Bill Passed by House Would Provide No Money for GPO's Federal Digital System, Sharply Cuts Other Information Resources
By Michael Kelley Jul 27, 2011Even as all eyes focus on the stalemate over the debt ceiling, the House of Representatives has been assiduously working on bills that, if unchanged, would have a deleterious effect on information resources at the Government Printing Office and the Census Bureau.
On July 22, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 2551, the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act, 2012 by a vote of 252 - 159. Unless the Senate acts, the bill would reduce GPO's budget for FY12 by 20 percent to $108.1 million.
Within the GPO budget is the appropriation for the Office of Superintendent of Documents' Salaries and Expenses, which funds the Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP). This appropriation would be reduced 16 percent, to $33.5 million, eliminating funding for the Federal Digital System (FDsys).
|
FY11 |
FY12 President |
FY12 House |
|
|
GPO |
135,067,324 |
148,474,000 |
108,053,860 |
|
Superintendent of Documents |
39,831,178 |
42,173,000 |
33,468,010 |
"The library community is deeply concerned about the impact these cuts would have on the American's public's ability to access government information," Emily Sheketoff, the executive director of the American Library Association's Washington office, wrote July 21 to members of the House Committee on Appropriations.
Gary Somerset, a spokesperson for GPO, said "We would be less than candid if we did not state our disappointment with the deep spending cuts affecting GPO included in the final bill, including the amendment approved Friday to further reduce our funding," he said, referring to House amendment 704 which reduced proposed GPO funding by an additional $4.9 million.
Structure of FDLP being undermined
FDLP is responsible for the free dissemination of government publications to about 1220 participating academic, research, public, federal, state and other libraries nationwide as well as thousands of others via the Internet. The depository libraries provide local, no-fee access to the information.
"No-fee public access to government information is the foundation of an informed citizenry; these cuts in appropriations will affect the public's right to government information," Sheketoff wrote.
Kirsten Clark, the regional depository librarian at the University of Minnesota and the chair of ALA's Government Documents Round Table, said the bill and the subsequent House report betrayed a lack of understanding of the GPO's role as a "great equalizer," that provides everybody access to "the same key documents of our democracy."
"The cut in funding to the Office of the Superintendent of Documents seriously undermines the work they do to support the Federal Depository Library Program," she said. "To cut the funding to the Office of the Superintendent of Documents affects the entire structure and provides less support for the libraries to meet the needs of the constituents those cutting the funding represent."
No money for GPO's "system of record"
GPO's FDsys provides free and authoritative online access to federal government publications. In an interview in April with Federal News Radio, Superintendent of Documents Mary Alice Baish said FDsys became the "system of record for the U.S. Government Printing Office" in December 2010. All the information previously housed on GPOAccess has migrated to the new system, and GPOAccess will become archive only and the site will sunset, she said.
"The lack of understanding is very much apparent in the cut of funding for the Federal Digital System," Clark said. "This funding provides for development to ensure FDsys is a system that changes with future technologies, provides permanent preservation of online government information, and ensures the authenticity of this information. Without the ability to continue work on FDsys or to add current digital documents to it, the government information being produced now will not be captured for use in the present day or preserved for use in the future. How can there not be funding for such basic access to what our government is doing now and for generations to come?"
Sheketoff wrote that "The lack of appropriated funds to FDsys means that this vehicle for public access is at great risk," and she also expressed concern about the long term preservation of born digital material.
Somerset said GPO was hopeful that the "final appropriations include the funding levels we will need to continue providing the work Congress requires us to perform," but he shared the concern about the fate of FDsys.
"This investment is essential to supporting GPO's 21st century digital information platform, which is being relied on by Congress to transition its information products to digital formats, save on printing costs, and improve transparency to congressional information," he said.
The bill would also require the Government Accountability Office "to review the feasibility of Executive Branch printing being performed by the General Services Administration, the transfer of the Superintendent of Documents program to the Library of Congress, and the privatization of the GPO ... [and] report its findings to the Committee on Appropriations of the House and Senate no later than January 31, 2012."
"We ask that the library community be involved in this study, as a report that speaks to the future of the GPO and the Superintendent of Documents program is of vital interest to the library community and to public access to government documents," Sheketoff wrote.
Census Bureau publications and data gathering at risk
Meanwhile, the Census Bureau is also fighting to save its budget from steep cuts. LJ has previously reported on how the Census Bureau, under its own budget proposal for FY12, plans to eliminate its Statistical Compendia branch, which is responsible for the Statistical Abstract, a stalwart reference work, as well as periodic supplements. Among these are the State and Metropolitan Area Data Book, County and City Data Book, and USA Counties web database. The budget would also eliminate Current Industrial Reports and Federal Financial Statistics.
President Obama proposed reducing the agency's budget from $1.15 billion to $1.02 billion in FY12, but now the House's Commerce, Justice and Science appropriations measure for 2012 includes further reductions, to $885 million.
This has spurred an unusually blunt July 15 blog posting from Robert M. Groves, the bureau's director, about the potential impact:
A cut of this magnitude in our periodic programs account means we cannot do all the work the Congress has asked us to do. Our ability to provide high quality and comprehensive statistical data will be severely diminished if we sustain such a large budget cut and we will be forced to cancel major programs that provide critical benchmark measures. This reduction also will force the layoffs of up to 700 employees from our headquarters workforce of almost 4600. In addition to the personal hardships that would cause the hard working, dedicated employees of the Census Bureau, the loss of scientific, technical, and professional expertise that would result from losing such a high percentage of our workforce would have programmatic and data quality repercussions for years to come.
Among other examples, Groves notes that the Bureau of Economic Analysis uses the statistics from the Economic Census to benchmark Gross Domestic Product (GDP) estimates and prepare input-output tables, which are the fundamental tool for national and regional economic planning. And it could undermine next year's Economic Survey, which is conducted every five years to calculate the Gross Domestic Product, since 90 percent of the data used in calculating GDP comes from the Census Bureau.
In other words, not only the Statistical Abstract may disappear, but the very statistics themselves.
"Taking away information, the lack of information is a huge issue to us," said Jenni Terry, a press officer for ALA's Washington office. "We want as much information as the government can make available to be available, and taking away the resources to do that is of concern," she said.
The Census Bureau recently closed half its regional offices in order to cut costs by $15 million to $18 million.
