PUBLIC BUILDING AMENDMENTS OF 1971

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP86-00244R000100080023-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 17
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 19, 1999
• Sequence Number: 23
• Publication Date: October 28, 1971
• Content Type: REGULATION

ILLEGIB
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Calenular No. 40.3
02D CO\ GRESS
Ist Session
P,T?ILDIPUBLIC tiGS AMENDMENTS OF 19 71
Mr. GRAVEL, from the Committee on Public Works,
submitted the following
REPORT
The Committee on Public Works, to which was referred the bill
(S. 1736) to amend the Public Buildings Act of 1959, as amended, to
provide for financing the acquisition, construction, alteration; mainte-
nance, operation, and protection of public buildings, and for other
purposes, having considered the same, reports favorably thereon with
an amendment and recommends that the bill as amended do pass.
Co~tMrrTEE AMENDMENTS
S. 1736, as reported, is a composite bill containing the essential fea-
tures of S. 17,36 and of S._344 9, a related bill. Purchase-contract aut Ilor-
ity for the accelerated construction of public buildings, which was a
part of S. `3475 clones is included in the reported version of S. 1730.
SUMMARY OF TIIE LEGISLATION
S. 17 36, as reported, amends the Public Buildings Act of 1959 (73
Stat. 479), as amended (40 U.S.C. 601 et seq.), and the Federal Prop-
erty and Administrative Services Act of 1949, as amended (40 U.S.C.
490),to:
(1) update certain limiting and technical provisions in the
public buildings law;
(2) require individual Federal departments and agencies to
account in their annual budgets for the approsiinate commercial.
value of the office space nhich th eF will occupy during that fiscal
year ;
(3) create in the Treasury of the United States a new Federal
buildings fund, to be composed n~ilnal ilj~of reirtal equivalents
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aid into..tha-fluid by depautnients and agencies _at rates estab-
isTied by the -Ndulinistrator._of General'Sergi ices, together with
cer 9aiii other revenues, collections, and moneys appropriated to the
General Services Administration;
(4) issue to the General Services Administration for 3-year
period authority to enter into purchase contracts in order to assist
in clearing the existing backlog in the construction of public
buildings;
(5) direct that in developing plans for future public buildings.
the Administrator of General Services shall give due considera-
tion to excellence of architecture and design, and
(6) insure compliance by the General Services ~ldministra
tion, in the acquisition of real property for the construction and
alteration of public buildings, with all applicable provisions of
the Uniform Relocation Assistance and Real Property Acquisi-
tion Policies Act of 1970 (8I Stat. 189I).
NEED
In recent years, fiscal conditions have made it all but impossible to
sustain a timely, efficient Federal building; program. As a result, the
General Services Administration o teii Tins been unable to supply the
space demands of Federal agencies in Government-owned buildings.
The GSA has reported to the conulii ee tai zt: no fearer than 63
public buildings, some of them authorized as long as 10 years ago,
remain unconstructed today although the land for these facilities has
been acquired and their designs completed. These (i3 buildings are in
a -dittoii`To many other public buildings projects which as yet have
received no appropriations. If sufficient. funds were available. con-
struction of the G could begin promptly. Clearly, their continued post-
ponement is costly to the Government, and not simply in terms of the
rise in construction costs which occurs as the years drag on.
For every year that these parcels of kind lie idle in the possession
of the Federal goAernuient, local jurisdictions are deprived of needed
property tax revenue without experielleiiig the. benefit. of increased
payrolls. The plans for the buildings themselves often become out-
moded. The Federal agencies which are, scheduled to occupy the facil-
ities are forced to scatter their personnel around in rented quarters,
an arrang;rinent which is expensive both because of the rent paid to
landlords and because of the inericiency which may result when an
ageiicy's staff is badly dispersed.:`+foreover, by not acting to overcome
this backlog, the ?*overm:nnent leaves thousands of persons unemployed
who might otherwise have found work as part of an aggressive Fed-
eral building program.
.The procedures now in effect for the funding of authorized public
buildings only contribute to the delays in construction time. Under
thew, time G.S.A. must cone before Congress two separate times in
order to obtain first., appropriations for the site acquisition and design
of a public building, and second, appropriations for the actual con-
struction of the facility.
Since this method has been in effect, the backlog' of projects leas risen
to the point that based on the average annual appropriation to the
G.S.A. for the coonstruction of Federal buiff ingssince 19 9-$11,i mil-
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lion per year-it would require 10 years to overcome the. present back-
log alone, much less to keep abreast of the developing office needs of
the Executive branch.
Last, it is apparent to the committee that, at least in part, the gov-
ernment's current space problem may be attributed to a misallocation
of existing office space among the Federal agencies. The G.S.A. pies-
ently bears the budgetary responsibility for th(Icost of"tli e office space
oct`t )leT1)v most of the Executive branch. Since the departments and
n encies themselves are not assessed in their individual budgets for
the value of the space which they occupy, they have little incentive to
conserve. Instead, the tendency is for agencies to request from G.S.A.
more space than they legitimately need, and then to hoard it. Aside
from the fact that an accurate performance k pc get is defeated unless
agencies are held accountable foi if1 of~tIieir costs, the diseconomies of
the present arrangement are clear.
HEARINGS
On September 28, 1971, the Subcommittee on Buildings and Grounds
of the Committee on Public Works held hearings on S. 1736 and S.
2479, a related bill. Witnesses who testified at that time were Robert
L. Kunzig, Administrator of the General Services Administration;
Gregory J. Apart, deputy director of the civil division, United States
General Accounting Office; William Marshall, Jr., vice president
of the American Institute of Architects; and Harold G. Tufty, vice
president for communications of the American Society of Value Engi-
neers. Each of these witnesses testified favorably as to the value. of
this legislation.
GENERAL STATE_lIE\ T
Legislation pertaining to public buildings has consisted of various
measures going back to 1902, when the first general Act was passed.
At the beginning of World War I, the entire government building
program was suspended, and was not reinstated until the enactment
of the Public Buildings Act of 1926. Under that Act, which until 19,59
provided the basic authority for direct construction by appropriations
of the Federal. government, a total of some $620 million was authorized
and appropriated.
- In 1919, the Congress enacted the Public Buildings Act of 1949,
known as Public Law 105 of the Slst Congress. In essence, P.L. 105
provided an authorization of $10 million for the acquisition of sites
and preparation of plans for Federal public buildings outside the
District of Columbia, and $30 million for improvements of existing
buildings. Also during 1919, the Congress enacted Public Law 103,
which created'the General Services Administration.
In 195k, the Lease-Purchase Act became law (P.L. 519, 83d Cong.).
That Act authorized a progra111 Tor the acquisition of title to real
property zi.nd construction cf buildings by the G.S.A. and the Post
Office I)epartmeiit through lease-pure lia. e agreements, and zlhS) pro-
vided an expansion of authority for term -leasing' a~~?i?ei'nments, not to
exceed 3l) ,-ears, for the accoinn~odation of activitie of the Post C rice
Department. Under the provisions of this Art, buildingg-s were financed
by private capital and installment payments on the purchase price
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were made by the government in lieu of rent.'Title to the property
rested in the United States at the end of the contract period, not less
than 10 nor more than 30 years.
The authority for lease-purchase contracts pursuant to P.L. 519
expired on July 22, 1987. Busing the years of its operation, some 8
Post Office Department buildings and 29 other public buildings had
been placed under construction through lease-purchase agreements.
The Lease-Purchase Act as fol ,m-ed._.by the Public Buildings Act
of 19 9