HIR QUESTIONS

Mr. SERRANO. I would like to ask you a couple of questions and bunch them together on HIR. We in our office use their services, and we are always concerned about where they are heading. They appear to be moving away from information services and to information exchange, fax, e-mail services, and the like.

First, would you describe the features of the new services? Does HIR have the appropriate hardware in place, and do they expect these services to impose new costs on use in offices?

And, secondly, HIR's intentions about creation and maintenance of Members' Web pages, particularly charging for the services, what would the impact be if some offices do not have or cannot afford to hire from HIR or an outside vendor the necessary Webmaster capabilities?

And, lastly, we are one of the offices that has been looking into setting up videoconferencing between the District office and this office here, and we know that there is only one person assigned to handling that, and we have gotten quite a bit of service from him. But I wonder, what is the future of HIR's involvement in this area of technology?

Mr. EAGEN. Let me see if I can remember all the questions and respond to them.

DIRECTION OF HIR

In a big-picture way, I believe HIR is at a crossroads. And to use a Yogi Berra-ism, if you are at a crossroads, take it. I think that what has been going on in the big picture sense, is that there has been a crossroads for HIR and it has tried to walk a couple of different directions at the same time.

Tim Campen, the director of House Information Resources, has only been with us since November 19th. In the intervening period before the departure of the previous director, we brought in KPMG Peat Marwick to do an assessment of House Information Resources. In fact, I have that document here today. It suggests, KPMG does, that a new model might better serve the House in the future. And, in some ways, that transition started before I came, and it is going to continue for the next year. It is going to have some ramifications in whether we maintain any kind of mainframe capability. The Committee on House Oversight, for example, has directed that a mainframe migration occur at House Information Resources. I alluded to that in my testimony. That is a significant transition. [A question from Chairman Walsh and response follow:]

Question. The House Information Resources budget is under the CAO. What is in this budget for telephone instrument replacements? There was some considerable interest in that item last year. Give us an update on the replacement program. Response. Funds have not been requested in the FY '99 budget for telephone instrument replacements due to budget priorities. However, the subcommittee did approve in the September 1997 reprogram $308,700 for new telephone handsets and their installation. Before the September 1997 reprogram, 205 Member offices had been converted to the new telephone instruments. Since the project restarted in December as a result of the September 1997 reprogram, 27 additional Member offices have been converted to new telephones for a total of 232 Member offices. It is estimated an additional 53 Member offices will be converted by April 1998 for a total of 285 Member offices with new telephone instruments.

In terms of the new services that have become a part of

Mr. SERRANO. Excuse me. When you say "significant," what effect does that have? You did not smile when you said that it was something that you were looking forward to.

Mr. EAGEN. It is not a matter that I am not looking forward to it, but it is a situation with a whole series of uncertainties at this point. The reason I say that is because the joint study that is being undertaken by the Inspector General, in which HIR is participating, is not concluded. I view that as the first key step.

That study, at the direction of this subcommittee, is supposed to produce a cost-benefit analysis as to how a mainframe migration should occur. Until we take that study as a base foundation and then build a plan, there is a lot of uncertainty.

NEW SERVICES OF HIR

In terms of new services-and these are a result of the cyberCongress type approach to HIR-I think the two biggest things, one you alluded to that the House has seen, is the e-mail system and, secondly, the Web interface.

Right now, we have 345 Member offices that have Websites. House Information Resources developed, I believe, 200 of those themselves. We maintain approximately 175 of those through the direct support of House Information Resources.

In the case of Exchange, the e-mail system, at the time that Microsoft installed it, my understanding is, it was the largest central e-mail installation that they had done of that particular application. Last year, at the end of the fiscal year, the House purchased a new license that will give us the flexibility to upgrade to the next level of e-mail software called Outlook. That will take us into the Year 2000, and we will be able to now transition the House from what is solely an e-mail client and has a limited scheduling capability to something that is built in with more sophisticated scheduling and tasking. I think it is the opportunity in terms of the goal of achieving the paperless office to really take the House, and it could mean significant changes for the way Members run their office, in a positive direction.

[A question from Mr. Serrano and response follow:]

Question. Roll Call reported on Cola Wars over the new food service contractor's pricing policies. A major problem for HIR was chain e-mailing of protest messages. It does'nt sound as if HIR's effort to stop chain e-mails was very effective. How did the chain e-mail effect the House computers and how can HIR more effectively limit chain e-mails?

Response: Chain e-mail or "spam" e-mails are difficult to proactively manage without invading the privacy of House Members and staff. These types of e-mail can originate internally from House staff or from external individuals or organizations. The "soda pop" e-mail that you are referring to originated from a internal House staffer, sending it to a large number of recipients. These recipients used the "reply all" feature to express their comments to those who received the original message, then those who received those comments used the "reply all" feature to express comments to those comments and so on, causing a huge spike in message traffic started by this one e-mail. The impact of this on the computers which run the House Messaging System was an extreme degredation of service. This huge spike in traffic caused all House Members and staff to experience a large slow down in e-mail and scheduling performance until these messages were processed by the House Messaging System, and delivered to their destination.

Once these types of e-mails get into the system they are very difficult to eradicate because they are mixed in with "real business" e-mail. Thus leaving HIR with the only option to have the computer systems process these as expeditiously as possible.

The Committee on House Oversight responded to this problem by sending out a reminder that there is an approved Information Systems usage policy in effect, reiterating appropriate use of House systems.

HIR currently has a defined method used to resolve e-mail attacks from outside sources. This is a process by which the Messaging Systems support staff works with the HIR Security staff and Associate Administrator to document the impact and initiate, by physically blocking, the delivery of e-mail from that individual or organization in response to the negative impact their e-mails may have on the House Messaging System.

VIDEOCONFERENCE TECHOLOGY

On videoconferencing, I believe we have installed videoconferencing or assisted in installing about 15 offices in the House. We also have a central videoconferencing facility in the recording studio that Members can book for their use.

I think this question was raised very specifically last year at last year's hearing, as well. At the time, the Director of HIR described what was needed in terms of having a videocam and so forth in Members' offices. It is still an expensive undertaking, and I think that there are still questions about as to what kind of investment will be required or appropriate for the entire House to move in that direction.

FUTURE OF HIR

Mr. SERRANO. I certainly share your concerns. And I can tell by your answer that, obviously, there are a lot of things that are not clear yet.

My initial concern, my overriding concern, is that this department was very instrumental in bringing us to the point where we are now, and we have made quite a bit of progress going from Web pages to the videoconferencing to the cyber-Congress. And now, obviously, we are on the brink of expanding, really getting to the point where we think we should be, which changes every day with some new invention in this field, some new knowledge. And I am just wondering, if in the desires to see how cost-effective everything that is going on at HIR is there might not be also a question as to the necessity of those services provided to the Members.

I think Member offices and Members have to know, with much anticipation, if the eventual plan may be to move HIR away from servicing Members, because up to now Members have been very dependent on that department, extremely dependent. That department has brought us into this era, this time and place, and now, if we are going to have to move and go out there, and then if we do, there should be something in place to assist Member offices. And we are dealing with a thousand vendors offering a million services and, in all honesty, we, nor anyone, except perhaps Bill Gates, have any understanding about what it is they are talking about in the first place.

Mr. EAGEN. I do not anticipate that HIR itself is going to be out of the service business. I think service is what the CAO is all about.

I think it is confusing for offices, and I have experienced it as an AA and as a staff director, and now as CAO, that you have what is supposed to be a closely coordinated layering of service capabilities for Members' offices. You have vendors; you have technical

service representatives that are part of HIR; and then, hopefully, you have someone with some amalgam of computer capability in the office themselves, whether it is a Novell engineer-systems administrator or somebody that was a political science major that took the right courses.

It is different, office by office by office. And I think one thing that we have come to recognize is that we are going to have to somehow perhaps establish some standards of how those things are going to interlink so that it is not confusing to Members offices. It is confusing to me.

Mr. SERRANO. It is sometimes confusing to me.

Well, thank you very much.

[A question from Mr. Serrano and response follow:]

Question. Without a mainframe, will HIR continue to be able to provide the National Change of Address (NCOA) service to House offices?

Response. No, HIR will not be able to provide the NCOA services to House offices. These services will need to be provided elsewhere.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Latham, any questions?

Mr. LATHAM. No.

Mr. WALSH. Mr. Fazio, any questions?

Mr. FAZIO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I want to welcome Jay and his staff and wish them all the best in moving forward the CAO position.

I know this is a relatively new position, and I know we can count on you to perform effectively and, I hope, far less prominently than your predecessor. I say that in the best sense, because I think this is a job that really does not require high profile, it just requires a job well done. I think your background in, user services here will be very helpful to others who depend on what is made available through your offices. I think you have already made that clear.

HIR STAFFING CONCERNS

I am also concerned about HIR. You talk about redirecting them. Is that why we are going to see a decrease in full-time equivalents of 25 people? That is the current budget, I understand. What does this downsizing imply?

Mr. EAGEN. It implies a couple of things, and I think it is actually from the appropriated approved level from last year, a 29 FTE reduction. Part of that is a transfer of certain skill sets to more appropriate functions within the CAO, a small number.

For example, the Committee on House Oversight this past fall approved a reorganization of the Finance Office, and we took the financial computer people, and transferred them so that they are now within the Finance Office with that system.

Second, it is a recognition that there is a fiscal constraint facing the entire CAO. We simply have to show some discipline. Third, it is a reflection of what is, basically, the personnel status at HIR today. The count as of 2 days ago was 220 people.

Mr. FAZIO. So if you did not have the restraints of the overall budget, other initiatives, that you have had to engage in, if that restraint was not there, you would probably look to other staffing? Do you think it is going to at some point be important to repair some of those losses?

Mr. EAGEN. I think that is a definite possibility. The outcome needs to be driven by this mainframe migration study, and it needs to be driven by the strategic assessment that we are doing right

now.

Mr. FAZIO. You are going to be using that as a guidepost in terms of whether you want to bring additional people on, perhaps people with different skills.

DISCUSSION ON COMPETITION FOR HIGH QUALITY TECHNOLOGY

PERSONNEL

Mr. EAGEN. Yes. And I think, in addition to that, there is an interesting article in the Business section of the Post today about the status of competition for high-quality personnel in the technology industry.

Mr. FAZIO. Exactly. There was a feature a couple of weeks ago composed about the region and the problem of hiring in the hightech fields. I guess that was really where I was going with my next question, merit pay. Are we going to be able to find the wherewithal to hire not just people to fill the slots, but the quality of people who we need to really perform in perhaps more challenging jobs that will be made available?

Mr. EAGEN. Well, the answer is, we need to. It is going to be a challenge. In the article this morning, for example, the Post indicated that even in the private sector, most of the technology firms in this area, I think, are suffering a 20 percent vacancy.

When we did the job search to hire Mr. Campen, one of the consultants that was on board, the person that was running HIR in the meantime, said, "Jay, I hope you understand that for this kind of position in the private sector, we are talking about double the salary that you are offering."

Mr. FAZIO. I think we have got to be realistic about this. I am afraid that, just as we have been doing for years in law enforcement here, we are going to become a training ground, we are going to give people opportunities they would not have elsewhere, pay them something that would be seen as generally not adequate, and then after they get the skills, they are out the door to one of these private firms in the region and we are back starting all over again with relatively inexperienced people.

Do you have any thoughts about how we may help you deal with this problem? because I do not think it is going to be short-term. When you have got numbers like 20 percent, you know, this is probably ongoing.

Mr. EAGEN. I believe the first answer to that question is, again, we need to complete the strategic assessment. And what is anticipated at the end of that is a recommendation to the Committee on House Oversight for a new structure for HIR.

My own personal view is that it is kind of a boxy structure that is not very adaptable and that any time technology changes, it requires us to submit a very complicated reorganization to the Committee on House Oversight, so that by the time we get that done, technology passes the House by.

My vision personally-and this is something the committee will have to discuss, quite obviously-is that we should try to create a more flexible, adaptable organization. That is what the computer