The above figures indicate that item-wise, Q property represents almost half of these items. Thus processing time and effort are substantially reduced for almost 50 percent of the items previously reported. To date only 45 Q items representing an acquisition cost of $9,170.90 have passed the 75-day limit (August 1 to October 15, 1953), but this number should increase considerably.

5. The real value of the Q plan is becoming apparent in still another way. As experience is gathered in administering the plan, additional items which logically belong in the Q category are being sought out. Headquarters AMC teletype MCSYDE-7-17-E has delineated a large number of cases in which property will be classed in the Q category. This trend toward a comprehensive delineation of P and Q property will ease the expense of the excess program, and at the same time increase its monetary return.

Mr. BALWAN. Everything before the July 23 directive was on the P plan because it had to have national screening. On the P plan, now, you are required to screen in the military within 45 days, aren't you?

Colonel RAMME. No, Q property only, sir. Under this Q plan you take what used to be all P and divide it into P and Q-P representing the high dollar and high utilization potential and Q the low value or low utilization potential. Under the P plan there is no change. Mr. THOMAS. When you talk about high value you are talking about $100?

Colonel RAMME. One hundred dollars or more.
Mr. THOMAS. Both P and Q?

Colonel RAMME. Yes, sir.

Mr. BALWAN. What is the upward limit of Q, $100?

Colonel PACKARD. It varies all the way from $300 to $500, depending on the category.

Mr. THOMAS. It has to be above $100 to get into P.

Mr. BALWAN. But the upward limit for Q is $300.

Colonel RAMME. Yes. There is no change in the processing of the P category material. The system is still the same. It gets national screening. But for the Q category, the Surplus Materiel Division of the Navy and GSA have a total combined time of 75 days to screen and say they want it, or we can throw it in salvage at the end of 75 days.

Mr. MORRIS. That is a regional screening?

Colonel RAMME. We do our regional screening in addition.

Colonel PACKARD. Actually it breaks down like this. The base, for example, starting out with a base excess sends it to the prime depot, and they are given 10 days only to hold it. Then they process it on to SMD, and they are given 10 days in which to get their listings out. The 75 days start from that date on. So, actually, it can be a total of 95 days plus mail time from the base. The lists are sent out

to the Army, Navy, or Air Force and they are given 30 days plus a 10 days processing time.

GSA, in the meantime, processes their lists on down to their regions, and can be screening their lists during the 40-day time. If the Services decide they need the property within 40 days, then GSA is notified. If they do not notify GSA within that 40 days, then GSA can approve the request for the property. In all cases it must be within the 75-day pipeline time from the time that SMD has prepared the listings.

Mr. BALWAN. Can you release P material automatically after a total of 75 days?

Colonel RAMME. No, just Q. P is not affected by this plan. You can release Q after 75 days.

Mr. THOMAS. You have no time limit on P. That can take a year or a year and a half, and in many cases has taken a year and a half. Mr. BALWAN. Where?

Colonel RAMME. In the screening.

Mr. BALWAN. In the military? Can the military take that much time?

Mr. THOMAS. No, it goes to the military and then to GSA, and then it goes through screening by State, health, and education agencies under the State donation statute. Consequently, it has taken, in many cases, a year and a half to get it released.

Mr. BALWAN. After the military has said that it is excess?

Mr. THOMAS. After they declared it excess. Then the screening process has taken a year, a year and a half. As you say it was totally unsatisfactory. This was the first step taken to break it down, and this has speeded it up some for disposal.

Colonel RAMME. The system started on the 1st of August. This chart indicates the number of items which we have put into this system since then, and you will note that the totals of P and Q each represent about half of our items.

Mr. THOMAS. How about the items under $100, isn't that a pretty substantial amount of your disposal?

Colonel RAMME. Yes, sir. That figure isn't on the chart, but in August we had 109 items under the P plan and 72 items under the Q plan.

Mr. HOLIFIELD. Your program, then, has speeded up that part of this program?

Colonel RAMME. Yes; this has very definitely speeded up, and by taking half the processing from the P category, this category should speed up automatically.

Mr. HOLIFIELD. You haven't noticed much expedition in the P program?

Colonel RAMME. Well, it just started-it's too new. We've hardly had time to complete a cycle yet.

Mr. BALWAN. Is it possible to have a $1,000 machine of some kind which automatically goes into P category, but to have it be in condition R-4, in other words, it is just not good, salvage material? Can you people automatically classify that in the X or Q and dispose of it, or does all material which is valued at a thousand

Colonel RAMME. If it is in that bad shape; yes, sir. If it is obvious that it cannot be of any use to anyone.

Mr. BALDWIN. Let's say if it is in R-2?

Mr. THOMAS. It could go into Q. It could be an item that had high sale value, and it would automatically go into P category. But if it is in bad condition, unusable, it goes into Q.

Mr. BALWAN. The reason we ask is that at some of these bases we saw certain items which had a high value and which appeared that they might have to go into P even though it would have little use to anybody, but because of their value it would have to receive a national screening which would probably exceed the cost-exceed the return from that.

Mr. HOLIFIELD. Expensive electronics equipment might well come in that category.

Colonel RAMME. This figure on the chart applies to fiscal year '53. Excess property which we have transferred from the active Air Force stocks directly to disposal in fiscal year '53: 4,589 with a property value of $15 million.

Mr. HOLIFIELD. They are tons, aren't they?

Colonel RAMME. Tons; yes, sir. Property which we have transferred from the excess account on to form 120's and reported them for fiscal year '53: 1,823 items, acquisition value of $2,653,000, and about 790 tons. Property which we have listed on this excess report but for which we have not received instructions: 568 of the 1,823 items, dollar value of $830,000.

Mr. BALWAN. How long has that been tied up?

Colonel RAMME. These were reported during fiscal year 1953. I presume they are scattered throughout the year.

Colonel PACKARD. Don't you have a breakdown of the number of items by age and quarters?

Colonel RAMME. Yes, we do have, in your brochure we have included a breakdown of these figures by quarter for fiscal year 1953 and these figures represent the total. I am glad you reminded me.

Mr. RIEHLMAN. You don't have any idea of the number of items in the 4,589 tons? You see, that doesn't give us a very clear comparison when you come down to the No. 2 there, the property account.

Colonel RAMME. This is tonnage. Can you estimate the number of items, Miss Zambelich?

Miss ZAMBELICH. Is that for account 1? No, I just have 7.

(NOTE. The approximate number of items transferred from account 1 to disposal during the last 4 quarters is 10,341.)

Mr. HOLIFIELD. In order to ascertain that dollar value you must have known what the items were. There must be a record somewhere. Mr. RIEHLMAN. You look at the number of items, 1,823, that you have disposed of and acquisition cost, $2,653,000, and then you look at your tonnage and your percentage of tonnage is very low compared with what you had in column 1 for the approximate tonnage there for the disposal of fifteen million.

Colonel PACKARD. Mr. Riehlman, that information is available in column 2. They show number of items and approximate tonnage and so forth. Again, going back to our pounds discussion, we have the number of items here and also the tonnage; so I am sure that can be furnished for the record. The number of items not including the tonnage and approximate value. As we explained before, the items are individually kept by record.

Mr. RIEHLMAN. Fine.

Mr. HOLIFIELD. Are your employees in this department hired on the basis of the number of tons they handle?

Colonel RAMME. No, sir.

Mr. HOLIFIELD. You have to have a skeleton force to handle the tonnage, regardless.

Colonel RAMME. You are talking about screening now, sir, to get this property into the excess category or the salvage yard.

Mr. HOLIFIELD. The salvage yard.

Colonel RAMME. They are not hired on their ability to produce tons, of course, but that is our goal.

Mr. HOLIFIELD. These tonnage figures you give us, is that an esti mate or is that a result of actual weighing?

Colonel RAMME. That is actual weighing, the material which goes into the disposal yard is weighed pound by pound.

Mr. BALWAN. It is not a figure taken from stock record cards? Colonel RAMME. No, sir; this should be the actual scale weight. Everything which comes to the disposal yard is weighed, and the documentation so indicates.

Mr. BALWAN. And the approximate value is taken from the record cards, or do you figure a flat rate of $3,000 a ton?

Colonel PACKARD. No, sir; it is the actual acquisition cost.

Colonel RAMME. It is the stocklist cost. We have the items from the stocklist on this. It came out of our active stock rather than scrap. The total movement of property in the last 6 months to disposal was 12 million pounds-slightly over 12 million. The movement out of disposal is 13,098,000 pounds. In the last 6 months we have moved out of disposal about a million pounds more than we have put into disposal. You will notice in the first 3 months we actually were accumulating faster than we were selling; the last 3 months it was reversed.

Mr. THOMAS. How much was left in the yard?

Colonel RAMME. As an estimate, about 2 million pounds.
Mr. RIEHLMAN. You are keeping ahead of the program?
Colonel RAMME. Yes, sir.

Mr. BALWAN. The point I am trying to make here, if we can establish it for the record in just a brief summary form-what you are giving is a good picture of the answer to our question, "Are you keeping up with the operation or is it getting ahead of you?" Are you developing a backlog of disposal?

Colonel RAMME. We are not; we are able to keep up.

Mr. BALWAN. In terms of tons coming in and tons going out, you are ahead, is that it?

Colonel RAMME. We are just about even, we are holding our own. In 6 months we have actually sold a million pounds more than we took in, but we may, in the 6 months prior to that, have had the reverse.

Mr. RIEHLMAN. For the past 6 months you are ahead of the game? Colonel RAMME. Yes, but if you take that figure and analyze it for the first 3 months, it shows we were falling behind. If you took only the last 3 months, it shows we are getting way ahead.

Mr. BALWAN. You still haven't received the impact of Spring Clean on your disposal program?

Colonel RAMME. Yes, sir; we have, very definitely. We have been disposing under Spring Clean here for several months-property

which we have on hand which was our own determination of excess in our prime classes.

Colonel PACKARD. I think perhaps we can clarify it this way. Warner-Robins had not advanced on Spring Clean as Sacramento had. They had not broken out their paper processing of their excess requirements. Sacramento has done that and has processed those to the bases and to the depots, and also locally here. You have processed those items into your excess-property account. Now at WarnerRobins they had just started that. Some of the depots are ahead of the others. So at least here at this depot, a good share of their property has been procesesd to the disposal account. Warner-Robins, in getting their lists out a little later, still have an impact on their depot that will come at a little later time.

Colonel RAMME. Further, in Spring Clean, parts which are peculiar to the F-82 airplane, for instance, are not usable on any other aircraft. Those parts went directly to disposal, as there is no screening you can do on them. The common parts were screened, however, so there was a large generation from Project Spring Clean.

I want to discuss briefly, the reclamation branch, which is a part of the Maintenance Engineering Directorate here, but is in the channel of our disposal of properties. I thought you should be familiar with it and the directives under which they operate. Again these directives are included in the brochure.

The physical facilities of the reclamation yard total just under 400,000 square feet and covered buildings, 36,000; at the receiving yard, approximately 188,000 square feet. In an area at the other end of the field, physically separated from the receiving yard, called Nat N, is another 175,000 square feet where the tear-down of aircraft is accomplished.

Mr. BALWAN. Colonel Ramme, let me see that previous sheet just a second. Now, that P material, $282,000 was the acquisition cost? Colonel RAMME. Yes, sir.

Mr. BALWAN. Have you disposed of that?

Colonel RAMME. Not disposed of, no, sir. This was reported during the month of August on the form 120 under the P category. Mr. BALWAN. That is $282,000 and only 13,000 in Q?

Colonel RAMME. That's right, sir.

Mr. BALWAN. So your big majority of reportable surplus is still in the P category?

Colonel RAMME. Definitely, sir, of the total.

Mr. BALWAN. The P is the one that goes through the whole screening.

Colonel RAMME. For the 3 months, we have accumulated $500,000 in P category and only 30,000 in Q.

Mr. BALWAN. Then your Q hasn't eased you up on a great deal.
Colonel RAMME. It represents 50 percent of the items.

Mr. BALWAN. Fifty percent of the items, but not the dollar?
Colonel RAMME. Not the dollar.

Mr. RIEHLMAN. But it eliminates a lot of paperwork, doesn't it?
Colonel RAMME. It sure does. Yes, sir.

Mr. RIEHLMAN. And that's what you are really saying, that by having this category, your biggest gain is in cutting out your paperwork rather than in dollar recovery?

Colonel RAMME. Yes, sir.