Mr. PACKARD. What about benefits to the employees? Is there a difference between the House and the Senate?

Chief ABRECHT. There are slight differences, as I mentioned on the on the Senate roll, if you go off, say, for an extend maternity period, you would be placed on what is called reduced pay status. On the House payroll, you would be placed on leave without pay. Mr. PACKARD. If we were to unify that to where it is all the same, number one, would we run into resistance? Number two, would it require legislative action?

Chief ABRECHT. It would require legislation.

Mr. PACKARD. What kind of difficulties would we have in implementing that? Not a great deal?

Chief ABRECHT. I don't think so.

Mr. PACKARD. What about retirement benefits?

Chief ABRECHT. They are the same on both rolls.

Mr. PACKARD. Leave policies?

Chief ABRECHT. Leave policy is the same. The Capitol Police operates under a Capitol Police leave policy. All our employees are under the same leave policy.

Mr. PACKARD. And the job description is interchangeable?

Chief ABRECHT. Absolutely.

Mr. PACKARD. I have one further question for the record before leaving this topic.

[The question and response follow:]

Mr. PACKARD. Several years ago, this Committee directed that proposals be developed to consolidate the police rolls onto one force-we wanted to eliminate the disparities between police assigned to House rolls and Senate rolls disparities in pay, benefits, retirement, leave policies, and other vestiges of the archaic separation between Houses of its security forces. This would be something within the legislative jurisdiction of the House Oversight Committee and Senate Rules. Have you had any discussions with those Committees?

RESPONSE. The Board is generally and conceptually in agreement regarding the unification or consolidation of the Capitol Police. The Capitol Police are currently discussing the issue payroll administration with the National Finance Center. The Committee on House Oversight is in agreement with the unification concept, at least in terms of payroll administration, and the issue of Capitol Police unification will be reviewed by the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration.

NATIONAL FINANCE CENTER

Mr. PACKARD. We talked about consolidating your payroll process, and certainly one way of doing that would be with the National Finance Center. How soon could that be done, in your judgment? Are there any reasons for it to be delayed?

Chief ABRECHT. It really is dependent on how long it takes the National Finance Center to do it. We have heard it takes a bit of time. As soon as they prepared to meet with us, we will meet with them and get it accomplished just as soon as it can be accomplished.

Mr. PACKARD. So if they are in agreement, you are ready to move?

Chief ABRECHT. Yes.

Mr. LIVINGOOD. In fact, Mr. Chairman, we have directed the Capitol Police to continue their discussions with the National Finance Center, and we are in the process of asking the Architect of the Capitol if we can borrow one of his experienced individuals— we haven't mentioned that to him yet because we just got to

gether-but we will be asking him if we can borrow one of his experienced individuals who is very, very familiar with the National Finance Center.

This, by temporary bargaining, would speed the process tremendously.

Mr. PACKARD. We would not be happy to have it be studied for another year or two or to go through a process of analysis. I think that has been done. I think you have already made your decisions. We would intend to concur. And I guess my recommendation would be that we should move forward.

And then whatever you need from us, we will try to accommodate.

SECURITY PLANNING

One of the concerns expressed has been the coordination or lack thereof between the police and the architect's staff on security planning and equipment matters. Have you looked into that, and do you have some suggestions on making improvements there?

Mr. LIVINGOOD. Yes, sir. We are currently aware that in the past there have been some delays in the implementation of some security measures, probably which could be attributable to a division of labor. However, we intend to focus special attention on this area in our security survey, which begins in March. After its completion, we will be in a better position to make a determination and to propose any specific and necessary adjustments. I will provide a more detailed response for the record.

[The information follows:]

RESPONSE. The Board and the Capitol Police are charged with the ultimate responsibility for security matters relative to the Congress. As such, the Board and the Chief need to be in a position to determine security needs, establish security priorities and implement security measures. Initially, the Board would recommend that an amendment to the current security funding mechanism contained in H. Res. 550 (September 19, 1972) be enacted into permanent law and provide that funds to procure, install, and maintain security apparatus for the United States Capitol Buildings and Grounds be made available to the Capitol Police Board and that the Board is authorized to expend such funds. In addition, it is recommend that the resources of the Architect of the Capitol be made available to the Capitol Police Board to provide technical, mechanical, and structural support for security installation projects.

Mr. PACKARD. Do you have a response to that, Mr. White?

Mr. WHITE. We are happy to continue in the same vein. From time to time these issues disappear as a matter of focus of attention. We look at them and nothing happens and they sort of disappear.

So we think this time we can continue focusing on it until it is solved.

MANDATORY INCREASES

Mr. PACKARD. The increase for mandatory items in your budget, in your salary budget is $2.6 million. What do you consider to be mandatory? And what are the components of this increase?

Chief ABRECHT. According to the instructions that were given to us by the Office of Finance of the House of Representatives, mandatory items to us are the cost-of-living adjustments and the locality pay raises, called up here comparability pay for our personnel.

We were told to place it under mandatory headings and that is where we have placed them.

The total increase for the fiscal year 1996 budget is $2,832,000. And of that, $2,642,000 is for personnel related expenses. In the fiscal year 1995 budget submission, funds were appropriated and then subsequently authorized for the cost of living adjustment and a comparability pay for our sworn members. The annualized cost for this increase was $439,000.

The Capitol Police are committed to keeping our personnel comparable in pay to our counterparts in the Federal law enforcement sector. Here in Washington we consider that to be the United States Park Police and the United States Secret Service Uniformed Division, to give you comparable types of work.

So we have sought and included in our budget to receive locality pay, or what we call up here comparability pay, to keep us comparable to the pay increases that they received in the executive branch law enforcement agencies.

[A question from Chairman Packard and response follows:]

LAPSED FUNDS

Question. Each year, the amount of funds that do not get expended from your appropriation "lapse" into the Treasury. How much of your appropriation has lapsed for each of the past three years?

Response. Below is a chart for the record to reflect the funds that have lapsed into the Treasury. From our General Expense account, we expended 97.4% of our appropriation in FY'92. During FY'93 we expended 98.9% of our appropriation for General Expenses. During this past fiscal year we were advised that we would be charged for our office supplies and office equipment, which were previously paid from the House Contingent Fund. As a result, we expended 97.3% of our appropriation and held funds to cover this expense which amounts to approximately $34,000. From our Personnel Expenses account, we expended 96.1% of our appropriation for FY92. The unexpended funds are due mainly to funds appropriated for overtime for the Gulf War. Since the war ended suddenly, the funds were not required and were allowed to lapse into the Treasury. During FY'93 we expended 99.3% of our funds, leaving a balance that represents the payroll for two days. During FY'94 we expended 98.4% of our appropriation leaving a balance that represents the payroll for five days.

[The information follows:]