Congressional Reaction to Galvin Task Force Report
Over the last six weeks, several House and Senate hearings have been held on the Galvin Task Force report on DOE’s national laboratories. Reactions have been consistent, with approval of many of the report’s findings and conclusions, the notable exception being the recommendation to corporatize the governance of the laboratories (see FYI #17.)
The House Energy and Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee held the first hearing on February 24. Chairman John Myers (R-Indiana) began the hearing discussing the “tremendous costs” of running the laboratories, asking, “how much longer can we continue to finance all of them?” Myers said, “I guess it has not worked” when describing the laboratories’ Government-Owned, Contractor-Operated management, later saying, “the labs have not done the job for the money we have invested in them in the past few years.” Nevertheless, he seemed to have doubts about corporatizing the laboratories, a sentiment shared by his colleagues. Rep. Harold Rogers (R-Kentucky) expressed concern about the ability to maintain future federal funding of basic research while Congress is cutting other programs, such as food stamps. While supportive of basic research, Rogers worried that it is “too boring for us to sell to the public.” Myers later said that he is asked by his constituents, “why did you spend $2.5 billion on a hole in Texas?”
On February 28, the Senate Energy and Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee and the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee held a joint hearing on the task force report. Appropriations subcommittee chairman Peter Domenici (R-New Mexico) began by saying, “I accept that the current system of governance is broken and should be replaced with a bold initiative.” He added that if corporatizing the laboratories was “too extreme,” management changes recommended by the task force could be implemented. Ranking appropriations subcommittee member J. Bennett Johnston (D-Louisiana) said that while changes are needed to ensure that the laboratories do not “fritter away,” he does not support corporatizing the laboratories.
Appearing at this joint hearing were Secretary of Energy Hazel O’Leary and Robert Galvin. O’Leary promised that “this is not just another lab report that will be filed,” adding that she “sincerely embraces a large majority of that which is in the report.” DOE will, she said, implement many of the management changes recommended by the task force, adding “I am doing it.” O’Leary took issue with Galvin’s recommendation to corporatize most laboratories by next year, which Galvin characterized at the hearing as an experiment entailing minimal risk. O’Leary remarked that she was “very loathe to submit it [the laboratory system] to some experiment,” since it represents a $100 billion investment by the taxpayer. She added though, “I’m still in the examining phase [of the corporatizing recommendation], not the rejection stage.” Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Frank Murkowski (R-Alaska) promised that the report would get a thorough review.
There was another joint hearing on March 9 by two House science subcommittees. Present at this hearing, in addition to O’Leary and Galvin, were the directors of ten national laboratories. Chairman Dana Rohrabacher (R-California) was disappointed that the task force did not recommend any laboratory closure or consolidation, asking if this decision should be left to others. Galvin replied that national science and technology needs are so great that the laboratories should not be diminished. Rohrabacher replied that everyone has similar views about all federal programs.
In both prepared testimony and oral comments, none of the laboratory directors embraced the corporatizing recommendation, although all found considerable merit in other findings of the report. None of the committees’ members expressed a readiness to corporatize the laboratories.
Judging from this series of hearings, there is a consensus among Members of Congress, Secretary O’Leary, and the laboratory directors that changes in the management style of the laboratories are needed. There is not such support for corporatizing the laboratories. What remains unresolved is if sufficient funding will be provided to the Department of Energy to run all of the laboratories in the future, given the budget climate. At a March 6 hearing on the Department of Commerce budget request, House Budget Committee Chairman John Kasich (R-Ohio) commented as an aside that “we have the national laboratories that aren’t working very well.” Kasich and his staff have to find an over-all $1.2 trillion in deficit cuts to bring the federal budget into balance by 2002. The pressure is now on these subcommittees to specifically identify some of those cuts in the Department of Energy budget for FY 1996 and the years beyond.
