operations at the same time they supported the necessary Y2K upgrade effort. The Y2K upgrade was accomplished with minimal vendor support costs. This upgrade improved financial operations by migrating from a "home grown, stovepipe" financial system environment to an off-the-shelf integrated processing environment. The new system will help to create a framework for more timely and useful budget and other financial information, and enable the AOC to reduce duplicate data entry and data redundancy within its systems and financial processing, especially in the areas of funds control and accounts payable.

In fiscal year 1998, the agency will strengthen the AOC financial organization, both in terms of personnel and operations. We are currently working with the General Accounting Office to prepare an implementation plan for installing a JFMIPcompliant Standard General Ledger (SGL) that seamlessly integrates with other AOC financial applications. Financial software currently available on Financial Management Services' (FMS) Financial Management Systems Software (FMSS) Schedule will be reviewed to ensure that a JFMIP-compliant SGL (and related contract support) is purchased by the AOC. In addition, the AOC will explore cross servicing possibilities. This plan will identify the need for necessary staff, contractor and vendor resources.

Also, the agency will work with the current environment to employ more refined cost finding techniques for improved AOC project cost reporting and for improved AOC facilities management operational cost reporting.

Question. In fiscal year 1998, $650,000 was provided for financial management. Please identify where those funds have been spent or are expected to be spent.

Answer. Approximately half of the funds have been obligated for continued technical support by the vendor and creating a redundant environment for the Y2K compliant system. Technical support of the system will be shared by the existing AOC IRM staff once full transition of all applications off the Unisys mainframe is accomplished. The balance will be used to continue refining reports generated from the system as well as pursuing the installation of a Standard General Ledger.

Question. The AOC budget request for fiscal year 1998 included a total cost of $1.650 million for an integrated management system (financial management system). The budget request for fiscal year 1999 includes a total cost of $2.850 million for the same project. Please identify what has changed to increase the cost of this project.

Answer. There are several reasons for the increase in the cost of the project. The interim Year 2000 fix for the core financial systems used in the agency temporarily delayed the development of IMS requirements. The agency has now presented to the GAO a draft accelerated implementation plan for adopting a JFMIP-compliant Standard General Ledger system that will lead to the ability to develop and audit financial statements. At the recommendation of several Legislative Branch agencies who had already gone through similar conversion processes, an additional year of implementation funding was reflected to provide sufficient resources to this effort. At the same time, the agency has accelerated its implementation of a computeraided facility management system (CAFM). The complexity of capturing data from both financial and facility management systems and incorporating it into an overall Integrated Management System (IMS) led to an increased out-year support cost.

Based on the pending recommendations from the GAO related to the implementation of an SGL, it is anticipated that the AOC will revise its initial implementation costs and out-year projections. These revised costs will be presented to the Committee as soon as possible.

YEAR 2000 PROBLEM

Question. What is your estimated total cost to address the year 2000 problem? What has been spent to date, and what is requested in fiscal year 1999? What is your cost estimate beyond fiscal year 1999?

Answer. The following table summarizes the estimated costs to date and beyond.

GENERAL ACCOUNTING OFFICE

STATEMENT OF JAMES F. HINCHMAN, ACTING COMPTROLLER GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES

ACCOMPANIED BY:

BRIAN P. CROWLEY, ASSISTANT COMPTROLLER GENERAL FOR PLANNING AND REPORTING

JOAN M. DODARO, ASSISTANT COMPTROLLER GENERAL FOR OPERATIONS

RICHARD L. BROWN, CONTROLLER

OPENING REMARKS

Senator BENNETT. Our second witness is Mr. James Hinchman, the Acting Comptroller General. It is no criticism of Mr. Hinchman that he remains with that adjective.

Mr. HINCHMAN. You are very kind, Mr. Chairman.

Senator BENNETT. Yes; I will say that over the last year this committee has had to look to GAO for expertise in a wide variety of areas just after this committee went through the process of cutting you back by 25 percent.

For me, you have risen to the challenge extremely well, and I am very grateful to you personally and professionally for the way you have taken on this assignment, particularly with respect to the year 2000 problem.

We continue to get in my other subcommittee chairmanship firstclass work out of GAO with respect to the year 2000 problem, and that is attributed, Mr. Hinchman, to you, and to the dedicated people who assist you, and I will be grateful if you would pass on to them my personal thanks for all they have done.

Mr. HINCHMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I will be happy to do that. It is the greatest satisfaction of our work to know that. I appreciate that very much.

Senator BENNETT. Now, having said that, I will recognize Senator Dorgan to give a speech with which I will associate myself in advance.

NEED TO APPOINT COMPTROLLER GENERAL

Senator DORGAN. Well, you may or may not. Mr. Chairman, let me just vent for a moment on this issue, and I will be very brief. Mr. Hinchman, I think, has done a remarkable job, and I have great respect for his work for the organization, the GAO. I think they serve Congress admirably, they do very professional work, and we could not do without them.

The former Comptroller General, Charles Bowsher, left 19 months ago. We knew 1 year before that exactly when he was going to leave, because his term was up and he was going to be gone. So for 22 to 3 years we have known that we need a Comp

troller General. Nineteen months after it became vacant, we do not have a Comptroller General.

Mr. Hinchman is an awfully good leader, in my judgment, but he is not a Comptroller General, because he has not been appointed. It is outrageous, in my judgment, that we have not found a mechanism or some method to appoint a new Comptroller General.

Let me just read the people who are supposed to be doing this, just so that we all understand: Speaker Gingrich, Senator Thurmond, Senator Lott, Senator Daschle, Congressman Armey, Congressman Gephardt, Senator Thompson, Senator Glenn, Congressman Burton, and Congressman Waxman. They comprise the commission that is responsible to develop the names to send to the President for this appointment.

This commission, for whatever reason, has been unable to reach agreement. It is true that the vice chair and chair of the commission have now sent three names to the White House; it is not true that the commission has sent names to the White House, because they have been unable to agree.

I am thinking of a couple of suggestions, which I will not offer today, but which I will intend to offer on the floor of the Senate either when this subcommittee sends the bill to the floor, or before. One is, perhaps if this commission is unworkable, and maybe 19 months, or 29 months, demonstrates that, then we should abolish this commission, and say, If you cannot do your job, we will construct something that can do the job, so essentially firing the commission, or second, simply say that those who have not performed are not able to access information from the GAO until they do.

Well, I say that, understanding that the chairman just said he has agreed with everything I will say, knowing that he likely would not want to join me in that recommendation, but-[Laughter.]

Senator BENNETT. I will take it under serious consideration. [Laughter.]

Senator DORGAN. I say to the leadership on both sides, who construct this commission, that they have a job to do. They have not done the job. It is embarrassing and it is outrageous. And in my judgment, it shortchanges a very important agency. This country deserves a Comptroller General. We ought to make this selection.

There are men and women of great quality and high character, and men and women that are of great distinction who can become candidates for this, and among which we can select a Comptroller General. And maybe your names are among that list; I do not know.

But look, my point is, I want this group to do its job, and if they will not do their job, I will recommend that we reconstitute a different commission with people who can do the job, and the sooner, the better.

Having said that, Mr. Hinchman, again, you have done an excellent job, but we need whoever runs that organization to have the title Comptroller General, and the full force and authority of what that title implies.

Senator BENNETT. I agree with everything you say. We will take under consideration your proposal, and maybe the proposals that you and I get to pick it after 60 days, or some such number. [Laughter.]

Mr. Hinchman, we are looking forward to hearing what you have to say.

Mr. HINCHMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have a prepared statement, with your permission I would like to summarize that

Senator BENNETT. Absolutely.

Mr. HINCHMAN [continuing]. And if that is acceptable, I would ask that the statement be put in the record. Senator BENNETT. Without objection.

STATEMENT HIGHLIGHTS

Mr. HINCHMAN. With me is Joan Dodaro, our Assistant Comptroller General for Operations, Brian Crowley, our Assistant Comptroller General for Planning and Reporting, and Dick Brown, our Controller.

I have only one brief point to make. GAO's mission is service to the Congress. A year ago we told you that our overriding internal management goal was to stabilize the operations of our agency following our downsizing, so that we could create the environment in which we could recruit and retain the talented staff we need to fulfill that mission, and provide the organizational and support structures that they need to do that job successfully.

I want to thank this committee for the $8.5 million increase which we received last year under your leadership. With those funds we have been able to pursue that mission of stabilization. In particular, we have instituted a limited hiring program to address our most acute staffing shortages and have also been able to begin modernization of our information technology infrastructure.

Our budget request for this year continues that goal of stabilization. To pursue that goal, we are again seeking an increase in our budget. That increase would go for only three purposes. One-half of it would go to meet mandatory and price level increases we cannot control.

The second part would go to pay for a portion of the cost of our information technology infrastructure modernization. That modernization, by the way, is critical to our plans for becoming year 2000 compliant. We are absorbing most of the cost of that modernization within our current funding level, but we do need some help.

The third component would go for a staffing increase to help move us toward our goal of a 3,450 staff level. We established that goal when we began our downsizing. It represents a one-third reduction from our 5,300 level, which is where we were at the beginning of that downsizing. We are currently below that level, and it is becoming increasingly difficult for us to meet growing demands for work in some critical areas.

You have already referred to the most critical of those. We have limited staff who can do the work we are trying to accomplish in the area of the year 2000 compliance, both within Government and our country as a whole. The demands for work in this area are growing daily.

But there are other demand areas. We are being inundated with requests for work in the area of telecommunications policy, an area in which we have had little or no expertise since we began our