LEGISLATIVE BRANCH APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2015 TUESDAY, MARCH 4, 2014. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE WITNESS HON. DAVITA VANCE-COOKS, PUBLIC PRINTER OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN COLE Mr. COLE. Good morning. The subcommittee will come to order. Today we begin our fiscal year 2015 budget hearings for the various agencies of the legislative branch. As members of the subcommittee are aware, the President's fiscal year 2015 budget is available online as of this morning. Limited printed copies are being transmitted to the Congress this morning. Advance information received by the subcommittee reflects that most all of the agencies under our jurisdiction have requested a budget increase over the amount carried in the fiscal year 2014 omnibus. With our Nation dealing with a national debt of over $17 trillion, it is going to be very difficult to not only maintain current levels but to increase funding above the current levels. Everyone can be assured that we will continue to lead by example, being efficient, effective, doing more with less. I look forward to working with our ranking member, Ms. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, as well as the other members of the committee. And just for purposes of clarification, I had the good fortune of being on this committee when I was new to the appropriations. And Ms. Wasserman Schultz was the chairman then. And she has forgotten more about this committee than I am ever likely to know. So it is really wonderful to have somebody like that to work with. Returning from the last session, we have got Dr. Andy Harris, who is evidently snowed in in the Eastern Shore someplace, our vice chairman of the subcommittee. Obviously, we have my good friend, Mr. Moran, who I think is in the progress of trying to get here, and Sanford Bishop. Great to have him as always. New to the committee, Martha Roby from Alabama. God knows where she is at right now. Mark Amodei got in from Nevada somehow. And Chris Stewart got in from Utah. So I am pretty impressed with the attendance, given the weather. The budget that this subcommittee will consider, not including the Senate items under the Architect of the Capitol, is $3,448,407,000. That is an increase of at that $122,515,000, or 3.68 percent above the fiscal year 2014 levels. Before everybody gets excited, though, again, we are a long way from having our 302(b) set. When you include the Senate, the entire request for the legislative branch is $4,464,900,000, an increase of $206,900,000, or 4.86 percent above the fiscal year 2014 level. Ms. Wasserman Schultz, do you have any opening remarks you would care to make? Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Just a few brief remarks, Mr. Chairman, the first of which is to welcome you. Mr. COLE. Thank you. Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. And congratulate you on your new role as chairman of the Legislative Branch Appropriations Subcommittee. You are certainly no stranger to this committee, as you said. And I am not sure if you characterized yourself this way, but I noticed, given the commitment to the institution that you have when you served on this committee, that you are a Leg Branch nerd like me. So, you know, there are some of us that actually volunteer for this job, and you and I have consistently been among them. We have a lot of work to do on our Leg Branch bill for fiscal year 2015. And Ms. Davita Vance-Cooks, who since our last meeting has been confirmed as the Public Printer, congratulations. That is wonderful. You were in an acting capacity a year ago. And everything I have heard about your service has really validated the Senate's confirmation of your choice. Ms. VANCE-COOKS. Thank you. OPENING STATEMENT OF RANKING MEMBER WASSERMAN SCHULTZ Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Last year, we discussed the National Academy of Public Administration report, which outlined recommendations for bringing GPO into the digital age. And I know the committee would benefit from hearing an update about that. I am assuming that you have one. The recommendations were costly to implement, and so, hopefully, you have made some significant progress. We also should acknowledge, Mr. Chairman, that a lot of Members, not on this subcommittee, use GPO as a political football because they have the word "printing" in their name, lacking the understanding that it is actually more expensive to produce things digitally than it is to actually print them. So the Public Printer has recommended a name change, which I understand in checking with them that the unions who represent the employees at GPO support, to more accurately reflect that they are a publishing operation, much moreso these days than a printer. So the Government Publishing Office would become their name after legislation that has been introduced would be adopted. GPO has repeated time and again that two-thirds of their print costs for congressional work go toward content development. So reflecting that name change is important. And I think we should keep that in mind as we listen to the Public Printer's testimony today. The other thing during your testimony, if you have not already planned to provide it, is GPO had some struggle with accident reports. When I was chair, we monitored those pretty closely because there seemed to be a disproportionately high number of accidents terested to hear about how both of those have developed or re tracted under your tenure. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. COLE. Thank you. Now, the first agency we will hear from this morning is the Government Printing Office. The Government Printing Office requested $128.9 for the fiscal year 2015, an increase of $9.6 million, or roughly 8 percent above the fiscal year 2014 level. I want to welcome Ms. Davita Vance-Cooks, and look forward to hearing your testimony on behalf of the entire committee. I want to congratulate you, obviously, for your new position as being named as our new Public Printer. We look forward to hearing your testimony. And as I believe you are the first woman and first African American to hold that position. So it is quite a wonderful distinction and recognition of your tremendous public service. Do you have any additional remarks you care to make? Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. No, not at all. Mr. COLE. Thank you. OPENING STATEMENT OF PUBLIC PRINTER MS. VANCE-COOKS. Mr. Chairman, Ms. Wasserman Schultz, and members of the subcommittee, good morning, and thank you for inviting me here to discuss GPO's appropriation request for fiscal year 2015. Seated beside me is Jim Bradley, the Deputy Public Printer. I am especially glad to be here on this day of all days because it is the 153rd anniversary of the day that GPO first opened its doors for business in 1861. In other words, today is GPO's birthday. So much of the GPO has changed since then. And it is especially evident today, because later this morning, we will be releasing the President's fiscal year budget 2015. And it is not just in print, which was the traditional format for decades. It is also in digital format, including a mobile Web app. Times have changed, and the GPO is changing with it. I would also like to point out at this very moment 153 years ago today, while the GPO was opening its doors for business, crowds were gathering on the other side of the Capitol to witness the inauguration of President Abraham Lincoln, another historic moment. I mention this because President Lincoln had a special relationship with the GPO, which is the subject of a current exhibit that we have open to the public. As you know, the GPO is the official digital secure resource for producing, procuring, cataloguing, indexing, authenticating, disseminating, and preserving the official information products of the Federal Government. This morning in my prepared remarks, I would like to discuss two key issues. The first is a brief overview of our accomplishments in fiscal year 2013, to be followed by a brief overview of our budget request for fiscal year 2015. Our key accomplishments: In spite of the fiscal challenges that we, like other agencies, confronted this past year, GPO was able to meet the information product requirements of Congress, the Federal Agencies, and the public without having to resort to furloughs |