SALARIES, OFFICERS AND EMPLOYEES

Mr. FAULKNER. Turning then to the actual salaries fo and employees, total salaries for the House in general, pag aries and expenses for officers and employees of the Hou thorized by law will be $101,989,000. Included in this a $56,900,000 for personnel, and $45,089,000 for nonpersonr The offices funded under this heading include the followin of the Clerk, Sergeant at Arms, Chief Administrative Of Inspector General, the Chaplain, Parliamentarian, Law Counsel, Legislative Counsel, and other authorized employ The Clerk of the House, Sergeant at Arms, Inspector Law Revision Counsel and Legislative Counsels are here testify on behalf of their own organizational budget request Page 23, then, is a spreadsheet reflecting the differences 1995, 1996 and 1997 in the fiscal years. If there are no q on the broader area, we can then turn specifically to the the House. Before we do so, I'll submit pages 22 and 23 record.

[The information follows:]

SALARIES, OFFICERS AND EMPLOYEES
(See Pages 57-91 Subcommittee Print)

For salaries and expenses of officers and employees, as authorized by law, $101.989.000.

Included in this amount is $56,900,000 for personnel and $45,089,000 for non-personnel items.

The Clerk of the House, Sergeant At Arms, Inspector General, Law Revision and Legislative

Counsels are here today to testify on behalf of their organizational budget requests.

Mr. PACKARD. All right.

Mr. YOUNG. Mr. Chairman, might I ask one question here on page 23. The unexpended balance for 1995 was $24 million, and the unexpended balance for 1996 was $72 million. Why is there such a difference in the numbers there?

Mr. ANFINSON. We are still in the middle of 1996, and so it represents one-fourth of the year's expenditures.

Mr. YOUNG. Oh. That is a very good reason.

Mr. PACKARD. That is why you have one on one. It is even higher than 1997 you noticed, Bill.

Mr. YOUNG. You are 2 weeks out of here, you forget all of the good stuff.

Mr. PACKARD. You thought we were saving money, didn't you? Mr. YOUNG. But still, that is still a low number, considering the fact that we are 5 months through the fiscal year. That is still very low, compared to

FY 96 EXPENDITURE TRACKING

Mr. FAULKNER. In fact, I think one thing which it is reflective of is the prudence and good management on the part of the officers of the House. In fact, our own CAO budget, which we will be speaking to later, we are already tracking a full 10 percent lower than what we have planned.

I have a document which I will submit for the record at a later point, but for this point, we literally are tracking at our half-year budget mark. We should be let's see here, looking at the operating costs. We are tracking at almost full $6 million lower than we thought we would be at this point last year.

So again, as we start to see the full impacts of running the House on a business basis and seeing the full impacts of some of the administrative reforms, we are already seeing savings in this fiscal year that we had not anticipated, and we are hoping to see that trend continue.

OFFICE OF THE CLERK

Mr. PACKARD. Ms. Carle, on your presentation, we would like to do it, with your permission, the same way we have been doing with Mr. Faulkner, and that is as questions come through your presentation, if you would not mind, I hope it won't interrupt your presentation too much, but it does help us not to overlook something. So if you will proceed with that understanding.

Ms. CARLE. All right. I will start with just a formal statement. Chairman Packard, other members of the subcommittee, I appreciate having the opportunity today to appear at this time to present the 1997 appropriations requests related to the operations of the Offices of the Clerk.

Before I present the general outline regarding the 1997 request, I must first state that certain significant expenses of the House now contained in the Clerk's budget were previously not itemized or assigned to this particular budget. Now, as requested by the subcommittee last year, several of these expenses have been eliminated from the House's Administrative Account and have been transferred into this fiscal year 1997 request. Items included in this category are the closed-captioning services of the House Floor proceedings and the private stenographic service of the com hearings.

Like all of you, I believe in complete disclosure and item of these House expenses, and in that vein we should see a and effect" with the transfer of such itemized expenses in my et. While these costs have increased the overall size of the budget request, they are not new expenses for the Hous should not increase the House budget as a whole.

With the exception of the creation of the new Office of Employment Counsel and the new add-in costs I just men this request is modest in size and growth.

The fiscal year 1997 request for the Clerk's Office is $15,37 This figure appears to be an 11.32 percent increase. Howeve the removal of new funds for the new Office of House Emplo Counsel and the other House expenses that were previou quested in the House's administrative account, this being th of $2,146,000, this is a simple request by the Clerk of $13,22 an increase of 2.12 percent when compared to the fiscal yea appropriations for personnel and nonpersonnel expenses.

INCREASED ACTIVITY OF 104TH CONGRESS

First, I should begin by congratulating the House members the robust and aggressive first session of the 104th Congress ing the first session, the House was in session 167 days for of 1,525 hours. There were 885 recorded votes, the second n the history of the Congress. There were also 2,191 House co tee hearings producing 1,666,528 pages of testimony, and bills and other legislative measures were introduced in House. All of these figures are increases over the 103d Co and I would anticipate will continue in the second session 104th Congress. Simply, such increased activity comes at a my offices' personnel and support costs. I am very pleased wi performance of my offices during this period, and I am seel continue to maintain the quality in services and support.

Since my previous appearance before the subcommittee, t fices of the Clerk have been reorganized to focus on the curre anticipated legislative needs of the House.

As I outlined in my earlier testimony, computerization an updating of communication equipment within the Offices Clerk is our primary and long-term goal. In many areas of 1 tive information generation, management and transmitta House is sorely lacking. The Clerk's offices are central in th ation and handling of this information and I believe what evolve are processes and procedures to rely more on compute other advanced technologies. I have not lost sight of the Hou ditions and the need to allow the House flexibility in a legi arena; however, I will be recommending in the near future changes in some of the procedures to help advance our elec venture.