Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. For the year 1934 you had an appropriation of something like $11,000,000, and last year it was dropped down to about $860,000. Is that difference due, in a general way, to the fact that the emergency fund stepped in and did work which otherwise you could nave asked for in your normal budget? Dr. MEAD. That is correct. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. In answer to Mr. Zioncheck's question, I understood you to say that there has been $105,390,000 made available for this work from emergency funds, of which something like $18,000,000 were expended as of the end of the fiscal year 1934. In your justification, you have some 38 different projects. Those are put there simply for the information of the committee, as I understand it? Dr. MEAD. Yes. Mr. KUBACH. That is the manner in which the emergency funds were allotted by the Public Works Administration. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. That is a complete list of all of the new construction under way at the present time? Mr. KUBACH. Yes. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Have some of those projects received the affirmative approval of Congress, or are they the result of legislative action? Mr. KUBACH. For some of them, emergency funds have been provided to continue work on existing reclamation projects. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Originally allotted by action of Congress? Mr. KUBACH. Yes. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. Could you indicate in your remarks which of those projects they are, when you revise your remarks? Dr. MEAD. Boulder is one. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. I assume that there is none included in this ist which has come before the Congress and failed to receive its approval? Dr. MEAD. No. Mr. ZIONCHECK. You may complete your general statement and enlarge upon some of the phases of it, if you wish. There is no new construction authorized in this bill is there, and most of the increases are restorations in pay to become effective July 1, or, if Congress shall say so, April 1? Dr. MEAD. Yes. OFFICE OF COMMISSIONER PERSONAL SERVICES AND OTHER EXPENSES, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA The first item in the bill reads as follows: Salaries: For the Commissioner of Reclamation and other personal services in the District of Columbia, $96,500; for office expenses in the District of Columbia, $15,000; in all, $111,500; Mr. KUBACH. This item is for the administrative office in the District of Columbia. The appropriations from the reclamation fund for 1934 and 1935 and the amount requested for 1936 are as follows: During 1934, 51 regular positions constituted the organization; annual base rate salaries totaled $147,260. For 1925, 51 regular positions are listed; annual salaries, $133,540. For 1936, 50 regular positions are listed; annual salaries, $130,420. The allocations for 1934 and proposed for 1935 and 1936 are as follows: Of the appropriation of $126,700 appropriated from the reclamation fund, for 1934, $94,795 ($81,684 cash, and $13,111 impounded) was expended. For 1935, only $51,378 will be expended of the $86,850 appropriated. Mr. ZIONCHECK. There is an increase, for the Commissioner of Reclamation and other personal services in the District of Columbia, of from $86,850 to $96,500, and, after you add office expenses in the District of Columbia, in all the increase is from $101,850 to $111,500. Is that merely for restoration of salaries? Mr. KUBACH. Yes, that mostly takes care of the increases. Mr. KUBACH. The 5-percent increase in salaries, or 10-percent increase in appropriations. All appropriations for 1935 were based upon 90-percent salary payments. Restoration of salaries to 100 percent during 1936 will require a 10-percent increase in appropriation for salaries during 1936. Mr. ZIONCHECK. What else is included in that, other than mere restoration of pay? Mr. KUBACH. If you will refer to the explanation on page 20 of the justification, and examine the allocation by funds of salaries of employees of the Washington office, you will find that we had emergency or Public Works money available in 1935, to care for some of the salaries of the personnel in the Washington office, and it is not known at this time whether or not such money will be available in 1936, so that we have to make a redistribution of salaries in accordance with available money. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. But, if you do get the money, this will be unexpended? Mr. KUBACH. Yes; we will not spend that entire amount. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. The total for the salaries for the Commissioner of Reclamation and other personal services in the District of Columbia is not increased over and above the funds which you had last year, including emergency funds, except for the 5 percent increase in salaries? Mr. KUBACH. That is correct. Mr. ZIONCHECK. If you will observe, in 1934 there was $94,795, and for 1936, $96,500. That represents 8% percent, does it not, by reason of the provisions of the economy act? In other words, that 8% percent is the difference between the two, and if you had full restoration now, it would be $96,500. Mr. KUBACH. That is correct. ADMINISTRATIVE PROVISIONS AND LIMITATIONS Mr. ZIONCHECK. The next item is as follows: Administrative provisions and limitations: For all expenditures authorized by the Act of June 17, 1902 (32 Stat., p. 388), and Act amendatory thereof or supplementary thereto, known as the reclamation law, and all other Acts under which expenditures from said fund are authorized, including not to exceed $100,000 for personal services and $15,000 for other expenses in the office of the chief engineer, $20,000 for telegraph, telephone, and other communication service, $5,000 for photographing and making photographic prints, $41,250 for personal services, and $7,500 for other expenses in the field legal offices; examination of estimates for appropriations in the field; refunds of overcollections and deposits for other purposes; not to exceed $18,000 for lithographing, engraving, printing, and binding; purchases of ice; purchase of rubber boots for official use by employees; maintenance and operation of horse-drawn and motor propelled passenger vehicles; not to exceed $20,000 for purchase and exchange of horse-drawn and motor-propelled passenger-carrying vehicles; packing, crating, and transportation (including drayage) of personal effects of employees upon permanent change of station, under regulations to be prescribed by the Secretary of the Interior; payment of damages caused to the owners of lands or other private property of any kind by reason of the operations of the United States, its officers or employees, in the survey, construction, operation, or maintenance of irrigation works, and which may be compromised by agreement between the claimant and the Secretary of the Interior, or such officers as he may designate; payment for official telephone service in the field hereafter incurred in case of official telephones installed in private houses when authorized under regulations established by the Secretary of the Interior; not to exceed $1,000 for expenses, except membership fees, of attendance, when authorized by the Secretary, upon meetings of technical and professional societies required in connection with official work of the Bureau; payment of rewards, when specifically authorized by the Secretary of the Interior, for information leading to the apprehension and conviction of persons found guilty of the theft, damage, or destruction of public property: Provided, That no part of said appropriations may be used for maintenance of headquarters for the Bureau of Reclamation outside the District of Columbia except for an office for the chief engineer and staff and for certain field officers of the division of public relations: Provided further, That the Secretary of the Interior in his administration of the Bureau of Reclamation is authorized to contract for medical attention and service for employees and to make necessary pay-roll deductions agreed to by the employees therefor: Provided further, That no part of any sum provided for in this Act for operation and maintenance of any project or division of a project by the Bureau of Reclamation shall be used for the irrigation of any lands within the boundaries of an irrigation district which has contracted with the Bureau of Reclamation and which is in arrears for more than twelve months in the payment of any charges due the United States, and no part of any sum provided for in this Act for such purpose shall be used for the irrigation of any lands which have contracted with the Bureau of Reclamation and which are in arrears for more than twelve months in the payment of any charges due from said lands to the United States; SALARIES AND EXPENSES, OFFICE OF THE CHIEF ENGINEER Mr. ZIONCHECK. Please explain this estimate for office of chief engineer. Mr. KUBACH. The regular appropriation act for the fiscal year 1934 carries a limitation of $156,000 for salaries in the office of the chief engineer, and $15,000 for other expenses; in all, $171,000. For the fiscal year 1936 the estimates carry a limitation of $100,000 for personal services and $15,000 for other expenses; in all, $115,000. The activities of the office of the chief engineer are confined to engineering; including investigations, construction, and operation and maintenance of irrigation and power projects, and administration incidental thereto. Investigations, construction, operation, and maintenance of projects are financed by appropriations from special funds, the reclamation fund, the Yuma auxiliary reclamation fund, by funds advanced by interested parties, by allotments from public works funds under the National Industrial Recovery Act, and by appropriations from general funds in the Treasury for the Boulder Canyon project, and the maintenance of the Colorado River front work and levee system. Since the approval of the Boulder Canyon Project Act on December 21, 1928, and the initial appropriation for the Boulder Canyon project on July 3, 1930, the office of the chief engineer has been functioning in part for reclamation project activities and in part for the design, preparation of specifications, and inauguration of the construction of the Boulder Canyon project, including the Boulder Dam, power development, and the All-American Canal. The availability of public works funds in September 1933 under allotments from the appropriation provided by the National Industrial Recovery Act, has necessitated a considerable increase in the personnel of the office of the chief engineer, to provide for the preparation of designs and specifications preliminary to the beginning of construction work on approximately thirty large construction projects, involving a total estimated cost of approximately $230,000,000. The functioning of organization of the chief engineer of the Bureau of Reclamation for the Boulder Canyon and other large construction projects, has made available for the benefit of these public works and construction projects, a supervisory organization of long experience having a high degree of technical ability, which has at its disposal valuable data. This form of organization should prove economical to both reclamation activities and the construction projects financed with public works funds. This type of organization for activities financed from various funds requires the proration of salaries of the employees to the various activities in proportion to the work performed. During 1934 the salaries of regular and temporary employees aggregated $1,121,052. It is estimated that $1,466,000 will be expended during 1935. The limitation for salaries payable from the reclamation fund during 1936 is fixed at $100,000. During 1934, $90,765 in salaries was charged to the reclamation fund. The following table shows the allocation of personal services in the office of the chief engineer for 1934 and 1935, and proposed for 1936: EXPENSES OF FIELD LEGAL OFFICERS Mr. ZIONCHECK. Now, you have a decrease, in the lower portion of the page, for personal services, from $10,000 to $7,500. How do you account for that? There you are asking for a decrease? Mr. KUBACH. The reduction is in the item for other expenses of field legal officers, and not in the item for salaries. Mr. ZIONCHECK. Wny is it that you have a decrease in the other expenses for field legal officers? Mr. KUBACH. That is brought about by having National Industrial Recovery money for expenditure, paying such expenses out of that fund, instead of the reclamation fund. EXPENSES OF DIVISION OF PUBLIC RELATIONS Mr. ZIONCHECK. Now, Mr. Kubach, turn to page 257 of the bill, in the seventh line, where you have new language. You have deleted the language "reclamation economics," and put in its place the words "public relations." Why do you have that new language, and what is the intention? Dr. MEAD. That is largely for the dissemination of information to irrigation projects, dissemination of information to the public. Mr. ZIONCHECK. Dr. Mead, will this public relations office be something like a public relations office of a private power company, to disseminate propaganda rather than enlightenment, or will this be an enlightening organization? Dr. MEAD. It is an educational organization, for the people on the projects. We want to give them more instruction than we have been able to give in the past. We want to send experienced, skilled men to all of these projects, to show them how to farm better. Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. How is that done? Dr. MEAD. I get good men and send them into the field, to talk to individuals and groups of farmers about their work. Mr. ZIONCHECK. That is for men who really go out to the settlers and help them to solve the problems as they come up? Dr. MEAD. Yes. It is a question which is the better term, but economics are largely investigation, and we do not do so much of that. It is more to give instructions to these people. GIVING INFORMATION TO SETTLERS Mr. ZIONCHECK. Doctor, on page 271 you have a paragraph reading as follows: Giving information to settlers: For the purpose of giving information and advice to settlers on reclamation projects in the selection of lands, equipment, and livestock, the preparation of land for irrigation, the selection of crops, methods of irrigation and agricultural practice, and general farm management, the cost of which shall be charged to the general reclamation fund and shall not be charged as a part of the construction or operation and maintenance cost payable by the water users under the projects: $20,000, together with the unexpended balance of the appropriation for this purpose for the fiscal year (1934 is continued available for the same purpose for the fiscal year) 1935. Does this relate to that other item that we just referred to? Dr. MEAD. Yes; it is now all under public relations. Mr. ZIONCHECK. You change the language in the previous section, and this coordinates with that? |