Dr. Billington asked the Senate on Feb. 25 to approve a Library fiscal 1994 net budget of $340 million. It represented a total budget increase of $30 million, or 9 percent, over fiscal 1993.
Of the $30 million increase, 71 percent (or $21.4 million) was required simply to fund mandatory pay and price level increases under existing law.
A new element -- President Clinton's proposed one-year salary freeze for federal employees -- was noted. If the freeze is approved, the Library's requested budget increase would be reduced by one-third (or $9.6 million), to roughly $20 million.
Dr. Billington and other Library officials testified for two hours on the budget and the LC strategic plan before the Senate Subcommittee on Legislative Branch Appropriations, chaired by Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.). Their appearance followed similar testimony before a House panel Jan. 25.
Sen. Reid made clear that fiscal 1994 would be a tough budget year. He noted that most legislative branch activities would be cut and that his committee would do what it could to keep the Library from being cut.
In January, House Speaker Thomas S. Foley (D-Wash.) and Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell (D-Maine) had pledged to reduce staff by 4 percent over two years and "administrative expenses" by 14 percent over four years in the legislative branch, which includes the Library of Congress.
[The Library accounts for roughly $310 million of the $2.3 billion overall fiscal 1993 legislative branch budget, which also covers the General Accounting Office, the Office of Technology Assessment, the Congressional Budget Office, the Government Printing Office, and other smaller agencies. About half the $2.3 billion goes to pay the direct costs of running Congress.]
Sen. Reid took note of LC's mandatory pay and price level increases in fiscal 1994 as well as LC's new money request for what Dr. Billington called critical "deferred maintenance" in collections security, human resources and financial services. He asked Dr. Billington to report back to the Senate panel on which programs and services LC would cut in fiscal 1994 in order to function within a budget set at the current (fiscal year 1993) level.
Dr. Billington has told senior managers to come up with spending options and has also asked the three employee union presidents for suggestions.
DISCUSSING THE FUND ACT
Prompted by a (partially accurate) front-page Washington Post story that morning, the Senators ended the session with a dozen general questions about LC's proposed 1993 Fund Act.
The bill had been introduced in the Senate Feb. 4 by Claiborne Pell (D-R.I.), and cosponsored by all Senate members of Congress's Joint Committee on the Library. The Fund Act is under the jurisdiction of the Senate Rules and Administration Committee, headed by Sen. Wendell Ford (D-Ky.). Hence, Dr. Billington did not, as the Post subsequently wrote, go to the hearing to "sell" the Fund Act.
He and Sen. Reid focused on the tough business at hand: the fiscal budget.
However, Dr. Billington pointed out that the Fund Act was overdue. After months of discussions with various interested parties, the Library has sought new authority from Congress to update its services to the nation in the Information Age. In essence, the 1993 Fund Act would permit LC to provide "extra" services to individuals and organizations on a nonprofit basis --the kinds of services now provided by 550 other American libraries, including New York Public, the University of North Carolina library and the Fort Worth Public Library. (For decades, for a fee, LC has duplicated its photos and microfilm and distributed cataloging records to libraries on tape.)
What new extras would LC provide "on demand" for a cost-recovery fee? Rapid document delivery by electronic (or other) means, translations, complex Law Library compilations, research analysis, training in manuscript preservation techniques and time-consuming searches for information.
The LC goal is to handle specialized requests, as they arise, from research scientists, lawyers, entrepreneurs and others across America. According to Dr. Billington, the Library would fill gaps, meeting demands not met by private information vendors but which now cannot, and should not, be handled by LC at taxpayer's expense. Under the Fund Act, on a cost-recovery basis (like the Photoduplication Service), the Library could contribute efficiently to greater productivity beyond the Beltway.
This modest effort, according to LC officials, should not be confused, as it was by some journalists last week, with levying "user fees" on other libraries or individuals who use the Library's free basic services; e.g., cataloging, reference, interlibrary loan and access to the collections. Nor, as a New York Times story erroneously indicated Feb. 27, is the Fund Act the key to the "electronic library" of the future, which will probably be funded in a variety of ways, public and private, with many cooperating players. The Library's basic operations will depend, as always, on annual congressional appropriations. Putting the Library's "electronic card catalog" online to users across the country via the Internet in April will be LC's latest expansion of its "free basic services."
Despite its built-in legal controls, and provisions for strict congressional oversight, the Fund Act last week sparked renewed cries of alarm, duly echoed in press reports, from various spokesmen for organized groups, including the American Library Association, the American Publishers Association and the Information Industry Association.
Some of these cries of alarm are "a bit disingenuous," commented Peter Braestrup, LC senior editor, "inasmuchas LC has been patiently discussing the bill's provisions with the interest groups for almost two years." Some librarians, he said, support the Fund Act as a "must" in the Information Age; others would rather see LC deny some extra services to scientists and lawyers for a cost- recovery fee if it cannot supply all services to everyone at taxpayer's expense. Still others, he said, ignore the act's explicit mandate, the first by Congress, continuing and affirming the Library's free core services; they voice fear that these services will be somehow shortchanged under the Fund Act.
In public statements, industry lobbyists, he said, choose to ignore the act's barriers to unfair LC competition with private vendors and its explicit protection of copyright owners. A "generalized anxiety over the future," Mr. Braestrup said, rather than any specifics, seems to fuel much of the Washington opposition to the Fund Act, which would merely get the Library up to par with other major research libraries around the country.