[General Services Administration Annual Report 1970]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

General Services Administration Annual x	Report
\	. 1970
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RICHARD NIXON
President of the United States
Left to right (seated) H. A. Abersfeller, Commissioner FSS; Daniel T. Kingsley, Commissioner PMDS; Robert L. Kunzig, Administrator; Evelyn Eppley, “Chief Judge,” Board of Contract Appeals; Arthur F. Sampson, Commissioner PBS; (standing) H. S. (Ted) Trimmer, Assistant Administrator; Hart T. Mankin, General Counsel; Dr. James Rhoads, Archivist of the United States; Joseph W. Daniels, Executive Director EEO; W. L. Johnson, Assistant Administrator for Administration; Robert M. O’Mahoney, Commissioner TCS; Rod Kreger, Deputy Administrator.
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3 1336 05725 9021
foreword
The first Hoover Commission reported in 1949 that the activities, services, and needs of the U.S. Government had been “piled helter-skelter on the honest foundation ... of the Constitution.” The Depression, the New Deal, and War had forced formidable growth in Government without the kind of skeletal changes needed to support a rapidly sprouting system.
One jumbled area was business services. There was senseless duplication; procurement, storage and handling of supplies were confused; record-keeping was haphazard; and buildings management was inefficient.
The Hoover Commission proposed an “Office of General Services” that would assume and broaden the responsibilities of the Treasury Department’s Bureau of Federal Supply, the National Archives, and the Public Buildings Administration.
The Federal Property and Administrative Services Act of 1949 created a General Services Administration that included those three agencies, but provided no answer to how they could be integrated or what responsibilities would be assumed in each branch.
Answers came slowly with experimentation and experience. Sound business management required not simply consolidation, but better organization. By 1954 the Public Buildings Service managed almost all Federal buildings and was charged with design and construction as well.
The National Archives had developed a records service which kept inactive but still vital records in central storage areas, whereas they once had cluttered offices across the country.
Federal Supply Service had begun to draw together the myriad functions of agencies which had dealt with supply in the past. And the success of GSA had prompted Congress to amend the 1949 act and give GSA the authority to form a Transportation and Communications Service.
Other duties came as needs changed. In 1962 GSA began procuring non-strategic supplies for the Department of Defense. In fiscal 1966 the Property Management and Disposal Service was established to consolidate the utilization and disposal functions concerning excess and surplus real and personal property, and the operations related to the acquisition, administration, and disposal of national stockpile inventories.
With a budget of $3 billion in the past year, and total assets of over $11 billion, GSA has become one of the Government’s largest independent agencies.
But in the past two years, Administrator Robert L. Kunzig has placed added emphasis on not simply doing “business as usual,” but on turning GSA into a “people-oriented agency.”
“The spotlight here,” Kunzig has said, “now is on people—those who work for this agency and those whom this agency serves.”
In describing GSA’s functions, this report focuses on novel and progressive programs recently initiated as well as familiar day-to-day tasks. The needs of people determine the function of Government, and people and people-programs are as much a part of GSA as the vehicles in its motor pools and the buildings it constructs and maintains.
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From The Administrator
On January 17, 1925, Calvin Coolidge told the nation that “the chief business of the American people is business.” Coolidge’s terse statement well-reflected the mood of a country reluctantly but inexorably moving into a position of world prominence.
Forty-five years later, almost to the day, another President described to Congress his sense of his nation’s aspirations.
President Nixon said in his State of the Union Message, “The moment has arrived to harness the vast energies and abundance of this land to the creation of a new American experience, an experience richer and deeper and more truly a reflection of the goodness and grace of the human spirit.”
GSA does business for the Government. We serve as purchasing agent, builder, designer, engineer, traffic manager, and historian for the Federal Government, and like any good businessman we strive to provide diligent service and efficient, well-wrought work.
But in this new moment it is insufficient to be only a businessman, only diligent, only efficient. The responsibility of every agency of Government to aid in the enrichment and broadening of American life is paramount.
Doing business for the Government at such a time is challenging and vitalizing, because the business of Government and GSA is people, serving Government by serving people. It is a chance to lead, a chance to show how business too can meet crucial human needs, and meet them in novel and imaginative ways.
At GSA we have worked together to make a new agency in a new moment. We have not forgotten that better management, greater efficiency, and continued diligence can serve America—but we have initiated other programs to give more direction and meaning to our efforts.
We have established new policies in employment and procurement to deal directly with discrimination by race and sex. We have piloted a bold, new experiment with a pollution-abating fuel for the internal combustion engine. We have started procedures to require Government contractors to recognize their responsibility to help preserve our natural environment.
We have initiated programs to make sure that buildings constructed by the Government reflect the most imaginative and tasteful thought in contemporary American architecture and that they are placed where they will contribute positively to the economic and social development of the community affected. We have made efforts to again make available to the public significant parts of the American past—artworks, films, and historical documents—that were unknown or unused.
And we have sought to bring the Government closer to citizens, through personal efforts by each employee as well as through the establishment of a network of Federal Information Centers where public inquiries about Federal activities can be answered promptly and personally.
We have attempted to make the integrated efforts of GSA’s five component services an example of the innovative, as well as effective, services that a Government can render to its people. We can hope for no more—except always to do that job better.
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A day-long program on working women was one of GSA’s many activities in the area of equal employment opportunity.
equal employment opportunity
The Negro woman was in tears when she entered GSA’s Equal Employment Opportunity office. A night shift worker who cleaned elevators, she was upset because she had no control over her two teenage daughters while she was away. She was on the verge of going on welfare, even though she had worked steadily for the past 16 years.
Notified of the woman’s plight, the building manager transferred her to the day shift.
This is not an isolated case. The working hours of eight other female Negro GSA employees in the Maryland-Virginia-District of Columbia area recently were changed to allow them to spend more time with their children. Similar reassignments have been made so that employees can pursue their education.
This is only part of what equal employment is all about at GSA. By mid-1970 there were 240 Negroes at GSA at the GS-10 level or above, a 55 per cent increase in 12 months.
Among the 86 new Negro employees in these higher grades are two GS-17s ($30,714 to start)—the first at this second highest level on the GS scale in the agency’s history. One is Deputy Commissioner for Communications in the Transportation and Communications Service, the other Deputy Assistant Administrator for Administration. Other Negroes appointed during the year included one GS-15, five GS-14s and 16 GS-13s.
Five novel seminars were among the highlights of the EEO office’s activities in 1970. The three-day sessions, believed to be the first of their kind in the Federal Government, were arranged for GSA’s top echelon executives on the theory that change can best be effected from the top down.
Two of the objectives of the seminars were to increase sensitivity to the feelings of minority race personnel and to give the executives the opportunity to diagnose some of the problems of managing an integrated work force and determine ways to deal with them.
“There is little question that the seminars achieved these objectives,” said GSA’s EEO director. “This is remarkable in so brief a period. We are now conducting similar seminars in the regions.”
EEO’s aim, of course, is to insure fair recruiting, hiring, and promoting practices and to create an atmosphere of dignity for the individual. Under GSA’s trainee recruitment program in 1970, members of minorities filled one-fourth of the positions. The agency also initiated programs designed to improve minority employees’ chances for promotion and expanded old ones. All training activities were given agency-wide publicity.
Dead-end jobs were restructured to pave the way to more challenging and lucrative positions. The policy enabling minority employees to alter working hours in order to further their education was established.
The Federal Contract Compliance Program was expanded to make certain that Federal contractors do more than pay lip service to the objectives of EEO.
Fair treatment for women also is in the domain of EEO. In August 1970, on the 50th anniversary of the amendment giving women the right to vote, a day-long program, “A New Day for Women,” in GSA’s Central Office was attended by 600 people (including 200 men). In addition to speeches and a skit, there was a display of 40 pictures of women performing jobs traditionally held by men.
Meantime, GSA is carrying out continuing programs to alert female employees to training opportunities and to eradicate from the minds of supervisors any stereotyped ideas about working women.
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federal information centers
“How can I get an international driver’s license?” “Is this where I report seeing an unusual object in the sky?” “Where can I buy a used clock from a ship—the kind that strikes bells rather than hours?”
These and countless other equally intriguing questions are pouring into Federal Information Centers operated across the country by GSA, in conjunction with the Civil Service Commission, as part of President Nixon’s program to bridge the gulf that too often separates the people from the Government.
Sixteen more Centers were opened in 1970 for a total of 25, with more to come. GSA also has hooked up tie-lines from 16 other cities to existing Centers. Tie-lines enable citizens in those areas to dial, from their homes, local numbers that will connect them with the Centers in distant cities.
A function of the Information Centers is to assist people who need a service provided by the Federal Government but who do not know which agency or office provides it. Specially trained personnel offer accurate and personalized information and referrals about Government services. They either know the answers or how to get them.
The questions concerning the license, the heavenly object, and the clock were fired at one of the three full-time female employees at the Center in Baltimore. And what in the world did she tell the callers?
She gave the aspiring international driver the address and phone number of the local American Automobile Association. To the citizen who spotted the unusual object in the sky, she gave the phone number of the Maryland Academy of Sciences.
And she told the man who wanted to buy the clock: “The central office for Department of Defense surplus is in Battle Creek, Michigan. That’s where you write to get a bidder’s application. They’ll put your name on a mailing list and when surplus supplies are offered for sale, you’ll be notified.”
Daily, Center personnel have interesting contacts with citizens. For example, one elderly woman wanted to speak to someone in Internal Revenue Service but couldn’t walk up stairs and feared elevators. An employee arranged for an IRS representative to come to the Center to help the woman.
Another woman said she hadn’t received her Social Security and pension checks and had only $4—not enough for another night’s rent. Center personnel arranged two nights’ free lodging with the Salvation Army and made an appointment for her with the local Social Services Agency.
By the end of 1970, Centers were operating in Atlanta, Kansas City, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Fort Worth, San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Albuquerque, Minneapolis, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Portland, New Orleans, Miami, Detroit, Cleveland, Newark, Honolulu, St. Louis, Cincinnati, Buffalo, and Seattle.
The tie-lines from the 16 smaller cities, plugged into the Centers at Atlanta, New York, Fort Worth, Denver, Kansas City, and Miami, extended the geographic coverage.
After a few months on the job, Center staff members are seldom caught off guard. Not even by a question such as the one posed by a woman who walked into a Center and asked, “Is there an escort service for single women in Puerto Rico?”
Accurate information about Government services is available at 25 Federal Information Centers across the nation.
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quest for youth
Administrator Kunzig (right) and Asst. Administrator Trimmer (center) join GSA recruiters at Amherst College.
A 32-year-old Phi Beta Kappa attorney is GSA’s third-ranking official . . . Another 32-year-old lawyer is Administrator Robert L. Kunzig’s executive assistant . . . The head of construction management in GSA’s Public Buildings Service, the nation’s largest civilian construction agency, is only 35 . . . Forty-five of the country’s brightest college students were GSA summer interns in 1970 . . . GSA has embarked on an aggressive college recruiting program which promises to double the agency’s annual hiring rate for trainees.
These are but some of the highlights of the campaign to bring youth into GSA. In addition, the agency’s participation in the Neighborhood Youth Corps program has given over 300 underprivileged youths the chance to train for meaningful jobs. And more than 1,400 underprivileged youths were hired for summer positions in 1970.
In the area of recruiting, GSA representatives visited 161 colleges during the year, including 50 which have predominantly minority enrollments. The program calls for the filling of 603 trainee positions on a GSA-wide basis by mid-1971.
Mr. Kunzig himself highlighted the campaign by visiting Harvard, Amherst, Boston College, the University of Tennessee, and Clark College in Atlanta. He discussed the new GSA—its concern with people and the problems of our society, and its operating role as the “business arm of the Federal Government.”
The 45 interns who spent the summer working for GSA represented 34 schools in 21 states and the District of Columbia. Their credentials were impressive: one was a Rhodes Scholar, some were members of Phi Beta Kappa, and 27 of them are in graduate school now.
They were not stuck with routine, unimportant jobs. They were given challenging and responsible assignments under the supervision of GSA’s highest level officials. They were encouraged to be innovative and to participate in the decision-making process.
The summer intern program was outlined in the President’s memorandum of March 31, 1970, in which he said “the beginning of this decade is a fitting time for us to demonstrate our commitment to the full involvement of today’s youth in the processes of government which will help shape their tomorrow and ours. Only with the help of this generation can we meet the challenges of the 1970s.”
federal-state cooperation
The Attorney General of Illinois called it “one of the best examples of state and Federal Government cooperation that we have ever experienced.” He was talking about the role played by three GSA men in the Commonwealth Edison Company rate increase application hearing involving air and water pollution issues.
The Illinois Commerce Commission granted a substantial part of Edison’s request for a rate increase, but not until the company agreed to certain pollution abatement terms. It is estimated that Edison will spend $200 million for abatement and control of air and water pollution by the end of 1974.
The three GSA men were praised for their thorough cross examination of witnesses, presentations of evidence, written briefs, oral arguments, and valuable advice.
The Illinois Attorney General said he considered it an “historic legal achievement” since it was the first case in which a state public utility regulatory commission used its powers to reduce and control air and water pollution by an electric utility.
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office of environmental affairs
An Office of Environmental Affairs was created by GSA in 1970 to coordinate the efforts of the agency in the critical battle against pollution.
As an agency with broad responsibilities, GSA has been deeply involved in the environmental field, but it recognizes the potential for doing much more. It buys $2.1 billion in common-use items a year, manages 10,000 Federally-owned or leased buildings, and disposes of Government real property. Each of these activities has a direct impact on the environment.
The establishment of the new office coincides with the commitment of the Nixon Administration to make the Federal Government a leader in the fight to improve our environment. The unit is working closely with the President’s Council on Environmental Quality.
The environmental affairs staff blends individuals with backgrounds in the natural sciences, law, and land use planning. Among the activities the new office will be involved in are:
—Use of anti-pollution clauses in GSA procurement contracts that would require suppliers to furnish non-polluting products and discourage suppliers’ use of manufacturing facilities or methods that contribute to pollution.
—Development of comprehensive plans for Federal land use that would include designation of Government-owned real property for urban park use, low and moderate income housing, and other Administration programs.
—Expansion of a solid waste recycling program for paper, metal, and glass. GSA is responsible for collecting waste from most Federal buildings.
The agency has an active program to eliminate pollution of any kind by Federal facilities. It is also directing a continuing and critical review of Federal real property to insure that it is being put to the best possible use.
The property review carries out goals established by President Nixon last February. The President emphasized the importance of using any underutilized Federal land for parks, recreation, open space, and historical sites.
Land use planning is part of the battle against pollution by GSA’s new Office of Environmental Affairs.
hiring the handicapped
A 31-year-old graduate of the University of North Carolina, who recently joined GSA, is engaged in an unusual project. He is developing a training course for blind telephone operators in Atlanta. What makes the project even more unusual is the fact that he, too, is blind. He is assisted by a reader furnished by the Community Services for the Blind, and uses tape recordings and a Braille typewriter in his work.
GSA also hired what are believed to be the first two blind key punch operators in the Federal Government. These are examples of what GSA is doing to provide meaningful employment for handicapped workers.
The agency’s largest program in the area of hiring the handicapped is the vending stand operation, which has annual sales of more than $10 million and provides gainful employment for hundreds of blind persons. There are 430 such stands in GSA-operated buildings where Federal employees can buy food, soft drinks, and other items.
Of GSA’s new employees in 1970, 184, or 2.41 percent, were physically handicapped, a record unsurpassed by any agency of comparable size. GSA also gave meaningful transitional employment to former mental patients.
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Public Buildings Service
The 4,000-pound, blue and gold wrecking ball struck the brick wall with a heavy thunk. Some glass tinkled. Bricks tumbled loose. The ground trembled and, as a section of the wall crumbled, spectators rushed to grab souvenirs. In the background, the Navy Band played “God Bless America.”
That was last July, when GSA’s Public Buildings Service directed the start of the demolition of the Main Navy and Munitions Buildings, the last of the unsightly World War I-vintage “temporary” structures that stood amidst trees and monuments on the Washington Mall, the grassy expanse from the Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial.
GSA Administrator Robert L. Kunzig led officials in the symbolic swinging of sledge hammers at the demolition ceremony. “President Nixon, in the great planning tradition of Pierre L’Enfant, envisions the Mall as a thing of beauty,” Kunzig said.
It soon will be. Demolition was completed by year’s end, concluding GSA’s plan to clear the Mall and to provide modern office space elsewhere for the employees formerly housed in the buildings.
Putting the buildings along the Mall always was viewed as a desecration, even in 1917 when the Navy Department urgently needed more space to meet the requirements of World War I. Franklin D. Roosevelt, then an Assistant Secretary of the Navy, decided on the location of the buildings, a decision he later was to regret.
“It was a crime,” he said. “I don’t hesitate to say so. It was a crime for which I should be kept out of heaven for having desecrated the loveliest city in the world.”
The clearing of the Mall was only one of the numerous responsibilities of PBS, however. The largest of GSA’s services in terms of dollar expenditures and number of employees, PBS designs, builds, or leases and maintains most Federal buildings across the nation. It is not only the Government’s landlord, but its architect, real estate agent, and space manager.
During the year, a major reorganization of PBS was ordered by Kunzig. By facilitating even more rapid GSA responses in all phases of building program operations, the reorganization is designed to reduce the time required to complete projects and, most importantly, to produce savings of tax dollars.
The new Office of Operational Planning considers the social and economic impact of the selection of sites for Federal building programs. In support of the Intergovernmental Cooperation Act, local government units will be con-
GSA’s Public Buildings Service operates, maintains, and manages more than 10,000 Federally-owned and leased buildings, such as the HUD building in Washington, D.C.
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suited prior to the formulation of any plans to build, relocate, or lease Federal buildings. This office also will be responsible for the enforcement of environmental quality requirements pertaining to Federal buildings and for insuring that new Federal buildings are advantageously located in relation to the development of new communities.
The Office of Construction Management is organized to provide a quicker response to operating management in the field. The Office of the Executive Director develops and coordinates administrative support functions such as budget, personnel, and program planning. A new management information system, utilizing a computer time sharing program, insures quick retrieval of complete information on the status of all Federal building programs in PBS.
Improved management procedures and program planning will aid in the handling of unusual problems—such as the 1970 census—that sometimes confront PBS. Nearly 400 census offices were needed across the country on a temporary basis. Through intensive efforts, including modification of standard procedures, PBS provided the required space so that communities could begin the census by February.
Under the new PBS, other concerns are being given high priority.
A recent study by PBS has pinpointed certain projects where concentrated efforts are being made to reduce construction time through parallel, rather than sequential, design and construction phases.
Regional architectural advisory panels help maintain high standards for the GSA design concepts and assure an architectural program of variety, vigor, and adaptability. Thus, buildings are constructed that are compatible with the character and cultural heritage of the particular locality.
GSA’s new Public Buildings Service is geared to improve the operation of all Federal building programs through use of the most modern management and business techniques. Computerization of management information will significantly increase the speed and accuracy of the response to Federal Building Management requirements at all levels.
A fisheye lens captured Administrator Kunzig as he struck the blow which triggered the start of the demolition of the Main Navy and Munitions Buildings. They were the last of the unsightly World War l-vintage structures on the Washington Mall.
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the art collector
During the depression years the Federal Government acted to insure that the creation of art did not entirely cease. Four federally-funded projects kept talented artists working and made certain the nation would see reflections of the anguish of poverty and the vibrancy of hope in one of its most troubled eras.
The paintings, sculpture, and pieces of decorative art were placed in Federal buildings around the country. In small towns and rural areas people who previously never had an opportunity to view original works of art found artists working within their own communities, usually painting a mural on the walls of the local Post Office. These murals depicted the prides and accomplishments unique to the region. Other works were sent to larger Federal buildings in Washington and the best of a Washington showing of one project were taken to the White House by President Roosevelt.
Yet the periods of war and revival in the 1940s and 1950s saw much of the work destroyed or dispersed. The White House paintings, for instance, were given by Mrs. Roosevelt to members of the White House staff as mementos of the President at the time of his death. Other works were neglected or forgotten as they became a commonplace element in the furnishings of the schools or Federal buildings in which they were housed.
In the past year, concern has mounted in GSA’s Public Buildings Service for the fate of many of these works which are still in GSA-maintained Federal buildings. A new project is underway to “rediscover” these pieces, to recognize them, and make certain they receive proper care.
An extensive inventory is being taken of all the art that decorates Federal buildings around the country. Not only are the works identified, but investigations are made to determine developments in the careers of the artists. Many of the GSA works represent significant early efforts in the careers of artists who later became American masters. Ben Shahn, William Zorach, Reginald Marsh, and Rockwell Kent are only a few of the well-known artists whose works have already been located. And additional “discoveries” of great importance are eagerly anticipated. Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, and Willem de Kooning, three recognized geniuses of American art, were struggling young painters during the Depression, and all three worked on the Federal projects which produced GSA art.
No accurate estimate can yet be made of the number of works that will be catalogued, and their value is certain to be immeasurable. The determination to locate these works and guarantee their preservation is a small show of the will at GSA—and in the Government—to honor and encourage the best that men can do.
collocation of agencies
Collocation: it is a strange, even unfamiliar word to most of us. But in GSA’s Public Buildings Service it is well-known and widely used.
That’s because PBS has been involved in a project called Collocation of Socio-Economic Agencies. Instituted at the direction of President Nixon, the project is designed to strengthen and streamline the management of programs by establishing common regional boundaries and headquarters for the five socio-economic agencies (Health, Education, and Welfare; Housing and Urban Development; Labor; Office for Equal Opportunity; and Small Business Administration).
It exists primarily for the benefit of States and communities. State and city officials, for example, frequently had to travel hundreds of miles to as many as five cities to discuss related programs financed by the agencies.
Now a standard 10-region pattern, with uniform geographical boundaries, has been established. The regional headquarters for the five agencies are in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Chicago, Kansas City, Dallas-Fort Worth, Denver, San Francisco, and Seattle.
A new GSA project is underway to “rediscover” paintings and sculptures in Federal Buildings by Depression-era artists.
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In the realignment process, PBS has worked closely with the agencies to provide suitable office space in the headquarters cities. Now, state and local officials can meet with the field representatives of the five agencies during a single trip to one city.
city of light
Washington soon may be known as the “city of light” as the result of an ambitious GSA program.
GSA’s Public Buildings Service has illuminated the outside of Federal buildings to assist President Nixon in his efforts to make the city safer and more beautiful at night.
The program is being coordinated with the District of Columbia Government and the Fine Arts Commission. The first phase of the plan was completed in mid-December before President Nixon lit the National Christmas Tree.
In sweeping the shadows from the Federal complex, GSA is avoiding the use of glaring spotlights on the ground which could be stolen or damaged by vandals and pranksters. The floodlights are protected and, for the most part, out of sight.
Since the focal point of the city is the Capitol, the lighting is in harmony with it and the nearby Lincoln Memorial, which were already lighted.
Prominent features common to all of the buildings, such as the 40-foot high columns and wide porticos, are highlighted in a manner which will enhance their architectural character and beauty. The parapet walls which top all of the buildings are illuminated to form a crown of light around each, providing a thread of continuity throughout. Special emphasis is placed on entrances, archways, and other areas where intruders have been able to lurk.
Hopefully, Washington’s merchants will follow suit and light up their stores at night. The cost would be insignificant compared to the benefits of a safer, more attractive city.
The Washington Monument (left) is an example of how lighting can enhance the beauty of a building. By bathing the outside of Federal Buildings in light, such as the Commerce Department (below), GSA is also helping to make Washington safer and more beautiful.
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better food service
An in-depth study, ordered by GSA in 1969, of the quality of food service led to the conclusion that sweeping management changes were needed in Government Services Inc., which operates 40 Federal cafeterias and dining rooms in the Washington area under a contract with GSA.
In line with GSA’s recommendations, Government Services Inc. last year appointed a new president, employed a Chicago food service and management consulting firm to suggest ways to streamline the operation, and placed representatives of the Federal agencies it serves on its board of directors.
Innovations introduced include an “all-you-can-eat” buffet which has been well received at several GSI-operated dining rooms.
building location weighs socio-economic impact
President Nixon’s new guidelines were explicit: henceforth, there would be an evaluation of the impact a Federal building site selection would have on surrounding social and economic conditions.
Accordingly, the welfare of the community is now a key factor in GSA’s site selection equation because of the realization that other interests and programs of the Government can also benefit from Federal building and leasing programs.
The pilot project under the new Executive Order was the selection by GSA’s Public Buildings Service in May 1970 of a site in Fresno, California, for an Internal Revenue Service Data Processing Center. The facility will bring 4,000 new jobs to the Fresno area.
The site offers a proper blending of many factors. A major one is that the site is at the edge of the Mexican-American community, the largest minority concentration in Fresno’s urban area. Other advantages:
—	It is convenient to ample low and middle income housing.
—	It will help revitalize Fresno’s core and balance the city’s growth which has been predominantly to the north.
—	It is expected to ease a growing polarity between black, Mexican-American, and white segments of the community.
—	It is within easy access of the entire urban area.
—	It will contribute substantially to the alleviation of social blight. Employment opportunities at the IRS Center will be an incentive for unemployed, underemployed, and untrained to escape the welfare dependency cycle. IRS is willing to train the unskilled.
The decision to place the Center at this location was made only after consideration of the views of IRS, city officials, the Council of Fresno County Governments, the Fresno Community Development program, and residents and organizations within the city. In sum, the selection is compatible with the mission of IRS and the socio-economic aims of Fresno.
Senator Murphy (with shovel) and Congressman Sisk (at Murphy’s left) participate in groundbreaking ceremony for IRS Center, a pilot project, in Fresno, California.
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Property Management and Disposal Service
One firm, owned by an Alaskan Indian with an Eskimo foreman and employing up to 20 Aleuts, was paid more than $180,000 in fiscal 1970 for repairing Government furniture.
A black firm in Washington, D.C., cleaned and laid carpet. Two other black firms in Detroit restored wooden and upholstered furniture. In Hawaii, an American-Oriental company renovated mattresses and furniture.
Call them rehabilitation contractors. They are but a few of the many minority-owned firms with whom GSA does business. Through its Property Management and Disposal Service, GSA maintains, repairs, and rehabilitates the Government’s personal property. Services are provided by existing Government facilities and by some 2,000 small business firms contracted by GSA.
The idea, of course, is to extend the useful life of equipment and reduce the need for new procurement, all to the benefit of the taxpayers.
As one of its major jobs, PMDS carries out programs dealing with the Government’s excess and surplus personal property. These programs involve not only rehabilitation, but the transfer of excess property between Federal agencies; the donation, through the states, of surplus property to schools, hospitals and other authorized institutions; and the sale of remaining items to the public.
Equipment and supplies no longer needed by a Federal agency are reported to PMDS, which conducts a Government-wide reutilization program to transfer such property to agencies which need it. By keeping property already owned by the Government in productive use throughout its life, new procurement is avoided with substantial cost savings realized. In fiscal 1970, excess personal property with an acquisition cost of $635.8 million was transferred between Federal agencies.
One institution which has benefited greatly through the donation program is the Edgemeade School in Maryland. A non-profit psychological treatment center which provides educational opportunities for boys from the elementary through the high school levels, Edgemeade has received thousands of dollars of surplus property, including office and classroom furniture, hardware, paint, shop equipment, and vehicles.
PMDS also maintains regional Personal Property Centers on behalf of Federal agencies which are periodically faced with critical storage problems. The Centers serve to consolidate excess and surplus property, some of which is sold. In addition, PMDS conducts numerous sales at the sites of various civil agency installations. For example, 26,950 Government vehicles were sold by PMDS in fiscal 1970 for $9,434,711, a 19.3 percent return on the original acquisition cost.
A highly unusual garage-type sale was held by PMDS during the year in Fort Worth. The warehouse clearance of some 150 surplus items included cars, trucks, buses, three-wheeled scooters, a large mobile crane, an outboard motor, office machines, old-time street lamps, a soda fountain, and a still. Yes, a still.
More than 850 bidders turned out and bought 145 items. Bidding for the still, used by the Government for water distillation purposes only, was quite spirited and it went for $40.
Excess Government land, including valuable beach front property, is disposed of by GSA’s Property Management and Disposal Service. GSA encourages the use of this land for parks, education, and housing.
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better land use
President Nixon, in February 1970, issued an Executive Order directing that each executive agency conduct a vigorous and complete survey of all real property under its control to insure that real property holdings that are no longer essential to their activities and responsibilities are adequately identified, and promptly released for further Federal utilization or disposal.
He emphasized his interest in making excess lands available for parks, recreation and open space, as well as his interest in placing unneeded properties back on the tax rolls and making them available for industrial and commercial development.
Basic responsibility for the review was assigned to GSA. GSA’s Property Management and Disposal Service has a major role in real estate management and disposal on behalf of the Federal Government.
During fiscal 1970, for example, PMDS disposed of real estate which had cost the Government in excess of $500 million. All types of property were involved, from a few hundred feet of vacant land to large military installations and industrial plants.
In complying with the President’s Executive Order, PMDS immediately established detailed procedures for conducting the review, and surveys are now in progress throughout the country.
Much Federal property has been made available to communities at no charge when they intend to use it for health and/or educational purposes. Properties which cost the Federal Government approximately $30 million were assigned in fiscal 1970 for such purposes. Also, properties costing in excess of $45 million were transferred for public use under special provisions of law, such as park and recreation, public airport, historic monument, or conservation of wildlife, either at a 100 percent or substantial public benefit discount.
The sale of properties having an acquisition cost of over $370 million, to public bodies and to private industrial or commercial interests, also contributes to the development of parks and open spaces as the proceeds from these sales are deposited in the Land and Water Conservation Fund. The Fund is used to plan the acquisition and development of land and water areas, and facilities to provide recreational opportunities for our expanding population.
The continued Federal utilization of real property, when possible, is the constant aim of GSA. During fiscal 1970, GSA was successful in transferring to other Federal agencies for further utilization real property which had cost the Government approximately $75 million.
When the Brooklyn (N.Y.) Navy Yard was vacated by the military, GSA had to dispose of a 253-acre facility which included buildings, piers, dry docks, cranes, runways, and railroad tracks. The property had cost the military more than $160 million.
After lengthy negotiations, GSA accepted the $22,482,965 offer of the city of New York, which wanted the property for port and industrial development. The city has leased the property to a non-profit development corporation known as CLICK (Commerce Labor Industry Corporation of Kings). New businesses that will move into the yard are expected to provide at least 20,000 new jobs.
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project home run
The continuing reduction of the scale of U. S. operations in Southeast Asia was marked in dramatic fashion last August by the return of the first shipload of excess and surplus supplies and equipment from the Far East.
“Project Home Run,” as it was called, was another phase in the Nixon Administration’s Vietnamization of the conflict in Southeast Asia. As U. S. forces in South Vietnam are reduced, equipment and supplies that can be economically returned for use in this country are being brought back, too.
More than 391,000 cubic feet of cargo, valued at $6.5 million, was aboard the ship, American Racer. It was crammed with goods ranging from diesel engines and truck tires to medical refrigerators and disposable surgeons’ gloves. There were roasting ovens and fire extinguishers, microphones, and floor polishers.
Although Home Run was the first massive shipment of its kind, it was actually part of a continuing GSA program to bring back excess and surplus military supplies for domestic use. GSA has directed the return of about $19 million worth of such material so far.
Original planning on Project Home Run was done by GSA Administrator Robert L. Kunzig on his inspection trip to Southeast Asia earlier in the year. It was jointly developed by GSA, the Department of Defense, the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, and the Veterans Administration to avoid the massive waste of goods and material that occurred after World Wars I and II.
About half of the goods, some unused and others used but serviceable, are being donated by GSA to the states. In turn, the states are distributing them to schools, hospitals, and other organizations eligible under the law. The remainder is going to Federal agencies.
A tractor is unloaded from a ship bringing back excess supplies valued at $6.5 million from Southeast Asia under Project Home Run, another phase in the reduction by the Nixon Administration of the scale of U. S. operations in Vietnam.
Goods ranging from diesel engines to disposable surgeons’ gloves were returned for further use in this country.
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super-salesmen
They’ve sold everything from livestock to a rocket gantry and screws from the Apollo 13 program.
They’ve sold more items than are listed in a mail order catalogue.
Who are these super-salesmen? They are members of the Personal Property Sales Division of GSA’s Property Management and Disposal Service, in charge of marketing surplus Government supplies.
After property has outgrown its usefulness to its original Federal owner, and is not claimed by another Government agency or a State Donation Agency, it is turned over to GSA’s Sales Division.
During fiscal 1970 the division sold property originally costing civil agencies of the Government $81.7 million. Most of the items had been used at least five years, some as long as 25 years, but $16.5 million in sales proceeds was returned to the Government, an $800,000 increase over 1969 and an all-time record.
Even large commercial retail houses don’t match the number or variety of items sold by GSA. In the past year, for instance, livestock, including a pig raised by the inmates at Leavenworth Penitentiary, x-ray film from the Veterans Administration, and a mail truck that the purchaser turned into a camper were bought.
GSA even sold surplus National Aeronautics and Space Administration equipment. A rocket gantry used in the space program was popular, as were screws from the Apollo 13 program which were purchased by souvenir seekers.
GSA sales are open to the public. More than 95 percent of the purchases are made by individuals and small businesses.
The national stockpile of essential raw materials maintained by PMDS includes minerals, ores, and precious metals.
strategic stockpile
The figure keeps rising—from $207.4 million in fiscal 1968 to $252 million in 1969 to $284.3 million in 1970. These are the revenues from the sale of excess strategic and critical materials from the Government’s stockpiles.
It is the job of GSA’s Property Management and Disposal Service not only to dispose of the excess, but to store, protect, and maintain this stockpile of essential raw materials which are so vital to the nation’s industries and defense.
The stockpile, which includes crude rubber, cordage fibers, oils, drugs, minerals and ores, ferro alloys, base metals, and other precious metals, is valued at $7 billion. Approximately $2.7 billion is excess to Government needs and represents a substantial economic burden to taxpayers. The emphasis by PMDS, therefore, is on disposal of the excess. Its sales goal in fiscal 1971 is $750 million.
There are 86 different materials in the stockpile, weighing some 46 million tons. They are stored at 135 locations throughout the country—in warehouses, in high security vaults, on tank farms, and at prepared outdoor areas.
Thirty of the storage facilities are depots operated by GSA. Stockpile materials also are located at 35 military installations, 18 other Government-owned sites, 12 leased sites, two commercial warehouses, and 38 industrial plants.
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copper output boosted
A $165 million copper mine went into production in April 1970 near Tucson, Arizona, as a result of a massive cooperative effort between the Federal Government and private industry.
The mine, second largest in the nation, is a joint project of GSA’s Property Management and Disposal Service and the Duval Corporation, the mining subsidiary of Pennzoil United Inc. In the interest of national security, GSA gave its support to the development of the mine in 1966 to establish an additional domestic source for copper. Under authorization of the Office of Emergency Preparedness, GSA advanced $83 million for the project, with the rest coming from private sources.
The mine is scheduled to produce more than 72,000 short dry tons of copper ore per day, plus about 6,000 short tons of molybdenum and 500,000 ounces of silver each year.
Repayment of the GSA advance will be made in copper at a fixed price of 38 cents a pound. That’s a bargain for the Government, considering that the domestic market price of copper had risen to 60 cents a pound by the end of the fiscal year.
In addition, the mine has provided employment for more than 2,350 people in the development stage and is expected to provide some 1,100 new permanent job opportunities in an area where job opportunities are needed.
The $165 million copper mine which went into production last April near Tucson, Arizona, is expected to provide some 1,100 new, permanent jobs in the area. The mine is a joint project of GSA and a mining subsidiary of Pennzoil United Inc.
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Federal Supply Service
The Continental Army which starved and shivered through the winter at Valley Forge was the victim of more than wretched weather and British strategy. The Revolutionists were miserably undersupplied, dependent on the contributions of individual states.
General George Washington condemned it as “a ruinous system . . . pertinaciously adhered to,” and not long after the signing of the Constitution a Purveyor of Supplies was established in the War Department to direct military procurement.
Supplying civilian Federal agencies was more tortuous. Departments invariably wound up procuring their own provisions. Alexander Hamilton himself had to sign requisitions for pencils and other office supplies during the brief period in the 1790s when supply was handled in the Treasury Department.
Modern management techniques and the organization of GSA as the Government’s business arm have made supply operations much smoother than in Hamilton’s day. GSA’s Federal Supply Service has assumed an ever greater role, and now provides all the material needs of civilian agencies from abrasives to zinc oxide and procures a significant share of the Defense Department’s non-strategic items.
Since Federal Supply was fused into GSA in 1949, its procurement volume has risen 11 times to more than $2.1 billion in fiscal 1970, including $303 million in purchases from small businesses.
The scope of the FSS operation is world-wide. To provide this extensive support, GSA has trained personnel in selected overseas areas to coordinate supply actions. The representatives have direct access to top management; thus, overseas supply deficiencies are promptly corrected.
FSS conserves millions of Federal dollars annually through its centralized storage facilities, the expertise of its procurement specialists, and the favorable prices a large volume purchaser can obtain from manufacturers. FSS saved the Government $445 million during the year; in other words, the prices paid through GSA procurement channels were 17.2 percent less than commercial wholesale prices.
To make thousands of common-use items readily available to agencies, FSS maintains depots and self-service stores, replete with everything from charge cards to shopping baskets. FSS also acts as supply manager of all
Computers, which have revolutionized the processing of data, are purchased and leased by GSA’s Federal Supply Service for Government offices across the country. The Government is using more than 5,000 computers today, 10 times as many as it was 10 years ago.
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computers used by the Government, a responsibility requiring detailed knowledge in a field where the range of vital facts expands daily.
FSS is constantly receiving unusual requests. In fiscal 1970 it bought and delivered five locomotives which the Agency for International Development needed in Indonesia, a fire engine for the White House heliport, and, although initially puzzled, 16,000 bags of charcoal briquets.
As it turned out, the briquets were for thawing frozen switch points on the Alaskan Railroad—an item which Washington’s troops at Valley Forge would have appreciated.
Wherever the Federal Government serves citizens, Federal Supply serves the Government—economically, efficiently, swiftly.
Counselors at GSA’s Business Service Centers show minority businessmen how they can bid for Government contracts.
helping hand given minority businessmen
“Black Capitalism,” “SBA Loans,” “A Piece of the Action”—all phrases that have been in the news, all of which stand for the honest intent of President Nixon—and GSA—to foster the growth of minority business enterprise.
Helping minority firms get Government business is a special commitment of GSA Administrator Robert L. Kunzig, who chairs President Nixon’s Federal Procurement Task Force on Minority Business Enterprise.
Working with the Small Business Administration, GSA operates a program utilizing Section 8(a) of the Small Business Act to encourage the development of minority-owned firms. Section 8(a) allows the Government to negotiate a contract with a minority-owned firm on a non-competitive basis when there are indications that it will substantially nourish that business.
During the second half of fiscal 1970 alone, GSA awarded 50 contracts totaling over $3.25 million to businessmen of many minority backgrounds: Negro, Puerto Rican, Cuban, American Indian, American Oriental. Contracts actually are awarded to the Small Business Administration, then sublet to the contractors.
The goal of President Nixon’s program is to channel $142 million worth of Federal contracts to minority businesses by the end of fiscal 1971, including $35 million through GSA.
Two invitational conferences for minority businessmen were held in 1970— one for the western states at the Western White House in San Clemente, California, the other for eastern states in Warrenton, Virginia. The purpose was to evaluate the work of the task force to determine if objectives were being met and what actions could be taken to strengthen the program.
GSA representatives conducted procurement seminars on minority business enterprise in 30 cities between February and October 1970. The seminars were designed to identify potential minority contractors and increase their participation in the Federal procurement program.
The response has been gratifying. As an example, there is a Negro firm in Detroit called Young Men on the Move which noted that the Government was paying $1 apiece for desk memorandum sets consisting of a roll of note paper, a pen, and a metal holder.
Young Men on the Move had a better idea. They would make the holder out of plastic—and sell the sets to the Government for 30 cents apiece. Two hours after the men presented their idea, GSA ordered 25,000 sets.
While in Babylon, New York, a GSA representative was delighted to hear the tale of a minority detergent manufacturer. As a result of his company’s contract with GSA, the owner said, credit lines with banks and suppliers magically opened and, for the first time, he could get materials wholesale.
As still another example of what the program is accomplishing, take the Watts Manufacturing Company in Compton, California, which was awarded a $636,732 GSA packing and crating contract for goods shipped to Southeast Asia. It was the largest contract ever awarded to a minority firm by GSA. No less than 250 men, who otherwise might be unemployed, now have work.
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During the year, GSA opened the nation’s first store-front counseling centers in minority neighborhoods in Philadelphia and Washington. Designed to help minority businesses compete for Federal contracts, the centers offer free counseling service ranging from practical advice such as how to estimate the amount of paint or material needed for a repair and improvement contract to how to fill out a bid document.
GSA also has a network of Business Service Centers where efforts are being accelerated to involve more small contractors in Government work. Counselors at the Centers show small businessmen how they can compete on an equal basis with others for Federal contracts.
computers speed work
The advent of computers has for years prompted science fiction writers to offer-up fantasies of machines that would run amuck like the brooms in “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” ranging beyond control and dominating their human masters.
Actually the most sophisticated of the tools that have been the symbols of the progress of human civilization, computers have revolutionized the processing of data. What was once wearying, sometimes impossible, drudge work, can be accomplished by the computer in millionths of a second. Many of the newest computers calculate far faster than they are able to print out the answer.
The larger Federal agencies have made extensive use of computers for years. But for smaller agencies, which might only require computer services for short periods each day, the cost of procuring a computer that would go primarily unused ruled out using a computer at all.
As a solution, GSA has developed a system of “time-sharing,” gearing a computer with programs that can fit the needs of various agencies around the country and making the computer available to them for the periods in which they would use it. There are now 49 users of one GSA computer located in Atlanta.
FSS computer specialists handled the procurement and programming of equipment and TCS data engineers developed ways of linking the FTS system to the Atlanta computer. A telephone cradled in a special keypunching console is all that is now needed to “talk” to the computer from anywhere in the country. TCS has even developed a “multi-plexing” system for use in large metropolitan areas that allows 15 agencies in each city simultaneous access to the computer, all through one telephone line—the first such arrangement in civilian use.
Already a success, the system called RAMUS (Remote Access Multiple Users System) aims at ultimately reducing the number of Government-owned computers by greatly increasing the volume on each machine—another way GSA is promoting thrift and efficiency within the Government.
even dog food
When the call came to GSA’s Federal Supply Service for the item, it was in critically short supply overseas. The request was for the so-called military stress diet.
A medical requirement for our fighting men, perhaps? Not quite. The military stress diet is a type of dog food.
The worldwide Federal sentry dog population is roughly 8,000. Many of the dogs are overseas, some in combat zones. They not only perform strenuous duties, but must undergo rigorous training. To maintain their efficiency, they need the military stress diet.
All dog foods have a limited storage life and therefore require a regular schedule of manufacture, shipment, and consumption. Consequently, when FSS got the request for the military stress diet, it established strict production schedules and arranged for the shipments to be airlifted to Southeast Asia.
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Transportation and
Communications Service
When Alexander Graham Bell first demonstrated his telephone, observers doubtless regarded it as nothing more than an interesting toy.
Today, telephone lines trace America like nerve paths and phones are the most vital instrument of business in a technological society. Government is dependent on communications that are instantaneous and reliable and the Federal Telecommunications System operated by GSA’s Transportation and Communications Service fills the bill.
The FTS lines are leased by telephone companies to the Government at reduced, high volume rates, saving taxpayers millions of dollars a year.
FTS is multi-faceted, including a facsimile network which transmits exact copies of messages. And there is the old standby, the teletype. The volume of teletype rose 12 per cent in fiscal 1970 to 1,250,000 minutes of usage a month.
The TCS transportation program has a double thrust: providing agencies’ transportation with Government-owned motor equipment or obtaining the transportation services from industry. The motor equipment program covers GSA and non-GSA vehicles. The agency’s vehicles are in interagency motor pools across the nation. Vehicular management counsel is given the other Federal fleet owners.
Obtaining transportation services from commercial firms may be likened to a management consultant with interagency responsibility. Systems and procedures must be developed and complex traffic problems specially handled. Information on proper charges and preferred routes must be developed and distributed. A complete file of rates or tariffs is maintained for all modes of transportation to support these activities.
To get the fairest prices for the huge volume of Government purchases, TCS transportation, communications, and utilities managers are constantly bargaining with their respective industries. They also represent Uncle Sam as a large consumer by appearing before regulatory bodies when rate or service changes are being contemplated. (The Government annually spends $8.1 billion for freight and passenger transportation and consumes $5 billion worth of utilities: communications services, electricity, gas, and water.) In fiscal 1970, over $12 million was trimmed from the transportation bill, over $5 million from the utilities bill.
The Federal Telecommunications System, which is managed and operated by GSA provides the Government with telephone service and transmits messages and data.
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dual-fuel cars = cleaner air
The unique dual-fuel system has been installed by GSA in hundreds of Government vehicles across the country.
The automobile is our worst polluter of the air. Adequate control requires further advances in engine design and fuel consumption. We shall intensify our research, set increasingly strict standards and strengthen enforcement procedures— and we shall do it now.
President Nixon
State of the Union Message January 22, 1970
The Presidential request for immediate innovations to deal with the specter of air blighted by the ever-present automobile prompted GSA’s Transportation and Communications Service to launch an exciting new experiment on some of the 52,000 vehicles the agency owns and operates on behalf of the Government in Federal motor pools around the country.
“Dual-Fuel” is the project’s name and in a 17-month period 1,400 GSA vehicles will be converted to a system that allows them to run on natural gas as well as gasoline. Designed to provide maximum use of natural gas as fuel, Dual-Fuel can cut noxious exhaust emissions by nearly 90 percent.
What’s so important about pollution abatement in 1,400 vehicles when the auto population of the U.S. is over 100 million? Dual-Fuel is especially significant because it represents Government taking the lead—not just regulating and recommending, but doing—and as the President emphasized, doing it now.
By demonstrating Dual-Fuel cars to commercial fleet operators across the country, GSA is offering a system that creates immediate and dramatic reductions in air pollution. And commercial vehicles are important. In Los Angeles, the city most imperiled by air pollution, commercial fleets—taxis, delivery trucks, buses—contribute 35 percent of vehicle pollution, a figure that could be reduced by nearly 90 percent if they were converted to Dual-Fuel.
Beyond acting on the most immediate priority—in the President’s words, to again make clean air an American birthright—Dual-Fuel offers the additional lure of significant cost reductions for fleet operators. The cost of conversion is more than made up because Dual-Fuel offers a reduction in fuel costs and a doubling of spark plug and oil life with lower maintenance costs resulting.
Dual-Fuel is still only an experiment. Distribution of natural gas remains a problem, and other fuels, liquid natural gas and liquid propane, are being tested. But the wealth of untapped natural gas in the United States is immense, and the dedication of TCS and GSA is real. It is an experiment made exciting not only because of discovery, but because of the success it offers in meeting a crucial human need.
exotic missions
Glamor may not be the name of its game, but Transportation and Communications Service does have a hand in some exotic missions and projects.
At the Kennedy Space Center, TCS provides several hundred vehicles for the Apollo Moon Program. In Houston, moon rock samples were transported in a specially modified GSA carry-all.
At the Mexican border, TCS joined the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs in Operation Intercept. Vehicles were stationed along the border and telephones and telegraphs were hooked up at border crossings, manned by TCS-trained teletypists. TCS is participating in the long term Federal project to intercept drug traffic.
And on the Ramganga River dam project in India, TCS was asked for its advice. The Agency for International Development, which is helping the Indian Government on the dam, requested and received time and money-saving suggestions from TCS on the maintenance and operation of a construction vehicle fleet.
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in time of disaster
First it was a hurricane. Next, a tornado. Then, finally, an earthquake. Each time, Transportation and Communications Service swung into action, lending emergency disaster support.
August 1969: Hurricane Camille struck the northern Gulf of Mexico, demolishing property, roads, and public utilities in Mississippi and Alabama. TCS switchboard and motor pool personnel gave 24-hour-a-day assistance. A telephone operator in Washington, D.C., served as a link between parties in Mississippi who couldn’t reach each other. She relayed critical messages, helping to save lives in the disaster area.
May 1970: A tornado ripped into Lubbock, Texas, devastating eight square miles. Within an hour, the inter-agency motor pool was manned at peak, readying vehicles for disaster relief work. Around-the-clock telephone service was established to help pull the crippled town together.
June 1970: An earthquake rocked Peru. TCS arranged air shipment of two 200-bed Packaged Disaster Hospitals to Peru, acting at the request of the U.S. Public Health Service in connection with emergency medical relief assistance being furnished under the State Department AID program. Each Packaged Disaster Hospital, valued at $31,190, included medical supplies and x-ray and operating room equipment in addition to 200 beds.
A near-emergency of another kind confronted New York City in December 1969. A threatened transit strike could have halted essential Government functions if employees had no transportation.
The regional TCS office became headquarters for Strike Plan: establishing car pools to the ferries and shuttle buses from the ferries to work. At the last moment, however, the strike was averted.
money-saving idea
It takes pretty smart managers to show a whole industry a better mousetrap.
The Transportation and Communications Service exhibited this kind of leadership in devising a better vehicle distribution system.
Five years ago, every vehicle purchased by the Government was delivered by truck from the plant to the point of use. Then the railroads began using the huge, tri-level railroad cars, capable of hauling many more vehicles. But volume was needed to make use of tri-levels economical. So the Washington Regional Office arranged for the purchase of vehicles for delivery at the assembly point.
Contracts were established at more than 20 basing points throughout the country where vehicles would be received and transported or driven to the receiving agency activity. Through the use of consolidated shipments on tri-level cars, the vehicles were moved to these basing points as Government property at greatly reduced shipping costs.
Now, the entire automobile industry is following GSA’s lead, in using basing points and tri-levels to reduce their shipping costs.
Another kind of transportation know-how is needed to connect Federal agencies in Alaska with the “South 48.” Supplies and equipment cannot be shipped straight through to Alaska. Instead, the seller delivers them to Seattle or some other trans-shipping point. It is then up to the Alaskan agency to get the material to its destination.
TCS stepped in to counteract the problems of irregular sailings and complex, nonuniform carrier rates. Special arrangements for consolidating and containerizing shipments were started. The result? Alaskan agencies don’t need a traffic office in Seattle—TCS manages their transportation for them.
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National Archives and Records Service
The nation’s memory, the collection of Federal records preserved by GSA’s National Archives and Records Service, was consulted nearly 10 million times during fiscal 1970.
These reference services, as they are called by archivists, were performed for the benefit of other agencies, scholars, and the general public who needed to “look at the record” during the year. The archival materials consulted were either part of the permanently valuable records which constitute the National Archives, were papers held in a Presidential Library because of their close association with a President’s administration, or were among the non-permanent records in a Federal Records Center.
The system of Federal archives extends far beyond the National Archives Building in Washington, D.C. It includes six Presidential libraries and 14 Federal Records Centers situated throughout the country.
In administering this archival network, NARS benefited from the advice of the Archives Advisory Council which met in October (1969) and in May (1970) for discussions of practices and policies affecting the preservation and availability for research of Federal records.
Three highlights of the year were:
—The holding of two scholarly conferences, “The History of the Territories” and “The National Archives and Urban Research,” which attracted historians and other researchers from throughout the country.
—The steady growth and acceptance of Prologue: The Journal of the National Archives. The journal attained a paid circulation of 2,500 subscribers ranging from elementary schools to advanced research scholars.
—Participation in the planning for the nation’s 200th birthday in 1976 and the activities preceding the Bicentennial.
As a member of the American Revolution Bicentennial Commission, the Archivist took part in the deliberations which led to the Commission’s report to the President containing recommendations for the role to be played by the Federal Government in the celebration. The Archivist also extended a formal invitation to the International Council on Archives, of which he is an active member, to hold its 1976 meeting in Washington coincident with the Bicentennial. And to open the Bicentennial period, the National Archives unveiled a revised and redesigned Formation of the Union exhibit in the Main Hall
A large share of the 969,000 cubic feet of Federal records of enduring value preserved by GSA are stored in the National Archives Building in Washington.
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which traces the making of the United States through the Revolutionary and post-Revolutionary periods.
There were also these developments in major areas of NARS activities:
Researchers made considerably more use of the National Archives—the 969,434 cubic feet of Federal records of lasting value—than in the past. Reference services totaled 833,416 during the year as compared to 634,964 in the previous year. Most requests involved records held in the National Archives Building in Washington. But more and more original records, largely of regional value, have been assembled in regional Federal Records Centers where, separated from the more current records in the Centers and supplemented by microfilm copies of some of the most important historical material preserved in the Washington headquarters, they serve as regional archives, convenient to scholars and other researchers living in the areas served by the Centers. There was increased usage of those resources.
Legislation was enacted during the year amending the Records Disposal Act of 1943 to simplify procedures, transferring to the GSA Administrator the former Congressional responsibility for authorizing the disposal of Federal records.
Publication of the Territorial Papers of the United States resumed after a hiatus of several years. The first of two volumes on the Territory of Wisconsin was issued. The initial volume consists of 1,250 pages of documents and notes and 185 pages of indexes; it includes the Executive Journal of Wisconsin Territory for the period 1836-1839. In addition to this volume of selected documentation, the National Archives is issuing microfilm reels of substantially all the records of the Wisconsin Territory that are in the National Archives.
All restrictions imposed by Federal agencies on records turned over to the National Archives were reviewed and, wherever possible, eliminated. Restrictions based upon statutes and Executive Orders were rewritten to achieve greater clarity and simplified procedures for obtaining access to such records were prepared for publication.
During the year, a program was developed to restore or reproduce nontextual records whose condition has reached the critical point. More than one-third of the records are still photographs and motion pictures on nitratebased film, hazardous and deteriorating rapidly. Many of them are original maps and aerial photographs and their continued preservation is required for legal as well as historical purposes.
The originals of the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Bill of Rights form the heart of an exhibit in the National Archives Building.
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records management
The lion’s share of reference services, naturally, are on records which remain in current use. Records sent by Government agencies to the Federal Records Centers usually are old enough to be retired from office space to low-cost storage space but young enough to require at least sporadic consultation.
During the year there were 9,146,360 reference services on the records in the 14 Centers. The records stored there totaled 10,528,000 cubic feet—more than one-third of all Federal records in existence.
During the year the Centers received 1,062,000 cubic feet of records from the various Federal agencies. No agency, incidentally, failed to use the Center network. Receipt of those records emptied 86,500 filing cabinets and cleared 690,000 linear feet of shelving. At the same time, their transfer freed nearly 850,000 square feet of office space. The cost avoidance: about $9 million.
There is another important aspect of the records management program of NARS. As everyone knows, much of the work of the Federal Government is, perforce, paperwork—the processing of wide varieties of licenses, bids, tax returns, contracts, personnel actions, applications, claims, and the like. Some of this processing is on such a large scale that extensive systems and procedures analysis is a necessity.
Federal agencies needing help with their paperwork can ask NARS to send in a team of analysts. During the year more than 135 such requests were received and honored. For example, the Post Office Department desired assistance with mailing guidelines to expand the use of optical scanner and automated mail handling equipment. The Department of Transportation wanted to remove paperwork impediments to international trade. The Department of Health, Education, and Welfare sought a review of Medicaid information systems and of equipment used in processing disability insurance claims. The Internal Revenue Service asked for an analysis of the way its tax files were maintained in its seven massive Service Centers.
NARS teams went into these agencies and the other agencies requesting assistance. On the basis of estimates from the agencies served, costs of records operations were reduced by more than $14 million by means of this professional records management assistance.
The Federal Records Center in Suitland, Maryland, maintained by GSA, contains 2.8 million cubic feet of records, enough to fill 583 boxcars.
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the federal register system
Through its various publications, the Office of the Federal Register serves as the Federal Government’s internal reporter of time future, time present, and time past.
Each daily Federal Register (averaging 80 pages per day in fiscal 1970) is devoted almost entirely to documents, such as agency regulations, having future effect.
The Code of Federal Regulations (50,000 pages) reports as of January 1 each year the permanent regulations.
The organization of the entire Federal Government, including the names of key officials, is reported as of July 1 each year in the United States Government Organization Manual (800 pages).
The Public Papers of the President (about 1,600 pages per year) record words spoken and written by a President during a calendar year.
Acts of Congress are presented daily in the Slip Laws and are permanently recorded in the United States Statutes at Large.
In order to help researchers such as archivists, historians, lawyers, and interested members of the general public locate what they need in the thousands of printed pages, the Federal Register annually publishes some 9,000 pages of guides, indexes, tabulations, and other special finding aids.
programs for the public
An exhibit on the Federal Government’s role in the development of aeronautics and space exploration, a new series entitled “Films at the Archives,” and the revised Formation of the Union exhibit were major attractions for the public.
The air and space exhibit, Into the New Realm, was opened formally on December 11, 1969, in tandem with a preview of a specially made film tracing America’s accomplishments in powered flight from Kitty Hawk to the first walk on the moon.
The documentary, Anatomy of a Triumph, was the first in the new series of film presentations drawn principally from motion picture footage in the National Archives. Other programs featured documentaries on the modern city and on the Truman and Eisenhower Presidential Libraries.
The revised Formation of the Union Exhibit in the Great Hall was prepared during the year and opened, appropriately, on July 4, 1970. Centering on the Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights, and including other key documents from the Nation’s formative years, the exhibit provides a clear and concise account of the nation’s beginnings. In conjunction with the exhibit, two new publications were produced: a narrative catalog which contains illustrations of part of every document in the exhibit and a facsimile portfolio of all pages of all documents in the exhibit.
Visitors to the National Archives Building during the year totaled 762,256.
national historical publications commission
The Archivist is chairman of this Commission, which is designed to stimulate the publication of the source materials of American history. During the year, upon recommendations by the Commission and from funds appropriated by Congress to carry out the program, 36 grants totaling $327,754 were made to 27 universities, historical societies, and other nonprofit organizations. The grants will help support 17 printed and 10 microfilm publication projects.
Additionally, grants totaling $179,984 were made from a fund given by the Ford Foundation to the National Archives to support printed editions of the papers of Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and the Adams family. Other Ford Foundation funds were used to grant six fellowships in advanced historical editing. And another project supported by such funds was completed: a survey of the use of documentary source materials in the teaching of history at graduate levels.
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presidential libraries
Both researchers and travelers are making increased use of the Presidential Libraries. Reference services provided during the year rose to a new high of 234,180 at the six libraries—including the Kennedy and Johnson Libraries which were not yet fully in operation.
Vacationing and traveling America made even more use of the Libraries. During the year 884,316 persons visited the museum sections of the Hoover, Roosevelt, Truman, and Eisenhower Libraries.
At the Eisenhower Library in Abilene, Kansas, there was an even greater outpouring of visitors to the Place of Meditation, the chapel-like building— apart from the rest of the complex—in which President Eisenhower was buried on April 2, 1969. Between that date and July 25, 1970, one million visitors stopped at the shrine. The millionth visitor turned out to be a vacationing Air Force man who works on Presidential aircraft at Andrews Air Force Base just outside Washington, D.C.
On June 3, 1970, the two millionth visitor entered the Eisenhower Family Home in Abilene which was opened to the public in 1947. And on July 8, 1970, the Truman Library in Independence, Missouri, welcomed its two millionth visitor since opening its doors in 1957.
Construction was either in progress or planned at five of the Presidential Libraries. At the Roosevelt Library in Hyde Park, New York, new wings were being built. The Lyndon B. Johnson Library was rising at Austin, Texas, and an addition to the Eisenhower Museum was under construction at Abilene.
Architectural plans were prepared for development of the Herbert Hoover Historic Site at West Branch, Iowa. At Cambridge, Massachusetts, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority acquired a new site for its yards and pledged to move by 1972 from the location on the banks of the Charles River where the Kennedy Library is to be built. Meantime, the Kennedy Library was temporarily established in the Federal Records Center in Waltham, Massachusetts, and some of its holdings were opened to research.
A sidelight at Hyde Park: When it was noticed that the Firestone tires on FDR’s old Ford were cracked and disintegrating, Leonard K. Firestone himself took an interest. He sent a repairman to the Roosevelt Library museum to seal, clean, and buff the tires on the car with its special equipment which enabled FDR to drive around his Hudson Valley estate despite his paralyzed legs.
Private groups such as the Herbert Hoover Oral History Project, the Harry S. Truman Library Institute, the Eisenhower Foundation, the John F. Kennedy Library, Inc., and the University of Texas—where the Johnson Library is being built—continued their active support of the various Presidential Libraries. There was a special gift to the Eisenhower Library from the Eisenhower Foundation: the $23,307.33 proceeds from the First Nixon Anniversary Ball. Mrs. Dwight D. Eisenhower made the presentation.
Exhibits at the Presidential Libraries, including the Hoover (left) and Eisenhower (above), attract visitors from across the nation.
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As the Government’s principal record-keeper, GSA makes extensive use of microfilm files and cameras at the Archives.
records symposium
It strains credibility, but on a single chip of microfilm, only two square inches, all 1,245 pages of a Bible can be recorded.
But we haven’t seen anything yet. Microfilm technology not only has progressed to the point where it is routine to compress so much information in such a small space, but beyond.
Would you believe that by using a new laser ray recording method all of the information in the immense National Archives building in Washington could easily be contained in one room?
Along with the devices needed to retrieve the information?
And that specific information could be located in seconds?
It is true, although as yet hardly practical.
This and other methods of record compaction and retrieval were the theme of a two-day National Symposium on New Technology for Image and Data Recording conducted in June by GSA’s National Archives and Records Service. It was the Archives’ 16th semi-annual symposium, each dealing with a different phase of records management.
GSA, as the Government’s principal recordkeeper, has a special responsibility to provide leadership in the pursuit of reducing record storage space and slicing retrieval time. It also has the responsibility, under the Federal Records Act, to help guide the Government in the efficient creation, maintenance, and disposal of recorded information. Finally, under the Brooks Bill, it is responsible for the economical procurement and utilization of computers. NARS is charged with all but the last responsibility, which is assigned to GSA’s Federal Supply Service.
Most of the nearly 600 symposium registrants were from Federal Government agencies. All were involved in records management. The Archives’ aim was to help them solve paper management problems in their agencies and to acquaint them with technical developments in the field.
No agency is without its paper problems. Today’s information explosion has created so many records that our storage facilities are bulging. One solution lies in miniaturization, accompanied by an efficient computerized index for retrieving the records.
The symposium featured lectures on subjects ranging from Space Age Recordkeeping, to Holographic Optical Memories, to Data Recording Using Electron Beams, to Magnetic Bubble Technology, to Preservation and Restoration of Machine and Language Records.
The symposium dealt chiefly with pioneering efforts in record compaction which will affect the archives of the future.
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friis frozen in
Most archivists don’t get stuck in the ice near the South Pole. But Herman Friis did.
He was aboard the Japanese icebreaker Fuji which lost one of its twin propellers and was imprisoned in the ice off East Antarctica for 23 days last February and March.
Actually, it wasn’t an unlikely place for Friis to be. He has an interest in the area as Director of the Center for Polar Archives of the National Archives and Records Service, and as President of the Society for the History of Discoveries.
The National Science Foundation named him U. S. Exchange Scientist with the Japanese Research Expedition during the polar summer at the scientific station Syowa on East Ongul Island in Lutzow-Holm Bay, East Antarctica.
Friis did detailed surveys of the area as part of a study of its physical characteristics. All was well until the return trip.
As the Fuji worked her way toward open water, Friis recalls, “Suddenly the ship’s engines stopped and then for several minutes there was dead silence aboard as the chief engineer assayed the damage. The four blades of one of the two 15-foot diameter propellers had been sheared off by hard ice.
“It was impossible to move forward and the captain decided to conserve the one propeller until the ice opened and safe movement was assured.”
The “safe movement” from the 30-foot thick ice didn’t come for 23 days. Finally, a south wind opened the ice and the Fuji escaped and sailed north to Capetown.
Friis returned to the National Archives Building with copious notes about the Lutzow-Holm Bay area, supplemented by color photographs and motion picture footage he took, to provide the basis for a detailed geomorphological study.
He also brought back increased respect for the strength of polar ice.
archives yields tale of south Carolina feud
Would you believe that President Andrew Jackson approved the pension request of a general (John Adair) with whom he once had a running feud?
Believe it, because the documentary evidence is among the millions of records of enduring value preserved in the National Archives in Washington.
A check of records relating to South Carolina Revolutionary War figures— in connection with South Carolina’s 300th anniversary—turned up the information about Jackson’s action on Adair’s pension.
Since researchers know that many such historical nuggets can be found in routine documents, the Archives is flooded with some 1,200 mail requests a week for photocopies of the military service or pension application documents of men who fought in wars from the Revolutionary through the Spanish-American.
Adair fought in 14 Revolutionary War battles for South Carolina, later became a general and, still later, Governor of Kentucky. His feud with Jackson developed during the War of 1812. Jackson made charges of cowardice against a group of Kentuckians who were in the Battle of New Orleans, and for two years he and Adair exchanged vitriolic letters.
Yet, in 1832, when Jackson was President and Adair was a tottery 78 years old, the feud was forgotten, or at least overlooked. At the bottom of Adair’s pension application was an approving and rather nostalgic note by Jackson. It’s in Adair’s file in the Archives and reads in part:
“. . . It (Adair’s account of his part in the war) accords with my recollections of the history of the times referred to. We were schoolfellows at Waxhaw Academy, I a boy, the General grown when he left it . . .”
Then, pouring it on, the President concluded that Adair served “under the Eagle of his country, fronted the battle storm and at the close of the war ranked as a major.”
And General Adair received a $600-a-year pension.
Herman R. Friis of the Archives checks for snow-covered cracks with a pole while crossing the Antarctic ice.
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Summary of Operations
	Fiscal Year 1970	Fiscal Year 1969	Fiscal Year 1960
FEDERAL SUPPLY			
Store Sales (Thousands of Dollars)		527,748	585,754	171,887
Nonstore Sales (Thousands of Dollars)		293,224	222,041	97,797
Stores Line Items Shipped (Thousands)		8,188.4	8,765.2	4,099.0
Number of Supply Distribution Points		88	87	20
Total Procurement (Millions of Dollars)		2,148.8	2,443.2	862.4
PROPERTY MANAGEMENT AND DISPOSAL			
Personal Property (Acquisition Costs—Millions of Dollars):			
a. Transfers to Other Federal Agencies		635.8	595.8	218.0
b. Donations 		360.8	320.2	413.0
c. Sales 		81.7	72.2	17.1
Total		1,078.3	988.2	648.1
Real Property (Acquisition Cost—Millions of Dollars):			
a. Further Utilization of Federal Agencies		111.0	174.0	33.0
b. Other Surplus Disposals (Donations, Etc.)		125.0	290.0	96.0
c. Sales 		371.0	303.0	320.0
Total		607.0	767.0	449.0
Defense Materials Service:			
a. Strategic and Critical Materials Inventory			
(Acquisition Cost in Millions of Dollars)		6,470.8	6,730.3	8,485.0
b. Sales Commitments (Millions)		284.4	252.0	148.0
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	Fiscal Year 1970	Fiscal Year 1969	Fiscal Year 1960
PUBLIC BUILDINGS			
New Construction Program:			
a. Design Starts (Millions of Dollars)		258.1	48.8	132.2
b. Design Completions (Millions of Dollars)		224.8	214.2	59.0
c. Construction Awards (Millions of Dollars)		34.7	86.1	156.2
d. Construction Completions (Millions of Dollars)		117.9	167.3	68.1
Buildings Management:			
a. Average Net Square Feet Managed (Millions)		203.3	198.2	119.8
Repair and Improvement:			
a. Repair and Improvement Appropriation:			
(1) Net Square Feet of R & 1 Responsibility (Millions)		187.0	187.2	115.6
(2) Obligations Incurred (Millions of Dollars)		77.0	72.9	53.1
b. Reimbursable Costs (Millions of Dollars)		68.9	43.4	NA
TRANSPORTATION AND COMMUNICATIONS			
Interagency Motor Pools:			
a. Number of Pools in Operation		97	97	55
b. Mileage (Thousands) 		568,111	557,257	117,301
c. Number of Vehicles in Pool (June 30)		55,141	54,959	18,115
NATIONAL ARCHIVES AND RECORDS			
Number of Records Centers		14	14	15
Records in Inventory (Thousands Cubic Feet June 30)		11,550	11,119	5,764
Inquiries Handled (Thousands)		9,939	9’324	3,429
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General Services Administration
Comparative Statement of Financial Condition (in millions)
ASSETS	June 30, 1970	June 30, 1969	Increase or — Decrease
Cash		$ 467.5	$	574.3	$ -106.8
Accounts receivable—Private debtors		174.9	120.2	54.7
Accounts receivable—Government agencies		224.4	229.8	-5.4
Inventories 		6,794.0	7,119.2	-325.2
Prepayments and deferred items		1.5	1.4	.1
Mortgages and bonds—Private debtors		203.1	178.0	25.1
Investment in U. S. Securities		2.0	2.3	-.3
Equipment 		184.6	177.5	7.1
Land and buildings		2,591.8	2,558.5	33.3
Construction in progress		603.9	784.6	-180.7
Surplus property		86.8	61.8	25.0
Total Assets		11,334.5	11,807.6	-473.1
LIABILITIES Accounts payable		374.8	325.2	49.6
Advanced payments to GSA		320.5	370.5	-50.0
Trust and deposit liabilities		1.8	1.6	.2
Deferred credits		98.9	114.7	-15.8
Liabilities for purchase-contract program		19.4	20.2	-.8
Employees' leave liability		28.3	26.1	2.2
Total Liabilities		843.7	858.3	-14.6
INVESTMENT OF U. S. GOVERNMENT Investment of U. S. Government		10,490.8	10,949.3	-458.5
Total Liabilities and Investment of U. S. Government		$11,334.5	$11,807.6	-473.1
			
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GSA In Brief...
Priceless Heritage
By merely pressing a button, the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Bill of Rights in the National Archives Building can automatically be lowered into a vault in IV2 minutes in the event of an emergency. If the power should fail, there are two standby systems utilizing batteries.
GSA’s a Good Scout
GSA’s Federal Supply Service provided thousands of folding chairs and kitchen equipment for 40,000 Boy Scouts at a jamboree in Farragut State Park, Idaho.
Presidential “Listening Walk”
GSA Administrator Kunzig was one of several key officials to take a “Listening Walk” in 1970 at the request of President Nixon. During a nine-hour, 11-stop tour of Miami on a hot July day, Kunzig listened on the President’s behalf to the concerns and suggestions of blacks, refugees, drug addicts, senior citizens, and the silent majority on such subjects as housing, education, jobs, and recreation. He also signed a $49,200 contract for 8,000 American flags to be produced by a Cuban exile-owned factory.
. . . “But he’s older than I am.”
A pleasant gentleman, pipe in mouth, entered the Federal Information Center in San Francisco and asked directions to the Passport Agency. The receptionist obliged and then, staring at the man, said, “Why, you look like Bing Crosby.” Laughing heartily, the man said, “Oh, but he’s older than I am.” (It was, in fact, Bing Crosby.)
Need a Plane Ticket?
Government travelers in 11 Federal buildings can simply go down the hall and get one now that GSA has provided space for airline ticket offices in return for the airline bearing the administrative costs of issuing the tickets.
Yankee Ingenuity
The GSA manager of a Federal building in Green Bay, Wisconsin, solved an unusual problem in an unusual way. When citizens complained about the noise made by the metal clamps clanging against the flagpole on windy days, the buildings manager took two rubber teats from the automatic milking machine on his farm and attached them to the clamps.
Moon Men Furniture
GSA’s Fort Worth office contributed to the Apollo 11 moon shot by providing three beds with bookcase headboards, nightstands, wardrobe chests, and lounge chairs for the astronauts in the quarantine quarters at the Manned Spacecraft Center in Houston.
Surprise Visitor
Mrs. Dwight D. Eisenhower, accompanied by Secret Service men, popped in unannounced at the Hoover Library in West Branch, Iowa, last September after spotting a library sign on the highway. After a 30-minute tour, Mrs. Eisenhower said, “I’m so glad Mr. Hoover lived long enough to receive the accolades he deserved.”
Millions Saved
GSA’s Office of Audits and Compliance received and responded to over 300 audit reports during the year. These reports contained recommended savings of some $10 million. Example: when an auditor questioned the entire amount of a contractor’s $500,000 claim, the contractor withdrew the claim.
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Purchaser of the Pill
Blushing a bit, GSA acknowledges that it is the largest purchaser of “The Pill” in the world.
For the past two years, GSA has had a sizeable purchasing program involving family planning items for the Agency for International Development. The value of the program in fiscal 1970 was $3,695,370.
The items are shipped to the Philippines, Thailand, Taiwan, Jamaica, Indonesia, Nepal, India, and Pakistan. Among the items in 1970 were 11,666,000 birth control pills.
A Lot of Heat
Electricity used in the thousands of buildings operated by GSA consumes more than 750,000 tons of coal annually, enough to heat the homes in a city the size of Louisville, Kentucky, for a year.
Whopping Repair Bill
In fiscal 1970, $77 million was obligated for the repair and improvement of the 5,365 Government-owned buildings for which GSA is responsible. While the main objective is to prevent deterioration and obsolescence, GSA is placing increased emphasis on providing facilities for physically handicapped persons and eliminating sources of air and water pollution. The buildings include post offices, courthouses, warehouses, records and archival depositories, Presidential Libraries, museums, border stations, mints, and office buildings.
Fill 'er Up
In keeping with President Nixon’s goal of reducing pollution, GSA issued a directive in October requiring the use of unleaded or low-lead gasoline in Government-operated vehicles wherever possible. About 600,000 vehicles, which consume 270 million gallons of gasoline a year, are affected by the order.
Old as Well as New
GSA maintains and repairs some of the oldest buildings in the country. A number are over 100 years old, and one still in full use is 170 years old.
Battle Against Rust
One of the items supplied by GSA is used to combat rust on vehicles in the Federal fleet. It will cut down on the nation’s rust bill which is an estimated $10 billion a year, a large part of it resulting from the rusting of automobiles.
Aid to Guatemala
Following the slaying of West Germany’s ambassador to Guatemala last spring, the AID Office of Public Safety called on GSA. The agency procured and shipped 22 trucks, valued at $44,957, for the Guatemalan Civil Police.
Big Film “Industry”
In its first full year of operation, the Archives’ National Audiovisual Center handled more than $1 million in orders for film prints, filmstrips, slide sets, and foreign language tapes for Federal agencies and the public. The Center also loaned some 20,000 prints of motion pictures, began a film rental service, and handled thousands of inquiries about audiovisual materials.
Off the Market
A can of pesticide exploded, killing a young boy. The content label was facsimiled over the GSA network to the Food and Drug Administration in Washington, D.C. Analysis revealed the highly flammable and poisonous nature of the pesticide. It was ordered removed from the market within 72 hours.
☆ U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: t97O O-410-354
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The New Management of GSA
ROBERT L. KUNZIG
Administrator of General Services
ROD KREGER
Deputy Administrator
H. S. (TED) TRIMMER
Assistant Administrator	(
W. L JOHNSON
Assistant Administrator for Administration
JOSEPH W. DANIELS
Executive Director
Office of Equal Employment Opportunity
EVELYN EPPLEY
“Chief Judge’’
Board of Contract Appeals
H. A. ABERSFELLER
Commissioner
Federal Supply Service
DR. JAMES B. RHOADS
Archivist of the United States
DANIEL T. KINGSLEY
Commissioner
Property Management and Disposal Service
ARTHUR F. SAMPSON
Commissioner
Public Buildings Service
ROBERT M. O’MAHONEY
Commissioner
Transportation and Communications Service
HART T. MANKIN
General Counsel
General Services Administration
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