[House Hearing, 113 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
COLLECTIONS STEWARDSHIP AT THE SMITHSONIAN
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON HOUSE
ADMINISTRATION
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
Held in Washington, DC, July 17, 2013
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on House Administration
Available on the Internet
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COMMITTEE ON HOUSE ADMINISTRATION
CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan, Chairman
GREGG HARPER, Mississippi ROBERT A. BRADY, Pennsylvania, Ranking
PHIL GINGREY, M.D., Georgia Minority Member
AARON SCHOCK, Illinois ZOE LOFGREN, California
TODD ROKITA, Indiana JUAN VARGAS, California
RICHARD B. NUGENT, Florida
Professional Staff
Kelly Craven, Staff Director
Kyle Anderson, Minority Staff Director
COLLECTIONS STEWARDSHIP AT THE SMITHSONIAN
WEDNESDAY, JULY 17, 2013
House of Representatives,
Committee on House Administration,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:28 a.m., in Room
1310, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. Candice S. Miller
(chairman of the committee) presiding.
Present: Representatives Miller, Brady and Vargas.
Staff Present: Kelly Craven, Staff Director; Peter
Schalestock, Deputy General Counsel; Yael Barash, Legislative
Clerk; Salley Wood, Communications Director and Deputy Staff
Director; Bob Sensenbrenner, Senior Counsel; Mary Sue Englund,
Director of Administration; Kyle Anderson, Minority Staff
Director; Matt Pinkus, Minority Senior Policy Analyst; Matt
Defreitas, Minority Professional Staff; Khalil Abboud, Minority
Elections Staff; Thomas Hicks, Minority Elections Counsel; Mike
Harrison, Minority Professional Staff; Greg Abbott, Minority
Professional Staff; and Eddie Flaherty, Minority Professional
Staff.
The Chairman. I am going to call to order the Committee on
House Administration's hearing regarding Collection Stewardship
at the Smithsonian Institution. In the hearing record, first of
all, for members, will remain open for 5 legislative days so
members might submit any materials they wish to be included
therein.
Today we are holding a hearing on collection stewardship at
the Smithsonian. The Smithsonian's vast collection, with more
than 130 million items, which I think is an extraordinary
number, holds so many objects of great significance to our
Nation's scientific efforts as well as priceless objects of
immense historical and cultural value.
However, given the size and the scope and diversity of the
collection, from insect specimens to artwork to live animals
over at the zoo, it has proven to be a significant challenge to
manage, and a challenge that I certainly commend the
Smithsonian for taking on with such great vigor and
determination and commitment.
The Smithsonian has not testified actually before this
committee since 2009. And so we decided to invite the
Smithsonian certainly to fulfill our duty of oversight, of the
oversight committee. And I think it is not often that you find
bipartisan, bicameral agreement in Washington these days, but
the fact that everyone loves the Smithsonian is something that
we can all agree on. It certainly is truly one of the treasures
of our Nation's Capital, of our Nation, of the world, really.
And I would hope that the Smithsonian takes this hearing as an
opportunity not only to answer important questions about the
collections, stewardship, and the progress that they have made
over recent years, which has been remarkable, I think, but also
to spread the word about the good work that the Smithsonian
Institution does each and every day.
Since its establishment in 1846, the Smithsonian has
provided America with free access--free access--to a treasure
trove of American history. And at its core, the Smithsonian's
mission, the increase and diffusion of knowledge, depends on
its collections. Without its collections, the Smithsonian
certainly cannot accomplish much of its scientific research nor
can it help other agencies--the United States, international,
accomplish theirs. Without its collection, the millions of
tourists who visit Washington would not be able to see the
famous ruby slippers, the Hope Diamond, or the original Star
Spangled Banner. And, thankfully, since its safe return, they
can also visit Rusty, the red panda, as well.
Collections are fundamental to the Smithsonian's mission,
and its strategic plan recognizes that as well as the
responsibility, as they say, to preserve them for future
generations. In 2005, the Smithsonian's Office of Policy and
Analysis recognized the Smithsonian had challenges in
maintaining its collection. Its report, ``Concern At the
Core,'' detailed how the Smithsonian had systematic weaknesses
in its collections care practices, and the report detailed how
the Smithsonian had fallen behind on its collections care and
expressed concern about the Smithsonian's ability to track and
maintain its collection. Subsequent IG audits of the
Smithsonian museums, such as the National Air and Space Museum,
the National Museum of American History, and the National
Museum of Natural History, from 2005 to 2011, further outlined
issues related to preservation, to inventory record, to storage
conditions and security of collections.
In recognizing these challenges, the Smithsonian, to its
great credit, realigned efforts to improve collection care
practices. In 2010, in its 2010 to 2015 strategic plan, the
Smithsonian specifically recognized strengthening collections
as one of the Smithsonian's top priorities. In 2011, the
Smithsonian appointed Mr. Scott--Dr. Scott Miller, who joins us
today, the Deputy Undersecretary for Collections and
Interdisciplinary Support. The Smithsonian then had a point
person in addressing the care of its varying collections, which
ranges, I say, from small insects mounted on boards to large
historical and industrial and military equipment. The
Smithsonian has also embarked on three different initiatives to
improve collections care; an institution-wide collections
condition assessment, allowing the Smithsonian to find out the
state of its collection; increased digitization of its
collections; and implementing collections space planning. And
while these are the overreaching plan at the Smithsonian, each
of the Smithsonian's museums have also undertaken their own
initiatives to improve collections care.
However, the work there is not done. In its ``Top
Management Challenges for 2012,'' the Smithsonian Inspector
General identified collections stewardship as one of the most
pressing issues for the Smithsonian's management. And as
chairman of the Committee on House Admin, I certainly feel
responsibility for ensuring that the Smithsonian, a rare
institution that everyone in Washington values, keeps its
collections available for future generations. And that is
really one of the purposes of our hearings today.
And I certainly want to thank the witnesses for attending
today, and I will formally introduce you in just a moment.
But at this time, I would like to recognize my colleague,
Mr. Brady, our ranking member, for his opening statement.
Mr. Brady. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Madam Chairman, thank you for holding this hearing. As
always, I am happy to work with you on this issue, and I expect
we will get into other important issues as well. And I would
like unanimous consent to be able to submit my opening remarks
for the record because they mirror yours, rather than be
redundant. We do have a fondness for the Smithsonian. We do
know that you do some extraordinary things. You are a wealth of
information and artifacts and memorabilia, and the whole
country uses it and uses it well. So, with that, I would just
like to submit these for the record and look forward to hearing
from our witnesses.
[The statement of Mr. Brady follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The Chairman. Very well.
Without objection, Mr. Brady's opening statement submitted
for the record.
I would like to now introduce our witnesses. Before his
appointment as the 12th Secretary of the Smithsonian in July
2008, Secretary Wayne Clough was President of the Georgia
Institute of Technology for 14 years, received his bachelor's
and master's degrees in civil engineering from Georgia Tech in
1964 and in 1965, and then received a doctorate in 1969 in
civil engineering from the University of California, Berkeley.
Secretary Clough was a member of the faculty at Duke
University, Stanford University, and Virginia Tech. And as
secretary, he is responsible for operating the world's largest
museum and research complex, with 19 museums, the National Zoo,
and numerous research centers. He oversees an annual budget of
$1 billion, with about 6,000 employees and an equal number of
volunteers. He spearheaded the development and successful
execution of a comprehensive strategic plan for the Smithsonian
and has overseen the opening of major permanent exhibitions,
including the Star Spangled Banner at the National Museum of
American History, the Hall of Human Origins at the National
Museum of Natural History, the new wing at the National Air and
Space Museum's Udvar-Hazy Center, as well as the Asia Trails at
the National Zoo.
Our next witness would be Dr. Scott Miller, who is the
Deputy for Under Secretary of Collections and Interdisciplinary
Support, responsible for central planning and development of
the Smithsonian's vast collections of 137 million objects. Dr.
Miller received a bachelor's degree from the University of
California and a doctorate degree in biology from Harvard. He
previously served as Deputy Under Secretary for Science,
helping to oversee the Smithsonian's science museums and
research facilities and as well was an Associate Director for
Science at the National Zoo from 2004 to 2006.
And before coming to the Smithsonian in 2000, Dr. Miller
designed and implemented an International Biodiversity and
Conservation Program for the International Center of Insect
Physiology and Ecology in Kenya.
Scott Dahl is the Inspector General for the Smithsonian
Institution. He graduated in 1988 from the University of Texas
Law School, worked at the Washington law firm of Arnold &
Porter from 1989 to 1992. He previously served as Deputy IG at
the U.S. Department of Commerce, Deputy IG for the Office of
Director of National Intelligence, and senior counsel for the
IG at the Department of Justice. And for the past 20 years, Mr.
Dahl has been an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law
Center, teaching classes on professional responsibility and
public corruption. The Office of the IG in the Smithsonian
Institution reports directly to the Board of Regents and
Congress as well. He was appointed by the Board of Regents. His
office conducts audits and investigations related to
Smithsonian programs and operations, promotes efficiency and
effectiveness within the institution, prevents and detects
cases of fraud, waste, and abuse, and makes recommendations
regarding existing policy and regulations at the Smithsonian as
well. And, of course, keeps Congress informed of his audits and
investigations.
STATEMENTS OF SECRETARY G. WAYNE CLOUGH, PH.D., SECRETARY,
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION; SCOTT MILLER, PH.D., DEPUTY UNDER
SECRETARY FOR COLLECTIONS AND INTERDISCIPLINARY SUPPORT,
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION; SCOTT S. DAHL, INSPECTOR GENERAL,
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION
The Chairman. So I certainly want to thank all of the
witnesses for being here. We had heard that last year alone,
there were over 30 million visitors to the Smithsonian. Again,
just an incredible, sort of a difficult number to even get your
mind around. But it is a wonderful, wonderful, as I say,
national treasure. And we look forward to your testimony today.
And I would--the chair now recognizes Secretary Clough.
STATEMENT OF SECRETARY G. WAYNE CLOUGH, PH.D.
Mr. Clough. Thank you, Madam Chair, and members of the
committee for this opportunity to testify. The Smithsonian
appreciates the support of the administration, Congress, and
the American People, especially regarding collections
stewardship.
Our collections reflect our broad mission, and include
objects from history, art, culture, and science. They represent
our collective memory of who we are as a people as well as our
knowledge of the natural world and our universe. We take our
role as stewards of the Nation's collection seriously, and I am
here today to assure the American people that their collections
are safe.
We do have challenges that are complicated by the size and
complexity of our collection, the scope of the work needed for
some of our older facilities that house collections, and some
uncertainties about the Federal budget. We are stewards, as you
mentioned, of 137 million objects and treasures, including
2,000 live animals; 127 million of the collections are indeed
scientific specimens. In addition, there are more than 163,000
cubic feet of archives, including paper records, images, audio-
visual and digital media, and 1.8 million library volumes,
including rare books. We have a giant squid, the desk upon
which Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence, Harriet
Tubman's shawl, the jacket of labor leader Cesar Chavez, the
Congressional Gold Medals awarded to the Japanese-American
Veterans of World War II, the Wright flyer, Amelia Earhart's
plane, and the Space Shuttle Discovery. We use them all to
inspire visitors, spark discovery, and create new knowledge.
And guided by our new strategic plan that you referred to,
we are focusing on our investments, measuring everything we do
and striving to continuously improve. And this applies to both
collections as well as our operations. There are great
opportunities ahead. But as I recently told Congress,
sequestration will affect the funding for the basics, such as
maintenance and collection care, and funding for capital that
is needed to address issues with older facilities.
Our 2010 strategic plan called for us to renew our focus on
collections care, and this was reinforced by the inspector
general's report in 2011. Three years ago, I elevated the
responsibility for collections by creating a new position,
deputy under secretary for collections and interdisciplinary
support, that provides an integrated view for the institution.
We appointed the highly respected scientist with long
experience in the field, Dr. Scott Miller, who is here today.
He will discuss in detail what we consider our three pillars of
our policy; pan-institutional collections assessment and
planning, focus on digitization to improve collections
preservation, management, information content, and lengthening
their lifespans and collection space planning.
Let me offer a few highlights. Our cumulative investment in
collections from fiscal years 2006 to 2012 includes $462
million for collections management and $390 million in major
facilities capital projects directly affecting collections
care. We created new state of the art collections care
facilities as follows: We opened a new collection center at the
Hazy Center of the National Air and Space Museum at Dulles. We
added a new collection support center in Landover, Maryland. We
built Pod 5 at the Museum Support Center, also in Maryland, for
scientific collections, and we renovated Pod 3 at that same
facility for three art museums, natural history collections,
and cryo, our frozen collection. We renovated an offsite
storage facility for our New York-based Cooper-Hewitt National
Design Museum, and we added new greenhouses for our
horticultural collections. We have supported research into best
practices at our Museum Conservation Institute, which is
located in Suitland, Maryland, and recently hosted the National
Summit on Sustainable Preservation Environment Strategies.
To reduce duplications over the past decade, we have
deaccessioned numerous items, including stamps, aircraft, and
scientific specimens. We also work collaboratively with four
Federal agencies that base 100 people in our natural history
collections to fulfill their agency missions. And, through our
Museum of Natural History, we provide technical support for the
Federal Aviation Administration and the Department of Defense
on aircraft bird strikes using our collections.
It is my honor to lead a dedicated staff of 6,400 employees
plus 6,200 volunteers, all passionate about the Smithsonian and
serving the American people. With the help of our Board of
Regents, which includes six members of Congress, the chief
justice, and the vice president, we are seeking to create a
more responsive and relevant Smithsonian. And as noted, last
year, we opened 100 exhibitions and hosted more than 30 million
visitors, the largest number in a decade. We are expanding our
reach through digital access, with more than 100 million unique
visitors to our Web sites and more than 2,000 lesson plans that
meet State standards which are delivered to all 50 States.
A scholar in American history once said the Smithsonian is
in the ``forever business,'' meaning our collections have to be
preserved for all future generations. Recently, we created a
new state-of-the-art home for the grand Star Spangled Banner at
our American History Museum. As the flag was being moved into
its new home, all the construction workers on the site stopped,
stood, took off their hardhats, and, in many cases, with tears
in their eyes, held their hands to their hearts as the flags
passed. That is the power of inspiring objects. With the help
of Congress and American people, we will preserve, protect, and
present them for future generations to come. Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you, Secretary.
[The statement of Mr. Clough follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The Chairman. That is a very great story there about the
Star Spangled Banner. That speaks to what you are about there,
certainly.
The chair now recognizes Dr. Miller for his testimony.
And we have a 5-minute light on. But if you need to go over
a little bit, we are--just take your time and go through it.
Thank you.
STATEMENT OF SCOTT MILLER, PH.D.
Mr. Miller. Thank you for this opportunity to testify.
As Secretary Clough described, I have oversight
responsibilities for the collections at the Smithsonian, and it
is a great privilege to do so. But as an entomologist with 30
years of experience doing collections-based research, I also
have a very personal appreciation for the value of the
collections and how they can be used. I, too, want to assure
the American people that their treasures are safe.
Our holdings are a global resource accessed by millions of
visitors and researchers each year in subjects from aeronautics
to zoology. With Federal support, we are working diligently to
ensure that our collections in art, science, history, and
culture are there for generations to come to educate, to
inspire, and to enlighten.
Collection stewardship is among the Smithsonian's highest
priorities and, in some cases, our greatest challenge. The
volume, characteristics, and age of Smithsonian collections
as--well as the variety of standards that apply to their care--
make their management, preservation, and digitization as
complex as the collections themselves. Yet we have been making
great progress in many areas.
Specifically, we have satisfied all but a few of the
inspector general recommendations, and those will be addressed
by the end of the year. As the secretary noted, we have focused
on three initiatives for a holistic view of the collection.
Specifically, those are the assessment of collections care
conditions, strategic focus on the digital Smithsonian, and
collection space planning. These three initiatives encompass
the concerns noted in the IG reports, specifically, inventory
control, security standards, and preservation. The creation of
my office itself has raised the profile of collections issues
within the Smithsonian and, in some cases, served as a catalyst
for our recent progress.
Most people think of the Smithsonian as the iconic museums
on the National Mall in front of the Capitol. We are a
destination, but we are also so much more, with collections
prominently at the heart of the Smithsonian. In fact, most of
our scientific collections are acquired and maintained solely
for the purpose of research. They enable experts to address
significant challenges facing society, such as the spread of
invasive species. Just one example is the emerald ash borer, a
beetle currently ravaging ash trees from Maryland to Michigan.
In addition to our own experts, last year we had more than
45,000 research visitor days to the collections. But we also
have some research visitors who simply stay and call the
Smithsonian home. Four Federal agencies base 100 people in our
natural history collections to fulfill their agency missions
and to serve the American people. We work together in
interagency partnership with them. In the last few years, we
have begun serious industry-leading assessments of collections.
We are using those data to drive pan-institutional
prioritization of resources. In that process, we look at many
factors, including the importance to the Smithsonian's mission
and strategic plan, the urgency of preservation needs and the
current or potential use for research, education, or
exhibition. This big picture has capitalized on economies of
scale and enabled comprehensive care improvements that benefit
the greatest number of items in an efficient, practical, and
cost-efficient manner.
We also have initiatives that involve collaboration across
different collecting units for similar kinds of materials, such
as improving the management and accessibility of frozen
biological materials, developing and implementing best
practices in the preservation of digital art and time-based
media, and developing an inter-disciplinary approach to
emergency preparedness and response for the collections.
We are stewards of the Smithsonian collections but we
affect collections globally. We set industry standards for
collections care. We also continuously evaluate those standards
for their utility and viability, often revising standards over
time as our scientific research on collections conservation
provides new information and guidance. We share that knowledge
in multiple ways. For example, I have the privilege of being
the co-chair of the Interagency Working Group on Scientific
Collections, which is enhancing collections policy across
Federal collections in response to the America COMPETES Act.
In some cases, final assessment data from those initiatives
that I mentioned are still pending, but we do know that we will
need more resources to address insufficiencies. We know that
targeted funding helps us to remediate conditions and
deficiencies that have existed for many years, and we are
grateful to Congress for that support, yet sequestration is an
issue for us at the Smithsonian. We have incredible challenges
to address at the same time that our budget is stretched thin,
and this can adversely impact the recent progress that we have
made.
We have shown what can be accomplished with targeted
investment. We will continue to seek alternative funding
models. But private donors often see collections-related
activity as primarily a Federal responsibility. Thus, we
continue to need the support and financial help of Congress to
continue to preserve America's treasures.
Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Dr. Miller.
[The statement of Mr. Miller follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The Chairman. The chair now recognizes Mr. Dahl for his
testimony.
STATEMENT OF SCOTT S. DAHL
Mr. Dahl. Good morning. Thank you for the opportunity to
testify about the Smithsonian's collections care challenges.
All of us here agree that collections care is critical to the
Smithsonian's mission and that management plays an essential
role.
The Office of the Inspector General also serves an
important oversight function in collections stewardship. Over
the last several years, we have conducted collections care--
collections management audits on three of the largest museums
on the National Mall that combined house nearly 99 percent of
the Smithsonian's collections.
In our audit of the American History Museum, we found that
many collections were stored in substandard conditions and that
storage equipment and buildings were deteriorating and
contained hazardous materials. Particularly troubling were the
storage conditions at the Garber facility in Suitland,
Maryland. Objects stored there were at significant risk of
damage.
We also found that required cyclical inventories were not
being done, and inventory records were often incomplete and
inaccurate, leaving conditions or collections objects
vulnerable to loss and theft. In fact, during our sample
inventories of collections, the museum could not locate 10
percent of the objects in our sample, including some items of
great value and significance.
Management concurred with our recommendations and has
completed almost all of the recommendations that we have made.
We have evaluated management's submissions to us to determine
whether they adequately address our recommendations.
In reviewing our prior collections audits, we found that
many of the same issues occurred across several museums. Rather
than conducting an audit of another museum, we decided to
approach our oversight of collections care from a pan-
institutional perspective. We also highlighted these systemic
patterns of collections care challenges in our 2012 report,
which the Chairman mentioned, the ``Top Management
Challenges,'' which identifies the most critical problems that
the Smithsonian faces. In that report, we once again emphasized
the need for the Smithsonian to address the collections care
challenges pan-institutionally. Management generally agrees
with our pan-institutional emphasis, and Scott Miller and his
office have moved forward on the three strategic initiatives
for collections stewardship that Dr. Miller and Dr. Clough
referred to earlier.
The three strategic initiatives partially overlap with the
collections care areas that we identified in our top management
challenges. We are assessing the impact that these initiatives
are having on collections care in our recently announced
review. In addition, we have been evaluating plans that
management has submitted in response to our recommendations.
While plans are a very important first step, they need to be
implemented in order to have an impact on collections care
problems. The implementation of many of these plans is at risk
because implementation is largely contingent on increased
funding levels. In fact, management has cited resource
constraints as an impediment to addressing collections care
problems. We acknowledge the decline in funding for collections
care, and we expect that trend will continue. Smithsonian's own
policy shop advised management in 2005 to seek other avenues
for additional funding for collections care, including from
private resources. Dr. Miller mentioned that they are exploring
those alternatives now.
Another impediment to full implementation is the
Smithsonian's decentralized approach to collections management.
The collecting units are still largely free to set their own
standards and allocate resources for collections care as they
see fit. Scott Miller does not have the authority to make most
of those resource allocation decisions. Going forward, we will
continue to monitor the Smithsonian's implementation of our
previous audit recommendations, and we have initiated a review
of these three pan-institutional collections care initiatives.
We remain concerned about the substandard and hazardous
conditions at Garber and will continue to monitor progress
there. By strengthening the Smithsonian's cross-unit
collaboration and implementing a more risk-based, prioritized
plan throughout the entire institution, we believe collections
care will be improved.
That concludes my statement. I am happy to respond to any
questions. Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
[The statement of Mr. Dahl follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The Chairman. And we thank all the gentlemen for their
testimony. Very interesting, I think.
And as we sort of focus here on collections care, all of
you mentioned the same thing, really, or are certainly
cognizant of the fact that the decline in funding. And no end
in sight, let's face it, for anybody really within the Federal
structure, as we are about to be voting in the fall on a--
raising the debt ceiling, et cetera. We have enormous fiscal
constraints in our Nation for all kinds of things.
But as we think about some of the priority collections in
the storage, et cetera, I was trying to listen closely, the
secretary was mentioning--I started making some notes and then
stopped about some--Udvar-Hazy and Landover, Maryland, New
York, some of the things you have done at the greenhouses, et
cetera. I guess my question would be, as far as the current
capacity for storage for all--for your entire collection, and
is there anything in imminent threat? Mr. Dahl mentioned
Garber. I am not sure where Garber is. I guess that would be
part of my question. Where is Garber, and what is actually in
it? You raised some concerns about that particular storage
facility. But is there anything that is really an imminent
threat that needs to be addressed? And also, I guess, it is
sort of like the short term, but long term, as you continue to
collect with your collections, are you collecting things that
you have a concern that you might not be able to store or have
the capacity for? And I am sure that goes into your strategic
plan as well. And maybe you could enlighten us a bit on that
also.
Mr. Clough. Thanks. And I will try to give an explanation
of that. Garber is part of a facility in Suitland, Maryland,
which now has a high-end, sophisticated center for our
collections. But initially, it was more of a warehouse. And so
the early stage construction there was deemed to be temporary.
And so a lot of metal buildings were put up with relatively
rudimentary ability to control environment and things of that
sort. And as you imagine with the old buildings, there were
some asbestos problems and other things there.
The intention in the long run, as I understand it, was to
get rid of those buildings as new facilities were built. I
referred to something called the Pod 5 and Pod 3. There is a
set of buildings that actually has five pods now, which are
very sophisticated collections buildings, state of the art,
absolutely the best in the world. In addition, we have
collections there for the American Indian Museum in their
particular center, which is also a state of the art facility.
Over time, the Smithsonian found it was not able to get rid
of the older buildings as the collections grew because it
needed the space. So, with time, as we build these new
facilities, we are trying to move things out of those
buildings, which, in some cases, you would prefer not to use.
Now, we did have a building that collapsed--you mentioned a
concern--in the large snow event that we had a few years ago.
And as a result of that, we did a structural reevaluation of
each and every one of those buildings. And we have addressed
most of the problems that were identified as most critical. We
still have three buildings that we have concerns about that we
would like to get out of. But gradually, as we built the
Landover facility and Udvar-Hazy facility, we have moved
collections out into those new facilities. And that is been a
big improvement for us. And we got rid of the building,
obviously, that collapsed. So that is probably the area that we
have the greatest concerns for. We would like to get out of
that. And it will just take some time to build new facilities
and take the collection out of those areas. I think otherwise
we feel positive about where we are. American History also
remains a bit of a challenge because it has a very old
collection. It is a building that was built in the 1960s. It
needs renovation. That is a process that will take place in
stages. We don't want to shut the whole museum down, so we do
it in stages. So American History, as was identified by the
inspector general correctly, is an area where we have concerns.
But other than that, we have done, I think, a good job of
bringing the facilities up and addressing some of the most
serious problems.
The Chairman. So that is sort of the short item. As you
look long term perhaps I would--first of all, Mr. Dahl, whether
or not you agree with that assessment and, Mr. Miller, what you
see long term. Some of the newer collections that you are going
to be--I mean, the T. Rex, for instance, I--various things that
you are collecting and how you are going to be storing those,
et cetera.
Mr. Dahl. Chairman Miller, we--we remain concerned about
the conditions at Garber for the reasons that the Secretary has
mentioned. Some of those buildings are in decline, and the
collections need to be moved out of there. They are making--we
have been monitoring this progress, as the Secretary noted,
through structural supports and moving some of the more valued
items to other storage centers. But we, as the Secretary,
remain concerned about the conditions there.
The Chairman. Mr. Miller.
Mr. Miller. Let me first just add to the secretary's
remarks about the three buildings of specific concern at
Garber, we have the plans now in place for the replacement of
those buildings and the decontamination of those collections,
and that new construction will start in the beginning of the
next fiscal year.
Regarding the longer-term issues, that really goes to the
space planning study that we have done where we have looked
very carefully at every space across the Smithsonian that
relates to collections uses, and that's 2.1 million square feet
of space. And we have identified which of those need
replacement or renovation. We have also identified what we need
to deal with incoming collections, according to our
projections. We have done three pilot studies looking at how we
can better use space in the downtown museum buildings, how
might we better use the Suitland facility that the secretary
mentioned, and also, how might we build a facility for large
objects at the Dulles campus where the Udvar-Hazy Center is.
And we are proceeding with that planning. It is clear that in
the long term, to deal with the challenges at the American
History Museum, we need new offsite storage. There is just no
expansion space in that building to allow us to decompress
those collections and deal with that in place.
Mr. Clough. I had a quick comment.
The Chairman. Certainly.
Mr. Clough. One of the things that we are working hard on
is looking at ways to use a public-private partnership aspect
of the Smithsonian to best effect to address these problems.
The Udvar-Hazy Center was built entirely with private money,
and it has a marvelous archival system in it. In some cases, we
are able to get donor support for digitizing collections and
particularly for what I would call enthusiast areas. The
Archives of American Art, for example, has a large following of
folks. And we were able to get a foundation to give us $6
million to undertake a serious effort at digitizing their
collections. That gives the public more access to them, that
gives scholars more access to them. In addition, it means less
movement of collections, less damage to collections over time.
It protects the collections, and better inventory control when
we can undertake these activities.
And, in addition, we are looking at simply more
productivity. The more we can use digital assets and move
digital assets around, the less we need an actual, physical
person to move these things around. And so we are tying to
increase our productivity as well as look at donor support and
other ways in which we can address these challenges.
The Chairman. I think I will just follow up on that. You
are talking about digitizing, digitizing all of your various
collections, et cetera. I am not a great--I am not great on
technology, although, believe it or not, our committee actually
has everything on our iPads here for this. It is the first time
we have done this at our hearing. I have all my opening
statements and various things on there. So we are trying. But
that is an effort, right?
But, you know, when we think about the fantastic collection
that you have, and, as I say, such a national treasure and how
we can allow every American to access the fantastic treasure
trove of information and collections that you have at the
Smithsonian, I am not really clear on how the digitization is
working. Actually, I have been trying to go on the Internet to
find out exactly what I can see there in an asymmetrical 3-D
type of way to your collections, et cetera. And I think when we
think about a major component of revitalizing education--and,
of course, today's kids are used to accessing almost everything
electronically. How is that--how can that help a school
district in my district, for instance? How could I go a teacher
or principal and say, look, do you even realize what the
Smithsonian has available for your students? And how they could
access all of this.
Mr. Clough. I think there are really three aspects of that.
One part of it is the physical digitization of an artifact. And
that is a physical act that has to take place, which is time
consuming and labor consuming. We are actually looking at
robotics as a way to find a more automatic way, because of the
scale of our collection. But that is a challenge for us because
of the size of the collection. So that is one aspect of it.
Now, we are working hard to find other ways to do this. It
is not just a question of incidentally making an image of an
object. We would like today to make a 3-dimensional image of
the object that you can put on your pad or tablet, and rotate.
A student can do that and understand it. But the second part of
that is what we call the metadata, and that is describing what
the object is. It doesn't do you any good just to see an image
if you don't know what the object is. So our objective really
is to put metadata against this object so you know what it is,
where it came from, how it was made, all those kind of things,
and what date and so forth that it was made.
So we are looking at using volunteers, digital volunteers,
to help us with that. The National Postal Museum has done a
great job of vetting about 160 people who are philatelists, who
love stamps--and many Members of Congress, incidentally, love
stamps, it turns out. They can actually help us add metadata,
which we would vet, but they would do some of the work for us,
if you will, in terms of that. So we are looking at ways to get
volunteers--volunteers want to help the Smithsonian. And we
have 6,200 physical volunteers; why not have digital volunteers
to help us? So we are creating a volunteer page where we will
offer tasks to people if they would like to help us. If you are
into coins or you are into First Ladies' gowns, we can let you
help us in that regard.
The second part is then access. Once you digitize
something, how can we make it easy for you to access it? And so
we are working on our search engines, which, frankly, aren't
where they need to be. We were very fortunate to compete for
President's Innovation Fellows. There are 40 or so of those
that were put up for bids this year. We competed and won three
of them. And so we have three folks working with us who are
from industry who are uniquely talented in this area. One is a
specialist in search engines. We are going to work with this
particular person to help lift our search engines to another
level to make it easier for people to use these.
And then, finally, you need to put these things into
contexts that are useful for teachers and for students,
enthusiasts, for that matter. That means you go to lesson
plans. We know that teachers want adaptable lesson plans. We
need to give them raw material; they will create the lesson
plan. But also focus it on State standards. We are working hard
with the Department of Education on trying to make sure all of
our aspects meet State standards. We have a group of about 500
teachers who are focus groups for us to help us as we are doing
this work and to create things that they really want.
Another challenge is to make sure we are putting something
up that people want to see. Because in our vast collections,
not everybody wants to see everything. We are trying to get
smarter about what people want from us so that we can use our
resources, which will be stretched, no matter what, in a more
effective way.
The Chairman. Very good.
And before I turn to my ranking member, I think I am going
to ask you to assist our staff, actually, on something that we
have been working on, a piece of legislation that passed this
committee and passed the full House. Congress for years has had
this artistic discovery with the art you see in the tunnel when
you are going in--all of our different districts have a
competition for art. But this--we are putting together our
staff here and House of professional staff is putting together
a new competition for STEM for an app for the kids. Right? They
got an app for this, for the STEM kinds of things. And we think
that that could be a fantastic competition. And kids need to be
recognized, not just for their expertise in sports but in the
sciences and engineering, et cetera, et cetera. And we may be
calling you to assist us a bit as we put together the
parameters for that type of competition. And the Smithsonian
would be a great----
Mr. Clough. One other small aspect about this is digital
badging, which has become very important. Once the teacher or
the student has access to the materials, how do they prove they
got something from it? So we have a digital badge, sort of like
the scout badge, that a student can earn when they show that
they have completed a task and actually finished it to the
satisfaction of our experts. We have about 120 of these badges
now. Many are the area of STEM education. It gives a student a
chance to be certified that they actually did the work.
The Chairman. Very good.
Chair recognizes ranking member, gentlemen from
Pennsylvania.
Mr. Brady. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, Smithsonian doesn't charge any entrance
fees. With the sequestration, would you think that may have any
change to that?
Mr. Clough. So far, we have avoided charging admission fees
to our museums. My philosophy on it has been affected by my
daily observations of visitors to our museum. The American
people, as I see it, have helped pay for our buildings. They
have helped pay for the collections and the maintenance of
collections. It seems kind of a shame to charge them again to
see something they own. Really, I always tell people when I
give talks, you own our collections and you should take
advantage of them. So that is the philosophy.
The second thing is if you charge admissions, the challenge
will be that it costs money to collect those admission fees.
And so you can't charge a small amount; you have to charge a
relatively large amount. And, in addition, because we have
visitors who like to be able to visit multiple museums, then
you would probably deter their ability to visit the multiple
museums that they come to see.
We are a little different than most museums that, and our
zoo, of course, in that we have a lot of folks who don't have a
lot of money coming to visit. They don't have enough money to
buy things in our stores. And they sit outside, and they make
their own lunches and so forth. And, to me, it is very moving
to see people be able to really enjoy something that they paid
for and they own.
Mr. Brady. I appreciate that, sir.
For the record, I am against charging for admission.
So I am in agreement with you.
The African American Museum, will that make the deadline in
2015? The opening? African American Museum.
Mr. Clough. We are still shooting for an opening in 2015.
Our plan originally was November of 2015. That is sort of tied
to the end of the Civil War as an anniversary. We have worked
hard to maintain that schedule and stay on budget. We have had
some challenges; construction encountered some difficulties at
the end of last year and early this year. As you know, I am an
engineer. And the site is on 14th and Constitution. That
happens to be a location where the Tiber River used to be. So
the river used to run through that area and actually was used
to deliver construction materials to the Capitol building. And
so they had a deep excavation well under the water table into
some gravelly, open materials. And so they had some water
problems that actually challenged them. Clark Construction, I
think, did a great job of recovering from that, but it cost
some time. We had a little schedule slippage. We still are
within the contingency that we set for the project. So we still
hope to open in November of 15. That is still our plan.
I am sorry.
Mr. Brady. Thank you.
One other quick thing. I understand that there will be some
submissions with the restaurant employees and the McDonald
workers that they are not getting a living wage. I appreciate
what you said about people outside making their lunches, and
you sympathize with them. I wish that you would sympathize with
the people that are inside making lunches for the people that
are coming in when you do your contract and make sure that they
may be able to get--or listen to them, anyway. They have been
to see me. Told them I would bring the question up. I think
they may make a little bit less than we even pay on our side of
the--with our concessions here in the House and the Senate. And
that is the McDonald workers and the restaurant associations.
And I think their contract may be coming up in 2015, also, if
you would take a look at that. And I may have to talk to you a
little bit further with that if you don't mind.
Mr. Clough. Sure. We are certainly aware of their concerns.
And they have presented petitions to us, which we have read
very carefully and brought to our Regents. Basically, the food
service workers are employed by our contractors. We were
encouraged by Congress, and we thought it was a good idea some
time back to outsource that business, both for our retail
stores and for food service and for some of our other
activities. And we follow the standard and local processes. So
we follow all laws and all policies that are set by local
government and by the Federal Government in working with those
contractors, that the contractors have to provide and meet all
laws and policies of Federal government and the local
government as far as that is concerned. And so we also try to
make sure that everybody has avenues for their grievances, that
they are not denied access to their grievances process. That is
something we are very concerned about.
Mr. Brady. I appreciate that. Thank you, Mr. Secretary, Mr.
Miller, and Mr. Dahl.
And thank you, Madam Chairman.
Mr. Clough. Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you, gentleman.
The chair now recognizes the gentleman from California, Mr.
Vargas.
Mr. Vargas. Madam Chair, thank you very much for this
opportunity, and also for this hearing. The ranking member
also.
I want to thank the witnesses for being here. I do want to
ask, the first question, about the collection itself. I have
had the opportunity to go both to the Hermitage in St.
Petersburg as well at the Louvre. And one of the things I think
that hits most of us when we get there is they are not always
air conditioned. And you wonder about the collection there and
some of the incredible works of art. Could you comment a little
bit about that? Because I know we are talking about collections
here and the maintenance of them. Could you talk a little about
our own system here?
Mr. Clough. And I will defer to Dr. Miller because he is a
bit more of an expert on this than I am. But the collections,
obviously, require humidity, temperature, and lighting control.
These are important aspects. Some collections are more
sensitive to that than others, clearly. But that is part of our
challenge, for example, in energy conservation in the
Smithsonian. We are trying to save money everywhere we can, and
yet this is a challenge for us because you can't shut the
temperature and air conditioning controls off on weekends or
when someone is not visiting the collections. And so this is a
big challenge for us. It is just a continual challenge.
Collections are a day-in, day-out responsibility; you can never
let up on collections. Works of art, particularly, are
sensitive to temperature and humidity and lighting. My office,
for example, has works of art from a number of our museums, and
the curators from those museums come by because the Castle
Building is not well air conditioned or temperature controlled.
They change paintings out, out of my office, because they don't
want to leave them there too long. So I know it is something
they are very sensitive to.
The Smithsonian has helped set the standards for these, and
it is something that we are very concerned about, particularly
in some of the older buildings.
But Dr. Miller may want to comment on that.
Mr. Miller. Well, I will just add that we do have one of
our units, the Museum Conservation Institute, where they really
have the expertise on the physics and chemistry of degradation
of materials. And then the corollary of that is, how do you
slow down those degradation processes? And so they help set the
standard for temperature and relative humidity in museum
collections some 30 years ago. And we actually, as I mentioned
in my remarks, just had a national and in fact international
summit, where we brought in the best experts, not only
internally but externally as well, to relook at that question
of the balance of temperature and relative humidity of
standards for collections with the specific view of now green
buildings. How can you balance energy consumption with long-
term stability of physical objects? We will be recommending
some small changes in that that we hope will help with energy
conservation in our own buildings and museums around the world.
Mr. Clough. I might add to that, one of the things we do as
we see ourselves as a leader, as part of our responsibility, we
have about 180 museums that are called affiliates. And we share
collections practices with them. Every year we have an annual
meeting here, which we just held. And three of those museums,
for example, are in San Diego. So our objective is, as we learn
these things, is that we share them, particularly with our
affiliate museums and others.
Mr. Vargas. You have to tell me, then, which three museums
are they in San Diego? Since I am from San Diego.
Mr. Clough. The Marine Museum; the Museum of Man, which is
your natural history museum; and your Air and Space Museum.
Mr. Vargas. Okay.
Mr. Clough. And we are working also with the development in
Balboa Park to give advice and consultation. And there is a new
exhibition coming up in 2015, marking 100 years since you
celebrated the Panama Canal in 1915. We have been asked to
share some of our collection objects from the Panama Canal
days. The Smithsonian, as you may know, was invited during the
construction of the canal to do the bioassay around the canal,
because you are going to change the ecosystem there with the
canal. So, through that effort, we now have the Smithsonian
Tropical Research Institute, which is the best in the world,
and it is located in Panama. We have a great relationship with
the Panamanian government and the Canal Authority. We will be
loaning objects so they can, in essence, create a way for
viewers, museum goers, to go to one museum and then go to the
next museum and go to the next museum and have a continuity.
And we are excited about that.
Mr. Vargas. Madam Chair, that is no fair. They are playing
to the crowd on me on that one because they know how important
that is. It is hard for me to ask tough questions when they
talk about San Diego, and especially how excited we are about
the hundred years of Panama Canal exhibits there.
But thank you. I do appreciate that. But I do want to
continue this line of questioning just because, again, we
collect old furniture, Stickley furniture, that is American
furniture from Gustav and the brothers. And one of the things
that is very sensitive, of course, is the changing of both the
humidity, the heat and light exposure. And so my concern when I
went to the Hermitage and when I went to the Louvre was to see,
wow, they really don't, except for where the Mona Lisa is, they
seem to be quite good about controlling. I think they even have
an individual control for the painting itself. But other than
that, there does seem to be a laxness. And certainly at the
Hermitage, with these incredible works, I went there in the
winter, unfortunately, and it was surprised at how cold the old
palace was. So, again, my concern is that these--you know,
these incredible works that we have will be damaged because of
this lack of control.
And the reason I was going to ask that is I--I do see, Mr.
Secretary, on your testimony, page number 7, the amount of
money--and if I could just read it to you--``the current budget
state sequestration especially comes at a particular challenge
for us at the Smithsonian. Our central collections care funding
was cut by 60 percent this year because of sequestration.''
Now, that is a very significant cut. If you could comment on
that just a little further. Because that does concern me.
Mr. Clough. Sure. And that was not something we wanted to
do, obviously. But the collections care pool is a special pool
that we created. It was created just before I came. It was
about a million dollars when I came, we got up to $5 million
now, thanks to the help of Congress, which has added budget
lines in that area for us. That is a strategic pool to address
critical problems. And so when we find that there is a
particular problem the IG might identify or we would identify,
we use those funds to rush in and try to address it--so we
don't want to let a problem fester, if you will. We put in
roughly each year about $60 million, actually, in the
collection. So what you are referring to was just the pool. And
that was a 1-year stoppage or shortcut because we wanted to
avoid cutting people, because there are about 450 people at the
Smithsonian who are involved in collections care. And if we cut
back there, that would be a permanent cut in collections care.
So our choice was to cut back on the small area of pool funds
for 1 year while we could think through how we would address
any additional cuts that we might be facing and absorb them in
a more logical way permanently. So it has just a short term
type of thing.
Mr. Vargas. Thank you very much.
I know my time has expired, Madam Chair. Thank you very
much. And really appreciate the work that they do. I think it
is an incredible museum and one that we are very, very proud
of.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
The Chairman. Thank the gentleman.
I am going to ask just a couple more questions, since I am
the chairman, I have a little time, and we can have a second
round as well.
But I think I will just follow up on this about the--you
mentioned you had--I just wrote 450 people in collections care.
And I thought it was interesting that the IG actually pointed
out in your ``Concern at the Core,'' you identified some need
for some additional training, new training. You identified that
a number of senior personnel, sort of the institutional memory.
We are all getting older, and it has always about the people.
No matter what business you are in, it is always about the
people. Really. And making sure that you have good training and
good back--background, the farm team that is coming up that has
the kind of expertise and the passion to be doing this kind of
a thing in collections care. And I am wondering, apparently you
have got a lot of senior staff that are going to be retiring
here sort of in a group, in a clump here in the next several
years. I am just wondering if the IG or the secretary or Dr.
Miller have any comment on the--your workforce and how you are
preparing for that very critical element of your mission.
Mr. Clough. Well, it has been--it was interesting to me
when I came to the Smithsonian to try to understand the larger
trends. The budget situation has been challenging, but the
people who work at the Smithsonian love it so much, they tend
not to want to leave. I noted that certainly one thing that was
going up at the Smithsonian was the average age of the
employees. That was something that was troubling. And it is not
only the institutional memory we stand to lose when one person
has been there for 50 years leaves, but in addition, it is
bringing in new folks who have new ideas. And, for example, in
this digitization area, that might take a younger person, if
you will, or person who is more versed in new technologies to
do those kind of things. So it is kind of a two-edged sword for
us. So we address this second challenge working with donors to
try to give us additional funds base for post docs. And we have
done a good job. We want to do more. We are trying to raise
more funds in that area. We have upwards now of 350 or so post
docs who work at the Smithsonian. These are young people who
won't stay with us forever, but in many cases, we find those
are the people who come back when there is a job opening. So it
is a great chance for them to get to know the Smithsonian and
then to hopefully want to come back and work with us. And the
interns are a younger group of people, but they can help as
well. The institutional memory challenge for us, in part, not
entirely, can be addressed by digital technologies. Because the
more we digitize things and the more we put the records and the
metadata against the objects in digital format, then we have a
way to save that as best we can. We are getting much, much
better at collecting oral histories as well, and we are
creating platforms for that. So if there are things and special
needs in collections, we can save those and document those as
well.
But eventually somebody is going to retire. And in any
case, we can lose people. We try to stack and stagger things so
if there is an older person getting ready to leave, we have got
a younger person in the queue who is picking up behind them to
continue the work.
The Chairman. Dr. Miller.
Mr. Miller. Let me just add to that. Succession planning is
a challenge because of the uncertainties of the budget as well
as not having a mandatory retirement age and it being hard to
plan. But I think our Natural History Museum has done really an
excellent job of what the secretary described in succession
planning and encouraging bringing in the next generation of
people. And I am pleased to say actually that one of the people
who was instrumental in that process is now the head of
administration at the American History Museum and is leading
that kind of a planning process there as part of their
strategic plan. And they are specifically looking at
collections management activities, among other things. And then
one other kind of internal training program that we have
recently instituted is called the Palmer Leadership Development
Program. It is an endowed program where we take about 20 of our
mid-level staff each year and put them through of leadership
development course. And a number of those people have been in
the collections area.
Mr. Clough. I would just add quickly that Congressman Brady
will be proud to know, Russ Palmer is from Philadelphia. He is
a great donor to the Smithsonian. He is a big believer in
training and investment in people. This cross-training allows
someone from collections care, for example, to work in another
organization and another part of the Smithsonian and learn how
that works and then bring that knowledge back into collections
care. We have now had four classes. We are in our fourth class
and something I am very excited about. It really will help to
institutionally build the expertise across the Smithsonian for
our staff.
Mr. Dahl. Chairman Miller, we had a recommendation that was
directed toward the American History Museum on your very point
on the need to develop a succession plan to address the
potential staff turnover with the aging staff, and we are still
awaiting a response from management on this. They have issued a
questionnaire to the staff at the American History Museum to
determine what their retirement plans are. We think with this
recommendation, like many of our others, has pan-institutional
application, and we would encourage the management to use that
recommendation to look at other museums that might have similar
problems. But we are awaiting the response to that
recommendation.
The Chairman. Thank you.
I think this is an area where the IG, sometimes you look at
the IG recommendations and think, oh gosh, but that really is
broadening the scope I think perhaps of IG looking at the
succession plan, et cetera. I think that was an excellent
point.
My last question would be, and I have to ask this question
since I got up reading my Washington Post this morning and saw
this article on the front page of the Style Section, ``Beyond
the Bubble,'' which really, as you look at this picture in
particular, anybody can understand what the impetus was to have
the bubble because it really was I think a very visionary
thing. But it didn't turn out as well as everybody had hoped
initially I guess.
I am just wondering if you could bring us up to speed on
what has happened at that particular facility? I know you
raised quite a bit of money, and where is the money going?
Mr. Clough. The bubble was an idea from the director at the
time, Richard Koshalek, and I think when he described it to us
and we thought about it, we thought it was a very clever idea
and one that would really add a lot of vitality to that space.
He was an expert in the use of public space and had a number of
ideas, that being one of those ideas, so that you add vitality
to that part of our campus, as we would call it, and also to a
building, which tends to be kind of intimidating unto itself
and make more people attracted to this public space around the
building and use it in a way that you could draw people in,
particularly from the diplomatic community and so forth, to
have discussions about international issues.
I thought it was quite whimsical. I thought it would add a
lot of vitality. I was in fact one of the early supporters of
it and made commitments of some of our trust funds in order to
help the project. We could not put it on the regular Federal
capital list because it was a temporary structure.
It was new and a new concept, because there are a lot of
inflatable structures out there. But this one would go up and
come down and go up and come down in a year, and it would have
to go up and come down twice because it did not have air
conditioning or heating in it so you can only use it during the
temperate parts of the year.
So as we got further down the line, two things emerged.
First, it turns out it had to be donor supported. It turns out
that donors really weren't interested in something that was
temporary, that might last 8 years or might last 10 years and
would only be used for a very small part of the year. So it
turned out to be a tougher nut to crack as we would say in
terms of fundraising than we thought.
Also, practically, it turned out to be more difficult. This
was a unique structure in all the world, so as we brought more
expertise against the problem, we began to realize that there
were serious practical challenges, because it is not just a
matter of blowing the structure up and taking it down because
it is a very sophisticated structure, but all the
infrastructure you put in it, all those chairs and seats and
the IT had to be pulled out each time and then put back each
time. So it turned out to have its practical challenges, as
much as many of us thought it is an interesting intriguing idea
and again one way to increase vitality on the mall.
The museum's board was also initially supportive of it, but
the board became more and more, if you will, split over the
idea and eventually did not support the idea. It was
unfortunate that we couldn't go forward. I liked the idea that
at the Smithsonian, we are trying some new things and trying
new ways to engage the public, and my feeling on that is, it is
okay if some of them don't work out. I lived in California for
quite a while and there was an spirit in California where you
try something, if it doesn't work, don't repeat it again, but
at least be willing to take a bit of a risk, and I thought this
one was worth taking the risk. It just did not work out in its
time.
We are doing a master plan for the south campus now with a
very creative firm, and they are taking some of the ideas that
floated around what the bubble would be for and looking at how
we can use the whole campus. So it comes back to the pan-
institutional approach again of how do we revitalize that whole
area, not just the Hirshhorn, but the new Arts and Industry
Building, which we will reopen next year, the Castle, the
Freer, Sackler and the African Art Museum, how do we make all
that work together for our visitors to enhance their
experience.
So we will use some of the ideas that came out of the
fermentation for that project, but it just didn't work as a
project itself. We did have some donor support for it. I
mentioned it was a challenge to raise, but we did have some.
The Bloomberg Foundation was a significant donor, and the
Annenberg Foundation. We have strong relationships with those
foundations. We had informed them that we were meeting
challenges and resistance, and I personally visited with them
myself and others of my staff did to have discussions with
them. And in the end, it didn't work and we are returning the
moneys to those foundations.
The Chairman. Very well. Thank you, gentleman.
The ranking member.
Mr. Brady. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I just have one
question.
How does one go about getting an intern?
Mr. Clough. The intern thing is close to my heart. I am an
educator, and I believe that these experiences that we can
offer young people are life-expanding experiences and that the
Smithsonian is a remarkable opportunity for a young person to
learn because we have history, art, culture and science. So we
really give them a large breadth, and we are on the Nation's
Mall for many of them. Now, not all of them are here. Some may
work in Panama. Some may work out at the zoo. Many do work out
at the zoo in our conservation biology program.
But we have a program, and it is on our Web site for
internships. So you just click on that, and it gives you a
detailed process for application. We take interns any time of
the year, but most of them come in the summer. We decided to
stir our pot differently because in the old days, it was mainly
local universities, and now we have expanded it, and we have a
new head of our internship program, who is very creative. So we
can give you advice if you would like to have any of the folks
in Pennsylvania know about it.
Mr. Brady. I know this is a public hearing, but I am still
a little bold. Who do I call to get an intern? I will talk to
you after the hearing.
Mr. Clough. We will make sure you get that number.
Mr. Brady. Because I pride myself with these young men and
women and have a lot in my office. The problem with it, and my
staff will tell you we have a lot here, is we run out of space,
our space isn't that adequate. And I just think it is a great
experience for them to be on the committee as an intern and in
our own personal office as a intern, and it would be a great
experience, and it is a good idea that you do it. And I am glad
that they are close to your heart because they are to mine,
too, that you can have an intern over at the Smithsonian. It
must be a great experience for them. So I appreciate it, and I
will talk to you.
Mr. Clough. Thank you.
The Chairman. Any other questions? The gentleman from
California?
I think you can see from all of our questions here what a
high regard certainly this committee and Congress and the
American People hold the Smithsonian in. As I said and keep
saying, it is such a national treasure. I think the testimony
was very good, and I think the question and answer period was a
great way for you to tell more of your story in a very
forthright way. So we appreciate your candidness this morning.
I would also mention for the record that any members that
would like to submit additional questions to the witnesses will
have 5 legislative days in which to submit those questions as
well. There may be some questions that we would ask you and ask
you to respond to.
With that, certainly on behalf of this committee, both
sides of the aisle, I know that I speak for the ranking member
as well, this committee looks forward to continuing to work
with you and to do everything we can to ensure that this
fantastic treasure does survive and improve for future
generations. The largest room is always the room for
improvement, no matter what business you are in, right?
So thank you very much. We appreciate the witnesses today.
This hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:38 a.m., the committee was adjourned.]
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