----------------------------Original message---------------------------- The Chair of GODORT and the Chair of the GODORT Legislation Committee have requested that the NAAN (national action alert network) be activated. Below is a summary of pending legislation that needs to be broadcast to all parties interested in government information and the FDLP. Please contact me with any questions. All NAAN volunteers must contact me regarding receipt of this info by Tuesday, June 13. Since I am on vacation, please either e-mail me ([log in to unmask]) or call me at home. Aimee Piscitelli, Coordinator of the NAAN June 9, 1995 TO: Depository Library Community FROM: Mary Redmond, Chair, Government Documents Round Table of the American Library Association RE: GPO Appropriations Legislative Alert ACTION REQUIRED IMMEDIATELY: information must be received by members of the House Appropriations Committee prior to Thursday, JUNE 15th. BACKGROUND: The Legislative Branch Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee held a mark-up session on June 8th on the FY 1996 Legislative Branch Appropriations. The Subcommittee proposes that the appropriation for the Superintendent of Documents be cut by HALF from this year's appropriation. The Public Printer's original request was $30.3 million for Salaries and Expenses to support depository library distribution and the cataloging and indexing of government information. FY 95 appropriation was $32.2 million, with $18.67 million going to printing and reproduction for depository libraries. The Markup reduced the overall appropriation to $16.3 for FY 96, with only $5.5 million for printing and reproduction for depositories. Instead of GPO funding the printing and distribution, the executive agencies will pay for it. Agencies will be required to reimburse GPO for cost of printing and distributing paper documents, which the Subcom. hopes will encourage agencies to use electronic format. The Appropriations Committee will hold a hearing on the Legislative Branch Appropriations on Thursday, July 15th, and plan to move the legislation to the floor on June 20th. This fifty per cent reduction would destroy the viability of the depository library program. There are provisions on the books now for agencies, when they print publications outside GPO, to pay for the extra copies that should go to depositories. Most of the time, agencies flout this law, creating an ever-increasing problem of fugitive documents. The agencies are under increasing pressure to save money, and this measure will provide a tremendous incentive to not provide information through the depository library program. With this change, Congress is disassociating itself from its historic commitment to providing access to government information. Further, this funding change is a major change in information policy that should not be undertaken without study and hearings. *The effect of this reduction is to make far less information available through the Depository Library Program. Publications will not be distributed throughout the country, made accessible through cataloging, and preserved. *Library costs to seek out and to catalog what are now fugitive documents will greatly increase. *GPO Access is funded on cost savings from the GPO's distribution of publications. With this reduction, GPO will no longer be able to support and expand the resources of GPO Access. *A precipitous shift to electronic only dissemination for government information will place unrealistic demands on limited library resources and could severely limit access for the public. This last point reflects a stated goal of the Legislative Branch Subcommittee, which is to encourage agencies to publish electronically in order to save money. GODORT has addressed before the need to provide information to Members of Congress on this issue. Electronic access points, such as THOMAS and the White House web site have been highly publicized. However, electronic formats of information are not yet accessible to a majority of the population and still represent only a small portion of all federal information. While there are certainly potential savings for producing and disseminating some information in electronic format, our library users still rely heavily on printed materials. There are still many issues, during this transition from printed to electronic information, to be resolved. Many libraries still lack adequate equipment to access electronic information, significant costs are transferred to the library and the user for printing the information retrieved electronically, and there are not yet adequate provisions for preserving and providing bibliographic access to electronic information. In the markup hearing, members were aware that this proposal is a radical change, and specifically noted that the (full) Appropriations Committee needs to hear from the library community. ACTION REQUIRED: Please review the list of members of the House Appropriations Committee attached to this letter. 1) If your representative is a member of the Legislative Branch Subcommittee (Representatives Thornton (Ark.), Packard (CA), Dixon (CA), Fazio (CA), Young (FL), Miller (FL), Wicker (Miss.) Taylor(NC), of the Appropriations Committee, call or fax immediately: Tell your representative on the Legislative Branch Subcom. how disappointed you are in the fifty percent reduction in appropriations for the Depository Library Program, explaining how important this program is to your library and its users. Ask your representative to support an amendment that would restore $16 million to the Superintendent of Documents Salaries and Expenses appropriation for FY96, for the reasons outlined above. 2) If your Representative is a member of the full Appropriations Committee, contact him or her immediately: Request support for an amendment that would restore $16 million to the Superintendent of Documents Salaries and Expenses appropriation for FY96, for the reasons outlined above. 3) If your representative is not a member of the Appropriations Committee, contact your own representative immediately: Ask your representative to request his or her colleagues on the Appropriations Committee to restore the $16 million cut from the Superintendent of Documents Salaries and Expenses appropriation for FY96, for the reasons outlined above. House Appropriations Committee ST Representative (Party) Phone Fax E-Mail == ========================== ======== ======== ============ Area Code 202 @hr.house.gov Chairman LA Livingston, Robert (R) 225-3015 225-0739 AL Bevill, Thomas (D) 225-4876 225-1604 AL Callahan, Sonny (R) 225-4931 225-0562 AR Dickey, Jay (R) 225-3772 225-1314 jdickey AR Thornton, Raymond (D) 225-2506 225-9273 AZ Kolbe, James T. (R) 225-2542 225-0378 CA Dixon, Julian C. (D) 225-7084 225-4091 CA Fazio, Vic (D) 225-5716 225-5141 CA Lewis, Jerry (R) 225-5861 225-6498 CA Packard, Ronald (R) 225-3906 225-0134 rpackard CA Pelosi, Nancy (D) 225-4965 225-8259 sfnancy CA Riggs, Frank (R) 225-3311 225-7710 CA Torres, Esteban E. (D) 225-5256 225-9711 CO Skaggs, David E. (D) 225-2161 225-9127 skaggs FL Miller, Dan (R) 225-5015 226-0828 FL Young, C. W. (R) 225-5961 225-9764 GA Kingston, Jack (R) 225-5831 226-2269 IA Lightfoot, James R. (R) 225-3806 225-6973 IL Durbin, Richard J. (D) 225-5271 225-0170 durbin IL Porter, John E. (R) 225-4835 225-0157 IL Yates, Sidney R. (D) 225-2111 225-3493 IN Myers, John T. (R) 225-5805 225-1649 IN Visclosky, Peter J. (D) 225-2461 225-2493 KY Rogers, Harold (R) 225-4601 225-0940 MD Hoyer, Steny H. (D) 225-4131 225-4300 MI Knollenberg, Joe (R) 225-5802 226-2356 MN Sabo, Martin O. (D) 225-4755 225-4886 MS Wicker, Roger (R) 225-4306 225-3549 NC Hefner, W. G. "Bill" (D) 225-3715 225-4036 NC Taylor, Charles Hart (R) 225-6401 225-0519 chtaylor NJ Frelinghuysen, Rodney (R) 225-5034 225-0658 NM Skeen, Joseph (R) 225-2365 225-9599 NV Vucanovich, Barbara (R) 225-6155 225-2319 NY Forbes, Michael 225-3826 225-3143 mforbes NY Lowey, Nita M. (D) 225-6506 225-0546 NY Walsh, James T. (R) 225-3701 225-4042 OH Hobson, David L. (R) 225-4324 225-1984 OH Kaptur, Marcy (D) 225-4146 225-7711 OH Regula, Ralph (R) 225-3876 225-3059 OH Stokes, Louis (D) 225-7032 225-1339 OK Istook, Ernest Jim (R) 225-2132 226-1463 istook OR Bunn, Jim (R) 225-5711 225-2994 PA Foglietta, Thomas M. (D) 225-4731 225-0088 PA McDade, Joseph M. (R) 225-3731 225-9594 PA Murtha, John P. (D) 225-2065 225-5709 Murtha TX Bonilla, Henry (R) 225-4511 225-2237 TX Chapman, Jim (D) 225-3035 225-7265 TX Coleman, Ronald D. (D) 225-4831 225-4825 TX DeLay, Thomas (R) 225-5951 225-5241 TX Wilson, Charles (D) 225-2401 225-1764 cwilson VA Wolf, Frank R. (R) 225-5136 225-0437 WA Dicks, Norman D. (D) 225-5916 226-1176 WA Nethercutt, George (R) 225-2006 225-3392 WI Neumann, Mark (R) 225-3031 225-3393 WI Obey, David R. (D) 225-3365 na WV Mollohan, Alan B. (D) 225-4172 225-7564 All e-mail addresses end with suffix at top of e-mail column.