And so throughout last year—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Twenty percent of? 

Mr. SHIN. Of research needs identified in the NextGen R&D 

plan. There are all together 163 research needs, sir, in that. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So which ones would you be in lead on? 

Mr. SHIN. Well, we will be working on airspace and ground automation, a lot of concept development, and assuring airport surface 

optimization can be achieved. Also, one of the backbones of this 

next encounter is about a trajectory-based operation, meaning that 

you know the airplane’s location any time, anywhere, and you can 

actually predict how the trajectory of this airplane will be from the 

departure to arrival. 

A lot of automation concepts and algorithms need to be developed. Those are all research needs. NASA is working on all of 

those. We have gone through a fairly laborious effort of mapping 

technical milestones to the NextGen R&D plan. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So how would you characterize the process? 

How would you assess where you are? 

Mr. SHIN. I am happy to report to you, sir, we have not found 

any gaps. All our technical milestones are addressing the NextGen 

R&D plan. In December, we also have program reviews for our 

three research programs and, most notably, the air space systems 

program, which addresses NextGen 100 percent. The independent 

review panel, which consisted of a lot of members from FAA and 

JPDO, gave excellent scores for relevance and quality. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I do not know whether you are familiar 

when the GAO testified in their testimony, they did raise some 

questions about the direction of the joint planning and development 

office and the interagency effort. 

You are familiar with those? 

Mr. SHIN. Yes, I am. I am serving as a board member there, and 

so we meet periodically. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, I know you are. That is excellent. 

But their view is that maybe things are not working as smoothly 

and perhaps as expeditiously as they might—— 

Mr. SHIN. I think—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. And the sense of sort of urgency. Obviously, NASA has lots of priorities. But many members 

of Congress feel this is something we would rather see sooner rather than later. 

Mr. SHIN. As I mentioned earlier, since we have been addressing 

fundamental research needs of this NextGen capability, we have 

not really heard that NASA is not working these things expeditiously as possible or slacking. I think the whole enterprise issue, 

this national air space system issue is very, as you might guess, 

very complex issue, so—— 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. It is complicated. It is complicated by the 

fact that there has been a cut in the money that you have available 

for your work. 

Has not the Earth space systems’ budget, which funds research 

for this type of work, been cut by 25 percent from levels that Congress established in fiscal year 2007 and 2008? 

Mr. SHIN. From Fiscal Year 2008 to Fiscal Year 2009, there is 

roughly a 25 percent reduction, but that is reduction from the Congressional augmentation in Fiscal Year 2008. Of course, we have 

not seen the 2009—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, the bottom line is when are we going 

to see something which can be put into effect? 

I assume like with a lot of military programs, if you come up 

with technology out of whatever the spirals are that you are involved in, that that stuff gets, in some ways gets utilized. 

Mr. SHIN. Yes. The leverage and—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Mr. SHIN [continuing]. They are important as you point out. DoD 

is a member agency in JPDO. So we are working very closely with 

our DoD partners and—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Have they been fully cooperative? 

Mr. SHIN. Yes. We have a very close working relationship with 

DoD and also Commerce and Homeland Security. So I think 

NASA’s research conservation has been significant in making good 

progress. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You are familiar with the GAO’s take on 

where you are? 

Mr. SHIN. Yes. I have seen them. Also, last year, there was an 

audit of JPDO, and we participated in that audit. So I am familiar 

with GAO’s view, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

DEEP SPACE AND NEAR EARTH NETWORKS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Dr. Griffin, when adjustments are made to recognize the transfer 

of deep space and near Earth networks from heliophysics to space 

operations, it appears that investments in your Science Mission Directorate are unchanged from the fiscal year 2008 enacted levels. 

Is that pretty accurate? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How did the Science Mission Directorate manage 

to accelerate the Earth science decadal missions and quintuple 

funds for lunar science research without an overall budget increase 

in science? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, money was moved from other portfolios to create the additions that you spoke of. Alan, would you care to comment on the specific sources? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. So $570 million was moved within the space 

science to the Earth science side of the Science Mission Directorate. 

The Heliophysics Division, Astrophysics Division, and Planetary 

Divisions each participated in that. Let me be specific about what 

we did. In the case—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. By program? 

Dr. STERN. I am going to go by division, yes, sir. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. 

Dr. STERN. In the case of the Planetary Division, the money that 

funded the acceleration of the Earth Science program to impact 

Mars program funds is, as you may recall, there was a difficulty 

with the current procurement activity on the Mars Scout mission, 

which caused it to be delayed so that it would have to fly two years 

later. That meant that we did not have to spend large sums on the 

development of that mission in 2008 and 2009. There was no other 

mission to infill that you could do feasibly just starting immediately. Therefore, the Planetary Division elected to make that 

money, that had become available, its contribution to the Earth 

Science initiative. So that was a relatively painless way of going 

about it because of the slippage that had taken place. 

In the case of the Heliophysics Division, we made a number of 

minor adjustments in the program. They are a smaller division and 

they did not contribute as large an amount. We asked them to contribute proportionately to their size. As you know, we were starting 

the Solar Probe mission. Solar Probe has been high priority in the 

decadal survey. What we did was we just stretched out the development of Solar Probe a little bit longer, and moved its launch date 

to the right so that Heliophysics could have a budget profile that 

accommodated Earth Science needs. 

In the case of Astrophysics, because of the development requirements of missions that are now being built in the Explorer Program (the James Webb Space Telescope, et cetera), Astrophysics 

was not in a position to contribute in the early years, but the contribution from the Planetary and Heliophysics program were sufficient. So Astrophysics made its contribution in the outyears, primarily in 2011, 2012, 2013 through efficiencies in the operations of 

missions that are now flying on-orbit observatories. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are those all the programs that suffered in order 

to pay for these increases? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir, I believe they are. 

LUNAR SCIENCE RESEARCH

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Why is the increase of nearly five times necessary for lunar science research? This year, it increases at another 

20 percent and most years thereafter. 

Dr. STERN. The lunar program that we proposed has two components. The first component was proposed by the President’s Fiscal 

Year 2008 request and was a part of the appropriation that was 

passed for Fiscal Year 2008. That is a program that began at 

around the level of $40 million and then went to $60 and $80 million. That was a part of the Fiscal Year 2008 proposal. On top of 

that now, that provided research and analysis funds as well as for 

funds to build instruments to fly on the missions of other nations 

going to the Moon, what we call missions of opportunity where we 

are a minor partner. 

What we proposed in the Fiscal Year 2009 request was to have 

a lunar science robotic program within the Science Mission Directorate flying small missions in response to the National Academy’s 

lunar science report that was published last year calling for just 

such a sequence of missions. That is where that second component 


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is. That runs at $60 million a year for three years and then $70 

million a year subsequently. 

SCIENCE MISSIONS COST GROWTH

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is there a new policy for containing cost growth 

on NASA’s science missions? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What is it? 

Dr. STERN. It has three parts. The first part is that we properly 

scope the missions to fit the budget so that we do not put ourselves 

in a position of selecting what has been termed, ‘‘eight pounds in 

a five pound bag.’’ That is a part of our selection criteria when we 

select the mission. We make sure that we are not getting ourselves 

into trouble to begin with. 

Secondly, as Dr. Griffin explained, we treat our reserves differently now using statistical estimation criteria that give us a very 

robust reserves program so that when missions do have development issues—and they will because, of course, we are doing things 

for the first time—we are doing things that are state-of-the-art in 

terms of the science and sometimes the engineering as well. We 

want to make sure that we have healthy reserves budgeted from 

the beginning. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You do not have now? 

Dr. STERN. No. We do. 

SCIENCE PROGRAM RESERVES

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What reserves do you have typically in these 

science programs? 

Dr. STERN. What we have typically done is asked the mission to 

propose its reserve level and we evaluate whether we think that is 

sufficient. Under Dr. Griffin’s leadership, we have gone to a different approach in which we use a confidence curve, and we require 

the missions to be at the 70 percent level in cost confidence, which 

has empirically been shown to, on average, to be sufficient based 

on actual aerospace experience. The third component of our cost 

control is to make sure that we have in our pocket, and are willing 

to execute, appropriate descopes between full mission success and 

minimum mission success, what are called level one requirements. 

We have been taking advantage of that and using it successfully 

over the last year. I would be happy to provide examples. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Have you been using it long enough to be able 

to make comparisons about what the results are and compare the 

success to the program? 

Dr. STERN. Well, I do not think that is ready for a strict mathematical comparison, but we have definitive examples where we 

were actually able to make relatively minor changes in those requirements allowing us to stay on track with the mission. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Can you give us an example? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. The Kepler mission is a good example. Last 

summer, they had a fairly significant problem with costs. We 

worked through their test program and their scientific requirements. We reduced their expected time on orbit by about ten percent and achieved a substantial reduction in their cost needs. By 

looking at their test program and some other aspects of the misVerDate Aug 31 2005 00:38 Aug 03, 2008 Jkt 042708 PO 00000 Frm 00068 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A708P2.000 A708P2

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sion, we were able to essentially erase what would have been a $50 

million class up problem. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. A cost overrun? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What kind of problem did you say that was? 

What problem? Class problem or what? 

Dr. STERN. Fifty million dollar class up problem, something—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Oh, class up. I see. Scale the problem? 

Dr. STERN. Scale the problem. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What was the explanation for the overrun? Just 

badly estimated to begin with? 

Dr. STERN. Well, the Kepler Project has had a variety of difficulties, some on the management side and some in terms of an underestimation of the technical difficulty. When you go out and buy a 

good digital camera, it has got eight million pixels in the CCD. This 

is a focal plane which will be the largest CCD focal plane that 

NASA has ever launched by a very large margin, approaching a billion pixels. The data handling and electronics that go with that 

turned out to be more complicated tasks than had been understood 

at the time that the proposal was initially accepted. That and some 

other technical problems as well as awkward management structure caused that mission to repeatedly get into cost difficulties. 

However, I have to tell you after the management changes and the 

suite of direction that we gave them, including this descope, they 

have been performing extremely well. They are on track and have 

been month after month for the February 2009 launch date next 

year. All the performance data we are seeing from the scientific instrument and spacecraft look very good. The team is performing extremely well. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. All that was a contractor issue, not a requirements issue? 

Dr. STERN. It involved contractors, as well as, NASA personnel. 

SCIENCE MISSION BUDGET

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The 2009 budget request for the Science Mission 

Directorate reduces the budget for technology missions such as 

New Millennium and reduces the programmatic content for planetary sciences, technology development from current levels through 

fiscal year 2012. 

What are the implications of the proposed cuts on NASA’s ability 

to pursue several new missions and to maintain schedule and cost 

discipline in executing them? 

Dr. STERN. What we have done is change our approach with regard to how we handle technology budgets. In recent years, much 

of the technology program has been pooled in a program called 

New Millennium, which was not for science missions, but entirely 

for on-orbit technology demonstrations. When we analyzed the effectiveness of that program, we found that it was not as effective 

as we would have liked it to be. Many technologies that were demonstrated were not needed by future missions and were, therefore, 

not picked up and had a relatively low efficiency of application. So 

we have gone to a different approach in which missions individually develop their own technology so that we know that there is 

a buyer out there that really needs what we are developing. A good 


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example is the James Webb Space Telescope. We could give you 

other examples. Be happy to do that. In addition, you will see in 

our budget request we have also augmented the Suborbital Program, which is a natural test bed for technology development. It 

has been used very successfully in the past. So what we have actually done is redistribute and refocus the way that we spend our 

technology money, walking away from the older paradigm under a 

New Millennium to a newer paradigm in which the projects in the 

Suborbital Program spend technology dollars that we hope will be 

much more effective use of those funds. 

NEW MILLENNIUM APPROACH

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Why? Talk a little more about that millennium 

approach and the way you are doing it now. 

Dr. STERN. Well, as you might imagine, if there is a pool of funds 

available for technology development, the selection criteria by 

which that program makes its decisions on what to fly has to be 

based upon projections of future needs and wants of the Science 

Mission Directorate. Sometimes those are not the best decisions. At 

least, historically speaking, we have learned that quite a number 

of those technologies that were demonstrated on orbit were not, in 

fact, subsequently used. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Not used for what? 

Dr. STERN. Not used in subsequent science missions. The technology was developed, but it was not technology that people needed 

to have to do future missions. So by asking the missions to develop 

their own technology, we know that there is a buyer who really 

needs it. We are not spending money where we do not need to nor 

are we buying too much. We know it is going to be applied because 

it is within the mission’s budget and they need to develop it to 

meet their own needs. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The next phase? 

Dr. STERN. Well, once we develop it to the technical readiness 

level, where it has been demonstrated on-orbit or on a group test 

program, if that is sufficient, then the mission that needs it actually flies it and counts on it. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. A lot of cost overruns in NASA’s science missions. They have become almost routine. Can you explain why twothirds of the programs have exceeded their thresholds on costs and 

schedule? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. There are quite a number of factors that are 

involved in that. We analyzed it and there is no single reason. 

Sometimes, as Dr. Griffin described yesterday, we have got into 

management issues like with the Glory instrument. The instrument’s supplier was unable to perform efficiently. They moved their 

operations to another base of operations for development of the instrument and it set it back. 

In many other cases, the missions were—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So Glory was a contractor performance issue essentially? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. Other factors have included too ambitious a 

set of mission objectives for the available budget and not budgeting 

sufficient reserves. Those are just the things I spoke about earlier 


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that we are trying to rectify now so that we do not have these problems going forward. 

COST OVERRUN IMPACTS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What impact do these overruns have on other 

projects within the Science Mission Directorate? 

Dr. STERN. Well, their effect is particularly what I call ‘‘the 

slaughter of the innocent.’’ When we have a problem that is related 

to a mission that is in development and we want to go forward and 

finish that mission, we have to put off future missions. That means 

delaying or canceling missions that have not gotten into trouble but 

are in the wings waiting to be started. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What are some examples of missions that have 

been delayed? 

Dr. STERN. Well, Solar Probe is a good example. Some are the 

missions that we are starting this year, the Explorer Program 

within Discovery, there is quite a long list. Almost any mission that 

we are starting now might have been started earlier, had we not 

had cost overruns or associated unexpected costs causing us to put 

them off until we could fit it into the budget wedge of a given 

year’s request. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How many of the programs that have been 

eliminated have been eliminated as a result of cost overruns? 

Dr. STERN. I would have to take that for the record and have 

that tallied for you, sir. 

[The information follows:] 

COST OVERRUNS

No Science programs have been eliminated as a result of cost overruns. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Some of them have been eliminated because of 

the budget, right, due to the amounts you are getting overall, but 

some of them have been eliminated—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is not a typical event at NASA to eliminate a 

given mission because another mission had a cost overrun. But 

delay is common which, of course, produces a cascading effect because the delayed mission then becomes less efficient and may 

itself overrun and the effect ricochets downstream. I mean, there 

has been a lot of discussion in this hearing on cost control. We have 

taken that on as a challenge that we want to address. We are very 

serious about it because if we can control it better, it feeds on 

itself. It produces a virtuous circle rather than a vicious circle, 

where one mission reflects on another downstream and it continues 

on. If we can get a handle around it, all of our missions will be better off. 

RETURNING TO THE MOON

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Dr. Griffin, what is the justification for going to 

the Moon? Science, preparation to go to Mars, commerce? I read a 

speech by Dr. Marburger last year where he or a large part of it 

was justifying going to the Moon for commercial purposes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, I personally think that the justification for returning U.S. astronauts to the Moon is to expand upon their presence. Certainly there is science about the Moon, science which can 


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be done from the Moon, which is of the first rank. You might or 

might not choose as a policymaker to make that the primary justification, but it is one of the justifications. 

Another important justification is if we do believe that Mars is 

an important destination for humankind, and I do, then we need 

to go to the Moon before we go to Mars. We are going to be living 

on Mars for months at a time, many months at a time, and it will 

take months to get there. We need a lot more experience of living, 

working, and operating in space than we have today if we are, in 

my judgment, going to mount a successful expedition to Mars a 

couple of decades from now. That experience will be gained on the 

Space Station, and it will be gained on the Moon. When we make 

mistakes, as we will, it is better if those mistakes occur three days 

away from home than many months away from home. So it is a 

training ground for Mars in my opinion. 

Finally, Dr. Marburger’s speech is one that I remember with 

great clarity. I thought it was one of the better speeches I have 

heard on the purposes of space exploration generally. Dr. 

Marburger asked the question. The question comes down to, do we 

wish to incorporate space within mankind’s economic sphere of influence, or do we not. It is a choice. And I think that the choice 

should be answered in the affirmative. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. That is a question to be answered to the whole 

world at this point. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is, but I would like the United States to be, and 

to continue to be, a leader in the world and in the world of tomorrow. In my opinion, and very firmly and often stated, if we are unprepared to lead in space, we will not be leaders on Earth. 

LUNAR RETURN PROGRAM

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And it is another question to what extent are we 

prepared to provide leadership with regard to how resources are 

exploited from the Moon. I mean, as I understood it, he was actually talking about extraction and how you—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That is correct, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are we thinking about that as a Nation? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. One of our earliest goals with our lunar return program is to learn how to utilize the resources on the Moon and later, 

on other planets, to again reduce the dependency on supplies 

shipped up from Earth. In a word, without using money, we are 

looking at how one goes about creating an economic enterprise in 

space, how one utilizes the resources and capabilities that are there 

in furtherance of human activities. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. A lot of aspects to that? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. There really are. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Much more than to get into here. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is fascinating. It is important. And it is about our 

future. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yeah. 

Mr. Culberson. 

NASA FUNDING LEVELS

Mr. CULBERSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 


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It is always a joy to have you guys here and to work with you, 

with NASA, with the scientific community. 

My hero, Thomas Jefferson, always said that you enjoy the 

dreams of the future better than memories of the past and it is one 

of the great aspects of this job, that we get to help you make the 

dreams of the future come true. 

And it is particularly frustrating to see the Office of Management 

and Budget continue to give recommendations to this Committee 

and the Congress that inadequately fund NASA. You have got 

more on your plate than you can deal with. 

One of the things I would love to work with you on, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Frelinghuysen, Mr. Schiff, and others on this Committee 

and the other authorizing Committee is I would love to think 

longer term about restructuring the way you all are managed. 

I think you have got a lot of funding problems because you are 

subject to the whims of the Office of Management and Budget. 

And I would love to see the recommendations for NASA’s budget 

come from an independent panel of engineers and scientists that 

are not obligated politically to any Administration or any political 

party but are driven purely by science and engineering. Anyway, 

just something to think about for the future because it is just going 

to continue to be a problem. 

And I know that the Chairman mentioned earlier during the earlier set of hearings and of questioning. 

I know how frustrating it is to you and would love to sit down 

with you and talk to you in some detail about what we ought to 

do for the future to cure some of those problems. 

But let me zero in on a couple of areas in particular that are of 

concern. And I am struck in particular by the phrase ‘‘put off the 

future and slaughter the innocent.’’ I just grieve. We all do. 

In particular, the most successful, I think, missions that NASA 

has ever flown, the Mars exploration program, the highest number 

of hits ever on NASA’s web site were immediately after the Mars 

Rovers landed and they are, of course, still operating, doing beautifully. You have got a terrific team of scientists working on that, 

on the Mars missions. 

I think without a doubt that is one of the most successful programs at NASA. Yet, you are asking for a big cut. You are taking 

money away from—you mentioned yesterday, Administrator Griffin, Mars has been so successful that you are taking money away 

from it to fund other flagship missions. 

And I know you have got a lot on your plate. But it just frankly 

to my mind, and I know to Mr. Schiff and others on the Subcommittee, is unacceptable to take money away from Mars when 

they have been so successful. 

Could you comment on the funding levels that you are asking for 

this year that OMB, excuse me, Office of Management and Budget, 

not you guys—you made your best case to OMB and the bean 

counters over there are recommending this big cut, bean counters 

and bureaucrats, which drive me nuts. I think it is one of the problems. 

If we would let the scientists drive NASA and then the engineers 

who we have so much faith in it rather than the bureaucrats. But 

if the OMB recommendation were followed, it appears to be, and 


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I have got this from a variety of very knowledgeable sources, if we 

followed the recommendation of OMB in order to keep a Mars sample return mission in 2020, would it not be essentially impossible 

to do any Mars missions between the Mars science lab which has, 

I know, had a little bit of a delay, I understand you may have to 

change the heat shield because of some tests that showed that the 

existing one may not be adequate and that that may delay it and 

knowing that you can only launch to Mars I think every other year 

because you have got to wait until it is essentially on its closest approach to Earth, so if we follow this recommendation in light of 

those restrictions, would it not be essentially impossible to do any 

Mars missions between science lab and sample return? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I will let Dr. Stern speak to that. But, no. We do 

have Mars missions between MSL and Sample Return. 

Alan. 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. We are going to be flying next the aeronomy 

mission of which I spoke to you just a little bit earlier, a highly recommended mission to study the mission of Mars’ atmosphere, how 

it lost its oceans, et cetera. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Now, these are low to moderate cost missions? 

Dr. STERN. This is a medium-scale mission. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Medium scale. 

Dr. STERN. In costs, it is very similar to many of the orbiters that 

we now have operating at Mars, in fact. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Could you tell me its name again, sir. I am 

sorry, Dr. Stern. 

Dr. STERN. Mars Aeronomy. Aeronomy is the study of upper 

atmospheres. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Aeronomy. 

Dr. STERN. Aeronomy, A-E-R-O-N-O-M-Y. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. That is actually a word I am not familiar 

with. 

Dr. STERN. It is a term invented in the 1950s, the study of the 

upper atmosphere of the Earth. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. So that is a medium. But if you, therefore, are going to do a series of low to moderate cost missions, do 

you not have to postpone—this, I understand, is a conclusion of a 

group of Mars scientists who looked at this and concluded that if 

you do these moderate to low cost missions in 2013 and 2016, you 

have to postpone the sample return indefinitely? 

Dr. STERN. No, sir, I do not believe that is the case. 

Mr. CULBERSON. That is not accurate? 

Dr. STERN. That is right. Our analysis, we—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Top scientists working on—— 

Dr. STERN. The analysis that we have shows that we can support 

the Mars aeronomy mission—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. STERN [continuing]. Which itself is approximately a half a 

billion dollar enterprise, an $880 million mission for 2016. The 

Mars community is deciding what they want to do. That is a fairly 

large mission as Mars missions go. That is the next launch opportunity after aerology. In that same timeframe, we are supporting 

U.S. participation in ESA’s, European Space Agency, rover activity, 

where we are putting about $70 million worth of instruments on 


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their rover mission. Then it is our ambition to have the first of the 

Mars Sample Return missions, and they have to be staged a few 

launches in a row. The first would launch in 2018 to begin the 

Mars Sample Return enterprise. We are still looking at the architecture for that. We may put the orbiter there first, which would 

be the rendezvous return vehicle bringing the sample back, and 

provide communications architecture, or we may provide the rover 

first. And that study is still in process. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. So you are happy with OMB’s recommendation on Mars and you would not ask for any more? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Let me, if I might, make a comment, Mr. Culberson. 

There has been considerable discussion of the cuts and reductions 

we have proposed in the Mars program already. That is a matter 

of policy. One can spend more on Mars, but then one must spend 

less on Earth Science which we have recommended increasing. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Unless we give you more money overall. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, of course. But that is not what the Administration is recommending. One must spend less on an outer planets 

mission. The question is not whether good work can be done on 

Mars. Of course it can. It is a wonderful program. It has gotten an 

A grade. It is a wonderful program. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Why would you cut it then? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Because there are other programs and other communities of outer planet scientists. There are other communities of 

scientists besides those working on the Mars program. The question is, what is an equitable and reasonable balance of resource distribution across our many communities. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Mars is not the only scientific community that 

NASA supports. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. And I have to say that without offering—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Part of our job on this Subcommittee is to help 

make those policy decisions and we will help you. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. I have to say that without any criticism of 

the Mars community which has done a wonderful job. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Right. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. But our planetary science program cannot be all 

Mars all the time. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Well, I am not suggesting. And we know you do 

not have enough money on your plate. This Subcommittee is—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I cannot do an outer planet flagship unless I take 

money from some other pieces of the Planetary Sciences Division. 

Dr. STERN. Sir, if I may interject just to tell you a little bit of 

history. This is not new. Now, I have only been at NASA a year, 

but I have been in the Planetary Science Program for decades. For 

example, in the 1990s, we can only afford in that program, as we 

do in others, one flagship at a time. Those are very expensive enterprises. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Right. The Cassini class. 

Dr. STERN. Cassini was a flagship of the 1990s. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Right. 

Dr. STERN. Following that, we did Mars Science Lab. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 


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Dr. STERN. Now, and according to the decadal survey, in fact, it 

has turned—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Outer planet—— 

Dr. STERN. It is time to catch up on Europa or the outer planet 

flagship and then we go to the Mars—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Science, but I love it. 

Dr. STERN [continuing]. Sample Return, which is the following 

flagship to that. So we take turns and we are following the behavior that has been—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. STERN [continuing]. In place for quite a while. 

OUTER PLANETS MISSION

Mr. CULBERSON. Talk to me for a minute about the flagship to 

Europa, the outer planets mission, which is the highest priority of 

the decadal survey, and how you intend to get there and what time 

frame to Europa—— 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CULBERSON [continuing]. Which is the moon of Jupiter that 

has an ocean, saltwater ocean that is as large or maybe even larger 

than, in terms of volume, the oceans on the Earth. 

And because of tidal flexing, of course, you have got heat coming 

up from the bottom of the ocean and almost certainly vents, volcanic vents where you have got heat and saltwater very likely the 

chemical energy then producing life like we have on the bottom of 

the mid ocean ridges on earth which is why, of course, we do not 

want to go there, right? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. You are going a little further than I would 

as a scientist. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Logical, though. 

Dr. STERN. We are genuinely conservative in our extrapolations, 

but we do know that Europa has an ocean on its inside. In fact, 

one of the great discoveries of the outer planets program, which the 

United States has led for the world, is that oceans are very common. It is just that they are rare on the outside of planets. They 

are very common on the inside of these icy worlds like Europa. The 

question, the operable question about Europa is how deep is the ice 

until you get down to the ocean. Is it accessible that we could actually imagine some 21st century probe getting through that ice? If 

it is hundreds of meters or perhaps a kilometer under the surface, 

one can imagine down the road, towards the middle of this century 

having the technology to get a probe into that ocean, which can 

communicate back to us. 

Mr. CULBERSON. And get off and swim in the ocean. 

Dr. STERN. Like a submersible, for example. But if it is many kilometers, that will not be possible. So the purpose of the Europa 

mission, if that is the outer planet flagship that we fly, is to assess 

the depth of the ice down to the ocean interface. Now, I am not 

sure if you are aware, but the science community has put forward 

three different concepts for an outer planet flagship, which are in 

competition, Europa being one of the three. Our Cassini mission, 

which is at Saturn, the Cassini Saturn orbiter, is a flagship mission itself. 

Mr. CULBERSON. It is still thriving and doing well? 


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Dr. STERN. It is doing extremely well. We have just authorized 

it for an extended mission. It has discovered another kind of ocean, 

actually lakes. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Encelioides? 

Dr. STERN. This is a Titan, a world that is larger than some 

planets in our solar system. These are hydrocarbon oceans. It is estimated that Titan has more than a hundred, and perhaps more 

than a thousand times the hydrocarbon reserves of the Earth. This 

shows an analogy to the early Earth’s environment, a pre-biotic environment of extremely high interest to the planetary science community. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Maybe a good gas station on the way there. 

Dr. STERN. It could turn out to be that way in the future, yes, 

sir. There is a third competing outer planet mission. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. STERN. Those are going through scientific development and 

peer review. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Titan, Europa, and what is the third one? 

Dr. STERN. The third one is called the Jupiter science orbiter, 

which would be a second-generation Galileo mission and would terminate in orbit around another one of Jupiter’s planet-size moons, 

Ganymede, which also is believed to have an ocean like Europa on 

its interior, but it is easier to access because the radiation environment is lower at Ganymede. 

Mr. CULBERSON. That is the third Galileo moon? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. It is, yes. 

Mr. CULBERSON. I was not aware it had an ocean. 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. 

PROMETHEUS MISSION

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. But all the work, of course, that has been 

done, you are going through a competition now. But I always remember my first year on this Subcommittee, I asked for a variety 

of briefings and was absolutely charmed and mesmerized with the 

Prometheus mission that John Casani, and I hope he is still thriving and doing well, you are taking good care of the projects. 

Dr. STERN. Yes. 

Mr. CULBERSON. John Casani is a national treasure. 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CULBERSON. He is at JPL and doing well, I hope. 

Dr. STERN. John is fine. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Yeah. He was leading that effort and they 

briefed me on these different missions they had. And this one they 

were developing. They were going to Europa and they were developing an ion engine because today we are still flying the same rocket engines that Robert Goddard designed. 

It is fundamentally, but they were better pumps obviously and 

better fuel, but fundamentally we are still flying Robert Goddard 

1920 technology. It is like we have left our astronauts and the 

science community at NASA, it is like leaving our Navy shoveling 

coal in the steam-fired boilers. It just drives me nuts. I want to 

help you find a way to develop that next generation of rocket propulsion. 


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But on the outer planets mission, what timeframe are you thinking about? And I am concerned that we are just not going to get 

it flown because it is a Cassini-class mission. It is a big—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We are talking 2016 or 2017 for the outer planets 

flagship, whichever—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. For launch? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. The President’s budget request provides a 

sufficient budget wedge to launch that mission by 2016 if it is Jupiter and 2017 if Saturn is the target. That is driven by the orbital 

mechanics, not by our budget needs. That also times well with our 

European partners, who will be major partners, as they have in 

other flagships—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. STERN [continuing]. The outer planets. How their funding 

profile—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. And that would include a lander obviously for 

Europa; would it not? 

Dr. STERN. No, sir, not for Europa. It is only an orbiter. The 

Titan concept does include a lander. These are very different missions obviously and the Jupiter science orbiter is yet a third architecture—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. STERN [continuing]. Depending upon the needs. But we 

are—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. So you are saying 2016 or 2017 for 

launch? 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CULBERSON. And you are sure we can get there with the 

money that you are asking for on the glide path that you are on? 

Dr. STERN. I am quite confident of it because we are scoping the 

mission to fit the budget, not leaving it open-ended in budget to fit 

whatever desires might be out there. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. The Chairman has been very generous of 

the time. Whenever you need me to stop. I could just go. But, I 

mean, I would love to ask about SIM, for example. Can I have a 

couple more minutes, two more minutes, a minute? 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Why don’t we come back to you—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Sure. Yes, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. Because you have had ample—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. I know Adam will also have—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Schiff. 

OUTER PLANETS MISSION

Mr. SCHIFF. I was going to say, Mr. Chairman, I would be happy 

to defer a couple of my minutes to Mr. Culberson because I actually 

just wanted to comment on something that Mr. Culberson said and 

then I would be happy to yield to the gentleman. 

I strongly support the outer planets mission. I think it is some 

of the most interesting work that NASA does and I am very excited 

about all the possibilities. And I have loved reading about the hydrocarbon lakes on Titan which are wonderful to imagine. My own 

theory is that there were dinosaurs up there. 

But I do not think the situation is that we cannot do outer planets if we want a strong Mars program. We cannot do our sciences 


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if we want to do SIM. We cannot do SIM if we want to get the cost 

overruns under—of the Webb telescope under control. 

The testimony you cannot give, I will give. If you were not constrained to be soldiers in the service of the Administration, you 

might come in and say we have to make drastic cuts to Mars and 

it is criminal because Mars is the best, one of the best programs 

that we have run. But we are going to cut it in half over the next 

five years because this is what we have been given. 

You might say if you were not constrained by the Administration 

that we have historically underfunded Earth sciences. There is a 

lot of need to do work in our sciences. We need to understand global climate change better. We need to make investment there. But 

we are not going to come in to you and ask you to savage Mars 

to do Earth sciences. 

We want to go with outer planets. We have got three great candidates. We would love to do two of them or three of them, but that 

is not possible. But we are committed to doing one of them and we 

are going to find out which is the best. 

You cannot say that, but it is our, I think, responsibility to look 

at those sacrifices you are proposing to be made in the interest of 

the numbers you are getting from OMB and the Administration. 

But I do not think it is productive to try, either try deliberately or 

have the inadvertent effect of trying to pit one center against another or one project against another. 

This is not, you know, whether we do outer planets or we do 

Mars or whether we do Webb or whether we do whatnot and I do 

not think it is constructive to the process to suggest that it is. Exactly. Exactly 

And I would be happy, Mr. Chairman, to yield the balance of—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. No. I am through. I had a chance to ask my 

question, so I would yield to my colleague. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. May I comment, sir, or would you prefer that I did 

not? 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Certainly. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We are not trying to pit one program against another or one Center against another. That is the last thing I want 

to do. I have striven hard for three years for more unity in support 

of all within our program. But it is fiscally true that at whatever 

budget level you would care to set, this Administration has set a 

budget level, which is very favorable to NASA in comparison with 

other domestic discretionary programs. But at whatever budget 

level you would set, you would have competition from various communities, each wanting to have the lion’s share of that budget. We 

try very hard without putting our own spin on it to execute what 

the scientific community says are its priorities in each of these different camps. 

But they are irretrievably committed to scientific competition for 

scarce resources among themselves, and we try to sort that out on 

an objective an impartial basis. We are not trying to create rivalries of one Center against another or one program against another. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Happy to yield. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Mr. Chairman, may I follow-up? Thank you. 


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I think one way that this Committee can certainly deal with it, 

it seems to me and our colleagues on the authorizing Committee, 

is to do whatever we can and we need to do to make sure that 

NASA flies the decadal survey missions as you always have. That 

is a great way to prioritize. 

The scientific community, as you know, has this survey every ten 

years. They meet. They talk. They debate. And they voted scientists one of the highest priorities. And you all have always flown 

those missions and that is, of course, what outer planet mission is, 

but the scientific community chose Europa. 

Why are you going back through another competition when the 

scientific community has said Europa is the highest priority? 

We have got this magnificent mission at Titan. We have landed 

on Titan. Cassini is doing beautifully, will obviously continue to 

thrive for years. 

Why are we doing another competition when the decadal survey 

says it is Europa? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Between the time when the last decadal survey said 

to go with preference to Europa, we have flown the Cassini mission 

and learned much more from earlier missions. So now the scientific 

community is no longer sure that they want to go to Europa as a 

first preference. They may, but these other possibilities have been 

put on the plate. I will emphasize again we, NASA, as a Federal 

agency are not trying to dictate to the scientific community which 

priority it must have. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We are also not trying to tell them that once you 

pick Europa as a priority, it must forever remain your priority. We 

are giving them the latitude before we actually start spending 

money on a particular path. 

Mr. CULBERSON. On a flagship mission. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Flagship mission. We are giving them the latitude 

to change their minds. 

OUTER PLANET FLAGSHIP PROCESS

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. How do you do those surveys, if I could, 

Dr. Griffin? What is the process? How do you do that? Who will 

make the decisions? I hope it is essentially a peer review. You 

know, the scientists and engineers and not being driven by a political appointee or a bureaucrat somewhere. That is really the scientific community that will make this decision, which flagship we 

fly. 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CULBERSON. What is the process? 

Dr. STERN. Let me—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. How do we guarantee that—— 

Dr. STERN. You are specifically asking, I believe, about how we 

are going to choose the outer planet flagship. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Between these three, yes. 

Dr. STERN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CULBERSON. What is the procedure? 

Dr. STERN. We are actually in the middle of that process. As Dr. 

Griffin described, science is always evolving. Because we flew the 

Cassini flagship, interest in Titan rose quite a bit, also in 


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Enceladus as well, the moon of Saturn that has the giant geysers 

that you are familiar with. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Water geysers. 

Dr. STERN. Right. As a result, through our Outer Planets Assessment Group, led entirely by scientists, not bureaucrats or politicians—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Good. 

Dr. STERN [continuing]. They took it through a variety of different possibilities. Their charge from NASA, from the Science Mission Directorate was as follows. Historically and as we see going 

forward, outer planet flagships have been rare and precious, with 

approximately one every 15 years. So pick this one carefully based 

on needs and what can best advance the science field, because the 

next one will come down the road another 15 to 20 years. 

So start with the fact that Europa was the highest priority in the 

2001 decadal survey process. But take into account everything we 

now know so we don’t misfire using only data from almost a decade 

ago. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. STERN. And then do the scientific rankings at the same time 

that we are doing engineering studies and costing studies to see 

what produces the best result to fit in the budget envelope, to deliver the biggest bang for the approximately—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. STERN [continuing]. $2.1 billion that is available. 

Mr. CULBERSON. It sounds good. And I would like to be briefed 

outside of this hearing. I would like to come down and have you 

talk to me about when you are doing it, because I would love to 

help. I want to be a—— 

Mr. STERN. We would love to do that. 

Mr. CULBERSON. We want to participate and help. I don’t know 

that the OMB has ever given you a budget request that has been 

sufficient. And this Committee—your best friends in the world are 

right here. These are your best friends in the world. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. And we take it that way, sir. 

Mr. CULBERSON. It is meant sincerely. We want to help. But it 

is frustrating. 

And I want to be sure, Mr. Chairman, before we—if I get a 

chance to come back to ask about the near earth asteroids that 

they were referring to earlier. If I am correct or actually you are 

supposed to identify ones that could strike the Earth, to identify 

ones that could at some point impact the Earth and how you would 

intercept them and nudge them out of the way. And be thinking 

about that. If I could, I want to do that and follow up. And then 

also trying to nail them down on SIM, if I get a follow up. 

SHUTTLE MANIFEST MISSION

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Oh, you will get a follow up. It is quite an agenda there. I was going to comment that you can tell your best advocates are sitting on this Committee although it needs money. 

In light of the Shuttle flight delays that have occurred since the 

shuttle’s return to flight after the Columbia accident, how realistic 

is it to assume that the shuttle will be able to complete all the remaining missions on its manifest by October of 2010, Doctor? 


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Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, to complete the remaining Shuttle manifest 

missions means that between February of 2008 this year, counting 

the mission we just flew and the end of 2010, we need to fly five 

missions a year on average. Our historical flight rate, including periods of time of almost three years each, where we had two Shuttle 

accidents and were down, as well as other periods of time where 

we were down for extended periods without an accident, our historical average is four-and-a-half flights a year. So we are now in a 

period where we were up and running and operating relatively 

smoothly. I have every confidence that we can execute at the rate 

of five flights a year from now until retirement. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And does that complete the manifest? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. And that completes the manifest that has been 

scoped out. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How will NASA avoid the schedule pressure that 

the Columbia Accident Investigation Board warned against when 

NASA’s need to complete the Space Station’s assembly, repairing 

the Hubble Telescope, creeps up against that October 2010 deadline? Did your answer to the last question imply that you are not 

going to have this schedule pressure? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. No, it didn’t. We always have schedule pressure. I 

dislike intensely the idea that external reviewers and advisers suggest that we should ignore schedule pressure. The importance of 

schedule is obvious to all project managers who ever ran any 

project in any kind of a human field of endeavor. 

Time matters. The expression, ‘‘time is money,’’ didn’t just originate for no reason. Time matters. What I would like for you to 

want of us is that we are a group of responsible managers who 

know how to balance schedule pressures against cost, performance, 

and risk, and to do so in a manner that no one of those parameters 

ever gets out of the box. It is true that in the past, in space projects 

as in many others, sometimes schedule pressures have been allowed to dominate inappropriately and to produce bad behavior and 

bad outcomes. Whenever a failure happens—a Mishap Investigation Board looks at it, and says that we should not do that. That 

is correct. We should not. We should not allow schedule pressure 

to dominate. But at the same time, we cannot ignore it. We must 

take it into account. We must make operational decisions to fly or 

not to fly in the face of less information than we would like to have. 

But we must do it. I think we are doing it today quite well. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. At what juncture will you know that you have 

time to complete all the missions on your manifest by the scheduled—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. This is 2008. At this point in time, we have until 

end of Fiscal Year 2010 to accomplish the job we want. So all of 

2009, all of 2010 and half of 2008, 30 months to accomplish the 

missions we need. If we get down to the last year, and still have 

nine missions to go, I would be very concerned. I mean, I would say 

we probably can’t accomplish that. If we get down to the last year 

and have six missions to go, I would say we probably can. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is there a contingency to push the date out if 

necessary? And what would be the consequences of that? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I would not. Again, you are asking me for an opinion. There is not presently a plan to push the Shuttle missions out 


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beyond 2010. I would not want to do that, because our future mission portfolio, discussed earlier from Members of the Committee, 

showed how we get into program overruns and delays and all of 

that. A classic way to get into an overrun situation is to have funding instability in early years. I mean one can make technical mistakes, one can mismanage contractors. Those things can happen. 

But a classic way is to underfund or to disrupt the funding stream 

promised to programs. 

If we fly the Shuttle beyond 2010, that will take an additional $3 billion or so for every year that we wish to keep the shuttle fleet 

around. That will produce a huge collateral damage effect on all 

other programs within NASA. I don’t recommend that to you. We 

will do as the Congress directs, of course. But I don’t recommend 

it to you that we extend the program. 

HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What is the priority of Hubble in that with—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. The Hubble will fly this August or September. And 

so it is—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. It is in the—well in the—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is the third flight from now. I mean, we are 

launching next week. We are launching in May, and then we do 

Hubble. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is next week’s flight a night flight? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is a 2:38 AM launch on March 11th we are currently scheduled, sir. So I don’t recommend we extend the Shuttle 

program past 2010. The other thing is for the Shuttle workforce 

itself, what our workforce needs is again stability. Stability in our 

plans. They need to know that we expect them, and we expect to 

pay them through 2010. And that after that we will transition to 

new programs, that we will work with them as best possible to 

transition them over. 

But they need to know what is going to happen, not to be deciding every year, will we extend the Shuttle program or not extend 

the Shuttle program. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

BUDGET STABILITY

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. This issue of budget stability, obviously, 

was sort of one of your centerpieces yesterday. What in this given 

time of Fiscal Year 2009 and 2010 makes the Constellation programs particularly vulnerable? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We are in possibly the most difficult transition period in the 50-year history of NASA. We are trying to phase 

out—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. In a disciplined, orderly, rational, intelligent, impartial way. We are trying to phase out a system that will 

be 30 years old by the time we fly the last flight. We are trying 

to phase in a new system to accomplish—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. This is a special plane, because time is a 

wasting. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes. Yes, sir. This is a very special time period. We 

are trying to phase in a new system with a minimum of delay. 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And this would be part. And I don’t mean 

to be rhetorical here. Get back to what some raised yesterday that 

is you had to leave a portfolio for the next President, that this is 

part of what you would say in terms of your anxiety or expectations. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Absolutely, sir. Absolutely. On behalf of the Nation’s 

civil space program. We have set a course. I believe it is an intelligent course. It clearly is dependent upon the amount of money we 

have. But for the amount of money we have, I believe we have an 

intelligent course of action. That we should stay on it. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you for letting me get my oar in the 

water. 

SUPPLY MISSIONS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The last missions on the manifest are supply 

missions, are they not? And I understand there are provisions that 

can only be taken up by shuttle? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That is correct, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are they at all expendable? And would you push 

out the last fly date in order to accommodate those missions? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It depends on what you mean by ‘‘push out.’’ Now 

our target is to finish flying by the end of Fiscal Year 2010. But 

we rarely get, and we do not expect to get, new Fiscal Year monies 

on October 1st of any given year. So we go into any new fiscal year 

with a little bit of carryover for several weeks or a couple of 

months worth of operations. 

So no irretrievable harm would be done if our last mission 

launched in—I will just pick a number, November of 2010 versus 

September 30th, of 2010. No one would notice the difference in our 

budget. If we tried to go more than a couple of months and use 

money from a new fiscal year, we would have to keep contracts 

open that we intend to close. That would then now get us into a 

huge impact. Again, I do not want to do that. With regard to the 

last couple of flights that you asked about, the plan in our manifest 

is that those are logistics flights. Yes, sir. They carry up spare 

parts for the Station to allow it to continue operating in the event 

of breakage of some certain subsystems. They carry up spare parts 

that we cannot get up by any other means, because—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. That sounds like they are pretty important. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. They are very important to us. Precisely because we 

expect to have a five-year gap where we don’t have real good access 

to the Station, because the Shuttle will be retired. Our new systems will not be available. We need to preposition those spare subsystems and parts ahead of time. Now you asked, ‘‘is it a hard cutoff.’’ Well no, first of all, we are not flying up all the spare parts 

we have. We are leaving some on the ground. That involves a reasoned judgement as to which subsystems and units are most likely 

to fail. Which are least likely to fail. We make the best judgement 

we can based on our existing flight experience, but we will leave 

some things on the ground. Can you leave more on the ground? 

Sure. We don’t want to. We would like to fly it all. It is a question 

of engineering judgement as to what will fail first and how often 

it will fail. We are making those judgements at a time when we 

don’t really have enough flight history on the Space Station to 


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make the best judgement we could make. So we are making reasoned judgements. They are not perfect. We hope to get as many 

spare parts as possible up before we end the Shuttle Program. 

COMMERCIAL ORBITAL TRANSPORTATION SERVICES (COTS)

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Can any of those spare parts—when will the unmanned alternative systems be available? Will they be available 

before the 2015 date, the COTS Program? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I can comment on COTS. We have a procurement 

going out this year. So I would like Mr. Gerstenmaier to comment 

on the details of the commercial procurement that we are trying 

for—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. 

Dr. GRIFFIN [continuing]. Unmanned cargo, to answer your question. 

Mr. GERSTENMAIER. We just released a draft request for proposal 

for the resupply services. That went out last week. In that we 

specify how much cargo we need, roughly, by calendar year. The 

cargo is in three categories. It is unpressurized cargo, cargo that 

can fly outside exposed to the vacuous space, cargo that flies on the 

inside or pressurized cargo, and then there is a line for cargo we 

would like to return to the ground. That cargo is broken out by 

metric ton delivered in each of those calendar years. We show we 

can start taking cargo as early as 2010 from a commercial supplier 

if we get a proposal back that shows that they can provide that capability to us. It starts at a very modest amount in 2010, roughly 

on the order of a metric ton or so. It grows to about 10 metric tons 

per year beyond that period. That is what we are seeking from the 

commercial sector to see what is available. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are there items that you are talking about in 

these last Shuttle flights that could not fly commercially? 

Mr. GERSTENMAIER. We selected items for these last Shuttle 

flights that are uniquely suited to the Shuttle. For example, the 

large control gyros that provide stability for our Space Station. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. 

Mr. GERSTENMAIER. There will be two of those on those flights. 

They could fly on an expendable vehicle. But they are going to really stretch the capability of the expendable vehicle. They may drive 

the shroud larger. They may drive up mass requirements. We 

picked items for the Shuttle flights that the Shuttle is uniquely 

suited to carry. Those last spares are uniquely designed for Shuttle. Also, the design environment, how much it will get vibrated 

during assent, thermal environment, if they need power, those 

kinds of considerations. If they are uniquely suited to Shuttle, we 

have chosen those to be placed on the Shuttle flight. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Not that you could do them otherwise, but—— 

Mr. GERSTENMAIER. But there will be an additional cost and—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Time and money. 

Mr. GERSTENMAIER. It will be an additional expense and drive a 

unique capability to the expendable that has not flown on a routine 

or easy basis. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you have authority, Dr. Griffin, to extend the 

sunset date for Shuttle missions? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I do not. No, sir. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. You do not? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I do not. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Where does that reside? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, Presidential policy was established before—actually before my arrival at the agency. Recommending a 2010 retirement date. The 2005 Authorization Act for NASA stipulated a 

retirement date of 2010, I believe. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So it would require a new Congressional authorization—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. To extend? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I am not an attorney. I am an engineer. I—my understanding of—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. No. I—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. My authorization is that if one wished to extend 

Shuttle flights beyond the year 2010, it would require Congressional authorization. That is my understanding, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mm-hmm. Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

ARES THRUST OSCILLATION

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Getting back to the stability in your budget 

issue, I don’t want to have a play on words. But the road to an initial operational capability in March of 2015 depends on stable 

funding. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That is correct. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Absolutely essential. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That is correct, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. But the road is not without some impediments. I don’t mean to raise the specter of GAO. But GAO has 

highlighted several critical risk factors in constellation program, 

which I am sure you are quite familiar with. 

Could you comment on thrust oscillation? Where we stand. Is 

that one of those obstacles? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is one of the obstacles GAO quotes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, how do you view it? If I set these up, 

will you bat them out of the park? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Probably. I am happy to tell you more about thrust 

oscillation—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes, would you. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. More than you would ever want to know. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. How are you dealing with it, and defining 

requirements, and impact of the weight of vehicles. Those sort of 

issues that the GAO raised. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. The issue of thrust oscillation and solid rocket motors is nearly universal. When we began the detailed design of the 

Ares rocket, which uses the solid rocket motor first stage, we realized it was likely to have, in the worst case, considerably more effect than we see on our Shuttle flights, where we have a huge stack 

of hardware that essentially damps out the vibration. That may 

very well end up being the case on the Ares. But in case it is not, 

we have had a Tiger Team looking at that for the past four months. 

First of all, we have carefully refined our estimates of those loads 

down to a factor of five or more, lower than originally thought. 


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So the loads themselves are not as great concern as originally 

thought. Second, we have come up with several mitigation methods. In fact, the team that has been working this meets next week 

to provide a set of final recommendations for flight on how we will 

design the thing to deal with those loads. I had a review of that 

just yesterday, a quick review of progress. I am entirely satisfied 

with what they are doing. I don’t see that as an insurmountable 

obstacle to our flying. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Relative to defining requirements and the 

impact on the weight of the vehicles. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We will have the estimate for that next week. 

ORION HEAT SHIELD

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Technology development such as the Orion 

heat shield. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. The Orion heat shield is an interesting matter. Mr. 

Culberson mentioned the Mars Science Lab heat shield. It has been 

a while in this country since we have flown heat shields that were 

significantly challenging beyond the Shuttle materials. So we are 

having to reconstitute the Nation’s technical base for those types 

of heat shields. It does not rise to the category of a problem for 

Orion. It is not a schedule driver. It is not a cost driver. It is not 

a technical driver. But it is a fair statement to say that the Nation, 

as we sit here today, cannot replicate the heat shield used for the 

Apollo spacecraft. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We drifted away from that technology when we 

adopted Shuttle. There was no other market for it, so we have to 

recreate it. But I am not worried about that. 

WIND TUNNEL TESTING

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Their contention that test facilities are inadequate to demonstrate new technologies. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I do not think that is right. We are testing those 

technologies today out of the Ames Research Center in our jet that 

we have out there. We do other tests in wind tunnels. 

Now, we do need to again reconstitute a technical base that was 

allowed to drift away, that once existed in the Nation when it was 

allowed to drift away. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. It drifted or atrophied? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It atrophied. But between the Aeronautics Research 

Mission Directorate and the Exploration Systems Mission Directorate, we are aware of that. We know what we need to do and it 

is in the budget. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And that is reflected, of course, in the confidence factor which you have repeated again. And we will not have 

you mention the percentage. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Absolutely. I am not trying to convey the impression 

to the GAO or anyone else that we do not have technical problems 

to solve. We do. You, this Congress, appropriate money for us to 

do bold new things that involve the overcoming of technical problems. You pay us to do that. We are doing it. It is frustrating sometimes and I think ultimately counterproductive for people to say, 


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well, you have technical problems to solve as if that were new 

news. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You do it every day? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We do it every day. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Everything you do is inherently risky? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. It is what you pay us to do. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. That divisible report, I just wanted to give 

you an opportunity to, shall we say, set the record straight. 

I do not have any problem with your reassurance, but sometimes 

the public record needs to reflect your strong objectives to some of 

the conclusions they have reached. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Do not mind providing you with that opportunity. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. If we did not have technical problems to solve, I 

would not be interested in this job. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am sure. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Culberson. 

CHINESE SPACE PROGRAM

Mr. CULBERSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Dr. Griffin, we talked last year a little bit about the Chinese and 

where they are going with their space program. 

Do you think today, as we sit here today, that it is likely the Chinese will land on the Moon before we do? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I certainly believe that they can if they wish to. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Can you talk to us a little bit about their plans 

and their program and the time table that they have set out to go 

to the Moon. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, China has not exactly laid out for us a blueprint of its space program. What they have announced is that their 

next flight to be conducted in the same timeframe as the Beijing 

Olympics will feature a crew of three. That is a very impressive 

feat for them on their third human space flight. Their third orbital 

flight will feature a crew of three. They have announced the intention to put up a small, I would call it a Salyut class Space Station 

like what Russia did in the late 1970s and early 1980s within their 

next few flights. I have no doubt that they will accomplish those 

goals. They are working on the development on the Long March 

Five which you can look on open sources on, you know, the web 

and find that they project to have a 25 metric ton carrying capacity 

and to be available in 2013. With four Long March Five launches, 

it is entirely possible to construct a scenario by which Chinese astronauts could be placed on the Moon. In my opinion, that could 

be done by late, in the next decade quite easily if they choose to 

do so. I find no fault with what they are doing. In fact, I admire 

their program. The Chinese are building a robust human 

spaceflight program, step by logical step in the very careful and 

very thoughtful way that they do everything else. So we should not 

be surprised by that. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Sure. They could land on the Moon then before 

the end of the next decade. And when under our current schedule 

will Americans return to the Moon? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Under our schedule, in 2019 or 2020. 


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SEA TREATY LAW

Mr. CULBERSON. The law of the Sea Treaty has intrigued me and 

watching the Russians and others try to make claims to some of 

the mineral resources under the Arctic is in my mind, and correct 

me if I am wrong, but there is no law governing those mineral assets under the Arctic and there is no real established law or treaty 

governing who has ownership rights or can exploit the mineral resource, for example, mineral resources on the Moon or on an asteroid that is rich, true? Am I right or wrong about that? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I do not know anything at all about the law of the 

Sea Treaty, sir, or the Antarctic Treaty. I am sorry. We recently 

did, at Congressman Feeney’s request, with benefit of external advisors as well, a study of the status of law and policy regarding 

lunar property rights. 

Mr. CULBERSON. That is where I am driving at. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Okay. So that study has been completed internally. 

It requires review within the White House before it can be released. But when it can be released, it will be provided to you. 

Again, I initiated that study at Mr. Feeney’s request, but certainly it will be available to you as soon as we can make it. 

Mr. CULBERSON. It is an important question that the Chairman 

was driving at that a little earlier, too, is about who has ownership 

rights or the ability to—because obviously the Moon is rich in resources. You got asteroids that are rich in resources. So I look forward to hearing it. 

NEAR EARTH OBJECTS

Let me follow-up, if I could quickly, on the near earth objects and 

the charge from Congress, I think a number of years ago, that 

NASA identify asteroids of a kilometer in length. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Our requirement is to identify, by the end of this 

year, 90 percent of all the near-Earth objects of one kilometer or 

greater in size. 

Mr. CULBERSON. And I know a part of that, because it was in 

some language that we in this Committee adopted year before last, 

Rusty Schweickart came in to see me several years ago. I think he 

was on the Apollo 9 mission and brought it to my attention. And 

it seems to me an important function of what you are doing identifying these objects is to how would you intercept one if you needed 

to nudge it out of the way? 

What has NASA done in terms of trying to identify technologies 

or prepare for a mission if indeed one was spotted? Like, I think 

there was one last year that they thought for a while might have 

a chance of—would make a real close pass. 

And I forget the name of the asteroid, but it is going to make 

a close pass and depending on how close it is in the year 2014, you 

will be able to see it visually from Europe. It will come so close to 

the Earth that I think in broad daylight, you will be able to see 

the thing whiz by. And Rusty showed me the calculations and it 

is going to come very, very close. 

What contingencies has NASA prepared to send the mission out 

to nudge an asteroid out of the way if indeed it looked like it might 

strike the Earth? 


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Dr. GRIFFIN. We’ve prepared no such contingencies. We’re not authorized by the Congress to do that mission. Money has not been 

appropriated for it, and the President has not directed us to do 

that. 

ALPHA MAGNETIC SPECTROMETER

Mr. CULBERSON. OK. Obviously, you don’t have enough money to 

do everything your plate right now. But it’s something I just wanted to get on the record to find out where you were on it. I do think 

it’s important. But we’ve got to make sure you have enough money 

for other requirements as well. 

I’m glad to hear you’re asking private contractors to find ways 

to get cargo to the Space Station. 

If I could also, Mr. Chairman, just briefly ask about the—when 

the Texas delegation met with you a number of months ago, that’s 

a cosmic ray experiment I think. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. The AMS, the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer. 

Mr. CULBERSON. What are you doing to try to find a way to fly 

that? I know it would require—it has to fly on the shuttle in order 

to make it up to the Space Station. And about $1 billion has, I 

think, already been spent to get this thing ready. And commitments were made that it would be flown, I think. I know the University of Texas is heavily involved in it. 

I’m not intimately familiar with it. But it is a very important 

science experiment that the scientific community is very supportive 

of, and is a high priority. Yet I don’t understand. It’s not going to 

be flown? What can be done to make sure that is on the manifest. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Allow me, if I might, to review the status of that 

with you. 

Mr. CULBERSON. OK. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. In last week’s hearing before Senator Nelson we received a direct action to study a particular approach to manifesting 

the AMS by removing some of the spare parts that Mr. Mollohan 

mentioned earlier. 

Mr. CULBERSON. And AMS stands for? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. That is the name of the experiment. We will, of 

course, answer that action. We will also answer the action to determine exactly what it would take to fly the AMS on a separate shuttle mission. So Mr. Gerstenmaier has those actions in work. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. The results are not completed but they will be completed as soon as possible and furnished to the Congress. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Broadly speaking, AMS is a 15,000 pound particle physics experiment. I am not a scientist, or certainly not a 

particle physicist, and I accept that it is a good piece of science to 

do. And I certainly know that in an earlier time commitments were 

made to fly it. 

When we lost Columbia we drastically reduced the number of 

Shuttle flights, limiting them to those that were involved with the 

construction and maintenance of the Space Station until its completion. So a good deal of science has now been left on the ground by 

the reduction in Shuttle flights and the AMS was one of those. It 


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does represent science with a substantial international commitment, as well an interagency commitment to DOE. And I understand that. 

Mr. CULBERSON. About $1 billion has already been spent, is that 

right? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I am not arguing that point. So one of the damaging 

results out of the loss of Shuttle Columbia was leaving this experiment on the ground. 

Mr. CULBERSON. $1 billion experiment. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Now there has been considerable advocacy to fly it. 

So I have said in the strongest possible terms that I do not recommend that the mission be directed to be flown if the consequences of flying that mission would be to remove Station logistics spare parts from the Shuttle manifest. I think that would be 

a poor trade. The Space Station is worth many of tens of billions 

of dollars and I just do not believe that it is wise to place it at risk 

to fly a science mission. I do not have the authority to direct adding 

one more Shuttle mission to the manifest. So I cannot take advantage of that. I do not have the money in the budget anywhere to 

make the changes to the AMS necessary to fly it on an expendable 

vehicle, or the purchase an expendable vehicle, and I do not recommend, as an engineer, making such changes to the experiment. 

They will be very costly and very difficult. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. 

AUTHORITY TO CHANGE MANIFEST

Dr. GRIFFIN. So I do not recommend that. 

Mr. CULBERSON. So the one option is find a way to get it on a 

shuttle flight. And you do have the authority, though, to change 

the manifest of what is flown on the shuttle. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. But in the strongest possible terms I do not recommend, I recommend that you do not direct me to fly, to eliminate Station logistics units in favor of the AMS. I believe you would 

be putting at risk the Space Station in which we have many tens 

of billions of dollars of investment. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Very quickly, just one last follow up. It only 

would require the removal of about 25 percent of one cargo I understand? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. No sir, that is by volume. You would have to remove 

43 percent by weight. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay, so forty-three—— 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Which would be several racks of spare parts that we 

would want to take up. 

Mr. CULBERSON. But you are doing this analysis for Senator Nelson I understand? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We are doing the analysis for Senator Nelson. 

Mr. CULBERSON. We will see that on this Subcommittee as well. 

You will give it to us as well, I hope. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CULBERSON. I would like to ask for it. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for being so indulgent with me. Thank you, sir. 

[The information follows:] 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Mr. Culberson. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Thank you, Dr. Griffin. 

IRAN, NORTH KOREA AND SYRIA NON-PROLIFERATION ACT (INKSNA)

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Dr. Griffin, you need authorizing legislation, do 

you not, to permit you to buy sole use flights from Russia beyond 

2011? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What is the status of that? Are you in conversations with the authorizing committees about that? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We are in conversations within the Administration 

to produce a coordinated request from the Administration for such 

additional exemption going beyond 2011. We have the exemption 

until 2011. I have notified the authorizing committees that, as a 

courtesy if you will, that they should expect such a request, that 

we are working within the Administration to obtain it. That the 

consequences of failure to get that exemption would be that there 

would not be any U.S. crew on the Station after 2012, nor would 

we be able to complete our existing obligations to our international 

partners to fly their crew. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What authorizing committees have jurisdiction? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I believe that the House and Senate Foreign Relations Committees have jurisdiction over this. But of course, I have 

to also notify my authorizing Committees and am doing so. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So the committees that have jurisdiction that 

will move the legislation is Foreign Affairs Committee? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I believe that is right, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And when would be the last date that you would 

have to have this authorization as a matter of practicality in order 

to negotiate with the Russians a deal? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. As a practical matter, let me work backwards. As 

a practical matter, we need to fly in the Spring of 2012 a crew. We 

would have a normal crew flight, logistics flights, in the Spring of 

2012. There is a three-year production sequence, for the Soyuz system. So we would have to have a contract in place, up and running, 

by the Spring of 2009 with the Russians. So as a practical matter, 

by this time next year, in order to have an uninterrupted logistics 

plan, I would have to have a contract in place with the Russians. 

Backing up from that then—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You really need this authorization this year. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. I do, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Does the Administration plan on coming forward 

with the request? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. We have so far nothing but positive indications from 

within the, we have had not negative conversations within the, Administration. It is just a matter of coordinating carefully with all 

of the stakeholders to produce a request that is fully coordinated 

among all the appropriate parties. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You would think the Appropriations Committees 

would have a room either in some office building or in the Capitol 

that we owned that we could control hearings, would you not? 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Well, you too sir are with government, as are we, 

and I think we all know the efficiency of government. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Now what should we do about that? 


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Dr. GRIFFIN. Would you like to come over to NASA and resume 

the hearings? I am certain I can find a room for you. 

CHAIRMAN’S CLOSING REMARKS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. This is a Ways and Means Committee room and 

we are ten minutes past due in turning it over to them. And we 

have a lot of other, I mean, aeronautics questions, you have folks 

here who we have not even spoken to. But we are going to bid you 

all a goodbye and submit a lot of questions for the record. Mr. 

Frelinghuysen cannot be here this afternoon so we very much appreciate your attendance. We appreciate the excellent work you 

and your staff—these guys are smiling—do for us and we look forward to working with you. And if you would be forthcoming in answering our questions that we submit for the record we would appreciate it. Thank you, Dr. Griffin. 

ADMINISTRATOR GRIFFIN’S CLOSING REMARKS

Dr. GRIFFIN. Thank you, sir. We will answer all questions as expeditiously as possible. I would like to say for just a moment that 

I do recognize that there are of course differences between this 

Committee’s views and those of the Administration. I very much 

appreciate your support of us and our plans for the Space Program 

to the extent that you have been able to do that, and very much 

appreciate the collegial working environment that I think we have 

established. Thank you. 

CHAIRMAN’S CLOSING REMARKS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, and we are going to work very hard. 

You see the support on the Committee. It is just scarce, we have 

the same issues at trying to find money that you do. But we are 

going to work very hard to see in some of these areas if we cannot 

get you additional resources. Thank you, Dr. Griffin. Thank all the 

witnesses here today. Thank you to everybody. 

Dr. GRIFFIN. Thank you, Mr. Mollohan. Thank you, Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:42 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 

[Questions and answers submitted for the record follow:] 


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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2008. 

OFFICE OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY POLICY 

WITNESS 

JOHN H. MARBURGER, III, DIRECTOR 

CONGRESSMAN MOLLOHAN OPENING REMARKS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Good morning. I would like to welcome all the 

members, staff and agency witnesses and the public to the Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee’s first hearing of the second session of the 110th Congress. 

There are many fresh faces here on the subcommittee staff, some 

familiar, others new, but I want to welcome them and encourage 

you all to reach out to them. 

This year, like the last, will be another busy year with a fastpaced hearing schedule, but this time it will be wedged into an 

election year. We surely have our work cut out for us, but I hope 

and expect this year to be exciting and productive. I am certain, 

given my past experience in working with the ranking minority 

member of the subcommittee, Mr. Frelinghuysen, that it will be a 

cooperative one. 

Before we proceed with this morning’s hearing, I want to reiterate this subcommittee’s procedures. 

For purposes of asking questions, I will recognize members arriving prior to the beginning of the hearing in the order of seniority. 

And then, for those arriving after the start of the hearing, I will 

recognize them on a first-come, first-served basis. 

All members will have 5 minutes of questioning during the first 

round, 10 minutes in the subsequent rounds. And in order to ensure that all members get to ask questions—Rodney, you and I will 

abide by this, and then we will inform people as they come in—that 

they respect the time restrictions. 

I ask, Doctor, that you keep your oral remarks to 10 minutes or 

so. And we won’t be as restrictive with you, as your prepared statement, as you know, will be made a part of the record. 

This year’s first witness before the subcommittee is Dr. John 

Marburger, III, the director of the Office of Science and Technology 

Policy for the executive branch of the President. Dr. Marburger 

serves as the senior advisor to President Bush and also co-chairs 

the President’s Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology 

and supports the President’s National Science and Technology 

Council. 

We are here today to more fully understand the President’s proposals for Federal research and development across our Government, with particular interest in NIST, NSF and NASA. Our Nation’s investments in science and technology; our place in the world 


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and how it is threatened; and how we, as a Nation, must respond 

to the narrowing gap. Collectively and cooperatively, we must ensure that limited Federal resources are optimally invested to sustain U.S. leadership in science and technology. 

Dr. Marburger, I would like to welcome you to the hearing today. 

Thank you for your good service to the President, to the administration and to the Nation. We are really pleased to see you here 

this year, and we are sorry that you weren’t able to be with us last 

year, which we understand, but we are really glad to see you here 

this year, for all the obvious reasons. 

And before turning to you, Doctor, I would like to recognize the 

ranking member of this subcommittee, Mr. Frelinghuysen, for any 

opening comments that he may wish to make. 

CONGRESSMAN FRELINGHUYSEN OPENING REMARKS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I look forward 

to working with you, as we go through the hearing process here, 

and having the active involvement of all members of the committee. 

I am pleased to join Chairman Mollohan this morning and welcome you, Dr. Marburger, to testify on the Nation’s science and 

technology policies and priorities, as well as the appropriations request for the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Executive Office of the President. 

First, let me congratulate you and the administration. You are 

again representing a very strong budget request for basic scientific 

research under the American Competitiveness Initiative, particularly for the National Science Foundation and for the National Institute of Standards and Technology under this subcommittee’s jurisdiction. 

This request for NSF is an increase of 13.6 percent, and the request for NIST core research is 21.5 percent. When you consider 

the overall non-security discretionary budget is under 1 percent, it 

is clear that science is at the very top of the administration’s budget priorities. 

Congress has endorsed in this committee large increases for 

science budgets in both the America COMPETES Act and in the 

appropriations bills for the last 2 years. So I think you will continue to find broad bipartisan support for the increases you are 

proposing. 

However, like other committees, this one operates in a climate of 

limited resources. At the same time the administration hands us 

this outstanding science request, we have other areas, including 

State and local law enforcement, all of which are popular and necessary, where deep and unsustainable cuts are proposed. All of it 

comes from the same allocation. The Chairman and the subcommittee have had a historically very difficult task in balancing 

these priorities, and this year will be no exception. 

You are here to testify in support of your own OSTP budget request, for which you are proposing a modest 2 percent increase. I 

and all of us look forward to your testimony, and we will have specific questions later on. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you, Dr. Marburger, for being with us this morning. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Dr. Marburger. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Well, thank you, Chairman Mollohan and 

Ranking Member Frelinghuysen and members of the subcommittee 

as they appear. I am very pleased to appear before you once again 

after a gap of a year to present the President’s fiscal year 2009 research and development budget. 

My written testimony has more detail about the overall budget, 

and I know you have considerable detail about the agencies that 

we will talk about, so I will make my oral remarks brief, and I will 

answer questions to the extent I can. And if I can’t do it here, I 

will do it in writing. And I want to make sure that we are all clear 

about this budget. 

First, I want to thank this subcommittee for its support of the 

President’s American Competitive Initiative through the initial 

House passage of the fiscal year 2008 Commerce Justice, Science 

and Related Agencies Appropriations Act. Unfortunately, the provisions of that act were not ultimately included in the 2008 omnibus 

funding bill. But the President remains committed to the ACI and 

is once again requesting funds to ensure America’s future economic 

competitiveness. 

The ACI and the ACA, the America COMPETES Act of 2007 that 

the President signed last summer, do respond to recommendations 

from a wide range of scientists, business and educational leaders 

and they’re many organizations who believe Federal actions are 

needed to ensure America’s future leadership in science and engineering—fields that are essential to the processes of innovation 

that lead to long-term economic competitiveness. And I look forward to working with this subcommittee to address the important 

goals of these initiatives. 

While the President’s fiscal year 2009 budget substantially funds authorizations under the COMPETES Act, of the $13.8 billion authorized in fiscal year 2009 in the act, the President’s budget funds 

$12.2 billion, or 85 percent, which, in total, compares favorably 

with the 82 percent level at which Congress funded the act last 

year in the omnibus bill. 

If the President’s request is funded, the COMPETES Act budgets 

would grow by almost 15 percent. To place this in context, as Ranking Member Frelinghuysen has noted in his opening remarks, the 

President’s overall request for all non-defense R&D increases by 6 

percent, compared with the remainder of the non-security discretionary budget which increases by less than 1 percent. 

In constant dollars, growth and outlays in non-defense R&D have 

increased by nearly a third under this administration. Total Federal R&D in the 2009 budget stands at $147 billion, an increase 

of $4 billion over last year’s appropriated amount, which represents 

$1 out of every $7 requested by the President in the discretionary 

budget, a growth of 61 percent during this administration. So it is 

just an extraordinary record for the R&D budget of this Nation. 

My written testimony summarizes the President’s request for 

several key research programs that cut across agencies and gives 

somewhat more detail for the agencies under the jurisdiction of this 

subcommittee. 

Overall, the President is requesting an increase of $850 million 

in the basic research category, for a total of $29.3 billion in basic 


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research, which includes a 15 percent increase of $1.6 billion for 

the three agencies that are prioritized in the American Competitiveness Initiative: the National Science Foundation, the Department of Energy’s Office of Science, and the laboratories of the National Institute of Standards and Technology. 

Basic research at the Department of Defense, which is another important priority for us, would grow by 19 percent, or $270 million, over the fiscal year 2008 request. 

The budget provides for key multi-agency science programs, in- cluding more than $2 billion for climate science, a 12 percent increase over the 2008 enacted, and an increase of about 9 percent 

for the entire range of climate-related activities, including science, 

technology, international assistance, and tax incentives. The total 

climate package in this budget is nearly $9 billion when everything 

is taken into account. 

The budget includes increased funding for a number of Earth ob- servation programs: $74 million for NOAA for certain climate sensors that had been demanifested from the National Polar-Orbiting 

Operational Environmental Satellite System, otherwise known as 

NPOESS; there is $103 million for NASA to begin a series of Earth 

observing missions recommended by the National Research Council’s Earth Sciences Decadal Survey; and $102 million for ocean 

science and research at NOAA, NSF and the U.S. Geological Survey in Interior. 

Information technology is another major cross-cutting Federal 

program. The Networking and Information Technology R&D program—we call it NITRD—would receive $3.5 billion in this administration. That amount has doubled. 

Another cross-cutting program, the National Nanotechnology Ini- tiative, would receive more than $1.5 billion—on an international 

scale, one of the major contributors to this area of research. 

At the agency level, National Science Foundation budget would increase by 14 percent to $6.8 billion, $822 million above the 2008 

appropriation. The NSF physical sciences directorates, a priority 

for this administration, would increase about 20 percent. 

The NIST core research and facilities budgets would receive $634 

million in 2009, an increase of 22 percent over the 2008 omnibus 

provisions for these crucially important parts of the NIST portfolio. 

That includes increases of nearly $114 million for new initiatives 

at NIST in high-leverage areas such as nanotechnology manufacturing, expansion of NIST neutron facility for material studies, and 

improved understanding of complex biological systems to accelerate 

innovations and enable investment in the biosciences. 

I have already mentioned new Earth observing programs at 

NASA. The NASA budget would increase by 3 percent over fiscal 

year 2008 to $17.6 billion. And, once again, this is a complex budget. I would be glad to discuss it further in response to your questions about NASA. But I do want to emphasize in my oral remarks 

that it is important to maintain NASA budget appropriations in 

order to avoid costly schedule delays in their large and multiple 

missions. 

For NOAA, the 2009 budget provides $383 million for oceanic 

and atmospheric research and again requests $20 million for ocean 

science and research as part of a $40 million interagency effort to 


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implement the Ocean Research Priorities Plan, which is part of the 

President’s U.S. Ocean Action Plan. 

Finally, my own office, Office of Science and Technology Policy— 

which, by the way, sustained a 6 percent reduction in fiscal year 

2008 in the omnibus—is requesting $119,000 above the fiscal year 

2008 appropriation but $215,000 below the fiscal year 2008 request 

on a budget of $5.3 million. This fiscal year takes us through the 

end of the current administration and the beginning of the next, 

and I believe the increased funding is important for this transition. 

And I am also requesting that the Science and Technology Policy 

Institute—we call it STPI—continue to be funded within the NSF 

budget. I would be glad to explain why this is important. 

So I thank you for this opportunity to highlight the President’s 

2009 budget proposal for science. I think it is a strong proposal, 

and I urge your support of it. And I would be glad to provide more 

detail. I know we will discuss these issues in the question-and-answer session. 

I am happy to be here once again. Thank you for the opportunity 

to appear. 

[The written statement of Dr. John Marburger, III, Director, Office of Science and Technology Policy follows:] 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Dr. Marburger. 

BUDGET PREPARATION

Dr. Marburger, you serve as the science advisor to the President 

and as the director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy. 

In those roles, you provide counsel to the President and to his executive offices on the impact of science. You coordinate science among 

the agencies and the interagency effort to develop sound, balanced 

budgets in research and technology. 

Describe for the committee, how you discharge those responsibilities, and particularly as they relate to the development of the annual budget estimates that the President sends to the Congress. 

What is the interaction with the agencies and with OMB? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Congressman, the process begins early in the 

year with requests to the chief scientists in the various agencies for 

recommendations for priorities for the subsequent year. And it continues with a priorities memo that I sign jointly with the Director 

of OMB, which outlines the priorities that will be paid attention to 

in the budget process for the ensuing fiscal year. 

And the agencies prepare their budget proposals, which are submitted to OMB, during the early and mid parts of each year. And 

as those budget proposals come in from each agency, my office 

works with OMB to review the proposals that the agencies are 

making, see to it that they do reflect the plans that have been 

worked out jointly among the agencies on who will do what and 

what the priorities are. And then, subsequently, we participate in 

the presentations that the budget examiners make to the budget 

director and advise on priorities in that forum. 

The ultimate choices about the actual amounts that the President will request are made, of course, by the President in consultation with the budget director and his Cabinet officers. And our primary role in that is simply to advise on the quality of the proposals 

and their relevance to the priorities that have been established. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you review those budgets before they are 

sent to OMB? 

Mr. MARBURGER. We do not review them before they are sent to 

OMB, no. We see them at about the same time that the OMB staff 

does. The OMB staff receives them and shares them with us. Sometimes the agencies share the budgets with us. But it is—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Before they go to OMB? 

Mr. MARBURGER. No, at the same time. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You receive the budget requests from the agencies under your jurisdiction at the same time they are sent to 

OMB? 

Mr. MARBURGER. That is correct. And I think we probably both 

receive them at pretty much the time that they are completed and 

ready to submit. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Excuse me for interrupting. Do you recommend 

to the agencies, while they are working up their budgets? Do you 

give direction to them in any way? Is there any interaction? 

Mr. MARBURGER. We do continually interact with the agencies, 

some more than others. The agencies that we interact with tend to 

be the ones that have larger science budgets and that have budgets 

that cross agency boundaries. 


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For example, we would probably give considerably less direction, 

if you wish—it is not so much direction as advice and working with 

them on their priorities—we probably give less to agencies like the 

National Institutes of Health, which more or less owns biomedical 

research, and on issues that are totally within an agency’s purview. 

Energy research is another example. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, at what point in the process are the administration’s priorities imported to the agencies, so that when 

agencies come forward to you and OMB at the same time they reflect the administration’s priorities? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I would say the strongest feedback on administration priorities comes within the context of the budget preparation. Although, we do let the agencies know the general priorities 

in that priorities memo that we produce about in mid-year or 

spring of each year. 

But the most direct feedback does come in the budget process, 

where the agencies are negotiating with the Office of Management 

and Budget regarding the amounts and what they will be spent on, 

because those agreements will be reflected in the document that 

you receive from the President. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Right. But in that process, it seems logical that 

you would be inputting at some point, if not at a budget level, at 

a policy level, what you want these agencies to concentrate on. For 

example, ‘‘We want you to fund MEP,’’ or, ‘‘We consider TIP—’’ or 

something else that is to be a priority or to highlight something 

that is in the COMPETES Act. 

In other words, how does that policy interaction occur? 

Mr. MARBURGER. We actually work with the agencies all year, 

during the course of the year. We convene them in interagency 

working groups to develop strategic plans and so forth. 

And, you know, unlike other areas of Federal operations, science, 

particularly the research part of the R&D budget, is something 

that comes from the scientists. We don’t attempt to dictate what 

the best course of action is in a research program. We tend to follow the recommendations from the agencies, from their advisory 

groups, and particularly from the National Academies of Sciences, 

and from the reports that are prepared by the President’s Council 

of Advisors on Science and Technology. And we try to assimilate 

that material and find out what the science community and the 

people who rely on the science community for their technologies, 

what they want and what they think is most important. And so, 

it is not exactly a top-down process. 

There are some raw principles that the administration espouses. 

The administration does believe that basic research is the most important research activity for the Federal Government to fund, and 

applied, shorter-term, lower-risk research is the proper province 

of—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you carry out that priority in this interaction 

that occurs during the year? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you give direction to the agencies? 

Mr. MARBURGER. We let agencies know that that is what the priority is. But most of them seem to sense that without us telling 

them. 


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RESEARCH GOALS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. When you came to the job, did you have any personal goals about where the country should go with regard to basic 

or applied research? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes, I did. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What were those? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Well, my personal goals were to achieve a good, 

balanced portfolio for the Nation. I did believe, coming into this job, 

that basic research was a very important driver for the country, 

that it’s not very well understood by the public and what its role 

is, but that it needed to be sustained and supported in a variety 

of areas in order to feed everything else. 

I do believe that technology draws upon the physical, biological 

phenomena, the natural phenomena that research investigates and 

clarifies, and that we have a, sort of, hierarchy of activities that 

have to be carried out, extending from basic research, primarily 

supported by the Federal Government, through applied research 

and development and on to industrial research and applications 

and innovation. 

And I came into the job with kind of a vision, a picture, of how 

that should work. And that picture is formed by being a scientist 

myself, being the director of a national laboratory, president of a 

research university. I saw it work. And I read the literature, I read 

the reporters of the National Academies, which I highly respect, 

and experienced imbalances in the budget that I thought were 

hampering our ability to compete internationally. 

I came to the job believing that it was important to increase 

funding for basic research in the physical sciences, in certain key 

areas. And I still believe that that is an urgent necessity for the 

country. 

And, otherwise, my intention was to try to make science work for 

the Nation. And I still believe that science is an important tool for 

us that we need to use in this globalization of our economy and 

world competitiveness. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. If you are comfortable, would you share with the 

Committee what you think we, as a country, are doing right and 

where we might not be doing as well, as reflected in the President’s 

budget or in whatever terms. This is just an opportunity for you 

to address what we can do better. If you don’t feel comfortable answering—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. I understand. No, I do feel comfortable with 

that, because I think we are very lucky in America. We do have 

huge investment in science. We really are doing very well. We are 

the envy of other nations, all of whom are trying to copy our models, and that puts a great deal of pressure on us to get it right. 

I think that we do have a need to have steady, more or less reliable funding. I think, speaking as someone who has managed research as a high level for much of my life, it is almost more important to have stability and predictability in Federal funding in research and programs than it is to have a lot of money. Although, 

a lot of money is desirable. 


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So I think we do a lot right. We do have substantial Federal programs. We do listen to the science community. The agencies do a 

good job of that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The important word I had in my question was 

‘‘specifically’’—‘‘specificity.’’ Because, at the end of the day, we have 

to end up putting dollars on accounts. Can you talk about it in 

those terms? 

INVESTMENTS IN SCIENCE PROGRAMS

Mr. MARBURGER. Well, I will tell you one very specific thing: I 

think the NIST research budget is the most underfunded budget, 

if not in the world, at least in the country. NIST is a hugely productive and high-leverage operation. And I am speaking particularly of the research that they do into basic physical phenomena 

that underlie most of our products, including biomedical products, 

software, hardware, just about anything that you can name. NIST 

is a focused, well-managed agency that ought to be about four 

times bigger than it is, in my humble opinion. And, although it is 

a small agency, that is why it features in the President’s American 

Competitive Initiative, and that priority has been embraced in the 

America COMPETES Act and by others. 

So I would start with NIST. If I had to put my money where my 

mouth is, I would start with NIST, their basic research budget. 

They have had three Nobel prizes in the last decade, and they 

know what to do. And I would be very proud of that. I have never 

worked for NIST. I don’t have any stake in it, other than I think 

it is important. 

Second would be the infrastructure for science, the big facilities 

that are operated by a number of agencies, including NSF and Department of Energy, both in NNSA and the Office of Science. And 

NIST operates a research reactor. The Department of Defense operates some important facilities. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. NIST operates a research—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes, NIST operates probably the most sophisticated research reactor in the United States. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I didn’t mean to interrupt you. 

Mr. MARBURGER. And that is used for material studies, improvement of various materials such as fuel cell membranes and things 

like that. 

So, similar facilities in other agencies that provide platforms for 

thousands, tens of thousands, of users in industry and universities, 

we need to make sure those platforms are there and available. 

And that is one of the reasons why the Department of Energy’s 

Office of Science was featured as a priority, because it operates, for 

example, the X-ray synchrotron facilities that are used to unravel 

the structure of biomedical molecules. All of these nice pictures 

that you see on the covers of magazines that show intricate molecules, they look like tangles of yarn—those structures are determined on the Department of Energy’s Office of Science’s machines. 

The Spallation Neutron Source has just been completed in Oak 

Ridge. That is another example of an infrastructure platform 

that—we need to sustain these. Other countries have discovered 

that they are important for their future economic competitiveness. 


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They are building them at a great rate, and we need to make sure 

that we catch up on those. 

And then the important university-based research that is traditionally funded by the National Science Foundation, NIH. The Department of Defense is a very important funder of basic research 

and engineering. That needs to be sustained. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. But quantify that for us a little bit. I mean, give 

us an idea of how you think we are doing with that. 

Mr. MARBURGER. In these areas, there is an imbalance, in my 

opinion, between our relatively healthy funding for biomedical research and the other areas of research. Particularly in certain 

areas of the physical sciences, there has been an imbalance in 

funding. 

Now, I don’t mean to suggest that NIH is getting too much 

money. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. No. 

Mr. MARBURGER. They also need to have stability and predictability in their budgets. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Right. 

Mr. MARBURGER. But we have an imbalance here. 

Even the biomedical sciences depend on the physical science infrastructure and continued research in these areas. And so one of 

the things that the COMPETES Act, as well as the ACI, does is 

try to prioritize a little bit and, during the next some portion of a 

decade, try to redress that imbalance. 

It is hard for me to say just how much money is required, because it is more important for us to get the balance right. We invest, as a Nation, much more money than anybody else in the 

world does, including the European Union and Asia and so forth. 

They are catching up. They will be investing comparable amounts, 

and already in some areas they are. But I am not so much worried 

about the absolute amount of money that we have; it is how it is 

distributed and how we manage it. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. 

I have terribly overstepped my time and apologize to Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, thank you, Chairman. I hope you will 

let me violate your rule. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I will. I will. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Let me again—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. It is really good testimony. 

COMPETITIVENESS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. It is excellent. No, I think this whole issue 

of imbalance is important. 

And, quite honestly, we respect what you call your humble opinion. You are at the top of the heap, in terms of the leadership hierarchy. You are the President’s science advisor. So you don’t need 

to be humble about your opinion. That is why you’re here. And we 

thank you for a very long and distinguished career. 

We became first acquainted when I visited all the Department of 

Energy labs, and you greeted me out in Brookhaven. And I think 

I have visited just about every one. And they are somewhat, at 

times, crying the blues in terms of their basic research. 


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But, by definition, you are, sort of, the chief cheerleader for the 

American Competitiveness Initiative. I mean, it is you, perhaps the 

National Science Board and a lot of other groups with many different acronyms that, sort of, have oversight here. 

And we talked about it indirectly, you know, pointing to the National Institutes of Health, it has almost been like a favored nation, 

NIH. We don’t take anything away from them. But both Republicans and Democrats have been able to say, over the last couple 

of years, that we doubled NIH funding and we took pride in that. 

We are talking, in some ways, the same language relative to this 

administration’s investments in science, although we have fallen 

pretty short of the mark for reasons I have mentioned and you 

have mentioned. It is more than dollars. How do you judge what 

are really concrete and specific results? 

And then I want to get into the issue here, too, and if we have— 

how do we measure what we anticipate from these programs, the 

imbalance issue? And then where we stand, let’s say, next to People’s Republic of China; growing capacity and activity in parts of 

India. I mean, when we talk about competitiveness, there may be 

some internal, domestic competitiveness. It is more than just competing with Europe. 

How would you characterize where we are relative to—you know, 

dollars are one thing, but how we actually measure competitiveness? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Well, I will try not to take too long in my answers. Those are big questions. 

This administration is very interested in the process of measurement and assessment and understanding what works and what 

doesn’t so you can invest wisely. And from the earliest days of my 

tenure in this position, my office has worked with OMB to craft 

some ways of making sure that science programs—which are notoriously difficult to assess, because usually they have long-term benefits, and you can’t just wait for many years to find out how something works. But, together, we have crafted assessment tools and 

the process of measuring and evaluating science programs and 

agencies. 

And each year in our budget request, the science chapter does include a section on how we do this. If you go to the President’s budget proposal for this current year, you will see in there a description 

of the evaluation process. 

Economists have studied the impact of basic research on competitiveness and economic growth over the years and give some overall 

figures on how we are doing. And they always indicate that there 

is a very high rate of return on Federal investments in research. 

As to how we are doing with competing with other countries, we 

still are leading. We are still very competitive, according to national polls and surveys, particularly according to the OECD data. 

We continue to be a leader in competitiveness. And I think that the 

openness of our society and the encouragement of entrepreneurial 

behavior are real assets that will sustain us in the future. 

But other nations, the rest of the world, are investing heavily in 

infrastructure that is pretty clearly designed to feed their innovative capacity. Certainly, Europe is getting its act together. It is beginning to fund basic research on a Europe-wide basis that uses 


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American models, peer review and planning and deliberate investments of their money. Asia also is making focused investments in 

areas of science, particularly physical sciences, where they expect 

to be able to innovate in the future and compete with us in areas 

like information technology. 

CHINESE ECONOMY

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. As you are aware, the Chinese economy has 

been growing at, like, 10 or 12 percent each year. I assume that 

productivity is fueled by their scientific research and innovation. 

Are we measuring that? Look where we are. 

Mr. MARBURGER. It is not clear to what extent innovation and 

science-based programs are responsible for the great rate of growth 

of the Chinese economy, but certainly they expect it to be important in the future and they are investing heavily in it. They still 

have a long way to go, and it is not clear just how their approach 

to planning their economy will work out in the long run. 

The U.S. has to have confidence that we have the right approach, 

and not lose faith in the ability of the basic research and technology development that we do so well. 

MATH AND SCIENCE EDUCATION

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. There are many spokes on the wheel here, 

and I just want to concentrate on one for a minute, relative to 

math and science education. The work of the National Mathematics 

Advisory Panel, established by the President by Executive order in 

April of 2006. It was created to advise the President and the Department of Education on the conduct, evaluation and effective use 

of the results of high-quality research pertaining to the effective 

teaching of and learning of mathematics. 

The group has met 11 times, reviewed over 16,000 studies and 

scientific documents, received public comments. Its recommendations are, I think, to be issued momentarily. Would you like to give 

us a little bit of a preview, from what you know? 

I mean, you know, one of the things I tell my constituents—and 

they get quite irritated, especially when I visit schools—they only 

go to school for 180 days a year. I am not sure what their Japanese 

and Chinese equivalents do. 

But, you know, what would be some of the findings that you 

would suspect that they would be recommending? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I can’t speak specifically to the findings in that 

report. I do know that it is modeled on the highly successful similar panel for reading. And controversies over best practices in how 

to teach reading were actually settled through the efforts of that 

panel, and I expect that similar controversies over the teaching of 

mathematics will be settled in connection with the report of the 

National Math Panel. That appears to be a successful operation. 

I have a lot of opinions myself, having talked mathematical topics, mathematical physics in my day. And I do believe that it is important for us to pay attention to how math is taught, from 

kindergarden all the way up through college, and that some of the 

programs that are authorized and have been funded in connection 

with mathematics and science education will certainly take us closer to ideals. 


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GATHERING STORM

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. When I see you here, I think of Norman 

Augustine, Rising Above the Gathering Storm. And, you know, I 

hate the whole notion—I think all of us do—of recommendations 

sitting on the shelf somewhere. But one of those recommendations, 

obviously, is to take a look at what we are doing in a variety of 

areas. 

Mr. MARBURGER. There are some successes. It is hard to identify 

exactly what the reasons are. Everyone is concerned about the 

teaching of mathematics. We need more math teachers. We need 

more math teachers who are qualified in mathematics and not just 

doing it grudgingly as an assignment because the schools couldn’t 

find somebody else to do it. And one of the objectives of the American Competitiveness Initiative is, in fact, to increase the number 

of qualified teachers in these subjects. 

But my understanding is that test scores in some grade levels 

have gone up over the past 5 years and that, although the results 

are sometimes difficult to interpret, the U.S. is making some 

progress in how—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Would you say—I don’t want to take words 

out of context—the imbalances of which the Chairman—you were 

reacting to—it is not only financial, you know, the imbalances. It 

could be that we are, you know, maybe doing—we should be doing 

some other things. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. These education issues are multi-dimensional. And they depend on having good teachers. They depend on 

having parents that are aware of the opportunities for their children and doors that might be closed by not taking certain subjects. 

They are affected by the system of rewards that society offers for 

teaching positions. They are affected by the ability of local governments to fund adequate facilities for schools. There are so many 

different things. 

I think we have to address these both with broad measures like 

No Child Left Behind, accountability approaches, and also with 

sharper measures like giving teachers tools, such as the national 

math advisory and reading panels would give. And all of these 

things have to be done at once. It is not clear which one of them 

is going to have the greatest effect. But, from my perspective, I am 

the science advisor, I am interested in using good information. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You want things to move ahead. 

Mr. MARBURGER. I want things to move ahead. 

INTERNATIONAL COMPARISON

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Simultaneously. And, obviously, there are 

some areas there where we have shown some weakness compared 

perhaps to our international competitors. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. The international comparison tests show 

Americans not anywhere near the front of the pack. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. It is discouraging, deplorable, so much so 

that sometimes people don’t want to talk about it. But you are in 

a critical position, and we are counting on your humble opinion. We 

value that opinion. 


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Mr. MARBURGER. My humble opinion is that this is an important 

thing for us to do and that we need to continue to invest in the 

kinds of—— 

OMB

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And the last comment here is, we have our 

own view of the Office of Management and Budget; it doesn’t matter which administration it is. We want you to press on. And, you 

know, this committee believes that basic research in science and 

science education is important. We don’t want you to bend too 

much. 

Mr. MARBURGER. I am grateful for your support. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MARBURGER. It helps. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Dutch Ruppersberger joins us this morning. He has a busier 

hearing schedule than anybody I know in Congress. And he told me 

a couple of weeks ago that he wasn’t going to be here for a couple 

of months, because he was having a very serious operation. So I am 

shocked to see him here this morning in one way, but I am not 

shocked on the other, because, as busy as he is, he is more faithful 

than anybody in attending the hearings. 

Dutch, it is great to see you. And I am glad you are—— 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. I hope, recovering. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. I had spinal fusion. Thank goodness for the 

research and discovery, so they are able to fix your backs when you 

get to be a little bit older. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yeah, well, there you go. Welcome. 

RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Thank you. 

Well, first, thank you for your testimony. What we do in research 

and development is so important to our country. 

One of my first questions is this: it is my understanding that we 

in the United States spend more money for research and development than probably all the other G–7 countries combined. Is that 

correct? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I believe that is correct. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Do you know how we relate in the amount 

we spend in research and development compared to China and 

Russia? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I can’t give you those numbers off the top of my 

head, but we spend substantially more overall in science R&D, both 

in the research part and in the development part, than China does. 

SATELLITES

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. The Chairman talked about my schedule. 

We all have heavy schedules. I am also on the Intelligence Committee, and I chair the Research and Development Subcommittee. 

And we are now focusing on our satellites. We have had a lot of 

failures in our satellite industry. Years ago, when Sputnik was 


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launched from Russia, we responded, as Americans, by within 12 

years of putting a man on the moon. And one of the main reasons 

that we are the most powerful country in the world is because we 

do control the skies. And we must maintain that advantage. And, 

as you know, China and Russia are getting very close to us in that 

regard. 

We have brought in all of the major contractors, and we are 

working a tabletop exercise and looking at our space industry with 

the DNI, Director of National Intelligence. And one of the things 

that has developed is that we are doing a lot of our research and 

development with our operations. In other words, we put out contracts to major contractors, and once they have these—I am not 

going to give you the costs, but they are very expensive contracts 

to build our aerospace industry—contracts they are doing the research and development as they are building the satellites, which 

I think is very dangerous. 

Because when you start the actual manufacturing of the satellites, there should not be any room for error. And there have been 

numerous errors. The research and development must take place 

before you actually put the contract out for the operation. 

Do you have any opinion on that position? 

And I know that you do not do defense; you are non-defense. But 

it is still very relevant to a lot of the areas that you work in, as 

far as research and development. 

In other words, my question: doing the research and development, having the failures, doing what you need to do before we actually get to the manufacturing mode? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes, sir. Well, in fact, we do have a great interest in the defense research budget. And I agree with the analysis 

that you just suggested about the need for the research and development to be done before large amounts of money are spend on 

production or even pilots. 

This is one of the reasons why we—in the materials associated 

with the President’s American Competitiveness Initiative, although 

we didn’t target the Department of Defense science budget for doubling over 10 years, we did indicate that it was important for them 

to increase their basic science research. That is one of the reasons 

that, in this year’s budget request, the President is asking for a 19 

percent increase in basic research in the Department of Defense. 

One of the things that the Department of Defense needs to do is 

develop their in-house basic research capability, so that they can 

clear away some of the questions that are needed to resolve issues 

across the board in many more-advanced development projects. 

And I believe that they are headed in that direction. 

Certainly the research capacity of the Department of Defense is 

important for maintaining the ability to evaluate contracts or readiness of programs to move forward. And I believe that it is important for them to sustain that ability. 

DARPA

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. How did you see DARPA, with the role that 

they play? Which I believe, personally, is a very positive role, is 

their research and development. 


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Mr. MARBURGER. DARPA is an excellent organization. They have 

a great history, and I believe that the current leadership of that 

organization is attempting to follow that history, of taking risks, 

funding early-stage research and development of concepts that may 

eventually pay off—— 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Are you familiar with IARPA? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I am. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. And IARPA is really DARPA, only in the 

intelligence community. I think there is a strong belief that, because of the competition not only in the area of terrorism but Russia and China and our overhead architecture, that the intelligence 

committee needs a DARPA. And DARPA has just been stood up 

last year. Do you have an opinion on IARPA? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Well, you know, these are all—— 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Research and development, out of the box. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Right. Well, in my mind, it is more the nature 

of the research that is funded and the quality of the management 

of it. The structural niceties, like having a DARPA separate from 

the service organizations or having a central research organization 

that isn’t committed to any particular one of the services, those are 

good ideas that could be captured in other kinds of management 

arrangements. 

DARPA was created, was successful and is used as a model in 

other agencies. But I believe that research programs, such as those 

in National Science Foundation or NASA or elsewhere, can be successful without that specific type of organization. 

So when it comes to evaluating a DARPA or IARPA, it really 

boils down to the leadership and the management, the people you 

have in place, the traditions that they have established to manage 

their research. 

So I think it is too early to assess the success of IARPA. But it 

is there, and it is an idea that is modeled on other successes. And 

we have to wait to see how it does. 

ITAR

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Let me ask you, are you familiar with the 

International Traffic in Arms—ITAR it is called? 

Mr. MARBURGER. As much as I can be, with such a complex 

issue. I am not an expert. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Basically I think, just to bring it down, that 

ITAR limits the sales of high-tech items to foreign countries. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. That is the purpose of ITAR. 

And another thing that we have seen and has been developing 

is that ITAR efforts seem not to be working in other countries. In 

other words, we are doing this to protect our sale of all of our hightech so that other countries wouldn’t take our high-tech, and yet 

it seems now that, especially in Europe but in other places too, that 

a lot of the European contractors are offering ITAR-type free satellite development. And it has been said, again, getting back into 

the satellite area, that in the commercial area especially, that the 

United States is almost 10 years behind Europe in the development 

of what needs to be done from commercial satellites. 


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So I am asking you, it seems on its face to be pro-American not 

to give away our high-tech, and yet other countries now, most of 

the European countries, are now taking their research and development, and they are using it, and it is now putting us in a position 

that could hurt us. Do you see that? Do you hear that? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes, I am aware of those analyses. I am concerned about the impact of ITAR on the ability of American firms 

and research organizations, including universities, to do work to 

advance the interests of our national security. So I think it is very 

important for us to watch ITAR and to evaluate it continually and 

update it and make it more effective. 

I think it is in our national interest to have a program, something like ITAR, to make sure that we don’t inadvertently give our 

potential adversaries, whether they are economic or military, advantage by using our own assets against us. So there is a need for 

a program, but it has to be done very carefully to avoid the kind 

of undesirable side effects that you refer to. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. It seems like we have the technology today 

to protect our high-tech. That is what the intelligence community 

is about, the classifications and people that have clearances. 

But what would you recommend, to try to look at some of the 

complaints that we are receiving now about how ITAR is now putting us, the United States, and our major contractors at a disadvantage compared to a lot of the European countries and also 

China? 

Mr. MARBURGER. It requires a review. As I recall that, I have to 

be careful answering this question because my memory is failing 

me about recent administrative actions on this. But we are concerned, and I am not the only one who is concerned about these 

impacts, and the administration has activities ongoing to evaluate 

and review ITAR. The Commerce Department has been quite involved in these efforts and is interested in doing it right. 

So we do participate with this. My office convenes interagency 

discussions about what should be done, and I might say something 

that is incorrect if I just—— 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. If you come to some conclusions on how you 

think you could make it better, if you could have your staff contact 

my office or contact this committee and get that information. 

Mr. MARBURGER. What I would do is tell you what is going on 

right now, and that would be our response to that. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Mr. Chairman, I have one quick question. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Sure. 

JAMES WEBB SPACE TELESCOPE

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. As you know, NASA is funding the James 

Webb Space Telescope, and it is very important, I think, to our 

country. And it is the at-large infrared optimized space telescope 

scheduled to launch 2013. And I notice you did not mention it in 

your statement or for the record. Is this considered an R&D activity? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. The Webb telescope is considered an R&D 

activity. It is a very important telescope, it has received high 

marks in all the reviews done by the National Academies and other 


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advisory bodies. And although it has had cost overruns and schedule slips, there remains a commitment to it to get this done. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Thank you for your testimony. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. 

BUDGET REQUEST FOR MEP AND TIP

Doctor, you indicated earlier the importance of NIST funding. 

Within NIST, there are two programs that were authorized in the 

COMPETES program: MEP, the Manufacturing Extension Program and the TIP program, the ATP follow-on. The administration’s budget zeroes out those two programs. And based upon your 

thoughts expressed earlier, perhaps that was just a prioritization 

of funding and not a reflection by the administration necessarily or 

you particularly that those two programs weren’t valuable, but 

other programs in this were valuable. 

I want to give you an opportunity to talk about MEP and TIP 

and their importance, and why the administration chose to zero 

those programs out, because they have a lot of support here on the 

Hill, and so you are up against that. I suspect you are not looking 

at it in terms of being up against those programs or against those 

programs. My sense is there is just a funding and allocation issue 

here. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. The short answer is it is a prioritization 

issue. I will say that I feel very strongly that the basic research 

part of NIST, their core operations are the most important things, 

and that they are underfunded. I want to be clear about that. The 

what I would call, ‘‘technology transfer operations’’ have been much 

improved. The ATP program, I know, was developed in cooperation 

with Congress and with NIST to try to address some concerns that 

had been expressed, which I will mention a minute, about these 

types of programs. And I don’t want to suggest that these are bad 

programs or that they are failing or that they are poorly managed, 

but only that in the grand scheme of things, if we have money that 

we can spend on NIST, I would like to see NIST grow its much 

more high-leverage operations first and let these others sort of rest 

until we can get the core up. So that is my personal opinion. 

Let me say about the technology transfer programs, there is 

clearly differences among administrations and various sectors of 

commentators about these types of programs. Many people feel 

that—well, it is very clear that the Federal Government should be 

supporting basic long-term, high-risk basic research, and the private sector should be supporting very short-term development activities. There is a grey area in the middle, and there is a lot of 

room for disagreement about the priority of programs in that grey 

area. 

This administration believes that the private sector should be investing in the types of activities that the MEP and the ATP program historically had been funding. So I want to acknowledge that 

the difference of opinion about the appropriate work to be done in 

private versus public sector does exist and does influence the decision about how to fund them. 

That said, the primary reason that these activities in NIST are 

not funded in the current requests is prioritization. I certainly understand the interest of Congress in doing these, and I regret that 


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we can’t just fund everything under the constraints that have been 

established for this budget. 

MEP OUTCOMES

Mr. MOLLOHAN. We have very impressive statistics that NIST 

itself reports regarding the MEP program per se. NIST reported 

the results of a survey of manufacturers that used the MEP program in 2006. One year after using MEP services, these manufacturers reported—I don’t know if you are familiar with these statistics or not, so let me read them, and if you would comment on 

them—52,000 jobs created or retained; $6.8 billion in new or retained sales; $1.1 billion in cost savings; and over $1.7 billion in 

private investment leveraged. If those are accurate statistics, those 

results came from a $100 million Federal program. 

That seems to be pretty good leveraging. What do you think? Do 

you think those numbers are accurate, or maybe the impact of 

MEP was marginal, and there would be some of these statistics existing if MEP didn’t exist? Are you familiar enough with the program to comment on that? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I am somewhat familiar with the program, and 

you, Mr. Chairman, answered a lot of my questions before I could 

get to them. But, yes, I do believe that some of those things are 

happening. It is not clear how much of that would have happened 

without the MEP funding. I do believe that industries and companies that gain benefits from MEP are bound to be happy with 

them, and I don’t want to criticize the management of the program 

by NIST. I think—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I know you are not criticizing the management. 

Mr. MARBURGER. So I think that these are probably well run programs. The first question is to what extent are funds that are being 

used for that program could be used on activities that simply 

wouldn’t ever happen if they weren’t funded there? And I believe 

that the type of basic research that—basic and applied research 

that NIST does, and that it does much of it in cooperation with industry and in laboratories, this has very close ties in its core programs with industry and universities. That work has a potentially 

much higher benefit in terms of jobs and competitiveness and economic growth than the sort of ‘‘one accomplishment at a time’’ pace 

of MEP and ATPO. 

So it is a question of putting your money where the biggest payoff is in the long run. I believe, that we would get much more if 

we funded NIST to be—for example, to be more active in taking 

leadership and setting standards for nanotechnology applications 

worldwide. NIST is acknowledged to be a leader in Europe and 

Asia in the standard-setting process. We ought to be funding them 

to do more of that. And that is part of their core activity. But they 

are also leading the way in characterizing—I used nanotechnology 

as an example and may as well continue. NIST is leading the way 

in characterizing nanotechnology products in a way that can be 

used by the people who study the health effects of nano. There is 

a lot of concern about that right now. 

Well, we can’t study the health effects unless we know what is 

in the people. And NIST is where people turn for techniques for understanding the characteristics of these new substances. So it is 


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that kind of a thing that we could be funding rather than the onecompany-at-a-time job creation, which is—you know, it is—I don’t 

deny its importance, but if you have got a choice to make, I would 

spend our money first on this, and if we can find money somewhere 

else to do some of these activities, then that should be evaluated 

very carefully. But I would say we have got a priorities problem. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So your position, if I might restate, isn’t that 

MEP or TIP don’t have value or potential value in and of themselves. It is that the money is within the NIST budget. Being in 

the NIST budget, you would have a different priority? 

Mr. MARBURGER. That is correct. I do have some sympathy with 

the notion that private sector does have an obligation to fund that 

sort of thing, and I know that some companies find it hard to get 

access to private-sector funds. But I would be willing to work harder on helping private sector find ways to do that. For example, part 

of the American Competitiveness Initiative is to make the tax credit for research and experimentation in the private sector permanent and to simplify it so more companies can take advantage of 

it. It is conceivable that incentives like that could create pools of 

funds that could assist in the tech transfer end of the business. 

So I think we have got other tools that we can use to address 

some of these functions. We should try to do that. 

BASIC RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER

I just wanted to add one thing to that. The private-sector assets, 

revenues and the private-sector investment in research is growing 

at a pace greater than that of the domestic discretionary budget at 

this time. And I have spoken over the past year about the desirability of finding ways to encourage the private sector to invest a 

greater portion of its assets and resources in more basic research 

or research and development that is a little bit closer to the tech 

transfer functions. So I just wanted to add that as an important—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, basic research isn’t in that area. Basic research is as you have described it. There is a real consensus that 

the Federal Government ought to be investing in basic research. 

But these are applied programs, and I would suggest that while 

there may be other ways of getting it. There could be some tax incentive that could incentivize this kind of activity. I am sure that 

this was considered when the authorizing legislation was developed. Nonetheless, this is impressive leveraging—if these statistics 

are correct—over $1.7 billion in private investment leverage. This 

is the number that NIST reports, so that is a pretty impressive 

leveraging of private sectors. 

But I guess my point is—and it is not to try to tie you down or 

anything, but it is to get an appreciation for your primary reasons 

for supporting the zeroing out of these two programs, and it is that 

dollars are scarce, it is a zero-sum game, and given your predisposition about the prioritizing of that and favoring basic research, you just think that money could be better spent at NIST 

basic research, it is not that you are per se opposed to these programs? 

Mr. MARBURGER. That is correct. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. If that is a fair assessment? 


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Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

MATH AND SCIENCE EDUCATION

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Dr. Marburger, I want to get back to how 

we improve math and science education. The increases for math 

and science have been primarily in the Department of Education 

programs. For the National Science Foundation, the American 

Competitiveness Initiative prioritizes basic scientific research over 

education programs. The NSF education request, as you are aware, 

falls far below the amount authorized by the COMPETES Act. 

I suppose the basic question, are the National Science Foundation education programs effective? And if they are, which ones 

would you single out for perhaps being the most successful? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I would first like to point out that the President’s 2009 budget request does request about a 9 percent increase 

in that part of the National Science Foundation that deals with 

education. So that is a sort of vote of confidence in NSF programs 

there. 

I think that the proper funding of research in science and math 

education is an important part of the American Competitiveness 

Initiative and obviously an important part of the COMPETES Act, 

so there is no animosity toward the National Science Foundation 

programs. The fact that it is only 9 percent is—well, which I think 

is a healthy increase at a time when the domestic budget is being 

held to 1 percent. But the fact that it is only 9 compared to 15 or 

20 percent, which is the amount—20 percent is the amount that 

the physical science budget would increase at NSF under this 

budget is just an indication—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Those who have reviewed these programs 

have they found them to be effective, and it all boils down to what 

part of this ensures that we are actually, quote, competitive. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And how we measure that. 

Mr. MARBURGER. There are two things I want to say in response 

to that question. The first one is that the National Science Foundation itself, as you know, most of its money goes out to universitybased research programs. The NASA Science Foundation requires 

that the research grants that it gives under these programs have 

evaluation tools built into them so that they have accumulated a 

lot of information about what works and what does not in their research programs. 

Now, that is the first sort of general answer. Secondly, the Department of Education and OMB in cooperation with my office have 

launched a study of the very large number of education programs, 

and particularly in math and science, spread around the entire 

Federal Government. There is a large number of such programs. 

They established a committee, an interagency committee, called the 

ACC, Academic Competitiveness Council, I guess, which made recommendations about assessing all of these programs. And under 

the actions of that committee, my office was asked to prepare a 

document that gave more detail and more direction to agencies 

about how they might go about evaluating these programs to find 

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grams are not evaluated in a way that would allow you to tell if 

they are working. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So they are being evaluated? 

Mr. MARBURGER. They are being evaluated. Some of them are 

being evaluated now, and more of them will be evaluated during 

the coming months as this process rolls out. Once again—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Because these are the programs that provide the very underpinning if we are ever going to get ahead of 

what is occurring in China and India where the numbers are staggering. The teaching of English, in the second or third grade, I assume both science and mathematics, the statistics, and you are 

pretty familiar with them, are pretty shocking, a huge wake-up 

call. You say there is oversight through this new acronym or this 

new group? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. I am satisfied that we are moving toward 

having a much more uniform and widespread evaluation process 

for all education programs throughout the government, not just the 

ones in NSF or the Department of Education, but elsewhere as 

well. I think it is needed, and we are supporting that effort. We are 

probably doing some things right. We could probably do a lot of 

things better. And we have to sort out which is which. 

AMERICAN COMPETITIVENESS INITIATIVE

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, you are in the critical position. So we 

are supportive of whatever you are doing to crack heads and make 

sure that things are coordinated, one hand knows what the other 

hand is doing. I just wanted to touch basically, obviously the cornerstone of the American Competitiveness Initiative is the National Science Foundation basic research, which obviously receives 

a pretty healthy increase, 13.6 percent. The biggest increases, correct me if I am wrong, are for math and physical sciences, engineering, computer sciences, and cyber infrastructure. Why are we 

prioritizing these specific disciplines or technologies over others? 

Mr. MARBURGER. This is the area that we have been hearing 

about for the last—almost a decade from industry, from educators, 

from scientists and universities and the national academies. This 

is the area where there appears to have been the greatest lag in 

funding, and the greatest mismatch between opportunities and 

abilities, capabilities because the funding has been lagging. The 

physical sciences—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am interested to know, you are in the 

process of responding, what data supports—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. There are a large number of—I will be glad to 

provide reports—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So there is substantive data that supports 

these types of investments? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. These investments are in the areas that 

support the information technology, nanotechnology and instrumentation, the measuring instruments that are used in all areas 

of science. The physics and chemistry and information technology, 

computer science and systems engineering, all of these things are 

very basic components of practically every field today. Most contemporary research—— 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The general consensus is, and I am a believer, that these will pay the biggest dividends. Do they match 

their counterparts from what we can gather from our own intelligence gathering of what is happening in parts of India, China? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Other countries are aware—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The Pacific Rim? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I give you one example. Just last year Russia 

decided to make a huge investment in nanotechnology, just huge. 

It is $1.5 billion per year, which is comparable to our investment. 

It is just an amazing investment. It is structured very differently. 

It doesn’t have quite the same emphasis on the basic research that 

ours does. But that is an example of a type of investment that 

countries are willing to make in these areas. They are building the 

kinds of infrastructure that are sustained by these physical science 

budgets and NSF and the Department of Energy and elsewhere. 

And we know that they are making those investments there, particularly because they see the payoff. So we are competing. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Just to sum up, we are doing it here, and 

it seems that everybody has a piece of the initiative. I mean, there 

are lots of consortiums or consortia that are around there. But who 

is sort of pulling all the disparate parts together such that we 

would have some way of knowing whether we would match the 

Russia initiative? I assume the Chinese are not asleep at the 

switch here, either through their own inventiveness or through 

what many of us suspect is their ability to, shall we say, cop information. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Congress has mandated a series of reports both 

from—in the case of the administration, the President’s Council of 

Advisors on Science & Technology has taken on this responsibility 

and from the National Academies to report periodically and frequently on the status of the nanotechnology initiative in this country and compared with other countries. And there are reports available that are pretty current that have these data in them. It shows 

our investment compared with Asia and Europe. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. There are people like you, and people who 

serve on the National Science Board, through whom these reports 

filter such that we have a pretty good grasp of what everybody is 

doing in university-based research and different medical centers, 

and within the DOD. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. Our office runs a national coordinating office for the National Nanotechnology Initiative, and they produce 

copious reports. I will make sure that those reports are available 

to you. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. 

VISION FOR SPACE AND FUNDING TO EXECUTE IT

Doctor, you used the words when we were talking a little earlier 

about the necessity for dependability in funding, dependability on 

direction in some of these programs. I would say the stability in 

them in every way. As I look at NASA, I don’t know any other 

agency that has had less stability, neither programs or funding. 

I would like to ask you a few questions about NASA. Let me 

begin with the notion which we get a lot of up here that the curVerDate Aug 31 2005 00:38 Aug 03, 2008 Jkt 042708 PO 00000 Frm 00344 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A708P2.001 A708P2

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rent vision focuses on space shuttle, space station programs, phasing out shuttle, doing something with station, followed by human 

exploration of the Moon. And there are those who would argue that 

that results in a deemphasis of the aeronautics accounts and the 

science accounts and the education accounts particularly. First I 

would like to ask you, were you involved with the development of 

the President’s vision for exploration? Did that happen before you 

came, or were you—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. I was involved with that, yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How did that happen? What led us to the conclusion that the President would initiate the exploration vision that 

he did? 

Mr. MARBURGER. The primary driver, the proximate cause for 

that vision exercise was the Columbia Accident Investigation Board 

report that found that the vision for NASA in general was in need 

of renewal and reexamination, that there needed to be a high-level 

statement of a program and a vision for what NASA was trying to 

do, where it should be going. And that recommendation in the accident investigation report triggered a number of activities. Another 

commission was formed which reported, and an extensive policy 

and exercise occurred in the White House involving NASA, and at 

the end of which the President made a speech and issued a policy 

statement on the vision. And I have given speeches about this giving my perspective in detail on this that I would be glad to make 

available to the committee. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Would you do that? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I will do that. 

In my view, a practical vision for space is rather constrained by 

physics. We need to make sure that we have the ability to get 

equipment up and to maintain complex operations in space, which 

is subject to physical constraint, one of which is just the cost of getting material up, various kinds, out of Earth’s gravity. So I attempted to advise the policymaking process based on the perceptions of my staff. Obviously I was working with experts on this. We 

advised the policy process on this regarding the constraints we 

thought were built into the science of space travel, if you wish, and 

space exploration, and the current vision does include those aspects. 

I think that the current path that NASA is on is a reasonable 

one and sustainable. In the President’s statement on this, on the 

exploration vision, he emphasizes the importance of having a sustainable step-by-step process and to try to get away from the notion 

of sort of one-shot spectacular missions that are very expensive, 

but that don’t accumulate an infrastructure that can be used to 

make subsequent missions both less costly and safer. So the whole 

program of phasing out the shuttle and working on a new generation of crew exploration vehicles that can serve the shuttle, as well 

as going beyond to the Moon and—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Service station, a service station? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Correct. I think that is a reasonable vision. And 

we do try to fund NASA on a regular basis. It is not easy. Of 

course, the President did request a budget within a long-term 

framework in 2008, but the omnibus bill failed to support it. That 


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causes problems. The NASA budget is particularly sensitive to 

these shifts in funding. 

So I think the administration has a pretty clear picture of where 

it wants to go and how it should be funded, but we desperately 

need to be working with Congress to make sure that we have got 

the funding on a pretty smooth path. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So you are affirming your support for the vision, 

generally—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. As it was proposed by the President 

as currently being carried out given the funding you have. You 

used the term reasonable and sustainable. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Not optimal, I assume. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Optimal is hard to define. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. It definitely involves more money. But could you 

give us your thinking about the concerns expressed by people that 

the emphasis on exploration does come right now given the President’s request at the expense of science, aeronautics education? 

And it is said that Dr. Griffin makes a case that science is, given 

his budget and his direction, not deemphasized, that it is not adequately funded, but it is in the balance of things fairly funded. 

There are a lot of people that don’t agree with that, and I am asking for you to comment and give us your thoughts about that. In 

other words, it is a balancing question within NASA. Do you agree 

with how the administration—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. First of all, if you have more money, you can 

do more things. Secondly, NASA is doing a lot of science. After 

NIH, NASA has the largest share of the science budget, the nonmilitary, nondefense research budget. NASA has the greatest 

share. NASA is currently flying about 60 science missions. They 

are up there gathering data. And that is just hugely more than 

anyone else is likely to have in the near future. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. When you are at these conferences, and all your 

science-biased colleagues come up to you and start banging on you, 

is that the response you give them? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. I look them in the eye and I say, can you 

tell me how many active science missions NASA has now? We 

know about the rovers on Mars, we know about the Hubble telescopes. How many? Well, they usually guess about 15 or 20. Well, 

there are 60. And so I tell them, how many do you think we ought 

to have? You can always put more up, but you need—you know, it 

is just a question of money. So I say that for the type of science 

that we are getting, and it is very exciting stuff, we are making a 

big investment in NASA science. 

There are pressures on NASA to do even more because we have 

a science community that sees possibilities. They would all like to 

have their satellite programs. And we have a very aggressive, competitive, capable space science community out there that is pushing 

for more and more. And I think that it is very important for us to 

have a clear idea of what we should be doing first so that if we do 

run short of money for one reason or another, there is a hiccup in 

the funding or another accident occurs, and we have to incur great 

expense, we know what we should be sustaining. 


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Congressman Ruppersberger asked about the Webb telescope, for 

example. Well, that is a high-priority project that NASA is just 

going to keep doing regardless. And there are a number of science 

projects in that category. But I think it is a mistake for us to just 

try to do everything that everybody wants to do. We—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, surely that doesn’t happen. But I had here 

a couple of years ago, or maybe it was last year, a list of all of the 

science programs that were being pushed out or terminated, and it 

was a pretty large list. So there were projects in the queue that for 

budgetary reasons were cancelled. 

Mr. MARBURGER. In my view, that was a direct result of the very 

tragic accident that took the shuttle program off line and incurred. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Because NASA had to pay for that out of its 

hide, so to speak. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. It sent ripples through the NASA budget. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. But NASA had to cover that cost within its own 

budget instead of having a supplemental or an emergency funding 

to pay for that. 

Mr. MARBURGER. There was some return-to-flight funding during 

that period. But, NASA deals with these big projects that have intrinsic difficulties that create cost overruns and schedule slips. You 

are pushing the edges of technology on these things, and there 

ought to be some flexibility in their budget to do that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You know, I know there is a lot of concern expressed about the vision, the vision being underfunded, I mean, by 

some accounts $4 billion, $4 billion-plus, and then in addition to 

the underfunding for the science and aeronautics and education. So 

do you agree with that? Do you disagree with that? Do you push 

for more funding for NASA in your efforts? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I talk about it differently from the NASA Administrator. He has a certain discretion about how he does these 

things. Since you mentioned education and aeronautics now, and I 

haven’t responded to it yet, let me talk about those first and then 

the other. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Please. 

AERONAUTICS PROGRAMS AT NASA

Mr. MARBURGER. NASA has basically reorganized its aeronautics 

function, I think, in a very healthy way, restructured it to emphasize a smaller number of more focused objectives, back to basics as 

it were. There has been a lot of planning activity and policy-level 

activity on the aeronautics program. The President approved an 

aeronautics policy, and now we have an aeronautics strategic plan, 

and the expenditures that the President is requesting in the 2009 

budget are consistent with the new look that NASA has given the 

aeronautics part and with the policy and strategic plans that have 

been developed. 

So I am comfortable with the direction of aeronautics. It definitely has been a change. There has been a refocusing, as it were, 

a reprioritizing of their mission. So I think that aeronautics and 

NASA is on the right track now. 

As far as the education part, well, that has to be evaluated along 

with all the other education programs that we have been talking 


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about. NASA has real assets for education. Kids love it, grownups 

love it, and they make a lot of educational materials available. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Just if I can ask the Chairman. Why is 

NASA not part of the American Competitiveness Initiative along 

with NOAA? 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Absolutely. 

Mr. MARBURGER. The reason NASA and NOAA aren’t part of the 

doubling track, for the American Competitiveness Initiative is 

that—there are two reasons. The first one is that they are more 

nearly adequately funded for the missions that they perform than 

these other parts of the science agency community; and secondly, 

that the direct product of their research is less relevant to longterm economic competitiveness and to the line of products that sustain the American economy at the likely future economy. So while 

there are important economic aspects, big economic impacts, of the 

operations, space operations, for example, weather and so forth, the 

research products are less directly relevant to the technologies that 

are likely to be—I mean, just to make it clear what I am saying 

so that—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I don’t want you to get too excited by responding, but this is the Chairman’s time. The issue of sustainability—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. For example, cosmology or understanding dark 

matter in space, those are very important issues where there are 

many important opportunities in science. You can call them physical science as well. But they don’t lead to technologies that are 

likely to be important in our economic future. You can get spin-offs 

from the various—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Our economic future is certainly connected 

to the 72 percent of the world’s surface that is oceans. 

Mr. MARBURGER. That is correct. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And the way we treat our oceans—and obviously we have a lot of scientific assets directed towards—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. That is correct. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Talking about competition, look what the 

Chinese and Japanese are doing out there in terms of their fleets 

and the depletion. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Those parts of the NASA budget should be 

funded, and, in this request that we are discussing here, the President is asking for increases and dollars for carrying them out. But 

the entire agency budgets, research budgets, don’t have the same 

level of sensitivity to economic competitiveness. 

So, I am trying to give you the rationale for these decisions, and 

they have been made carefully and based on analyses and extensive reports. It is not something that we just thought up. We try 

to listen to the communities out there and respond to what they 

think is important. 

So to get back to the funding gap, as it were, that we here discussed in connection with NASA, this is where the emphasis that 

the President has made on sustainability and step by step comes 

in. We think it is important for NASA not to have big increases 

and then decreases in its budget. We think that it is important for 

NASA to have a budget envelope that Congress can support and 

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thing that is going to go up and down with the fashions of the moment or the political interests of a particular administration, because this is something that takes place over many, many years, 

decades. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I would subscribe to the notion that we should 

have sustainable funding, and it should be level, and I think there 

would be a lot of concern, which I would share, about the adequacy 

of it, and it should be sustained at a higher level in order to 

achieve the goals of the vision and at the same time to fund the 

other terms. But thank you very much for your thoughts on that. 

NASA AND THE ACI

Going back to Mr. Frelinghuysen’s question about NASA being a 

part of the American Competitiveness Initiative, it is interesting to 

me that you said because the products that come out of NASA 

aren’t as relevant, I think there would be a lot of people on Capitol 

Hill, and I would be one of them, that would think and believe that 

actually it is a part of NASA’s authorization to be very concerned 

with and very focused on meeting goals with regard to technology 

transfer and bringing technologies to the economy that directly impact on America’s competitiveness. I think, and please correct me 

if I am wrong, that is a part of the statutory mandate; is it not? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I believe so. And my remarks may have been 

misleading in this respect. There is no question that NASA and 

other agencies have important products that have an important impact on our competitiveness, but that there is a differentiation and 

impact among different areas of science. The people who are concerned about information technology, communications, telecommunications, materials, energy—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Again, kind of emphasizing the basic research—— 

Mr. MARBURGER [continuing]. Biomedical research. All of these 

things are pointing to these agencies as being significantly underfunded for the role that they play. They are not pointing to NASA 

as being significantly underfunded for the role that they play. 

So it is dangerous for me to make invidious comparisons here. I 

don’t want to do that because all of these agencies are carrying out 

their missions quite well, but there are some differences at the 

level at which we have been funding these things, and we have had 

a situation where we have let a certain very key area of science go 

underfunded for decades, and we are trying to fix that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. It is basic research? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Basic research in certain areas of physical 

science. And NASA and NOAA and a number of other agencies, 

while very important agencies doing their jobs well, are not as significantly underfunded as these key prioritized agencies. And even 

in the materials that were produced at the time that the President 

announced the American Competitiveness Initiative, we tried to explain that there were other agencies, and we particularly mentioned the Department of Defense as being a key agency, that had 

traditionally invested in research in this area that needed to increase it, but it was not being proposed to be put on a doubling 

track. Only these most seriously underfunded agencies relative to 


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their missions were put on that doubling track according to the 

President’s principles. 

You know, I tried to explain the rationale for a fairly targeted 

initiative. The idea was that within an overall constrained budget, 

you had to have some priorities, and priorities had to make sense, 

and we tried to design priorities that would funnel the dollars to 

the highest leverage, most needy areas, high-impact areas, while 

acknowledging the importance of all areas to achieve economic 

competitiveness; funding those high-priority things first, making 

sure that that got done, and then subsequently when balance is restored, we can, you know, move ahead on all fronts if we can afford 

to do that. So that is sort of the picture here. It is all about priorities. 

REVISITING THE VISION FOR SPACE

Mr. MOLLOHAN. One of my last questions with you with regard 

to NASA has to do with the basic vision, concept at this point in 

time, and I say NASA is one of those agencies that has been least 

stable in its funding profile, and that we try to redefine or some 

try to redefine every year. But there is significant thinking out 

there in the community, rethinking, of the vision, which I am sure 

you are aware of, and if I can just read a few paragraphs from 

Aviation Week and ask you to respond to this. 

First introductory paragraph: Influential leaders of the space 

community are quietly working to offer the next U.S. President an 

alternative to President Bush’s vision for space exploration, one 

that would delete a lunar base and move instead toward manned 

missions to asteroids along with a renewed emphasis on Earth environmental spacecraft. Participants in the upcoming meeting contend there is little public enthusiasm for a return to the Moon, especially among youth, and that the Bush administration has laid 

out grandiose plans, but has done little to provide the funding to 

realize them on a reasonable time scale. Another contention is that 

abandoning the President Bush lunar base concept in favor of 

manned asteroid landings could also lead to much earlier manned 

flights to Mars’ orbit where astronauts could land on the Moon. 

And it goes on to more specific justifications for revisiting the vision. But are you familiar with this thinking? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. Yes, I am. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And my first question was, learning progresses 

and ideas mature, and people begin one direction, and they get so 

far in the direction and decide, gee, there is a better one, but they 

wouldn’t realize there was a better one if they hadn’t pursued the 

first vision in this case. But was this notion a competing one? Was 

this vision that this group is touting a competing one of the President’s vision at the time? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. You know, people have been conjecturing 

or conceptualizing things to do in space and what our approach 

should be for decades, and nearly everything that you can think of, 

including missions to asteroids and buildings, structures, and socalled Lagrange points, which are points in space, all of these 

things were more or less in the air, have been in the air for a long 

time. And so when we began looking around, and others, at the 


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time the vision was assembled, there were scores of ideas about 

how to proceed. 

With respect to the specific ones that you mentioned, I think 

there are some good ideas in there and some not so good ideas. I 

certainly believe that Earth observations are very important. Probably the highest priority for space operations for this country 

should be Earth observations. The most interesting thing in the 

solar system is the planet Earth, and that is where we are. So I 

agree that that should have a high priority. 

As far as visiting asteroids, I don’t regard that as a good idea, 

except in connection with a larger plan that does include the use 

of the Moon. The Moon is unique in being a source of material that 

is not deep in the Earth’s gravity well. It is unique. There is nothing else like it. It is the closest thing, and it provides a stable base. 

Unlike anything else that is accessible to us, only the Moon provides a stable base for complex operations. And the reason you go 

to the Moon is not to just repeat the Apollo experience, but because 

you want to establish operations there that could very well serve 

the Earth-observing capabilities that we have in a way that reduces the cost of sustaining them. It is conceivable that there could 

be commercial operations and commercially successful operations 

on the Moon in the future where it is inconceivable to me, at least 

within centuries, that you could have similarly commercial viable 

operations anywhere else. The Moon offers a source, sort of an infrastructure that can be exploited for all other space exploration. 

So that is what I think. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And this group would disagree with that very 

premise? 

Mr. MARBURGER. This group disagrees with that, and I think—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I am not going to mention all the folks. 

Mr. MARBURGER. I know about that conference. But I think they 

are wrong, just to make it clear. I think they have some good ideas, 

but on that one I think that that is a mistake. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is there debate within the administration on 

that issue—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. Not particularly. You know, the administration 

does listen to outside advice. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are you sure? 

Mr. MARBURGER. And there is a debate within that community. 

There is one sector that thinks the Moon is the thing, and the reasons that many people think the Moon is important are somewhat 

different. In other words, people have different reasons for going to 

the Moon. Other people favor building a big infrastructure in something called the Lagrange point, which is a gravitationally stable 

place where things don’t float away if you drop them. Once again, 

there are serious disadvantages with that and so on. There are a 

number of factions out there that have their—and some people 

think that we should just go right to Mars and not worry about 

building all of this infrastructure in between. All of these things 

have to be analyzed seriously and continually. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are these either/or visions? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Not necessarily. Once again, it depends how 

much you want to spend. You know, the more money you put on 

the table, the more different things you can do. But to my mind, 


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looking at that time from a dispassionate point of view, my responsibility, I looked at all of these things and listened to all of these 

people, and it seemed to me that there are certain things that you 

would want to do whatever else you did. One of those things is exploiting whatever resources you can find on the Moon. Whatever 

else you do, that is the big thing that is up there that has mass 

that—it is very expensive to get mass out of the Earth’s gravity. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is there momentum out there for a change in the 

vision that we just described, and are those who are proposing, are 

they credible? Are these proposals and these—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. We have a very aggressive, capable, as I said 

before, capable community of space scientists, many of which have 

their own ideas about how to do things and what to do. There are 

organizations, clubs, Web sites that have formed around different 

approaches to this so that you can probably find momentum in almost any direction. 

The trick here is to try to be responsible about it; what are the 

criteria that you would use to select among these things and 

prioritize them. In my view, it is pretty obvious that the Moon has 

got to be a major objective for any space vision, and, number two, 

that we have to get away from this notion that we are just there 

to impress other countries and plant flags and so forth. That is not 

why we are there. There are other really pragmatic reasons, including science. Science is one of the functions that should be served 

by space exploration, and very important science can be done on 

any of these missions, but they can all be sustained by a development of complex operations on the Moon. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Have you spoken on this topic before this hearing? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes, I have. Yes. A number of times. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is it available? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. I will provide—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. We can go online probably and find it. 

Mr. MARBURGER. I will make sure that you get it. I gave a talk, 

an actually quite well-received talk, to an annual symposium, the 

Goddard Space Flight Center, on this 2 years ago, and it is on my 

Web site. And, in fact, in about 2 weeks, I will give another one 

of these talks. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. On this topic? 

Mr. MARBURGER. On a similar topic, yes, exactly. And I will 

make sure that once I get it written—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Doctor. 

SCIENCE EDUCATION

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Very briefly, I would just like to get back 

to planet Earth for a few minutes here and get back into the issue 

of science education. You are involved in the Academic Competitiveness Council. Are you familiar with their work and their recommendations? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Obviously their job is to examine, see 

where things are working, where they are not, whether there are 

efficiencies. You are familiar with their recommendations? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes, I am. 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Do you have any reaction to their recommendations? And you are aware that the council found a general 

lack of evidence, effective practices and activities in STEM education? You are familiar with all of those, correct? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes, I am. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. What is your feeling on those recommendations? 

Mr. MARBURGER. My feeling is that they are in the right direction, and that they need to be articulated and carried out. The Academic Competitiveness Council has charged my office with coming 

up with methodologies for further guidance for carrying out some 

of these suggestions. 

NATIONAL SCIENCE BOARD

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And tell me, didn’t the National Science 

Board make some recommendations to your office? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Also the National Science Board also made recommendations that are separate from the Academic Competitiveness Council. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Where do those recommendations stand? 

This is the whole issue of better coordination for STEM education 

and the National Science Board. Has that been done? 

Mr. MARBURGER. The recommendations of the National Science 

Board—or the National Science Board is an external advisory or 

oversight group for the National Science Foundation, and the Academic Competitiveness Council is an internal administration executive branch organization that is—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So you are reviewing the American Academic Competitiveness Council recommendations? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. So we have a specific task under the Academic Competitiveness Council recommendation, and we are considering what to do with the recommendations of the National 

Science Board that have recommended a number of things. They go 

in very different directions. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, just out of my curiosity, are you creating a standing committee on the National Science Board recommendation? 

Mr. MARBURGER. We are going to respond to the National 

Science Board recommendation with a committee that is probably 

a little bit different from the committee that they actually recommend. I don’t know whether they were familiar with our structure or not, but we have a structure in which that function would 

fit very well that we plan to use in the National Science and Technology Council. So we are prepared to be responsive to the National 

Science Board recommendation fitted within the framework that 

we have to operate. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, I assume the National Science Board 

is pretty familiar with the Academic Competitive Council and their 

recommendations. 

Mr. MARBURGER. I hope so. I hope so. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I know that the National Science Foundation is increasing, I think, by 32 percent their graduate fellowships. 

I am sure that is admirable, they do great work. Why is there a 


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flat funding for the National Math and Science Partnership and 

what they call the NOYCE scholarships? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Those are two different programs. The NOYCE 

scholarships will, in fact, increase in the President’s 2009 budget 

request. The Math and Science Partnership program will not increase, that being funded primarily in the Department of Education. Did I get that wrong? I do believe that the NOYCE scholarships will increase. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I am not sure that is right. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The increases are pretty small, and if you 

compare them to the graduate fellowships. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Okay. My budget expert says that there was an 

increase of about 5 percent in the NOYCE scholarships. It is a matter of fact, we can straighten it out among ourselves, but the intention was for that to go up. Once again, it would go up more if there 

were more money on the table and the priorities were different. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The priorities, not to go argumentative, 32 

percent for graduate NSF fellowships, obviously, is a priority, you 

have to measure that against what we might be doing on the math 

and science partnerships, which are pretty important as well. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Right. The math and science partnership program is being funded by this administration primarily in the Department of Education. So there is no—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Again, you are part of that science hierarchy, and we hope that the resources will be—I won’t say evenly 

divided—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. The Department of Education does science, too, 

but they particularly run these big programs for schools. The Department of Education has a somewhat different function than the 

National Science Foundation. The National Science Foundation 

does research, and it is focused on graduate education much more 

than K through 12. The math and science partnerships are more 

of a K-through-12 function that is, that we would like to see expanded in a program that is suitable for the Department of Education. So I accept all of the Federal agencies as appropriate domains for carrying out the signed education mission. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you for what you do. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

ICE BREAKING

Doctor, last year, it was some interest to the committee that the 

National Science Foundation expressed concern about their icebreaking capability. There are some studies underway, interagency 

discussions were underway then, I don’t know what the status of 

those are now. I would like to ask you what the status of those are 

now. 

I would like you to talk to the committee about the problem we 

face with regard to ice breaking capability, what the interagency 

studies are coming up with, with regard to solutions and what your 

personal feelings about it might be and how you would suggest that 

the committee approach that, it involves a lot of money, you are not 

asking for it. How do we address this problem? 


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Mr. MARBURGER. So my office has been working to understand 

the problem and to make sure that the National Science Foundation had the ability to gain access to the important science facilities 

in Antarctica, the South Pole particularly. And we participated in 

a solution to their problem, which was to make sure that they had 

money in their budget to arrange for ice-breaking services—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You participated in a solution, I am sorry? 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes, in the current situation, that is working, 

which is that there is money in the National Science Foundation 

budget for them to procure ice-breaking services so that they can 

have access to their South Pole stations. Their arrangement includes providing a relatively steady stream of funding to the Coast 

Guard for backup services, but as I understand it, they are using 

their funds for primary services to rent or lease ice-breaking capabilities from other countries to serve the South Pole station. So 

that is the least expensive way for them to carry out their science 

mission. 

Now the issue of future ice-breaking capabilities for the South 

Pole is—well, for both poles actually, is an issue that is larger than 

just science. The National Science Foundation—the missions of the 

National Science Foundation are not the primary drivers for ice 

breaking capabilities. And so, consequently, there are policy level 

processes going on currently to try to get all the actors together, 

the State Department, the Department of Defense, the Department 

of Commerce and all the other actors who have a stake in this, to 

work together to develop a policy for going into the future. 

I do not regard the ice breaker issue as primarily a science issue. 

It is a broader issue and needs to be addressed in a broader context. So what is driving this, there are two things. One is that the 

current ice-breaker capabilities of the Coast Guard are aging, need 

to be renovated or replaced, number one. And number two, the 

polar regions are increasingly interesting, particularly the north 

polar region, the arctic region, where the ice is melting rapidly, and 

there is a great deal of rapidly growing interest in commerce and 

natural resource exploitation, extraction and so forth that go way 

beyond the science interest. So those agencies that have those aspects in their portfolios need to come together and agree on the 

path forward, and that, such a path is being explored currently at 

the policy level. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Frelinghuysen has a question. 

SOUTH POLE TRIP

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. In the interest of full disclosure, I had a 

chance to travel with Dr. Bement and two of his predecessors, Rita 

Colwell and Neal Lane, a trip to remember, to the South Pole. It 

was fascinating to me, the partnership between the National 

Science Foundation, all those countries and how the military provides access. While I am certainly a red-blooded American, it did 

bother me that they had to use a foreign ice breaker. It was considerably cheaper, quite honestly, than if we would had perhaps our 

own Coast Guard there. But I would agree with you from what I 

can gather. There is a larger picture. I was hugely impressed, so 

that is why I am somewhat wearing my NOAA watch today. So 

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tive, given all the good things they are doing down there, I was a 

little bit—but I would agree. The research down there is absolutely 

fascinating, and we need to get in there. 

I thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Sure. 

Well, it is my understanding—and I would be interested in hearing about Mr. Frelinghuysen and what he has learned on his trip 

down there—but that the NSF polar research actually has become 

the primary use of our ice breakers. And this year, NSF’s budget 

eliminates funding to continue the caretaker status of the Polar 

Star since NSF does not envision current or future use of this vessel in support of its mission. If that is true, how do you think— 

well, let me ask you specifically, is a report planned on this? You 

have got an interagency study going on? 

Mr. MARBURGER. I am not aware of a report in preparation. 

There is an early policy process that is occurring. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. It can’t be too early, Doctor, this has been going 

on for I can’t tell you how many years. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Well, the policy process that I am referring to 

is one that includes all, appropriates the recent developments in 

the Arctic and the rapidly increasing interest there; brings in these 

considerations, brings in the geopolitical considerations that make 

it mandatory, I would say, for other agencies to participate. I do 

not regard this as primarily an NSF problem or a science problem. 

This is, the issue of ice breakers is one that has to be solved in a 

much broader context. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, are you involved in that solution, because 

if it is not only an NSF or a sciences issue, it is in part an NSF 

and a science issue. 

Mr. MARBURGER. That is correct. My interest is in making sure 

that the National Science Foundation has access to their polar station. How they get that access is less interesting to me. Now as a 

member of the administration, as a U.S. citizen, I care a lot about 

the ability of the U.S. to be able to operate in the polar regions, 

but my specific interest as a director of the Office of Science and 

Technology Policy is to make sure that the National Science Foundation has access to their operations in the South Pole. And I don’t 

want to see the National Science Foundation budget burdened with 

a national ice breaker program. That doesn’t make any sense to 

me. That is not their mission. And their budget would be artificially inflated if the money to build new ice breakers would be put 

into it. So that is why I have been insisting that there be a larger 

process, and I think we need that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, last year, we had testimony from NSF that 

the conditions in the Arctic actually were contributing to the necessity of more ice-breaking capability. Which prompts us to ask how 

are we solving that problem, but you have given us the benefit of 

your thinking here today at the hearing. 

Let me ask you if you would step back and provide a full discussion of this issue and submit it to—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. The committee and give us some direction on where you think the needs are, to what extent the 

science community has needs, to what extent they are going to be 


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met and how, so that we can stop worrying about how we are going 

to fund ice breakers if indeed that is not going to be something that 

this committee is going to have to look at. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Good. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Should we go to the Defense Committee and ask 

them to come up with some money here? I’ll let you submit that 

for the record. 

CLIMATE CHANGE DATA AND ITS AVAILABILITY

A number of changes have been made that the conduct of climate 

change science and expression of findings have suffered from political interference, and I know you are familiar with that. We are familiar with that. I would like for you, Doctor, if you would, talk a 

little bit about that issue and what role you envision playing or 

what role have you been playing to ensure that the integrity of scientific work with regard to climate change is there and that the administration is focused on ensuring it and assuring the public that 

the science with regard to climate change is being conducted in a 

scientific way and that the information that comes out of those efforts are available without filtering to the public and the scientific 

community generally. If you would give us your thoughts on that, 

please. 

Mr. MARBURGER. I think the easiest, most efficient way for me 

to answer that question is to recall that the—what bill was it, 

the—a bill was passed last year that required my office to—what 

was it? Oh, it was the COMPETES Act. I’m sorry, my staff tells 

me that it was in the COMPETES Act that a requirement was 

transmitted to my office to issue a guidance to all the agencies that 

provided for a complete and open transmittal of scientific information. I am sure that one of the contributing factors for that language was the concern that you have expressed about possible interference with scientists who have attempted to express themselves, particularly about climate change. And so we have worded 

our response to that requirement in a way that takes that into account. And so, consequently, and I don’t know if this has gone out 

yet. It is still in the interagency review. 

The process that we have for these official transmissions of guidance to agencies is that we first consult with the agencies to make 

sure that the wording is something that they can actually carry 

out. And then we rely on the Office of Management and Budget to 

go through a process of vetting this, and it is in that process right 

now. The memorandum that we are sending out, that I am sending 

out to agencies is basically in process now, and it includes a description of best practices, that there needs to be guidance to scientists as well as other employees that emphasizes the importance 

of complete, timely and accurate disclosure of scientific information, makes it possible for scientists to interact with media or the 

public in a free way. And we include the reference to best practices 

that already exists in some agencies. 

So I take this very seriously. I have been—I have resisted sweeping statements about the causes or the reasons or so forth, but I 

do acknowledge that there have been incidents where guidance was 

needed and think that it is important for us to be responsive in 

this way to those concerns, and we have done it. We are in the 


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process of getting it out. It should be out within the next month 

I would say. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Just thinking about this, I have no doubt about 

what you understand the importance of credibility in this area. You 

are a scientist. But you also have a policy role here, certainly. You 

probably want to get that out as soon as you can. I mean, that is 

a part—— 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. Of what you did. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Yes, I want it to be out. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Sure, you do, but I think it is in your personal 

interest, given the responsibility that you have, to make sure that 

that gets out for you and make sure it is clear and unambiguous 

and that it is followed, but time is marching by. So I just encourage 

you to—you know, part of legacy. 

I have some questions with regard to climate change that I 

would like to submit for the record, give you an opportunity to respond thoughtfully and completely. We are very interested in that. 

We have established, last year in the bill, a review, group of that 

with the academy. I might even want to talk with you about that 

some time, chat with you about it. 

Mr. MARBURGER. Sure. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Frelinghuysen, do you have anything else? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Nothing else. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Again, I am extremely pleased that you are here 

today and appreciate your thoughts on all these issues. We will follow up in areas that we need to follow up on. And as I said, we 

will submit these climate change questions. If you have any other 

thoughts after the hearing that you would like to submit for the 

record on any of these topics we have covered, we would certainly 

welcome them, we would value them. You have scarce resources, 

and we have scarce resources, and we want to apply them certainly 

with your thinking, and as all of our hearings and input would suggest that your thoughts are very important to us. Thank you very 

much for your testimony here today, Doctor. 

Mr. MARBURGER. And thank you for the opportunity to appear. 

It has been good, thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I thought it was excellent testimony. We appreciate it. 

[Questions and answers submitted for the record follow:] 


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(455) 

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2008. 

NATIONAL SCIENCE BOARD/NATIONAL SCIENCE 

FOUNDATION 

WITNESSES 

DR. STEVEN BEERING, CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL SCIENCE BOARD 

DR. ARDEN L. BEMENT, JR., DIRECTOR, NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION 

CONGRESSMAN MOLLOHAN’S OPENING REMARKS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The hearing will come to order. Welcome. Glad 

to see everybody was able to get in and get settled. We appreciate 

your attendance. 

Welcome to Dr. Beering and to Dr. Bement. This Subcommittee 

looks forward to your testimony here today on the budget request 

for the National Science Foundation and our nation’s strategic direction in the area of science research. 

The budget request for the National Science Foundation is a 

mixed bag. On the one hand, it is an exciting day for the Foundation. The budget request from the President proposes a total of over 

$6.8 billion, an increase of over 13 percent from the enacted level. 

The budget request puts the Foundation back on the doubling 

path outlined in the American Competitiveness Initiative. 

That sounds good on the one hand. However, on the other, the 

budget request falls far short of the levels authorized for the Foundation and the American COMPETES Act, some $472 million 

below the authorized level in fiscal year ’09. 

The Congress approved this funding level in response to the findings contained in the report, ‘‘Rising Above the Gathering Storm, 

Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future.’’ 

The report noted that the scientific and technological 

underpinnings, critical to the United State’s economic leadership, 

are being weakened at a time when our international competitors, 

led by China’s emergence, are enjoying large and sustained increases in GDP. 

COMPETES response to that threat. Dr. Beering, your recent 

companion piece to the Digest of Key Scientific and—of science and 

engineering indicators notes these trends. 

Some have expressed concerns about the priorities that the Foundation is setting. Funding requested for research and related activities grows by 16 percent. While the major research, equipment, and 

facilities construction account is cut over 33 percent, deleting funding for many ongoing projects and denying any new construction 

starts. 

Similarly, while education and human resources is slated to get 

an increase of almost nine percent, the Foundation’s budget for 


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education is some $200 million below the authorized levels. Critical 

to respond to the challenges of educating qualified math and 

science professional and K through 12 programs, they are slated for 

cuts in real terms, programs like STEM Talent Expansion Program, the Advanced Technology Program, and the Noyce Teachers 

Scholarships. 

In keeping with the Administration’s emphasis on the mathematical and physical sciences, engineering and computer sciences, 

each see an approximate 20 percent increase over fiscal year 2008, 

while the biological sciences receive a 10 percent increase. Social 

and behavioral and economic sciences see an 8.5 percent increase. 

Although the COMPETES Act does not assume that all fields receive equal increases each year, the law does call on the Foundation not to disinvest in the biological and social sciences over the 

longer term. 

So there is some anxiety about this. And we look forward to 

hearing about the research priorities presented to the Committee 

this year by the Board and the Foundation. For EPSCoR, the budget proposes $113.5 million for fiscal year 

2009. We look forward to talking with you, Dr. Bement, about 

EPSCoR about why the Foundation has chosen to disregard the 

Congressional direction to fund the EPSCoR program and the 

Noyce Scholarship Program at the levels specified in the conference 

report accompanying 2008. 

And we look forward to your testimony and that explanation and 

working with you on that as we go forward, not on this appropriation but with the implementation of the 2008 bill. 

Thank you both for appearing today. We look forward to your 

testimony. And before we proceed further, I call on Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

CONGRESSMAN FRELINGHUYSEN’S OPENING REMARKS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and good morning to all of you. Please to join the Chairman in welcoming you, Dr. 

Beering, Dr. Bement to the hearing today. 

You are here today to testify in your fiscal year 2009 budget request for the National Science Foundation. As I mentioned to Dr. 

Marburger, the President’s Science Advisor, yesterday, it is clear 

that science is at the very top of the Administration’s budget priorities. 

The National Science Foundation request for fiscal year 2009 to- tals $6.85 billion, an increase of 13 percent from the enacted 2008 

level. 

I am very pleased to see this level of commitment to funding 

basic scientific research and to maintaining our leadership in 

science and technology. 

It will be very difficult to provide increases of that magnitude 

given the many competing priorities and limited resources. But it 

is reassuring that you are being aggressive in requesting the resources. 

Let me say that I also associate myself with the Chairman in 

terms of the Augustine report, The Gathering Storm. That should 

never remain on the shelf. That should be always a goal for us to 

shoot towards. 


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I look forward to your testimony today. And I will have a number 

of questions. And may I associate myself with just about all the remarks of the Chairman about the American Competitiveness Initiative and your efforts to improve science and technology education. 

Let me just take this opportunity, Mr. Chairman, I know that 

you have been to Antarctica, to express my thanks to Dr. Bement 

and the National Science Foundation for including me as part of 

the group that was involved in the opening of the new South Pole 

Station. 

I wouldn’t call the trip a life-altering trip. But in reality it did 

alter my view of the world. And gave me an incredible respect for 

the work that is being done there. And I know it is being done. 

Other types of scientific research is being done in other parts of the 

world. 

I had a very, very positive impression. And what impressed me 

the most is the number of young people, maybe because I am over 

60. But the dedication. And you have seen it. The dedication of the 

men and women there and in other parts of the world. This is obviously one of the most inhospitable, yet most interesting places. The 

dedication—the true dedication of the workforce there, which is enlarged during the summer and shrinks during the winter. But I 

want to thank you and your staff for making that trip a remarkable trip. And I came away with a huge respect, a much greater 

respect, for the work of those who work with you. 

So thank you very much. And thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Gentlemen, again, welcome to the hearing. Your 

written statements will be made a part of the record. And if you 

would proceed with your oral statements and summarize in any 

order that you wish. Thank you. 

Dr. BEMENT. Would you like to—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you have a preference, if not, we will call on 

Dr. Beering. 

DR. BEERING’S OPENING REMARKS

Dr. BEERING. Okay. Thank you. Good morning. Chairman Mollohan, Ranking Member Frelinghuysen and members of this Subcommittee, I appreciate the opportunity to address you today. 

I am Steven Beering. And I am the Chairman of the National 

Science Board. I am honored to represent the 24 members of our 

Board before you today. I would like to thank the members of this 

Subcommittee for your long-term commitment and support of the 

National Science Foundation and our investments in the portfolio 

of research and education. 

We also applaud your strong bipartisan support for legislation 

over the past year that will bolster the U.S. leadership in science 

and technology, including the American COMPETES Act. 

The National Science Board and the broader science and engineering community are disappointed, however, by the actual appropriations in the fiscal year 2008 Omnibus Bill, which erased most 

of the anticipated increases in support of research. 

In such an uncertain funding climate, we are concerned with the 

signal it sends to our potential partners in the National Science 

Foundation, but also the message to international and American 


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students who may be deterred from pursuing science and engineering careers in this country. 

As many other countries invest heavily in science and engineering research, graduate a record number of scientists and engineers, 

and increase incentives to attract outstanding international students and scholars, it is a dangerous time for the United States to 

neglect our science and engineering enterprise. 

The National Science Board is committed to helping this country 

maintain our leadership in science and technology. In addition to 

its policy and oversight role at NSF, the Board has also addressed 

a number of significant policy issues for U.S. science and engineering. 

Let me cite a few. We are working with NSF to implement recommendations in several recent research and education reports, including the national action plan for addressing the critical needs of 

U.S. science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education 

system, our STEM report. 

Moving forward to improve engineering education. 

Hurricane warning, the critical need for a national hurricane research initiative. 

Enhancing support for transformative research at the National 

Science Foundation and science and engineering indicators, which 

includes the digest of key science and engineering indicators. And 

a companion piece policy statement entitled ‘‘Research and Development: Essential Foundation for U.S. Competitiveness in a Global 

Economy.’’ 

We will be introducing an additional report in March entitled 

‘‘International Science and Engineering Partnerships: A Priority for 

U.S. Foreign Policy and our Nation’s Innovation Enterprise.’’ 

And we just a few weeks ago began an in-depth study of renewable energy issues, which will be ongoing this year. 

In response to the American COMPETES Act, the Board has undertaken a number of actions. We recently sent reports to Congress 

to make recommendations on NSF policies regarding cost sharing 

and on preconstruction and management and operation cost coverage under the major research equipment and facilities construction account. 

And we will be preparing a final report for Congress on this subject later this year. 

The report is also—the Board is also reviewing the impacts of 

NSF policies on interdisciplinary research and on limiting the number of proposals for institution of high education for some awards. 

The Board will report back to Congress on both of these issues by 

August 2008. 

Finally, the Board will evaluate a pilot program for grants for 

new investigators at NSF and report these findings to Congress by 

August 10. 

For fiscal year 2009, the request for the National Science Board 

is $4.03 million, an increase of 1.5 percent over the fiscal year 2008 

budget. 

Next year’s budget will allow the Board to strengthen its oversight and policy duties for NSF and to provide independent scientific advice for the President and Congress. 


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In addition, the Board will continue to increase communication 

and outreach with all of its stakeholders. For example, we continue 

to engage with numerous stakeholders to implement recommendations from our STEM education action plan. 

The National Science Board supports the fiscal year 2009 budget 

for NSF and for basic science research in other agencies of the 

President’s request, so that we can begin to make up for the opportunities that we will miss this year under the 2008 Omnibus Appropriations Bill. 

You have my pledge on behalf of the Board that we will continue 

to work closely with the NSF Director to ensure that funding decisions continue to provide maximum returns on the taxpayers’ investment in our Nation’s future. 

Thank you very much. 

[The written statement of Dr. Steven Beering, Chairman, National Science Board follows:] 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. Dr. Bement. 

DR. BEMENT’S OPENING REMARKS

Dr. BEMENT. Yes, thank you. Chairman Mollohan, Ranking 

Member Frelinghuysen, and members of this Subcommittee, I am 

pleased to present the National Science Foundation’s budget for the 

2009 fiscal year. 

NSF proposes an investment of $6.85 billion to advance the frontiers of science and engineering research in education. 

Our budget request includes an increase of $789 million or 13 

percent over fiscal year 2008. This increase is necessary to put NSF 

back on the course that was charted by the American COMPETES 

Act and the President’s American Competitiveness Initiative. 

This budget reflects the Administration’s continued resolve to 

double overall funding for the NSF within ten years. 

Let me begin by expressing by sincere appreciation of this Subcommittee’s support of the American COMPETES Act. I would also 

like to thank you for recognizing the importance of our agency operations and award management account in the 2008 Omnibus Appropriation. 

Our stewardship activities allow us to serve award recipients 

with tools such as the new grants management website, research.gov. 

The timing of this testimony coincides with a period of economic 

uncertainty in our country. I have come here today to tell you that 

an investment in the National Science Foundation is an investment 

in America’s economic security. 

NSF provides the two essential ingredients of a healthy, hightech economy: Basic research discoveries and a highly trained 

workforce. 

For over 50 years, NSF has been the foundation of innovation, 

fostering great ideas and the great minds who discover them. NSF 

discoveries have led to many of the technological innovations you 

and I take for granted today. 

And yet for fiscal year 2008, NSF’s budget increase fails to keep 

up with inflation. By contrast, other nations of the world are steadily increasing their investments in STEM education and basic research and development. 

I assure you that multi-national companies will have no problem 

relocating their operations to the countries where they can find the 

best trained workforce and the latest research ideas. 

The world is changing. Lead times for new products are shrinking. Now more than ever, basic research discoveries are essential 

to keeping the wheels of innovation turning in America’s high-tech 

companies. 

It is not merely enough to maintain the federal R&D investment 

status quo. It is our solemn obligation to keep up with corporate 

America’s demand for innovative people and ideas. 

At NSF, we are responsive to emerging potentially transformative ideas of research. I would like to highlight some of our 

new cost cutting multi-disciplinary initiatives. We created these 

initiatives in response to inputs we received from the research communities we serve. 


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We request $100 million to continue cyber-enabled discovery and 

innovation. Our bold two-year initiative, to apply revolutionary 

computational tools and concepts to all fields of science engineering 

and education. 

Our request includes $20 million for Science and Engineering Beyond Moore’s Law. This initiative aims to position the United 

States at the forefront of communications and computation. Moving 

us beyond the limitations of current systems. We are requesting $15 million to fund Adaptive Systems Technology. Our new effort aimed at using all aspects of biological 

science to inspire transformative new technologies. Our request of $10 million for the Dynamics of Water Processes 

in the Environment initiative, will bring together researchers from 

various disciplines to enhance our ability to understand the complexities of fresh water systems at regional and local levels. 

In addition to our ongoing efforts in transformative research, we 

believe that a truly competitive workforce is one that reflects the 

full potential and diversity of the American people themselves. 

Our efforts to broaden participation in science and technology 

target students at all educational levels and from all geographic 

areas. 

We train the Nation’s skilled workforce by providing research opportunities for undergraduates, graduate students, and post-docs. 

We research and evaluate effective STEM curricula for the Nation’s 

K to 12 classrooms. And provide opportunities for teacher education. 

And we develop innovative programs for informal science and 

technology learning for students young and old in museums, 

through the mass media, and through other outreach activities that 

touch the imaginations of millions of Americans. 

Mr. Chairman, time does not permit me to describe the other numerous activities NSF sponsors to strengthen and support our Nation’s science and technology research and education. 

NSF’s relatively small size relies on its catalytic impact on all 

sectors of the economy. I am hard pressed to think of another example in which the taxpayers derive such a tremendous return on 

investment. 

Thank you for extending me the invitation to speak with this 

Subcommittee today. And I look forward to answering your questions. 

Thank you. 

[The written statement of Dr. Arden L. Bement, Jr., Director, 

National Science Foundation follows:] 


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NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION AND NATIONAL SCIENCE BOARD

RELATIONSHIP

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Dr. Bement. I thank both of you for 

your testimony. You have an unusual relationship, unusual for a 

federal agency. The governing board has oversight responsibilities, 

program direction responsibilities, and the Foundation has implementation responsibilities. That balance between autonomy and 

working cooperatively must present such challenges. 

The Committee would appreciate the benefit of your discussion 

of those challenges as they exist, and how you work them out, and 

how that relationship is today. I would like both of you to speak 

of that. 

Dr. BEMENT. If I could lead off? 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Please. 

Dr. BEMENT. Being a member of the Board and also being a 

former member of the Board, I feel that the relationship depends 

very much on leadership and also on the congenial relationship between the Director and the members of the Board. 

We have very good leadership in Dr. Beering. And the relationship is better than I have known it for quite a long time. Obviously, there are issues that arise. Those need to be negotiated. And 

we do negotiate. They take continuing discussion with individual 

members of the Board. But I would say that those discussions are 

going quite well. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Dr. Beering. 

Dr. BEERING. Let me add that I have profound admiration and 

respect, not only for our Director and his deputy, but for all of the 

remarkable staff members that comprise the NSF group. 

We meet regularly, not only in connection with the Board, but 

also before and after and on occasions like this. And there is complete agreement on our objectives and on how we can work together to further the objectives of the Foundation. 

We are there to help the Foundation realize its goals and to 

serve the public in the best way we can. And I must say in my almost six years now, I have enjoyed this assignment very much. 

And look forward to continuing a very productive relationship. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are there any challenges before you today that 

pit the Board and the Foundation? 

Dr. BEERING. I am unaware of that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How effective is oversight? Dr. Beering, do you 

feel like you are on top of oversight of the Foundation? Is the Foundation appreciative of that relationship? 

Dr. BEERING. Well I think it is a collegial relationship. We are 

not an IG board. We work together as colleagues. And we understand each other’s roles very well. We are really one common entity. And I have total confidence in what Dr. Bement and his associates are doing. 

Dr. BEMENT. I would like to add that the Board serves as a very 

important and effective interface, as well as a communication channel with the community at large. They represent the community. 

In some cases, they also provide the support for the Foundation 

in dealing with the community in setting budget priorities and in 


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dealing with some of the hard policy decisions that we have to govern ourselves by. 

So I think that the Board, and the structure that we have, is 

very positive. 

U.S. LEADERSHIP IN SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The Committee appreciates the work of the 

Board in developing the report, ‘‘Science and Engineering Indicators of 2008.’’ 

It makes clear that we are at a critical time for the nation in 

science and engineering. The report shows that the U.S. remains 

the world leader in scientific and technological innovation. 

But our leadership is being challenged in many areas. What 

trends most concern you, Dr. Beering? 

Dr. BEERING. Well, I guess it is the beginning of the enterprise 

that most concerns me. And that is the subject of the STEM report. 

If we don’t improve our STEM education enterprise, we are not 

going to have the manpower to compete effectively in the world of 

science globally. 

And that keeps being documented in our indicators report. We 

have fallen behind many other countries. And we would like to see 

us regain the advantage that we enjoyed at one point. And I think 

we can. But it is going to take a concerted effort by all of us. 

And there is no magic wand that we can wave. It is going to take 

a great deal of help by parents, by communities, by schools to get 

the underpinnings of our educational enterprise back in order. 

And I am looking forward to an early implementation of our recommendations, in particular the Non-federal Coordinating Council 

that would assist the 95,000 school board members around the nation in their work. 

NATIONAL ACTION PLAN FOR STEM EDUCATION

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You mentioned in your opening remarks a 

STEM action plan. 

Dr. BEERING. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Talk to us about that a bit please. 

Dr. BEERING. Well the main thing is that we are recommending 

horizontal and vertical alignment of curricula efforts and a national 

non-federal coordinating council that would serve all of us. 

And then secondly, another main recommendation—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Excuse me, what does ‘‘horizontal’’ and ‘‘vertical’’ 

mean? 

Dr. BEERING. This has to do with the flow of curricula opportunities for students. Right now when a student moves from one school 

district to another, he may miss the sequence of offerings that he 

would have had had he stayed in the same school district. And 

there just isn’t any crosstalk among the school boards and school 

systems right now that would be desirable to make a smooth transition possible for the students. 

And the other big thing is that teachers are not paid in keeping 

with the marketplace value that they have. A math teacher, for example, can be employed by industry at a much higher salary than 

this individual would get in the school system. And that is why we 


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see a great many of them bailing out after two to five years and 

going into the private workforce and leaving the school system. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay, thank you. We have a number of members 

here today. And we are going to proceed on a five-minute rule in 

first round. And ten minutes in the second round to assure that everybody gets an opportunity to ask questions. And we will see how 

many members remain after that. But sticking to the five-minute 

rule, Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Dr. 

Beering, you are responding to the Chairman’s questions relative 

to what is called the National Education Plan; isn’t that right? 

Dr. BEERING. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You know, you mention 95,000 school board 

members. I mean, it is a thankless job. 

Dr. BEERING. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And I just wonder, how are you going to 

shake things up? Maybe that is not the politically correct way to 

say it. You have got obviously 50 states, each with a history of 

doing somewhat whatever they have always done. 

There is always a question of how much an impact federal policy 

has. I mean, they are still arguing about the consequences of the 

No Child Left Behind Act. 

How do you and others that you are working with plan to insert 

yourselves into a situation, which is sort of traditionally hidebound, 

stove-piped. All those things that may be appropriate to other parts 

of the government. 

How are we going to get some success here? We can’t sit around 

and argue philosophical things here. How are you going to insert 

yourself here? 

Dr. BEERING. We are not proposing to have the National Science 

Foundation or Board manage individual school districts. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I wasn’t suggesting that. I am just suggesting if we are going to vertical and horizontal. 

Dr. BEERING. We are hoping that this National Coordinating 

Council will assist the individual school jurisdiction to structure a 

voluntary set of standards that everyone would subscribe to. 

And to also have a better flow of curricula events so that there 

is some coordination across the state lines and also up and down 

the system. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So this is what you have somewhat charged 

Dr. Marburger with; is that right? 

Dr. BEERING. Yes indeed. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And his response to my question on that 

yesterday was a little cloudy and unclear. 

Dr. BEERING. Okay. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Where do you think the situation stands? 

I mean—— 

Dr. BEERING. Well, I think—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. You charged him and his office 

to create a standing committee within the National Science and 

Technology Council with the responsibility to coordinate all federal—— 

Dr. BEERING. Right. 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. STEM education. How would 

you characterize where that might stand? 

Dr. BEERING. Well I don’t know how he feels about doing that. 

I hope that he is positively inclined, because so many federal initiatives right now that are not coordinated either. That was the intent 

of that particular committee to bring together the federal efforts. 

And to coordinate them. 

And then the National Coordinating Council, non-federal, would 

assist the individual states and school jurisdictions to coordinate 

the rest of it around the nation. It is going to take—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, I am all for it. 

Dr. BEERING. Okay. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Quite honestly, I have always felt that between our Department of Energy labs, our military installations, 

and the resource of the National Science Foundation, we ought to 

be turning the eyes and brains of a lot of fantastic federal employees and for those in university-based research, more towards K 

through 12. And I assume this is something, which is happening. 

So maybe to Dr. Bement. His Board recommended create a roadmap for STEM education, K through 12 and then to college and beyond. Could you comment as to where you think we are? 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. I think we are doing quite well. Our Education 

and Human Resources Directorate has not only taken that charge 

seriously, but has spent a lot of time this past year developing 

partnerships with our research directorates in order to facilitate 

the implementation of the plan. 

They identified five cross cutting themes, which will add impact 

and improve the outcomes of our education investments. 

One of those themes is really to do institutional integration, the 

vertical part of what Dr. Beering called attention to. Namely being 

sure that at critical junctures in the education process, there is a 

seamless transition, so that expectations for performance match requirements for higher level education. 

We call that our two plus two plus two approach. The first two 

is the last two years of secondary education, the junior and senior 

years in high school, including advanced placement and international baccalaureate programs. The second two are the first two 

years of undergraduate education, which brings in the community 

colleges as well. And then the third two-year period is the second 

two years of undergraduate education, which also includes matriculation of students from community colleges into four-year colleges 

and universities. 

Being able to stimulate and to guide students through those critical decision periods is part of the vertical integration I am talking 

about. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, you certainly gave some of my people 

in New Jersey a pretty clear path. I appreciate that. 

Dr. BEMENT. Thank you. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I hope we are doing as well around the rest 

around the country. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. Mr. Latham. 


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LEVEL OF INVESTMENT: U.S. VS. OTHER NATIONS

Mr. LATHAM. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and welcome both of 

you. I’d like to step back in kind of a broader picture. 

Where are we compared to the other advanced nations as far as 

our level of investment? Can you give us kind of an overview? A 

lot of people think we are falling way behind. Is that, in fact, the 

case? What do we need to do? And how do we rank? 

Dr. BEMENT. Well, I will give you my impression. But Dr. 

Beering could talk more about the science and engineering indicator results. 

I think in terms of high-tech manufacturing and development of 

innovative products, we are still a world leader in terms of percent 

of global market share of wealth generated by that type of industry. 

On the other hand, we have to look ahead and look at the rate 

of change. And the rate of change is a little disturbing, not only because of the increasing rate of investment in China, where they 

vow that they are going to triple their investment over the next 20 

years, but also because of their heavy investment in higher education, especially in graduate education, masters and PhD programs, which will greatly reduce the incentive of Chinese students 

to come to the United States and other countries for graduate education. 

Projections indicate that China will close the gap with the United 

States over the next 20 years, in terms of not only innovation potential but also market share for high-tech products. 

In order to address that challenge, we have got to keep our innovation system strong. But we even have to make it stronger. And 

so that is where my concern is. 

CHINA’S INVESTMENT IN HIGHER EDUCATION

Mr. LATHAM. Give me a comparison. I mean, you state there is 

a heavy investment in higher education, and advanced training in 

China. What does that mean? I mean, compared to what? How do 

they range? 

Dr. BEMENT. It is the founding of whole new universities and 

whole new graduate programs in China. A huge increase in investment. 

I can get you numbers for the record. But I don’t have them off 

hand. 

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Mr. LATHAM. Okay, if you would. We hear about this all the 

time. I hear it. And I have Iowa State University in my district. 

We have difficulty getting top international students anymore to 

come in. A lot of them are going to stay in Europe or some are 

staying in Asia. 

Dr. BEMENT. The cost of education is a big factor. We are a very 

expensive country when it comes to the cost of education for international students, especially coming—— 

INVESTMENT IN RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT: U.S. VS. CHINA

Mr. LATHAM. Do we know how much they are increasing, you 

know, percentagewise, their research—I mean, we have been reasonably steady. 

Dr. BEMENT. Well if you look at the increase in research investment, at the present time China is investing at the rate of one percent of their gross domestic product in research and development. 

Their intent is, by year 2020, to increase that to three percent 

of gross domestic—— 

Mr. LATHAM. Where is the U.S.? 

Dr. BEMENT. At present, we are at about 2.6 to 2.7 percent of 

GDP. And about two thirds of that is private sector investment; 

one third is federal investment or public sector. 

On the other hand, the public investment has been skewed very 

much more strongly toward development and away from basic and 

applied research. And so it tends to be much more short-term oriented than it had been in the past. And that is a concern, especially for the National Science Foundation. 

Mr. LATHAM. Dr. Beering, do you have any comments or—— 

Dr. BEERING. Yeah. I might give you some numbers here. In 

terms of the U.S. versus China, our indicators show that China is 

rising rapidly, investing in capabilities associated with highgrowth, high-technology industries. 

They have captured a growing export share of high technology 

and manufacturing, reaching 20 percent share in 2005, while our 

share declined from 23 to 12 percent. Japan’s share declined from 

21 to 9 percent, and the European Union from 39 to 28 percent. 

And we don’t know how India is doing. But we suspect they are 

ramping up as well. 

So in a global context, we are reducing our efforts. And China 

is the remarkable tiger in the cage here. They are coming on 

strong. 

IMPACT OF FY 2008 APPROPRIATION ON THE NUMBER OF GRANTS

FUNDED

Mr. LATHAM. I know the fiscal year 2008 funding set you back. 

Can you give us any idea of how many fewer grants you were able 

to fund because of that? 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes, I can. The lost opportunity we had in 2008 as 

a result of the Omnibus Appropriation was the loss of 1,000 grants. 

Those are 1,000 new ideas that will have to be put on hold. 

In addition to that, since we educate graduate students through 

our research grants, that could represent as many as 1,500 graduate students that will not get support as research assistants. 


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It could also represent 300 to 350 young investigators, within 

five years of their last degree, that will not get funding support 

this year. 

And I think that is a very big loss. 

Mr. LATHAM. How many grants do you give? You are saying 

1,000 less. 

Dr. BEMENT. Last year, it was—I can give you the exact numbers. It was about 11,000 grants. Maybe I can. Here we are. Yes, 

last year we gave 11,500 awards based on 45,000 proposals. And 

we hope to increase that in the ’09 budget by about 1,000 grants. 

Mr. LATHAM. Okay, very good. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will 

have some more questions later. 

URGENCY OF ADDRESSING STEM EDUCATION

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Honda. 

Mr. HONDA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And Dr. Bement and Dr. 

Beering, thank you for being here today too. 

October of last year, the Board released a National Action Plan 

for Addressing the Critical Needs of the U.S. Science, Technology, 

Engineering, and Mathematics Education System. 

And I was really excited to be at the unveiling here on Capitol 

Hill. I support a number of your recommendations. 

Currently I am developing legislation to coordinate the STEM 

education activities of the state, the federal agencies, institutions 

of higher education, and business through the Council for STEM 

Education and for the establishment of STEM education at the Department of Education. 

And relative to that, my questions to both of you are what sense 

of urgency do you feel around making this a reality? And what 

might be the cost of waiting to provide the infrastructure to meet 

the challenges of what you have identified as a global economy? 

Dr. BEERING. Well, I think it is urgent that we move ahead. But 

on the other hand, I would like to see us be deliberate. Do it right. 

So I am not going to set a time frame on it. I hope that everyone 

will agree that that is an issue that needs to be addressed at all 

levels. And that we ought to work together to achieve some of these 

proposals that have now surfaced as part of that STEM report. 

Mr. HONDA. Well let me follow up on your comments. What you 

say is we should make haste with all deliberate speed. 

Dr. BEERING. Deliberate speed, right. 

Mr. HONDA. Starting when? 

Dr. BEERING. Yesterday. As soon as possible. 

Mr. HONDA. Okay. So it is an urgency that needs to be addressed 

now. 

Dr. BEERING. Right. 

Mr. HONDA. What you say is we should lay out the roadmap and 

those things—the components of it, check it off to see if there is 

concurrence. And then move on. And who would do that? Would 

that be the council that has been recommended to be put together? 

Do you have any idea? 

Dr. BEERING. Well it would be multiple efforts. The council would 

be one. And the committee at Dr. Marburger’s level would be another. The Department of Education, if they concur and appoint an 

organization within their department to address this issue, would 


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be a third. The roadmap development that NSF is working on 

would be a fourth. And I think there need to be a great many collateral efforts that would all come together at the end. 

But we all need to work at it. 

Mr. HONDA. Dr. Bement. 

Dr. BEMENT. Well you talked about partnerships. And partnerships are very important. We find in our Math and Science Partnership Program that bringing the private sector in, bringing community colleges into the picture, and also local and state governments are critically important in order to make progress. 

And in that program, we have seen that getting whole communities together, including parents and businessmen, has really 

made a difference in sustained improvement, continuous improvement, in the education system, because everyone reads the scorecard, everyone keeps track of improvements, and everyone cares. 

Now the issue is how do we do that at a larger scale? How do 

we do it at the stage of scaling up new initiatives, new interventions, new and best practices? And then how do we transfer that 

across the whole Nation? That is a higher order of partnership that 

we really need to work on. And that is where the state governments and the federal government have to be willing to come together on developing new standards, guidelines, and curricula improvements. 

Mr. HONDA. So with respect to the action plan and developments 

of the council and the Office of STEM Education, were they not 

part of the thinking of the Board when they put the action plan 

together? 

Dr. BEERING. That was part of it. 

Mr. HONDA. Okay. 

Dr. BEMENT. We directly participated in the report of the Board. 

I would like to add, and I think it is very important to bring this 

before the Committee, that we have very close working relationships with the Department of Education at every level. 

And while we are doing the research and developing new best 

practices, we work closely with the Department of Education to 

link those to state efforts through their formula grant program in 

order to do just what I was talking about, in order to scale these 

efforts up, and also to transfer them broadly. 

I think that type of a partnership has been effective. And it 

would certainly be prominently represented in our roadmap. 

Mr. HONDA. If there was a vision that was put together to coordinate all these things together, and if you have a statute that allows 

you to do that, an enabling act, it would seem to me that there 

would be some initiative on someone’s part there to create at least 

the first step in participation of that. 

And if we look at our current curricula and the way it’s established, it is pretty much disjointed, we don’t coordinate our instruction of math, physics, chemistry. 

And the way science is going now with their nanoscale, there is 

an obvious convergence of biological life science and natural 

science. If we don’t start talking about that and preparing our 

teachers and our students to think like that, the industry’s going 

to be continuously pulling people together, creating that team, and 


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creating that mind set. It seems to me that this is something that 

we should be looking at. 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. I—— 

Mr. HONDA. I am concerned about the sense of urgency. 

Dr. BEMENT. I fully agree with you. Right from the beginning of 

our nanotechnology initiative, we set aside funding to support education in the schools. And that is a very active program at the 

present time. 

In almost all of our advanced technology programs, we pay a lot 

of attention to upgrading curriculum and inserting new knowledge, 

contemporary knowledge. 

Mr. HONDA. Right. 

Dr. BEMENT. That is critically important. 

Mr. HONDA. Okay. And then in line—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Honda, we will get you next round. Mr. 

Price, please. 

Mr. PRICE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to welcome both 

of you to the Subcommittee. Dr. Bement, as time permits, I would 

like to take up two matters with you. 

The first being the funding for the Advanced Technological Education Program, the only NSF program focused primarily on community colleges. And I would like to ask you to tell us what the 

implications are of the President’s proposed flat funding for that 

program in terms of the number of meritorious applications you 

will be able to fund. I may have to do some of that for the record. 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. 

SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING BEYOND MOORE’S LAW

Mr. PRICE. Because I first want to turn to your Moore’s law initiative. The international technology roadmap for semiconductors 

produced by the SIA and the Semiconductor Research Corporation, 

located by the way in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, 

projects that Moore’s law will reach its limits around 2020. 

Dr. BEMENT. That is correct. 

Mr. PRICE. Now, my understanding is if we are going to be producing commercially-viable technology that goes beyond Moore’s 

law by 2020, the key seminal papers conceptualizing that technology need to be published now or very soon. Others appear to be 

moving on the issue. 

A press release last week announced that the European Union 

plans to invest 3 billion euros. That is about $4.5 billion over the 

next ten years in nano-electronics. So it would appear your inclusion of funding explicitly targeted at taking science and engineering beyond Moore’s law is very well conceived. 

With this situation in mind, including the competition we are 

facing, I wonder if that $20 million is a sufficient figure? It is not 

clear to me how that figure was arrived at. Nor is it clear how new 

this focus is. Is this $20 million new money newly focused on 

Moore’s law? Or has a roughly equivalent amount been directed toward this problem in the past and this is more of an attempt at 

improved coordination? 

Dr. BEMENT. Well let me answer the question two ways. First of 

all, we have a working relationship with the Semiconductor Research Corporation. We both put a million dollars to supplement 


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ongoing grants in order to look at particular issues that are on 

their roadmap. And that has been a very good working relationship. 

With regard to your second question, we see opportunities looking ahead to molecular electronics, which would bring in the biological sciences, looking at quantum dot devices and quantum electronics, which would bring in math and physical sciences as well 

as engineering. 

So what we are trying to do is to integrate across the Foundation 

initiatives that have been supported in each of the directorates and 

offices in the Foundation. So this is just the beginning, the first 

year of a growing effort to do that interdisciplinary integration and 

to call for proposals that will offer transformative ideas on how 

best to get beyond current CMOS technology on silicon. 

Mr. PRICE. That integration and improved coordination is worthwhile in and of itself. Do you have any estimate, though, of how 

much in the way of new investment or investment beyond past levels that $20 million represents? 

Dr. BEMENT. I’m sorry. I didn’t understand. 

Mr. PRICE. How much of this is new money so to speak, or how 

much of it is just mainly pulling together existing projects and the 

funding streams? 

Dr. BEMENT. It is part of the increased funding we are requesting 

in 2009. So it is over and above the funding that we have been investing in this area. 

If you look at our overall initiative in communications or what 

we call the NITRD program, which is working in information technology research and development, it is well over a billion dollars 

all together. So this is the beginning of a new funding wedge that 

will deal with the cross integration through the Foundation. 

ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY EDUCATION PROGRAM

Mr. PRICE. As I said, I commend you for that. I think it is an 

important initiative. And hope that we can support it fully. 

As time permits, now let me turn to the ATE Program. I should 

acknowledge and commend both the Administration and the Committee for the increase in the current fiscal year that ATE has enjoyed, something like 11 percent, much needed. 

However, we are back now to the old pattern of flat funding. And 

I wonder what you would say about that. And explicitly what you 

would say about the kind of proposals you are receiving that have 

merit. And how many of them you are able to fund. Do you have 

figures or can you furnish figures about the—— 

Dr. BEMENT. Well, I can—— 

Mr. PRICE [continuing]. Number of ATE proposals submitted for 

2007, what percentage of those were funded, and how many you 

anticipate funding for 2008. 

Dr. BEMENT. In fiscal year 2007, we received 185 proposals and 

made 53 awards for a funding rate of 29 percent. In 2009, we expect to make 70 new awards with the available funding. And the 

percentage of the budget that will be available for new awards will 

be 60 percent of the budget. Forty percent will be used to continue 

ongoing awards. 

And I can get the numbers for 2008 if you would like. 


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Mr. PRICE. Well on the face of it I don’t see how the funding we 

are talking about translates into that level of awards or that percentage of awards. 

What would you say in general about the merit of the proposals 

you are receiving in these areas and what in the best of all worlds 

we would be funding? 

Dr. BEMENT. Well this program enjoys a much higher funding 

rate than the Foundation in average. Our average funding rate is 

about 21 percent. So I would say that the awards that we are getting are very fundable. 

In terms of award size, that is variable. The Center awards 

range from about $375,000 to $1.25 million per year. But we also 

give awards for individual projects—— 

Mr. PRICE. Yes. 

Dr. BEMENT [continuing]. In addition to the Centers. And those range from $25,000 to $300,000 per year. So the total number of 

awards is a combination of those two categories. 

Mr. PRICE. Well, I would appreciate it. I know my time has expired. I would appreciate you presenting, if you will, for the record 

in tabular form the full account of the awards granted versus the 

applications for these three years we are talking about. And any 

other information you think would be relevant to help us assess 

where we are going with this program and where we need to go. 

Dr. BEMENT. Well we have that information. We would be 

pleased to provide it. 

[The information follows:] 


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Mr. PRICE. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. Mr. Schiff. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just at the outset want 

to comment that the work being done at the Research Triangle is 

incredibly valuable and important. Although I think we all have to 

acknowledge that it pales in significance next to Advanced LIGO, 

which I think is done, oh, actually in my district. 

Mr. PRICE. I am shocked, Mr. Schiff, that you would even broach 

the subject. 

NSF FUNDING TRAJECTORY

Mr. SCHIFF. I want to ask you about a couple of things. And if 

there is time, get back to Advanced LIGO. 

In terms of the overall budget for NSF, had you not been dinged 

by the Omnibus last year and gotten an increase last year that 

would have put you on track to double your funding, does the 13 

percent increase this year make you whole in terms of where you 

would be on that trajectory? Or is it still short of that? If it is short 

of that, when you submitted the budget request or the proposal to 

OMB did you ask for more? That is my first question. 

Why don’t you go ahead, either one of you. And I have a followup question. 

Dr. BEMENT. Well let me say that we are delighted, considering 

the amount of funding available for non-defense, discretionary 

spending, that the President has put us in a position where we can 

stay in the doubling track. So the 13 percent would keep us on that 

track. 

Mr. SCHIFF. So if you had gotten the increase last year, you 

wouldn’t be any further ahead if you get the full 13 percent this 

year? 

Dr. BEMENT. Well if we had gotten the request last year, that 

would have been part of the 13 percent. So that would have made 

up about 7 percent of the 13 percent. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Okay. 

Dr. BEMENT. So this would be a continuation. 

Mr. SCHIFF. And I realize that your grantees would be further 

along—— 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. 

Mr. SCHIFF [continuing]. If that happened. I am glad to see that 

the funding trajectory in the proposed budget has been restored. 

Dr. BEMENT. Well, there were a large number of programs that 

had to be put on hold. And there were a number of other programs 

that had to be flat funded. And quite frankly, there are certain facilities where there may have to be reductions in force as a result 

of that. 

POLITICIZATION OF SCIENCE

Mr. SCHIFF. Dr. Beering, let me ask you as an independent advisor to the Congress and the Administration, over the last several 

years there have been concerns raised in different fields within 

science and the Administration of politization of science. This was 

most notable in areas like global warming. From time to time large 

groups of scientists would write to raise this issue—that they considered that science was being put aside. 


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Is there anything going on now in any of the areas of science that 

our government is involved in? Do you think that the scientific conclusions are being either ignored, changed, altered, diminished for 

reasons that are separate and apart from good science? 

Dr. BEERING. Well in general I would say no. But there are some 

indications, for example, off and on that stem cell research has 

major promise for the treatment of diabetes, particularly juvenile 

diabetes and Parkinson’s disease to cite two. And there is more interest on the part of the private sector than on the part of the public sector to support that. That is more on the NIH side than it is 

on NSF. That is the only one I cite right now. 

Mr. SCHIFF. I don’t know if you have anything you would like to 

add on that question as well. 

Dr. BEMENT. Well we do have a robust program in determining 

the rate of climate change. And, of course, that is different in different parts of the world. So we study it in the polar regions especially, because that is where the change is most dramatic. 

We make all of our results publicly available. But we—— 

Mr. SCHIFF. Are either of you in a position where scientists who 

work within the Administration come to you and say, look, the 

work that I am doing and the conclusions that I am reaching are 

being misrepresented or are not being given the kind of public 

scrutiny that they deserve for reasons that I don’t think are appropriate and are undercutting our work? 

Are you the kind of positions that people would go to if they had 

those concerns? Have you heard those concerns? 

Dr. BEMENT. As a matter of policy, we don’t try to represent the 

research results of our grantees. We expect that they will present 

that type of information and full disclosure of their data in the 

open literature or other open formats on the Internet. 

So we look to the community itself to develop their own conclusions. Now just to give you a snapshot of where I think the community is at the present time, there is absolutely no doubt that we are 

entering a period of global warming. I think that issue has a clear 

consensus. 

There is also a clear consensus within the community that there 

is an anthropogenic forcing effect. That human beings are part of 

the problem. 

Where there is a lack of consensus is the degree to which that 

forcing function is driving our current climate change. How much 

is cyclical and how much of it is due to anthropogenic effect. 

And so there is a wide range of opinion. And it will take time, 

I believe, for the community, through further research, to narrow 

that range of variability on that issue. 

So I think that is pretty much where things are at the present 

time. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Am I out of time? Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. Mr. Culberson. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This is I think the 

most satisfying part of my job is being able to help this wonderful 

Subcommittee, where there are no partisan distinctions when it 

comes to investing in the sciences and in NASA and in protecting 

the future of this country by investing in basic R&D. 


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It is the one area I know that we can invest our dollars and 

know that it is truly going to improve the quality of life for our 

kids and our grandchildren. 

And it is—I mean it sincerely, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Frelinghuysen, 

and all of you. It is just a joy to work with you, because we are 

all on the same page. And it is a lot of fun knowing that we have 

got these wonderful—this wonderful, friendly competition going between North Carolina and California. And Rice University, with 

nanotechnology research, the work being done at the Texas Medical 

Center, where they are using gold nanoshells where they appear to 

have essentially cured cancer in soft tissue cancers using these gold 

nanoshells. And work that is being done with single wall carbon 

nanotubes at Rice University to improve the semiconductor, making Moore’s law. 

Chairman Price, perhaps you are right. Absolutely using 

nanotechnology to make Moore’s law obsolete is—it is just exciting 

stuff. 

My hero, Thomas Jefferson, always said he liked the dreams of 

the future better than the memories of the past. And this is the 

one area where we can make the dreams of the future come true. 

So I am thrilled to be a part of this Subcommittee and to help with 

it. 

And certainly to see the 13 percent increase. And Mr. Schiff’s 

question is right on target. I am sorry you got dinged by the Omnibus but that the 13 percent gets you back on track. 

And thinking about the strategic importance of the National 

Science Foundation to the future of the Nation. And the need to 

keep you on a path to doubling and sort of insulated process, reminds me of the—if you think about the Congress over the years 

has insulated the Federal Reserve Board from the pressures of politics by setting them out to serve as an independent agency. 

The Congress has over the years protected the Government Accountability Office from the pressures of politics. And set them up 

as sort of an independent agency. The Congress has sort of insulated the Pentagon as essential to our strategic survival as immune 

from politics largely. And sort of set them and given them some 

special protections against the currents and winds of politics. 

And I really hope—I would really love to work with the members 

of this Subcommittee and think of a way, for example, for the—following up on what Mr. Honda is talking about when it comes to 

strategic planning for education. 

Why don’t we think about long-term legislation? I would love to 

see the National Science Board for example be given the authority 

to give us a yearly budget. Just completely take science out of the 

President and the Executive Branch budgeting process. And let the 

National Science Board give the Appropriations Committee essentially a recommendation on what they think the funding level 

should be that is immune from politics and completely separate. 

I think we owe that to our kids and grandkids. NASA frankly 

ought to be in the same boat. I just threw it out, because I think 

it is important we think outside the box. 

We are facing challenges that this Nation has never really encountered before. And it is deeply disturbing. You are exactly right, 

Dr. Bement, to point out Norman Augustine’s comment that unless 


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we make substantial investments in basic scientific research, that 

the next generation of kids and our children and grandchildren 

may be the first in our Nation’s history to see a lower standard of 

living. 

And I couple that with the fact that the GAO—and I don’t know 

if many of us have focused on this or seen it, because it is not— 

may be not widely known. But David Walker, the Comptroller of 

the United States, has calculated that the existing financial obligations of the United States are about $54 trillion. It works out to 

$175,000 a person. We would all have to write a check for $175,000 

to pay off the existing obligations of Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and the other federal government programs. 

And the only way we are going to dig out of that hole is by not 

only strict fiscal discipline here, and not just on this Committee, 

but on Ways on Means, all the authorizing committees for the big 

social programs. But investing in science. I mean, you truly, 

throughout the Nation’s history it has always been the investments 

in science that have made the—helped it—you know, increases in 

productivity, increases in scientific advancement. 

We even have the possibility, Mr. Chairman and members, I— 

in talking to the scientists at the Texas Medical Center, not only 

have they—I don’t have a question here, because I am totally committed to you guys. I just wanted to share this with the Committee. 

They have literally almost cured cancer. 

They have literally been using gold nanoshells that they—two female chemists at Rice University have developed. They can create 

a batch of gold nanoshells that will stick to only a particular type 

of cancer. And they inject them in your body. They will after 72 

hours shine an infrared light on your body that travels through 

your body like our body is as transparent as glass. And the gold 

nanoshells then heat up under the infrared light killing the cancer 

cell they are sticking to. 

And without drugs, without surgery, without side effects, without 

chemotherapy, it kills every cancer cell in your body. And you are 

cured. And it works. Appears to be 100 percent effective. They are 

testing it now in head, neck, and throat cancers. 

That research is also leading to the—and this is being done in 

California as well. I am not sure about North Carolina or elsewhere. But I hope it is, because we all need to work together on 

this. But they can also take this a step further. Just to throw this 

out to you all. 

This is why this is so important what we do here and also at the 

National Institutes of Health, which by the way also needs to be 

pulled out of politics, because it is absurd that they have a flat 

funding this year. It is ridiculous. 

But very quickly, just let me share this with you. They cannot 

only with gold nanoshells cure cancer, but now technology they are 

developing nanosponges that they can—when a child is in the 

womb, with the amniocentesis not only determine if the child has 

birth defects, but identify genetically based diseases such as—Lou 

Gehrig’s disease or polio or diabetes, et cetera. 

And this is literally being worked on right now in the Texas 

Medical Center using nanotechnology and research grants coming 

from the NIH and National Science Foundation. If the child is geVerDate Aug 31 2005 00:38 Aug 03, 2008 Jkt 042708 PO 00000 Frm 00500 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A708P2.001 A708P2

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netically predisposed to a particular disease, whip up a batch of 

nanosponges. And with a protein fix they can fix the genetic defect 

by reinjecting that back into the amniotic fluid. Which the child 

will then take up and cure the child’s diseases before she is born. 

Just extraordinary. And that is all there within our reach. But 

every year you guys have to go from pillar to post, and fight the 

bean counters at OMB, and make the case to them that you need 

this funding. I mean, it is just absurd. 

And there are no party labels in this Committee. It is one of 

my—the whole Committee has been wonderful about it, but particularly this Subcommittee. And on Homeland Security, I mean, 

we are focused on the needs of the nation. 

I just want to tell you how proud I am of the work you are doing. 

How I am of this Subcommittee and how devoted I am. As conservative as I am, this is the one area where the answer is always yes. 

And I am just very proud of you. And look forward to working with 

you Mr. Chair, Mr. Frelinghuysen, and the Subcommittee members 

to make the dreams of the future come true. 

Dr. BEMENT. It only amplifies very elegantly the importance of 

one transformative idea. And that is where we are focused: at the 

frontier and supporting transformative research. 

STEM EDUCATION RESEARCH

Ms. MELVIN. Thank you, John. Mr. Culberson states the sentiment of the Committee. And you have to look on that—just compelled to say right now is you have to look to the Committees mark 

as it came out of Committee to appreciate the—this Subcommittee’s 

sentiment with regard to the National Science Foundation. And 

there is chagrin shared by every member of the Committee in the 

ding that you experienced in the Omnibus. We regret that. But we 

are glad to see your request put you back on track. 

There is a lot of interesting STEM research in education. What 

we do, what we model, how we model it, how you scale it up. I 

would like to give both of you an opportunity just to kind of summarize your feelings about what we ought to be doing in order to 

meet the challenge that is presented by—every year report to the 

Committee that we are falling behind or we are not catching up 

with regard to producing enough scientists and engineers. And 

what we need to do in our educational system in order to solve that 

problem. And every year we talk about it. And this does not seem 

to be a solution. 

But what are we doing? What is NSF’s role? And is there adequate funding? 

Dr. BEMENT. I would like to focus for a moment on a very important element of education, which really deals with the goals of the 

America COMPETES Act and also the American Competitiveness 

Initiative, to stimulate innovation in the country. 

If you look at the growth of the STEM workforce, there are some 

problematic issues. The growth in the demand for stem scientists 

and engineers is growing at the rate of about five percent a year 

in high-tech industries especially. 

However, the growth in degree production is only going up at the 

rate of 11⁄2 percent a year. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I’m sorry, the growth in what? 


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Dr. BEMENT. Degree production is about 11⁄2 percent a year in 

science and engineering in STEM areas. 

The serious factor on top of that is that we are beginning to retire significant numbers of baby boomers. And that retirement rate 

will also begin to increase over the next five to ten years. 

So we are going to see very high level talent hollowed out from 

some of our laboratories, both defense and non-defense, and also 

from some of our industry laboratories. 

So the budget request for 2009 addresses that. And I should say 

that we don’t prioritize separately science from education, because 

they are integrated. Research and education are totally integrated 

along with broadening participation in the Foundation. So they are 

all equally important. 

And as an illustration of that, we support the education and 

training of our graduate students through the research grants that 

we provide. And 95 percent of our total budget goes out the door 

in the form of grants. 

Now in 2009, we will be able to support the education and training just through our research grants of 40,775 graduate students, 

which will be an increase from 2008 to 2009 of 5,000 graduate students. 

Through our fellowships and traineeships, we will be able to provide fellowship and traineeship support to 5,450 graduate students. 

Those are the students in the next three to four years, five years 

perhaps at the outset, that are going to provide a stimulus to keeping our innovation system strong, and help offset some of the losses 

that we are likely to see over the next five years due to retirements 

and other factors. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Does this solve our problem? 

Dr. BEMENT. It would certainly be a step in the right direction. 

It is pretty hard to know what would totally solve the problem. I 

don’t think the numbers are adequate. But I think they are going 

to be helpful. 

GRADUATE RESEARCH FELLOWSHIPS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The graduate research fellowships you are talking about, is that what you are talking about—— 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes, the graduate research fellowships. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. A 32 percent increase in—— 

Dr. BEMENT. There is a 32 percent increase, which will increase 

the number of graduate research fellowships by 700, which is a significant increase. And it will make up for some of the losses in 

2008 for that matter. 

I should point out that in our graduate research fellowships, our 

flagship fellowship program, about 73 percent of those who get 

these fellowships go on and complete their PhD. And over the history of this fellowship program, we have supported the work of 29 

Nobel Laureates. 

Furthermore, Sergey Brin, who is the founder of Google, started 

his research with a graduate research fellowship at Stanford in 

ranking websites. And, of course, what we see is a return on that 

investment in a relatively short period of time, in ten years or less. 

So these are the types of returns we are getting from this fellowship program. And it is also a way of providing talent directly to 


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both universities and industry. As they graduate, they take with 

them their knowledge, their skills, their understanding of where 

the frontier is, what new ideas are viable, commercially viable, that 

can make a difference. And, of course, it is not just in industrial 

settings. It is also in medicine and many other settings as well. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, that part of your answer focuses at the 

graduate level. 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. 

PRE-K TO 12 EDUCATION

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Should we be doing something at the earlier? 

Dr. BEMENT. Absolutely. It has to be along the entire pipeline. 

And it is for that reason that the Foundation starts even before 

kindergarten, pre-K all the way to postdocs. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I know you do, but what should we be doing at 

pre-K and K through 12? And are we doing it? And is there adequate funding for it? 

Dr. BEMENT. We should be, to start with, starting earlier in exposing young minds to hands-on activity related to science and engineering technology. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are you looking at how you do that? 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. It is a very important part of our program. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And when do you—— 

Dr. BEMENT. It is not just in doing research on how early that 

can be effective, but what else should be taught in the earlier 

grades. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Well—— 

Dr. BEMENT. But also how to prepare teachers to provide that 

type of education. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Well, just focusing on that very early age, 

what are you doing, and I’m not saying you alone? What are we 

doing as a Nation? And I am very interested in the NSF’s role. 

With regard to pre-K, the group you are talking about right now, 

what should we be doing? What are we doing? Is there adequate 

funding? 

It is one thing to do it in the laboratory, but how do you communicate this to the educational community and implement it? And is 

it possible to implement it? 

Dr. BEMENT. I think you are getting in an area where I should 

have Dr. Ward respond. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Sure. 

Dr. BEMENT. Dr. Ward is Deputy Assistant to the Director of our 

EHR Directorate. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Because honestly every year we say this. We 

have this discussion. But the products maybe aren’t developed. But 

they are not implemented. They don’t become a part of the educational system. So—— 

Dr. WARD. May I speak loudly? 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yes. 

Dr. WARD. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You certainly may. Yes. 


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MATH AND SCIENCE PARTNERSHIP PROGRAM

Dr. WARD. I would follow along what Director Bement mentioned 

earlier. Just one example is the Math and Science Partnership. 

And that is a program that focuses very heavily on teacher education, most particularly professional development of existing 

teachers. 

But some aspects of pre-service also, trying to make the connection before students actually become teachers. We have evidence 

based on some of the tools that have been developed with the Math 

and Science Partnership, working in close collaboration with the 

Department of Education. That even early in this program, which 

began around 2000 or so, we are seeing significant improvement in 

student test scores, which is one indicator. Not the only indicator. 

But in both science and math, at the elementary through the 

high school level, through the math and science program, they 

work very—in a very engaged fashion as Dr.—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So you are employing this program on a trial 

basis in some areas—— 

Dr. WARD. Well MSP is—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is that—— 

Dr. WARD [continuing]. Nationwide. And it has almost 52 partnerships in existence now. And we have evidence of the effectiveness of this large teacher education program. And it results in the 

students—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So it is still a trial. How would you characterize 

the effort? Is it a trial? 

Dr. WARD. It is trial in the sense of the development of research 

and development of assessment tools of curriculum practices, of 

master/teacher strategies, and the like. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What is it called? 

Dr. WARD. Math and Science Partnership. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Math and Science Partnership. 

Dr. WARD. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And when do you draw conclusions about the 

success of the program and make recommendations based upon 

that success? 

Dr. WARD. That is part of the scale up and transfer—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. When does that happen? 

Dr. WARD. After adequate assessment. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, I mean, I was looking for kind of a period, 

a time. Two thousand ten or two thousand nine. 

Dr. WARD. Well recently some of the evidence that we have as 

recently as 2006 is convincing enough. It is early data. But it is 

convincing enough that it is being adopted by some of the state 

education MSPs. Policies are being implemented statewide in 

places like Georgia. Other locations as well on the basis of convincing evidence that is resulting from assessments underway by 

some of the best experts in the field. 

And, again, this is from elementary through high school. It is encouraging. It is still early. But it is encouraging. It is impressive 

enough to be picked up by the state level. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you anticipate it being—I don’t know how 

you would characterize it, but a product that can be taken by a 


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school system at different grade levels and implemented in their 

system and—— 

Dr. WARD. We have many examples of that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yeah. Well, that’s exciting. 

Dr. WARD. We are working with the University of Michigan. 

Statewide work in Georgia now adopted from those kinds of assessments. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And it is still ongoing. I would be interested in 

following up. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Would the Chair yield? 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Since he is finished, I will yield to you. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You might just remain standing for a 

minute if you don’t mind. Thank you. 

On the Math and Science Partnerships, I want to get a little 

more specific. Most of the money goes to the U.S. Department of 

Education, is that right, about $179 million. The National Science 

Foundation portion is $51 million. Is that flat, or has there been 

a reduction? And if there has been a reduction, was there some sort 

of method to that? 

Dr. WARD. A few years ago there was a very steep reduction to 

the NSF investment in the Math and Science Partnership. We are 

very encouraged that we are seeing a reversal of that. Even last 

year, there was a significant reinfusion of funds back into the Math 

and Science Partnership. And even now there is about—I believe 

about a five percent, five and a half percent, growth rate. And as 

was mentioned earlier, as existing awards come to completion, we 

can fund up to 15 to 20 new Math and Science Partnerships over 

several categories of this program. 

So we are pleased about that. We are pleased about the impact 

that we can make, not only in the return of our budget. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Okay. 

Dr. WARD. But, again, in terms of being able to transfer and disseminate the findings of these tools at the research throughout all 

of the Math and Science Partnership. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you for the good work you are doing. 

Dr. BEMENT. I can augment that just a moment. And Dr. Ward 

hopefully will correct me if my numbers wrong. But I think at the 

present time we have Math and Science Partnerships in about 30 

states; is that correct? 

Dr. WARD. That is correct. 

Dr. BEMENT. And about two thirds of the states are participating 

in implementation of some of the methods that are developed out 

of our Math and Science Partnership. And that is through full participation of the Department of Education, which has responsibility 

for scaling these programs up. 

So I see our respective roles of the National Science Foundation 

doing the research and development to determine what works and 

can be shown to work through effective evaluation and the Department of Education working with the states and with the National 

Science Foundation to make what works work more broadly in our 

education systems. 

Now at present, we only touch about 5 percent of all the school 

districts in the country. There are roughly 15,000 to 16,000 school 

districts. So it is a daunting task to carry on that transformation 


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throughout the country. But that is what we have to do. That is 

the challenge that we have. And that is where the—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I don’t mean to be solicitous. You have 

huge credibility. 

Dr. BEMENT. We have a large footprint. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes, you do. And not to say that the Department of Education doesn’t. But when your stamp of approval 

goes on there, a lot of thought, and time, and effort goes into it. 

I commend you for your involvement. And at every opportunity, we 

need to promote. 

Dr. BEMENT. And I see the good work of the Board in developing 

their action plan is addressing that issue. 

INTERNATIONAL POLAR YEAR

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I wasn’t leaving the Board out. But I appreciate their support. 

Dr. Bement, I want to shift somewhat dramatically, but not because of the absence of the Chairman. Your involvement as the 

lead agency for the International Polar Year—— 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I sort of wear my heart on my sleeve. I 

would like you to talk about your leadership in that arena. Where 

are we working with our international partners? And why these 

polar missions, and particularly our work at the South Pole, is so 

important in the overall scheme of things, relative to scientific exploration, pushing that envelope in those unique harsh regions. 

Dr. BEMENT. Well I think our leadership has existed on several 

fronts. One is we were the lead agency for the interagency program 

of the U.S. and our being involved in the International Polar Year. 

But we have also worked with international organizations as 

well, ICSU and some of the other international organizations that 

started this whole initiative, the International Polar Year. 

But also we have taken a multi-national approach and both in 

the Arctic and the Antarctic we have multi-national initiatives. Not 

only to study climate change, but also ice sheet stability and other 

global issues that are before us. 

For example, in the Antarctic, you saw the Andrill Coring Operation. That was an international partnership. Some of the coring 

that is going throughout the ice sheet in the Antarctic involves cooperation with several nations. 

In the Arctic, we are working with a number of nations now to 

set up an Arctic Observing Network. 

So it is not just what is occurring in the International Polar 

Year, which will end this year. It is the legacy that we will leave 

behind that will be ongoing activities involving international participation. 

But also in capturing all the data that is coming out of this twoyear effort and mining it in the future to get a better understanding. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. It has been a while since we have had an 

International Polar Year. 

Dr. BEMENT. That is right. They come every 50 years. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. It has been a while. The effort is something which I quite honestly was not totally aware of. 


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Dr. BEMENT. Well we are putting infrastructure in place that 

didn’t exist before the International Polar Year. And that new infrastructure will support science going forward over the next—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Your Office of Polar Programs has an 11 

percent increase. And I assume you are going to put that to good 

purposes. 

Dr. BEMENT. Absolutely. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I just had a comment. As I said earlier, I 

was impressed by the dedication and relative youth of those that 

are involved with the research on behalf of the National Science 

Foundation and other federal agencies. 

And the university connections, and obviously people are very 

proud of their own university-based research, and I think we had 

a brief discussion. I think that the National Science Foundation 

ought to be somewhat—I won’t say selfishly more identified with 

some of those projects, because were it not for your—you know, the 

reviews that you make in a very—some of those university-based 

projects would perhaps never see the light of day. 

I do hope and I know that each of these sites that I visited has 

a Web site. And in reality we need to put a human face, even 

though it may be difficult for me to explain exactly what—although 

I did see certain things in the sediment. To think that you could 

actually transmit that scientist, that man or woman, the work that 

they are doing, right into an American classroom, that speaks of 

why we—why we are doing so much in terms of STEM education. 

I just wondered if you would speak to that issue briefly. 

Dr. BEMENT. I am glad that you brought that up, because it is 

a very important part or our International Polar Year. Apart from 

the publications that each of the individual scientists put into the 

public domain, we have, as part of our leadership, established an 

IPY Web site that brings together all the work of all the agencies 

that have been involved in this program, and makes that information available to the public. 

In addition to that, through our public outreach activities, and 

our Office of Public and Legislative Affairs, we have any number 

of initiatives, more than I could recite briefly, but we can submit 

this for the record, where we are informing the public not only 

through museums but by other means. And I would like to have 

the opportunity to provide that information. 

[The information follows:] 

NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION PUBLIC OUTREACH ACTIVITIES

The National Science Foundation’s Office of Legislative and Public Affairs has 

formed a variety of partnerships to communicate science broadly through print, 

broadcast and multimedia outlets, including the Internet, newspapers, magazines, 

public forums, television, and radio. Below are a few examples. 

NATIONAL MEDIA PARTNERSHIPS

NSF has partnered with the ResearchChannel to provide 150 hours of programming a year. The programming includes a series of scientific lectures, panel discussions, and new and archived video from research and educational communities. 

ResearchChannel is available in more than 26 million U.S. households. Another recent partnership is with U.S. News & World Report. NSF provides weekly content 

for the newsmagazine’s science section on http://www.usnews.com/sections/science/ 

index.html. In addition, NSF works with universities and colleges around the Nation to publish weekly articles and daily images or video to Live Science (http:// 


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www.livescience.com/index2.html), an online community news resource that attracts 

more than 4 million visitors each month. 

NEW ONLINE TOOLS

NSF is collaborating with the AAAS Center for Public Engagement with Science 

and Technology to offer online communication webinars, how-to tips for media interviews, strategies for identifying public outreach opportunities, and more via ‘‘Communicating Science: Tools for Scientists and Engineers’’ (http:// 

communicatingscience.aaas.org/Pages/newmain.aspx). And, in order to better illustrate the outcomes of NSF-funded research, NSF is developing a Science and Innovation Web site that highlights research by state, region, and Congressional district. 

This site is under development and will be launched in fall 2008. 

COLLABORATIVE EFFORTS

NSF’s public affairs office has established two-day workshops with public information officers at American colleges, universities, and research institutions to foster 

stronger collaborative communications efforts. A related Web site—the Public Information Officer Resource Center—offers a forum to share ideas and learn more about 

how NSF can help reach diverse audiences: http://www.nsf.gov/news/nsfpio//. 

POLAR ICEBREAKING

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well thank you. And lastly, we had some 

discussion with Dr. Marburger. I am not sure we caught him off 

guard on the fact that our Antarctic stations are dependent on ice 

breaking capability. I am not sure he was prepared for that question. 

Could you sort of talk about that issue just for the record? Obviously, we have been able to count on a far and assist. But the Committee had some interest yesterday. Maybe that was reported to 

you, where we should be making investments. And we certainly 

don’t want to do it at the expense of your budget. 

Dr. BEMENT. Our primary interest is, of course, to support 

science in these extreme environments. So the ice breaking we support. It is primarily for that mission only. Recognizing that there 

are other missions for ice breakers. 

With regard to that responsibility, we are also required under executive directive that we do it in a most cost effective way. And we 

have benefitted from the availability of the Oden to break through 

the ice to McMurdo. Primarily because they bring their own fuel, 

they are not dependent on McMurdo. They have berthing space and 

laboratory space to support scientists. So it is really a research vessel as well. And that is an added benefit. 

But getting beyond ice breakers per se, we are also trying to invest in our infrastructure to use renewable energy, instead of using 

fuel to reduce the fuel loading. But also to find alternate ways to 

transport fuel from McMurdo to the South Pole. And improve our 

storage capacity, so it may not in the future be necessary that we 

break through the ice each and every year. We will have enough 

storage capability to perhaps skip a year from time to time. 

Those are the economies that we constantly look at with regard 

to logistics support. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Honda. 

Mr. HONDA. Thank you. If I could direct the question to the Assistant Secretary. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Deputy. 


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PRE-K TO 12 PROGRAMMING

Mr. HONDA. I am sorry, I didn’t know your name. But just to 

pick up the conversation on what the Chair had asked about. The 

question really was towards pre-kindergarten I believe. And you 

were addressing kindergarten and on. 

What are the kind of activities that are being geared towards 

pre-K and those from K–12 on? My sense of what is going on in 

the field is that what you are describing is not really out there as 

of yet. You said there are 20 states, two third of the 30, which is 

20 states, that are actively involved. Do you have a written report 

on this kind of activity? 

Dr. WARD. I certainly can provide that. We can provide ample detail to that. 

Mr. HONDA. By when? 

Dr. WARD. But thank you also for the follow up. In addition to 

that program, and I will—you are correct. The emphasis is on elementary through high school. There is some involvement through 

significant outreach through parental involvement and the like, 

even at the pre-K before they actually get to kindergarten. 

But another very important avenue for us at NSF is through our 

Informal Science Education program. We can provide that information to you as well. There is significant outreach through exhibits, 

through the media, Bill Nye the Science Guy, through our teacher 

proposals. 

[The information follows:] 


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Mr. HONDA. Okay. So that you will have that in writing. And the 

mechanism by which you extend this information. 

Dr. WARD. Absolutely. 

STEM POLICY NATIONWIDE

Mr. HONDA. But this is not in a formal manner. It is what you 

are doing as a matter of course at this point in time. 

The issue about the council and the office of STEM education, 

the office of education, as a person from that department, is there 

a need for this focus in order for us to be able to move forward and 

accomplish what we are asking about the coordination of the different disciplines? And the disciplines are only in the science areas. 

It is not in ethics or any other humanities, which I think it should 

be part of the full educational process. So that we have citizens 

who understand, who are exposed to science as well as the humanities. 

But the Office of Education and establishing the Office of STEM 

Education, is that something that you see as necessary to accomplish the goals that have been laid out? I know it is a loaded question. 

Dr. BEMENT. That is a question for the Administration. I can’t 

really speak for the Administration on that issue. 

Mr. HONDA. Well, we are putting together a bill. And that was 

part of your action plan. It was part of your recommendation. 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. But the report put out by the Board was not 

just for the NSF. It was for the federal government at large. So it 

was policy advice to the Administration for the most part. 

In other words, it is a report for the nation more than anything 

else. Would you—— 

Dr. BEERING. I think the problems that we are confronting today 

as a world, which is a small world, a flat world, we can communicate instantly around the globe, are really issues of humanity 

and society that affect everybody. And it is not just while the manifestations may be local, it isn’t just an American problem or a Japanese or Chinese problem. It is a global problem. 

And so I look forward to presenting to you the ideas that come 

from our international task force, which we will get to you in a 

matter of weeks. 

And the key word there is partnerships around the globe. And 

we would like to foster an environment where we work together on 

commonly recognized issues that affect all of us. 

And I guess what is the biggest challenge is going back to Plato 

and Aristotle and Socrates is how can we frame the best questions 

to address all of these issues that would be understood and subscribed to by the people around the world? 

We need to take the lead in that, because we have the resources, 

we have the background. We have the fundamental ability to make 

a huge difference for everybody. And I look forward to that. 

Mr. HONDA. Through the Chair again. Intellectually I understand what you said. Practically in terms of taking action, we know 

what we have to do. You laid it out there as recommendations of 

a plan of action. 

You know, to be partners and full partners, we have to be prepared to do that. And part of that preparation it seems like we are 


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not preparing our systems to do that. We know what we have to 

do. We know how to extend Moore’s law to 2010–2020. The nano 

initiative says that. We can accomplish income that exceeds a trillion dollars. And also extend Moore’s law. I think it is up to 50 

years in this arena. 

The more I know these factors, it seems to me somehow there 

should be a sense of urgency to have our departments work together, come out with a plan, and lay it out in front of us so that 

we can say ‘‘yea’’ or ‘‘nay’’ and fund it appropriately, teacher education, student preparation, and parent participation. 

Maybe I am missing something. 

Dr. BEERING. I think you are right on. And I love the attitude 

that you have all displayed here. And I would like to take up Mr. 

Culberson’s charge to be nonpolitical and nonpartisan. And not be 

constrained by arbitrary budget restrictions. It would be exciting. 

GRADUATE RESEARCH FELLOWSHIPS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. And Dr. Bement, when I left we 

were talking about education funding. And I wanted to give you an 

opportunity to speak to the graduate resource fellows program. We 

understand how important they are and how important they are to 

you. Your request in 2009 is for $117 million. That is—if this is accurate, this is a 32 percent increase. But it is actually a request 

above the authorization. So do you know you are asking for a request above the authorization? 

I mean, it is fine that you do that. But I want to give you an 

opportunity to—— 

Dr. BEMENT. I wasn’t aware of that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yes. I just want to give you an opportunity to 

talk about how important that program is to you, because that is 

a big increase you are asking. 

Dr. BEMENT. I think it is the most important investment we can 

make in our graduate education program and in our fellowship program. 

I think I expressed myself a little bit earlier about the impact of 

that program, potential impact, and why we consider it so important. 

The more top talent that we can put out into our innovation system in the short term, in the next four or five years, the better. 

I believe this is one of the best investments we can make. And I 

would give that very high priority. 

EPSCOR FUNDING

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Thank you. You in your op plan, and we 

just received it last night, I had a chance to see it. I knew you were 

the high-tech agency. When it came across, we couldn’t open it last 

night. Maybe it was our fault. 

Your justification would suggest that you are going to recommend funding EPSCoR at $111 million. 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. We included $115 million in the conference 

agreement. So you have nicked that. And then your 2009 request 

is $114 million. 


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Dr. BEMENT. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So how do you—what is your reason? 

Dr. BEMENT. Well, first of all, we consider the EPSCoR a major 

program as far as the American Competitiveness Initiative. We 

can’t meet the Nation’s goals to be internationally competitive 

without full participation of the EPSCoR states. 

In structuring the budget, however, we pay attention to the number of commitments we have in terms of continuing grants, renewal 

grants, and also new proposals for all of the 27 states that are part 

of the initiative and the two districts. 

And as we look at the 2009 budget year, we feel that we put 

enough funding in for all the expected RII grants and also the 

track 2 grants. So we feel we not only are prepared to meet those 

commitments, but we might even have a little extra money left 

over, which is often the case. And it means carrying over funding 

from year to year. And, of course, that funding got rescinded as 

part of the Omnibus Bill. 

The problem we have is lack of flexibility, because there is a partition of what we can put into the RII program and what we can 

put into the co-pay program. And I consider that unfortunate, because we have now increased the leveraging of the co-pay program 

over time. It used to be a dollar for dollar. Now it is two dollars 

for a dollar. So we get much more bang for the buck in order to 

leverage the funding in the EPSCoR account by funding provided 

by the other directorates. 

And it would be very helpful to us if we had the flexibility of taking money that we may not use for the RII grants and put that into 

co-pay in order to use all the funding effectively. 

So the short answer to your question is I think I believe we have 

put enough money in the 2009 budget to meet all of our requirements. 

EPSCOR PROGRESS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. How are the states doing in the EPSCoR 

program? How do you measure how they are doing? 

Dr. BEMENT. Well one way we intend to measure it— first of all, 

I brought the program up to the office of the Director in order to 

try and make it more strategic and to put more of a planning component into the program. That has been embraced by each of the 

EPSCoR states. 

And they are now developing strategic plans, which not only deal 

with how they are going to invest the resources, but also how they 

are going to graduate over time. So it is a much more proactive 

stance than we have had in the program for some years. We 

haven’t seen those plans yet, but they will be forthcoming with new 

proposals. 

At the present time, looking at the states that are in the 

EPSCoR program, there is only one state that is close to graduating under the current criteria for graduation. And that state is 

just a little bit below the mark, which is .75 percent of the NSF 

budget. They are .7477 percent, which is getting awfully close, even 

out to the third decimal point. 

But that generally has to be sustained and demonstrated over a 

three-year period. Going beyond that one state, the numbers trail 


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off very rapidly. So many of the states are not going to be ready 

to graduate for many years to come. 

Through our outreach activity, we hope we can continue to improve the effectiveness of the program, but also improve the competitiveness of these states for getting grants in our base program 

through all of our directorates. And, of course, that will be the 

measure of success; how successful they are going to be in order to 

get normal grants and compete with other scientists throughout 

the community. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Thank you. Mr. Frelinghuysen. Oh, Mr. 

Latham. 

PLANT GENOME RESEARCH PROGRAM

Mr. LATHAM. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As I understand in your 

budget proposals, you proposed to move the National Plant Genome 

Research Program from one program to another. 

And there is great concern that this will effectively reduce the 

funding for that type of research by about 25 percent. Clearly, that 

would have a very negative impact as far as plant biology, as far 

as current/future crops. 

I just wondered if you could give me any assurance that type of 

reduction will not occur. The Chairman may remember we had a 

great witness at the end of last year that spoke about the importance of this project. If you could give me any kind of information. 

Dr. BEMENT. I can assure you that that program will not be reduced. It is one of our most important programs. In fact, it is more 

important now than it has been. We are making good progress in 

completing the understanding of Arabidopsis as a standard. 

We are now into a ten-year program to understand the expression of all the genes in the genome. That is critically important as 

a reference. 

We have a very active program in completing genomes for rice, 

maize, and other crops of economic importance. And now we are on 

the threshold of dealing with biomass for energy conversion. 

And so the science that we are doing on plants is also dealing 

with the recalcitrance of extracting sugars from these plants and 

also advanced processing. And perhaps even eventually getting to 

green gasoline, converting biomass directly to gasoline. That is 

quite possible. 

BIOFUEL RESEARCH

Mr. LATHAM. Yeah. Well and that is exactly my next question, 

talking about ‘‘green gasoline.’’ Could you maybe elaborate on that? 

And what other types of research projects are you funding in that 

biofuels, and you know, green gasoline area? And what impact? 

Dr. BEMENT. I can give you three or four examples. But I welcome being able to present a more complete—— 

Mr. LATHAM. Right. 

Dr. BEMENT [continuing]. Listing for the record. Investigators at 

the University of Wisconsin, in collaboration with the Danish Technical University and the Max Planck Institute in Munich, have explored the use of using inorganic catalysts to take the sugars that 

come out of the early extraction process, converting them directly 

to what is called furfurals, which is a precursor to gasoline. 


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Now that process has been brought to a demonstration stage. In 

fact, it is a truck-mounted demonstration we want to bring to the 

Hill one of these days to show you how this works. But we still 

have to get through that first stage of extracting the sugars from 

the biomass. 

Part of the research really has to do with how can you, by bioengineering, design plants that are more amendable to processing 

so that recalcitrance can be overcome? Some of this work is being 

done jointly with the Department of Energy as well. 

We have another program that deals with the biocatalysts, which 

are poisoned by the alcohol. And so there is a dilution factor. It has 

to be sufficiently dilute, so you don’t destroy the biocatalyst. 

Researchers at MIT are using genetic engineering to actually 

come up with biocatalysts that are much more resistant to alcohol 

poison. And we will be able to work with much more concentrated 

liquids, and get much higher yields. 

Finally, the third example would be work at UCLA, I believe, in 

looking at production of isobutanol, which is a much more effective 

fuel, insomuch as it has the same energy content as gasoline. It has 

a much lower vapor pressure than ethanol. And you don’t have to 

take range penalty as far as mileage in the blending of gasoline 

with alcohol. 

And there are many other advantages that have to do with compatibility in storage containers and so forth, because it doesn’t take 

up water as ethanol does. 

So those are just a few examples. 

[The information follows:] 


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Mr. LATHAM. What we do in this area is absolutely critical. We 

passed the energy bill last year with substantial renewable fuel 

standards. And a great deal coming from cellulose production of 

fuels. 

And we are not there. With current technology, there is no way 

we are going to meet that standard. And that is why I think your 

research is absolutely critical. 

Dr. BEMENT. Cellulose is about the only pathway forward. So we 

have to crack that. 

Mr. LATHAM. I guess I have a few other questions I would submit 

for the record. Is Culberson really with you on this stuff? 

Dr. BEMENT. We would welcome any of you to come to NSF and 

spend some time with us. 

AGENCY STEWARDSHIP

Mr. LATHAM. In your brochure here with your budget request— 

I understand the pie chart here and the discovery learning, research infrastructure, etc., and the $404 million of stewardship. 

From the description, I don’t know exactly what this is, ‘‘Support 

excellence in science and engineering research and education 

through a capable and responsive organization.’’ I am not sure 

what that is. Maybe it is—— 

Dr. BEMENT. That—— 

Mr. LATHAM. Maybe it is me. But what is ‘‘a capable and responsive organization’’? 

Dr. BEMENT. Almost the bulk of that is for agency operation and 

award management expenses. That includes salary and space. But 

it also includes our management of the whole grant processing 

cycle and also our pre-award and post-award auditing of performance under those grants. So it is something that involves the whole 

agency. 

In addition to that, it also includes support for physical security, 

as well as our information systems within the agency: Systems like 

FastLane, which is how proposals come to the Foundation, but also 

systems within the Foundation for processing those proposals. It 

deals with many other administrative systems that we have. 

And it also helps support upgrading some of our technology systems within the Foundation, which because of shortfalls in this account over the last two or three years, have gotten pretty seedy 

and really need to be replaced or refurbished. 

Mr. LATHAM. Maybe if you just point administrative costs, ongoing expenses to run—— 

Dr. BEMENT. This is within the five—— 

Mr. LATHAM. It may be a little clearer to me anyway. 

Dr. BEMENT. This is within our five percent overhead that makes 

the other 95 percent worthwhile. 

Mr. LATHAM. Thank you very much. And keep up the great work. 

Appreciate it. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

INTERNATIONAL COMPETITIVENESS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I just have a few sort of general comments. 

You know, as I read this report, and I know this is a distillation 


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of a much larger report, Dr. Beering, there is some level of optimism. 

Dr. BEERING. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. But then there is a sort of an onset of 

somewhat pessimistic projections. You know, we are three years 

into the American Competitiveness Initiative. And I am not quite 

sure how we judge our success to date, how you would. How do we 

define and measure how we are doing in the competitiveness 

arena? 

And I don’t want to have this a play on words. But, you know, 

when you talk about the American Competitiveness Initiative, and 

I don’t mean to be Chinese centric here, but let us say that there 

is a countervailing for us in the Pacific known as Chinese competitive initiative. They have quite a different system of government. 

And they can make things happen. 

We have our own stove pipes. We have our structure. We have 

our own, these days, architecture, all this. You know, I sort of 

would like to have a better handle as to how we are doing relative 

to what appears to be in your own words here, ‘‘their acceleration 

on a lot of fronts.’’ 

I serve on the Defense Appropriations Committee. 

I get the view that they are doing things in their education system, obviously, dealing with a massive population. But they are 

teaching English starting in the second or third grade. I mean, we 

would have to have one major transformation in our country to 

meet the Chinese competitive initiative, if there is one. 

I sort of was sharing somewhat anecdotally when I should have 

been paying attention. I was so enthused by Congressman 

Culberson. We look towards the next budget cycle. And, you know, 

that the fact that 1,000 young people might not get their scholarship grants. But our Chinese competitors, and I am not picking on 

the Chinese, I am hugely admiring, they are looking towards 10 or 

15 or 20 years. 

Here we are on the edge of a recession. They are not immune to 

the things that are out there. They may, in fact, in some ways contribute to it. Some say they might provide stability by owning our 

paper. They maybe even own some of our subprimes. Somebody’s 

got to own them. 

I want to sort of get your take on where we are going. I am not 

an alarmist. There is a little bit of sugarcoating here. 

Would you react to my statement? I know I have been all over 

the map. But I think we are dealing with a major power here that 

really has got its act together. 

Dr. BEERING. I guess a good summary would be that we are not 

falling further behind in this particular set of indicators, as compared to previous two-year reviews of that. And we admire what 

they are doing in the Far East. And certainly there are cultural differences that are profound. 

The individual initiative that is exhibited by Koreans and the 

Chinese students is extraordinary. We see that in our own universities when they come here. They work day and night. They don’t 

seem to need to sleep or eat. They are just constantly engaged. And 

it is tough for our students when they see an Asian student in their 

midst to try to out compete that person. So they just give up. They 


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say, ‘‘Well, we know they are smart. They wouldn’t be here otherwise. They work harder. And so we will just let them do their 

thing.’’ 

And when you go over there, which I have done, and you see 

what happens there, it is astounding. They bring their mats to the 

office and to the laboratory. They don’t even go home. And they are 

just there. They work. That is a cultural thing that I don’t think 

we can bring about here. 

I see some of this in Ireland by the way where I have also visited. And the parent involvement there is profound in their K–12 

system. And it is not acceptable to drop out of school like we have 

a huge problem here with school drop outs all over the country. It 

is just not done. And the parents see to it that the kids do their 

homework. They actually come to school with them. And they help 

the teachers in the classroom. And it is a kind of a community effort. 

Well it is not a community effort in the United States unfortunately. And we hope that we can focus ourselves on these challenges and do better. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. To some extent, you know, obviously we 

don’t want to denigrate our own system. Obviously, part of what 

we want here is to have the workforce of the future. 

Dr. BEERING. Yeah. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. We know where their workforce is. They 

are pretty demonstrative now. They are not waiting. A lot of countries are not waiting. 

And then, we ring our hands obviously at the loss of our industrial base, which is pretty difficult to ever recapture. 

Dr. BEERING. Right. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I obviously congratulate you for all your 

public service. But I worry that this report doesn’t dramatize the 

situation enough. 

Dr. BEERING. Well I think you are quite accurate in this characterization, because we tend to react to crisis in America. And unless we see a desperate situation, we don’t rise up as a group to 

meet it. 

And this situation hasn’t been characterized as desperate by individual school districts or states by any means. 

SUPPORT BY SCIENTIFIC DISCIPLINE

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, I think we need a little bit of shock 

treatment here. I am not sure who is going to perform it. Certainly, 

politicians being respectful of institutions and the way things are 

done, I am not sure we are the best administrators. But, obviously, 

we have some responsibility. 

I am not unhappy with your response. I am that we can’t do 

more. 

The cornerstone of our American Competitiveness Initiative is 

the national science basic research, a pretty healthy increase of 

13.6 percent. The biggest increases are for physical and computer 

sciences and engineering. We have somewhat talked about this. 

Why are we specifically prioritizing these disciplines? And are 

they matched? Are they somewhat related to what I am talking 


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about in a more general sense as to what may be happening in the 

Pacific or for that matter let us say within EU countries? 

Dr. BEMENT. I think the reason for that is primarily the reason 

why it was recognized in the American Competitiveness Initiative. 

This really deals with our innovation system and where the critical 

needs are at the present time to support that system. 

Unfortunately, the physical sciences and engineering, which are 

key drivers, have not been given adequate attention over the years. 

In fact, overall funding in costs and dollars is almost halved in the 

last couple decades. 

And so that needs a shot in the arm. That doesn’t in any way 

say that other disciplines are any less important. 

The one thing I would caution, however, is don’t just look at the 

organization chart and assume that that is where all the work is 

being done. 

Biosciences, for example, has an increase of about 10 percent, 

which is the largest increase they have had in about eight years. 

But the point is that everyone in the Foundation recognizes that 

we are in the biocentury. So you are going to find in math and 

physical sciences significant programs in biophysics, biochemistry, 

biomaterials. And our CISE directorate, computer directorate, you 

are going to find significant work in bioinformatics. And in our engineering directorate, you are going to see significant work in bioengineering. 

So it is threaded throughout the Foundation. And our polar programs, a good part of our polar program, as you saw in Antarctica, 

is biorelated. 

But it is important that we do support the biosciences, because 

that is where the fundamental work is being done. That is where 

the basic concepts are being developed all the way from the molecular scale up to the organismic scale and the ecological scale. 

So that has to be supported well. And it has to be the backbone 

of all the other Foundation efforts that we have. 

Social behavioral sciences are also interconnected with almost all 

of our advanced technology programs, because all those programs 

have a human dimension. They have a human element that has to 

be attended to. 

And that is especially important in human machine interactions. 

How do you adapt humans to machines, and how do you adapt machines to humans? How do you develop virtual organizations? That 

is a symbiotic relationship, because advanced computer technology 

enables virtual organizations. But if you don’t have the social component of virtual organizations, it is not going to be very effective. 

But in setting our budgets, we not only wanted to increase and 

strengthen all of our disciplines, but we also wanted to pay attention to alignment with the American COMPETES Act and also the 

American Competitiveness Initiative. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I appreciate your view. I must say, one of 

the things that Chairman Mollohan and I heard quite a lot of yesterday from Dr. Marburger is the whole issue of imbalances. That 

is pretty worrisome here. He somewhat is a gatekeeper, overseer, 

as I suppose you are, Mr. Chairman. I know you are doing your 

level best to educate us to fill the gaps. But I must say there was 

a sort of unease we had. 


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Dr. BEMENT. Well, as an interdisciplinary agency, we can’t serve 

our community, and we can’t serve the Nation unless we keep all 

of our disciplines strong. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Culberson. 

NANOTECHNOLOGY RESEARCH AND PARTICLE PHYSICS

Mr. CULBERSON. Mr. Chairman, I will be as brief as I can. But 

I wanted to ask in particular about nanotechnology research that 

you see being done around the country and what NSF is doing in 

particular, because while I am passionate about the sciences, the 

nanotechnology is something I am particularly enthusiastic about. 

I am convinced it will revolutionize the 21st century and the future 

in ways we can’t even imagine. And certainly affect our future in 

this century in much the same way that oil and electricity affected 

the 20th century. 

And I just wanted to ask you to talk to us about what NSF is 

doing in supporting and funding nanotechnology. 

And then secondly I noticed also you have specified that you are 

paying particular attention to particle physics. And I assume that 

is because the Department of Energy for whatever reason has decided we don’t need particle accelerators in the United States, 

which I think is appalling. I understand most of the research 

money is going to Europe. And I think in the very near future we 

could be in a situation where there will be no particle accelerators 

in the U.S. 

So I want to ask you about nanotechnology and particle physics. 

Dr. BEMENT. The facilities that we support in particle physics are 

pretty much accelerators and light sources that are used as tools 

to study materials, study other substances. 

We are not trying to delve into that kind of work. Although we 

are part of the Large Hadron Collider. So we are doing some theoretical work. But—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. Individual research—— 

Dr. BEMENT [continuing]. I want to keep this—I am sorry, go 

ahead. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Individual research—do you more focus on individual research projects—— 

Dr. BEMENT. Well—— 

Mr. CULBERSON [continuing]. And the Department of Energy is 

investing in infrastructure to build the—— 

Dr. BEMENT. Yeah. 

Mr. CULBERSON [continuing]. Particle? 

Dr. BEMENT. You are absolutely correct. The Department of Energy at their national laboratories build user facilities. And we support the users. At least we support a large fraction of users. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Is it accurate to say DOE is, you know, shrinking our investment in particle physics? I have been a subscriber to 

journals Nature and Science for years. And it is my impressions 

from reading those articles that there is a real alarm among scientists that all the particle accelerators are going to wind up being 

in Europe. And we are just simply not replacing, or enhancing, or 

building new facilities in the U.S. Is that correct? 


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Dr. BEMENT. From my vantage point, the Department of Energy 

has been a champion for particle physics. And they—it is not just 

particle physics but nuclear science in general. And I don’t think 

anyone in the Department of Energy is happy with the 2008 appropriation. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Right. 

Dr. BEMENT. That really cut nuclear science and particle physics, 

which really put on the brakes where they wanted to go. 

NANOTECHNOLOGY RESEARCH

Mr. CULBERSON. Well if I could then in the brief time we have 

got, because I know that everybody needs to wrap up. But talk to 

us a little bit about the nano research and where you see that. 

Dr. BEMENT. The nano research is robust. It covers every field 

of nano science from engineering, to nanoparticles to device technologies to nano manufacturing. 

Mr. CULBERSON. I am sorry, sir. Can you expand? 

Dr. BEMENT. But, again, this is another example. We not only 

have our own nanocenters, which serve the interests of the academic community, but we also support researchers that use the Department of Energy facilities and other nano facilities as well, 

which gives us tremendous leverage. 

The one area that we have increased funding for in the 2009 

budget is in the area of environmental health and safety of engineered nanoparticles. And we are working with NIST, with the Department of Energy, and other agencies, especially the regulatory 

agencies, EPA and so forth, in trying to understand fundamentally 

what risks there may be in these particles being in the environment, being ingested in—— 

Mr. CULBERSON. It is particularly important, because we don’t 

want the country to react as the Europeans did to the bioengineered—like corn and other products. 

Dr. BEMENT. Right. 

Mr. CULBERSON. But specifically if I could ask you, because I am 

also convinced nanotechnology will—from what I have seen at Rice 

University with the single-wall carbon nanotubes, allow the country to become energy independent. 

Dr. Richard Smalley was a friend who passed away about a year 

and a half ago. He actually developed and had on the drawing 

board a device about the size of a washing machine that would 

store enough electricity. You could buy electricity off the grid at 

night when it was cheap. And then use it during the day to run 

your entire house, charge your automobile. And if you invest in this 

technology and this was distributed out throughout the country, I 

think he told me that if as few as 30 maybe 40 percent of the 

households in America had this washing machine sized device to 

store electricity, that we would then be completely free of foreign 

oil. 

And it would just completely revolutionize the electrical grid. A 

single wire of carbon nanotubes is smaller than your little finger 

and will carry ten times the electricity carried to one of the giant 

overhead towers from Los Angeles to New York with zero loss of 

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duct. It is ballistic transmission of electrons, because it is a tube 

like this. 

So it also has the promise not only of allowing us to identify and 

cure human diseases, but making the United States completely energy independent, correct? 

Dr. BEMENT. When we lost Dr. Smalley we lost one of our great 

visionaries in nanotechnology. And NSF takes pride in supporting 

the research that he did. And there is a great deal that can be done 

with nanotechnology. We have only scratched the surface. 

Mr. CULBERSON. These are competitive review grants, Mr. Chairman, and I just in conclusion want to point out that the NSF has 

been magnificent in supporting this type of work. I wanted you and 

Mr. Frelinghuysen to know both that, for example, NASA, which 

we will also hear from later actually had a signed contract. Well 

I am, you know, NASA does great work but is an example of the 

difference between the way NSF, which is driven by science, and 

NASA, which is driven both by bean counters and bureaucrats, is 

that NASA actually has a signed contract with Rice University for 

$6 million to invest in infrastructure at Rice to develop the quantum wire, which I just described, which would have revolutionized 

the electricity conduction, every device that we use. Anyway, 

signed contract, Rice went out and hired physicists, brought in 

graduate students, was building the facilities. And then the new 

NASA Director came in and said, ‘‘No,’’ and tore the contract up. 

It is just maddening. And you just do a magnificent job at NSF. 

We just need to find a way to further insulate you, I think, from 

politics and do what we can to help NASA limp along. 

Thank you very much. It is a pleasure to be on this Subcommittee with you, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Frelinghuysen, and 

thank you for what you do. 

Dr. BEMENT. Thank you. 

FACILITIES MANAGEMENT

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, it is good to have you on the Subcommittee, sincerely. You talk a lot about accountability in your 

justification. You talk about reviewing projects. You talk about delaying funding for projects. And that suggests to me that you have 

some issues in that account. I just wanted to give you an opportunity to talk about it at the hearing. 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes, thank you. Almost from the time I came to the 

Foundation there was activity underway to address concerns of the 

Congress in the management of our facilities account, which led to 

a study by the National Research Council, which I was fortunate 

enough to begin implementing with a Deputy. So that led to a lot 

of internal activity within the Foundation to develop a facilities 

manual in managing these facilities, which we wanted to be the 

very best in government. And that facilities manual has been in 

place. We have been actually operating against it. It has been presented to the Board. The Board has approved it. But we were left 

with a lot of legacy facilities, because these are multiyear projects. 

So we just could not go back and redo all the projects to force fit 

them into the manual. But now that the manual has issued we do 

have new projects in the wings, and we want those projects to comply with the manual. And one of the—— 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. How many projects? 

Dr. BEMENT. We have one, plus three. Advanced LIGO will start 

in 2009, and then we have three in the wings. The Ocean Observatories Initiative, the Alaska Region Research Vessel, and NEON, 

the National Ecological Observing Network. And ATST as well. 

Now for those projects going forward, we want to employ the rigor 

that we built into our policies and our practices in managing these 

projects. And one of the requirements is that they meet a rigorous 

final design review before we submit the proposal to the Board for 

approval to put funding in our budget. Because without that final 

design review there are risks, there are issues that carry over. We 

are constantly redoing the base lining of our budget. We are changing the contingencies. And in many cases, if we cannot fit within 

the assigned budget we have to descope the project, which detracts 

from meeting the scientific requirements that the facility was designed for in the first place. I am convinced we can do a lot better, 

and that is what we are proposing to do. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you have some troubled projects right now? 

Dr. BEMENT. No, I would not say that we do. I think all of our 

projects, the one area where we have some difficulty is in ship 

building because of the fact that shipyards are full. We have hyperinflation in commodities, steel, and so forth. If you lose time then, 

of course, the price of these commodities goes up. And in just keeping projects on schedule, we are pretty much at the mercy of the 

shipyard because our projects are not of a scale that they want to 

divert all that much engineering and high skilled technical labor 

away from other, more lucrative projects. So we are always fighting 

with shipyards to pay attention to their contract. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So all of your projects are within budget and on 

time? 

Dr. BEMENT. All of our projects are within budget. They are not 

all on time. The one where we have slipped is in the Scientific 

Ocean Drilling Vessel, and that is one of the shipyard problems I 

was talking about. That will be delayed about six months. But it 

will be ready for shakedown testing this summer, and we expect 

to have it in operation this coming fall. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are you familiar with all the specifics of these 

projects? You may not be able to answer all of them. 

Dr. BEMENT. I would say yes. I get reports every month and I 

read them. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well that is good. NEON, is it within budget and 

within schedule? 

Dr. BEMENT. NEON, we are not asking for additional funding 

until, again, it complies with our manual. That will have its final 

design review this summer and any issues from that design review 

will have to be resolved before we come forward with any more 

funding requests. But NEON has come a long way. It is really a 

very attractive project right now. It will be transformational. 

BENEFICIARIES OF LARGE FACILITY CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Typically, who are the beneficiaries for these 

projects? 

Dr. BEMENT. The science community at large. These projects are 

proposed by the science community. They are initially funded 


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under the Research and Related Account in order to develop the 

concept, to be sure that the design of the facilities meets all the scientific requirements. And those scientific requirements are set by 

numerous workshops with the community in order to be sure that, 

first of all, they are feasible, and secondly that they are affordable. 

So there is a lot of give and take in changing the scope of the 

project in order to be sure that the funding that we ask for is, first 

of all, adequate, but not unreasonable. So that is pretty much how 

the process starts. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And it would be an academic institution? A federal laboratory? 

Dr. BEMENT. Usually they come from academic institutions or 

from community organizations representing the community. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is there a matching requirement for these 

projects? 

Dr. BEMENT. No. 

FUNDING FOR FACILITIES PLANNING

Mr. MOLLOHAN. No? There is a difference of opinion, or a consideration and reconsideration, among the Board and the Foundation, 

you, about how the initial planning, the funding, might be 

achieved. Could you talk with us about that and where that issue 

is? And ask Dr. Beering to address that as well. 

Dr. BEMENT. Let me dispel that notion. I asked the Board, actually, to get involved earlier in the development of our projects as 

they come through the horizon stage and before they go into our 

readiness stage. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mm-hmm. 

Dr. BEMENT. So we are actually welcoming their recommendations and we want to work more closely with them so that we get 

their—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well you know, honestly, my point is not that 

there is a disagreement. My point is just understanding, letting 

you talk about how the planning should be funded and what you 

think about that. And just share your ideas, and have you reach 

a consensus on that. 

Dr. BEMENT. All right. Let me address that. Up to the point 

where we satisfy all the scientific requirements we feel that that 

type of planning and design should be carried under the Research 

and Related Account, because it really deals with science issues. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. It ought to come out of the Directorate? 

Dr. BEMENT. And that comes out of the Directorates. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And why is that? Is that because they are closer 

to the substantive need? 

Dr. BEMENT. Some of these projects are very complex. Some of 

them require research and development, in some cases a lot of development. And they deal with very complex science issues, which 

are better dealt with by the science community. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. This question of whether this project is more important scientifically than another project? 

Dr. BEMENT. Well, this is where the prioritization comes through 

the Board, and this is why we would like to get the Board involved 

earlier in the process so that the prioritization starts earlier. But 

there are special circumstances as the project matures. Once it has 


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passed a preliminary design, it pretty much has satisfied all the 

scientific requirements. Then you start getting into a 

preconstruction phase, which deals with things that have nothing 

to do with science, like site preparation. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mm-hmm. 

Dr. BEMENT. Like meeting changes in regulations—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mm-hmm. 

Dr. BEMENT [continuing]. Which requires some reconstruction. 

Those types of burdens, we feel, should really be assigned to the 

MREFC account, under construction, rather than under science in 

the R&RA account. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And right now it is with science? 

Dr. BEMENT. And right now it is with science. And so this is 

where the Board and the Foundation have been working together 

in trying to come up with a better approach. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Dr. Beering, do you have thoughts on that? 

Dr. BEERING. Yeah. We want to be and are eager to be helpful 

in early planning and be involved in the entire scoping of the 

project. And there has been a misperception on the part of some 

of the scientists and others involved that the granting of planning 

funds means that the project is automatically approved at the end 

of the planning cycle. We want to make sure that that 

misperception is clarified, that planning is planning. That the 

project approval comes after that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Typically or has that always been the case? 

Dr. BEERING. Well, it has been confused. But I think we are together on it now. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. No, no. I mean, as a matter of fact has, if someone gets approved at the, I am hoping I am using the right characterization—— 

Dr. BEERING. Yeah, at the planning stage. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. At the Directorate or the planning 

stage in the past, did that equate to automatic funding for construction? 

Dr. BEERING. I think most of that time that has been the case. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Have there been any exceptions, just to—— 

Dr. BEERING. I cannot answer that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay, it does not matter. No, no, there must 

have been exceptions. 

Dr. BEMENT. We have stretched some projects out until they 

were much better defined and until we had a more credible budget. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is there a difference of opinion here or is there 

a consensus? You are asking for an authorization here from this 

Committee, so we have to understand. 

Dr. BEMENT. I think all the projects that are in our funding request, asking for authorization, have been approved by the Board 

and so they have pretty much gone through this process. 

USE OF MREFC FUNDS FOR PLANNING PURPOSES

Mr. MOLLOHAN. But as I understand it, you are asking for an authorization to use the construction money for planning purposes. 

Dr. BEMENT. Correct. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And that is something that you are not allowed 

to do now. 


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Dr. BEMENT. That is correct. So—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So the point of my questioning is that we want 

to feel comfortable. I mean, we are not in the authorization business. It is tough for us to think about even authorizing it. But we 

do want to feel comfortable that there is a consensus and if there 

is not, we would like to know. 

Dr. BEERING. No, we are together on it. 

Dr. BEMENT. I think there is a consensus. I think there is a 

meeting of the minds on that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. And so you are requesting of this Committee with regard to this what? 

Dr. BEMENT. What I am requesting is, if there are circumstances 

beyond the establishment of scientific feasibility for a project that 

is more related to preconstruction or construction that that be included as part of the MREFC budget for that project. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is that stated correctly? Okay, thank you. Mr. 

Frelinghuysen. 

MREFC ACCOUNT PROJECTS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. We are a little bit past high noon here, so 

I do not want to keep you here. I am not sure what the Chairman’s 

plans are. I just want a little clarification. Your request for this account is reduced by a third, right? 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And that is largely due to the fact that 

these three projects are being deferred—— 

Dr. BEMENT. Until they pass final design review. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. Until they pass? 

Dr. BEMENT. It is not only final design review, but they have to 

have a risk management plan. They have to have a supportable 

contingency. And so, at the time we start construction all these 

early issues are pretty well resolved. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. But as you defer these, you are moving 

ahead with a new project? The Advanced Technology Solar Telescope? 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And that obviously is priority number one. 

Behind that project is a growing backlog, which obviously you are 

quite cognizant of. 

Dr. BEMENT. Well, actually, what is happening is that over the 

next year, actually this year and next year, we will be completing 

three or four of our projects. And so the overall budget in the 

MREFC account will probably dip and then slowly come back 

again. But I think we are over the hump at this point. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. But at some point in time you are going to 

have—— 

Dr. BEMENT. We are going to have three—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. You are potentially going to 

have three—— 

Dr. BEMENT. Three or four new projects, that is correct. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Which would mean that you would have a 

need for some pretty substantial construction funds. 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. But that would not be unusual with regard to 

the level of funding we have had in this account in past years. 


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ATACAMA LARGE MILLIMETER ARRAY

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Let me just get a little parenthetical in 

here. We briefly discussed in our time together what was happening in Chile. Is it called the ALMA Project? 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And of course, the paper underscored the 

fact that the participants there are anticipating that the National 

Science Foundation is going to come through for them. Can you 

maybe shed a little light on that? 

Dr. BEMENT. Oh, absolutely. Once you get that far into a project 

you certainly do not want to disrupt it because then it becomes 

very expensive. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So how would you characterize the project? 

That particular project? 

Dr. BEMENT. I think it is on schedule. It is on budget. I think 

it is going along quite well right now. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. It is the single largest project, is it not? 

Dr. BEMENT. It is the single largest and the most complex. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So just put a dollar figure on it for me? 

Dr. BEMENT. Total? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Dr. BEMENT. Let me see if I can—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The man who wears that raincoat over 

there. I hear half a billion, but it is a whisper behind me. 

Dr. BEMENT. It is, it is actually a jointly funded program between 

NSF and our partners, and the European Southern Observatory 

and their partners. They are putting out $500 million, we are putting out $500 million. 

RESEARCH FUNDING RATE

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Just a last question. One of the measures 

of the health of research funding is the funding rate issue, percentage of proposals you are able to fund. I understand that this year 

you expect to fund 24 percent of the competitive research programs 

you receive. I understand, and you have added some emphasis to 

this, with the requested increase you would expect to support approximately 1,370 more research grants in 2008. Will this translate 

into an increase in the funding rate for research proposals? 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And where do you match up the whole 

issue of having a greater increase in the number of grants and the 

whole issue of the increase in the average award size? 

Dr. BEMENT. I think the total number of proppsals has stabilized 

at around 45,000. It was ramping up earlier, and that is why our 

success rate was dropping. If you just take the competitive research 

proposals, the ones that we provide grants for, our success rate on 

average would be about 21 percent as of today. With the budget 

that we are requesting for ’09, that success rate would go up to 23 

percent. And it would also enable us to fund well over 1,000 new 

grants. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. There are those grants and then there are 

the dollars which focus on the national centers. That is about 5 

percent? 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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Dr. BEMENT. Yes. There are centers, there are contracts. What 

other categories? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. What is the percentage and does it match 

whatever Dr. Beering and his colleagues—— 

Dr. BEMENT. Well, some of those grants are renewal grants. And 

the reason why the overall success rate looks higher than what I 

quoted, like 21 percent, is that when you are renewing grants, you 

are not competing with a lot of other grants. So that the success 

rate is like 100 percent. So when you average everything in, the 

overall success rate would be higher than the success rate just for 

the competitive research grants. And that is why I say today that 

percentage is 21 percent, and we expect it will go up to 23 percent. 

AVERAGE AWARD SIZE

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. On the average award size, could you make 

any comments on that? 

Dr. BEMENT. Yes. I think we have that. We can provide that, we 

can provide that for the record. But it is going up slightly in 2009. 

I want to say it is about $160,000. 

[The information follows:] 

NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION AVERAGE ANNUAL AWARD SIZE 

FY 2007 Estimate FY 2008 Estimate FY 2009 Estimate 

NSF all .................................................................................................................... $146,270 $151,355 158,290 

Biological sciences ................................................................................................. 182,246 191,000 200,600 

Computer & information science & engineering .................................................... 139,000 150,000 180,000 

Engineering ............................................................................................................. 115,860 116,000 118,000 

Geosciences ............................................................................................................. 153,922 155,000 160,000 

Mathematical & physical sciences ......................................................................... 130,459 145,000 145,000 

Social, behavioral, & economic sciences ............................................................... 115,337 115,550 117,810 

Office of Cyberinfrastructure .................................................................................. 511,682 440,000 440,000 

Office of International Science & Engineering1 ..................................................... 156,673 50,000 175,000 

Office of Polar Programs ........................................................................................ 238,398 245,198 249,398 

1 The spikes in average award size in FY 2007 and FY 2009 are related to Partnerships for International Research and Education (PIRE) 

competitions, which are held every other year. 

Dr. OLSEN. It really depends upon discipline, the average award 

size, but what we are trying to do—— 

Dr. BEMENT. Well, across the Foundation we have those numbers 

and we will provide those for you, what the average award size is. 

I thought I had it here but I am not finding it. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you both. 

Dr. BEERING. Thank you. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

USE OF MREFC FUNDS FOR PLANNING PURPOSES

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay, thank you Mr. Frelinghuysen. Dr. 

Beering, I just want to be clear on this whole question of spending 

planning funds, or using funds out of the major construction fund 

for planning, is that decided on the Board? Or is that being now 

considered by the Board or reconsidered by the Board? What is the 

status of it within the Board? 

Dr. BEERING. Well, we talked about it. And A, we wanted to be 

involved in the early planning and the total project scoping. And 

B, we wanted to make certain that the applicants did not confuse 


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planning grants with project grants. There was a two stage process. 

And I think we are totally in agreement on that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. But this question of funding planning out of the 

construction account? 

Dr. BEERING. Yeah, we did not really care. The Board did not 

care which account it came from so long as we all understood how 

we were doing it and what the administration has proposed is quite 

acceptable. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. But you represent here that you are in 

total agreement? 

Dr. BEERING. Yes, we are. 

Dr. BEMENT. Mr. Chairman, let me change the wording. It is not 

really planning. The planning is pretty much done. It is late stage 

design or redesign as a result of circumstances that are brought 

about by either changes in construction planning or changes in regulations. And at that point, generally the proposal, or the project, 

has already gone through a fairly rigorous preliminary design and 

final design review. But then there are issues that come up after 

final design that are really preconstruction in nature. 

OUTSOURCING

Mr. MOLLOHAN. A couple of questions about contracting out. How 

has your contracting out your A–76 initiatives affected the mission 

of the Foundation? 

Dr. BEMENT. We have been operating with many of these operations contracted out for a very long time. As a matter of fact, we 

reached pretty much the bottom of the barrel. So we have had pretty stable operations for some time now. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Reached the bottom of what barrel? 

Dr. BEMENT. Well, in terms of what we can outsource, for contracting out. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You have exhausted the number of functions you 

can outsource? 

Dr. BEMENT. We started well over twenty years ago contracting 

out administrative functions, security functions, many of our support functions. There is not a lot more to outsource. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. My question was how has it affected the mission 

of the Foundation? 

Dr. BEMENT. I do not think it has affected the mission, because 

the oversight of all of those activities are done by the Foundation, 

and if we need to correct them we will correct them. But I think 

our mission is being well fulfilled. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, talk to me a little bit more about the quality of the service you get from contracting out and by giving me 

some examples perhaps of good results that I would be interested 

in, as well as problems. 

Dr. BEMENT. Let me ask my Chief Operating Officer to respond. 

She is closer to it than I am. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Certainly. Thank you, doctor. 

Dr. OLSEN. We contract out our IT services, the facilities maintenance of our building, those types of activities that are not what 

we consider essentially governmental. So things like our merit review and that kind of stuff stays within the National Science Foundation. In many cases we have oversight of that and we review the 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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contracts over certain periods to be recompeted. We contract out 

our cleaning services. And we do not have any issues. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Maybe you could just give your name for 

the record, please? 

Dr. OLSEN. Kathie Olsen. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yes, thank you. 

Dr. OLSEN. Oh, and we are red, as you know, in terms of the yellow, red, and green. In terms of competitive outsourcing we are actually red. We have always been red because of the fact that, 

again, as Dr. Bement indicated under Eric Bloch’s leadership, he 

started looking at things that were not inherently governmental 

and already contracted them out. So when the President’s Management Agenda came aboard, we actually did not really have anything additional that we could consider that we were not already 

doing to run the Agency effectively. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you have any other additional activities that 

NSF plans to outsource? 

Dr. OLSEN. The only other issues that they had asked me to put 

on the table is the icebreakers in terms of competitive outsourcing, 

to say ‘‘This is what we need to enable the science’’ and then have 

everyone compete for that. But that is not anything I think that 

in reality—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What table do you put that on? 

Dr. OLSEN. Table in terms of discussions, in terms of internal—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Who are you discussing it with? 

Dr. OLSEN. Internally. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Who else are you discussing it with? 

Dr. OLSEN. Within the Foundation at this point. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. That is all? 

Dr. OLSEN. At this point. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You are not discussing it with OMB? 

Dr. OLSEN. Well, we have had that discussion in terms of competitive outsourcing, researching—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, that was my question. Who are you discussing it with? 

Dr. OLSEN. Well, I have discussed it recently with Clay Johnson. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And who is he? 

Dr. OLSEN. He is the Deputy of OMB. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How is the travel service working out for you? 

Dr. OLSEN. That is a challenge. It is FedTraveler. It is something 

that every one of us faces. And we have to look at it, we have some 

very good staff at NSF that are evaluating that. And it is one that 

could be improved, let us put it that way. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What is the ‘‘that’’ you are evaluating. 

Dr. OLSEN. Basically, it is very—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. This is really, this is really easy. 

Dr. OLSEN. Digging down to sort of the level is very time consuming, it is very difficult. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What is very difficult and time consuming? 

Dr. OLSEN. The actually making the system itself. Okay? And it 

is just, it is a challenge. And so that is one that we have actually 

looked at, and whether or not we should, we are trying to work 

with the contractor to improve that system. 


bajohnson on PROD1PC67 with HEARING
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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are there any other contracting out situations 

that you are having difficulty with? 

Dr. OLSEN. I think FedTraveler is our—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, I know it is, I understand that seems to 

be the most difficult example. But are there any other examples 

that you have? 

Dr. OLSEN. Not that I am aware of. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Not that you are aware of? Okay. Thank you. 

Dr. OLSEN. You are welcome. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. That was easy. I mean, that was not hard. Mr. 

Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Nothing for me. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Nothing for you? Would you, gentlemen, like to 

add to your testimony, or is there anything you think the Committee would appreciate hearing about? 

Dr. BEMENT. Well, the one thing that I would have stated at the 

very beginning was to express my appreciation for the support you 

gave us in the ’08 budget. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. In the early budget. 

Dr. BEMENT. I am sorry it came out the way it did. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. In the early budget. 

Dr. BEMENT. In the early budget. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, as we said during Mr. Culberson’s testimony, the final result was not satisfactory to us and what we want 

to do was reflect it in our House Bill. And hopefully we will have 

better opportunities to fund the Foundation at the level that I 

think everybody on this Committee wants to fund it at in this 

cycle. 

Dr. BEMENT. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. We certainly want you to, and we are glad that 

your request, as you have testified, gets you back on the track that 

you want to be back on. Dr. Beering? 

Dr. BEERING. Thank you. We do not want to be hit by another 

bus. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, thank you very much for your testimony. 

Thank you for the good work of everyone, and everyone attending 

here today. 

Dr. BEERING. Thank you. Thank you very much. 

[Questions and answers submitted for the record follow:] 


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THURSDAY, APRIL 10, 2008. 

EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY COMMISSION 

WITNESS 

NAOMI C. EARP, CHAIR, EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY COMMISSION 

CONGRESSMAN MOLLOHAN’S OPENING STATEMENT

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Good afternoon. The Subcommittee would like to 

welcome Naomi C. Earp, Chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, to discuss her agency’s fiscal year 2009 budget 

request. We are pleased to see you again, Ms. Earp, and thank you 

for your time. You have the distinction of being the last regularly 

scheduled hearing of the season. I am sure we will have other hearings as the year goes on but this is the last regularly scheduled on 

the President’s budget submissions for our Subcommittee. 

Most people who have not experienced employment discrimination probably do not have a full appreciation for the depth and 

breadth of this problem. Employment discrimination can and does 

take place in this country and we rely on the EEOC to help remediate that discrimination, set precedents to deter future violations, 

and educate employees about their rights. 

Unfortunately, the administration’s budget requests for EEOC 

over the last five years have not been sufficient to adequately carry 

out these important responsibilities. Increasing receipts and decreasing staff levels have combined to create a chronic backlog of 

pending charges that grows bigger every year. That backlog may 

look like just a column of numbers on a spreadsheet but each one 

of those pending charges represents an employee and an employer 

who are waiting for closure on what is no doubt a painful and contentious issue between them. Delaying the closure has real impacts 

on real people and I think we need to ensure that we do not lose 

sight of that fact. 

This year, for the first time in a number of years, the EEOC’s 

budget proposal contains a real increase in basic operations. Specifically, the 2009 budget provides an increase of $12.6 million, or 

a little less than 4 percent, to slow the growth of the charge backlog and to complete the transition of the now defunct National Contact Center to an in-house capability. We are pleased to see these 

proposals but we remain concerned that they do not accomplish 

such essential tasks as actually reducing the charge backlog. 

The population of the United States is getting bigger, older, and 

more diverse as the years pass. Ensuring that we have a robust capacity to protect basic civil rights is only going to become more important as vulnerable populations continue to grow. We will be 

closely examining your request to make sure that the EEOC is well 

positioned to help you achieve that goal. And before we invite you 


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to offer your oral remarks, and your prepared statement will be 

made a part of the record, I would like to turn to our Ranking 

Member, Mr. Frelinghuysen, for his opening statement. 

CONGRESSMAN FRELINGHUYSEN’S OPENING STATEMENT

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Ms. Earp, good afternoon, welcome back. I 

join the Chairman in welcoming you here this afternoon to hear 

your testimony in regard to your budget submission for 2009. As 

the Chairman says, you are requesting a total of $341.9 million, 

which represents an increase of $12.6 million, or 3.8 percent above 

last year’s level. Much of this increase would be devoted to recreating the Commission’s customer response function in-house after 

the cancellation of the contract call center. Also, there is a modest 

increase toward reducing the significant, and as the Chairman has 

said, growing backlog of private sector discrimination charges. 

The EEOC is tasked with preventing and eradicating employment discrimination across the United States. As the Chairman 

has said, yours is an important and difficult mission and we would 

like to work with you to find ways to maximize your effectiveness 

within available budgets. And again, welcome. Thank you for being 

here. 

Ms. EARP. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Ms. Earp. And again, your written 

statement will be made a part of the record. You can proceed. 

Ms. EARP. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. 

CHAIR EARP’S OPENING STATEMENT

Ms. EARP. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the opportunity to testify in support of the President’s fiscal year 2009 budget request of $341.9 million for the Equal Employment Opportunity 

Commission. It is indeed a pleasure to appear before you again this 

year. As always, I thank you for your past and anticipated future 

support of EEOC. 

Our mission is to ensure fair and inclusive workplaces so workers can compete on the basis of merit and pursue their individual 

versions of the American dream. To do this, we are continuously 

assessing the strategic focus of our enforcement litigation and federal programs. We also educate employees and job seekers from 

teens to retirees, as well as employers from small business owners 

to the largest corporations. I have submitted for the record a written statement that highlights specific aspects of the budget. But before answering questions I would like to just take a few minutes 

to highlight the issues and challenges we have faced since I last 

appeared before you. 

First, I want to mention our workload. I note that our dedicated 

employees are challenged on a daily basis with a workload that is 

prodigious. In fiscal year 2007 we received almost 83,000 private 

sector charges, over 13,000 federal sector appeals and hearing requests, we filed 336 lawsuits, and we recovered close to $350 million in benefits for victims of discrimination. However, we still 

ended the year with an inventory of 54,000 charges. For those accomplishments I thank the dedicated employees at EEOC who have 


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made all of this possible. They are our most valuable resource and 

I am proud to be a part of their team. Approval of our 2009 budget 

request, a $12.6 million increase over this year, will greatly assist 

us in managing our workload. 

Next I want to call the Committee’s attention to staffing. In 2007 

we hired 172 new employees but this was just barely enough to 

match the number of separations. There was no net gain of employees last fiscal year because employees were retiring, transferring, 

and otherwise leaving as fast as the new employees were coming 

on board. The news is better for 2008. We have improved our hiring processes and as of today we have a net gain of forty-six new 

hires over separations. I am committed to backfilling front line positions as they become vacant, and as the budget permits. And I 

am always looking for dollars to ensure that we put the resources 

on the front line. 

For fiscal year 2009, in addition to the backfills, we project 175 

new hires, the vast majority of which will be for front line positions. Of the President’s budget request, almost 75 percent will go 

to staffing. This will enable us to retain and hire the investigators, 

mediators, attorneys, and support staff that we need. The new 

hires are critical to reducing the rate of the inventory’s increase. 

Finally I want to note, as has been said, that the National Contact Center has met its demise. Having completed the hiring and 

training of our information intake representatives this past March, 

the customer response function is officially in-house. The full time 

trained, permanent, government employees work at fifteen of our 

district locations and they are now handling roughly 85,000 calls 

a month. The good news is that the fifty-five employee outsourced 

center has been abolished and the new internal, sixty-six federal 

employee customer response system is operational. The bad news 

is that this internal operation is costlier to operate. 

In conclusion Mr. Chairman and Committee members, the 

charges that we receive are increasing nuanced and more complex. 

This requires refocusing and making a strategic alignment to enable the Commission to continue to be effective in this twenty-first 

century environment. The President’s request for 2009 provides a 

significant increase and will allow us to continue our mission. 

Thank you for inviting me to appear before you today. I am 

happy to answer any questions. 

[Written statement of Naomi Churchill Earp, Chair, U.S. Equal 

Employment Opportunity Commission] 


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BACKLOG REDUCTION

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Ms. Earp. EEOC’s charges pending 

at the end of the year have been increasing consistently over the 

last few years. The backlog reached nearly 40,000 at the end of 

2006, which was a 19 percent increase over the previous year, and 

the backlog grew in 2007 to 54,970, a 38 percent increase. The 

backlog is projected to grow to 75,000 in 2009. I understand that 

according to a presentation that you made to some stakeholders, 

you think it might go to as much as 100,000 in 2010. Is that correct? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I mean, that is really unacceptable. You are projecting 109 new personnel, and I commend you for having an increased budget request. I do not know how you were able to do 

that, but there is a lot of people that testified here before you that 

I am sure are envious. But is that adequate? If 109 new personnel 

can only slow the growth of the backlog are we doing what we 

should do? And what would it take to begin erasing this backlog? 

Ms. EARP. Mr. Chairman, EEOC’s financial issues are very, very 

longstanding. They go across a number of administrations. We are 

pleased with the President’s 2009 budget because it is a beginning 

to address, in our base, issues that have been so longstanding. We 

need the front line employees. During the same period of time that 

you mentioned when charges were increasing anywhere from 19 to 

34 percent, investigators were decreasing anywhere from 3 to 10 

percent. So we feel very pleased that we are an agency with an increase this year while so many others are actually being cut. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Well, I wanted a little more on that. What 

do you think we would have to do in order to reduce these backlogs 

and begin a downward trend in real terms? 

Ms. EARP. We need—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You are estimating that the percentage of 

charges you will resolve within 180 days will jump from 56 percent 

in 2007 to 73 percent in 2008 and to 75 percent in 2009. Are those 

realistic? 

Ms. EARP. They are the best projections that we could put together given the number of people that we have and the anticipated workload. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are they realistic? 

Ms. EARP. Fairly realistic. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Have you done a mid-year review for 

2008? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are you reducing at the rate of 73 percent for 

the first six months of 2008? Or however many months we are into 

2008? 

Ms. EARP. Not quite. But at this point in 2008 we have a net 

gain of forty-five employees, the vast majority of which are front 

line employees. So there are investigators at the point where 

charges and receipts come in. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What is your point? 

Ms. EARP. The point is, last year we did not have a net gain at 

all. This year up to this point we have—— 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. You did not have a net gain? 

Ms. EARP. In employees for 2007. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Oh, oh, okay, sure. 

Ms. EARP. So we feel we are a bit ahead. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. But what I was asking was, what is your midyear experience? You are estimating that your charges resolved 

within 180 days will jump to 73 percent in 2008. And this is just 

one measure, I guess. But my question is, have you done a midyear review to test that against real experience? 

Ms. EARP. May I provide the—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Oh sure. Absolutely. 

Ms. EARP [continuing]. Written information for the record. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Oh, for the record. Okay. If you have to, yes. 

Ms. EARP. Yes. I do not have that data at my fingertips. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, I have got it here so I am ahead of you. 

I just cannot interpret it immediately. Well, I guess I would suggest that if the numbers do not prove themselves out that those are 

rosy projections. I will tell you what the Committee would like to 

have, but I imagine you will need to spend some time with this and 

can only submit it for the record. We would like to know not what 

you have requested but what you would have to request in order 

to reverse this unacceptable trend line. And obviously you are not 

going to do that in a year. 

Ms. EARP. Right. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. But in some acceptable period of time, which I 

leave you to select. Would you do that for the record? 

Ms. EARP. Yes, sir. 

[The information follows:] 

WORKLOAD MANAGEMENT

The percentage of charges that will be resolved within 180 days is a strategic goal 

and we are devoting our resources and energies to try to achieve it. At midyear, of 

the 34,636 resolutions, 17,853 (51.5%) were resolved within 180 days. We also know 

that the average processing time for resolutions at midyear is 206 days, which 

would indicate that the inventory continues to be an issue in resolving charges within 180 days. Our budget request for 2009 brings us a step closer towards meeting 

that strategic goal. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What it would take. What is the number of employees and what positions, and can you associate that with a dollar amount. I am going to yield to Mr. Frelinghuysen at this time. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Why are you anticipating such a dramatic 

growth in the backlog? 

Ms. EARP. Primarily it has to do with the attrition of staff. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So staff? Disassemble the backlog for me. 

How many of these cases have been pending for two years? Three 

years? Or are there some that have been hanging around the 

EEOC for years without resolution? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. I can provide specific data for you for the record. 

But we know that we have some aged cases. The work that EEOC 

does is very labor intensive. The backlog, well actually the inventory, does not mean that the case is not being worked. It means 

it has worked through various phases as it makes its way from intake to whether or not we are going to litigate it. A lack of resources at any point along the continuum slows the process, and 


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we have had a lack of investigators to complete investigations of 

cases in the inventory. 

[The information follows:] 

AGE OF PENDING INVENTORY

EEOC has been vigilant in attempting to ensure that charges are resolved as 

quickly as possible. EEOC field offices have continued to focus on charges more than 

one year old to ensure that they are promptly addressed. Of the more than 72,000 

charges in our inventory at midyear, 1,636 were two years old or older. Of the 1,636 

charges two years old or older, 532 were three years old or older. Our data system 

tells us that 50% of the charges two or more years old are prioritized under processing as ‘‘A’’ charges and are likely in extended investigation or conciliation between EEOC, the employer and the employee. For those charges three years old or 

older, 70% are prioritized as ‘‘A’’ and are in extended processing. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, the backlog seems to be exploding. 

But I always thought the phrase ‘‘justice delayed is justice denied,’’ 

surely you are working on some of the older ones first? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. We prioritize the aged cases. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So how many aged cases are there? Do they 

go back five years? Or? And do some of these parties give up? I 

mean, what happens? After a while here I would assume a lot of 

people say, ‘‘Well, you know, we are not getting any resolution 

here.’’ 

Ms. EARP. The best information that I have today is the average 

age of our charges is about 209 days. And the short answer to your 

question is, yes, when we are unable to investigate in a timely 

manner we lose witnesses, we sometimes lose charging parties. 

Yes, people do eventually sometimes give up. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The 109 new investigators, attorneys and 

support staff, is it your intent that all of those new positions will 

be working on the private sector enforcement? 

Ms. EARP. The vast majority of the President’s increase, roughly 

90 percent of those funds, will go to staff and staff related expenses. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The EEOC has been working in these areas 

for years. 

Ms. EARP. Yes, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And I do not mean to be insulting, but obviously I assume there is a fair amount of the same sort of charges 

and issues. Some have a far greater degree of complexity than others. After a while, there must be some recognized ways that in 

some cases you could expedite some and perhaps because of the 

complexity, or lack of staff, you could not expedite others. I just 

wonder whether you had tried to introduce some more efficiencies, 

either through the use of different or new technologies. I know that 

your budget document mentions a cost/benefit analysis that shows 

that the EEOC could achieve efficiency savings of $15 million if you 

implemented a document management system agency wide. 

Ms. EARP. We are working on that. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So what exists now? Is it all hard copy or 

carbon paper? Or is there some degree of, what is it? Are you online? 

Ms. EARP. Quite a bit of what we do is online. Our document 

management posture is uneven. Because when you are an agency 

that is resource intensive, where the majority of the funds go to 


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paying staff salaries, it really leaves very little for the kind of technological advancements and advanced planning that is necessary. 

But in the last couple of years we have been able to realize efficiencies through the use of the web, the internet, and various technological support, especially to our legal staff. 

MEDIATION

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And lastly, I am not a lawyer but I do have 

a huge admiration for people who spend a good portion of their 

lives on mediation. You know, there is a possibility of intervention. 

Where is that in the overall scheme of things? 

Ms. EARP. Mediation remains a centerpiece of what we do and 

is one of the truly good news success stories that EEOC has to tell. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. But as I look at some of your budget materials, the number of charges being resolved through mediation apparently is dropping. Is that accurate? 

Ms. EARP. It is. It has to do with the fact that we have both mediators who are federal employees on our staff, as well as contract 

mediators in various places around the country. And we have not 

had contract dollars. We also have not had as many pro bono mediators as in the past. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. We have through the doors here the Legal 

Services Corporation. And they promote the idea, which I think we 

are enormously sympathetic for, that members of the Bar ought to 

be doing more. Certainly in my neck of the woods there are more 

law firms, maybe it is just a great place to practice law. But you 

would like to see a few more law firms stepping up to the plate in 

terms of participating. I do not mean to get off track here. I think 

mediation is a good thing in a lot of different legal arenas. 

Ms. EARP. I agree. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you for the time, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay, thank you. Let me follow up on that line 

of questioning that I had before. I think I understand these numbers a little bit better, partially based on your testimony just a moment ago. Let us help you in this process by your identifying what 

I would like to get at the end, identifying the responsibilities, the 

jobs, that need to be increased and where they are, if you will cite 

them in light of this information. These statistics would suggest 

that you had pending at the end of February 2007, 45,671 charges. 

At the end of February 2008 you had pending 70,209 charges. If 

that is correct, in one year you would have a 53.7 percent increase 

in pending charges. Are those statistics accurate? 

Ms. EARP. Those statistics sound somewhat flawed. The largest 

single increase that I am aware of is somewhere between about 25 

and 30 percent. And that would not have been between 2006 and 

2007 where we realized—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. No, between 2007 and 2008. Did I say 2006 and 

2007? I meant February of 2007 and February of 2008. This would 

be a mid-year snapshot. Would you be able to turn around and answer this question by consulting with your staff? And if so, would 

you please do it? 

Ms. EARP. My Program Director says she believes that data is accurate. But that by the end of the year that number will have 

dropped significantly as we close cases by the end of the fiscal year. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Well I hope that is true. But right now 

those are accurate. We want to help you achieve that goal. That is 

why we are going through this exercise, for no other reason. The 

average age of the charges in days was 189 days in February of 

2007. February of 2008, the average age of those charges is 211 

days, a 22-day increase. So it is taking you longer this year rather 

than shorter compared to 2007. You had received, in February 

2007, 30,775 charge receipts. In February of 2008, 40,328, a 31-percent increase. So you are receiving more charges. Something is 

going on out there. Your resolutions, in February of 2007 were 

27,433. In February of 2008 you had 27,516 resolutions, a .3-percent increase. But it is taking you 18 days longer. I just cite those 

last statistics to round this out. This is not a good picture. So we 

need to address this. 

Since 2001 you have lost over one-quarter of your employees and 

your charges are increasing. So it is no wonder that you are having 

this very unfortunate trend line. You are about 200 FTE below 

your ceiling right now. The Inspector General has declared ‘‘it is 

imperative that senior level management place greater emphasis 

on the human capital condition at EEOC.’’ Do you agree with that? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are you doing that? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How are you doing that? 

Ms. EARP. We are working on a Human Capital Plan. We need 

to make sure we have the right positions at the right grade with 

the right skills. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And the right number. 

Ms. EARP. And the right number. 

BUDGET REQUEST

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, does your budget request provide sufficient 

funding to hire those 200 already short FTEs in the fiscal year 

2008 staffing ceiling, in addition to the 175 new FTEs you are requesting? 

Ms. EARP. No, sir. It does not. The gap between—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What does your funding request allow you to do 

then? Just hire the 175? 

Ms. EARP. The 175. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So you are still going to be short 25 for this fiscal year. So how many employees and in what positions would you 

have to hire to reduce this trend line? 

Ms. EARP. That is the information that I am going to be very 

happy to provide to you? 

IN-HOUSE CALL CENTER

Mr. MOLLOHAN. For the record, all right. Now, let me ask you 

one other question. I am going to get deeper into this but I want 

to go to Mr. Honda here in a second. What relationship is there between the quality and quantity of the intake personnel that you are 

in the process of hiring because you are taking the call center inhouse and a resolution of these cases? My thinking is that if you 

had a capability at that initial contact point, that you might be 

able to resolve cases at that point, or shortly thereafter. That may 


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be all wrong. It just seems logical to me that you could because I 

have heard, I must tell you, that the folks being hired at those positions are pretty entry level, minimally credentialed people. So I 

am just wondering if it would be possible to resolve some of these 

cases with higher credentialed people at the contact point, and help 

in that way to reduce this backlog? 

Ms. EARP. Theoretically, I think so. In an ideal world, if we had 

intake being performed by attorneys or highly skilled investigators, 

sure. Because they understand the law and they more quickly 

would be able to apply the law to the set of facts that the charging 

party is explaining. But that is a very, very expensive proposition. 

For the people that we are currently hiring, I think over time they 

can be trained to add additional value. Right now we are just making sure that we get the charge in and that we understand what 

is being alleged. After the employees have been with us for a while 

and better understand the process that they are helping to administer, I think we will get more value. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, that suggests a number of other questions 

to me which I will ask in another round. Thank you. Mr. Honda. 

SUCCESSION AND TRANSITION PLANNING

Mr. HONDA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And welcome. I understand that a question has already been asked regarding the workload and shrinking workforce. But I was wondering whether there 

has been any planning on succession on those slots that have been 

vacated or within the Department, whether there is a succession 

planning that you have created or implemented? And if so, what 

does it look like in terms of demographics and language abilities? 

Ms. EARP. We do not have at this point what I would describe 

as a fully fleshed out succession planning system. We have a strategic human capital plan that we are working on which will include 

provisions for succession planning. And it is anticipated that the 

succession planning will take into account how diverse America has 

become, and the changes that we see in our charge receipts. 

Mr. HONDA. And with the changes that have occurred, the increasing diversity what would you consider some of the characteristics of an employee that should be embedded in that person in 

order to reflect or deal with the change in the population? 

Ms. EARP. Well, clearly employees who are multilingual would be 

an important skill to have. But also employees who are more analytical, who have some understanding of statistics. There are a 

number of skills that we would consider for the 21st century that 

perhaps were less important in our old case work. 

Mr. HONDA. Would you submit for the record a list of the permanent hires made since 2006, including the date of hire, the position 

for which they were hired, and the position they currently hold, 

and a description of their positions, and the office to which they 

were assigned? 

I have a question, Mr. Chairman, and I am not sure if it is pertinent for this hearing but since it is EEOC and it is a question that 

probably applies to general practices across the board during the 

time of change, and if I may ask the question. During this time of 

change, there may be some shifting of personnel across the board 

in the capital. And I have always had a concern that some folks 


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may be placed in one position over another in another position over 

someone who has been waiting for a promotion. Coming from another department, if they are favored by the person who has more 

control over personnel. Is that something that one watches out for 

and monitors or looks at when new hires, what positions will be 

moved around? That kind of, for lack of a better word, cronyism is 

avoided? 

Ms. EARP. I am not sure I completely understand the question. 

But I would—— 

Mr. HONDA. I will be more blunt then. 

Ms. EARP. Okay. 

Mr. HONDA. In a time of change, some people will be placed in 

positions over other people by a political appointee before they 

leave. 

Ms. EARP. We do not have any burrowing going on at EEOC. We 

do not have, the only political staff at EEOC are the Commissioners, the Legal Counsel, the General Counsel, and the Legislative Director. Those are the only ones. And the Office of Personnel 

Management has been very clear by directive about positions happening between now and next November, and that they have to be 

vetted by OPM. So I think that we are pretty vigilant and we are 

on guard for making sure that our career employees—— 

Mr. HONDA. That is a better word. 

Ms. EARP. If there are positions to be filled, that they are the 

ones that get them. 

Mr. HONDA. And I did not mean for the question to be directed 

towards EEOC. But EEOC’s function, I thought, might also extend 

into other practices in other departments. And there is some sort 

of watch dog implemented, such as the one you described for your 

department. 

Ms. EARP. No. Other than having watch dog responsibilities for 

diversity and equal opportunity, we do not look specifically at what 

is transpiring during a transition period. 

Mr. HONDA. Okay. Do you have a suggestion where that might 

be, that question might be placed? 

Ms. EARP. Well, both the Merit Systems Protection Board and 

the Office of Personnel Management have responsibility for nonmeritorious promotions or hires. 

Mr. HONDA. Okay. Very good. Thank you very much. 

Ms. EARP. Thank you. 

Mr. HONDA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Mr. Frelinghuysen? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Could you tell me, of the charges that are 

brought, obviously a number are resolved but obviously you have 

not been able to resolve too many because you lack staff. A number 

are pending and those figures are escalating. What would be your 

make up of those charges? Let us take age, race, sex discrimination, national origin, issues related to people with disabilities. 

Could you just give us a general run down? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. Roughly—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And is there sort of a history relative to 

any of those categories? And I do not mean to be saying that those 

are the only ones you deal with, are historically issues that relate 

to one of those areas more prevalent in the pending category? 


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Ms. EARP. I think that our inventory is probably pretty consistent with the level of charge receipts on various bases. Historically, race is the number one charge filing that we receive and race 

normally accounts for somewhere between about 30, 35, 37 percent. 

Usually the number two category is gender, including sex discrimination, pregnancy discrimination, those kind of things. Number 

three can fluctuate but most recently it is retaliation. In fact, depending on how you slice the data, retaliation might actually be the 

number two basis. And then disability and age and national origin 

typically come in somewhere around 10 to 15 percent or less. But 

race and gender tend to be number one and number two. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Do you have case managers? Obviously, you 

have some people with more institutional memory and experience 

than others. Are people assigned that have a wealth of experience 

in a certain area to work on those cases? How does it work actually? Do those that work on behalf, on your behalf, do they own 

these cases until they are resolved? How would you characterize 

your workforce? Do they own these cases until they are resolved? 

Ms. EARP. A single individual, I cannot say—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I know you get input from all sorts of people, obviously, if certain people are doing investigatory work 

and—— 

Ms. EARP. Right. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Doing all the things that are necessary. 

Ms. EARP. Well first of all, we try to pair our staff so that more 

junior staff gets the benefit of being mentored and trained and 

monitored by more senior staff. The best example of that is the way 

we are approaching systemic litigation and investigation where we 

are teaming those staff that have a lot of experience with the less 

experienced, more junior staff. But the complaint, the charge is 

owned on a continuum by the staff assigned to that particular process. In intake the intake staff takes care of it. They own it. They 

do everything they have to do with it. Then the investigator has 

it. Then it may go to a mediator. And certainly when it gets to 

legal, legal owns it, and becomes very passionate about it. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So they own it—— 

Ms. EARP. On a continuum it is owned by staff with various expertise. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. When the National Contact Center ceased 

operations in December their work was brought in-house. 

Ms. EARP. Yes, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So these people would be classified as intake? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And those intake workers are in the 15 offices around the country, is that right? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

CALL CENTER

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Last year you submitted for the record that 

bringing the function in-house would involve one time costs, I think 

you mentioned of $2.3 million, and additional costs of $3.5 million. 

Do those estimates still hold? 

Ms. EARP. Pretty much. 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Have there been any benefits in terms of 

overall efficiency and customer satisfaction, not forgetting the fact 

that there is this enormous backlog? Has there been any positive 

reaction to the new, to doing things the way that they historically 

had been done before the National Contact Center was set up? 

Ms. EARP. Well, we hired the customer intake representatives 

just last March. So it is still a pretty new function for us. But it 

is up and running. We will have customer satisfaction surveys in 

fairly short order to send out so that we can do some comparison. 

But at this point, I would basically say we are performing the intake function and responding to the public. And we will get better 

at it. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And how would you define repositioning? 

Ms. EARP. We basically collapsed our field structure from twentythree district offices to fifteen. That allowed us to save by not having to hire twenty-three executives, hire fifteen instead. And it also 

gives better management control. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Has it? 

Ms. EARP. Yes, I would say so. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

STAFFING ISSUES

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. I would like to follow up a little bit 

on the staffing issues which really are going to have to be addressed if EEOC is going to do its job. You are going to have to 

have better staff and they are going to have to be qualified staff. 

Looking at your pending retirement eligibilities, I note that the IG 

report found that 42 percent of EEOC employees will be eligible to 

retire between 2007 and 2012. That includes 46 percent of the investigators, which is a huge number, and 24 percent of the attorneys, which is a large number. So talking a little bit about your 

succession plan, tell us how you are now thinking and those in 

your organization who are thinking about this, how are you planning for succession? 

Ms. EARP. We are working on a human capital plan which will 

take into account the fact that so many of our employees over the 

next five years are retirement eligible. The most important thing, 

especially for attorneys and for investigators, is to make sure we 

have the right number of people in the right places at the right 

grade level. Part of our inability to fund all of the positions that 

we have has to do with unfunded promotions and just structural 

deficiencies. A big centerpiece of our Human Capital Plan will be 

position management. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Unfunded promotions means you cannot promote. Or if you do, you tell the people, ‘‘Great you are getting a 

promotion but we are not able to fund it. Therefore you are not receiving any more salary.’’ Is that right? 

Ms. EARP. Well basically we have professional staff but we just 

do not have the dollars. If you hire someone at the GS–12 level and 

the only budget you have is for a GS–12, if there is an across the 

board cost of living adjustment, increase in benefits, promotion, we 

have to take that money from somewhere in order to fund it. So 

usually we would take it from a vacancy. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. So does this year’s budget request 

address those concerns and those short fundings? 

Ms. EARP. Modestly. But you have already indicated the problem, 

and the problem is the gap between our ceiling and what we can 

really afford. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I see. 

Ms. EARP. The plan that I will give you proposes to close that 

gap. This is a structural problem that we have lived with probably 

for twenty years. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. When will you be able to get that plan up to this 

Committee? How long will it take you to do that? 

Ms. EARP. My Budget Director thinks about a week, maybe two. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Does your Budget Director have that in 

his head? Okay, but you are going to pull it together and get it up 

here within a week? All right. Just sharing some ideas. You are 

hiring x number of people to bring the call center in-house. 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How many offices do you have across the country? 

Ms. EARP. Fifty-three. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Fifty-three. Are you going to hire an intake person, that is a person who will be replacing the responsibilities of 

the call center, in every one of the fifty-three offices? 

Ms. EARP. No, fifteen. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay, I thought I heard that. So you are only 

going to have those in fifteen offices? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And how many people will that be in each of the 

fifteen offices? 

Ms. EARP. It varies by the size of the district, but we are hiring 

sixty-six total, which includes sixty-one to actually answer the 

phone and the rest are either tech support or supervisors. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I see. And the places you think you are saving 

is on the supervisors and the tech support, I guess? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. This is a huge attrition due to retirement. I 

think it is. I am just wondering if it would not be a good idea to 

hire, going back to my previous questions, people who are 

credentialed higher than you would normally think of hiring for an 

intake person, and look to move those people into investigators and 

attorneys positions. See, that would be a terrific training ground to 

move people in. Then you would ask for budgets to support them. 

Ms. EARP. Well, I would note that while 40 percent of our employees are eligible to retire over the next five years, the fact is 

EEOC’s employees stay on average six to eight years beyond retirement eligibility. So those employees who are eligible to retire, we 

still believe that for most of them the exit will be a lot slower. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So that is about 20 percent? 

Ms. EARP. It is about 19 percent a year actually eligible to leave. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. All right, well whatever those numbers are I just 

think that would be a good way to get talent into the entry level 

of your organization. When they were hired, if they are interested 

in this kind of work, and people who are interested in it are passionate about it, then they know that, wow, there is an opportunity 


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for advancement. Again this is off the top of my head and I am not 

doing anything but sharing thoughts with you. 

But I will say this. This cannot fail. With these backlog rates, 

and we are going to do our very best to look at funding and be responsive to these numbers you come up with, you cannot fail here. 

If hiring people at these fifteen offices does not work, that is a bad 

thing. So you need to be really carefully looking at the successful 

transition of the call center to the in-house function. I respect totally that you live with this every day. We are going to be making 

judgments after the fact, which is always easier to do. But because 

of your expertise you are in a better position to make these judgments prospectively. But you cannot fail in this. We have backlogs 

here. This is the United States of America and this backlog record 

from 2001 is abysmal. We have all talked about that and you totally agree with it. We are agreeing together here, and I am sure 

most people sitting here also agree. This Committee wants to support you. So we need to know what to do. 

If only putting people in fifteen of these call centers is not good 

enough then you need to rethink it. If it is, that is great. If bringing people in who are more credentialed into these entry level positions, opportunity made available because you are bringing the call 

center activity in-house, I think, just off the top of my head that 

sounds like a great strategy. I think you need to do a cost benefit 

analysis regarding the various levels of expertise that can handle 

your intake. In other words, if you bring somebody into these call 

center positions or these entry level contract positions that is a little higher credentialed, that is a great training ground. They are 

going to move up and they can resolve cases. But what is the rate, 

and is there an opportunity to help reduce the backlog and to resolve charges at the entry point if there are people handling those 

entry level calls that have greater capability? Or greater experience, however you want to say that? That would be kind of a cost 

benefit. Maybe you pay a little more money for them, but you resolve more cases. I assume even somebody taking a call right now 

with the entry level people you are hiring can resolve some of these 

cases—— 

Ms. EARP. Mm-hmm. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. Probably, just by giving them information, right? So that is more of a speech, but do you have any 

thoughts to express on that? 

Ms. EARP. I would just like to underscore how pleased we are to 

have the $12 million increase and the opportunity to begin to address some of these structural issues. It is absolutely imperative 

that EEOC have a human capital plan that includes position management. I would agree with you that we need to refine exactly 

what skill at what level is needed along the continuum. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yes. 

Ms. EARP. Maybe for the most complex, the most nuanced 

charges, having a front line staff doing intake that is highly skilled 

and therefore expensive in some small number of cases is the way 

to go. But for 60 percent, perhaps, of the people who call, perhaps 

we would not want to spend more than what we are already investing. But I am very happy to continue to explore that and to provide 


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for the record some thoughts on how to close the gap in our funding. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well again, nothing I have said is a judgment 

about this. I am in a poor position to make those judgments. You 

are in an excellent position with this good staff behind you to make 

those judgments. But I do think I am correct in looking at the 

number of folks that at least are eligible to retire and the fact that 

you are increasing the number. You can look at all this as an opportunity. You know, you need to do it right. And hopefully you 

really are and I know you are trying. Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. According to your budget document, and I 

quote, ‘‘to move towards the vision of knowledge management, 

EEOC obtained external expert resources to conduct a knowledge 

management study, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.’’ Where is that 

study? 

Ms. EARP. Well, we are actually implementing some of it with 

the in-house call center. To make sure that the people on the front 

line have the appropriate understanding of civil rights law to be 

able to vet the questions and respond to callers in an effective way. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, it is more than that though, is it not? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And it falls under the title of information 

technology, employing the latest technology. 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The gathering of statistics, of data, and 

drawing some conclusions from that data. So it is more than reinvigorating or educating the intake workers that are now back in 

the fifteen different centers. 

Ms. EARP. Well, in the sense that the technology is used to give 

the intake workers scripts and scenarios that allow them to immediately look to see is the caller stating a fact pattern, that more 

easily guides the intake worker to what the answer is. It is putting 

the knowledge in an easily accessible way through technology. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You completed this analysis in 2007? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

OUTREACH

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. My last question. In terms of outreach and 

education, wherever I go, whatever office I visit, prominently there 

is usually some poster which has the EEOC. While people may get 

it, some sort of ignore it because it is on the wall for a long time. 

However, it is a viable document. How would you characterize your 

outreach? In other words, some things are so innate and so abominable. But in many ways you are proactive on the prevention side 

of things here. There is a certain maturity out there, but in some 

cases, you are reinforcing things which are so basic, so obvious, so 

human. How are you doing your outreach? How would you characterize your outreach these days? 

Ms. EARP. We would characterize our outreach as highly effective 

and a contributing factor in the rising receipts. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Good. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 


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STATE AND LOCAL ASSISTANCE

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. Your fiscal year 2009 request contains a reduction in EEOC’s support to state and local Fair Employment Practice Agencies and Tribal Employment Rights Organizations. At the requested level you will reimburse the FEPAs and 

the TEROs about $26 million in 2009, which is $3 million less than 

you reimbursed them for, or are planning to reimburse, in fiscal 

year 2008. What is the justification for this reduction in state and 

local assistance? 

Ms. EARP. The workload. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Has gone down? 

Ms. EARP. For the state and local agencies, yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is that demonstratable across the country? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, would you give us detail on that please? 

Ms. EARP. Sure. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I mean right now. Can you do it right now? Talk 

to us about how the workload has gone down. 

Ms. EARP. Well, the state and local agencies around the country 

are somewhat uneven. They have different responsibilities. Some of 

them can take a charge all the way to an administrative decision. 

Others merely complete an investigation. But over the last several 

years, the charge receipts from state and local agencies have 

trended downward. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And this reduction will not result in an increase 

of charges being carried forward, or create a backlog at the state 

and local level? 

Ms. EARP. We do not think so because the charges are considered 

dual filed. When they are filed with the state or local agency, or 

whether they are filed with us, ultimately they are considered filed 

with EEOC. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well if that is true I would think almost by definition they would be carrying increased backlogs. Because you are, 

and if they are dual filed and you are not disposing of them, then 

why are they not increasing at the state level? 

Ms. EARP. Well we think that is why our receipts are going up, 

because they are decreasing at the state and local level. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, would it not be to your advantage then to 

promote the states taking up and disposing of these cases at the 

state level? And are you doing that? 

Ms. EARP. We work very, very closely with the FEPAs. We use 

some of them not just for processing charges but conducting investigations, mediations—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. But are you promoting their taking cases? I 

guess that is an outreach and education effort and I know that 

your outreach and education budget is going down. 

Ms. EARP. Because the front line activities, our priorities are investigations and legal to put—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you think the states are not taking cases, or 

are assuming a declining responsibility in this area in part because 

they are not being encouraged or educated or outreached by the national EEOC? 

Ms. EARP. No, I do not think that. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Really? 

Ms. EARP. I think that across the country there are complex reasons why some state and local agencies do very well and some do 

not. On average, their receipts have been trending downward. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. No, I know that and that is why we are asking 

these questions. I am sure it is an uneven experience across the 

United States. Some states are leaning forward in this area and 

some states not. But that was not my question. My question was, 

do you think you could reverse what is an unfortunate trend line? 

With backlogs going up nationally there is obviously a need out 

there. So it is unfortunate that the states are not taking it up. But 

is that possibly in part because the federal government is not being 

aggressive enough in outreaching and encouraging the states to 

take on this responsibility? Which if they were to do it would arguably lighten your load. 

Ms. EARP. I think that we could always improve our support of 

the FEPAs by advancing them more. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, you have a variety of outreach and education programs. I really would like to know an answer to this. You 

are requesting less and less money all the time for education and 

outreach. That is going down. I know the focus of your outreach 

and education is to the companies, it is to the communities, it is 

telling people what their rights are. But is part of your education 

and outreach program to the states also? Or not? 

Ms. EARP. It could be. Typically they are our partners in the various outreach activities. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Well these three sources are on the decline and your justification states that, ‘‘We plan to reduce the resources committed to this activity,’’ outreach, ‘‘to support our administrative enforcement inventory reduction.’’ Well, we are extremely supportive of backlog reduction. But I am not sure I see 

why that would come at the expense of outreach and education. 

Why should we treat these two activities as though they were a 

zero sum game? 

Ms. EARP. Basically, because everything cannot be a number one 

priority. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Basically because you have not been given 

enough money. You would like to have more money in education 

and outreach? Is that correct? You would like to have more. I am 

not asking you to disown OMB as much as you would like to. Well, 

that was presumptuous. I take that back. Don’t tell them I said 

that, will you please, Mr. Frelinghuysen? 

HEADQUARTERS RESTRUCTURING

What is the status of your headquarters restructuring effort? 

Ms. EARP. It is on hold. We are a commission and we have not 

been able to reach a consensus, majority point of view, to reorganize headquarters. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What options are being considered by the work 

group, or by the group of folks that are considering this question? 

Ms. EARP. Basically, the work group is looking at ways to be 

more efficient in the service to the field, to eliminate redundancies 

in headquarters, and there are a few. But at this point we do not 

see any consensus for moving forward. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Does your budget request take into consideration 

a headquarter restructuring? 

Ms. EARP. No, but it does take into consideration about a 20 percent attrition rate of headquarters staff. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you think that is realistic? 

Ms. EARP. It has been borne out more or less, senior people retiring in Washington. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, are they not going to be replaced? 

Ms. EARP. Where we have the opportunity to replace for the most 

part we are not doing it at headquarters. We are replacing in the 

field. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How many people do you have working in headquarters? 

Ms. EARP. 450. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And as they retire? What explains the attrition? 

Ms. EARP. Mostly retirements, but also promotions and just other 

opportunities. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. And you are not replacing these people? 

Ms. EARP. For the most part, no. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Does the fact that you are not replacing them 

partly explain your growing backlogs? 

Ms. EARP. No. Washington has less effect on helping to process 

the inventory than the field does. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Have you done an assessment of what is needed 

in headquarters in terms of employment recently? Because it 

sounds like you do not need this number of people, if you are not 

replacing them when they leave. 

Ms. EARP. We hoped to accomplish just that with the headquarters working group but, again, we were not able to reach consensus so we have not had an opportunity to fully review where efficiencies could be gained in headquarters. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, we need a little more information on this. 

I mean, most agencies can tell you how many people they need operating in the various offices that are under their jurisdiction. So 

I guess the question is, how many people do you need working at 

headquarters? Can you tell us that? 

Ms. EARP. That is a question that I had hoped the working group 

would answer. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well of course you are answering it as a matter 

of practice every day when you are not replacing people who are 

leaving. You are saying, ‘‘Well, we do not need that person.’’ 

Ms. EARP. Well, what I am doing is robbing Peter to pay Paul. 

Essentially, if I have a GS–14 who retires in Washington, D.C. but 

I need an investigator in Tupelo, Mississippi I am going to try to 

make sure I put that investigator close to the field, to where that 

person is needed in the field. It is prioritizing. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Have you had an outside entity, GAO or the IG, 

look at your staffing needs from headquarters down to the field offices recently? 

Ms. EARP. The working group that looked at headquarters repositioning essentially recommended that we have an outside firm 

with organizational development expertise look at headquarters. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. When was that recommendation made? 

Ms. EARP. Last fall. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. And what has happened to that recommendation? 

Ms. EARP. We have not acted on it because to spend the money 

we need a consensus from our commissioners to do it. And there 

is no consensus. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How much money would be involved? Do you 

have an estimate? 

Ms. EARP. Quarter of a million dollars. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. In other words, some of the commissioners want 

to have the study and some commissioners do not? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. And for some of the commissioners timing is important. 

HEADQUARTERS RELOCATION

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay, I feel like we just got into a political quagmire here and I do not know where to go exactly with this so we 

will follow up in different ways. You are planning on relocating 

your headquarters from L Street to M Street. Where are you on L 

Street? 

Ms. EARP. Right now we are at 1801 L, Northwest. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. 1801 L Street, just off Connecticut Avenue? 

Ms. EARP. Yes, a block up. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How long have you been there? 

Ms. EARP. Almost twenty years. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So you are one block north? M? H, I, J, K, L, 

M? 

Ms. EARP. We are moving to NOMA in Northeast. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, everybody wants to get in on this. Are we 

excited about this move? So southeast? 

Ms. EARP. Northeast. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Oh, northeast. Northeast, okay. Well, your secu- rity costs are supposed to go up by $1 million? Somebody has done 

a study here and came up with that estimate, is that correct? 

Ms. EARP. Well, basically the Department of Homeland Security 

tells us what our security costs will be. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Oh, really. It is in their building or something? 

Ms. EARP. Well, they control how many cameras—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. 

Ms. EARP [continuing]. How many guards we have to have. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay, how are you going to pay for that? 

Ms. EARP. Some of it is absorbed in the cost of the move because 

we have been planning for the move for a number or years, and 

GSA has built it into this total move package. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Because you have not requested anything for the 

extra security. 

Ms. EARP. No. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, that is an annualized item, is it not? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

ENGLISH ONLY IN THE WORK PLACE

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. I have to ask a question about Englishonly workplace rules. As you are certainly aware, there has been 

considerable congressional interest in the EEOC’s pursuit of discrimination charges relating to English-only workplace rules. I 


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would like to give you an opportunity to explain EEOC’s legal reasoning on these cases and to put them into perspective compared 

to EEOC’s overall employment discrimination workload. It is my 

understanding that the EEOC supports an employer’s right to promulgate an English-only rule, but only in certain circumstances. So 

can you explain to us those circumstances where English-only rules 

are necessary and those where they are discriminatory? 

Ms. EARP. Very briefly, the Equal Employment Opportunity 

Commission does not believe that employers should have proxies 

for race or national origin, or any other unlawful basis. And sometimes requiring English can be a proxy for discrimination based on 

national origin. If the job involves health, safety, those kind of 

things, we believe that an employer should be able to make a rational justification to require English within the context of the job. 

Not, however, when a person is on a lunch break or a bathroom 

break, or coming or going to work. It is a thirty-year policy of 

EEOC. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You sounded like you really got into your—— 

Ms. EARP. That is my comfort zone. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. Into your comfort zone right there. 

Good for you. What portion of your charge receipts allege discrimination based on English-only policies? 

Ms. EARP. Very, very, very small. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Very few? 

Ms. EARP. Very few. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are you familiar with the provision that the Senate tried to put into our bill last year regarding this matter? 

Ms. EARP. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Without getting into it, did you oppose or support that initiative? 

Ms. EARP. I support my agency’s thirty-year policy. I believe it 

is. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Which that would have contradicted. That provision would have contradicted it. It would not have been consistent 

with the standard you just testified to, am I correct? 

Ms. EARP. Employers can require that English be spoken when 

there is a rational, business reason to do that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. All right. Mr. Frelinghuysen? Okay. We 

will have some questions for the record. We very much appreciate 

your testimony here today. We appreciate your good work trying to 

work with declining scarce resources each and every year during 

the last eight or so years. We appreciate the good work of all of 

your staff, those who are here and those who are out in the field 

working hard to see that the mission of the EEOC is carried out 

properly and effectively. So thank you again for your testimony. We 

look forward to working with you and getting some information 

from you that you have committed to supplying to us in the next 

short time frame. 

Ms. EARP. Thank you, sir. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you very much, Ms. Earp. The hearing is 

adjourned. 

[Questions and answers submitted for the record follow:] 


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(727) 

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 2, 2008. 

LEGAL SERVICES CORPORATION 

WITNESSES 

HELAINE M. BARNETT, PRESIDENT, LEGAL SERVICES CORPORATION 

FRANK B. STRICKLAND, CHAIRMAN, LEGAL SERVICES CORPORATION 

OPENING STATEMENT BY MR. MOLLOHAN

Mr. MOLLOHAN. The hearing will come to order. Well, good afternoon. We welcome two witnesses to testify on the fiscal year 2009 

budget request for the Legal Services Corporation, Ms. Helaine 

Barnett and Mr. Frank Strickland, respectively, the LSC’s President and Board Chairman. 

Established in 1974, the Legal Services Corporation’s mission is 

to promote equal access to justice in our nation and to provide high 

quality, civil legal assistance to low income people. 

The Legal Service Corporation carries out this mission by awarding grants to legal service providers in more than 900 locations 

across the nation. The Legal Services Corporation budget request 

for the fiscal year 2009 is $471,400,000 an increase of $121 million 

over the current year funding level. 

In 2005 the LSC issued a Justice Gap report which was a nationwide study which found that half of the eligible people who seek 

legal help from LSC funded programs are turned away due to lack 

of resources. Clearly, there is much work to be done to improve 

America’s access to justice. 

Ms. Barnett and Mr. Strickland, we appreciate your efforts to 

grant people access to justice. We welcome your testimony. And before you proceed, I would like to call on my Ranking Member, Mr. 

Frelinghuysen. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF MR. FRELINGHUYSEN

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I join the Chairman in welcoming you both to testify about your 2009 budget request. The Act that created the Legal Services Corporation in 1974 

provided you with pass through budget authority and therefore you 

can provide the Appropriations Committee with an independent assessment of your funding without OMB approval. 

We know those amounts. I think we are aware that the President’s budget requested a lower amount, $311 million which is 

$39.5 million below the fiscal year 2008 level. Also, you have had 

two recent GAO reports that contain many recommendations on 

governance, oversight, and grants management. I will have some 

questions about the follow up work you are doing in that regard. 

And like the Chairman, I welcome you. Thank you for the good job 

you are doing. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. Both your written statements will be 

made a part of the record and Chairman Strickland would you like 

to proceed? 

OPENING STATEMENT

Mr. STRICKLAND. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Mollohan and Congressman Frelinghuysen and members of the Subcommittee, thank you for giving me the opportunity to testify today 

on the work of the Legal Services Corporation. And on behalf of our 

Board of Directors, I want to thank you for the continued support 

that you have shown for this program. It means a great deal to the 

lives of our clients and fulfills our obligation as citizens to support 

equal access to justice. 

We have a dedicated and committed team of directors, each of 

whom take their obligations very seriously. The Board fully supports our appropriations request for fiscal year 2009 and feels that 

it is based on a necessary assessment of where we need to be on 

the road to closing the justice gap in America. 

The Legal Services Corporation is the largest single source of 

funding for civil legal aid for low income individuals and families. 

We fund 137 programs with more than 900 offices serving every 

congressional district. More than 95 percent of LSC appropriations 

are distributed to these programs. The Corporation provides guidance, training and oversight to ensure that programs provide high 

quality legal services and comply with congressional restrictions, 

LSC rules and regulations. 

In that regard, I would like to address at the outset the issue of 

two GAO reports on LSC. As you know, GAO published reports in 

2007 and early 2008 on our Corporation’s governance and grants 

management. We appreciated both of these reviews and accepted 

all of the recommendations. With regard to the governance and accountability report, the Board has approved a code of ethics and 

conduct for directors, officers, and employees of the Corporation; established a separate audit committee of the Board; and approved 

a charter for that Committee, and approved the continued use of 

the Government Accounting Standards Board guidelines for LSC’s 

financial reports. 

LSC management has completed the first phase of a continuity 

of operations plan for the Corporation, which has been disseminated to all LSC staff. In addition, we have begun an intensive review of the elements of a risk management program so that we can 

adopt a best practices program commensurate with the size and 

budget of LSC. 

With respect to the GAO report on LSC’s grants management 

and oversight, the Board of Directors at its January 2008 meeting 

appointed an ad hoc committee consisting of three board members, 

one of whom I designated as board liaison. We assigned them to 

work directly with LSC management and its Office of Compliance 

and Enforcement, the Office of Program Performance, and the Office of Inspector General to implement the recommendations of the 

GAO reports. 

The Board liaison held two day long meetings at which representatives of these offices identified each aspect of fiscal oversight, areas where improvement could be made, and areas where 


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729 

greater communication and organization would improve fiscal oversight and help achieve the LSC mission. 

Importantly, management and the OIG identified in detail the 

oversight roles and responsibilities of each relevant organization 

within LSC, and in so doing specifically addressed oversight of the 

independent public accountant process. 

The Ad Hoc Committee has briefed the Board and the Board is 

expected to act on the Ad Hoc Committee’s recommendations regarding a delineation of roles and responsibilities during its meeting at the end of April. As you know, the report on grants management contained troubling references to alleged improper use of 

grant funds by nine LSC funded programs. Eight of the nine cases 

were referred to the then acting assistant inspector general on November 20, 2007 by President Barnett. 

The compliance review of the ninth program, Nevada Legal Services, had begun prior to the GAO report and was retained for a follow up by the Office of Compliance and Enforcement. That report 

is near completion and further action will result. In addition, in an 

advisory to all LSC funded programs dated March 20, 2008, President Barnett reminded executive directors of the need for appropriate documentation of expenditures of LSC funds, of the regulations regarding unallowable costs, and specifically stressed the prohibition of expenditures for alcohol and lobbying, the need for written policies governing salary advances, and a reminder of the regulation governing derivative income. 

The OIG has visited three grantees and is scheduled to visit the 

other five over the next two months. The OIG has reported to us 

that for the three sites already reviewed and based on the OIG’s 

preliminary analysis, management at the grantees has taken corrective actions based on the GAO recommendations and has implemented or is implementing additional controls to prevent those 

issues from recurring. 

And speaking of the OIG, I am pleased to announce the appointment of Jeffrey E. Schanz as the Corporation’s Inspector General 

effective March 3, 2008. Mr. Schanz is in the audience today. Mr. 

Schanz comes to LSC from the U.S. Department of Justice where 

he served for the past 17 years as Director of the Office of Policy 

and Planning in the Audit Division at the Office of the Inspector 

General at the Justice Department. 

Mr. Chairman, we are taking these matters very seriously and 

are giving our highest priority to implement all the recommendations with speed and diligence. All of this effort is in recognition 

of the fact that stewardship of taxpayer dollars is among our most 

important responsibilities. 

Our Board remains proud of this program and the critical role 

it plays in our nation’s justice system. And we will continue to ensure that LSC provides the most effective and efficient representation possible of the civil legal needs of the eligible poor throughout 

this country. 

Thank you and I would be happy to answer questions at the appropriate time. 

[Written testimony by Frank B. Strickland Chairman, Legal 

Services Corporation] 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Mr. Strickland. President Barnett. 

OPENING STATEMENT

Ms. BARNETT. Chairman Mollohan, Congressman Frelinghuysen, 

thank you very much for holding this hearing and giving me the 

opportunity to testify on the fiscal year 2009 budget request of the 

Legal Services Corporation. I also want to thank you for the bipartisan support you continue to provide LSC. 

While I know that you share our disappointment in how the 

budget process ended last year, our community greatly appreciates 

your efforts in attempting to help close the justice gap. 

At the outset, I wish to echo the sentiments of Chairman Strickland regarding the reports of the Government Accountability Office. I want to assure you that I am sincere when I say that we 

truly embrace those reviews, take them with the utmost seriousness, and welcome the opportunity they afford us to do our job even 

better. 

Oversight of the use of scarce resources is necessary and appropriate. And as Chairman Strickland said, we are responding aggressively to the concerns and recommendations made by GAO. 

Our job is important and it is vitally important that we carry it out 

with energy and the proper level of stewardship. 

And why is it important? As you know, my entire career has 

been devoted to providing legal aid to low income persons. I am 

honored to be the first legal aid attorney to hold the position of 

President of the Corporation in its 34 year history. I know firsthand what our mission means to the lives of our clients. In fact, 

civil legal assistance to the poor literally saves lives. When we assisted a young family in Wheeling from being evicted and falling 

into homelessness, when we saved a battered wife in Memphis 

from a violent and abusive marriage, when we helped a young 

mother in South Jersey maintain custody of her little girl, and 

when we saved a Baltimore grandmother from losing her home to 

foreclosure, our programs are literally saving the lives of our clients and giving them a chance to be productive members of society. 

But legal aid is more than that. In a very direct way it saves 

money by preventing the downward spiral of the poor into costly 

public support. Ensuring that our clients are adequately represented in the civil justice system greatly improves their chances 

of keeping a home rather than moving into a shelter; holding a job 

rather than going onto public assistance; receiving medical care 

rather than costly hospitalization; escaping an abusive relationship 

rather than suffering further injury and even death. 

In short, civil legal assistance saves both lives and money. Someone asked me the other day what was the hardest thing I ever had 

to do as a legal aid lawyer. Without a moment’s hesitation I said 

having to tell someone we couldn’t help them knowing they had nowhere else to turn was the hardest task I ever had to do. 

Our Justice Gap report has documented that for every eligible 

client that we are able to assist, one is turned away due to lack 

of resources. Recent State legal need studies and reports since the 

Justice Gap report not only affirmed the earlier findings, but 

showed that the needs may well have been understated in the report. 


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735 

The Justice Gap report concluded it will take a doubling of the 

resources from both federal and non-federal sources to fill the Justice Gap. While I am pleased to report a rise in non-federal resources for civil legal aid in 2005 and 2006, in the past year the 

fiscal problems of many State governments and IOLTA programs 

have threatened this progress. 

The $22 million increase that this Subcommittee was able to give 

LSC in 2007 was our first federal increase in four years and was 

a good start. But we need to work with you and the Senate to continue that progress this year. 

With respect to the fiscal year 2009 budget, LSC requests an appropriation of $471 million, an increase of approximately $40 million over our fiscal year 2008 request. Again this year more than 

95 percent of the request is for basic field grants to programs that 

provide essential civil legal assistance to low income Americans 

and for grants to programs to improve efficiency and effectiveness 

through the use of technology. 

Since we testified before this Subcommittee last year, the sub 

prime mortgage crisis across the country and the rise of foreclosures has overtaken many of our clients and flooded many of our 

programs with requests for assistance. Renters and senior citizens 

with fixed incomes are especially vulnerable to be displaced by foreclosure. Our programs across the country are seeing a dramatic increase in calls from people seeking assistance with housing and 

predatory lending matters. Without additional funding, these programs will be unable to meet this increasing demand for legal services. 

In addition, LSC funded programs continue to provide civil legal 

assistance as part of the recovery process to victims of natural disasters such as hurricane Katrina, fires in Southern California, 

floods in the Midwest, tornados recently in Tennessee and Arkansas. More than two and a half years after hurricane Katrina, LSC 

grantees continue to help people with the loss of their homes, jobs, 

and health care. I know from my own experience with 9/11 in New 

York City that the legal problems of victims of disasters continue 

for many years to come. 

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, as you noted at this hearing last 

year, the appropriation for the Legal Services Corporation amounts 

to less than half of what was provided in 1981 in inflation adjusted 

dollars. Fourteen years ago LSC received $400 million from Congress. The LSC Board and I urge you to restore adequate funding 

for the provision of civil legal aid to the most vulnerable among us. 

In this effort the federal government must lead the way consistent with its role in fulfilling the promise of our constitution, the 

promise inscribed on the Supreme Court Building, ‘‘Equal justice 

under law.’’ I can assure you that your support will not only help 

fulfill the promise, it will literally save more lives. 

Thank you and I would be happy to answer your questions. 

[Written testimony of Helaine M. Barnett, President, Legal Services Corporation] 


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FUNDING

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Ms. Barnett. You raised the issue of 

your funding in the past years in comparable dollars what would 

your request be this year if you were to receive the appropriation 

you received in 1995, which in your chart here is $400 million? Do 

you know the answer to that? 

Ms. BARNETT. Probably more than, certainly more than what we 

are asking for and probably closer to the seven hundreds. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I would guess. 

Ms. BARNETT. I am getting the—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well you can get a better number for the record. 

[The information follows:] 

Congress appropriated $400 million to LSC for fiscal year 1995. Had LSC’s funding kept pace with inflation with its 1995 level, LSC would be receiving $555.6 million today. In addition, if LSC’s funding had kept pace with inflation on our FY 1980 

funding level of $300 million (high-water mark), our funding level today would be 

$770.7 million. 

Ms. BARNETT. Certainly. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. But I am sure that is right. So your request is 

considerably lower than what your highest funding level was 

some—— 

Ms. BARNETT. Fourteen years ago. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Fourteen, thirteen, fourteen years ago. Well 

Legal Service Corporation has certainly been looked at here. The 

IG last year, the GAO this year. And you have embraced the recommendations which seems don’t know how you could be more responsive. And you are in the process of developing methods and 

procedures and requesting funding so that you can even expand 

your oversight capabilities, both financial activities and programmatic activities. Is that correct? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Correct. 

GAO

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Chairman Strickland, do you want to speak to 

that a little more than you did in your testimony? And in regard 

to the nature of the concerns that GAO has come up with and how 

you think that defines the Legal Services Corporation today. 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Well I think the Board has been extraordinarily 

responsive to the report on governance of the Corporation. As I outlined, we moved very quickly on that at the January meeting here 

in Washington and we continue to move ahead on that. 

As I said, we have already adopted a comprehensive code of ethics and conduct. That is already in place. That is for the whole organization, not just for the Board. Another recommendation that 

the GAO had for us was to develop a continuity of operations plan. 

That is not in place, but it is well under way in terms of its development. 

We are also looking at a number of things that are in the category of best practices, best management practices, so that we can 

adopt a program for LSC that fits us as opposed to some much 

larger organization. 

And the most recent thing we did, which was something that the 

GAO, as I recall it, asked us to consider, and that is whether to 


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have a separate audit committee. We did have that function under 

our Finance Committee and our Ad Hoc Committee which was appointed in January, brought to us a recommendation that we 

should have a separate audit committee. And the Board in a conference call meeting within the past couple of weeks accepted that 

recommendation and approved a charter for the audit committee, 

and delegated to me as is typical for an appointment of committees, 

that responsibility. So I have appointed the Audit Committee and 

the Board also approved a charter for the Audit Committee. 

So we have taken a number of steps. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What would be the responsibilities of the Audit 

Committee? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. The Audit Committee will work in conjunction 

with the Inspector General relying on the professional side of the 

equation and looking to the IG to bring recommendations for LSC’s 

outside accounting firm, which performs an annual audit of LSC’s 

books and records. 

So the IG and the Audit Committee of the Board will work together in that effort to select the auditor, oversee the audit function itself, receive and review the annual report from the accounting firm and then bring that to the Board. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Ms. Barnett, are all of your programs audited 

across the nation? 

Ms. BARNETT. Yes, Mr. Chairman. Every LSC grantee is required 

by the LSC Act to have a financial audit each year. And in 1996 

Congress and the Appropriations Act actually designated the independent public accountants to be under the supervision of the Office of the Inspector General. And the audits have to be completed 

on an annual basis. They are given to the Office of the Inspector 

General who is to refer to management any findings that need followup. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So typically a local program would hire a local 

accounting firm to conduct an audit of that particular program at 

that site? 

Ms. BARNETT. That is correct. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And do they have a uniform set of criteria besides what normally the accountants look at in order to judge the 

program by? 

Ms. BARNETT. Well, the Office of the Inspector General has an 

audit guide and a compliance supplement that they are given. I 

think as a result of the GAO recommendations on grants management and oversight, we are working with the Office of the Inspector General and with the Board to clarify the roles and responsibilities of fiscal oversight. And to give guidance, further guidance, to 

both the auditors and to our grantees in their accounting manual 

with regard to the financial audits. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So you are tightening up the financial requirements for your local programs? 

Ms. BARNETT. We are certainly looking to give better guidance to 

the IPA’s and to our programs. And as I said where we are working 

to clarify the roles and responsibilities and to improve our information sharing. So that I think as a result of the GAO report that is 

what will happen. 


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744 

HIRING

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Now you are requesting increased funding to 

hire additional personnel at the LSC offices. Could you tell us what 

that increased funding is for and what capabilities you need to be 

hiring? 

Ms. BARNETT. I will be happy to. At the moment the Corporation 

has 88 persons in our Washington Headquarters office. Roughly 

half are devoted to our two offices that do oversight in terms of 

looking at program quality and compliance with regulations, rules, 

and the LSC Act. 

We have asked for an increase from $12.5 million to $17 million. 

That would basically provide additional staff for those two offices 

to permit us to do more of the oversight, more visits in the field. 

The total request, I would point out, is only 3.8 percent of the total 

request for administration that we are requesting. 

So I think we are low by any standard. But we do feel we need 

more staff in order to be able to make more visits in the field. We 

do have 137 programs with 900 offices throughout the country, and 

the staff we are asking for, by the way, also includes management 

support. It is not everybody that can go to the field. But that is the 

basis for our request for management administration this year. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Thank you. Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Again, I welcome both of you. The first 

GAO report was issued in August, is that right? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Correct. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. September of last year. And that first report indicated that a properly implemented governance and accountability structure might have prevented questionable expenditures in the incident where pay exceeded statutory caps. 

As a general question, I understand the notion from Mr. 

Strickland’s testimony, ‘‘We have accepted all the recommendations.’’ That is accepting responsibility. And, you know, I am a supporter of the Legal Services Corporation. How many of the recommendations actually have been resolved? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Well—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I understand the exceptions noted, but how 

many have actually been resolved? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Well, for example, it was recommended that we 

establish a code of ethics and conduct. We have done that. It was 

recommended we have a continuity of operations plan. We are in 

the first phase of developing that plan. It is not quite as easy to 

develop that as it is a code of ethics and conduct. 

It was recommended that we make a decision on the use of the 

Government Accounting Standards Board guidelines for our financial statements. We have adopted that. 

There was a recommendation that we establish a separate audit 

committee. We have done that. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Lets just focus on that just for a—— 

Mr. STRICKLAND. On the Audit Committee? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You established a separate Audit Committee of the Board, which I think obviously is beneficial. Can you 

describe to the Committee what the Committee’s charter is? 


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Mr. STRICKLAND. Well the charter is, I don’t have it, but it is a 

fairly detailed charter. It runs on for several pages, but the essence 

of it is, and by the way, that—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. More importantly, if you know if there is 

specific responsibilities what are they doing under the charter, the 

new vehicle, that they weren’t doing before maybe in a general 

sense? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. The Audit Committee as I mentioned has just 

been established in the past 30 days. And it has not had its first 

meeting. It will have its first meeting at the end of April at our 

Board meeting scheduled for that time. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So has the Committee’s charter—is there a 

charter? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Yes, sir. There is a written charter, the charter 

was adopted. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The charter I assume embodies certain 

principles? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Yes. And I outlined—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And are they remarkably different than 

what you have been operating under in your prior life or? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. I think they are considerably more detailed. 

What we had been operating under for a number of years were the 

typical corporate bylaws for LSC as a Corporation. The more current thing to do both in publicly traded corporations and non-profits is to have charters, that is a much more detailed outline of the 

responsibilities of Board Committees. 

So as I mentioned, we now have a much more detailed charter 

for our Audit Committee, which I think will enable that Committee 

to give much sharper focus to the oversight of LSC’s financial statements and its own audit. 

The entire focus of the Board’s Audit Committee is it doesn’t 

really have anything to do with our grantees. It has to do with—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. But the grantees themselves are audited. 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Oh, yes. But they are not—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So under the purview of the Audit Committee surely would come the audits which would, I assume, be annually submitted by all of those programs under your area of responsibility? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Correct. But the responsibility for overseeing 

the independent audits of our grantee programs rests in the Office 

of Inspector General. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. What does the new Committee do then? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. The new Committee’s function is the oversight 

of LSC’s own books and records, its internal functions. Overseeing 

its own independent public accounting. The selection of that accounting firm working with the auditor on LSC’s audit. And receiving that report and presenting it to the Board. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Is this new Committee different? Well how 

is it different from what you had before? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Well before it was combined with our Finance 

Committee, which is primarily on the budget side of the equation. 

And as an adjunct it had a general responsibility for the audit. But 

it was almost entirely delegated, in fact it was entirely delegated 


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to the Office of Inspector General to select the auditor, to oversee 

the audit, and to bring the auditor to the Board. 

So the—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So now the Board members take—— 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Now the Board members are right in the thick 

of it. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. In the thick of it. 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Right in the thick of it. That is the big distinction. 

NEW CODE OF ETHICS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Your testimony describes a new code of ethics, new orientations and evaluation for Board members and the 

adoption of charters for each Board Committee. How many Board 

members are there? How regularly do they meet? And what is the 

time commitment that each of them makes in order to serve? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. The Board as a matter of law has 11 members. 

It is a bipartisan Board, also by law. We currently have ten members. One of our client Board members died and we have not 

brought on a replacement or the President has not appointed a replacement to the Board. So we have ten members. And we are, 

again, required by law to meet no less than four times per year. 

And in my tenure on the Board, which is just this month ending 

or actually—or yes, five years, we have met I would say on the average of seven to nine times each year. Four times in person and 

the balance in extended conference call meetings. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I think that is hugely admirable. In your 

testimony you described the new code of ethics. Is every member 

been run through that process and do they familiarize themselves 

with should we say the new posts? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. It as you can tell from the discussion here the 

GAO report was issued last September. And between then and 

now, which is roughly six months, we have adopted some charters. 

They are all new to the Board. And the Board, I would say it is 

a fair statement that it is just getting acquainted with the essence 

of each of these charters. 

Now all the charters are not done yet. We have now with the 

Audit Committee, four standing committees of the Board. So the 

Audit Committee has its charter. The other charters are works in 

progress and are not yet in place. 

NEW REQUIREMENTS FOR BOARD MEMBERS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well I am not sure I fully understand it, 

but will all the new requirements for Board members be in place 

by the end of the year? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Oh, absolutely. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. They will be? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. No question. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And, lastly, the GAO also made some recommendations to Congress to consider making changes in law to 

Legal Services Corporation governance and accountability requirements, you are familiar with some of those recommendations? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. I don’t know that I—are you inquiring about 

the governance or a change in structure? 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Governance and accountability requirements. 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Some that are different from those in the GAO 

report? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am not sure that you need to ask me the 

question. 

Mr. STRICKLAND. I am trying to—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am trying to figure out whether—— 

Mr. STRICKLAND. I am trying to clarify. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. If you are familiar with what 

the GAO has recommended. 

Ms. BARNETT. Congressman Frelinghuysen? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And do you agree that the changes they 

have recommended are necessary to ensure proper oversight? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. As we have said, we have accepted all the recommendations and we are working diligently to implement our responses to those and many of those are already in place. And we 

fully embrace them and intend to comply with all of them. 

Ms. BARNETT. Congressman Frelinghuysen, if I could offer to 

please, as part of the record, we would send you the charter that 

was newly adopted for the Audit Committee and the code of ethics 

and conduct. And, yes, I would say every Board member is completely familiar with that code. We are in the process of ensuring 

that all our employees are familiar with it. They are going to have 

to acknowledge receipt and agree to abide by it. 

So I think that surely I would have answered by the end of the 

April Board meeting, I think, the Board is going to have acted on 

that. 

[The information follows:] 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am on your side, but I think these are the 

sort of questions that certainly are within the purview of our Committee. 

Ms. BARNETT. Absolutely. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. If there are some doubts about what you 

are doing, and I have no doubt about the mission of the Legal Services Corporation, certainly from the New Jersey experience, it 

would be good to address them head on. This is a pretty good 

venue to give us some pretty good assurances. So I think you have 

done that, Madam President. 

Mr. STRICKLAND. I will say Mr. Frelinghuysen that having 

worked with this Board for five years I am absolutely convinced 

that every member of the Board is dedicated to what they are 

doing. And they demonstrate that every time I have the occasion 

to work directly with them at Board meetings and otherwise. And 

there has never been any doubt of that. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am sure it is true dedication, but the 

GAO has found some weaknesses and obviously even despite that 

dedication there have been some identifiable weaknesses and I 

think we have a right to sort of—— 

Mr. STRICKLAND. I agree with you completely. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. Mr. Fattah. 

Mr. FATTAH. I just really want to complement what you have 

done by responding to the concerns that have been raised. Obviously, this is a very important agency to Philadelphia that has a 

done a great deal of service for thousands of my constituents. 

So, Mr. Chairman, I yield for any other questions at this time. 

OVERSIGHT

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, I am impressed after reviews by the IG 

last year and by the GAO last year and this year that LSC is first 

of all being responsive to the governance issues raised by both of 

these entities, leaning really forward and reorganizing in such a 

way as that you are going to have better oversight. 

And I look at these issues that have been raised as being solvable by reorganizations and better communication with your grantees as to what is expected from them in their annual audits. Whatever weaknesses occurred in the internal controls over the grants 

management and oversight, it seems that you have taken immediate action. That is all to your credit, and is not at all surprising. 

I am comforted by the fact that in all that oversight I don’t see 

any bombshells here. So it sounds like you are, number one, being 

responsive and number two, being responsive. 

FUNDING LEVEL

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Now, you are requesting $471.4 million and that 

is $121 million over the current year funding level. In my first 

round I tried to get some sense of what would be the comparable 

dollars today if you were being funded at the 1995 level. And you 

are estimating you are going to supply for the record a better number it would be over $700 million. You aren’t nearly approaching 

the real number that you had back then and therefore you are not 


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able to provide the services at the same level you were previously. 

Thus, the gap that we talk about. 

And I would like to give you an opportunity to talk about the gap 

to give the Committee an appreciation for what you are trying to 

say about it and how it translates into the needs of the country 

with regard to providing legal services for those who can’t provide 

them for themselves. 

Ms. BARNETT. The Justice Gap Report which was the first nationwide study as to eligible people who come to LSC funded offices 

throughout the country indicated how many were helped and how 

many we were not able to help. And as a result of surveying all 

of our programs it was uniformly reported that for every one person that was eligible and did receive service, we were unable to 

serve one because of lack of program resources. 

So we were meeting less than 50 percent of the need. Since the 

Justice Gap Report came out, there have been at least ten State 

legal need studies and reports that have documented far greater 

needs and indicate that our report understated the actual need, 

ranging anywhere up as high as 80 to 85 percent not being met. 

In addition—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Good point. 

Ms. BARNETT. Yes. 

UNMET NEEDS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You measured unmet need by the percentage of 

people who came into your office that you had to turn away. How 

is this unmet need that you didn’t identify, how is that being measured? 

Ms. BARNETT. With the State studies? 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yes. 

Ms. BARNETT. Each State study did it in a different way. Some 

were engaged academics. Some had consultants. I think in our 

written testimony we indicate and give the cites to all the State recent need studies. I would be happy to elaborate further on the way 

in which they use them. They were published reports by different 

entities in the States that document the needs as being far greater 

than the 50 percent that we documented by the request we made 

of our programs during a two month period in 2005. 

NUMBER OF CLIENTS SERVED

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are you able to relate the appropriations that 

you have received in the past and the number of clients that you 

have served compared to how many clients you could serve if you 

were to receive your request? 

And maybe you can do it for the record if you can’t do it here 

today. 

[The information follows:] 

LSC grantees have been closing nearly a million a cases a year collectively. In 

2006, with an appropriations of $326.5 million ($4.5 million less than previous year), 

LSC-funded programs closed a total of 895,000 cases. In 2007, LSC received its first 

funding increase of $22 million, for a total appropriation of $348.5 million. LSCfunded programs closed an additional 11,000 cases than the previous year. While 

that number is substantial, since it was the first funding increase in four years, infrastructure and salary improvements are also being addressed. We would expect 


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any funding increase in the future to result in an increase at least commensurate 

with the 2007 increase. 

Ms. BARNETT. I would be happy to elaborate for the record. I can 

share with you that in 2007 when we got a $22 million increase 

in our funding we were able to close 11,000 additional cases and 

they are eligible cases regardless of the source of funding. 

Now that is a substantial number, but it would have been even 

more but for the fact it was the first federal increase we have had 

in four years. And our programs have infrastructure needs, their 

operating costs have gone up. They have salary needs. As you 

know, legal aid lawyers are the lowest paid lawyers in the public 

sector. 

And so in spite of that I would indicate that we would be able 

to increase the number of cases commensurate with the increase 

we did with the 2007 increase. But closed cases are not the sole 

measure of the services that Legal Services programs perform. 

They do an extensive array of non-case work that is preventative. 

They do community legal education. They do legal brochures. They 

do pro se assistance. They do self help materials. 

And in fact last year we handled 500,000 or close to somewhere 

between 500,000 and a million more of these additional services 

which would bring that up to 16,000 people being helped by them. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well if you were here asking for an appropriation that would close the gap as you defined it, what amount would 

you be asking for a federal appropriation? 

Ms. BARNETT. Our Justice Gap Report said we needed a doubling 

of both the federal and the non-federal sources to close the justice 

gap at that time. And I think our Board recognizing political realities decided that they would ask for a 20 percent increase of basic 

field grant over five years. 

Well, clearly, we are not going to close the gap in five years. But 

that was the principled approach in trying to ask for an appropriation that would eventually help close the justice gap. 

But the justice gap is in fact a moving target. And it has increased by the needs of the sub prime loan mortgage crisis. And 

it has increased by the needs of victims from natural disasters. So 

in one point of time when we said what was the justice gap, the 

justice gap keeps increasing as the economy and these different disasters of one kind or another increase the number of poor people 

who are in need of and are eligible for free legal services. 

And today there are 50 million people that would qualify for eligibility for civil legal assistance. 

TURNING AWAY CLIENTS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. So it is your testimony that for one of the 

one out of two people that you have to turn away that walk in your 

office and ask for help, that the person you have to turn away or 

that 50 percent, they would otherwise be eligible except you just 

do not have the capacity to provide service to them? 

Ms. BARNETT. That is correct. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. They are turned away because you don’t have 

enough resources to provide service to them. Otherwise, they are 

eligible. They are not excluded by any of the restrictions and—— 


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Ms. BARNETT. That is correct. They are turned away solely because our programs don’t have the resources to be able to assist 

them. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well that must be difficult to turn these people 

away. Do you simply turn them away? Do you refer them to other 

resources? You put them on a waiting list? How do you deal with 

the people you turn away? 

Ms. BARNETT. Well as I indicated in my oral testimony, I found 

that to be the hardest part of the job of being a legal aid lawyer, 

because when you turn them away many, many if not most times 

there is nowhere else to go. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Really? You don’t have any place to refer them 

to? 

Ms. BARNETT. I don’t. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You are often just saying, ‘‘Sorry, we can’t help 

you.’’ 

Ms. BARNETT. That is right. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Wow. 

Ms. BARNETT. That is why we are increasing the amount of work 

we do for self help material and community legal education to 

know your rights to try to empower people to help themselves 

when we are not able to help them ourselves. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are you developing strategies for these alternative ways to assist people? 

Ms. BARNETT. Oh, we are doing that through our technology 

grants. We are doing that through the other services that we provide. We are trying to better capture those services from our programs in order that we can be able to have available to people we 

are not able to provide legal representation the means by which 

they can help themselves. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Fattah. 

Mr. FATTAH. On the Chairman’s—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You will just yield to—— 

RESTRICTIONS

Mr. FATTAH. On the Chairman’s line of questioning, some of 

these people you are turning away as individuals could be assisted 

if you were able to proceed and focus on groups of individuals, class 

action and other types of more broad-based strategies and there are 

restrictions now, right, on what you can and can’t do in that regard. 

Could you talk about how that impacts your work, you know, for 

instance on the foreclosure crisis that the nation is facing now. I 

would imagine that thousands and thousands of families who have 

been victimized to predatory lending or the like, you know, could 

conceivably be helped through aggressive legal work, but there are 

restrictions on how far you can go now in terms of working with 

groups or classes of individual Americans, right? 

Ms. BARNETT. That is correct. The Corporation believes that it is 

our duty and obligation to see that the will of Congress is followed. 

And as long as the restrictions are a part of our appropriations we 

vigorously enforce them and support them through our regulations. 

In fact, there are two cases pending. I can’t talk about the substance of the cases, but I can just report on the status, one in OrVerDate Aug 31 2005 00:38 Aug 03, 2008 Jkt 042708 PO 00000 Frm 00762 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A708P2.002 A708P2

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egon and one in New York where we are vigorously defending the 

regulations. The Oregon case was brought in 2005 and motions for 

summary judgement were argued February 8 and a court decision 

is awaited. In New York the case was filed in, I believe, 2001. It 

has gone all the way up to the Supreme Court who denied cert and 

it is now back in the Eastern district of New York waiting for the 

judge’s decision applying the appropriate standard that was determined by the Second Circuit. 

So there is litigation on these matters. We are defending them 

and we await the court’s decision. And of course we look to enforce 

the will of Congress in this area. 

Mr. FATTAH. Let me yield to the Ranking Member. Are you going 

to go vote? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I have voted. 

Mr. FATTAH. Oh, you have. The floor is yours. 

GAO REPORT

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [presiding]. I thank the gentleman for yielding. I just wanted to get a little bit of clarification since Mr. Strickland made the centerpiece of his testimony, you know, a reaction 

to the GAO reports. I just want to understand here. 

The GAO actually made recommendations to Congress about possibly making changes in law about your governance. And I think 

we discussed in my office that there might be some potential down 

sides. So I would just like to know does the Legal Services Corporation think, that is necessary, or are things should we say on the 

road to fiscal stability and accountability such that maybe Congress doesn’t need to open this issue? 

Ms. BARNETT. If I could respond, Congressman Frelinghuysen. 

There was one recommendation by GAO to Congress that you have 

rightly referred to. And I think it is the Corporation’s view at this 

point having been looked at extensively by the Office of Inspector 

General, having being looked at extensively by GAO with regard to 

our governance and accountability, having been looked at extensively by GAO as to our relationship with our grantees and our 

oversight, that we have been looked at from top to bottom, inside 

and out. And I think we have come out of it stronger and I do not 

believe that the Corporation feels there is any further need to do 

that. 

And I guess we would agree with the wisdom of Congress when 

they established the Corporation as an independent corporation 

and kept it somewhat free from political decisions in its operations. 

NEW INSPECTOR GENERAL

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You have a new Inspector General who was 

introduced. Are you reviewing these cases maybe through your 

President and Chairman? 

Just for the record, if you would just identify yourself for the 

transcriber. 

Mr. SCHANZ. Yes. Jeffrey E. Schanz. Last name S C H A N Z. 

I was selected as the Inspector General for Legal Services Corporation on March 3 of this year. I bring a lot of energy and experience 

to the position. And I plan on conducting both internal of the CorVerDate Aug 31 2005 00:38 Aug 03, 2008 Jkt 042708 PO 00000 Frm 00763 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A708P2.002 A708P2

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poration and external reviews, audits and investigations of the 137 

grantees and corporate governance. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well God speed to you. [Laughter.] 

ALLEGED INAPPROPRIATE EXPENDITURES

The alleged inappropriate expenditures, I assume there is going 

to be a report coming at some point in time? 

Mr. SCHANZ. Correct. We have already visited three of the eight 

sites. We have teams out at the other sites and including Chicago 

and Casper, Wyoming. And I am used to traveling so I believe my 

staff will be traveling. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Okay. You have three offices that deal in 

some ways with grants oversight unless there have been any more 

created, let me know. The Office of Program Performance, the Office of Compliance and Enforcement, and the Office of the IG, Inspector General. 

You both testified that the responsibilities of these offices are 

under review, but can you describe in general the differences in the 

roles of these three entities? 

Ms. BARNETT. Well, I will start with explaining our Office of Program Performance, which really looks to ensure that the service delivery system that is being provided is of high quality and efficient 

and effective, meeting the legal needs of the service area. And their 

guiding principle is our revised performance criteria. And it is 

based on the criteria which reflects LSC’s sense of current best 

practices to ensure high quality legal services, that they do office 

visits, they do their reports based on that. We do the competitive 

grants process based on the performance criteria. 

Our Office of Compliance and enforcement looks to ensure that 

our programs comply with LSC regulations, rules and the LSC Act. 

And they go out and also make program visits. They look at such 

things as the intake and case management system to see that the 

clients are financially eligible, to see that the clients are citizens 

or lawful aliens. To see that the cases are within program priorities. To see that there are retainer agreements. 

They look to see that the programs comply with our case service 

reporting system. They look to see that their PAI is done in conformity with both fiscal and programmatic needs. They look at limited fiscal areas at this point. They look at timekeeping. They look 

to see if there are fee generating cases. But they don’t look more 

broadly. It is a very limited fiscal component. 

And then, of course, they look to see that the activities don’t violate the regulations. So they look at the cases and pleadings to see 

there are no class actions, there are no attorneys fee cases, there 

are no solicitations. In addition, they give prior approvals as required for any expenditure over $10,000. And all the programs 

have to report to LSC on either an annual basis or a semi-annual 

basis regarding many of their activities. 

So those are basically the oversight functions of the Office of Program Performance and the Office of Compliance and Enforcement. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You don’t anticipate any reorganization or 

consolidation of any of those areas? 

Ms. BARNETT. I don’t anticipate reorganization and consolidation. 

What I do anticipate and what we are clearly working on the sharVerDate Aug 31 2005 00:38 Aug 03, 2008 Jkt 042708 PO 00000 Frm 00764 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A708P2.002 A708P2

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ing of information, better coordination not only between our two offices, but the Office of the Inspector General as well, and the clarification of the roles. So I don’t anticipate an actual restructuring, 

but I see a much closer relationship. I see a much closer sharing 

of information and coordination so that we all know what the other 

one is doing to ensure the best oversight we can provide. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I think Mr. Schanz is showing his eagerness to make sure that all of those oversight responsibilities allow 

us to draw as much information from them as possible. 

Your testimony mentions, we touched on this earlier, that you 

are reviewing your oversight of the IPA process, the Independent 

Public Accountant process. Correct me if I am wrong, this is the 

process whereby each grantee has an annual independent audit. 

What improvements do you have in mind for this process and how 

proactive are you in reaching out to grantees and their IPAs to 

comply with the underlying new procedures? 

Ms. BARNETT. Well, I think as I indicated, the IPAs are supervised by the Office of the Inspector General. And we are working 

with that Office together to try to come up with some guidance. For 

instance, guidance that when IPAs go to a program and they ask 

if the program does entertaining, they look to the expenses to see 

whether or not perhaps alcohol was mischarged to LSC funds. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you for your response. I have to 

vote. [Laughter.] 

FUNDING LEVEL

Mr. MOLLOHAN [presiding]. The Bush Administration has requested $311 million for fiscal year 2009 which is $40 million below 

the current year’s funding level. Aren’t you glad you don’t have to 

go through them? 

What would be the effect of this cut on the clients served by LSC 

grants? 

Ms. BARNETT. Three hundred and eleven million dollar budget 

would be close to a $40 million cut or a 13 percent decrease, not 

counting the four percent of inflation. It would be devastating on 

our programs, offices would have to close, staff would have to be 

laid off. But the most significant would be fewer deserving low income persons who require legal assistance to keep a roof over their 

head or to get out of a battered relationship or to get necessary 

health care or to protect elderly who are subject to predatory lending would not be able to be assisted. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You know information that I am supplied and I 

ask you to verify this is that if the Committee were to adopt the 

President’s request, again which is $40 million below the current 

year’s funding level, that Legal Aid of West Virginia would be cut 

by $315,000 below its current funding level of $2.8 million. And by 

contrast the Legal Service Corporation’s 2009 request of $471 million would provide an additional million dollars for West Virginia. 

Are you prepared to verify numbers? 

Ms. BARNETT. I believe they would have less than $350,000—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Uh huh. 

Ms. BARNETT [continuing]. Under the President’s budget. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What did I say? 

Ms. BARNETT. Three fifteen. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Three fifteen. Thank you. 

Ms. BARNETT. Right. Yes, we would be happy to verify that. 

[The information follows:] 

At the request of Chairman Mollohan, I want to confirm that that the President’s funding request of $311 million for LSC could cut the funding level for the Legal 

Aid of West Virginia (LAWV) by more than $350,000. The program’s current budget 

is $2.8 million. With LSC’s FY 2009 budget request of $471 million, LAWV would 

receive a total of $3.8 million or $1 million increase, funds that are desperately 

needed to provide legal assistance. 

MORTGAGE FORECLOSURES

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Great. Thank you. How has the wave of 

mortgage foreclosures across the country affected demand on LSC 

services? And you touched on this a bit, but if you could elaborate. 

Ms. BARNETT. The sub prime mortgages are disproportionately, 

I think, impacting low income renters and elderly on fixed incomes. 

And the sub prime loans are recent phenomena, that they are 

tainted with fraud and other unlawful acts, and I think we believe 

this requires legal representation in order to preserve the homes. 

The programs, we don’t have national statistics, but we are hearing from programs. Some programs are getting four or five calls a 

day. Some programs are doubling the amount of requests that they 

have had. There is no question that programs have set up special 

projects to try to deal with the increased demand. 

These loans have been targeted for low income and minority communities. And they prey on the elderly and the uninformed and 

those with limited English proficiency. And we are just getting case 

by case stories, actually that at least the provision of legal aid has 

helped them negotiate the terms of their loan, challenge their notice in court, challenge the underlying proceeding in court and preserve the homes for these people. 

But without additional resources I don’t believe that our programs will be able to meet this increased demand. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Uh huh. LSC’s Loan Repayment Assistance Program, will you tell us what that is? 

Ms. BARNETT. We are in the third year, we were appropriated 

one million dollars to operate a Loan Repayment Assistance Program. We began initially by reaching out to our programs that had 

particular difficulty in recruiting and retaining attorneys. And in 

our first year I think we had 71 attorneys both who we recruited 

and retained. We paid $5,000 for each of three years. 

Our preliminary assessment and evaluation of the first year 

clearly demonstrated that this Loan Repayment Assistance Program, even as small as it was, was making a meaningful difference 

to young lawyers who graduate with over $80,000 worth of debt 

and have an average starting salary of $37,000 but want to do public service and legal aid work were able to come to the programs 

and it was able to keep experienced staff that were already in the 

programs. 

So it not only helped the young attorneys for joining the programs, it enhanced the ability of the programs to be able to recruit 

and retain staff. This year we raised the amount to $5,600 and we 

have 58 participants. We are very pleased that the Higher Education Act of 2007 included a provision for loan repayment for legal 

aid lawyers, but we believe until it gets funded and implemented, 


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it is more than a year away. We have asked for additional funding 

to increase the pool so then when we report back to Congress, finally we have a larger pool to be able to make the case that this 

has not only helped attorneys come to legal aid and stay at legal 

aid, it has helped the programs be able to recruit well qualified and 

experienced attorneys. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is the need for this program geographically uniform across the nation or are there areas that it is more effective 

in helping to recruit? 

Ms. BARNETT. Perhaps in major metropolitan areas it is not as 

needed. We did not choose those as much as some of the rural 

areas where it is more difficult to get attorneys. But we have a 

broad spectrum of programs participating in the—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So you are implementing this program selectively—— 

Ms. BARNETT. Yes. We—— 

RECRUITING LAWYERS

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. In areas where you are having more 

difficulty recruiting lawyers? 

Ms. BARNETT. We asked our programs to submit to us the reasons why they were having difficulty in recruiting and retaining. 

And we made a judgment. And we looked at geographic balance 

and we looked for larger programs and small programs and rural 

programs and urban programs so that we would have a mix to be 

able to report back to Congress. And I think we do have a mix of 

programs, but it was based on their response to us of their difficulty in being able to recruit and retain attorneys. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And you are suggesting that the program has 

been effective? Has it been in effect, has it been implemented long 

enough for you to make a determination about its real effectiveness? 

Ms. BARNETT. Well we have evaluated its first year. We are in 

the process of completing the evaluation in the second year. I don’t 

think any of the results are surprising to any of us. That it helps 

the attorneys make this decision. It helps the programs. And without this, even though people want to do this kind of work, they 

would not be able otherwise to come. Whether they will stay when 

the loan repayment is over and they say they don’t know whether 

they will be able to, even though that is their what they want to 

do and they are satisfied with their job. 

So—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You mean stay—— 

Ms. BARNETT. In legal aid. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. Past the point that they are receiving this loan repayment supplement—— 

Ms. BARNETT. Right. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. Which is three years. 

Ms. BARNETT. Right. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. My information is that the average law school 

debt is over $80,000. Three years of $5,000 or $5,600, I mean during that three year period, I suppose, it is a way to pay it, but it 

is you know, on an $80,000 average debt it doesn’t really make a 


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dent on the overall debt, but I suppose it helps the lawyer repay 

it during the year that they are working for legal aid. 

Ms. BARNETT. That is correct, Mr. Chairman. It is not a lot, but 

it certainly helps them while they are repaying it. And that is part 

of the reason we are asking for this additional one million dollars 

to continue it. We certainly would like to continue it until a federal 

program comes into effect. And we would like to have a larger pool 

so that when we come back next year with our evaluation you 

would find it meaningful. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Be able to assess it at that time. 

Ms. BARNETT. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Fattah. 

Mr. FATTAH. No, I am done. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You are done. Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

FORECLOSURES

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Just back onto the foreclosure issue. I assume you gave us some anecdotes. You did give us some statistics. 

I assume you are going to keep a pretty close eye on this, pulling 

as much information as possible. 

Ms. BARNETT. We certainly are. And I can even share with you 

that we added two new case categories to our case service report 

so that if we come back next year we would be able to have a better 

idea of the actual numbers for you. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. This obviously requires the local legal services group to, you know, do pretty much of a balancing act, I assume? 

Ms. BARNETT. It would require the local programs, of course, to 

identify this as a program priority. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Ms. BARNETT. Because it is up, as you know, to the local programs to—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So more of one might mean less potential 

support for what Legal Services Corporation does traditionally? 

Ms. BARNETT. And that would be left up to the programs. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I think we are becoming a little more expert on this issue of sub primes. It certainly is in nobody’s interest 

to promote foreclosures, but needless to say there is somebody out 

there filling that gap and it really is outrageous that there are people taking advantage of people to expedite their losing. I mean it 

really is outrageous. There is a website mentioned in the New York 

Times the other day which I thought was even more appalling. It 

is called walkaway.com. I mean it was front page New York Times. 

Just a couple of other questions relative to compensation rates 

above statutory caps. Last year, as you are aware, we carried a 

provision that gave you the authority to pay employees in 2008 at 

a rate above the statutory caps. Can you describe why this is necessary and how many employees have been affected? 

Ms. BARNETT. This has to do with the locality pay. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Yes. 

Ms. BARNETT. All right. And we had been paying locality pay 

above the statutory cap. And we had asked Congress to continue 

to permit us to do that and I believe it affected only 17 employees; 


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11 in management and administration and six in the Office of the 

Inspector General. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. We carried that provision at your request. 

Ms. BARNETT. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So I assume you are familiar with it. Of 

course, the President’s budget proposes to eliminate it. So I guess 

my bottom line question is are you going to ask the Committee to 

carry the same waiver language for fiscal year 2009? 

Ms. BARNETT. Yes, we are, Congressman Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

PRIVATE SECTOR LAWYERS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. You require your programs to promote 

private sector lawyer participation providing legal services. Tell us 

how you do that. Give us an idea how many clients that allows you 

to serve. 

Ms. BARNETT. I would be happy to. We require our programs to 

expend the equivalent of 12.5 percent of their basic field grant on 

private attorney involvement in their service delivery. 

This means that they are spending it to do training and recruiting of volunteers, the oversight of the cases, whatever—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Training and recruiting of private sector lawyers? 

Ms. BARNETT. Right. To do pro bono work. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you pay private sector lawyers to do—— 

Ms. BARNETT. The vast majority—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. But wouldn’t be doing pro bono, but 

to represent. 

Ms. BARNETT. The vast majority of the private attorneys that 

work with our programs do it pro bono for no cost. We do have 

some Judicare or reduced fee attorneys in certain areas of the 

country where it is difficult to find private attorneys to do pro bono 

work. However, we had over 97,000 cases closed by private attorneys in 2007 with over 31,000 attorneys helping our programs. We 

have made it a major initiative to increase the private attorney involvement with our programs. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Pro bono? 

Ms. BARNETT. Pro bono involvement. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Under what circumstances would you hire a private attorney? 

Ms. BARNETT. Well we don’t hire these attorneys. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. No, I know the pro bono ones you don’t, but I 

understood your testimony to be in some certain circumstances you 

might pay on a lower scale—— 

Ms. BARNETT. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. A private attorney to undertake a 

case. 

Ms. BARNETT. I can think of—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You are looking for a specialty or are you looking—— 

Ms. BARNETT. No. I am thinking of Wisconsin Judicare in areas 

where there aren’t many private attorneys. We would pay a very 

much reduced rate for us to be able to send cases to this panel that 

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ity of private attorneys that work with our programs and handle 

these 97,000 cases are pro bono. And actually our Board initiated 

a private attorney involvement plan called ‘‘Help Close the Justice 

Gap. Unleash the Power of Pro Bono.’’ 

And they adopted a resolution encouraging programs to enhance 

their private attorney involvement. And we asked all our programs 

to adopt similar resolutions. And to date we have more than 80 

programs that have already adopted it. 

In addition, I sent a program letter out in December of 2007 encouraging our programs to look at creative, strategic, innovative 

ways to use private attorneys. And citing examples that many of 

our programs have used so that other programs could think to replicate them. And private attorneys do direct representation of clients. Private attorneys co-counsel and support cases with them. 

Private attorneys do transactional work, they do training in their 

areas of specialty. They have on occasion helped draft manuals for 

the use of our attorneys. So there is a wide range of services that 

private attorneys provide to LSC eligible clients. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Thank you. Mr. Strickland, you are probably sitting there feeling neglected. [Laughter.] 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Oh, that is all right. I don’t mind it a bit. This 

is a tough, tough crowd here. [Laughter.] 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You were really busy at the beginning talking 

about all these GAO studies and reports. I want to give you an opportunity. 

JUSTICE GAP STUDY

Mr. STRICKLAND. I wanted to make a couple of points, if I may, 

Mr. Chairman, to quantify when you were talking a moment ago 

about one out of two eligible clients being turned away. In the year 

of the Justice Gap study, those numbers were that our grantee programs combined with pro bono lawyers had represented a million 

eligible clients and it follows that they turned away a million. 

I remember reading the draft report before it was published and 

that number just jumped off the page. And as President Barnett 

said that probably has gotten worse. And particularly as we do 

these State legal need studies, I think we are going to find that it 

is worse than that. 

And I also wanted to emphasize that included in the legal work 

that was done for those clients was this private attorney involvement. So even with that, there was still this tremendous unmet 

legal need. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And that can all be translated into the human 

consequence of that. 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Absolutely. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I am sure that translates into battered women, 

maybe people killed. 

In any reports you submit or communications with us, if you can 

translate the consequences in those terms, that is always a good 

thing to know. 

Mr. STRICKLAND. And in terms of being able to refer those individuals elsewhere they really have come to the court of last resort, 

so to speak, when they have come to—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And they are desperate. 


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Mr. STRICKLAND [continuing]. To legal aid. Absolutely. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Obviously, they are desperate. They probably 

wouldn’t know where to go if—— 

Mr. STRICKLAND. Where they think they should go, of course, is 

to legal aid. And unfortunately as we have observed today that half 

of them are being turned away. And we are speaking of income eligible clients, not undocumented immigrants or folks in that category, but eligible clients. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well that is a serious issue. Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

NEW TECHNOLOGY

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Just about everybody who comes before the 

Committee is talking about utilizing new technology. You have a 

technology initiative. Do you want to roll it out for us? I think you 

are doubling the amount of money and is it exciting or how would 

you characterize it? What are you doing to promote inner 

connectivity and give your people the tools you need to communicate with one another around the country. Tell us about it. 

Ms. BARNETT. We, with Congressional appropriations, began our 

technology initiative grants program in 2000. And through 2007 we 

have made grants totaling $27 million. And the results of that have 

been enhanced and more efficient and more services. Through that 

funding we have funded centralized intake systems, which gives 

clients easier access to our services. 

We have funded Statewide websites in every State that give a 

full range of information. We have funded the automated document 

assembly where people who are unable to get representation can 

fill out court forms, online that have been drafted with court input 

that are accepted in the courts in multiple languages. Maybe in 35 

different languages we have done that. 

So we have, I think, enhanced pro se assistance, enhanced access 

to our programs. We have improved technology infrastructure in 

our programs. We have this year funded an 800 number for low 

wage workers to be able to claim the earned income tax credit. And 

in 2007 alone we have returned over $10 million to low wage earners because of that. 

We are looking at other ways that 800 numbers can be used by 

low income people throughout the country. We are looking at the 

possibility of online intake where 24/7 through the internet people 

could access our services that would be then integrated into their 

case management system. We don’t even know what the use of cell 

phones may be in the next couple of years as a means of communicating. 

So I think our technology initiative and the funding we get from 

Congress for technology we have used to both expand our services, 

increase them, improve the efficiency of our programs and we look 

forward to continued funding to be able to report to you the new 

advances that—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well we commend you for your efforts. As 

you know, I am housed in my New Jersey Office cheek by jaw with 

one of your legal aid, Morris County Legal Aid Society. And of 

course, you know, it is the same old, same old in terms of the people who do a remarkable job for, I mean earning nothing. You 

know, I don’t think they get any pension benefits at all. I mean 


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they do some incredible work. I always hope that some day maybe 

they might be slightly compensated by some technology that would 

enable them to do an even better job with the resources they get. 

So thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Now there is a good opportunity to input a program with a member of Congress. [Laughter.] 

Right next door to him. Mr. Fattah. 

Mr. FATTAH. I will yield, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. 

Mr. FATTAH. I think we have gotten to the point. 

ADVERTISEMENT

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Just following up a little bit as a final question. 

I have seen advertisements, not for legal services because they are 

not provided by lawyers, but by corporations online for leases, 

deeds and wills. The organization may be run by lawyers, but they 

specifically disclaim giving legal advice. 

Are you familiar with such services? And if so, can you automate 

your services in that sort of way? You are unfamiliar with them? 

Ms. BARNETT. I am not familiar with them. In some ways I wonder whether there is any unauthorized practice of law implications, 

but—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well I know that immediately occurred to me, 

but I am advised there is not and I have not looked into specifically, but there were corporations that provide, it is threatening 

isn’t it? 

Mr. STRICKLAND. It is threatening. [Laughter.] 

We do have on, correct me if I am wrong on this, but I believe 

we have on some of our websites that is websites maintained by 

our grantee programs, some standardized pleadings. For example, 

for a domestic relations case where an indigent client could capture 

those pleadings and fill in the blanks and at least file the case in 

the correct form so that it comes before the court in good order as 

opposed to something just their own attempt to do that. 

So I think we have in effect gone into that business to some extent, that is providing a standard form pleading, in a domestic case 

is one that I can think of right now. 

Ms. BARNETT. I will just supplement that, if I might. One of the 

grants that I thought was terrific that we did with our TIG funding 

was in Idaho where we had the approval of the courts to adopt 

Statewide forms. And believe it or not somebody could fill the form 

out in Spanish and it would come out absolutely properly formatted 

in English. 

So we are using technology in that way. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I will find out more about this and follow up. 

Ms. BARNETT. We would be happy to answer. And if you have a 

question on it and specifically. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well if there are no more questions, Chairman 

Strickland, President Barnett, we very much appreciate all the 

good work you do on behalf of providing legal services to those who 

can’t afford it. And we appreciate your testimony here today. And 

know that you are going to continue to aggressively follow up on 

all those oversight issues. 

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


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Ms. BARNETT. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. 

[Questions and answers submitted for the record follow:] 


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(781) 

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2008. 

INTERNATIONAL TRADE COMMISSION 

WITNESS 

DANIEL R. PEARSON, CHAIRMAN 

OPENING REMARKS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. We will come to order. 

Welcome to members, staff, agency witnesses, as well as the public. 

This afternoon we welcome the Honorable Daniel Pearson, Chairman of the International Trade Commission, to testify on the challenges facing the Commission as it carries out its critical trade 

functions in fiscal year 2009 and the budget proposed to meet those 

challenges. The budget request of the Commission is $73.6 million. 

Before inviting you to make an opening statement, Mr. Chairman, I recognize my ranking member, Mr. Frelinghuysen, for any 

opening comments. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. It is a pleasure to welcome Chairman Pearson. 

I echo the Chairman’s comments. We look forward to hearing 

about some of the challenges you are facing that are reflected in 

your budget materials and in your statement. 

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Your written statement will be made a part of 

the record, and we invite you to summarize it as you see fit. 

Mr. PEARSON. I was hoping you would allow me to deviate from 

the prepared script. 

Let me begin by thanking the subcommittee, both for the opportunity to testify and for managing to grant our full fiscal year 2008 

appropriation request of $68.4 million. And I will explain a little 

later why that has been so useful. 

I am pleased to have both Vice Chairman Aranoff and Steve 

McLaughlin, our Director of Administration, here. They will answer all of the hard questions. 

What is the same as last year for us? Our budget allocation is 

about the same, in terms of how we split the pool of funds. Salaries 

and benefits account for about 71 percent of our total expenditures. 

Rent accounts for 12 percent. It is a little bit up from last year, and 

I will explain that in a bit. Services are around 11 percent. Those 

are our security guards, some of our IT support, people with whom 

we contract for necessary services. That leaves us with 6 percent 

for other that is somewhat discretionary—travel and training and 

miscellaneous. 

Another thing that is the same as last year is we are still digging 

out of the situation we got ourselves into by asking for a reduction 

of $2.75 million in our fiscal year 2006 appropriation, which then 


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gave us a low baseline for the modified freeze in 2007. We have 

made good progress now with the 2008 appropriation, but we still 

have effects from that earlier situation. 

And the final thing that is the same is we still have no control 

over our workload. We deal with what comes in the door. 

So what has changed since last year? We managed a cash flow 

under the modified freeze by allowing our vacancy rate to rise. As 

of the end of this week, it will be at 16 percent. Normally we have 

had about a 5 percent vacancy rate, so we are at roughly three 

times the normal level. We have 64 vacancies currently, out of a 

total of 407 positions. The number of ITC civil service staff is now 

at its lowest level since sometime prior to 1980, and we didn’t have 

time to go back and check the archives, but it is been several decades. 

Another thing that has changed, our workload has gone up. We 

have become entirely too popular. Last year we talked about the 

filing of new antidumping/countervailing duty cases going down. 

We were in a 3-year downtrend; knew it would likely turn at some 

point; couldn’t predict when. 

Two things have happened since then. One is that the Department of Commerce made a decision to allow the filing of countervailing duty cases against nonmarket economies, including China, 

and that has encouraged several filings. And then, in addition, the 

economy has weakened, and as we see demand for some products 

start to soften, then there is no longer room in the marketplace 

comfortably for both domestic production and imported products. So 

we see an increased filing because of financial pressure on domestic 

producers. 

Now, the vacancy rates for the people who do those anti dumping/countervailing duty investigations had been allowed to rise. I 

mean, that was a logical thing for us to do to manage the cash 

flow. But we are in a situation now where we really do need to rebuild that staff. 

Another thing that is different than last year—well, then I told 

you our 337 intellectual property investigations, that those were 

going up, but we were hoping they were plateauing. Well, they 

have continued to go up. So they didn’t stop. Last year when we 

spoke, we had about 40 active investigations; now we are at 50, so 

with a 25 percent increase. 

We have an office in the ITC, our Office of Unfair Import Investigations, which serves the public interest in these intellectual 

property cases. And they have a lot of contact with the Trade Bar. 

They discuss petitions that are coming up and that sort of thing. 

The head of the Office of Unfair Import Investigations advises that 

there is just no slowdown in new filings. The cases are out there, 

just over the horizon. We don’t know exactly when they will be 

coming; they will be coming. 

We have already had 24 new filings this fiscal year. In order to 

deal with that, we spoke last year about trying to hire a fifth administrative law judge. Well, we had that effort under way, but 

then we had two of our then-sitting judges retire. So we went from 

four judges down to two. We have managed to hire two back or, you 

know, two replacements. And so we are still at four ALJs. We are 

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line closes here in a few days, and we will, I hope in March, be able 

to interview some candidates. 

What we have been able to do is to hire more staff for the ALJs, 

more clerks. We have also added resources to the Office of Unfair 

Import Investigations and to the general counsel’s office. And when 

I say ‘‘add resources,’’ I mean adding basically patent attorneys. 

One other thing that doesn’t really come under the purview of 

appropriations, but we are seeking legislative relief regarding the 

hiring of Section 337 judges because of problems we have with the 

existing alternatives. 

Another thing that has changed since last year, we have more requests for Section 332 investigations on trade issues. These are the 

economic analyses, the reports that we are asked to prepare, either 

by the Ways and Means and Finance Committees here on the Hill 

or by USTR. 

As examples, we are doing more support for USTR in the Doha 

round. We have a very interesting but complicated request from 

Chairman Rangel for a three-part study on China, trying to understand the policies that China has that influence international 

trade. The first of those studies is completed. The second one is 

under way, and the third one will end sometime late next year. 

But they are very resource-intensive. They take a lot of time. We 

have challenges obtaining data from the Chinese. Some travel is required. So these are very interesting and worthwhile, but they 

have required more resources than we anticipated. 

The staff who work on those tend to be the same staff who would 

be available otherwise to work on the antidumping/countervailing 

duty cases. We have a fair amount of synergy between some of our 

offices that work on slightly related items, and so we are seeing a 

pinch both ways there. 

With all this focus on staff shortages, it probably won’t surprise 

you to learn that I have developed a reputation as being fairly good 

at saying no. We haven’t had any money. I can assure you, though, 

that my happiest day as Chairman came this past December when, 

after learning that we had been granted our full $68.4 million appropriation request, I sat down at the desk and signed a stack of 

Form 52s to allow some hiring, which—it was a wonderful thing. 

Let me say a good word about the senior managers in the Commission. They all knew the budget situation that we were in. And 

I wouldn’t say there was no complaining or anything, but they 

pretty well tightened their belts and—and with the light at the end 

of the tunnel, they found a way to get things done. But when we 

could authorize some new hiring, it was great for me and for the 

full Commission. 

So we now are trying to fill 25 of the 64 open slots. If we can 

get those key positions filled, then we will be able to move on to 

do the others. It is our plan to try to get down to a 9 percent vacancy rate by the end of fiscal year 2008. And then the hope is that 

we could continue that rebuilding process and get it down to a 7 

percent vacancy rate by the end of 2009. 

Another thing that has changed since last year is our rent. And 

I talked last year about the rent. It was our projection, based on 

what the GSA had told us, that we would be looking at a 15 percent increase. In August, less than a week before we were expected 


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to sign a letter of agreement, they advised us that, ‘‘Oops, well, 

sorry, it is 38 percent, $1.3 million.’’ 

Of course our appropriation request was in long before that, and we have had no alternative other than to absorb the $1.3 million, 

which we are doing basically by delaying some IT-related projects 

and some FISMA-related items. There are certain things that we 

would prefer not to delay, but we are not taking it out of personnel. 

We are sticking with our personnel plan for fiscal year 2008. But 

in fiscal year 2009 we just, out of necessity, have to build in an 

extra $1.3 million that we hadn’t thought we were going to ask for, 

as part of our ongoing funding requirement. 

So what is not included in our 2009 request? Well, we have not 

included a sixth administrative law judge. We have had some discussion as a Commission. We may need to take that step sometime 

in the future. We don’t think we are quite there yet. We want to 

get five ALJs up and running and see how that goes, let that consolidate a little bit, and then make a call on whether to hire a 

sixth. 

The judges are telling us that they really need another courtroom. We have two courtrooms that are devoted to the 337 cases, 

and that worked okay when we had a lower caseload. What we are 

having as a problem now is that we have the guidance in the statute to try to finish these cases in 12 to 18 months. And partly because the caseload is heavy in and of itself and partly because soon 

after the case is filed the judge will schedule a time when a hearing room is open to hold the hearing, and with hearing rooms being 

booked, they are having to schedule those out further—so many of 

our cases now are being scheduled for well over 20 months’ completion times, and the intellectual property holders are not amused. 

Another thing that is not included in this request is some larger 

IT expenditures, IT infrastructure issues. We are not so far away 

from having to come forward, I think, with a more significant IT 

request, that would go beyond basic replacement. 

And then we continue to be behind in our continuity-of-operations planning. We have done some planning work, but we have 

not been in a financial situation where we have been able to actually locate a site, an off-site site, to relocate to and to go through 

any type of actual drill for continuity of operations. 

Another thing that is not in the budget is preparation for what 

I might call the coming wave of retirements. Twenty percent of ITC 

staff currently are eligible for retirement. Within 5 years, another 

19 percent will be eligible. And that, of course, is on top of the current 16 percent vacancy rate. So you can understand our interest 

in trying to bring in some younger staff to work with the older 

folks, try to get the benefit of that expertise before they leave us. 

So this last part has been by way of early warning. Don’t be surprised if we talk to you about some of these again next year. 

Let me comment briefly on the risks that I see of an appropriations freeze in 2009. We don’t know if it will happen, and I understand it is beyond the control of anyone here, but we have had to 

think about that as we, you know, get ready for what lies ahead. 

Even a partial freeze would derail our 2-year plan for rebuilding 

staff. If we have to pause in our recruitment efforts, it would mean 

that we would miss the January hiring cycle for economists. We 


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are several Ph.D.s short now, and this year we have been in the 

market, trying to hire some. We have been turned down by three 

so far. We are doing our best. I have approved waivers to grant 

some extra preferences, and we hope to be able to hire someone, 

but it has been a little dicier than I would have liked. But if we 

miss them this year, then we need all the more to be able to hire 

some of those folks next year. 

A complete appropriations freeze would have the effect of reduc- ing our personnel compensation by $3.6 million relative to what we 

are now planning for fiscal year 2009. And to fill that gap would 

require either an immediate reduction in force of 7 percent of our 

staff or, over the course of the year, allowing the staffing to fall 

enough so that we would have an average vacancy rate of 16 percent. And if we follow the average approach, by the end of the year, 

as a practical matter, we would be somewhere around 56 people 

short, on top of the vacancy rate that we started with at the first 

of October, this coming. So we would be really in a world of hurt. 

And the other risk if there is a real constraint on appropriations 

next year is equipment upgrade, especially in the IT area. 

Conclusion—I am getting to the end here. 

I would like to express appreciation for the work of your staff, 

Mr. Chairman and Mr. Ranking Member. Tracey LaTurner, Adrienne Simonson, Sally Moorhead, Mike Ringler, Katie Haslet, they 

have really been exceptional to work with. And I say that because 

we are a small agency and, in the broad scheme of things, not terribly important, and yet your staff has treated us as if we are real 

people. And that is very gratifying. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Fantastic. 

Mr. PEARSON. But, no, I have just had the impression, our concerns, even though they are modest in the broad scheme of things, 

are being taken seriously. And so that makes us feel wanted. 

My 2-year term, Mr. Chairman, will end this coming June, and 

I will be pleased to hand over those administrative responsibilities 

to one of my highly qualified Democratic colleagues. Don’t know 

who at this point, but I have my hopes. I sincerely hope that the 

new Chairman will be able to continue the process of rebuilding the 

Commission’s staff and its broader capabilities. 

And to that end, it would be very helpful if we are able to receive 

the full $73.6 million appropriation that we are requesting, which 

has the bipartisan and unanimous support of the Commission. I 

recognize that is a 7.6 percent increase. It is significant in percentage terms. And I would be pleased to discuss in more detail why 

we think it is necessary. 

Thank you very much. 

[Testimony of Daniel R. Pearson, Chairman, United States International Trade Commission] 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Chairman Pearson, and thank you, 

Vice Chairman Aranoff, for your good work on the Commission. It 

is certainly appreciated by everyone. And you deal with a lot of 

issues that I am concerned with, and really do appreciate your consideration as you consider those cases. 

Administrator McLaughlin, how long have you been in this job? 

Mr. MCLAUGHLIN. I have been in this job since 1995. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You know, as you look ahead at some of the 

challenges you have—rent challenges, relocation challenges, staffing challenges—as the Chairman has described them, have we 

built into that some contingencies? 

And first of all, let me, on one hand, commend you for your fiscal 

responsibility and for your honesty in coming forward. 

But I am wondering if you anticipated some of the unintended 

results of, you know, no good deed goes unpunished. And looking 

forward, are you anticipating the unexpected here or the unintended? 

And I am referring to giving back money and maybe the rent situation, not any of which is necessarily anybody’s fault. But as you 

are looking forward, to what extent do you think you are anticipating the unexpected? 

Mr. MCLAUGHLIN. I think it is fair to say that we try to balance 

what could happen good with what could happen bad. It is hard to 

fully anticipate the unanticipated, obviously. 

But when we look at risk items, one of the things we certainly 

didn’t anticipate was the kind of change in our rent. I mean, you 

are always concerned, when dealing with other Government agencies or contractors, that costs won’t come in exactly as you projected, but the history has been that some come in lower and some 

come in higher. Rarely do they come in that much higher. And 

then, since it is a Government agency, you have really no control 

over what you are going to do with it. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I am sympathetic to that, because GSA has surprised a lot of Members of Congress, certainly this Member of Congress, with some really high rent increases over the last 4, 5 or 6 

years. But I am wondering, at this point, if that is to be unexpected. 

Mr. MCLAUGHLIN. Fool me once. The next time—we are assigning higher-level staff to overseeing that contract. So we are going 

to be monitoring that very closely, certainly. 

And we do have other risk factors. And, frankly, it just hasn’t 

been prudent, given the kinds of requests that we are asking for, 

to also load in things on security and replacement of equipment 

when, obviously, we have to accomplish our mission first. 

So we have seen—I am not completely comfortable, in the last 3 

years, we keep deferring these kind of secondary requirements to 

mission accomplishment, given the budget circumstances we are in, 

but we, frankly, have little choice. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, with your request of $73.6 million, which 

is a 7.6 percent increase over 2008, do you think you are anticipating being able to adequately address deferred expenses in addition to the unexpected? 


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Mr. MCLAUGHLIN. We have decided that we really need to move 

forward on the human capital and rebuilding the agency, and that 

is really where we are putting the bulk of our money. 

There is some risk there on systems failures and things of that 

nature, and some of the documentation on information security. 

But to a large extent, we have decided it is not that we are completely vulnerable in these areas, it is just that we can do a better 

job of meeting OMB requirements for documentation, not that we 

are vulnerable. 

So I am reasonably comfortable, given the budget environment, 

that we can get the job done if we get our request. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. In this first round, we are going to stick to 5 

minutes so everybody can have a chance to ask questions. And we 

just got a vote. 

How many votes do we have? 

We have three votes. Okay. Well, we are going to try to keep rolling with this hearing. 

And, Rodney, do you think you can agree with that? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Sure. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. We can keep rolling. So we will try to stay 5 

minutes—we will stay 5 minutes in the first round, and then the 

second round we will just see how many folks are here. 

Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. When the Chairman of the Ways and 

Means Committee asks you to do something, you do it, I take it? 

Mr. PEARSON. We certainly try to. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. And, obviously, whatever three targets he 

suggested you investigate—and you said you have completed one 

study—obviously that benefits the House and Senate and, generally, I assume, gets out into the public. 

Mr. PEARSON. Yes, they are intended for public distribution. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. But are there any other congressional directives that are in that sort of a category that we are not aware 

of it, or a whole slew of them? Maybe we have put a few in our 

own bill. Just so I understand, so the people who would be responding to Chairman Rangel, which obviously everybody would want 

you to do expeditiously, are taken away from their traditional role. 

I see a head. I sort of wonder, how is this handled? 

Ms. ARANOFF. We have statutory authority under Section 332 of 

the Tariff Act which gives the Ways and Means and Finance Committees, as well as both houses of Congress as a whole and the 

President the authority to directly request these studies from us. 

So that is our responsibility. We have people whose primary job is 

to respond to those kinds of requests. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. No, I am admiring of it, and we salute you 

for doing it. But you are obviously doing a lot of other things, as 

well. In the Chairman’s statement, he says, and I quote—this is 

under the ‘‘Increases in the Import Injury Caseload’’ section. It 

says, ‘‘The recent spate of new filings seems to be related, to some 

extent, to the U.S. Commerce Department’s recent decision to apply 

countervailing duty law in China. Six new CVD investigations were 

filed against products in China,’’ et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. 


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So besides, obviously, congressional directives, you take upon 

yourself historic missions from the Commerce Department? Sort of 

explain to me how that works. 

Mr. PEARSON. Right. What is going on here, the private sector, 

domestic industries have responded to a change in rules that Commerce has implemented. Commerce has made it, as some firms 

would see it, more attractive to bring countervailing duty/antidumping cases against China. And once Commerce made that decision, then we saw firms responding to that and bringing petitions 

forward. 

So it wasn’t a direct request from Commerce to us, but Commerce kind of opening the door wider to the private sector. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Educate me. Quite honestly, I have reviewed a lot of figures here. And, I think we are hugely admiring 

of what you do. The protection of intellectual property is incredibly 

important. Is a very high percentage of this related to things from 

China? 

Mr. PEARSON. Right. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. If you were to describe to a layperson, what 

is the caseload? Could you talk about the complexity of some of 

these cases? You know, historically it has been done in an 18- 

month period of time. Now I assume if it goes to 20 months, either 

because of lack of manpower—it must be somewhat related to the 

complexity of the cases as well. 

Mr. PEARSON. Oh, yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So, to the layperson, how would you characterize why you are doing more? And, is it particularly related to 

certain countries? 

Mr. PEARSON. Right. Let me split the investigations into two separate parts. 

We have our intellectual property investigations that we conduct 

under section 337. Those are basically like court cases where a 

company that believes its intellectual property—usually it is patent—is being infringed by an import can bring a case to be heard 

by our administrative law judges that will allow us to issue an exclusion order to keep out the infringing product. Okay. Very useful 

to owners of intellectual property, especially in a global economy 

that is increasingly dependent on trade, where so much of what we 

consume is imported. Okay. 

Set that aside. The antidumping/countervailing duty cases are 

different. Those are brought usually by groups of companies, a domestic industry represented by—they will put together an ad hoc 

coalition or some organization, and they will decide to bring an 

antidumping/countervailing duty petition against imports from a 

country or group of countries. 

We find that China often is one of those countries. Somewhat 

more than half of our cases deal with steel products of various 

sorts, with which the Chairman is particularly familiar. We also 

deal with quite a few chemical cases, some consumer products, a 

few agriculture products. 

And in those investigations, we don’t issue an exclusion order. 

We would instead be blessing the antidumping duties that Commerce has agreed on. Commerce has the job of determining how big 

the margin of underselling is, what is the level of unfair pricing. 


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And that will be the dumping margin or, in the case of subsidies—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. They have that responsibility. What is your 

responsibility on that? 

Mr. PEARSON. To determine whether the domestic industry is injured. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So it is your investigations that make those 

determinations? 

Mr. PEARSON. Right. Assuming Commerce finds the dumping, 

then we look at the industry to see whether they are being hurt 

by the unfair imports. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am staying in the 5-minute rule. I yield 

back, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. Ruppersberger. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. First thing, I thank you for being here 

today. 

Just quickly, I think you referred to it, to an extent, about the 

Department of Commerce’s decision to apply the countervailing 

duty law to China. Specifically as it relates to steel, have you seen 

a change in the cases that you are hearing as it relates to steel? 

Is it affecting your workload? Where are we as it relates to the 

issue of steel on the new Commerce decision to apply the countervailing duty law to China? 

Mr. PEARSON. Right. I think that we have only one steel case 

that has been filed since then, and that has to do with stainless 

steel pipe from China. The other cases all have dealt with a variety 

of other products. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. That is amazing. 

Mr. PEARSON. Right. I mean, in general, the steel industry has 

experienced quite strong demand, and they have been doing better 

financially in the last 3 years, for instance, than they had been in 

the previous several years. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. So the dumping has slowed down, to an extent, their concern about the—— 

Mr. PEARSON. Or even if there is some modest amount of dumping, it has not been hurting the domestic industry. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. You mentioned in your testimony about 

needing another courtroom. How many administrative law judges 

do you have? 

Mr. PEARSON. Currently we have four. We hope soon to have the 

fifth. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Okay. And so, how many cases are they 

able to hear a year? Do you know? 

Mr. PEARSON. We think in terms of eight cases, eight active 

cases, being a full workload. And we have the four of them now, 

each dealing with a dozen. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. How long are the cases in the system from 

the time they start, on average? A year? Half a year? 

Mr. PEARSON. Eighteen months is what we are taking now, except that it is going longer than that. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Will an additional judge make a difference 

in that? 


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Mr. PEARSON. We certainly think so. We think we can get it back 

down more to the 15-month range. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Do you need that additional courtroom also 

to make that happen? 

Mr. PEARSON. At this point, we don’t think so. And the reason 

is that we have our main hearing room, which some of you have 

seen. It is not ideally set up to be a courtroom for the ALJs, but 

it can work as a backup. 

So what we are encouraging the ALJs to do is to go and schedule 

three hearings at any given time. There is a reasonable chance that 

one or more of those cases will settle before getting to the trial. 

And in the case where they actually have to go forward with three 

cases, we will allow them the use of the commissioner’s hearing 

room. And if we need to schedule it for a vote or something, we 

would just have to postpone the ALJ hearing for a day. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Schiff. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will be very brief, because we are going to have to run to vote. 

I am interested particularly in the IP work that you do. I wanted 

to ask you a question on the patent cases. Darrell Issa and I introduced legislation to establish a pilot program in the district courts 

to develop experience among Federal district judges on patent 

cases, because of, among other things, the very high rate of reversal in the court of appeals on patent construction cases. 

The ITC has had a very low rate of reversal, and I am interested 

to know what you attribute that to. What are you doing right, that 

the district courts are doing wrong? How have you managed to 

have a much higher sustainability in the court of appeals than your 

fellows in the Federal court system? 

Mr. PEARSON. Would you care to respond? 

Ms. ARANOFF. The main reason that we have had such a high 

rate of success is our level of expertise. Our administrative law 

judges hear nothing but intellectual property cases, and about 95 

percent of them are patent cases. Even though many of our ALJs 

don’t come to us with patent expertise, they quickly develop it. And 

we do have full-time staff of patent attorneys who come in with 

that expertise and are hired for it. As compared to district court 

judges, who might only hear one or two patent cases every few 

years. 

Mr. SCHIFF. It sounds like a pretty persuasive argument for our 

pilot project. 

Mr. MCLAUGHLIN. I would just like to add, in addition to that, 

the decisions of the administrative law judges are reviewed by our 

commissioners, and they have good advisors on their staff as well, 

and the general counsel has patent attorneys. So if there are some 

things wrong, we can fix it before it gets out of the agency. 

Mr. PEARSON. Representative Schiff, if I could just explain that, 

of the six commissioners, I am the only one who is not an attorney. 

So I found it prudent at times when legal questions get asked to 

turn to one of my more learned colleagues. So it is not that I have 

no opinion, it is just that I trust Shara’s more than I trust mine. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. 


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You talked a little bit about your 2009 funding request and how 

important it was to get it. What would be the effect of a 9-month 

CR on the Commission? 

Mr. PEARSON. At the 2008 level? 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yes, at the 2008 level. 

Mr. PEARSON. It wouldn’t be pretty. The problem we have is that, 

because we have no—we would anticipate that there would be a 

Federal pay raise. And that would somehow have to be absorbed. 

Three months into the CR, we would need to absorb the pay raise. 

Are we building in 4 percent for that? 

Mr. MCLAUGHLIN. Three and a half. 

Mr. PEARSON. Three and a half, okay. We will have the $1.3 million higher rent than had been projected when we got our 2007 baseline funding, so that would have 

to be absorbed. The only alternative that we really have, since we 

have—you know, we continue to push out the IT projects that can 

be pushed out, but we would cut staff. 

I am not saying we would do this. We have no Commission consensus to do it. But as a practical matter, if we need to have a 7 

percent staff reduction, the simplest way to accomplish that would 

be a reduction in force at the start of the fiscal year, because that 

would take the number down immediately and we would get the 

savings throughout the full year. Whereas if we don’t act soon, 

then we will dig ourselves in the hole and have to have an even 

more severe reduction in personnel later in the year. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Will you elaborate on that answer for the record, 

please? 

Mr. PEARSON. Certainly. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I will give you more time to think about it and 

actually give us an assessment of that. 

Mr. MCLAUGHLIN. Mr. Chairman, you had asked previously what 

risks was I concerned about. Going forward, I think we are navigating between risks fairly well. The one risk that would really 

scare me would be the risk of a 9-month CR. Because we are putting all our money in staff, and it is hard to take money back out 

of staff once they are here. That is the thing. When I became Director of Administration in 1995, we were running a RIF at that time. 

And I would not like to have to go back to those days. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Well, if you would submit for the record 

an answer to that question, in addition to your answer here. 

I think I heard you say that you were hiring more clerks to support your ALJs. Is that because of your increased caseload? Is that 

because the clerks, you can hire the expertise without seniority 

considerations? Or is it both? 

Mr. PEARSON. Well, both, I guess. 

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Mr. PEARSON. It is challenging for us to hire administrative law 

judges. We have only two ways to do it. One is to recruit sitting 

administrative law judges, which all of our current judges were sitting at some other agency. Or we can go to the Office of Personnel 

Management and get the three most senior names off their registry. As a practical matter, we have always done both, but we 

have never found one of those three off of the OPM register as having a sufficiently technical background dealing with complex cases, 

and certainly we have never found anybody with patent law background to hire. 

So what we have tended to do is hire judges from the Federal 

Energy Regulatory Commission or other agencies that have a history of dealing with complicated litigation of the sort that we have. 

And our pool of applicants has been shrinking. I don’t know what 

we are getting now in the current go-around, but in the last—when 

we hired the last judge, the pool was smaller than when we had 

hired the previous judge, and that pool was smaller than when we 

had hired the previous judge. 

So I don’t know what is going on, but the trend is against us. 

Our ALJs really do work quite hard. In a sense, they might be at 

the pinnacle of ALJ practice in the Federal Government. Some 90 

percent of all ALJs work for the Social Security Administration, 

and they do important work, and it is relatively shorter cases, and 

they can get through it quickly. A lot of our Initial Determinations 

that the judges put together when they decide the cases run hundreds of pages. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, what I was wondering was, is that the reason you are hiring additional clerks, more clerks, for that reason? 

Mr. PEARSON. Right. Apologies for not answering the question. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. No, no, no. You were answering the question. 

Mr. PEARSON. Yes, what we are trying to do is augment the skills 

that we have there in the four ALJs by giving them everything 

they need. Everything they can farm out to somebody else we are 

trying to allow that to happen, so that they can focus on what only 

they can do. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And you are having an increased caseload at the 

same time? 

Mr. PEARSON. Oh, yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So that is obviously helping with that. Is this 

solving your problem? Are you solving your problem through hiring 

these additional clerks? 

Mr. PEARSON. At a minimum, it has had the effect of persuading 

the existing ALJs not to retire. I mean, I think we have demonstrated to them, as a Commission, that we are committed to trying to give them what they need. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Helping them with their workload. 

Mr. PEARSON. Right. We are trying to get another ALJ; while 

that can’t be done, what else can we do for you? And we have been 

doing all those things that we can. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And with all that, you feel you need one more 

ALJ? 

Mr. PEARSON. Yes. Soon. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And that would solve your problem? 


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Mr. PEARSON. That addresses the problem for now. At the 50-active-cases level, I think we would be okay with five judges. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I guess when I say solve your problem, does that 

dispose of your cases in a timely manner? Do you project that another ALJ and complement of clerks would resolve your cases in a 

timely manner? 

Mr. PEARSON. Another ALJ with clerks, yes, that should get us, 

I think, back to at least an 18-month figure. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is that acceptable? I mean, are you asking here 

in your request for what you need in this area, I guess is my question? And this gives you an opportunity to speak to that, you know. 

Do you need more ALJs? What is your—— 

Mr. PEARSON. If our caseload continues to increase in the coming 

year the way it has in the past, someone from the Commission will 

sit in front of you next year and say we need a sixth ALJ. That 

is my personal view; that is not a Commission decision yet. But 

there is just no way around it. We have the tide flowing in and rising to higher and higher levels. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. McLaughlin, do you have a comment on 

that? 

Mr. MCLAUGHLIN. When we were here last year asking for the 

fifth ALJ that we still don’t have, it was based on 40 active cases, 

and the model was about eight active cases per judge. We are now 

at 50. We are still asking for five, but that is because we don’t 

know that it is going to stay at 50 over the long term and we are 

trying to be prudent. But if it is at 50 next year, I think you could 

anticipate additional upward pressure on the number of judges and 

the resources for each judge. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. 

Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Relative to the ALJs, if it is simply a matter of a waiver? Is the OMB involved in this, as well? 

Mr. PEARSON. OPM more directly. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Okay. Is there something we can do in our 

bill, in terms of language, that could help resolve this issue? 

Mr. PEARSON. What would be needed, we believe, is—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Is there a legislative remedy outside of 

somebody putting in a bill? 

Mr. PEARSON. It is a change in authorizing language, and I have 

no permission to come before you and suggest that that is an appropriate role for the Appropriations Committee. 

But I would note that Senator Baucus has introduced a provision 

in a trade package back in August that would allow for the hiring 

of Section 337 judges specifically to address the concerns that we 

have been discussing. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The four judges you have now, are any or 

all eligible for retirement? 

Mr. PEARSON. Three of the four are eligible for retirement. One 

of our judges is 77 years old, still enjoys his work a lot, but—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. That is a huge amount of devotion. Just 

think if that person were to step down. From what you have told 

us, if you have a smaller pool of people from which to choose, you 

have a pretty difficult problem finding somebody to accept that or 

go through the process to be considered. 


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Mr. PEARSON. Right. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Are these presidential appointments? 

Mr. PEARSON. No, we are able to hire them. The Commission 

does the hiring. And these ALJs are hired under the procedures— 

it is the Administrative Procedures Act, correct? 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I want to get back to the whole issue of 

your complexity of your cases. Is it too much to say all your cases 

continue to be more complex, just the nature of the beast, whether 

they have to do with pharmaceuticals or technology? 

Mr. PEARSON. That certainly is the trend in the patent case area. 

We have—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You have remarkable people who work with 

you, which you have pointed out. We are very lucky to have these 

people. But, in reality, we are moving into an area of greater complexity. 

Mr. PEARSON. Without a doubt. And we have more claims per 

patent being contested. We have oftentimes petitions brought involving multiple patents, each with multiple claims. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You have gotten pretty high marks from 

everybody, in terms of your proceedings are identified with expeditious actions. So we are moving ahead to a situation where it will 

be potentially from 18 to more months? Is that where you are suggesting we are going? 

Mr. PEARSON. Oh, we are there already, yes. And we are trying 

to push the tide back toward 15 months, is where we would like 

to go. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. In your intellectual property proceedings, if 

they result in the finding of a violation and result in exclusion orders and cease and desist orders, who is responsible for enforcing 

them? Customs? 

Mr. PEARSON. Customs enforces them directly. We provide guidance to Customs in terms of what specific tariff items are to be excluded. And their technical staff work with ours. And, on the 

whole, I think Customs does a good job of enforcing. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So they are effectively enforced? 

Mr. PEARSON. Yes. There are instances—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Do you have any problems? 

Mr. PEARSON. Oh, yes, sure. When—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Give us an example. 

Mr. PEARSON. Well, what often happens is that an order will 

cover quite a specific product, and an importer will have a product—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Let’s give an example. Is there a problem 

with this picking a product where there has been—or is this all, 

sort of, in the era of litigation? 

Ms. ARANOFF. Just as an example, if there is a particular IT 

product, maybe a piece that goes into a computer that is covered 

by a certain patent, the engineers will design around it, and they 

will design a product that is going to do the same thing as this part 

that was found to be infringing. Someone has to make a determination of whether the design-around is actually far enough that it is 

outside the scope of the patent. And those sorts of things are frequently disputed. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Those would be within your purview? 


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Ms. ARANOFF. Sometimes. In the first instance, that would go to 

Customs. But there are times when people can actually come to us 

for an advisory opinion or an enforcement proceeding where it 

would go back to the ALJ for a formal adjudication. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. How would you characterize Customs? Do 

they have people that are pretty well-qualified in some of these 

areas? 

Ms. ARANOFF. You will have to ask them. They have an IP rights 

branch which handles these matters. Its staff is relatively small. 

Mr. PEARSON. I think, if the questions get complex enough, they 

probably prefer that we look at it again and decide what—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Could you make any comments, in the 

Chairman’s absence, on the probable effects in terms of the exiting 

free-trade agreements? You have completed all your work relative 

to the ones that are out there now; is that right? 

Mr. PEARSON. Yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. What areas do you expect your economic 

studies will focus on this year and next? USTR is pretty busy. 

Where do you see the next focus? 

Mr. PEARSON. We are unlikely to do any more FTA reports for 

a little while. We hope sincerely at some point to be able to do a 

report on the Doha round, which, of course, isn’t ready yet either. 

Some of the work that we have been doing for USTR in regard 

to the Doha negotiations includes analysis of the nonagricultural 

market access negotiations. We have done a project for them to 

look at the economic partnership agreements that the European 

Union has been signing with its former colonies to try to understand, in aggregate, the effect those are having. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So you are looking at the trade agreements, 

as well? 

Mr. PEARSON. Oh, yes. If the USTR asks us to do it, it is relevant 

to how USTR is trying to position in various ways, you know, in 

negotiations with other countries. So, yes, we have a much larger 

economic staff than USTR. I think they have 10 or fewer economists, and we have in terms of positions, what, somewhere over 40. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. So these are men and woman who are familiar with Central America, South America, and Africa? 

Mr. PEARSON. Right. One of our divisions is a regional analysis 

division, one of our divisions in the economics group. We have three 

divisions. So we have some people who try to look at the world in 

terms of its regions, to understand what is going on in the various 

areas. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Does the USTR have her own equivalent, 

or are you her main backup in this area? 

Mr. PEARSON. Because their staff is so small and I think they 

deal much more with the moment-to-moment issues of the negotiations, we serve what you might call a back office function or a 

backup function, where the more complex, bigger projects they 

hand off to us, and they give us anywhere from 2 weeks to 1 year, 

and we try to give them an answer. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I think we are going to take a brief recess 

until the Chairman comes back, if that is all right. 

Mr. PEARSON. That would be just fine. I recall well—the tagteam effort that the two of you put in last year was admirable. 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I was rehashing a number of questions. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I am sure it was the same ones. Thank you, Rodney. 

Did Mr. Frelinghuysen talk about countervailing duties and antidumping? No? I can safely get into that without asking you to repeat? 

The fiscal year 2009 budget request states that import injury investigations are projected to increase by 10 percent because of increased filings of the antidumping and countervailing duty petitions. In your statement, you mention seven new CVD investigations filed against products from China in the past year and project 

they will remain at relatively high levels in fiscal years 2008 and 

2009. 

Please explain how the U.S. Department of Commerce’s recent 

decision to apply the CVD to non-market economies such as China 

effects the levels of filings of this type of petition. 

Mr. PEARSON. Sure. Some U.S. industries have been concerned, 

because when they have brought just antidumping petitions 

against the Chinese, sometimes the margins have come back at relatively modest levels. Some of the Chinese firms have been effective at retaining counsel and working with the Department of Commerce, and they have argued successfully for relatively modest 

margins. Given the cost advantages that some Chinese firms have, 

they have still been able to export to this country without a huge 

restriction despite the antidumping order. 

So I think that by—the reasoning of the Department of Commerce, I think, was that if they were to look at the subsidies in 

China, which we understand there are quite a few, and then calculate a subsidy margin, that perhaps the antidumping-plus-CVD 

margin would be sufficient that it would be harder for firms from 

China to export products to the United States. 

So, in other words, once that door is open, then U.S. firms may 

be more likely to file cases. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are there any other reasons for the increased filings? 

Mr. PEARSON. I think that it is not possible to ignore the economy. As we see the economy slow down, as we see demand weaken, 

there just isn’t room left for firms to sell at profitable prices with 

a shrinking or a weakening demand base. 

So this is normal. I mean, our workload in antidumping/countervailing duty cases tends to be counter-cyclical. The better the economy is, the fewer cases we have filed. When the economy heads 

south, our caseload goes up. So, without knowing any precise numbers, we would anticipate that we are going to see some filings 

through this time of weak economic growth. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What other countries are involved besides 

China? 

Mr. PEARSON. Well, we see quite a variety of petitions. We have 

one that we have just dealt with involving France only. We have 

quite a few involving India, Thailand. 

When we are reviewing existing orders, we often—we have been 

dealing with Ukraine and Eastern European countries, as well as, 

you know, some of the Western European countries, occasionally 


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South American countries. Particularly Brazil is a major exporter; 

it shows up occasionally. 

If you would like, I can provide in post-hearing a more thorough 

review of countries that we have been involved in in the past year. 

That would be simple enough. 

[The information follows:] 

Question. What other countries are involved [in antidumping and countervailing 

duty investigations besides China? 

Answer. In FY2007 and year-to-date FY2008, antidumping and countervailing 

duty cases have been filed with respect to imports from the following countries: 

China—20 cases, Korea—4 cases, India—3 cases, Germany—2 cases, United Arab 

Emirates—2 cases, Australia—1 case, Brazil—1 case, France—1 case, Indonesia— 

1 case, Japan—1 case, Mexico—1 case, South Africa—1 case, Taiwan—1 case, Thailand—1 case, Turkey—1 case, and Vietnam—1 case. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you have any steel cases pending? 

Mr. PEARSON. Yes. We have a hearing for next, what, next month 

sometime on stainless steel pipe from China. 

[The information follows:] 

Question. Do you have any steel [antidumping or countervailing duty] cases pending? 

Answer. Active Steel Product Investigations: 

1. Steel nails/China & United Arab Emirates. 

2. Circular welded carbon-quality steel pipe/China. 

3. Light-walled rectangular pipe and tube/China, Korea, Mexico and Turkey. 

4. Steel wire garment hangers/China. 

5. Welded stainless steel pressure pipe/China. 

6. Steel threaded rod/China. 

Active Steel Product Reviews: 

1. Carbon and certain alloy steel wire rod/Brazil, Canada, Indonesia, Mexico, 

Moldova, Trinidad & Tobago & Ukraine. 

2. Steel concrete reinforcing bar/Turkey. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is that the only one you have, countervailing 

duty or antidumping case petition? 

Ms. ARANOFF. That is the only new one. We are continuing to do 

sunset reviews on quite a number of steel-related orders. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So all that represents an increased workload? 

Mr. PEARSON. The new cases clearly do. See, in terms of the 5- 

year sunset reviews that we do, we know what is out there, because any time an order goes into effect, we know that 5 years 

later we are going to look at it again. So that is predictable; we can 

budget for that. The new cases are brought at the pleasure of the 

domestic industries. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I know you have talked about this already in the 

hearing, but how are you with your current staffing levels? How 

are you meeting this demand? You have a higher demand here. 

You have a higher demand from the Congress, a request from the 

Ways and Means Committee. 

Mr. PEARSON. We are meeting it with some difficulty, frankly. 

We are pushing people harder than we can over the long term. 

That is why I mentioned earlier it is important for them to see the 

light at the end of the tunnel, because people are—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What is the light at the end of the tunnel? 

Ms. ARANOFF. Getting the vacancy rate down. 

Mr. PEARSON. The light they would see is if we have the 2008 

appropriation we asked for, if we get the 2009 appropriation. Then 

I think there will be a general sense across the agency, ‘‘Okay, we 

are back. We are rebuilding. We are going to be okay.’’ 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. But you really should be okay with the 2008 request you asked for, but you are saying the rent situation frustrated that; is that correct? 

Mr. PEARSON. Yes, that is correct. Although what we have done 

is we have protected the personnel side of our plan and we have 

taken the hit on the IT side. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. If you protected the personnel side, then your 

2008 request should have taken care of your personnel needs. But 

it hasn’t taken care of your personnel needs. 

Mr. PEARSON. Well, I see what you are saying, but, in fairness, 

it is very difficult for us, given the specialized requirements we 

have for many of our offices, to just go out and in one fiscal year 

hire all the—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you have the money to do it? 

Mr. PEARSON. We have the money this year to get our vacancy 

rate down from 16 percent to 9 percent by the end of September, 

which we hope to do, which is about as much as we think we can 

absorb this year. That is why to have continuity through fiscal 

2009 is so important to us, because, otherwise, we are going to 

have the job half-finished, with the risk that we have to turn 

around and start reducing employment again. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You have to be approved by OMB; is that correct? 

Mr. PEARSON. Our appropriation request has to be submitted to 

OMB, but they can’t adjust it. It is one of the elements of our independence. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And I remember that. 

Mr. PEARSON. We are one of the most independent of all independent agencies. You know, six commissioners, no more than 

three from any one party. We serve 9-year terms, staggered with 

one term ending every 18 months. We all outlive any administration. And the chairmanship flips back and forth every 2 years by 

presidential designation. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You didn’t adjust your request based on anything OMB had to say about it? 

Mr. PEARSON. No, not at all. It passes directly through to you, 

and we are very much subject to whatever you should decide, 

which is why we appreciate this opportunity to visit. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And we want to help you. So your $73.6 million 

is what you all have sat down and said, ‘‘That is what we need for 

2009’’? 

Mr. PEARSON. Right. The commissioners met in late August, 

early September, I guess, and approved this figure. So we have, 

like I said, bipartisan and unanimous agreement with this request. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. 

Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. That is pretty good and admirable. 

I just want to get to the rent increase and GSA. Did you protest, 

or what did you do? You didn’t take the rent increase sitting down 

when they made initial projection of 15 and then came up with 

somewhere between 38 and 40 percent. 

Mr. PEARSON. Right. We did not take it sitting down. But in the 

short term, they have the right to take out of our accounts however 


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much money they want, on a monthly basis. So they go ahead and 

get their money, and we have to live with that. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. You protested, but what did you actually 

find out? Do you think that there was any justification? 

Mr. PEARSON. Well, they have their rationale. It is just they did 

not communicate it to us. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. What do you think their rationale might 

be? What did they tell you? 

Mr. PEARSON. Let me turn to Mr. McLaughlin. 

Mr. MCLAUGHLIN. Most of my summer was spent on this rationale. 

The short version of the story is what we were being quoted as 

our price was not the bottom-line price; it was GSA’s costs. So notwithstanding our request for a budget figure, they were quoting us 

their cost. They are renting the property from Boston Property. 

They did not disclose to us that, oh, by the way, their cost doesn’t 

include operating fee escalations for the last 10 years and real estate escalations for the last 10 years and their 8 percent administrative fee, which totals $1.3 million. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Oh. 

Mr. MCLAUGHLIN. That was my reaction. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, I am glad we have it entered into the 

record, because obviously this impacts other agencies and groups 

that come before us. I would think, obviously, those figures were 

set before maybe our economy was headed south. 

I just have a question on Thailand. When I was in Thailand in 

late August, I met with a variety of people at the embassy. The 

Thai case you are talking about here, didn’t that involve pharmaceuticals? Any of you familiar with that issue? I know there are 

things going on there where people are not playing by the—rules. 

Mr. PEARSON. I don’t believe we have had a pharmaceuticals case 

in front of us. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The Thai issue, you don’t remember what 

that was? 

Mr. PEARSON. We had a steel case involving Thailand, a review 

of an old order, and then a little more than a year ago, we had a 

case involving crushed canned pineapple from Thailand and other 

countries. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Interesting, somehow I thought there was 

some sort of pharmaceutical case that was involved. 

Mr. PEARSON. And that is not impossible. We could have easily 

had an intellectual property case, a 337-case, that might have involved one or more producers in Thailand. And I wouldn’t know 

that unless I went and looked at it closely. We do as a practical 

matter deal with some biotech and pharmaceutical cases on the 

patent side. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Were you involved in any way in any of the 

Mattel stuff with toys? 

Mr. PEARSON. No, we watched that from the side lines wondering 

what it would mean for the bilateral relationship, but there was no 

trade remedy case brought before us, and we have not been asked 

to look specifically at toys by the Rangel study that we are doing 

on China. The request for the study preceded the concerns with 

toys. 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Even though maybe the Chinese are to be 

blamed, obviously, these were American companies that are contracting so there are obviously obligations they have. 

Mr. PEARSON. Important lessons to learn about one’s supply 

chain, I think, yes. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Absolutely. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. With regard to your exemption from OPM’s ALJ 

pool requirement. Does your request or desire to be exempt from 

OPM’s ALJ pool and priority, does that have to be coordinated 

through and approved by OMB? 

Mr. PEARSON. No. I mean, if OPM had some administrative authority that it was willing to use to grant relief, then perhaps OMB 

would have to look at it. I don’t know that. But OPM has made it 

clear to us that they don’t think they have the administrative authority, and if they did have, they wouldn’t be inclined to use it, 

because they are not eager to start what they would see as a slippery slope by making an exemption for one small agency, because 

then what would come next in terms of requests. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. In July of last year you released a report on certain economic effects of U.S. restrictions on agricultural sales to 

Cuba. 

Mr. PEARSON. Yes. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I have a series of questions on that, please. 

What factors raise the cost of U.S. Goods for Cubans and limit U.S. 

sales? What factors raise the cost of U.S. goods for Cubans—— 

Mr. PEARSON. Okay. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. And limit the U.S. sales. 

Mr. PEARSON. I will try to answer these, I have not looked at 

that study now in over half a year, but off the top of my head. 

[The information follows:] 

Question. What factors limit U.S. agricultural sales to Cubans? 

Answer. Several factors, both economic and non-economic, limit U.S. agricultural 

sales to Cuba. Beyond the additional costs of U.S. goods mentioned above, Cuba is 

unable to benefit from several USDA credit programs that provide low-interest credit for the purchase of U.S. agricultural products. Such credit is available to the 

Cuban Government from many U.S. competitors, such as France, China, and Vietnam. Even though the United States is able offer Cuba high quality agricultural 

products at prices lower than most competitors, non-economic factors are important 

to Alimport in making its purchasing decisions. For example, Cuba seeks to diversify its agricultural import suppliers, not only to avoid becoming too reliant on any 

single country, but also to develop favorable geo-political relationships (such as with 

China and Venezuela). U.S. travel restrictions also limit our agricultural sales to 

Cuba in a number of ways. For example, reducing the number of U.S. citizens able 

to travel to Cuba lowers demand for U.S. products in Cuba. Further, Cuban officials 

wishing to visit the United States in order to inspect U.S. processing and port facilities, a prerequisite in many cases for purchases, have difficulty obtaining visas from 

U.S. authorities. Similarly, U.S. exporters face time-consuming and complicated procedures in obtaining licenses for travel in order to conduct essential face-to-face 

business negotiations in Cuba. 

Question. What factors raise the cost of U.S. goods for Cubans? 

Answer. Sanctions prevent the Cuban Government entity, Alimport, (the sole purchaser of U.S. agricultural products) from conducting financial transactions with 

U.S. banks. This means that Cuba must make payments for U.S. agricultural sales 

through third-country (typically European) financial institutions. The additional 

costs associated with such third-party transactions, including currency conversions, 

raises the price of U.S. goods paid by Alimport. Also, compliance with stringent financing regulations often results in delays at U.S. ports, leading to additional shipping costs for Alimport. Sanctions also penalize shipping companies whose vessels 


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enter Cuban ports. As a result, few companies service Cuba and a lack of competition among shippers leads to higher freight charges on goods coming from the 

United States. 

The majority of U.S. agricultural products imported by Alimport are distributed 

directly to the Cuban population through government-run ration stores. However, 

some products imported from the United States are resold by Alimport to private 

sector grocery outlets, hotels, and restaurants. As the sole buyer and seller, 

Alimport is able to charge higher prices to these private sector outlets than if these 

outlets purchased directly from U.S. suppliers. Overall, the ITC estimated that sanctions raise the cost of U.S. goods for Cubans by as much as 2.5 to 10 percent, depending on the products. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay, go ahead. 

Mr. PEARSON. There is the travel restriction that makes it challenging for people who want to go to Cuba on sales calls to do so, 

so that is one factor. And there are the financing issues where U.S. 

financial institutions can’t be involved in a trade with China— 

Cuba, excuse me. Those would be the two things that would come 

to me. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What agricultural commodity sectors would likely benefit most from the lifting of financial restrictions on U.S. agriculture exports to Cuba? I will submit these for the record. 

The recent WTO rules draft apparently included changes with regard to the administration of sunset reviews, and the new provision 

would perhaps provide for mandatory sunset trade relief at 10 

years. Is it true that the WTO rules draft provides for mandatory 

sunset trade relief at 10 years? 

Mr. PEARSON. Yes, the chairman’s draft that is currently under 

consideration does include a provision that would sunset all orders 

after 10 years. 

[The information follows:] 

Question. What agricultural commodity sectors would likely benefit most from lifting of financial restrictions on U.S. Agricultural exports to Cuba? 

Answer. The United States export a wide range of agricultural commodities to 

Cuba, including food and feed grains, soybeans, dry beans, dairy and meat products, 

fresh fruit and vegetables, and a variety of processed food and beverages. The ITC 

estimated that U.S. agricultural sales to Cuba could double absent the financial restrictions. Sales of all products would benefit from lifting financial restrictions, with 

fruit and vegetables, meats, bulk dairy products, and processed foods benefiting the 

most. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, what effect will this have on U.S. citizens 

who have used the existing trade laws to obtain relief from unfair 

trade practices? 

Mr. PEARSON. It would require them to come back and file a new 

case. Now, my understanding is that the chairman, without defining it, has indicated that he would be open to some expedited procedure in that situation. But at this stage of the negotiations, that 

is only a concept; it is nothing more than something we could speculate on. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I understand that some members of the Commission recently traveled to Geneva to meet with officials to discuss 

these issues. Can you elaborate on those meetings? Did you travel? 

Mr. PEARSON. Certainly, yes. Four of the commissioners went. It 

had been several years since we had been there, there had not been 

a lot happening in the Rules negotiations, okay? So we didn’t want 

to spend unnecessary time there. And I should explain, too, that 

the Commission does not negotiate directly on Rules. Those negotiations are handled by Commerce and USTR. The reason that both 


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Congress and USTR want us to be informed and kind of a part of 

the process is that, at some stage late in the game, we are going 

to get a phone call saying, okay, the language on material injury 

is this, can you live with it? And of necessity we need to be aware 

of what those changes are, what changes are being proposed. 

But there are suggestions to change the material injury standards that are of some concern, and those were the ones we were 

primarily focused on. Sunset, although it would have an effect on 

us, there was nothing there that we would—that we would take a 

position on, because it is kind of outside the scope of what we 

should focus on. We have been very scrupulous to leave to Commerce and USTR the things that are their—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So you would not have commented on the sunset 

provisions? 

Mr. PEARSON. If it goes into effect, it may or may not change our 

work load; it depends. If new petitions are filed, that may have the 

effect of increasing our work load. If new petitions are not filed, our 

work load would go down. We kind of know what is out there for 

work load if we are just doing a review every 5 years. It is a little 

easier for us to plan. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. 

Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am all set, Mr. Chairman, thank you. 

Mr. PEARSON. Mr. Chairman, could I add it has been pointed out 

to me, you had asked earlier about steel cases. We do have a case 

involving steel nails from China and—is it the United Arab Emirates? I think it is probably Dubai, and that is in front of us now. 

It is not one of our traditional steel cases, but it is a steel product. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay, Mr. Fattah. 

Mr. FATTAH. I will pass this round. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. We’re done. 

Mr. FATTAH. We’re done? I have some questions that I will submit for the record. 

Mr. PEARSON. That would be fine, thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Mr. Fattah. 

Mr. Chairman, Madam Vice Chairman, Mr. McLaughlin, we appreciate your testimony here today, thank you again for your good 

work. There will be some questions submitted for the record. Mr. 

Fattah has indicated his interest in doing that, and we may as 

well. That was excellent testimony, and again, I appreciate very 

much your good work. And if you will please give my personal regards to Commissioner Lane, I’d appreciate that. 

Mr. PEARSON. I would be pleased to do so. And again, we appreciate so much the attention that you give to our little agency. I 

mean, we do our best, and we may be one of the most bipartisan 

places in town. We try hard to maintain that working atmosphere 

and to have good relations with the Hill, so thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. You are small enough that these accounts get 

scrutinized, which is important to do. But you know, we want to 

be responsive to your needs, so you need to come forward with 

what they are. Thank you for your testimony. 

Mr. PEARSON. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And the hearing is adjourned. 

[Questions and answers submitted for the record follow:] 


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(829) 

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 9, 2008. 

OFFICE OF UNITED STATES TRADE REPRESENTATIVE 

WITNESS 

SUSAN C. SCHWAB, UNITED STATES TRADE REPRESENTATIVE 

OPENING REMARKS

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Good morning and welcome to staff, Members, 

and the public. This morning, we welcome Ambassador Susan C. 

Schwab to testify on the United States Trade Representative’s fiscal year 2009 budget request. This is her first appearance before 

this Committee. 

Welcome, Ambassador. We look forward to working with you. 

This year’s budget proposes a slight increase of 4.9 percent. However, the justification clearly conveys the inadequacy of this request. Current FTE levels cannot be sustained at this level and 

other risks to the budget have been identified but not included. 

Furthermore, the assertion is made that any remaining carryover funding will be exhausted in fiscal year 2008, leaving no capacity for unbudgeted events. 

Yet, the annual performance goals and 2009 initiatives are far 

ranging. The workload will have to be managed by eliminating 

noncritical missions. Indeed, USTR has already begun deferring 

such missions in fiscal year 2008. 

USTR plans to slow hires or not backfill vacancies, increase the 

number of unreimbursable detailees, and reassign personnel based 

on mission priorities. As a result, critical institutional knowledge 

may be lost. 

This justification states, ‘‘This request significantly slows important administrative and infrastructure upgrades that commenced 

in fiscal year 2006,’’ which were an attempt to reverse a decade of 

inattention to support and logistical needs. 

You may recall that in fiscal year 2006, the President’s proposed 

budget was just 38.8 million. Congress appropriated 44.6 million. 

It has been two years since USTR has appeared before this Committee and we have a new Ambassador. Unfortunately, my concerns about the economic and social effect of free trade agreements 

on American communities has not abated in the intervening years. 

There appears to be some progress on the inclusion of environmental agreements and labor principles into trade negotiations, but 

the U.S. is still disadvantaged on balance. 

Moreover, the idea that nations should avoid using the environment and climate change as an excuse to impose trade restrictions 

is worrisome. 

And then there’s China. In 2006, USTR’s top-to-bottom review of 

trade with China concluded that the relationship lacked equity, 

balance, and durability. 


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In October 2007, GAO testified before the House Judiciary Committee on Courts, the Internet, and Intellectual Property that U.S. 

intellectual property faces increasing risk of theft as U.S. firms integrate into the world economy. 

‘‘The severity of these risks has been intensified by weak enforcement in some countries, particularly China, whose enforcement 

challenges have persisted despite U.S. efforts.’’ 

In February 2008, the Department of Commerce reported that 

the trade deficit with China rose to 256 billion in 2007, the largest 

gap ever recorded with a single country. China has now surpassed 

Canada to become the U.S.’s largest source of imported goods and, 

yet, despite the decline in the dollar, U.S. exports to China fell 15 

percent in January 2008 amid contentions of unfair manipulation 

of China’s currency to keep its value low against the dollar. 

The Committee looks forward to your thoughts on these issues, 

Ambassador Schwab. And so I will invite you to go forward with 

your oral testimony. Your written testimony will be made a part 

of the record. And then when Mr. Frelinghuysen arrives, we will 

give him an opportunity to make an opening statement. 

Welcome. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Super. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank 

you very much. 

Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee, I appreciate this opportunity to discuss the fiscal year 2009 budget for the Office of 

U.S. Trade Representative. 

As you know, the USTR is the lead agency in the U.S. government responsible for the development, the negotiation, and the implementation of U.S. trade policy. We are a lean, efficient, effective 

organization that currently boasts around 226 FTEs. 

And the principal focus of virtually everyone on the staff is opening markets abroad for the products and services of American 

workers, farmers, and entrepreneurs. We negotiate agreements 

that level the trade playing field and hold our partners to their 

commitments. 

Our trade policy and the agenda to deliver it has four main components. First, multilateral trade talks such as the WTO’s Doha development round; second, regional and bilateral trade talks such as 

pending free trade agreements with Colombia, with Panama, and 

South Korea; third, monitoring and enforcement of U.S. rights 

under existing trade agreements; fourth, issue-specific problemsolving and negotiations on topics such as intellectual property 

rights protection, softwood lumber, removal of nonscience-based 

sanitary and phyto-sanitary barriers to U.S. farm exports, and the 

use of trade to contribute to international, environmental, and climate objectives. 

Trade today is playing a larger role in our economy than ever before and while some sectors of the U.S. economy are under stress, 

more than 40 percent of U.S. economic growth last year was attributable to the growth in U.S. exports, goods and services. 

With U.S. exports to our free trade agreement partners rising 

significantly faster than our exports to the rest of the world, our 

trade agenda is more important than ever. 

I am here today to ask that you fully fund these very important 

activities for fiscal year 2009. With our funding levels relatively 


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flat for the last two years, our office has been challenged to keep 

pace with our growing responsibilities. 

USTR has a very high-skilled labor and travel-intensive job to 

do. And of the 45.2 million we spent in fiscal year 2007, 33 million 

or 73 percent went to payroll. Travel was the next highest expense 

at 12 percent. 

In fiscal year 2008, our payroll increases to 35 million, primarily 

due to a cost-of-living adjustment, making payroll this year almost 

80 percent of our current appropriation. 

If the budget is cut below the President’s budget proposal, the 

new USTR, the next USTR will have to reduce costs by cutting 

staff. This would seriously impair USTR’s congressionally mandated mission of opening international markets to U.S. exports and 

enforcing trade agreements. 

Let me briefly mention some of our activities and accomplishments if I may. 

First, on the multilateral front, a successful WTO Doha round 

outcome is our top trade negotiating priority. This multilateral 

agreement in the WTO offers the potential to generate economic 

growth and development here and around the world and to help lift 

millions out of poverty. 

We have worked since 2001 to achieve a successful Doha outcome 

that will open markets, generate new trade flows, and boost both 

economic growth and confidence in the global economy, but it is important that the United States stay a strong and active leader at 

the WTO so as to ensure maximum benefits to U.S. interests. 

On FTAs, we are working very closely with Congress as we did 

last year to address the environmental and labor protections in 

four free trade agreements. The four FTAs that were pending before the Congress, Peru, Colombia, Panama, and South Korea. 

We included at Congress’s suggestion and in concert with a bipartisan agreement stronger enforceable provisions that have set a 

new standard in both areas, environment and labor protections for 

FTAs. 

Monitoring and enforcing these and earlier labor and environmental provisions in our FTAs is important but also resource intensive. And with a substantial increase in the number of countries 

with which we now have FTAs jumping from three to seventeen 

during the course of this Administration, USTR’s workload has 

grown dramatically. Despite this increase in workload, we have increased staff by only 13 percent since fiscal year 2001. 

On the enforcement front, since USTR testified last before this 

Committee, we have initiated five WTO cases challenging China’s 

trade practices. This brings the total number of cases filed against 

China to six since March 2004 when we filed the first ever case 

against China at the WTO. 

As the result of filing one such case last year, China agreed to 

eliminate a dozen major export subsidies and important substitution incentives. 

We also continue to challenge in the WTO the European Union’s 

undue delays in approving agricultural biotechnology products. We 

have initiated two arbitrations against Canada to enforce bilateral 

softwood lumber agreement. 


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USTR has, as you know, an array of tools available to us to enforce our rights under trade agreements. And while litigation is 

never the preferred option, it is an option that we have and will 

continue to use when other efforts fail to resolve our trade problems. 

Just briefly before closing, a couple examples of subject-specific 

negotiations or actions that we are engaged in. 

First on intellectual property rights, we have made progress with 

several of our trading partners this past year in improving IPR 

laws and enforcement. For example, the three pending FTAs, Colombia, Panama, and South Korea all contain world-class IPR protections. 

USTR uses our annual special 301 report that will come out later 

this month to guide our choice of policy priorities, our priority targets for addressing IP challenges. 

In addition, we recently announced the launch of the negotiations of the new anti-counterfeiting trade agreement with key trading partners designed to hit a higher standard for combating intellectual property rights violations, piracy, and counterfeiting. 

On trade and the environment, in addition to improving environmental standards through our free trade agreements, the United 

States together with the European Union recently submitted a 

groundbreaking proposal as part of the Doha round negotiations to 

reduce international barriers to trade and environmental goods and 

services, including important climate-friendly technologies such as 

clean coal, wind energy, and solar cells. 

I would note that USTR depends greatly on our interdependent 

relationship with other agencies when we move forward with the 

Administration’s trade agenda. In particular, we rely on the capacity building, development, and technical assistance provided by 

some of the development agencies to support in particular the labor 

and environmental provisions of the free trade agreements. 

And since I know that these decisions are vested with another 

Subcommittee, I hope that you would keep that in mind because 

these are tools that we really rely on. 

In conclusion, American taxpayers get an exceptional return on 

their investment in USTR and, therefore, I would respectfully ask 

that you fully fund our 2009 budget, fiscal year 2009 budget so that 

the work of the U.S. Trade Representative’s Office can be smoothly 

transitioned to the next Administration. 

Thank you for your time and I would be happy to take any questions. 

[Written testimony by Ambassador Susan C. Schwab, United 

States Trade Representative] 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. 

I recognize Mr. Frelinghuysen for an opening statement. 

OPENING REMARKS

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. First of all, let me apologize, Mr. Chairman, for being late. 

And, Ambassador, it is my pleasure to join the Chairman in welcoming you for your first appearance before this Subcommittee. 

You are requesting an appropriation of $46.3 million which provides no increase for your fiscal year 2008 operating level which included carry-over funds. 

The fiscal year 2009 request provides no additional resources for 

pay, inflation, or other built-in cost increases, let alone any increases for the new initiatives that you have mentioned. This 

seems to me to be somewhat shortsighted given the very active 

trade agenda facing the nation. 

As you said in your testimony, the American taxpayer gets an exceptional return in their investment in the USTR. I had an opportunity over the weekend with you to see some of that investment 

and the extraordinary amount of work that you have been doing 

relative to that trade agreement and so many others. 

I also had an opportunity to take a close look at your 2008 national trade report, the NET, which substantiates very much to me 

your successes and many challenges. That is quite a list of accomplishments and a lot of barriers yet to overcome. 

I believe that our security and prosperity are dependent upon active engagement in the global economy through free and fair trade. 

I am convinced and certainly even more so having been with you 

recently on a bipartisan trip that the Colombia free trade agreement will yield important economic benefits for the United States 

and Colombia and also will demonstrate support for a very strong 

ally. 

The odds of President Uribe succeeding were long, but he has 

succeeded and now we need to match his courage and the work of 

the men and women who support him. 

I am very pleased that you are here and I salute you for your 

work. Your budget needs a lot more money. As I know you said in 

your testimony and certainly in your published testimony, you are 

preparing for the next Administration and they have to face these 

challenges. 

You are not only looking after your needs between now and the 

end of the year, but giving the next President the tools they need 

to open the marketplace for American goods and services. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

USTR BUDGET

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you, Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Ambassador Schwab, I just point out that it puts the Committee 

in a difficult position when we receive testimony as late as we received your testimony. I do not know whether you know it or not. 

We received your testimony 6:30 last evening, which actually was 

15 hours in advance of USTR’s hearing. That beats Census. Census 

was 19 hours in advance of the hearing. Of course, we gave about 


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two postponements of their testimony in order to accommodate 

their trying to get their information together. But we have not even 

read and what we heard of your testimony is the first we heard of 

it. So it really does put the Committee in a difficult position. 

Thank you for appearing at the same time. 

In 2009, USTR budget includes an increase of $2.1 million. That 

is just under five percent of the fiscal year 2008 appropriation. 

However, this is just equivalent to USTR’s fiscal 2008 spending 

level, which allowed USTR to spend 2.2 million in no-year carryover funds in addition to the enacted level of 44.1 million. 

Indeed, your justification makes it quite clear that 46.3 million, 

the President’s request, is not enough, as Mr. Frelinghuysen is 

pointing out here, for fiscal year 2009, in part precisely because 

USTR will have exhausted all of its no-year carry-over funds in fiscal year 2008. 

The justification states that, ‘‘This will be a challenge to USTR 

management.’’ 

On page 23 of the justification, USTR lists its fiscal year 2009 

budget risk. Included on this list, but not in the budget, are first 

a WTO ministerial normally scheduled bi-annually which has not 

been assumed in this budget due to the current stage of the Doha 

negotiations. 

Two, capital security costs in China related to the State Department’s Global Embassy Construction Program that have not yet 

been charged to USTR despite the fact that it has been in Beijing 

since 2007. 

Three, the need to strictly control personnel costs through deliberately pacing hiring requirements. 

And, lastly, a new lease for the Ambassador’s residence in Geneva. 

Ambassador Schwab, this budget was developed some time ago 

and we heard from your office that the Doha round was heating up. 

Please update us on the Doha negotiations and explain how this affects the need for a WTO ministerial. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

As you note, the Doha round negotiation is heating up. It has 

done so periodically over the last several years. We are once again 

going to take a run at getting this elusive break-through that 

would open markets to trade in agriculture and manufacturing 

goods and services. And we do hope to see a ministerial sometime 

in the next two months or so. 

Unlike the previous ministerial in December of 2005, which was 

in Hong Kong, this one would probably be in Geneva, which is 

slightly less costly for us because we have a small office in Geneva 

that can support us. So that is a good development. 

The key to the Doha round from our perspective is to make sure 

that this multilateral development round meets the promise that 

was stated for it when it was launched in 2001, namely to help 

generate economic growth, including in developing countries, and 

to help alleviate poverty. 

And the key, one of the key points that we have found is a challenge in this negotiation is ensuring that the emerging markets, 

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tribute to this market, opening at a level that is commensurate 

with their level of development. 

Obviously the developed countries would be expected to do the 

most and the least developing countries are the ones that we are 

targeting for the most help, but everybody needs to contribute for 

this to be a successful round. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Your risk was calculated at a million dollars for 

this ministerial. How risky is the exclusion of the ministerial request? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I would guess at this stage, first of all, the 

ministerial, assuming the ministerial takes place, and there will be 

a lot of developments in the next four to eight weeks to see whether we are ready for a ministerial, we cannot afford a failed ministerial again, assuming it takes place, my guess is that it will be less 

costly than the million dollars that it cost us to do the Hong Kong 

ministerial in December of 2005, and that if there is a second ministerial to eventually close the Doha round, it would be in the next 

fiscal year. 

So we are talking about one in this fiscal year, one in the next 

fiscal year, but neither of them—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What fiscal year? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. One in fiscal year 2008, one that would be 

closer to the end of this calendar year, therefore, fiscal year 2009. 

Neither would be as costly as the Hong Kong ministerial was. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. How costly was the Hong Kong ministerial? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. It was close to a million dollars. This was 

December of 2005. 

But I would be happy to provide—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you really think it is going to cost less than 

a million dollars? And even if it does, it is not provided for, so how 

are you going to cover it? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. USTR has become pretty adept at setting 

priorities and making sure we have the resources available to fund 

those priorities. And there are other things that we could and probably should be doing that sometimes slip. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Why do you not request it? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. You know, obviously USTR, I am fully supportive of the President’s request. We can manage with the President’s request. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I know you have quoted the President’s request. 

We understand that. Why do you not request it? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. For the ministerial? 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Yes. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. In part because we have been planning. 

We have assumed or thought there would be a ministerial for several years running and there has not been one. We thought there 

would be one in 2006. We did not have one. We thought there 

would be one in 2007. We did not have one. 

I cannot actually tell you there is going to be a ministerial in fiscal year 2008 or fiscal year 2009. We believe we are going to have 

a ministerial in fiscal year 2008 later on this spring, but that is 

not even set yet. And, therefore—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is the funding for that provided for? 


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Ambassador SCHWAB. We would make certain that we had the 

funding for that. And as I said, because that ministerial would be 

in Geneva, and my guess is both would be in Geneva, if there is 

one to get the break through and one to close the deal, my guess 

is both would be in Geneva. 

And Geneva, while there has been some increase in cost associated with exchange rate changes in doing any of our travel, a Geneva ministerial will cost significantly less than a Hong Kong ministerial because we have the infrastructure of our office in Geneva. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. But just looking at probabilities, which is the 

way you are answering my question, just how risky is the exclusion? With what probability do you think you are going to have a 

ministerial in 2009? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. In 2009? 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. That is what this budget request is. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Right. I think there will be a ministerial. 

I suspect it will be on a smaller scale. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. But it is not requested in your budget request, right? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. We do not know that there will be a ministerial. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I understand. But you have not requested it? 

You have not requested funding for it, have you? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. That is correct. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Sorry. There is a number of risks as I went over. 

USTR has been in Beijing since 2007, but no capital security costs 

have yet been charged. 

Has the USTR been in contact with State Department about a 

possible range and do you have any idea how much these costs 

might be? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. We worked very closely with the State Department on this and to this point, we have not had to absorb a 

significant cost associated with this. I will continue to work with 

the State Department and the U.S. Embassy in Beijing to make 

sure that if they have to transfer those expenses to us that we are 

able to manage payment of those. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, as I understand it, we used to fund State 

Department. They are supposed to charge you. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. They are supposed to charge us $50,000 a 

person basically. We pay that. We have someone in Brussels and 

we pay that in Brussels. And so up to this point, we have not received a bill from the State Department. 

We do an awful lot of work with and for the State Department. 

They are in many ways an extension of our mission. We are an extension of theirs. So far, they have cut us a break. We are talking 

about three individuals that we have in U.S. Embassy Beijing. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you have any indication that you will or will 

not be charged in 2009 for the—— 

Ambassador SCHWAB. We do not have any, up to this point, we 

do have any indication. If we were charged in 2009, that would be 

an expense of approximately $150,000—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. 

Ambassador SCHWAB [continuing]. For the three individuals. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. But you have no communication one way or the 

other from State Department to give you an inkling of whether you 

are going to be charged in 2009? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. No, not to date. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Satisfy my curiosity. I read in the newspaper the other day that the Chinese are aggressively pursuing 

like 30 free trade agreements and they concluded one, I think recently, with New Zealand. I know we monitor those, but obviously 

our focus here is on the budget as well as policy. 

How do you match how we resource your people versus their negotiating teams? It seems to me you basically have had a sort of 

a budget freeze here for three years. 

Knowing the Chinese, it seems like if we have three people in 

Beijing, that is a paltry amount considering the size of their marketplace. And as you make clear in your testimony, you are not 

only about promoting free trade and opportunities, you are also 

there to make sure that those treaties are enforced. 

I would like to know what the literal impacts would be? Are you 

suggesting you are having a hiring freeze or your budget as submitted to us represents a hiring freeze? And given that, you would 

not have any ability to do anything more in Beijing in terms of 

adding people that you might need. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. That is correct. We could not under this 

budget ramp up our activities in Beijing. We do not as a matter 

of course throw quite as many numbers of individuals at negotiations as the Chinese do. But, again, we work very closely with 

other agencies, the Congress Department, Agriculture Department, 

State, and so on. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. ITA. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. ITA. All of these other agencies, we work 

very closely with them. 

No, we could not ramp up for a stronger presence in China. Our 

staff in China is almost exclusively an enforcement team. It is intellectual property rights. It is a team that supports our Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade activities, some of our strategic 

economic dialogue. 

And what we end up doing is we spend a great deal of time with 

the Chinese on problem solving. And it ranges from, you know, jaw 

boning at one end of our toolbox to filing cases and retaliating at 

the other end. 

And there we have much more engagement in terms of the 

Washington team of the General Counsel’s Office, our China shop, 

our IP shop. So there is a lot of backup in Washington. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. But with no more money for increases in 

your budget, there are going to be some pretty big impacts. Should 

we anticipate that you would have to implement a hiring freeze? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. It is not our expectation to implement a 

hiring freeze. I do—— 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. We gave you some help last year. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Right. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Up to 335, I believe. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Last year, what sustained us, in fact, in 

the last couple years—— 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Two thirty-five, yes. 

Ambassador SCHWAB [continuing]. Is the no-year carry-over, 

which, unfortunately, we will have exhausted by the end of this fiscal year. I do not see us imposing. I would hope we would not need 

to impose a formal hiring freeze. But as you know, what you end 

up doing is you end up running vacancies longer than you might 

otherwise want to run vacancies. You deploy, you have to deploy 

resources to your highest priorities. Obviously enforcement and 

particularly enforcement vis-a-vis china is a very high priority. 

Your point about free trade agreements, I think, is a worry for 

us because while we are not actively negotiating many free trade 

agreements at this point, there are hundreds of FTAs being negotiated around the world by our trading partners. And there are 

countries including China that are negotiating free trade agreements and regional trade agreements that could very well lock us 

out and disadvantage our workers, our farmers, and entrepreneurs. 

One of the reasons we are so anxious to move ahead with the 

three pending FTAs before the Congress, Colombia, Panama, and 

South Korea, you mentioned the geopolitical implications. The 

trade implications are just as profound because right now in the 

case of Colombia, they get virtually unlimited access to the U.S. 

market under preference programs that have been around since 

1991. And our guys are paying 35 percent tariffs on manufactured 

goods, 80 percent tariffs on farm goods, and this would level the 

playing field. 

I mean, so the Colombia agreement for every day that we are not 

passing it, it is our workers and our farmers and our entrepreneurs 

who are getting hurt, who are paying hundreds of thousands of dollars, indeed, you know, millions of dollars in tariffs. 

In the case of Panama, it is exactly the same. And in the case 

of the Korea FTA, that is as, you know, a large market with high 

trade barriers. We have low barriers in terms of what they ship to 

us. You both go to zero. You have got a lot of new market access. 

And those three together, you are talking about customers, over 

a hundred million new customers for U.S. exporters. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am highly supportive of all of what you 

are doing. I just want to make sure that there is a mandatory pay 

raise in here. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Yes, sir. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. How are you going to meet that mandatory 

pay raise? Is there going to be some sort of reduction on the FTE 

side of things? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Our current plan would be, and we did articulate the budget risks as the Chairman noted, our current plan 

would be that we can manage with the President’s request, that we 

would not expect to be cutting personnel, that we would need obviously to focus on our priorities, and there may be things that would 

slip in the process. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Can you provide, perhaps for the record, 

your fiscal year 2009 built-in costs associated with a 2.9 percent 

pay increase, pay raise in January 2009, and the cost of 

annualizing the three and a half percent pay raise in 2008? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I would be happy to provide that. 


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Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Somehow as we looked over some of your 

budget documents, it seemed to be lacking a little bit of a clarity 

in that regard. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I would be happy to provide that. 

[CLERKS NOTE.—The information was not submitted before the 

print deadline.] 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Culberson. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I also want to tell you how much I appreciate the work that you 

do. Of all of the different agencies of the Executive Branch, your 

work in particular is extraordinarily important to the U.S. job market. And I share my colleague, Mr. Frelinghuysen’s enthusiasm for 

free trade, but distressed to see once again, Mr. Chairman, the Administration’s priorities. 

As important as the Office of Trade Representative is, the White 

House continues to frankly short stick you and not give you enough 

money. And it is distressing to hear that you do not even have 

enough personnel to man the office in China sufficiently to be able 

to really engage them on a full range of issues that are important 

because the Chinese, our trade deficit with the Chinese is just 

awful. 

And I wanted to ask just a couple of quick things. Where are we 

negotiating free trade agreements and with who? You said we were 

not really working on many. What others are out there that you 

are working on? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. In terms of free trade agreement negotiations that are pending, there is an FTA with Malaysia that has 

been under negotiation where the negotiations have slowed of late, 

in part because the expiration of trade promotion authority and in 

part because their election and changing government as they sort 

themselves out. 

We have other negotiations on trade and investment framework 

agreements, bilateral investment treaties. Those are being negotiated or negotiations are being explored with a number of countries. 

We have recently entered a negotiation on the services, financial 

services and investment provisions associated with a group called 

the P4, which is a small Asian regional agreement that currently 

exists between Chile, Singapore, New Zealand, and Brunei. And we 

have got FTAs with two of the four. Because we are anxious not 

to be locked out of regional deals in the Asian market, joining the 

P4 at some point might be part of a way to integrate ourselves into 

Asia. 

So in terms of formal free trade agreements, there is very little 

under negotiation at the present time for a variety of reasons. 

However, we do have, as I said, TIFA negotiations, BIT negotiations going on and a lot of troubleshooting and individual market 

opening activities. 

EXPORT ISSUES

Mr. CULBERSON. And, finally, I just want to ask a very narrow 

question involving an employer in my district who manufactures 

forklifts who are upset that we export forklifts. Korea, China, othVerDate Aug 31 2005 00:38 Aug 03, 2008 Jkt 042708 PO 00000 Frm 00846 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A708P2.002 A708P2

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ers are hammering us with a big tariffs while we do not impose 

any. 

I want to ask specifically have you raised that? My office and 

others have contacted you. Have you raised that yet and will you, 

please, try to get that resolved? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. In the case of forklifts, in the case, we are 

aware that one of the principal benefits of the Colombia free trade 

agreement and the Korea free trade agreement will be the elimination of tariffs in both of those countries for U.S. forklift exports. 

And that will be of significant benefit to a variety of U.S. manufacturers of forklifts, earth-moving equipment, tractors, and so on. 

In the case of China, the Chinese tariff has been brought down 

through its accession to the WTO. I am not exactly sure where it 

is now, but I certainly will look into it. 

Our hope would be if we get a Doha round multilateral trade 

agreement, that will be a great venue, a great opportunity to reduce some of these tariffs. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Okay. But rather than just look into it, I am 

asking specifically will you raise it, please, with the Chinese? This 

is a really important issue and it is hammering our forklift manufacturers. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I will do so, absolutely. 

Mr. CULBERSON. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Schiff. 

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY ISSUES

Mr. SCHIFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Madam Ambassador, I want to ask you a number of questions 

about intellectual property issues which are very important to not 

only the country at large but certainly a great many of my constituents in Southern California. 

Along with several of my colleagues, I am co-sponsoring legislation called the PRO IP Act which you are probably familiar with. 

A number of proposals that I have made have been incorporated 

into the bill. 

I understand your office has raised some concerns with this legislation recently, and the inability to resolve some of those concerns 

has hindered the progress of the bill moving forward. 

One issue in particular, and I do not know if this is an issue that 

your office has expressed an opinion on, was based on recommendations from several GAO studies and a broad industry labor coalition. That would create a permanent high-level White House IP enforcement coordinator to ensure that the U.S. government approach 

for attacking IP theft was thoughtful and effective and consistent. 

Has your office taken a position on that provision? Are there 

other aspects of the legislation that you want to share your 

thoughts on? I think there is a markup anticipated in a couple 

weeks. I would like to work with you and your office to try to resolve any remaining issues you have over the bill. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Thank you, Congressman. And I commend 

you, as you know, I did last fall when you were there for the 

launch of the anti-counterfeiting trade agreement negotiations, for 


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all of your dedication and commitment on issues of piracy and IPR 

protection. 

USTR, as you know, has a very active set of IP related activities, 

including the cases that we have filed against China, the anti-counterfeiting trade agreement, and the very strong IP protections we 

negotiated into our free trade agreements. 

On the legislation that you mentioned, I am not in a position to 

comment on the legislation at this time. The Administration is 

pulling together its official position and I would very much welcome the opportunity to work with you and work with the Committee on the legislation. 

We would obviously be concerned by any legislation or any legislation that would call into question the responsibility for developing, coordinating, negotiating U.S. IP protections. 

I think we work very well with our fellow agencies as we developed the special 301 report, as we negotiate on these FTAs, as we 

decide to file cases. And it is a system that works. We stepped up 

the pace. 

And as I said, we would very much like to work with the Committee on those pieces of legislation that may work better than others. And you have my commitment to do so. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Thank you. I appreciate it. 

The thought is not to inhibit the work that you are doing, but 

rather you have a very broad portfolio of issues to be responsive 

to. I think it is the consensus of many in the industry and the Congress that it would be desirable to have someone at a very high 

level whose primary focus each and every day they get up is dealing with the IP problem and who is at a high enough level within 

the White House to actually effectuate changes necessary to deal 

with the problem. 

Let me give you one illustration of what we are confronting. You 

mentioned China. By some estimates, there are more than 225 million internet users in China and a majority of those are 

downloading and streaming music illegally. 

Two recent newspaper articles discussed a China-based internet 

company called Baidu, which offers illicit music downloading. They 

are basically a search engine, I guess like Google or whatnot, but 

one that also lets users listen to and search for songs free of 

charge. 

Roughly nine percent of their traffic comes from the MP3 search. 

This has helped make them China’s biggest search engine, accounting for nearly half of all the queries on the site. This is a company 

evidently that trades on U.S. markets via U.S. or American depository receipts. 

Can you tell us what USTR is doing to confront this company 

since they are in our market and yet they are becoming one of the 

major sources of the illegal IP downloading and theft in China? 

Has your office worked with other Executive Branch agencies regarding the company’s activities, particularly given that they trade 

in the U.S. markets? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. We are obviously well aware of the problems posed by Baidu and it showed up prominently last year in our 

annual special 301 report as one of the notorious markets that we 

highlighted. 


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And as you know, we used the special 301 report to set priority 

targets for the U.S. government, not just USTR, but U.S. government activity related to intellectual property rights violations in 

our trading partners. 

This is an issue that we have raised with the Chinese, in some 

ways is similar to a problem web site that we are aware of in Russia that we have made some progress on, in fact, and so the answer 

is, yes, we are working on that, doing that in conjunction with 

other agencies. And along with a lot of other IP challenges in 

China, this is very high on our priority list. 

Mr. SCHIFF. One of my staff was recently in China, and I participate in a parliamentary exchange with China where we continually 

raise the IP issue. During my staff member’s recent visit, he saw, 

not that it will surprise you, no diminution of the number of pirated goods in Chinese shops and markets. 

A store near the Forbidden City had a sign offering DVDs of ‘‘all 

of the 2008 Oscar winners’’ and the Hung Chow market in Beijing 

and New Gardens area of Shanghai were filled with counterfeit 

goods, including a virtually identical kiosk selling fake iPods. 

I think as we have seen in reference to the Olympics, it is not 

a matter of China’s capacity to deal with this problem. Where they 

have the will to do it, they do very well in dealing with expressions 

of any kind, let alone pirated music and film. 

We run an enormous trade deficit with China where we see that 

China has the capability and China cannot plausibly make the argument that they are powerless to deal with this problem. 

What more can we do? I know we filed the case with the WTO, 

which is good. Maybe you can share with us the status of that, but 

also what efforts we can do to make sure China understands we 

are serious about this and it is going to have trade repercussions. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Congressman, you are absolutely right 

about the degree of seriousness of the China IP problem. In the 

last couple years, close to 80 percent of the pirated and counterfeit 

items that have been seized at the border in the United States 

came from China. 

So it is a topic that is always at the top of our priority list when 

we are in China. I was there late last month, I mean, just three 

weeks ago and it was something that I raised with the new Vice 

Premier who is responsible for the trade and international economic portfolio and with the new Trade Minister. 

And the answer is we have a variety of tools that we have and 

will continue to use through, for example, the JCCT. We have 

reached an agreement in the past where the Chinese agreed that 

all computers produced in China would have preloaded operating 

software. It seems like a small thing. It had a dramatic impact in 

terms of the sale of the legitimate operating software. We understand that from U.S. software producers. That is one example of 

sort of a success in a problem-solving approach. 

Where we have not been able to get traction, get success in enforcement, and in the case of copyright heavy trade distribution, we 

now have two cases pending in the WTO, one on enforcement, one 

on market access related to copyrighted products, which is, you 

know, music, video, books, reading matter. 


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We do not like to go to litigation, but we will go to litigation. And 

the status of those cases is this fall, we would expect to have interim panel findings, early in the fall on the IP enforcement case, 

later on in the fall on the market access case. And we will continue 

to pursue those rigorously. 

Our objective, though, is to solve the problem, you know, and, 

therefore, whether it is through law enforcement, and I am sure 

you are aware last year the FBI and Chinese law enforcement authorities seized half a billion dollars in counterfeit software, there 

are various successes we can point to, but we know that it is not 

nearly enough. And, therefore, we continue to ramp up the pressure and ramp up the cooperation that we seek and often get from 

the Chinese authorities. 

We also believe that the Chinese authorities are capable of doing 

more in this area and we will continue to push. 

Mr. SCHIFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Aderholt. 

Mr. ADERHOLT. Thank you. 

Thank you, Ms. Ambassador, for being here. It is good to see you 

again and thanks for coming to the Subcommittee for your testimony. 

Of course, the issue that you and I have talked mostly about is, 

of course, the CAFTA issue of 2005. I know that was before you 

came on board, but you came along right on the heels of CAFTA 

passing. 

And as you are well aware, I supported CAFTA in 2005 after a 

lot of discussion, especially concerning the sock tariffs and either 

the phase-out will be gradually over ten years or be maintained indefinitely through a rule of change of origin. 

And, of course, both of those sort of have been derailed over the 

past couple of years. Of course, the sock tariffs disappeared when 

each country joined CAFTA, as you know, and the rule of origin 

was never changed. 

Back several months, and it may even have been close to a year 

ago, I think you were kind enough to come here and meet with 

Senators Shelby and Sessions and myself and two or three other 

members from other states including North Carolina and Wisconsin. And we talked about this issue. 

And at that time, you were talking about working to implement 

the tariff phase-out. And at the time, you seemed optimistic about 

that occurring. And I just wanted to touch base with you and see 

if you are still optimistic and what your thoughts are on that, if 

you could just share a little bit about that. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Thank you, Congressman Aderholt. I hope 

your soft sock producers have a sense of what an incredible advocate they have in you here in the Congress. You are right. This is 

sort of topic number one every time we get together and you have 

brought—I think I have learned more about socks than any USTR 

in the history of this organization. 

In the letter of July 2005 that my predecessor, Ambassador 

Portman, and Secretary Gutierrez sent to you, there were five provisions, as you know. And we believe that we have been able to deliver in whole or in part on at least four of them. 


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We have been less successful in terms of modifying the phaseout, tariff phase-out. But in some ways, the negotiation is being 

overtaken by the safeguard action, as you know. And we would expect shortly to see the imposition of safeguard on Honduran socks. 

Also, you are aware that the special China textile safeguard that 

was renewed expires at the end of this year. That was also part 

of the commitment. And our chief textile negotiator, Scott 

Quesenberry, continues to pursue the other elements in that commitment. 

So we have succeeded, as I said, we have succeeded in, we believe, delivering in whole or in part on at least four of the five. And 

on the last item, the crackdown of transshipment from Asia is an 

ongoing challenge. But, again, we have made some progress there 

too. 

Mr. ADERHOLT. The concern with the transshipment issue is, do 

you have the funding available so Commerce is able to do that? I 

know that is probably more Commerce than your office in particular, but I am sure they give you reports and probably keep you 

posted on that, or do you feel confident that they are, you know, 

having the funding to do what they need to do with that? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. This is a good example where we work 

very closely with other agencies to accomplish objectives. Commerce being one. And in this case, obviously Customs and Border 

Patrol being the lead on this kind of addressing transshipment. 

But I will give an example of one of USTR’s activities there. We 

have signed transshipment prevention MOUs with several countries in Asia designed specifically to make sure that those countries 

do not become vehicles for the transshipment of textile products. 

Indonesia. Scott is not here. Indonesia, the Philippines, others, 

these are countries where we have been concerned about transshipments in the past and have specifically addressed them in dialogue with these countries. 

Mr. ADERHOLT. Well, I know that has been the issue with my 

folks as well. Of course, even with the textiles. But one thing I 

would like to do is if you could get with the negotiator. You talked 

about the chief negotiator, Quesenberry. If we could get maybe an 

update from him at some point. If he could give us an update of 

how those negotiations are going and let us know. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Absolutely. 

Mr. ADERHOLT. As you mentioned, he is working on that. So that 

would be very helpful so we could have an update to know how 

those negotiations are in process. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Absolutely, Congressman. Happy to do 

that. 

[CLERKS NOTE.—The information was not submitted for the 

record before the print deadline.] 

Mr. ADERHOLT. Okay. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Ruppersberger. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Ambassador Schwab, now where were you 

before your current position? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I was at the University of Maryland. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Oh, so you are a Terp. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I am. I am Terp. 


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Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Well, I am from Maryland, too, so I just 

had to get that in. Okay. That does not mean that I am going to 

be easy on you now. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I understand, sir. Go Terps. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. All right. You said in your statement or 

opening statement, I was not here, I did not read it, I am not sure 

if you read it or not, about having trade agreements are really 

pointless unless you have enforcement. 

And what is the Administration’s total budget request for your 

office and how much of that budget is related to enforcement, what 

percentage? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. The fiscal year 2009 request is 46.3 million. And it would be very hard to differentiate between those who 

are involved in enforcement and those who are not involved in enforcement in the agency. 

Enforcement activities really are throughout the agency, Office of 

General Counsel being the most obvious, but also our Intellectual 

Property Rights Office. Our China office spends, I would say, the 

bulk of its FTE’s on enforcement issues. Similarly, in some of our 

services shop on financial services, on other services issues. 

So even those folks who are out there negotiating trade agreements frequently are addressing, you know, trying to work through 

some of the trade barriers that we see as enforcement issues in the 

context of negotiations. You try to settle disputes sometimes. 

So I would not actually, we have never done assessment because 

it is really—— 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Well, let us get to what I am really getting 

to is not the issue of enforcement is important. I mean, you have 

made that statement. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Absolutely. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. It seems to me that the budget that you 

have here, there is not enough money in there for enforcement. 

Now, I know you have to protect the President’s budget. 

But do you feel that you will need more money in order to effectively deal with the issue of enforcement, because that was a 

strong statement you made? Really trade agreements are pointless 

if you do not have enforcement. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. USTR and I would say the Administration 

and a lot of the folks we work with in the Administration and other 

agencies, we feel very, very strongly about enforcement. You have 

to have enforcement for these agreements to be credible. And we 

think we do a good job of enforcing them. 

One of the challenges that we have had is as you increase the 

number of trade agreements, whether it is multilateral trade agreements or going from three free trade agreements to seventeen free 

trade agreements, that obviously increases dramatically the kind of 

monitoring and enforcement that you need to do. 

And particularly in areas such as labor protections and environmental protections that we have built in to the most recent free 

trade agreements, we will make certain that we allocate within 

USTR, within our budget whatever we need to meet our enforcement, mandated enforcement obligations. 


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As I noted in my oral testimony, we know that we can manage 

within the President’s budget request. We also know that if that 

amount is cut at all, we are in trouble. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Are you familiar with ITAR? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Yes. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. And the State Department basically manages the approvals of the sensitive technology sales. I am on the 

Intelligence Committee. I deal a lot in the area and information 

that has come to us is that we have some serious issues with ITAR. 

I think the entire industry has a problem with ITAR. 

And really ITAR was really created to protect sensitive technology so that it did not go to other countries, probably China and 

others. But now it seems that, especially in the European countries, that ITAR is a hindrance not only to our manufacturers and 

our companies here in the United States, but it can be a hindrance 

to our national security because literally people are marketing 

products in Europe as ‘‘ITAR free’’, which means that they are trying to come up with our type of technology to sell it or for components in Europe. And I think it is something that has to be dealt 

with. 

Now, what jurisdiction would you have there? What is your opinion of ITAR? What do you think we need to do? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. USTR has no role in ITAR. I am familiar 

with it. It is one of those areas where like the Administration of 

the anti-dumping and counter-veiling duty laws or export promotion, you know, formal export promotion, ITAR, these are areas 

that we are not directly involved in. 

We do hear from governments that our export control policies, I 

mean, we hear from industry and we feed that into the State Department, Commerce Department, Defense Department process. 

We are on the CFIUS Group. I mean, so on that, we are part of 

CFIUS, that Committee, but on ITAR, I would be happy to pass 

along your thoughts on that to the agencies with jurisdiction. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Because you have such a great background 

and great educational background and coming from a great school, 

do you have any suggestions on, from your point of view and what 

you know now in your job, on how we can really aggressively pursue this issue because it is getting to the point that it really could 

hurt our country? Any ideas? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. When I used to teach this in graduate 

school at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy where 

I was Dean, I used to talk about the balance that is necessary. I 

mean, clearly priority one has to be our national security interests. 

But having a healthy economy and vibrant technology growth and 

development and exports are key to our economy. 

One of the things I mentioned earlier in my testimony is that 

even with some bumpiness in our economy today, one of the bright 

spots is exports and we need to be opening markets for U.S. exports with 40 percent of U.S. economic growth last year attributable to our exports, our export growth. 

And so when it comes to export controls, you need to strike the 

balance. You do want to ensure that you are not letting technologies fall into the wrong hands that could come back and jeopVerDate Aug 31 2005 00:38 Aug 03, 2008 Jkt 042708 PO 00000 Frm 00853 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A708P2.002 A708P2

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ardize our national security but at the same time, you do not want 

to be in a position of shooting yourself in the foot. 

So it is that balance, I think, that is important. And I know that 

the agencies that administer ITAR, State and others most directly 

involved are aware of the importance of that balance. It is also 

sometimes a balance that is hard to strike, as you know. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Okay. I am going to throw you one softball 

and that is the last question. Do you have an opinion or why do 

you feel that the trade agreement with Colombia is so important? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I believe the trade agreement—thank you 

for the question—with Colombia is incredibly important for a variety of reasons. First and foremost, going to the economic issue, the 

U.S. workers, U.S. farmers, service providers are as dependent, 

more dependent than ever before on exports. 

And what the Colombia FTA does is takes a one-way free trade 

situation where 92 percent of what Colombia ships to us comes in 

duty free and makes it a two-way trade relationship. It eliminates 

the unfairness that our workers, our farmers face with tariffs up 

to 35 percent in industrial goods, up to and above 80 percent in agricultural goods. And 80 percent of the tariffs on industrial and 

commercial goods in Colombia would be eliminated on the first day 

of entering into force of this agreement. So first and foremost, our 

economic commercial interests. U.S. jobs really are what we are 

talking about and the advancement of U.S. jobs. 

National security, you are on the Intelligence Committee and 

probably know more than I do about how critically important Colombia is as an ally in a region that is a troubled region at times 

and that Colombia represents a pro Democracy, pro markets, and 

pro U.S. country that has made incredible strides in terms of their 

own progression to more safety, more security. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Especially under the leadership with Uribe. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Particularly under the leadership of Uribe. 

And that really gets to the third point which is whether the issue 

is violence in Colombia or narco-trafficking. Since 2002, there has 

been such a dramatic improvement in the level of violence, in the 

level of impunity. 

And we believe that the free trade agreement will enable those 

trend lines, those really positive trend lines to continue and that 

a delay or a voting down of this free trade agreement really risks 

the progress that has been made. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Do you negotiate or do you communicate 

with labor? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. All the time. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. And what is labor’s position and how would 

you answer to labor’s position? What is their issue as far as this 

agreement? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Well, first, as you know, organized labor in 

the United States as a general matter just opposes trade agreements and I think this has been a really hard agreement for them 

to oppose because it takes one-way free trade and turns it into twoway free trade, and so the job benefits are very clearly going to accrue to the United States and the stability benefits to Colombia. 

Organized labor, the labor leaders I have spoken with have expressed concern about violence toward trade unionists in Colombia 


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and that has been a problem and has been a very severe problem 

in the past. As you know, the level of violence against journalists, 

against legislators, against jurists, there are certain groups in that 

country that have been targeted in the past. 

What I think organized labor or labor opponents to this agreement miss is, one, the incredible improvements in the level of violence, the safety and security that President Uribe has brought to 

that country with a 40 percent decline in the murder rate, an 80 

percent decline, I might add, in the murder rate as it involves 

trade unionists, a dramatic decline, over 80 percent decline in kidnapping, over 75 percent decline in terrorist attacks. 

And so from our perspective, if you look at how Uribe has done 

this, he has set up special protections for union members and others and he has demobilized 40,000 paramilitaries and other guerillas into the broader economy. And for that, the current trade 

preferences and the free trade agreement are absolutely critical to 

keep those individuals out of violent pursuits and moved into the 

legitimate economy. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. One more question. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Sure. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. How would not only organized labor, but 

especially blue collar workers in the United States benefit from this 

free trade agreement. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Very clear benefits to American workers, 

American workers and American farmers because the Colombia 

market has 44 million customers. Right now Colombian products 

are coming into the United States duty free and U.S. products are 

facing, U.S. exports are facing high barriers in Colombia. 

This agreement eliminates every single one of those barriers to 

U.S. exports to Colombia which means that the increase in U.S. exports to Colombia that we have already seen would go up dramatically. And we have seen this when we talk to Caterpillar or John 

Deere or laptop computer producers, Sony television producers 

making Sony televisions outside of Pittsburgh. 

These are all companies that have told us they would expect— 

Whirlpool is another one—they would expect to be able to increase 

their exports and, therefore, have a positive impact on their workforce from this agreement. 

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Okay. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Madam Secretary, following up on Mr. 

Ruppersberger’s line of questioning, in your testimony, you state 

that these agreements, free trade agreements have been an enormous gain for U.S. farmers, workers, entrepreneurs, and consumers. U.S. exports to the 14 countries with which we have free 

trade agreements that have entered into force have grown over 40 

percent faster than U.S. exports to the rest of the world. 

Would you acknowledge that there have been winners and losers 

in this process and when we are talking about workers, there have 

been substantial losers in sectors, particularly the manufacturing 

sectors, and our economy? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. It is correct that there are individuals and 

individual companies and communities that have been negatively 

impacted by—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What about whole industries? 


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Ambassador SCHWAB. There have been industries negatively impacted by trade, but I think when we are looking at the churn in 

the economy, we need to take into account technological advancements, need to take into account productivity enhancements. 

And trade ends up, when you sort of go through the list of 

changes that affect jobs and the economy, trade and trade agreements ends up being a minute part of it, but it is a part of it and, 

therefore, programs like Trade Adjustment Assistance have become 

incredibly important for us to be able to—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Programs like Trade Adjustment Assistance are 

inadequate. And I would suggest that if you would acknowledge the 

significant and severe impacts, industry eliminating impacts of 

trade agreements and then address the fundamental causes of that, 

you would advance your cause in getting and acquiring additional 

support for trade agreements. 

I represent an area that is highly dependent on basic manufacturing generally, but principally steel of late, and there have been 

a lot of industries that have gone by the wayside preceding steel. 

In the Mon Valley, steel industry is gone many, many years ago. 

In the High Valley, it is now atrophying to the point of nonviability 

in certain communities. 

So when you talk about the benefits on the one hand, I think you 

have to, on the other hand acknowledge the extremely negative impacts that trade agreements have caused on sectors of the economy 

and large geographic areas in the United States. I mean, it is there 

before us. 

And the concern expressed by those who have been defending the 

interests of these sectors need to be taken seriously and need to be 

incorporated in these trade agreements if you are going to broaden 

the support that you have for the agreements. 

So with that in mind, what types of products and which sectors 

benefit the most from these agreements? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Actually, these agreements benefit sectors 

across the board when we look at manufacturing. U.S. manufacturing exports, for example, have increased over 128 percent since 

the Uruguay round was negotiated in the 1990s. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. To what extent is that sector specific and what 

sectors have been benefitted? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. It is almost across the board. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I want you to detail, if you will. Give me some 

examples of—— 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Sure. Okay. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN [continuing]. Sectors that have been benefited. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Happy to do that. Happy to do that. 

Agri-business, earth-moving equipment, tractors, autos, auto 

parts, electronics, a lot of industrial goods. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. So the automobile industry, you would suggest 

has been benefited by trade agreements? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. The auto sector has, in fact, been benefited 

by trade agreements. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What about the steel industry? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Parts of the steel industry have benefited 

from trade agreements. Parts of the steel industry have had a 

harder time adjusting to it. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. On balance, how do you measure how that nets 

out? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Well, if you look, you ask—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Do you measure? Do you measure how that nets 

out and do you—— 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Well, we have a group of economists and 

it is hard to measure the impact of trade because, for example, U.S. 

manufacturing output in this country is higher today than it has 

ever been before in our history. I mean, U.S. manufacturing output 

goes up. U.S. manufacturing employment has not gone up. 

And, therefore, the key question, and I think this really goes to 

your fundamental question, when we look at trade in the economy, 

we need to make certain that we have in place the environment 

within which American workers can remain competitive in an economy where there is constant churn and this has to do with education and it has to do with education and skills. It has to do with 

portability of pensions. It has to do with healthcare. It has to do 

with a variety of things. 

In terms of a specific way to help individuals, Trade Adjustment 

Assistance is a more narrowly drawn approach which has, as you 

know, health benefit components and wage insurance components. 

In terms of beneficiaries and the U.S. economy from these agreements, we are looking today at over a $100 billion surplus in trade 

and services, for example, and these include high skill. These are 

high-skill services. They are engineering services, architectural 

services, legal services, that kind of thing. 

In agriculture, one out of three is produced for export in this 

country. So, again, exports has a measurable impact on farm income. And in certain sectors, beef, poultry, pork, you are talking 

about in some cases half of everything that we produce is being 

produced for export. 

In the Colombia agreement, the tariff, the Colombian tariff on 

high-quality beef which is currently 80 percent goes to zero immediately upon entering into force. For an industry sector that is now 

facing higher input prices, that is very, very important. 

But on the manufacturing side, recognizing that obviously West 

Virginia has a large manufacturing base, industrial and consumer 

goods almost across the board benefit from this trade agreement. 

I would be happy to get you a list and we have, I believe, we 

have state-specific information sheets about benefits for each of the 

trade agreements and would be happy to provide that specific information to you. 

[CLERK’S NOTE.—The information was not submitted before the 

print deadline] 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. And do you have sheets also that show the cost 

in terms of economic dislocation for those same areas? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Honestly, in the case of the Colombia free 

trade agreement, because—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. For whatever you have the benefit list, do you 

have a detriment list? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. The answer is yes. In the case of the Colombia and Panama free trade agreements, because both countries 

have had unlimited access to the U.S. market, virtually unlimited 


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since 1991 or so, we would not expect much of an increase in imports. 

In fact, the difference between the 92 percent of duty free treatment that they get now and what they are likely to get, there is 

a 50,000 metric ton increase in sugar imports, for example. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, let me just say that the reality that the 

world is increasingly becoming a smaller economic community and 

that that is a good thing is acknowledged, I think, broadly. 

The fact that this has happened in a very precipitous way and 

that as we have negotiated these trade agreements, we have not 

taken into consideration the adverse consequences of throwing high 

standard of living populations, manufacturing populations specifically, against low standard of living manufacturing populations is 

a reality and has had devastating effects. 

Throw in those disparate standard of living populations today, 

doing it in a very short period of time without, in these trade 

agreements, negotiating the provisions that would at least in part 

level the playing field, stretching out the agreements over time, requiring these countries to begin the process of adopting environmental regulatory activity comparable to ours, workplace health 

and safety requirements comparable to ours and the rights of collective bargaining which we should embrace and promote around 

the world, our trade agreements have not incorporated these provisions that do create, along with the standard of living disparities, 

do create a very unlevel playing field. 

And I think if we are going to aspire to the Adam Smith principle that the natural advantages of different areas to different sectors of the economy ought to be allowed to work their selves out 

so that we have the cheapest goods and services provided to everyone and now around the world, then we have to address the artificial disparities that are created by government activity and regulatory enforcement. And that has not been done in trade agreements typically up to this point. 

So my question is, with regard to the Colombia free trade agreement, I am giving you an opportunity to speak to that, to what extent are you negotiating in the Colombia free trade agreement 

these level playing field labor standards: right to organize, environmental requirements, beginning the process of complying at least 

equally to our standards, and to workplace health and safety requirements which all cost our manufacturing a lot of money and, 

because they are not incorporated into the manufacturing practices 

of many of our competitors, do not cost them and, therefore, in and 

of themselves create the disparities which result in the dislocation 

of a lot of jobs from the United State to these foreign competitors? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I appreciate what you are saying, Mr. 

Chairman. And I think some of the issues that you have raised including the question that Congressman Ruppersberger raised are, 

in fact, addressed in a very unique and very powerful way in—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Which ones and what are they specifically? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. As you know, last May, we reached a bipartisan agreement, the Administration with the leadership here, 

to include in these free trade agreements enforceable labor and environmental provisions. 


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So in the case of the labor provisions, what we are talking about 

is the 1998 declaration of fundamental worker principles and so 

our worker standards and there are five. One is the right to, let 

me make sure I get these right, right to organize, right to bargain 

collectively, the end of forced labor, the end of child labor, and nondiscrimination. 

So those are in there along with a requirement that both countries, along with a requirement that Colombia enforce its own labor 

standards which are strong labor standards. 

And what we have done for the first time with this level of specificity is made these as enforceable as the commercial elements of 

the trade agreement, so as enforceable as and subject to the same 

challenges, dispute resolution, and remedy as the intellectual property rights provisions. 

The environmental standards are similar in approach and I know 

those also have been cited as adding to cost of production in the 

United States. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Let us take the environmental standards. What 

environmental standards have been incorporated into the agreement? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. There are two sets of environmental standards incorporated. One is again that Colombia’s domestic environmental laws be fully enforced. As you know, many of these countries have labor or environmental standards that are as strong as 

ours. They just are not necessarily enforced. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Are you suggesting that Colombia does have environmental standards as strong as ours and they have labor 

standards as strong as ours? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. My understanding, and I can get back to 

you with the specifics if you need a specific comparison, but my understanding is that Colombia does have on the books strong labor 

and environmental protections. 

The other environmental, again, the new environmental component in this free trade agreement, the Colombia free trade agreement is the addition of a number of multilateral environmental 

agreements and making those enforceable. 

For example, the Endangered Species Act where both the United 

States and Colombia are signatories of the Marine Protection 

Agreement. Those are examples of multilateral environmental 

agreements where Colombia is a signatory. The U.S. is a signatory. 

And we are agreeing through this FTA to mutually enforce our 

participation in those agreements because frequently these are 

multilateral agreements that sometimes have teeth and sometimes 

do not have teeth. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, you may not know the answer to this, but 

my question was, does Colombia have a standard or standards in 

the area of labor and environmental principles that are comparable 

to those standards which manufacturers in the United States of 

America have to comply with? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. In large measure, my understanding is 

that they do. There are going to be differences, for example, in 

terms of minimum wage and so on. But if I may get back to you 

with a specific response. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. Certainly. If we had representatives of the environmental community and the labor community sitting at this 

table asking that same question, would they agree with that answer, do you think? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I would hope so. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, do you know? I mean, you work with this 

every day. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I do not. I do not know the specifics and 

I will—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, what are they saying to you? When environmentalists and labor, representatives of the labor community 

input this issue, what are they saying in this regard? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Well—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Surely they are and surely you are listening to 

them. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Oh, yes. Absolutely. In fact, we have as 

part of our statutory mandate and responsibilities, we have an Environmental Committee that advises us. And we have a Labor 

Committee that advise us. And—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. My question is, are they agreeing with your assessment which you have just given us here? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. If you look at the reports that the Environmental Committee and the Labor Committee have provided on 

these trade agreements, because they have to provide recommendations on these trade agreements, in the case of the labor group, 

they have not been supportive of this or, quite frankly, any other 

trade agreement that our office has ever negotiated. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well—— 

Ambassador SCHWAB. In the case of the environmental group, it 

is as uneven. It depends on which of the participants. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. So you have given us very positive 

thoughts about the quality of the environmental standards and the 

labor standards which are in effect in Colombia vis-a-vis the 

United States, but you also acknowledge that there is a lot of opposition from the respective communities, the labor and environmental communities about that. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Those communities were involved in—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. They are not totally satisfied—— 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Negotiation. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. They do not see it as positively as you see it. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. We believe that the provisions, the labor 

and environmental provisions in these agreements that we worked 

out with congressional leadership, the Ways and Means leadership 

and the House leadership, Senate Finance Committee leadership, 

go a long way to meet the objections. 

In fact, I would note that if you look at the positions that labor 

representatives have taken on trade agreements in general over 

the last several years, the last ten years, what they have advocated 

formally on the record be included in these free trade agreements, 

we did that and more in terms of the Colombia free trade agreement and others. And, quite frankly, the goal posts have moved. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, and that was the point of my question before. You are giving us a very positive assessment of that. And my 

question was, would they be expressing the same opinion if they 


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were sitting here based upon the input you are receiving from them 

on a daily basis as you process their input? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I suspect not, but you would need to ask 

them. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, it is fair. Of course we will. But it is fair 

for you to have your opinion. I was just asking to what extent you 

acknowledge that they would have a different opinion. 

Mr. Frelinghuysen. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And following up on the Chairman’s comments and Mr. 

Ruppersberger, I think big labor is opposed to this agreement and 

I think, as you said in your earlier testimony, just about all the 

other free trade agreements. 

There is a public perception that the Administration and the 

USTR has not come to the table to address these sort of labor and 

environmental and workplace condition issues, but in reality, to 

add emphasis here, that has been done. Now there seems to be sort 

of another barrier, shall we characterize it as a political barrier, 

which is perhaps made even more difficult because you have everybody running for President and trying to appeal to their base. 

But you have substantially addressed as you have the trade 

issues a lot of these hot-button issues with the leadership. I think 

that is somewhat not so subtly referred to in the transmission letter that both Secretary Paulsen and Condoleezza Rice have sent to 

Speaker Pelosi on Monday. 

I want to focus on a paragraph in that transmittal and let me 

quote it. One of the benefits of travel, and it was bipartisan travel, 

is to go to Meta and to Cartagena where literally six years ago, it 

would be a place where few Colombians could live in safety without 

the potential of being killed, where kidnapings were rife, where the 

drug lords ran the place. It was no place for foreigners. 

In the transmittal letter and I quote, ‘‘We take very seriously the 

importance of timely and effective solutions to concerns regarding 

labor violence and impunity. The government of Colombia has engaged actively to address these concerns. We have already seen 

concrete evidence of sustained results. Since 2002, kidnapings are 

down 83 percent. Homicides are down 40 percent,’’ which you mentioned in an earlier response, ‘‘and terrorist attacks are down 70 

percent. Homicides of trade unionists declined by over 79 percent 

between 2002 and 2007. Meanwhile the number of trade unionists 

enrolled in the Ministry of Interior Injustices Protection Program 

has increased with more than 9,400 individuals, one-fifth of whom 

are trade unionists taking advantage of this protection.’’ 

My view is, and we discussed this among our congressional colleagues on the trip and on our way back, is a lot of what big labor 

is operating on is old news. There are horrific things that happen. 

I assume you would agree and I would like your comments. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. You are absolutely right, Congressman, 

that one of the challenges that we have in selling the Colombia free 

trade agreement is perceptions that are obsolete. And the tremendous progress that has been made in the decline of violence and 

impunity since 2002, very, very significant. 

And we believe that those remaining concerns, and Colombia 

continues to be a violent country and we do not imply otherwise, 


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that those remaining concerns are best addressed, and these are 

concerns of American workers and concerns of Colombian workers, 

really are best addressed by enacting and implementing this free 

trade agreement, that delaying the free trade agreement or stopping the free trade agreement is not going to save a trade unionist 

in Colombia, is not going to create a U.S. job, is not going to save 

an endangered species. 

And so we believe very strongly that the free trade agreement actually contributes to solidifying, locking in the tremendous progress 

articulated in that letter, solidifying that and putting it on an even, 

stronger trend line going forward. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, we met with the Colombian Attorney 

General. We met with a variety of prosecutors, some members of 

the Judiciary, and prosecutions are up. And, of course, I asked the 

question, which hopefully was not viewed as an irritant, in a bipartisan way, since the days of former President Clinton, we have substantially invested in what is called Plan—— 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Plan Colombia. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN [continuing]. Colombia. I mean, of all the 

countries in the hemisphere, Colombia has been the beneficiary, 

and you would agree, I assume, that we have seen substantial results. We have operatives there from the Drug Enforcement Agency, the FBI, and the ATF. The Department of Justice has basically 

been a leading agent, not forgetting we respect their sovereignty, 

in setting up and promoting the rule of law. 

There has been a sea change. While there are obviously incidents 

of violence and the history of paramilitary operations and guerillas 

doing what they did, people are ever mindful that there has been 

some major progress. I assume you would agree? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Congressman Frelinghuysen, I agree absolutely. And I would note just as one example the peace and justice 

law that was passed in 2004 which has facilitated the demobilization. 

It also changed their approach to prosecuting from one inquisitorial system to an accusatory system which has helped them to 

move through the pipeline of outstanding cases. 

And, of course, as you have 30, 40,000 combatants demobilized, 

they are, as part of the demobilization, they are presenting evidence and disclosing information about things, bad things that happened which add to the number of cases that the prosecutors need 

to address. 

And this transformation to an accusatory system means that 

they are able to move cases through the Judiciary in three months 

instead of five or eight or nine years. 

And so that again has been just a dramatic transformation that, 

for example, in my conversation a couple weeks ago with the Mexican Attorney General and they are looking at, you know, the challenge of narco-trafficking in Mexico, they are looking at that peace 

and justice law as a potential model to help them move more cases 

more rapidly through their judicial systems. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Talk for a minute about trade agreements 

with other countries in this neighborhood here. You know, the 

focus is on Colombia and they have been singularly our greatest 


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ally in support of, and it is a nasty neighborhood to say the least, 

Hugo Chavez and bullies like him. 

What have we done in terms of preferences and trade agreements with countries in the neighborhood that have been willing 

to negotiate with us, that would somewhat lead to Colombians 

being bereft. I mean, in other words, we would actually weaken the 

one ally that we have there. 

Paint a picture as to what is occurring in this hemisphere and 

how important Colombia is in the overall security picture. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I think there are two elements here that 

bear looking at. One, I think was best articulated by Alan Garcia, 

President of Peru, when the President signed the free trade agreement implementing legislation late last fall. And he made the point 

if you look at this region, there are basically two groups of countries in this region. 

You have got the pro Democracy, pro markets, generally pro U.S. 

group, Chile, Peru, Mexico, Colombia, and then you have got the 

anti markets, anti Democracy, anti U.S. group, Venezuela, Cuba, 

Bolivia, and others, and that within the near term, countries are 

going to—Latin America is going to go one way or the other. 

I mean, there is one path. There is sort of the populist anti 

Democratic path and there is the path that is Democracy and freedom and economic freedom and turning away from isolationism 

whether it is political or economic. So you have got those paths and 

that is the geopolitics. 

The second area, and this was the one that Colombia articulated 

very clearly when we were down there this weekend, is they are 

saying, look, you have got a free trade agreement with Mexico, you 

have got a free trade agreement with Chile, you have got a free 

trade agreement with Peru, with the CAFTA countries, you would 

be putting Colombia at a disadvantage relative to other countries 

in the region if we were to deny or to delay the Colombia FTA. 

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. It would be inexcusable, it may happen, 

that we would not act on this. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, there might not be an excuse, but there 

might be some reasons. With respect to the Colombia free trade 

agreement, what would be the benefit to Colombia to enter into 

this agreement if, as you have suggested here, and it has been suggested, if Colombia already enjoys duty free status on most of what 

it exports to the United States? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Very good question and one that you can 

imagine I get asked frequently because it seems so obvious that 

this would benefit U.S. workers and U.S. farmers and service providers and why if Colombia has had 17 years worth of preferences 

would they want to open their market that way. 

One, their own economic philosophy and, as I noted, their ability 

to continue migrating people from paramilitaries into the legitimate economy, from narcotics into the legitimate economy. So that 

is one. 

What this brings for Colombia in addition to some additional exports like—— 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. How does that work? I am sorry. Explain that. 

How does migrating them from the illegal to the legal part of the 

economy, how does a free trade agreement affect that? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. It is the combination of the preferences up 

to this point and then locking it in and expanding it. So, for example, the stability that comes with knowing this access to the U.S. 

market is permanent will generate investment and it will generate 

investment from Colombian entrepreneurs. It will generate, as we 

have seen it with the Peru FTA, for example, they saw new investment from Brazilian businesses, from businesses in Spain, from 

businesses in Mexico. Their own entrepreneurs invested more 

there. 

And so what they see is investment in, for example, more flower 

farms, they ship a lot of flowers to us, significant amounts of our 

cut flowers, coffee. Again, if you are not sure and you look at the 

trade preferences we have had to extend, the Congress has voted 

to extend those trade preferences twice in the last 18 months. 

If you have that kind of uncertainty, you are not generally going 

to put in the kind of long-term investment that you need to build 

your employment base. 

And so President Uribe has been able to turn around that economy. That economy has experienced in the past negative growth. 

Since he has been in office, they have enjoyed an average of six 

percent growth. Unless you have that kind of growth, it is impossible to move people from, you know, growing coca into growing 

other products, you know, flowers as I said, coffee as I mentioned. 

It is also not likely that you will see the combatants, the demobilized combatants having the ability to move into new jobs being 

created. 

And in part honestly, Colombia sees this agreement as a way of 

helping them and we should see it as a way of helping ourselves 

compete with China and third countries because by giving each 

other preferential status, Colombia products, for example, will be 

better able to compete with Chinese products coming into this market. We will better be able to compete for Colombia consumers than 

our Chinese counterparts. 

So to give you a sense of the multiplier effect of this FTA. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, obviously it is a cost benefit analysis and 

you have done that. And you have just suggested some reasons why 

Colombia would benefit from the agreement, an expansion of their 

economy. 

On the other side, surely you have done an assessment of what 

sectors of our economy would benefit and you have suggested some 

of that. 

Have you at the same time done an assessment of what sectors 

of our economy would be hurt and could you talk about that for us? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Sure. And let me—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I just need to round this out, and I understand 

there are going to be some sectors that are benefited. And you are 

advocating that overall to be positive. And I am just asking what 

sectors would not benefit, what sectors might be injured in the 

process. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. And, Mr. Chairman, I have been remiss in 

not having mentioned the International Trade Commission report 


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that is required for every single one of these free trade agreements. 

So for every one of these free trade agreements, the ITC does a 

very detailed analytic study about the impact on the U.S. economy, 

so exactly what you are describing including sector-specific impact. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Give us some examples of sectors. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. In the case of the Colombia FTA, we do not 

expect there to be any negative impact in terms of the import side 

simply because our market is already open to Colombian imports. 

Now, as I said, there is a little bit of an impact in textiles and 

apparel. That industry is supportive. There is a little bit of an impact in sugar. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. But what kind of an impact? I mean, when your 

testimony is on the record and you say there is a little bit of an 

impact, that could be a positive impact. That could be a negative 

impact. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I see. Okay. I would—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. What is your testimony here? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Let me suggest that what I need to do is 

to provide for this Committee and the record the ITC report. Let 

me do that. 

[CLERKS NOTE.—The entire report was submitted for the record 

and is retained in committee files] 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Okay. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. And since I do not have it in front of me, 

as I recall from that report, there could be some modest increase 

in imports of textiles and apparel products. We know that that industry is supportive of this agreement, but there could be some 

modest increase in imports. So it is not necessarily a negative, but 

describing that. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. When you say the industry—— 

Ambassador SCHWAB. In the case of sugar—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Excuse me. When you say the industry, the textile industry is supportive, is that the manufacturing part of the industry? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Correct. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Is that the owner? What about the labor part of 

that industry? Are they supportive as well? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I do not know. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Well, you should know. I mean, that to me 

is—— 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I mean, presumably—— 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Presumably what? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. I am assuming that the labor part of that 

industry’s position is reflected in the Labor Advisory Committee report that we received on the Colombia FTA which is not favorable 

to the FTA. 

You know, quite frankly, when we negotiate these agreements, 

we are very, very conscious of the impact on U.S. workers. And in 

the case of the Colombia FTA, it is an overwhelmingly favorable 

impact on U.S. workers. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. I did not mean to spend so much time on that. 

In the steel sector, the USTR worked with the organization of 

Economic Cooperation and Development, the Steel Committee, the 

North American Steel Trade Committee, and WTO accession negoVerDate Aug 31 2005 00:38 Aug 03, 2008 Jkt 042708 PO 00000 Frm 00865 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A708P2.002 A708P2

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tiations and with countries bilaterally to focus on steel capacity 

worldwide and subsidy and other marketing distortions. 

The JCCT steel dialogue was launched on March the 4th, 2005. 

A follow-on meeting was scheduled for late 2006 with industry participants. 

Please describe the ongoing work affecting the steel sector. What 

accomplishments, if any, have been achieved? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. In terms of the steel sector, clearly there 

are challenges associated with global capacity and with increases 

in construction, a lot of that, and economic growth that we have 

seen worldwide, a lot of that has been absorbed. 

We have been concerned, as you know, with overproduction and 

overcapacity in China and this has been an area where the JCCT 

working group has been very actively engaged. It is also an area 

where I have been personally engaged. 

And in the first meeting of the strategic economic dialogue in December of 2006, I used the steel industry in China as a case study 

for the problems in China’s economic industrial policy where they 

have made sort of an incomplete transition to market economics. 

And they got overcapacity in steel. 

They have addressed it, and this is in part due to our dialogue, 

in part due to the working group. They have eliminated a lot of 

their export rebates of value-added taxes. I mean, they are allowed 

to, under the WTO rebate value-added taxes at the point of export. 

They are no longer doing that on most, but not all steel products. 

So, for example, in my last visit to China, I sat down with my 

counterpart and identified a couple of products like pipe and tube 

where they are still rebating the tax and noted that that is creating 

some dislocation. Aluminum foil is another area. 

I do not know how much granularity you are looking for here. 

But their industrial policy, value-added rebates. 

The single biggest accomplishment that I can point to affecting 

steel vis-a-vis China is the WTO case that we filed beginning of 

2007 against a dozen Chinese export subsidies and import substitution subsidies that presumably had an impact across a broad 

range of manufactured goods because they were generic. They were 

not sector specific, including the steel industry. 

And China settled that case last year, late last year by eliminating every one of those twelve subsidies. That was perhaps the 

best example that we have of, you know, the combination of problem solving on the one hand and resorting to litigation where necessary on the other. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Mr. Honda. 

Mr. HONDA. Mr. Chairman, I apologize for being a little late 

here. 

And as I walked in, I heard the comment about the effort of the 

Administration in Colombia working more hard on prosecutions 

and that over the past few years that there has been an increase 

in prosecutions. And there was a comment about having visited 

that area also in that discussion. 

So I assume that you have been to Colombia and discussed these 

things with the Attorney General there and with the President? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Absolutely. In fact, just this weekend had 

a chance to meet with the Attorney General and the President. 


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Mr. HONDA. Now, how does a trade agreement affect the ability 

of the Attorney General to continue and increase his prosecutorial 

list? I understand they have a big shift and they went from inquisitory to prosecutorial process. I understand that. 

But my sense is that that becomes very expensive. And how does 

the trade agreement impact his ability to move forward and increase his list of folks that he wants to go after? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. It has a both direct and indirect impact. I 

think the most significant direct impact which really we cannot 

take credit for as part of the FTA because this is something that 

President Uribe launched when he came into office in 2002, but 

that has been increasing levels of funding for both the Prosecutor 

General and for the Judiciary to process these cases. 

And one of the challenges they faced, as you know, is with the 

demobilization of 30,000 paramilitaries, another 10,000 guerillas. 

With that demobilization and part of their peace and justice law, 

those individuals have been providing more and more information. 

Mr. HONDA. But how does it impact his ability to increase his list 

of people he wants to prosecute in the way that would bring some 

justice to those who have been killed? How is that connected to 

trade or is that part of Plan Colombia? Is Plan Colombia part of 

the trade agreement? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Plan Colombia and the free trade agreement are separate. 

Mr. HONDA. Okay. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. However, they are obviously complementary and funding—— 

Mr. HONDA. So how does trade impact the Attorney General’s 

ability because there is a lot of talk about there is improvement, 

but improvement means what, going from ten to thirty, and is that 

pace acceptable? I am just trying to understand why we feel that 

the trade agreement will effect an increased list of prosecutions. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Most of what is going on in Colombia related to prosecutions is separate and apart from the trade agreement. It is related to President Uribe’s commitment to his citizens 

when he was reelected and the additional funding that he is providing both for prosecutors, for the protection program, and for the 

Justice system in general. 

To the extent that there is a direct relationship with the free 

trade agreement, it is by creating an environment within which, 

meaning the stability within which they can see more demobilization is appropriate, where they have the economic growth to sustain the funding that they would continue to provide for this. 

Plan Colombia is a very important part of this effort and, as you 

know, bipartisan initiative launched originally by President Clinton. And part of what we see happening here is for President Uribe 

and subsequent Colombian administrations to sustain this transformation and sustain, you know, the rapid decline in violence and 

the rapid uptick in prosecutions and convictions is to move into 

more self-sustaining capacity to fund these things. And the FTA 

would help do that. 

Mr. HONDA. So it sounds like Plan Colombia should be the mechanism to increase funding for that, for the AG? 


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Ambassador SCHWAB. If you are asking for direct impact, absolutely, yes sir. 

Mr. HONDA. Well, he said he would like to have more because he 

spends more now on protecting judges, the attorneys—— 

Ambassador SCHWAB. That is true. 

Mr. HONDA [continuing]. And, you know, other folks that are involved in this difficult process. My other question would relate to 

the fact that 25 percent of Colombia’s population are Afro-Colombians. How does this trade agreement help that community and, is 

it directive? I mean, is there a prescriptive way of having some of 

that wealth that is supposed to be realized go to certain communities that have heretofore before Uribe even helped create an economic development stimulus for them? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. We had a chance to talk about that issue 

with President Uribe and with one of the Afro-Colombian legislators and the mayor of Cartagena when we were in Colombia this 

past weekend. The Colombians have, as you know, a growing set 

of initiatives to address problems faced by Afro-Colombians, including land returns and so on. 

And so the capacity of the Colombian government to continue 

helping bring along the Afro-Colombian population and right some 

of the previous wrongs is related to or is aided by the stability, the 

economic stability, political stability, and economic growth that we 

would see as part of the FTA, you know, one of the results of the 

FTA. 

Again, we are talking about an indirect impact, much as you articulated the Plan Colombia, direct impact and the work of our Justice Department in helping the government of Colombia on the 

issue of impunity, prosecutions, and convictions. 

Again, in the case of the initiatives that President Uribe has underway, particularly in the coastal areas to address challenge, 

coastal areas around Bogota to address challenges faced by AfroColombians, the FTA has an indirect benefit in terms of stability 

and job creation and economic growth, contribution to economic 

growth that at the end of the day enables the positive trends to 

continue and to be sustained. 

Mr. HONDA. So last question, Mr. Chairman. 

So there is no direct initiative through the FTA that would impact economic development through trade on the population along 

that coast in terms of infrastructure or economic activity? 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Only to the extent that we are talking 

about increased investment likely to accrue along the coast and the 

generation of jobs. That would be the most direct impact from the 

FTA. 

Mr. HONDA. Okay. Thank you. 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Thank you. 

Do we have any other questions from Committee members? 

[No response.] 

Mr. MOLLOHAN. Madam Ambassador, there will be some questions submitted for the record and we appreciate your response to 

those. We very much appreciate your testimony here today. There 

will certainly be some questions, budgetary questions submitted for 

the record. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Absolutely. 


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Mr. MOLLOHAN. And, again, thank you for your service and for 

your testimony. Thank you. 

Ambassador SCHWAB. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much, 

members of the Committee. 

[Questions and answers sumitted for the record follow.] 


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896 


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898 


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W I T N E S S E S 

Page 

Barnett, H.M ............................................................................................................ 727 

Beering, Dr. Steven ................................................................................................. 455 

Bement, Dr. A.L., Jr ................................................................................................ 455 

Earp, N.C .................................................................................................................. 635

Griffin, M.D .............................................................................................................. 1, 43 

Marburger, J.H., III ................................................................................................. 311 

Pearson, D.R ............................................................................................................ 781 

Schwab, S.C .............................................................................................................. 829 

Strickland, F.B ......................................................................................................... 727 


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I N D E X 

Page 

National Aeronautics and Space Administration 

Aderholt, Questions Submitted by Congressman ................................................. 314 

Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) ..................................................................... 90, 92 

American Competitiveness Initiative (ACI) ........................................................... 44 

Ares Thrust Oscillation ........................................................................................... 86 

Budget Cuts, Overall ............................................................................................... 40 

Budget Stability ....................................................................................................... 83 

Budget, Constrained ................................................................................................ 51 

Budget, Research and Development ....................................................................... 24 

Chinese Space Program........................................................................................... 36, 88 

Civil Space Exploration, U.S. Leadership .............................................................. 11 

Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) .......................................... 85 

Constellation Confidence Level .............................................................................. 53 

Core Visions ............................................................................................................. 51 

Cost Overrun Impacts ............................................................................................. 71 

Culberson, Questions Submitted by Congressman ............................................... 303 

Deep Space and Near Earth Networks .................................................................. 66 

Exploration on Architectural Review ..................................................................... 55 

Exploration, Adequate Funding for ........................................................................ 50 

Failures, Program Manufacturing .......................................................................... 22 

Foreign and Domestic Suppliers ............................................................................. 31 

Foreign Contracts .................................................................................................... 31 

Frelinghuysen, Opening Remarks of Ranking Minority Member Rodney P ...... 2 

Frelinghuysen, Questions Submitted by Ranking Minority Member .................. 272 

Funding, NASA Adequate ....................................................................................... 13, 21 

Funding, NASA Levels ............................................................................................ 72 

GAO Accountability ................................................................................................. 46 

Glory Mission ........................................................................................................... 26 

Griffin, Closing Remarks of Administrator Michael D ......................................... 98 

Griffin, Opening Remarks of Administrator Michael D ....................................... 3 

Griffin, Prepared Statement of Administrator Michael D .................................... 6 

HSPD–12 .................................................................................................................. 40 

Hubble Space Telescope .......................................................................................... 83 

Human Exploration Beyond Earth Orbit .............................................................. 53 

Hurricane Katrina ................................................................................................... 20 

Ice, Clouds, and Land Elevation Satellite (ICESAT) ............................................ 24 

Independent Auditors .............................................................................................. 39 

Independent Cost Estimates ................................................................................... 49 

International Space Station.......................................................................... 2, 21, 46, 63 

International Space Station Participation Program ............................................. 36 

Latham, Questions Submitted by Congressman ................................................... 311 

Lunar Return Program ........................................................................................... 72 


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iv 

Lunar Science Research .......................................................................................... 67 

Manifest, Authority to Change ............................................................................... 91 

Manifest, Shuttle Mission ....................................................................................... 81 

Mars Program Funding ........................................................................................... 16 

Mars Program .......................................................................................................... 58 

Mollohan, Closing Remarks of Chairman Alan B ................................................. 98 

Mollohan, Opening Remarks of Chairman Alan B ............................................... 1 

Mollohan, Questions Submitted by Chairman Alan B ......................................... 99 

Moon, Returning to the ........................................................................................... 71 

Moon, US Presence on the ...................................................................................... 50 

NASA’s Budget Request .......................................................................................... 18 

Near-Earth Object (NEO)........................................................................................ 34, 89 

New Millennium Approach ..................................................................................... 70 

Next Generation ....................................................................................................... 64 

Orion Heat Shield .................................................................................................... 87 

Outer Planet Flagship Process ............................................................................... 80 

Outer Planets Mission ............................................................................................. 76, 78 

Plutonium-238 .......................................................................................................... 40, 43 

Prometheus Mission ................................................................................................ 77 

Rebaselined Projects ................................................................................................ 48 

Research Training Opportunities at the University Level ................................... 30 

Return to Flight, Shuttle Cost Compensation ....................................................... 19 

Rogers, Questions Submitted by Congressman ..................................................... 306 

Ruppersberger, Questions Submitted by Congressman ....................................... 268 

Russian and Chinese Relationship with NASA .................................................... 12 

Schiff, Opening Remarks by Congressman ........................................................... 14 

Science Mission Budget ........................................................................................... 69 

Science Mission Cost Growth .................................................................................. 68 

Science Program Cost Increases ............................................................................. 28 

Science Program Reserves ...................................................................................... 68 

Sea Treaty Law ........................................................................................................ 89 

Space Interferometry Mission (SIM) ...................................................................... 15, 56 

Space Transportation Gap ...................................................................................... 52 

Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) ............................... 32 

Supply Mission ......................................................................................................... 84 

Transition Cost......................................................................................................... 13, 38 

Visible-Infrared Imagery Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) ............................................ 27 

Wind Tunnel Testing ............................................................................................... 87 

Workforce Retirement, Civil Service ...................................................................... 29 

Workforce, Contractor ............................................................................................. 63 

Workforce, Transition .............................................................................................. 62 

International Trade Commission 

Frelinghuysen, Opening Remarks of Ranking Minority Member Rodney P ...... 781 

Frelinghuysen, Questions Submitted by Ranking Minority Member .................. 822 

Latham, Questions Submitted by Congressman ................................................... 826 

Mollohan, Opening Remarks of Chairman Alan B ............................................... 781 

Mollohan, Questions Submitted by Chairman Alan B ......................................... 816 

Pearson, Prepared Statement of Administrator Daniel R .................................... 786 

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