[House Hearing, 111 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
RECOVERY ACT PROJECT TO REPLACE THE
SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION'S
NATIONAL COMPUTER CENTER
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS
SUBCOMMITTEE ON SOCIAL SECURITY
JOINT WITH THE
COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND
INFRASTRUCTURE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT,
PUBLIC BUILDINGS, AND EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
DECEMBER 15, 2009
__________
Serial No. 111-39
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Ways and Means
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
63-031 WASHINGTON : 2011
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COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS
CHARLES B. RANGEL, New York, Chairman
FORTNEY PETE STARK, California DAVE CAMP, Michigan
SANDER M. LEVIN, Michigan WALLY HERGER, California
JIM McDERMOTT, Washington SAM JOHNSON, Texas
JOHN LEWIS, Georgia KEVIN BRADY, Texas
RICHARD E. NEAL, Massachusetts PAUL RYAN, Wisconsin
JOHN S. TANNER, Tennessee ERIC CANTOR, Virginia
XAVIER BECERRA, California JOHN LINDER, Georgia
LLOYD DOGGETT, Texas DEVIN NUNES, California
EARL POMEROY, North Dakota PATRICK J. TIBERI, Ohio
MIKE THOMPSON, California OHIO GINNY BROWN-WAITE, Florida
JOHN B. LARSON, Connecticut GEOFF DAVIS, Kentucky
EARL BLUMENAUER, Oregon DAVID G. REICHERT, Washington
RON KIND, Wisconsin CHARLES W. BOUSTANY, Jr.,
BILL PASCRELL, JR., New Jersey Louisiana
SHELLEY BERKLEY, Nevada DEAN HELLER, Nevada
JOSEPH CROWLEY, New York PETER J. ROSKAM, Illinois
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland
KENDRICK B. MEEK, Florida
ALLYSON Y. SCHWARTZ, Pennsylvania
ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama
DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois
BOB ETHERIDGE, North Carolina
LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California
BRIAN HIGGINS, New York
JOHN A. YARMUTH, Kentucky
Janice Mays, Chief Counsel and Staff Director
Jon Traub, Minority Staff Director
______
SUBCOMMITTEE ON SOCIAL SECURITY
JOHN S. TANNER, Tennessee, Chairman
EARL POMEROY, North Dakota SAM JOHNSON, Texas, Ranking Member
ALLYSON Y. SCHWARTZ, Pennsylvania KEVIN BRADY, Texas
XAVIER BECERRA, California PATRICK J. TIBERI, Ohio
LLOYD DOGGETT, Texas GINNY BROWN-WAITE, Florida
RON KIND, Wisconsin DAVID G. REICHERT, Washington
JOSEPH CROWLEY, New York
LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California
JOHN A. YARMUTH, Kentucky
COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE
JAMES L. OBERSTAR, Minnesota, Chairman
NICK J. RAHALL, II, West Virginia, JOHN L. MICA, Florida
Vice Chair DON YOUNG, Alaska
PETER A. DEFAZIO, Oregon THOMAS E. PETRI, Wisconsin
JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina
ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee
Columbia VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan
JERROLD NADLER, New York FRANK A. LOBIONDO, New Jersey
CORRINE BROWN, Florida JERRY MORAN, Kansas
BOB FILNER, California GARY G. MILLER, California
EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas HENRY E. BROWN, Jr., South
GENE TAYLOR, Mississippi Carolina
ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland TIMOTHY V. JOHNSON, Illinois
ELLEN O. TAUSCHER, California TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania
LEONARD L. BOSWELL, Iowa SAM GRAVES, Missouri
TIM HOLDEN, Pennsylvania BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania
BRIAN BAIRD, Washington JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas
RICK LARSEN, Washington SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West
MICHAEL E. CAPUANO, Massachusetts Virginia
TIMOTHY H. BISHOP, New York JIM GERLACH, Pennsylvania
MICHAEL H. MICHAUD, Maine MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida
RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania
GRACE F. NAPOLITANO, California CONNIE MACK, Florida
DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois LYNN A WESTMORELAND, Georgia
MAZIE K. HIRONO, Hawaii JEAN SCHMIDT, Ohio
JASON ALTMIRE, Pennsylvania CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan
TIMOTHY J. WALZ, Minnesota MARY FALLIN, Oklahoma
HEATH SHULER, North Carolina VERN BUCHANAN, Florida
MICHAEL A. ARCURI, New York ROBERT E. LATTA, Ohio
HARRY E. MITCHELL, Arizona BRETT GUTHRIE, Kentucky
CHRISTOPHER P. CARNEY, Pennsylvania ANH ``JOSEPH'' CAO, Louisiana
JOHN J. HALL, New York AARON SCHOCK, Illinois
STEVE KAGEN, Wisconsin PETE OLSON, Texas
STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
LAURA A. RICHARDSON, California
ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey
DONNA F. EDWARDS, Maryland
SOLOMON P. ORTIZ, Texas
PHIL HARE, Illinois
JOHN A. BOCCIERI, Ohio
MARK H. SCHAUER, Michigan
BETSY MARKEY, Colorado
PARKER GRIFFITH, Alabama
MICHAEL E. McMAHON, New York
THOMAS S. P. PERRIELLO, Virginia
DINA TITUS, Nevada
HARRY TEAGUE, New Mexico
SUBCOMMITTEE ON ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
PUBLIC BUILDINGS AND EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT
ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of Columbia, Chair
BETSY MARKEY, Colorado MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida
MICHAEL H. MICHAUD, Maine TIMOTHY V. JOHNSON, Illinois
HEATH SHULER, North Carolina SAM GRAVES, Missouri
PARKER GRIFFITH, Alabama SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West
RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri Virginia
TIMOTHY J. WALZ, Minnesota MARY FALLIN, Oklahoma
MICHAEL A. ARCURI, New York BRETT GUTHRIE, Kentucky
CHRISTOPHER P. CARNEY, ANH ``JOSEPH'' CAO, Louisiana
Pennsylvania, Vice Chair PETE OLSON, Texas
DONNA F. EDWARDS, Maryland
THOMAS S. P. PERRIELLO, Virginia
JAMES L. OBERSTAR, Minnesota
(Ex Officio)
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C O N T E N T S
__________
Page
Advisory of December 9, 2009 announcing the hearing.............. 2
WITNESSES
Michael Gallagher, Deputy Commissioner, Office of Budget, Finance
and Management, Social Security Administration................. 14
Rob Hewell, Regional Commissioner, Mid-Atlantic Region, Public
Buildings Service, General Services Administration,
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania..................................... 20
The Honorable Patrick P. O'Carroll, Inspector General, Social
Security Administration........................................ 25
SUBMISSION FOR THE RECORD
Questions for the Record......................................... 45
RECOVERY ACT PROJECT TO REPLACE THE
SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION'S
NATIONAL COMPUTER CENTER
----------
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2009
U.S. House of Representatives,
Committee on Ways and Means,
Subcommittee on Social Security,
joint with the
Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure,
Subcommittee on Economic Development,
Public Buildings and Emergency Management,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittees met, pursuant to notice, at 9:31 a.m. in
room 1100 Longworth House Office Building, the Hon. John Tanner
[Chairman of the Subcommittee on Social Security], presiding.
[The advisory announcing the hearing follows:]
ADVISORY FROM THE COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS
Chairman Tanner and Chairwoman Holmes-Norton Announce a Joint
Oversight Hearing on the Recovery Act Project to Replace the Social
Security Administration's National Computer Center
December 9, 2009
Congressman John S. Tanner (D-TN), Chairman of the House Ways and
Means Committee Subcommittee on Social Security, and Delegate Eleanor
Holmes-Norton (D-DC), Chairwoman of the House Committee on
Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee on Economic Development,
Public Buildings, and Emergency Management, announced today that the
Subcommittees will hold a joint oversight hearing on the progress made
to replace the Social Security Administration's National Computer
Center. The hearing will take place on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 in
the main Ways and Means Committee hearing room 1100 Longworth House
Office Building, beginning at 9:30 a.m.
In view of the limited time available to hear witnesses, oral
testimony at this hearing will be from invited witnesses only. However,
any individual or organization not scheduled for an oral appearance may
submit a written statement for consideration by the Committee and for
inclusion in the printed record of the hearing.
BACKGROUND:
In February, Congress passed and the President signed the American
Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA, Pub. L. 111-5), which
provided $500 million for the Social Security Administration (SSA) to
begin the process of replacing its national computer processing and
data storage facility, the National Computer Center (NCC). This amount
is expected to cover the cost of building a new facility and part of
the cost of equipping it. Replacement of the NCC is the single largest
building project funded under the Recovery Act.
The NCC houses 450 million records of Americans' earnings and
benefit data for almost 56 million beneficiaries. It performs a billion
electronic transactions annually in the administration of benefits and
data-matching agreements with other federal, state and local agencies.
As reliance on electronic processing and technology has grown, the
ability of the current NCC to function effectively is deteriorating.
The NCC is nearly thirty years old and the building in which it is
housed is nearing the end of its useful physical life. The NCC's
capacity is inadequate to meet anticipated future needs, and
deterioration of the facility is posing increasing risks to SSA
operations.
For these reasons, Congress provided SSA with necessary funds to
begin the process of constructing and equipping a new facility. The
General Services Administration (GSA) is managing the process of
locating, designing and constructing the building which will house the
new data center. In addition, the SSA Office of Inspector General (OIG)
was assigned additional oversight duties under the Recovery Act,
including oversight of the NCC project.
SSA also has completed construction of and has transferred some
computer operations to a secondary data center in North Carolina. This
secondary data center was initially designed to support a portion of
the work done at the NCC, but is now being developed as a comprehensive
backup facility in case of failure of the NCC. It is unclear whether
this secondary center will be fully operational in time, or if it will
have sufficient capacity, to provide full backup support in the event
of failure of SSA's primary data processing facility.
In April, the Subcommittee on Social Security held a hearing on the
initial plans and progress on this complex project. In May, the
Subcommittee on Economic Development, Public Buildings, and Emergency
Management also held a hearing on GSA's plans to execute the Recovery
Act.
This hearing will continue Congressional oversight of this critical
project. It will provide a general update on the status of the project,
including an examination of the decisions made thus far, and on the
planning and next steps being taken by SSA and GSA. It will also
provide an update on the agencies' plans for avoiding delays in the
project's completion, and contingency plans in the event of
catastrophic failure of the existing NCC prior to completion of the new
facility.
In announcing the hearing, Chairman John Tanner (D-TN) stated,
``Many of us strongly support the unprecedented transparency
requirements for projects in the American Recovery and Reinvestment
Act, including the construction of a new and updated Social Security
data processing facility. This investment is urgently needed to ensure
continued smooth operation of a program that is so crucial to 56
million Americans. Our subcommittee is committed to making sure that
the decisions made in pursuit of replacing the Social Security
Administration's (SSA's) primary computing facility are fiscally and
technically sound and help continue SSA's improvements in service to
beneficiaries and other taxpayers.''
Chairwoman Eleanor Holmes-Norton (D-DC) stated, ``I am pleased to
hold this joint hearing on the General Services Administration's SSA
primary computing center. Our committee has held four stimulus tracking
hearings and believes that focusing on this project, with its many
unique environmental and technical aspects, will serve as an excellent
way to drill down into one project to highlight and explore the process
and progress across the GSA portfolio.''
FOCUS OF THE HEARING:
The hearing will focus on the progress to date of SSA and GSA in
using ARRA resources to replace the NCC, including the development of
requirements for the new center, and the site selection process and
criteria. The hearing will also evaluate SSA's and GSA's management of
the potential for unexpected cost and delay. Finally, the hearing will
examine SSA's preparedness in case of catastrophic failure of the
existing NCC, including the role of the new data support center in
North Carolina.
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Chairman TANNER. We will come to order. I am informed that
Mr. Johnson is entering the premises now. I have been assured--
we have a slight time problem here--that he has no objection to
us going ahead. I know Ms. Holmes Norton's Ranking Member, has
previously told us they would be running a little late.
We will get started with our opening statements and then by
that time hopefully Mr. Johnson will arrive.
This is a joint oversight hearing that we have called. I
want to welcome warmly Chairwoman Holmes Norton, who is our
colleague on the Subcommittee on Economic Development, Public
Buildings and Emergency Management, the House Committee
overseeing GSA.
I told her a while ago she may be the only one in Congress
who is home for Christmas. The rest of us will be in our
dreams, I am afraid.
This is a critical project. It is the largest and one of
the most needed construction projects funded by the American
Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
This is the second hearing the Subcommittee on Social
Security has had concerning the project. I want to welcome
again Chairwoman Holmes Norton and thank her for all her work
in this regard.
We have some real questions. I am not going to read all of
my opening statement because I want to give this panel an
opportunity and Ms. Holmes Norton an opportunity to talk about
their interest in it.
I want to know why we are in such a time crunch here and
what has happened. I want to ask about some of the decisions
that have been made and why they were made as they were.
We are up against a time line here because in January I am
told we will have a decision made on a location for the new
data center.
I hope we have a productive hearing this morning. I think
we will.
[The prepared statement of the Honorable John Tanner
follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3031.001
Ms. Holmes Norton, do you have an opening statement?
Ms. NORTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I am
going to simply synopsize my opening remarks and ask that my
full statement be placed into the record.
I want only to say how pleased I am to sit with Chairman
John Tanner and with the Ways and Means Committee in what
amounts to a partnership between two agencies, General Services
Administration, which comes under the jurisdiction of my
Subcommittee, and of course, the Social Security Subcommittee.
To have what amounts to a discussion of something that
rarely happens in the Federal Government, where an agency gets
a direct appropriation to do construction.
The GSA is the Federal Government's expert construction and
real estate agency. When it does, the agency which usually does
not have particular expertise in construction, turns to the
GSA, and the GSA is pleased that the Recovery Act has provided
half a billion dollars to the Social Security Administration
for a new National Computer Center, which we understand is very
much needed.
You are in an overloaded facility. You are in an energy
inefficient facility which is costing the taxpayers needless
dollars.
I also want to say how important this large and important
center is for job creation, which is an important element of
the stimulus package. We are sure in Maryland where this is to
be built and in the surrounding area, that part of the mission
of these funds will be fulfilled.
I thank you very much, Chairman Tanner. I yield back.
[The prepared statement of the Honorable Eleanor Holmes
Norton follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3031.002
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3031.003
Chairman TANNER. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Mr. Johnson has joined us. Before I recognize him, I would
like to ask unanimous consent that all opening statements be
entered in the record in their entirety.
[The prepared statement of the Honorable Mario Diaz-Balart
follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3031.004
[The prepared statement of the Honorable Betsy Markey
follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3031.005
Chairman TANNER. Mr. Johnson?
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to
thank you for holding this important hearing and welcome our
witnesses.
Before I turn to the hearing subject, in light of the
Social Security Subcommittee Chairman's recent retirement
announcement, I want to take advantage of this opportunity to
personally acknowledge and thank the Chairman for his long and
distinguished service to this nation.
Chairman TANNER. Thank you.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Mr. Chairman, the American people
have truly benefitted from your leadership and I am proud to
call you a good friend.
Chairman TANNER. Thank you, sir.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. With about a year to go, I still look
forward to working with you on this Subcommittee and thank you
for all you have done. God bless you in whatever you try to do
in the future.
Turning to the focus of today's hearing, Social Security is
at a critical crossroads. While this hearing may seem rather
technical in nature, at heart, it is about Social Security
being able to operate day in and day out for the American
people.
As our population ages, more workers and retirees are
depending on Social Security's essential benefits and services
that they paid for throughout their lives with their hard
earned wages.
Social Security's ability to deliver those services depends
on its use of modern, secure technology that they and the
American people can rely on. Yet Social Security's 30 year old
National Computer Center that allows the Agency to process
applications, pay benefits and store secure data for most U.S.
workers is on its last legs.
That is why Congress has given Social Security $500 million
to build a new 21st Century center.
In the meantime, however, should the current center fail,
Social Security's recovery plan falls short. Currently, it
would take a week to restart only some of the system's
operations, and even then Social Security will only be
operating at a third of its current level.
Social Security reports it is making progress on plans to
fully restore service delivery and protect Americans' personal
information in the event of a major failure by bringing on line
its back-up data center in North Carolina early next year.
I look forward to hearing from Social Security in terms of
what it is doing to ensure there is minimum disruption in
service to the American people in the event of a system failure
and the progress it is making to bring its North Carolina
center on line.
Replacing Social Security's outdated National Computer
Center with a new support center is critical to maintaining and
improving service delivery.
Taxpayers are investing $500 million in this project. They
rightfully deserve to know their investment will produce the
right state-of-the-art center on time and within budget. It
should not take seven years as we have been told.
I thank the witnesses for joining us today and presenting
their expert testimony and I yield back the balance of my time.
[The prepared statement of the Honorable Sam Johnson
follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3031.006
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3031.007
Chairman TANNER. Thank you, Mr. Johnson. Without objection,
we will put all the opening statements in the record in their
entirety.
Ms. Brown-Waite, you are recognized.
Ms. BROWN-WAITE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I come from Florida and I represent a huge number of people
on Social Security. I do not think I am number one in the
nation. I think I am number two in the nation with people on
Social Security. I know on Medicare, I am number one.
One of the things that I believe taxpayers really bristle
at is the slowness with which Government responds. The Social
Security Administration--I know in previous years you have not
had the funding that you needed. You have the funding now and
to say it would take seven years to build is a little
frightening, quite honestly.
It is a disappointment to taxpayers and to those who have
paid into Social Security.
I am looking forward to hearing your testimony on what is
being done to expedite the process while still being able to
process those very necessary Social Security payments to
individuals.
I know that most people here did not come to hear us speak
but rather to hear you speak, so with that, Mr. Chairman, I am
going to yield back the balance of my time.
Chairman TANNER. Thank you. We will have unanimous consent
that all of the witnesses' statements be included in the record
in their entirety, and we will ask the witnesses to please try
to hold their statements to five minutes.
Before we begin, I understand, Mr. Gray, you will be
retiring and this is your last appearance before the
Subcommittee on Social Security. Thirty-three years. Your
service has been recognized by the Commissioners, Presidents
and all of your peers, and we thank you.
As Mr. Johnson was saying nice things about me, I am
reminded of the fellow that was lamenting the fact that he
would not be able to attend his own funeral because there would
be so many nice things said about him, he said but I am going
to miss it by three days.
[Laughter.]
Chairman TANNER. Mr. Gallagher, you are recognized for five
minutes, sir.
STATEMENT OF MICHAEL GALLAGHER, DEPUTY COMMISSIONER, OFFICE OF
BUDGET, FINANCE AND MANAGEMENT, ACCOMPANIED BY BILL GRAY,
DEPUTY COMMISSIONER FOR SYSTEMS, SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION
Mr. GALLAGHER. Thank you. Chairman Tanner, Chairwoman
Holmes Norton, Ranking Members Johnson and Diaz-Balart, and
Members of the Subcommittees, good morning.
I am Michael Gallagher, Deputy Commissioner for Social
Security's Office of Budget, Finance and Management, and the
Senior Accountable Official for Recovery Act funds.
I am joined here today by Bill Gray, Deputy Commissioner
for Systems. I am also pleased to be joined by Pat O'Carroll,
our Inspector General. We work closely with his office as it
plays a vital role in ensuring the thoroughness of our decision
making and actions.
On behalf of Commissioner Michael J. Astrue, I thank you
for the opportunity to update you on the progress we have made
working with the General Services Administration (GSA) in
replacing our outdated National Computer Center (NCC) using the
$500 million appropriated to us in the Recovery Act.
First, we want to thank you for your prompt response after
we informed you of our need for a new data center. Our new data
center is needed to ensure that we can continue to perform our
vital services for the American public.
We collect benefit, earnings, and demographic information
on virtually every American. Over the last decade, we have
moved from a paper-based system to electronic processing of our
core workloads.
Currently, over 95 percent of our work is electronic. As
new benefit applications continue to flood our Agency due to
the economic downturn and the aging of the baby boomers, we are
handling an all-time high of over 75 million electronic
transactions per day. Without technology, we would be unable to
manage this onslaught of work.
In order to ensure that we get our technology right, we
continually examine our needs and the available technology to
fit those needs, not just today but in the future.
For example, we have established an advisory committee of
world-class IT experts from top universities, successful
companies, and other agencies for the best technical advice to
guide our future use of technology.
Internally, we have strengthened the role and functions of
our Chief Information Officer (CIO) to ensure that we have a
transparent and long-term vision and a process is in place to
make use of leading edge technologies.
One of the three issues you identified for the hearing
today was our preparedness in case of a catastrophic failure of
the NCC, including the role of a new supplemental center in
North Carolina.
Let me briefly address that issue now. Currently, if our
NCC went down, we would take our back-up tapes to a commercial
hot site to recover data. This process would take seven days
and would provide only about 25 to 30 percent of our capacity
to run our most critical applications that we use to issue
Social Security numbers and administer benefits.
To remedy this, we established our North Carolina facility
to act as both a co-processing center and as a disaster
recovery resource. In January 2009, we took possession of the
North Carolina facility and began equipping it to provide the
day-to-day operations for about half of our systems.
In May 2009, the North Carolina facility began limited
production operations. Earlier this year, the Commissioner
accelerated the purchase and installation of additional
hardware and software for North Carolina to support our
critical claims and data processing systems currently housed in
the National Computer Center.
In January 2010, next month, this equipment will be fully
operational and will recover all of our critical systems from
the back-up tapes in seven days instead of using the commercial
hot site.
By October 2010, we will be able to recover the entire NCC
production operations in the North Carolina facility. By 2012,
we will be able to restore all production in 24 hours and not
seven days. Thus, we have a sound plan to provide continued
service to the American people in the event of a catastrophic
failure in the NCC.
The other two issues identified for the hearing today
relate to our efforts to construct and equip a new state-of-
the-art data center on budget and on time with the right site
and building criteria.
As these two issues are interrelated, I would like to
address them together. To begin the process of developing the
requirements for the new data center, SSA and GSA assembled a
project team of our most seasoned technical experts, including
architects, engineers and security and systems experts. We
placed a senior executive with substantial experience in site
selection and project management in the lead of our effort.
The team is adhering to all applicable procurement rules
and is engaged in a rigorous comprehensive and critical review
of our needs, business processes and available technology.
We are following best practices for site selection, data
center design and construction, as well as green technology and
security requirements.
We are consulting with industry experts and our efforts
have included site visits to leading edge data centers in both
the public and private sectors.
In August 2009, GSA solicited expressions of interest to
obtain a site for the new data center and is reviewing possible
sites along with SSA.
Although GSA possesses the legal authority for SSA to lease
or purchase real estate and award contracts for the building
construction, our relationship with GSA is one of true
partnership. Working together, we are pleased to report that we
are on time and on budget.
We provide regular updates directly to Congress. GSA and
SSA meet quarterly with staff members from the Social Security
Subcommittee to brief them on our progress towards constructing
this important data center, and we provide written monthly
updates to Congressional leadership on our progress.
Finally, Recovery.gov, our own Web site, ensures
transparency by posting weekly updated information about our
progress in meeting plan objectives including costs and
milestones.
None of this progress would have been possible without the
support of these two Subcommittees. Thank you. I would be
pleased to answer any questions.
[The prepared statement of Michael Gallagher follows:]
Prepared Statement of Michael Gallagher, Deputy
Commissioner for Budget, Finance, and Management
Chairman Tanner, Chairwoman Norton, Ranking Members Johnson and
Diaz-Balart, and Members of the Subcommittees:
Good morning. I am Michael Gallagher, Deputy Commissioner for
Social Security's Office of Budget, Finance, and Management and the
Senior Accountable Official for Recovery Act funds. I am joined here
today by Bill Gray, Deputy Commissioner for Systems. On behalf of
Commissioner Michael J. Astrue, I thank you for the opportunity to
update you on the progress we have made working with the General
Services Administration (GSA) in replacing our outdated National
Computer Center (NCC), using the $500 million appropriated to us in the
Recovery Act. Our new data center, the National Support Center (NSC),
will replace our 30-year-old NCC. This new facility will be state-of-
the-art and incorporate green building technology.
Before I explain our process for replacing the NCC and the
safeguards we have established to deal with unexpected cost, delay, and
the risk of catastrophic failure of the NCC, I will briefly describe
the role and importance of information technology (IT) to the services
we provide to the American public. An understanding of the ever-
increasing role IT plays in our processes will put our needs for robust
and reliable data repositories in perspective.
Over the past three years, we have made a concerted effort to
improve our service delivery by taking advantage of modern technology
and the Internet, and have made fundamental changes in our use of IT.
We have taken to heart the recommendations of the 2007 report by the
National Academy of Sciences to modernize our IT infrastructure. We
have established an advisory committee of world-class IT experts to
guide our future use of IT, and we also have strengthened the role and
functions of our Chief Information Officer (CIO).
Technology Is Crucial to the Services We Provide
We maintain benefit, earnings, and demographic information on
virtually every American. Over the last decade, we have moved from a
paper-based system to electronic processing of our core workloads.
Currently, over 95 percent of our work is electronic. As new benefit
applications continue to flood our agency due to the economic downturn
and the aging of the baby boomers, we are handling an all-time high of
over 75 million electronic transactions per day. Without technology, we
would be unable to manage this onslaught of work. Technology has
allowed us to provide faster and more accurate service to the American
public.
For instance, technology will allow us to fast-track about 140,000
disability applications this year, and we will award benefits, when
appropriate, in those cases in a matter of days. Our new electronic
disability case analysis tool, eCat, is improving the consistency and
quality of our disability decisions.
In addition, we maintain claims information in electronic folders,
which allows us to move work to available resources and respond to
catastrophic events like Hurricane Katrina. We maintain one of the
world's largest repositories of imaged medical evidence, storing over
400 million medical records, to which we add nearly 3 million new
records each week. We exchange over 2 billion data files annually with
public and private entities for benefit management and homeland
security purposes.
We have embraced the need for more and better on-line services.
With the launch of our new on-line retirement estimator, benefit
application, and Medicare low-income subsidy application, we have
emerged as the Federal Government's leader in on-line services. The
public rated these three services the highest in the University of
Michigan's satisfaction surveys. These new on-line service options have
allowed us to weather the increased workloads due to baby boomers and
the economic downturn without substantially increasing waiting times.
We are not resting on our laurels. In 2010, we will introduce a
Medicare-only on-line application, an improved disability application,
and the first Federal Government Spanish-language on-line application.
To help us achieve our IT vision for the future, we have
established an advisory committee of world-class IT experts to reach
outside of the agency for the best technical advice, which we use to
guide our future use of technology. And internally, we have
strengthened the role and functions of our Chief Information Officer
(CIO) to ensure that we have a long-term vision, and the processes in
place to make use of leading edge technologies. Our Office of the Chief
Information Officer now has functional responsibility for: (1) Open
Government to ensure transparency in our decisions, improving
communication with the public, and providing authentication solutions
that will create additional opportunities over the Internet; (2)
Investment Management to oversee the agency's IT investment process;
(3) Innovation to serve as our ``think tank'' for emerging
technologies; (4) Vision and Strategy, so as to define our technology
vision and establishing a long-term, architectural plan, and (5)
Information Security, to develop a policy framework that effectively
manages risk, and safeguards the personally identifiable information
with which we are entrusted .
To protect our sensitive data and continue to enhance our
electronic services, we have worked with you and the Administration to
address our need for data centers that support the rapidly expanding
demand for electronic services. We first apprised you of this need in
July 2008, and you quickly took action to allow us to replace our aging
facility that is running out of capacity. We are grateful for your
prompt response.
Second Support Center SSC) Necessary for Our Electronic Environment
For years, we have contracted with a commercial hot site to provide
us with the ability to recover our data in the event of a disaster. As
our use of technology has grown, this commercial site has become a less
viable disaster recovery option. With nearly all of our business
processes fully electronic, if the NCC were to go down, we would come
to a near standstill while we recover our systems. If our NCC went down
tomorrow, we would need to take backup our tapes to the commercial hot
site in order to recover these data. This process would take 7 days and
would provide only about 25-30 percent of our capacity to run the
critical applications that we use to issue Social Security numbers and
administer benefits. To remedy this issue, we sought a second support
center, geographically separate from the NCC, now located in North
Carolina.
The initial vision of the second support center (SSC) was to serve
as a co-processing center on a daily basis and back up the NCC in the
event of a disaster or catastrophic systems failure. In the last year,
we have accelerated and expanded the role of the SSC to address the
vulnerabilities of our 30-year old NCC.
In January 2009, we took possession of the SSC and began equipping
it to function as a co-processing center that will provide the day-to-
day operations for about half of our systems. It began production
operations in May 2009 and now maintains medical images for the
electronic disability folders and fully-redundant communications
connections to our offices, to the Internet, and the NCC. Moving these
workloads to the SSC reduced our disaster exposure from systems failure
in the NCC. In addition, maintaining medical records at the SSC
minimizes the down time of our disability systems.
By 2012, we will synchronize data between both centers every hour.
In the event of a disaster, we will be able to use these data to
restore services within 24 hours. These data will be current to within
one hour prior to the disaster.
Recognizing that the timeframes for fully synchronizing the two
centers would still leave us dependent on the commercial hot site in
the event of a disaster through 2012, the Commissioner decided to
accelerate the purchase and installation of the additional hardware and
software necessary to support our critical claims and data processing
systems housed in the NCC. This equipment will be fully operational by
January, 2010, and a major protection for the American public, because
we will be capable of recovering all our critical systems from the
backup tapes at the SSC, instead of using the commercial hot site.
While it would still take us 7 days to restore services, once services
are up and running, we would be able to handle all critical claims and
data processing workloads. In the near future, we will perform a
disaster recovery exercise in the SSC to fully test our ability to
recover completely.
We are currently adding the facility infrastructure to the SSC to
support important NCC workloads that are not critical to the payment of
benefits. These workloads include management information, forecasting,
cyclical, regional, and end-user developed applications. By October
2010, we will have the infrastructure needed to recover these services
in the SSC. With these changes, we will be able to recover the entire
NCC production operations in the SSC. (Please see the attached chart
for additional details about our NCC disaster recovery capability
timeline.)
National Support Center Project Is on Track
Our rapidly growing electronic business processes and service
channels, as well as the tragic events of September 11, 2001,
underscored the critical need for the SSC. At the same time we decided
to pursue the SSC, we continued to make improvements to the NCC to deal
with our growing workloads.
The NCC was designed over 30 years ago. Technology has changed
radically since then, and the NCC's infrastructure, including the
building's cooling, electrical, and fire suppression systems, is not
sufficient to fully accommodate current technologies. As a result, the
infrastructure systems will not be capable of accommodating the
information technology necessary to handle our increasing volumes of
work, our new and expanded responsibilities, and our new ways of doing
business. Our transition to full electronic processing of our core
workloads and the growth of electronic service delivery over the last
decade resulted in a dramatic increase in our need for data storage and
network capacity. While we have modernized our hardware, we are facing
finite limitations on our ability to distribute electrical power to our
servers and mainframes.
Updated servers and mainframes have significant electrical
requirements. Until recently, each server required only one power
supply to operate; now, a server requires two to four power supplies to
function, which the NCC can accommodate at this time. The current
facility's electrical panels will not accommodate the more than four
power supplies that we will need to run servers in the future.
We have undertaken important steps to continue the services of the
current facility until the new data center is operating. As the NCC has
aged, we have continuously upgraded and repaired structural,
electrical, and data processing capabilities. Incrementally upgrading a
facility of this kind is a best industry practice for maintaining
facilities beyond their life cycle. We must incrementally repair these
infrastructure systems because we cannot totally replace them in the
existing NCC. To replace them, we would have to shut down the building
completely for an extended period of weeks or months. Such a shutdown
would result in an unacceptably long interruption of service to the
public.
We considered the possibility of renovating the existing building;
however, renovations of this magnitude would require us to vacate the
building and design and lease a facility to temporarily house the data
and employees. The expense of doing this would be almost as costly as
simply building a new, up-to-date data center and would create a risk
of a major interruption in service and require relocation twice,
incurring significant costs.
Even if we could overcome the obstacles to repair and upgrade the
NCC and its infrastructure, we would still have a building designed
around a 1970s mainframe environment. In the seventies, redundant
electrical, heating, and cooling systems were not state-of-the-art
requirements for data centers. In addition, fire suppression systems
were not designed to cover an entire floor. In short, the current
facility will not be able to meet the industry standards for data
centers in the future.
In 2008, it was determined that a replacement facility was the most
viable option and began the planning efforts with GSA. SSA cannot lease
or purchase real estate, so we rely on GSA; and our relationship is one
of partnership. GSA offers its expertise in real estate and building
construction, and we offer our expertise in data center design and
operations. Specifically, we work closely and constructively with GSA
and its expert contractors throughout every stage of this process. Our
most seasoned real estate professionals work side by side with their
GSA counterparts. I assure you that both we and GSA are taking all
appropriate steps to ensure that this partnership is successful.
Our GSA/SSA project team includes architects, electrical engineers,
mechanical engineers, fire protection engineers, project managers,
occupational safety and industrial hygiene experts, physical security
experts, and network and IT engineers with knowledge and experience in
our IT program requirements. We have great confidence in the site
criteria and Program of Requirements that the team developed. The team
is adhering to all applicable procurement rules and is following the
best practices for data center construction.
We and GSA are closely monitoring the planning and construction of
the NSC to ensure mitigation of any unexpected challenges, and we are
holding our executives and staff accountable for achieving the goals of
this initiative. For example, as the Senior Accountable Official, I
oversee and monitor overall progress. I also function as a liaison for
the SSA executives who have lead responsibility for the planning and
the execution of the project.
We hold periodic meetings at both the executive and staff levels to
discuss implementation status and any other issues that may arise. We
also hold regular meetings internally and with GSA executives to review
the status of the project. We have established performance measure
targets that we will monitor in these status meetings.
The joint project team is thoroughly analyzing our detailed list of
technical specifications for all aspects of the NSC project to
efficiently use taxpayers' dollars and minimize cost and schedule
overruns. We have consulted with industry experts, such as Uptime
Institute, to ensure we are implementing the most current data center
standards. We have toured several existing data centers to learn about
best practices.
Our requirements for the new facility site are based on our
business process and technology needs, and the security standards that
are necessary given the sensitive data we maintain. In August 2009, GSA
requested expressions of interest using the Federal Business
Opportunities Web site. The notice contained mandatory requirements,
such as a minimum of 35 acres suitable for development within 40 miles
of our headquarters. It also included requirements to avoid increased
project costs or a delayed schedule that could be caused by landfills,
hazardous waste, or soil or water contamination on or near the site.
The site cannot be located within 100 or 500 year flood plain and must
have reasonable access to utilities, including fiber optic, power and
water.
After conducting research and consulting industry experts, we
determined that the best practice to ensure continuous service to the
public when we eventually migrate from the NCC to the new center would
be to bring the systems in the NSC online incrementally. That would
allow us to test their stability while continuing to operate the
systems in the NCC in case something did not work properly. For
example, the computer processes involved in adjudicating a benefit
application actually ``talk'' to each other to verify and update the
applicant's personal information on multiple systems. In order to
properly maintain this interactivity, we need to use software that
enables the synchronization of data bases with responsive systems
performance. Available technology limits the separation of the
transitioning systems to less than 100 kilometers. A site located
within 40 miles of our headquarters assures us a lower risk transition
that will not disrupt service to the public.
The project team is currently evaluating the sites.
GSA is also leading the development of the detailed Program of
Requirements for building the NSC. GSA's contractor, Jacobs, is
developing these requirements through interviews with technical
experts. While this process is lengthy, a comprehensive and systematic
approach to long-term planning will provide us with a facility that
will meet our needs.
Conclusion
The SSC will allow us to recover all essential functions and
systems associated with our primary mission while we make steady
progress toward having our NSC fully operational in 2015. This state-of
the-art facility will help us maintain the service the American public
expects.
None of this progress would have been possible without the support
of these two subcommittees. We appreciate your advice and input as we
work together to improve our computer systems and security. Again, we
thank you for the Recovery Act funding and for your continued support
for timely, adequate, and sustained funding.
Chairman TANNER. Thank you very much.
Mr. Hewell, you are recognized.
STATEMENT OF ROB HEWELL, REGIONAL COMMISSIONER, MID-ATLANTIC
REGION, PUBLIC BUILDINGS SERVICE, GENERAL SERVICES
ADMINISTRATION, PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA
Mr. HEWELL. Thank you, Chairman Tanner. Good morning,
Chairman, Chairwoman Holmes Norton, Ranking Members Johnson and
Diaz-Balart, and members of the Subcommittees.
My name is Rob Hewell. I am the Regional Commissioner of
the General Services Administration's Public Buildings Service
in the Mid-Atlantic Region.
I am pleased to have the opportunity today to discuss GSA's
progress on behalf of the Social Security Administration in the
delivery of the new Social Security Administration's national
support center.
As part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of
2009, SSA received a $500 million appropriation for a new
national support center to replace the existing National
Computer Center in Woodlawn.
SSA turned to GSA for assistance in locating, designing and
building this new national support center which will meet the
Agency's requirement for redundancy and expansion needs for
long-term needs.
Based on initial capacity studies, we are planning to
construct a facility of approximately 300,000 gross square feet
that will include data, office and warehouse space. We are
using a multi-phased approach to the construction of the
facility ensuring that site and design criteria development are
concurrent and interrelated.
With respect to site selection, GSA has committed to
researching, evaluating and selecting a site that can best
serve the interests of the Federal Government, the end users,
and the community. There are many factors associated with
selecting and acquiring a site for Federal construction and a
data center creates additional challenges.
In August 2009, GSA requested expressions of interest from
land owners and authorized agents through a FedBizOpps notice.
We also contacted local economic development and planning
groups regarding our search, which produced over 150 potential
sites.
These locations were screened against a number of mandatory
criteria that included land area and geography, proximity to
SSA headquarters and roadway access, available utility
infrastructure, cultural and historic resources, proximity to
security hazards, and proximity to environmental hazards or
concerns. These sites were then narrowed down based on further
evaluation of proximity to power and site characteristics.
Our next steps include a more detailed analysis of
potential locations to closely examine utility and fiber
availability, security, environmental impact, development
costs, and potential schedule impacts. The site selection
remains on schedule for purchase in March 2010.
With respect to requirements development, GSA is currently
working with Jacobs Facilities to conduct a full analysis of
the SSA data center building and housing plans.
In July 2009, GSA brought EMC Consultants on board to
assist in developing a design for the building that is
versatile and flexible enough to serve SSA information
technology needs for the long term.
EMC has developed a growth model for equipment requirements
through 2033, which takes into account both SSA historical data
as well as industry trends toward newer equipment technology.
SSA concurred on this growth model in October 2009. We are now
working collaboratively with both EMC and Jacobs to develop a
space power cooling and data center master plan.
The program of requirements is progressing toward a 50
percent report at the end of December 2009. Once the location
is selected, site specific design directives will be
incorporated into the program of requirements. Program of
requirements completion is scheduled for August 2010.
Once we acquire the site, we will begin developing the
solicitation for a design/build contract based on the finalized
program of requirements. At the same time, we will continue
developing the design criteria specific to the selected
location.
We will then procure a contractor to both design and build
the facility. We anticipate contract award for design and
construction of the new national support center in March 2011.
Substantial construction completion is scheduled for October
2013, at which time the building will be turned over to SSA for
IT migration.
This is the same schedule we provided to the Committee back
in April and included in our recovery program plan, and we are
still confident we can deliver on schedule.
There are a number of steps we are taking to minimize risks
throughout this process. We have toured established data
centers to identify industry best practices.
In July 2009, the project team participated in a charrette
facilitated by Lawrence Berkley Laboratories that focused on
energy optimization techniques in data center design.
Environmental screening of possible sites is helping us to
identify potential impacts early in the process.
Our partnership with Jacobs and EMC are ensuring that we
will provide a flexible facility design capable of
accommodating expansion, mission related changes, and
advancements in technology.
GSA is moving swiftly to meet SSA's national support center
requirements on schedule, within budget, and with careful
consideration given our responsibility and accountability to
the American taxpayers.
Along with SSA, we are happy to provide quarterly briefings
to these Subcommittees as the project proceeds, and we are
committed to working with you in the successful delivery of the
national support center as part of the Recovery Act program.
Chairman Tanner, Chairwoman Holmes Norton, Ranking Members
Johnson and Diaz-Balart, Members of the Subcommittees, this
concludes my statement. I will be pleased to answer any
questions you may have.
[The prepared statement of Hewell follows:]
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Chairman TANNER. Thank you very much.
Mr. Inspector General, glad to have you back. You are
recognized.
STATEMENT OF PATRICK P. O'CARROLL, JR., INSPECTOR GENERAL,
SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION
Mr. O'CARROLL. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, Madam
Chairwoman, Mr. Johnson, and members of both Subcommittees.
Thank you for requesting that I testify today and for your
interest in this critical issue.
The National Computer Center houses benefit data for SSA's
56 million beneficiaries and earnings data on every American.
The importance of the NCC to SSA's operations and many other
facets of American life, such as applying for a driver's
license, cannot be overstated.
A failure of the NCC would have devastating consequences.
Unfortunately, the NCC is now 30 years old, and is rapidly
approaching obsolescence.
You recognized the need for replacement when you provided
SSA with $500 million for this purpose in the American Recovery
and Reinvestment Act.
The Office of the Inspector General is committed to
ensuring that SSA uses these funds wisely. Replacement of the
NCC must be accomplished based on sound decision making and
without unnecessary delays.
SSA's experience in constructing the Durham Support Center,
a co-processing site for the NCC, revealed the challenges that
can cause delays. It took six years to take possession of the
DSC, and the facility is still not fully functional.
Replacing the NCC itself began in earnest in 2007 with a
Lockheed Martin study completed in 2008. Lockheed Martin
identified several NCC replacement options, but ultimately
recommended that SSA construct a new NCC offsite.
Based on this, it is our understanding that SSA plans to go
forward with an offsite NCC within 40 miles of the main SSA
campus, to maximize data transmission speed and limit employee
commutes.
SSA next asked GSA for a more detailed cost estimate, then
engaged Booz Allen Hamilton to conduct an alternative analysis.
Booz Allen recommended against locating the NCC on the SSA
campus for reasons ranging from outages during construction to
higher operational and maintenance costs than any other option.
Thus, it has been consistently suggested that the off-
campus option is the more efficient approach. Unfortunately,
the OIG did not initially receive the information and
documentation it needed to conduct an independent analysis of
this issue.
More recently, we obtained additional information from SSA
and retained a contractor, Strategic e-Business Solutions or
SeBS, which conducted a review of SSA's site selection process
on our behalf. They found that SSA, working with GSA, had
developed ``a highly sophisticated set of selection criteria
which was used to evaluate general areas of consideration and
prospective individual properties.''
However, they also found that questions remained concerning
the process SSA used in creating a short list of priorities and
properties.
They recommended that SSA look more closely at the
following factors: prospective energy costs, better methodology
documentation, and early involvement of power providers and
telcom providers.
After SeBS completed this report, we asked that they take a
closer look at the on-campus versus off-campus dichotomy. We
were informed yesterday that they agree with two of our most
significant concerns.
First, there appears to have been confusion starting with
the Lockheed Martin report as to purported six-year delays for
land acquisition and zoning issues if an on-campus site was
selected.
While there may be some community-based issues if this
option is chosen, there are no actual zoning issues and delays
should be short-lived.
Second, SeBS shares our concern that the comparison of the
on-campus and off-campus options may not fully take into
account how different each project is from the other. Comparing
these two undertakings is much like comparing apples to
oranges, and we remain unconvinced that many differences have
been fully taken into account.
The Office of the Inspector General looks forward to
continuing to monitor SSA's efforts to use sound planning and
due care in replacing the NCC. We will keep these Subcommittees
fully informed of SSA's progress.
I thank you again for your invitation to be here today, and
I will be happy to answer any questions.
Chairman TANNER. Thank you all for again being here and for
testifying. We do have some questions.
How did we arrive at this urgency that we are told that
exists and that I believe exists where the time line is this
tight? The North Carolina facility, I am told, still cannot
function as a back-up for any sort of construction.
We have been given a whole menu of reasons why the on-
campus site is not acceptable, some of which changed.
I must tell you I am upset about the situation we find
ourselves in here. I want somebody to explain exactly where we
are and how we got here and why we are having so much trouble
when even 48 hours ago we got another reason why we cannot
build on-campus.
This thing is very, very loose in my opinion in terms of
the way it is being handled. Who wants to try to respond? Mr.
Gallagher?
Mr. GALLAGHER. Yes, sir. I think you raised a couple of
different questions. I will try to take them in order.
We began our deliberations on replacing the National
Computer Center back in 2007, and that resulted in a report
that Mr. O'Carroll referenced concluding that the NCC is a 30
year old building and needed to be replaced.
We began discussions with GSA at that point and started to
engage in the normal process for appropriations where we would
get the prospectus and such working with GSA to replace that
building, and I believe GSA actually had contracted with a firm
called EYP to take a look at a possible lease issue, looking at
various alternatives.
We did receive, as Mr. O'Carroll said, two Booz Allen
Hamilton reports. Then the passage of the stimulus bill gave us
the $500 million, and we started in earnest to assemble the
team to get things started, and on a rather aggressive
schedule.
As somebody mentioned before, we expect that later next
month we actually will select a site for the National Support
Center (NSC). In March 2010, we will purchase the site. In
March of 2011, we will start the design and build construction.
That alone, the design/build approach will help to
accelerate the timeliness in the sense that there are pieces of
it that we can start to build while also doing some of the
design work. By October 2011, we will start the general
construction on it. By October of 2013, we will be
substantially complete on the construction of the facility.
By November 2013, we will finish up the final commissioning
and that will be completed in January 2014, and then the
transfer of data from the current National Computer Center to
the new facility will be completed in or about July of 2015.
I believe we are on a rapid schedule to get that done.
Chairman TANNER. I am told that the existing NCC is
supposed to reach its electrical capacity in 2013, and you say
2015 is when we will be functional. What about that 24 month
gap?
Mr. GALLAGHER. Sir, let me address that. Actually as early
as the Lockheed Martin report, we looked at the fact that we
were at the greatest risk starting about 2012 and going
forward. We saw actually a couple of different contemporaneous
items to mitigate that risk while we are building the new
National Support Center.
One of our biggest issues that we identified was our
uninterrupted power system. That is we need to be able to take
the wholesale power we get from the electric company and clean
it up so we can go ahead through generators and switching gears
and to make it into useable electricity.
In addition, we recognize that the current NCC contains old
pieces of equipment and that we were running out of spare
parts, and our maintenance contract was going to end at the end
of 2012.
One of the things we did is we bought all the spare parts
we could to have them on hand. We were able to extend the
maintenance contract through 2015 so we could keep that going.
We actually did replace a number of feeder cables and some of
the panels that actually handle the transfer of cables up to
the data center area so we would have that in place.
We did some other things as far as updating and
retrofitting some of the other electrical cables so we could
mitigate the risk we would have, so we would have confidence
that we would be able to get to that 2015 date.
I would say that the North Carolina facility also plays a
part in that mitigation in the sense that it will be up and
running in phases to take on additional workloads, to take that
off the campus location, so we could reduce the ever increasing
demand for power, we could actually lessen that, and that was
part of risk mitigation as well.
That combination of North Carolina being up and taking on
some of those workloads plus some of the continual maintenance
that we were doing to get things updated would help us mitigate
that risk.
Chairman TANNER. I want to give the other members of the
panel time. Tell me again how you went about determining that
an on-campus site was not feasible. We have been told various
things for over a year now it seems. In fact, we were told that
at one time there was a zoning problem out there, which is
almost ludicrous.
Where are we on that? Why?
Mr. GALLAGHER. With respect to the campus, we looked at the
campus and actually made a presentation to the Commissioner
back on or about the first of August 2008 on various possible
sites. He actually pushed back on us about not putting it on-
campus. We talked about the areas that we were looking at for
the campus.
Our view was that the topography and the actual envelope
did not present itself as a good site for it. There were two
pieces that really led to that.
One, sir, we made an error on the zoning issue. We had
deliberated that it could take up to 72 months for zoning. That
was set forth in the contract reports. That was an error. We
should not have relied upon a 72 month period for zoning.
Zoning and land use actually is part of the study that will
go on as far as an assessment on it, but we did make a mistake
there.
The other issue we had is that we looked at the building
envelope. Our thought that the best place based upon the
topography was a place on the large parking lot that houses
thousands of spaces for our employees. In order to do that, we
thought we would have to build a parking garage before we would
be able to begin digging for the computer center. That could
take 18 to 24 months.
It was our view that this was a project that needed to be
shovel ready, that we needed to act with all the speed we
could. We wanted to eliminate risk to any delay in getting that
built, so we made the recommendation to the Commissioner and he
did push back on us, so our initial thought back in 2008 was
the campus was not the right place for it.
Last month, as a result of some questions from the
Committee, GSA and SSA revisited that issue, and GSA took a
thorough look, re-look, at the viability of the campus for that
location. I heard as well as I think some of your Committee
staffers heard this past Friday about their review of the
usefulness of the campus location.
With your permission, perhaps Mr. Hewell could address the
assessment of that.
Chairman TANNER. I am a business guy. If I was in business
and I had a campus like this, I think I could figure out how to
utilize it. Mr. Hewell?
Mr. HEWELL. It is difficult to figure out where to start.
There have been a number of studies done on this campus and on
this project. They have been used in different ways. Some of
the early ones were intended for a lease solution which
produces different issues than a federally owned solution.
Relying on contractors sometimes produces impressions that
are wrong such as the zoning one. There is clearly not a zoning
issue on federally owned land.
Chairman TANNER. Who was the contractor? This is almost
ludicrous as a reason for not proceeding because of a zoning
problem.
Mr. HEWELL. I bring it up just to say that it is clear
mistakes have been made. We went back after our last meeting
with the Committee and we were asked how the existing site
compares to the site criteria that we were using for the site
selection.
We went back and took the campus and ran it through the
same process that we have used to evaluate over 150 sites. We
briefed Committee staff last week on this for four or five
hours, and I do not propose to take that much time today. I
would just like to offer you sort of a summary of it.
Our conclusions--we did a number of things. We looked at
the topography of the site, the land use around the site, the
incoming electrical service, the needs for other things, the
associated spaces including parking associated with the data
center.
We did several test fits in different places on the site to
see how well the data center would fit there. It is incorrect
to say that the data center cannot be built on the existing
campus. It clearly can be. In our opinion, it is not the best
solution.
I think there is a presumption that using the existing
campus would save so much money in land costs that we should do
it for cost reasons. There is no identifiable cost advantage to
being on the campus. It will probably cost more because of the
need to create parking garages or structured parking of another
kind, which will actually cost more than the cost of acquiring
a site.
There is clearly an increased complexity both in design and
in construction that will add to the schedule. It is much
easier to design and build a project on a green field site that
is leveled, that does not have the surrounding complications of
the campus.
There are topography issues on the site that will clearly
limit what we can do. It is not impossible to build it there.
It will be quicker and cheaper to build it somewhere else.
Chairman TANNER. How many cars are you talking about in
this parking garage?
Mr. HEWELL. Offhand, I do not know, if you will give me
just a second, I can get you an answer.
Chairman TANNER. You are telling me a parking garage is the
problem? They built parking garages for every football and
baseball stadium in this country. They built a big stadium
right beside the old one in Atlanta. You are telling me you
cannot build because it is so expensive to build a parking
garage out there that you have to move?
Mr. HEWELL. No. It is not impossible to build. It will be
more expensive to build those garages than it will be to----
Chairman TANNER. How many cars are you talking about?
Mr. HEWELL. To do surface parking on a flat site.
Chairman TANNER. How many cars are you talking about?
Mr. HEWELL. Just one second. The existing NCC has 760
parking spaces. The NSC will require an additional 300. That is
over 1,000 parking spaces. The construction cost for that is
roughly $20,000 per square foot--per space.
Chairman TANNER. Thank you. Mr. O'Carroll, would you
comment, please?
Mr. O'CARROLL. Yes, Mr. Chairman. Our biggest concern has
been the documentation. Part of the job of an Inspector General
is to be able to examine documents and then provide feedback.
This has been a fairly confusing issue over the last few
months because we have gotten information from four different
contractors with costs ranging anywhere from about $200 million
to $800 million. We are talking buildings without computers,
buildings with computers, et cetera.
It has been very confusing for us to sort through these
apples and oranges estimates.
What we are looking at is the decision process that was
made first on not considering the current NCC property and
instead looking at other properties. We have been trying to
compile that information.
We have hired a contractor, SeBS, who has been requesting
these documents. It has been enlightening, as they are asking
for these different documents, and we are getting some
documents months after decisions are made. We are sorting
through them all right now.
We are really just waiting to get our report back from the
contractor. We got an initial report back yesterday with some
preliminary information. I have to say our contractor at this
point has found the offsite solution could be viable.
We are looking very closely at that. We are still skeptical
and we are still waiting for all the documents.
Chairman TANNER. One final thing. Mr. Hewell, could you
give us the analysis for the record that you have gone through
of this parking garage and the on and off-campus proposals? Do
you have one? I assume you have some sort of analysis about why
one is better than another. Can you submit that for the record?
Mr. HEWELL. The cost analysis is fairly straightforward.
The cost of acquiring land, our current estimate for that is
about $12 million. The cost of structured parking for the
number of spaces that we need to deal with would be a little
bit more than twice that.
Chairman TANNER. Do you have an analysis of that we could
see, or are you just telling me?
Mr. HEWELL. We will prepare it for you, sir.
Chairman TANNER. All right. Thank you. Ms. Holmes Norton,
you are recognized.
Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, first I want to say I thank you
for your line of questions because I am perplexed, and Mr.
Hewell, you know there is a strong presumption of building on
Government owned land, a commonsense presumption, it is a
presumption that can be overcome but not very easily.
Your Agency is about to build on the old St. Elizabeth
campus. It is not an optimum site. It is not in the middle of
Washington. It is not close to the Capitol. Guess what? The
Government of the United States owns that land. Uncle Sam owns
this land. We are going to build on land we own.
I listened carefully to Chairman Tanner's questions for how
you overcame the presumption, a very strong presumption, in
favor of building on your own land with by the way considerable
land, I understand, at the site, rather than as you seem to
believe should happen, going and buying land to build near the
site.
I think you have to explain to us and to the Ways and Means
Committee why this is a rare instance where given existing
land, where there is room to build, you are asking the
taxpayers to buy you some more land and then build a new
facility.
Mr. HEWELL. Thank you for the question. There were several
reasons why we came to the conclusion that a new site would be
preferable to building on the existing campus site.
Ms. NORTON. Excuse me, I have to stop you there. It is
preferable for me to build a house on land I do not own because
I like that land, because I could do it more easily.
I want to know given all of the considerations,
particularly the strong consideration of existing federally
owned land, how you overcame that. Not what is preferable. It
might be preferable to build it anywhere, but comparing
building on-site, on land you owned, how did you overcome the
presumption that you were well aware of, Mr. Hewell, from your
GSA experience, how did you overcome that presumption?
We spend our lives preferring one thing over another, but
that it was essential to build off site and to acquire land in
order to do so.
Mr. HEWELL. The conclusions that we came to, let me just
run down those really quickly. Any savings in land cost is
overcome by additional project costs created by building on the
site.
Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I am going to ask that a detailed
analysis based upon those conclusions be given to this
Committee and to our Subcommittee. I have seen no analysis, Mr.
Chairman, to indicate that it flies in the face of the usual
situation where the opposite is the case.
I am aware of the topography there. I am also aware that
GSA knows how to build on all kinds of topography. Look at what
you are going to be doing at the old St. Elizabeth's site where
the topography is anything but made to be built upon.
Mr. HEWELL. We are not contending that it is impossible to
do it. We are contending that it will cost more and take
longer.
Ms. NORTON. I will end this line of questioning by saying
if a detailed analysis----
Mr. HEWELL. We will be happy to provide that analysis.
Ms. NORTON. Some of the issues that arise in building would
certainly not arise if you built on the site. Public
transportation. I take it public transportation is near a site
you are considering?
Mr. HEWELL. There is limited public transportation at the
majority of sites that were offered to us.
Ms. NORTON. I have a GSA estimate here of $396 million. Why
is that so much higher than the Lockheed Martin estimate of
$172 million?
Mr. HEWELL. I am sorry, Madam Chairman. I do not
understand.
Ms. NORTON. We understand that GSA estimated a cost of $396
million and Lockheed Martin's study was very much lower.
Mr. HEWELL. The Lockheed Martin study was preliminary. Ours
is much later and much more comprehensive.
Ms. NORTON. What LEED rating will this building have?
Mr. HEWELL. We are seeking a minimum of a silver rating.
Ms. NORTON. That is good. What about the old discussion, if
you really want to get into controversy when you are building,
you mess with the delineated area. Is that straightened out, so
that we are not carving out part of what would be a natural
area and saying wherever we build, that area cannot be
considered the old redlining technique that the GSA is famous
for?
Mr. HEWELL. As far as we know, the delineated area is a 40-
mile radius of the campus.
Ms. NORTON. On our own Subcommittee, we have been doing
hearings in order to see whether or not one of the major points
of the money you have received--you probably would not have
gotten this money except for the collapse of the economy and
the need to stimulate jobs.
When are we going to get to the point where you can report
to those committees that jobs are in fact being created, are
they being created? You say you are on time and on budget. How
much money has been spent and obligated?
Mr. HEWELL. I would have to get back on you on to how much
money has been spent to date. It has been mostly on the cost of
doing studies and doing planning.
Ms. NORTON. You see the problem, the administration and
this Committee is going to be held accountable for whether or
not there will be jobs produced.
What does ``on time, on budget'' mean? When are you going
to be making jobs?
Mr. HEWELL. The substantial portion of the jobs that are
created by this project will begin on or around October 2011
with the start of general construction. There will be obviously
other people employed before that in the design process, but
the numbers will be much smaller than the construction.
Ms. NORTON. When will the building be completed?
Mr. HEWELL. From our perspective, before IT migration, it
will be completed by October 2013.
Ms. NORTON. Finally, the design/build option, you need to
explain why GSA has chosen the design/build option as opposed
to the advantages and disadvantages as opposed to other ways
that GSA builds, because GSA does not usually build/design
build.
Mr. HEWELL. The primary reason for using design/build in
this case is that----
Ms. NORTON. Explain what ``design/build'' is.
Mr. HEWELL. I am sorry. In the traditional construction
project, we contract for design separately. We get a complete
design and then we compete that design for construction.
In a design/build project, we hire one contractor to do
both the design and the construction. It saves us time in
procurement because we do one procurement instead of two, and
in general, because the contractor can start construction
before design is complete, we often find the design/build
produces a shorter schedule. That was the primary reason for
using it in this case.
Ms. NORTON. That is certainly understandable.
Finally, the GSA isn't very good in my experience in
keeping public controversy from developing around projects.
Have you a program of public outreach so as to avoid public
controversy?
Mr. HEWELL. Absolutely. One of the criteria that we are
using in the site selection is to try and find a site that we
believe would not cause much public disruption in order to make
the environmental process easier and quicker.
Ms. NORTON. We certainly know on-campus would not cause
much public disruption or much public controversy, since you
would be building on your own land, sir.
Mr. HEWELL. In order to build on our land, there are some
private properties that are sprinkled around the campus that
would probably have to be acquired.
Ms. NORTON. What does that mean? You are talking about you
would have to build on land you do not own as well?
Mr. HEWELL. Most of the potential test fits of the facility
would require the acquisition of individual homesteads that are
sprinkled throughout the eastern side of the campus. There
would be some issues with respect to acquisition.
Ms. NORTON. Again, as part of your analysis, I think you
need to submit that analysis to the Chairman and to our
Subcommittee.
Mr. HEWELL. We will be happy to do that.
Ms. NORTON. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman TANNER. Thank you. Mr. Johnson. Mr. Diaz-Balart,
welcome. We have asked unanimous consent that any opening
statements be submitted to the record in their entirety.
Mr. Johnson.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
You know, following that line of questions, what would be
the cost of condemning or buying those houses that are private
on that property as compared to what you are doing now or
thinking about doing?
Mr. HEWELL. I do not know what the cost of acquiring
those----
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. You have not looked at it yet; is
that correct?
Mr. HEWELL. Yes, we would need to do appraisals and that
kind of thing.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Tell me who makes the final decision
regarding the location. Is it GSA, SSA, OMB or all three?
Mr. HEWELL. The correct answer is probably all three. The
project team, which is primarily both SSA and GSA, will come to
a conclusion and make a recommendation to the Commissioner of
SSA who will, I guess, do thumb's up or thumb's down, and if it
is thumb's up, he would report that decision to OMB and
ultimately to Congress.
I have been asked that question before and I do not
actually know the answer.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. If you have been asked the question
before, you ought to go find out the answer.
Mr. HEWELL. The authorities seem to be multiple.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Then you need to deal with all those
agencies; is that true?
Mr. HEWELL. Yes, that is true.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Would it cost less to buy up those
houses and put the building on that property than what you are
talking about?
Mr. HEWELL. The site acquisition costs for those properties
at the existing campus would I am sure be less than the cost of
acquiring a new site.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. That is interesting.
Mr. HEWELL. The cost of developing the existing campus for
this project would exceed the cost of developing that in an
open green field site with flat topography.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. I am not sure that we can guarantee
that thing will be built on time and on budget. Can you
guarantee that?
Mr. HEWELL. We are very confident about that, sir.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Are you?
Mr. HEWELL. Yes.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. We have not been able to do that in
the past.
Mr. HEWELL. If I may speak for my regional office, sir, we
have a long history of being on time and on budget. We are very
proud of it.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. That is why you stick it way out
there to 2015, you can make that.
Mr. Gallagher, you say next October you will have the
infrastructure in Durham to recover and run the entire
operations through the computer center. Why did you decide to
build a new computer center instead of using Durham as a
primary site?
Mr. GRAY. Mr. Johnson, maybe I can answer that for you. The
reason that we cannot just move our workloads to Durham while
we are building a new data center to replace our current one is
that if we did that, we would be in exactly the same situation
that we are in today where, if we had a disaster, we would have
to back-up at our commercial hot site, which is inadequate for
a disaster.
If we can maintain two data centers throughout this entire
effort, we can make sure that if we have a disaster, we can
recover all of our workloads at either one.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. I understand that idea. Why can you
not make Durham the primary center and the one up here a back-
up?
Mr. GRAY. Because neither one is a primary and a back-up.
Both of them are co-processing centers today. Half of our
workloads run at Durham. Half of our workloads run in the
National Computer Center. In the event of a disaster, either
one would take over for the other.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Is the Durham center modernized? It
doesn't use COBOL; is that true?
Mr. GRAY. Yes, sir. It is modernized. The workload that is
there is on modern computers. There is some code that we run
that is COBOL code that runs both in the National Computer
Center and in North Carolina.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Why has it taken us 13 years or more
to get off that COBOL system?
Mr. GRAY. Well, first of all, the issue here is that you
could just hire someone to convert that COBOL code----
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. I think Microsoft could do it
overnight.
Mr. GRAY. I do not know if they could do it overnight but
certainly they could do it much faster. The issue here is that
if we did that, if we just converted the code to another, we
would maintain the same problems in our systems that we have
today.
Let me give you an example. You are very familiar with the
fact that today, we are replacing 54 COBOL systems that run in
our DDS', independent systems. If we were to just convert that
code, we would end up with 54 web based systems all
independent, all hard to change, all the problems that we have
today.
Instead, as we are going forward and replacing the COBOL
code, we are modernizing our systems, we are redesigning them
so that we really have more flexibility, for example, in the
DDS systems, not only will there be one single web based system
that can be changed overnight, but in addition to that, we will
be able to integrate health information technology. It will be
able to integrate case analysis tools.
We will really have a more robust system serving us for the
21st Century than if we were just to convert that code from one
language to another.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Do you agree with that, Mr.
O'Carroll?
Mr. O'CARROLL. Mr. Johnson, our concerns are with the speed
with which the Agency is moving forward with conversion of the
COBOL. As it stands now, it is in the plans, and as Bill just
mentioned with the DDSs, but when you are looking at the major
systems of SSA, we are seeing no major progress in converting
that COBOL language.
Our concern, and what I think should be the concern of
everyone, is as we are building this new computer center,
wherever it is built, that we look into the future and do some
long range planning, and look out 20 years and see what type of
technology is going to be needed, and take that into
consideration.
I use the example of buying a brand new limousine and
putting a golf cart engine in it. We should be making sure that
the best of technology is being used in the location as well as
in the data systems.
Mr. GRAY. Mr. Johnson, I agree that we ought to be looking
ahead to the best technologies that are available. I would just
say to you that over the last several years, we have made a lot
of progress in moving into modernized systems. Our databases
that house information, benefit data, two-thirds of that data
has now been moved into a modern industry standard database.
Forty percent of the COBOL code we had is now running in modern
languages.
I think we are making progress as we move along. I just
think it is more difficult in some cases as we redesign our
systems.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. It is awfully slow. I think today's
computers all over the world share information with each other
and yours do not seem to want to.
Let me ask Mr. Hewell, did you analyze and concur with
Social Security's rationale for a 40 mile radius or did you
just accept it?
Mr. HEWELL. I guess the quickest answer to your question is
that we accepted it. We looked at their rationale for it. It
seemed to make sense. The rationale was a technical one.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Yes, but it would not be a problem if
we put it on the current site, would it?
Mr. HEWELL. That would not be a problem.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. I think that is another reason for
doing that. Are you saying, Mr. Gallagher, let me ask you, that
by October, Durham is going to be able to recover all the
systems?
Mr. GALLAGHER. Yes, sir.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. October of this year? Are you telling
me it is going to be until October next year before we can
recover all the systems?
Mr. GRAY. Sir, maybe I can help you. In January, in a
couple of weeks, the North Carolina site will be able to
recover all of our critical production systems, which are the
payment systems.
In October, we will also be able to recover the non-
critical systems, which are some of the regional workloads,
some of the management information, some of the forecasting
workloads that are not as time sensitive to bring up.
In reality, the systems that this country relies on to be
available will be able to be recovered in North Carolina
starting in just a couple of weeks.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. In October of next year?
Mr. GRAY. In January.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. That is only a couple of weeks away,
you know.
Mr. GRAY. Yes, that is what I am saying.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. By January, we have full capability
on our Social Security system and we will not lose anything
except what you just talked about?
Mr. GRAY. Yes, sir. All critical production systems we
would be able to recover in North Carolina.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. We would not have to stop Social
Security checks or disability checks; is that true?
Mr. GRAY. That is true, sir.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. I am glad to know that.
Mr. Gallagher, you also talk about the strengthened role of
your Chief Information Officer is to ensure that you have a
long term vision and a process in place to make use of leading
edge technologies. Is this position that you are talking about
a political appointee, and if that is such an important thing,
why is he not testifying here today?
Mr. GALLAGHER. The new Chief Information Officer is a
political appointee, but is not in a position that requires
confirmation by the Senate. We have only three Senate-confirmed
positions which are the Commissioner, the Deputy Commissioner
and then we have the Inspector General as well.
Mr. Baitman joined us earlier this year. He is actually
seated behind me.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Has he signed off on your decisions
concerning the national support center, the new location?
Mr. GALLAGHER. He has been involved in meetings. I believe
he attended the meeting on Friday. He has raised some questions
which is rightly so, because we look for him to be a critical
thinker.
I met with the Commissioner last night where we expressed
to him or I expressed to him along with the chief of staff the
results of Mr. Hewell's study, and the Commissioner has decided
that we need to have this shovel ready. He wanted to proceed as
we initially had outlined about moving forward.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. How many GSA staff are assigned to
you for help in this deal?
Mr. GALLAGHER. Sir, I actually do not have that number. In
a project that is a joint project, I guess I am hesitant to use
the word ``assigned.'' I would defer to Mr. Hewell about how
many folks are actually from his shop that are working on the
project, if that would answer your question.
Mr. HEWELL. In one capacity or another, we have about a
dozen people from GSA assigned to the project, and then of
course, there are additional contractors assigned.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. How many consultants and contractors
have been involved in the process so far and did you hire them
or did somebody else hire them?
Mr. HEWELL. The consultants we are using we hired. Let me
just get a number for you. We have two consulting firms working
for us.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. You coordinate with them every day?
Mr. HEWELL. Several times; yes.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Okay. What do they think about the
location?
Mr. HEWELL. They were part of the study. They are in full
agreement that it should be off site.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Can you give us about ten reasons why
you cannot use the existing site?
Mr. HEWELL. As I said earlier, sir, I would not tell you
that you cannot use it. I would tell you there are reasons why
it makes more sense to use a different one. Those reasons are--
--
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. I think Ms. Holmes Norton was right
on when she asked, ``What are we doing buying more property for
the Federal Government when we have a site that large?''
Mr. HEWELL. If I may, sir, the actual developable area of
the site is smaller than it looks. What is developable is
fairly critically sloped which makes development on the site
more expensive and more complicated.
Most of the flat area on the existing campus is currently
developed. As we expand construction on the campus, we would be
building on existing parking lots and creating structured
parking in other places at the expense of that. It also
requires that we phase construction which affects schedule on
the site of anything that we do.
If we do something for the computer center on the existing
site, we would be taking away some of the possibility of
further developing the site in the future for additional office
related space, like what is on the campus now.
That actually in our opinion would be a mistake because we
already have a lot of leased square footage in buildings that
kind of ring the campus, and for long term, we would like to
see that become Government owned because this is clearly a
facility that will be around.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. One of the questions that has not
been asked is what do you intend to do with the existing
building? Are you going to demolish it?
Mr. HEWELL. The existing building would probably be
ultimately converted to office space. We need to do further
study on it. There is a chance it would be torn down. The
likelihood is that it would end up being converted.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Are you going to get rid of all that
wiring that is in there right now?
Mr. HEWELL. We would certainly have to get rid of some of
it; yes.
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you,
Ms. Holmes Norton.
Ms. NORTON. I just wanted to say in light of both Mr.
Johnson's questions and your questions, for the record, on the
St. Elizabeth's site, we do have something to compare with
here, that is the biggest construction going on in the United
States today. We own the land.
The Chairman was concerned about the parking lot, about
parking, and whether or not you needed to have a flat surface.
I just want to say that at the old St. Elizabeth's site, they
simply dug into a hill and they are putting parking right on
that site. Again, in keeping with the presumption in favor of
building on land you own.
Your notion that you have to have a flat site in order to
park----
Mr. HEWELL. Most of the construction that is going on at
St. Elizabeth's is office space, which can be----
Ms. NORTON. I am talking about the parking lot. I am
talking about the parking. There is parking. This is a sloped
area.
This is an area full of historic buildings and still the
Government is so concerned that we build on existing land that
we are re-using the historic buildings rather than taking the
whole facility off site.
That is how strong there is a presumption of building on
your own land, even using--these are old, old buildings, not
only old buildings, buildings that we used for everything from
clinics to dormitories. Because they are historic, the
Government is willing to spend some money to in fact re-use
them because they are on land we own.
Again, Mr. Chairman, I have not heard in your call for
specific analyses, particularly given the fact that we have
some time, it is very important before we do what frankly
-- I will ask you, Mr. Hewell, do you know of any other
instance where the Government has owned land but has
decided to buy land instead of using land it owned?
Mr. HEWELL. The answer to that is surely yes, but I can't
give you----
Ms. NORTON. You are going to have to--I do respect
precedent. If you give me examples given GSA's long history of
building, I think it would be----
Mr. HEWELL. We will look for some precedence. Madam
Chairman, I ask you to realize also that we are talking about a
computer center and not office space here. The construction
needs of a computer center are different. This is a big flat
building.
We are also talking about a need for speed. I have heard
that from all of you today. Building on the campus will present
difficulties that we will not experience elsewhere that will
affect the schedule.
Chairman TANNER. How many acres are out there on the
campus?
Mr. HEWELL. 270.
Chairman TANNER. You said earlier that it was not cost
effective to build there because you had to build a parking
garage. You have surface parking now, and you cannot find in
270 acres other surface parking if you use the campus?
Mr. HEWELL. The large majority of the space in that 270
acres that is flat, the easiest to build on, is either covered
currently with buildings or parking lots.
Chairman TANNER. You are saying you cannot build a surface
parking lot on a hill?
Mr. HEWELL. You can certainly build parking on a hill. It
requires excavation and foundation work.
Chairman TANNER. Would that be cheaper than a parking
garage?
Mr. HEWELL. Structuring parking whether it is a garage or
not is comparably priced. The area to the north of the existing
data center, as an example, has something like a 60 foot
elevation on it, between where the current data center and the
property line is, which is roughly six stories.
We are dealing with some significant topography.
Chairman TANNER. Mr. Diaz-Balart?
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I am from Florida. I do not have a dog in this fight as far
as one place or another. I am concerned obviously about making
sure that the safety issue has to be paramount.
Also, regardless of what has happened in the past or what
will happen, safety is paramount. I think you all will agree
with that.
You mentioned speed. Speed is important because of costs. I
know it is also part of job creation which is supposed to be a
stimulus. Also, cost is paramount in my opinion.
Let me ask you the following, which is less expensive, to
keep it on-site or to move it to a new location? Number two is
which is safer for everything that it entails to keep it on-
site or to move it to a new location, and third, which is
related to the expense, which is faster, to keep it in this
location or to move it to a new location?
Mr. HEWELL. My answer to those three questions would be the
outside solution in all three cases.
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. The off site solution is less expensive?
Mr. HEWELL. We believe it would be less expensive.
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. Any idea how much less expensive?
Mr. HEWELL. I do not believe our studies are developed
enough to give you that answer specifically. We know the cost
we would incur to go off site as opposed to stay on-site would
be the cost of acquiring land. That cost is roughly $12
million.
The additional cost we will incur on the existing campus to
deal with the things that we have been talking about will in
our opinion exceed that. I am a little afraid to throw out any
numbers because I do not know that we have developed them that
much.
The cost of dealing with the topography to build either a
building or parking will exceed that $12 million cost.
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. In your opinion, it would be less
expensive to build elsewhere than on the current site?
Mr. HEWELL. We believe so.
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. It would be great if you could give us
something regarding that.
Mr. HEWELL. We will develop that analysis.
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. That is crucial. Again, we should not be
talking about theories here. We should know. Again, we would
like to see and I think the Committee would like to see that,
as the Chairman has just said off microphone, an analysis of
price differences between off-campus and on the current
location.
Number two is speed. I would also like to see, Mr.
Chairman, if possible, an analysis of which one would happen
quicker, if that is at all possible.
Mr. HEWELL. It is possible and we will produce that.
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. The third one which is paramount,
obviously--I said I do not have a dog in this fight except for
the fact that we all need to make sure that safety is
paramount. We need to make sure people continue to get their
checks and that information is not lost or whatever.
Do you have an analysis on what the impact on safety of the
information would be, the potential risk of putting it on-
campus versus off?
Mr. HEWELL. The analysis would go something like this. If
we build a facility off site, we will not run any risk of a
backhoe running into existing wiring or something like that
which we may or may not know about.
If we build on-site, we will certainly do everything we can
with respect to the plans that we have for what is underground
and that sort of thing already, but the risk exists for
something to happen. It happens on construction jobs all the
time.
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. Particularly with an old facility where--
--
Mr. HEWELL. Where the plans from 30 years ago are not
necessarily up to date or findable.
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. Mr. Chairman, what I would like is as much
as possible if you could get us answers to those three
questions as specific as possible, as accurate as possible.
Mr. HEWELL. We will take a shot at it.
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. Great. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. NORTON. Mr. Diaz-Balart, you asked a question that was
very important here about safety. In the analysis they are
getting to the Committee on safety, an analysis of the kinds of
offsets that would be required.
Once you acquire new land, which is not already protected
as this land is, you then will have to erect a whole new set of
security procedures which have to be figured into the cost. It
raises costs and certainly for the Social Security system
raises real safety issues in security terms.
Mr. HEWELL. The offset for the perimeter security will
actually not be a great deal less because that same security
would need to be done on the campus. The campus itself is not
secured to the level that the data center area needs to be.
There are setbacks and things that are associated just with
that facility.
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. If I may, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman TANNER. Yes.
Mr. DIAZ-BALART. I think my Chairwoman had a very important
point. I think we need to have some answers and we need to have
those as specific as possible and as timely as possible. I
appreciate if you could do that.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman TANNER. Thank you. Ms. Brown-Waite?
Ms. BROWN-WAITE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Hewell, I travel back and forth in my District every
week, and sometimes at the airport, I meet some of the most
interesting people.
Are you aware that GSA actually has contracted with an
organization that has expertise in putting up commercial
buildings and has sought their advice? Are you aware of such a
contract? This is a consulting contract on how GSA can build
better, faster and cheaper. Are you aware of such a contractor?
Mr. HEWELL. I have to say no, I am not. My purview is the
regional office. What you are describing sounds to me like a
national office contract.
Ms. BROWN-WAITE. If I could make a suggestion. I have seen
this person several times at the airport, and I am naturally
interested in saving taxpayer dollars. This consultant has come
up with a plan. They believe that various buildings could be
constructed in half the time at half to two-thirds of the
current cost.
Obviously, GSA was amazed at this. It seems to me as if in
private industry, there is a deadline, and cost overruns are
very seldom allowed because they hold the feet of the
contractors to the fire and get the construction done very
quickly.
I strongly advise you to follow up and get the information
that has been supplied to GSA. Government workers, we are
shocked, tried to shoot holes in the proposal, but were really
unsuccessful because it works.
I would really strongly suggest that you follow up on this
with the main office.
The other question that I have is how do you think other
than this private contractor that Congress could help you speed
up this process? The whole building process.
Mr. HEWELL. For all of the 35 years or so that I have
worked for GSA, we have continuously looked for ways to do
that, and we have actually made significant improvement.
We do over 95 percent of our business in terms of dollars
spent through contractors. We talk to them all the time about
many things.
I would like to take this opportunity to say that in terms
of dealing with the SSA issue at hand, Congress has certainly
helped us a lot already by appropriating the funds for this
project as quickly as they did.
If I might get the name of this contractor that you were
talking about after the hearing, I would like to do that.
Ms. BROWN-WAITE. I have a briefing I have to go to but I
will make sure my staff gets it to you.
Mr. HEWELL. Thank you very much.
Ms. BROWN-WAITE. I have a question for Mr. O'Carroll. Mr.
O'Carroll, what do you think is the most important lesson that
can be learned from the building of the secondary data center
in Durham, and how can we apply this lesson to the new
construction of the National Computer Center?
We were originally told that the building would take six
years. It took eight years. Should we really believe that the
building that we are discussing today will be constructed on
time?
Mr. O'CARROLL. Congresswoman, that is a very good question.
All of these questions are interesting. One of the
responsibilities of being the Inspector General is remaining
independent. With all the discussions of the tour on Friday, we
are usually not invited to those events. We do not go along,
but we review the documentation afterwards.
It is sort of the same thing that happened with the Durham
Support Center. We took a look at the overruns, and we went
down there twice. Once, we went down with the Agency to do a
walk-through. Afterwards, our auditors went down and we took a
look at the pitfalls that occurred as they were building the
Durham Support Center.
We identified those issues and wrote a report that is
available.
We are optimistic that a lot of the mistakes and a lot of
the issues on the overruns in Durham, now that they are known,
should be avoided in any of the planning going forward.
I have to say we are impressed with the way that Durham has
progressed. We were impressed with the flexibility, because
nine months ago, it did not have the capability of redundancy
that it now will have. That is partly a result of our report in
which we noted on the disaster recovery that not enough
resources were put into Durham. They are included now and we
are looking at that for the future.
I think the mistakes that were made and valuable lessons
learned, Durham should help going into the future.
Ms. BROWN-WAITE. Mr. Chairman, if I could ask one followup
question to Mr. O'Carroll.
Mr. O'Carroll, when you say not enough resources, could you
elaborate a little bit on that? Not enough staff? Help me out
here.
Mr. O'CARROLL. Yes. Having made the visit down there, we
found the facility is in a rural area. It was away from a lot
of the resources that were needed.
I think in terms of, as we discussed here, the infringing
area, they needed a lot of real estate development. It was
initially interesting.
When Durham was first selected, it was going to be for
redundancy, but with funding and other issues, it became a
secondary site as opposed to being a redundant site.
I have to say in some ways, it was probably a reduction in
funding, why the decision was made to make it a secondary site
as opposed to a redundant site. Now, with more resources
devoted to it, it is now redundant, so it is going to have that
capability in January that Mr. Gray mentioned, being able to
replicate many of the same processes that are done in
Baltimore.
On resources, it means you are going to have to make sure
there will be enough power generators. One of the issues that
was addressed in the last year is they doubled the amount of
generator power down there so it could be redundant. That is a
resource that needs to be looked at in advance.
Ms. BROWN-WAITE. Are you concerned that all of the
facilities are along the East Coast?
Mr. O'CARROLL. We are looking at that. One of our concerns,
of course, when we heard about a 40 mile range, we thought that
immediately took off the table the ability to go into other
states, other areas, other parts of the country.
It, of course, is a concern that everything is East Coast
located. However, we are feeling more comfortable that there is
going to be redundancy in at least a couple of different
locations, which in a sense is doubling the sense of security
that there was a few years ago.
It would be nice if geographically it could be in a
completely different location, but I have to say, given the
resources and the opportunities that SSA had, just the fact
that there are eventually going to be two redundant sites, we
are less concerned with geographical location.
Ms. BROWN-WAITE. Mr. Chairman, thank you for your
understanding, and I yield back the balance of my time.
Chairman TANNER. Thank you. Does any Member have further
questions?
[No response.]
Chairman TANNER. We want to again thank you all.
Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, I just want to make sure that Mr.
Hewell and Mr. Gallagher understand that in light of the
questions of the Committees, before you move forward on buying
land, one, the analyses need to be presented to the Committees,
and two, the Committees need to have fair notice in advance if
the decision is made to buy land.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman TANNER. Thank you, Ms. Holmes Norton.
There is a concern here. We need to see some data, some
analyses here. I think you all would agree this is a big deal.
It is extremely important. It is critical to the Social
Security delivery system.
The concern here is that we have access to the analyses
about what we are doing so that you all and these two
Committees who have jurisdiction can comfortably face any
questions about it that we might receive.
We will be looking forward to your submission.
Do any of you all have any closing comments?
[No response.]
Chairman TANNER. If not, we thank you and the hearing is
adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:03 a.m., the Subcommittees were
adjourned.]
[Questions for the Record follow:]
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