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Statement of James H. Billington
Librarian of Congress

Before the Legislative Branch Appropriations Committee
January 27, 2000

On April 24, 2000, the Library will be 200 years old. It is the oldest Federal cultural institution in the United States and the largest and most inclusive library in human history. In pursuit of its mission to make its resources available and useful to the Congress and the American people and to sustain and preserve a universal collection of knowledge and creativity, the Library has amassed an unparalleled collection of 119 million items, a superbly knowledgeable staff, and cost-effective networks for gathering in the world's knowledge for the nation's good.

As we enter the third millennium and the Library's third century, we ask the Congress to support the Library's leadership role in delivering free electronic information to the nation. Building on the overwhelming success of the Library's five-year pioneering National Digital Library Program, we have developed an overall strategy for the Library's electronic future and an appropriate budget request for fiscal 2001. With Congressional support, our goal is to begin building a new kind of 21st century library for all Americans - the National On-line Library.

The Internet is creating a profound, fundamental shift in the way people communicate. An estimated 1 00 million Americans now use the Internet, which is producing dramatic alterations in the workplace and in daily life. The extent of these changes far outpaces our understanding of their implications. However, it is already clear that the new communications era offers this unique institution extraordinary opportunities to achieve new levels of cost-effective service for the Congress's legislative work and for citizens in every congressional district.

The Library is now a proven and dependable Internet site for primary source material on the Congress and on American history as well as for cataloging, copyright information, and much more. Our web site now receives an average of four million electronic transactions every working day.

The Library is the 1999 winner of the Global Information Infrastructure Award for Education for the primary source materials we provide about our American heritage. Our award-winning site demonstrates how the Library's services will be increasingly made available to serve national needs in the future. An estimated 90 percent of K-12 public schools are now connected to the Internet, with most schools having direct access in the classroom. The tidal wave of Internet growth coincides with a growing and increasingly insatiable demand for access to high-quality primary materials of real educational value. Congress's library is the world leader in providing such material -- and is almost alone in providing quality content both free of charge and with authoritative explanatory material. Congressional vision and support have uniquely positioned its Library to make a major contribution through the Internet towards the nation's educational development and future productivity.

Fiscal year 2001 will be the critical one for permanently putting into place the people and support systems required to secure the Library's digital leadership role for the nation. The Library is now ready to build on the experience of the last five years to begin transforming traditional library services in ways that will meet America's new information needs by building a National on-line Library.

We ask the Congress to support these essential elements required to sustain our future:

Digital Futures Initiative - Create a National On-line Libra[Y by providing permanent funding for the Library's innovative National Digital Library Program (NDLP), that is currently due to expire in fiscal 2000. By funding the lean and extraordinarily talented staff of the NDLP, the Congress will permit the Library both to begin capturing and preserving materials that exist only in digital form (i.e., "born digital") and to continue the conversion of unique educational content that will include important international as well as national materials;

Succession Planning - Extend our staff succession program to include the Law Library in addition to the Congressional Research Service (for a third year) and Library Services (for a second year). This is essential to ensure the continuity and quality of core services at a time when unprecedented numbers of staff will be retiring;

Security of Staff and Collections - Permanently fund both the police positions authorized by a fiscal year 1999 emergency supplemental appropriation and item- level tracking and inventory collections security controls now made possible through the new Library of Congress Integrated Library System (LCILS); and Preservation and Storage of Collections - Permanently fund a mass deacidification program and the full operation for the first off-site storage module at Fort Meade, Maryland.

The Library's budget request for fiscal year 2001 -- $428.1 million in net appropriations and $33.6 million in authority to use receipts -- supports the Library's mission to make its resources available and useful in the 21st century. This is a net increase of 1 1.4 percent over fiscal 2000. A major part of this increase ($1 6.6 million) is needed to fund mandatory pay raises (driven largely by the January 2001 pay raise of 3.7 percent) and unavoidable price-level increases; $27.1 million is needed to meet critical, growing workload increases (net of program decreases). The Library is requesting an increase of 192 full-time equivalent (FTE) positions -- from 4,076 to 4,268 FTEs. Even with this increase, the Library's FTEs would still be fewer by 281 FTEs or 6.2 percent lower than in fiscal year 1992 (see attachment 1). The Library has been doing more with less since 1992, but the tidal wave of Internet activity now imposes a level of workload that requires the Library to rebuild a portion of its workforce that has been reduced or funded privately since 1992.

The Library will use its Bicentennial in the year 2000 more to leave a legacy for the future than to celebrate our past. We invite the Congress and the nation to join with us in celebrating our 200th birthday, which is being done largely with private funds. At the start of our third century, we ask the Congress to support the increase in resources required to meet the new mission-driven workloads brought on by the Internet age.

Funding our fiscal 2001 budget request will enable the Library to sustain its basic, traditional services while comprehensively addressing its inescapable, digital future. We hope the Congress will continue its historic and fruitful investment in the Library as it enters its third century of serving the nation's legislators and their constituents.

The Library of Congress Today

The core of the Library is its incomparable collections -- and the specialists who interpret and share them. The Library's 119 million items include almost all languages and media through which knowledge and creativity are preserved and communicated. The Library has more than 27 million items in its print collections, including 5,700 volumes printed before the year 1500; 12 million photographs; 4 million maps, 2 million audio recordings; 800,000 motion pictures, including the earliest movies ever made; 4 million pieces of music; 53 million pages of personal papers and manuscripts, including those of 23 Presidents of the United States as well as hundreds of thousands of scientific and government documents.

New treasures are added each year. Notable acquisitions during fiscal year 1999 include: Harry Blackmun Papers and Ruth Bader Ginsberg Papers - more than 600,000 new items of these Supreme Court Justices; Marian Carson Collection - 1 0,000 papers and documents relating to the early history of the U.S.; Bronislava Nijinska Collection - multi-media[ collection of the noted ballet choreographer; Carte de Canada et des Etats Unis de I'Amerique -the first map (1778) to recognize the independence of the U.S.; Persian Manuscript Celestial Globe - ca. 1650; The First American Haggadah - published in New York City, 1837; 337 issues of the important Revolutionary American newspaper Claypoole's Daily Advertiser, 1791-1793; the extraordinary J. Arthur Wood, Jr. Collection of Cartoon and Caricature - 40,000 works by more than 3,000 artists; Victor Hammer Archives - the works of one of the great hand-press printers, print makers, and type designers of the 20th century; and Politica by Aristotle (Cologne, 1492) --the earliest printed version of Aristotle's work to become available in the West.

Every workday, the Library's staff adds more than 1 0,000 new items to the collections after organizing and cataloging them and finds ways to share them with the Congress and the nation -- by providing on-line access across the nation, by assisting users in the Library's reading rooms, and by featuring the Library's collections in cultural programs.

Major annual services include delivering more than 550,000 congressional research responses and services, processing more than 600,000 copyright claims, and circulating more than 22 million audio and Braille books and magazines free to blind and physically handicapped individuals all across America. We annually catalog more than 250,000 books and serials and provide the bibliographic record inexpensively to the Nation's libraries, saving them an estimated $268 million annually.

The Library also provides free on-line access, via the Internet, to its automated information files, which contain more than 75 million records -- to Congressional offices, Federal agencies, libraries, and the public. Internet-based systems include major world-wide-web (www) services (e.g, Legislative Information System, THOMAS, LC-web, Global Legal Information Network), the Library of Congress On-line Public Access Catalog (catalog.loc.gov), and various file transfer options.

The Library of Congress programs and activities are funded by four salaries and expenses (S&E) appropriations which support congressional services, national library services, copyright administration, library services to blind and physically handicapped people, and management support. A separate appropriation funds furniture and furnishings.

Digital Futures Initiative (National on-line Library) - The Library of Congress is committed to bringing America's story -- in all its variety --to everyone, whether at work, in their homes, in schools, or in libraries. We realize that the fiscal year 2001 budget request of $21.3 million for our digital futures initiative represents a significant increase in resources. However, the need for a bump-up in our appropriations has emerged inescapably from our extended internal review of the Library's digital future needs to support additional domestic and international digital content ($7,590,392), to implement the critical technology backbone ($11,049,182), and to enhance the educational outreach access services begun by the NDLP ($2,644,205).

We must make permanent the National Digital Library/American Memory effort by assuring that the priceless technical know-how and substantive knowledge acquired by the staff and now embedded in this program are retained and deployed for the National on-line Library of the future. Fiscal year 2000 marks the end of the initial five-year digitization program at the Library, which was funded by both public and private funds. As the Library now moves to build and sustain a core set of on-line services for the nation, the NDLP's technically skilled staff has to be funded on a permanent basis. If we are not able to retain these talented -and, by now, uniquely experienced - people, we will simply not be able to continue servicing the new national constituency we have built. Indeed, without this cadre of professionals, the Library will not be able to begin the long overdue work of capturing and making usable for the Congress materials created by others that are now increasingly available only in electronic form.

The Library must tackle the unprecedented challenges posed by ever-changing digital content embedded in rapidly changing technologies. The Library has been deeply studying the complex problem of preserving and accessing digital materials. But unless the Library can retain the professionals that it has already uniquely trained, there is little chance that the Library will be able to find and hire the people needed to deal with this problem for many years to come. The Library simply must have the people and the resources to build a state-of-the-art software, hardware and telecommunications technology backbone able to support and make accessible the electronic materials that Congress and the nation will want in the future. Finally, for the new millennium, the Library has a unique opportunity to become a global leader in digital information: the hub of an international network to advance education and understanding. Following the Congress's lead in establishing in the Library a "Meeting of the Frontiers" project with Russia, we have taken the first steps to create a global on-line library, using the Library's international materials to provide stunning digital images of America's dynamic interaction with the world. The Library is exploring partnerships with the world's great archives beginning with Spain.

Computer Security

The Library's on-line services represent a critical infrastructure asset, which is vital to the operations of the Legislative Branch and the nation. But, the new age of Internet opportunities also brings with it the vulnerabilities of the Library's automated systems to intrusion and destruction. The Library's fiscal year 2001 budget requests $660,690 and five FTEs to support our computer and network security programs. The President has developed a National Plan for Information Systems Protection, which calls for a major effort to improve computer security. The Library also recognizes the urgent need to address this vulnerability by implementing its plan and requests approval of the resources to ensure the protection of our information assets.

Succession Program - The Library's ability to serve Congress and the nation depends in large part on its expert staff, particularly those who perform legislative analysis, have intimate familiarity with the special collections, or have fluency in foreign languages. The Library's fiscal year 2001 budget requests an increase of $2,568,882 and 34 FTEs to support a three-part succession program: (1) $1,033,788 and 28 FTEs to support the hiring of Library Services technicians to provide for the timely upward mobility of the most qualified technical staff into a few of the key professional positions, which are being vacated by retirements; (2) $1,130,772 to support the hiring of additional CRS analysts to ensure the continuity of in-depth analysis to support legislative deliberations; and (3) $404,322 and 6 FTEs to support the hiring of additional foreign legal specialists to ensure the continuity of congressional services in foreign law provided by the Law Library.

Library Service's analysis of its vulnerability to retirements, particularly in those areas requiring extensive familiarity with special collections and fluency in foreign languages, indicates that 27 percent (555) of Library Services staff is already eligible to retire during fiscal year 2000, and that number will increase to 52 percent (1,088) by fiscal year 2005.

We are grateful that the Congress funded half of Library Services' request as part of the fiscal year 2000 budget, but the situation outlined in last year's budget has grown even more critical. The retirement rate in fiscal year 1999 increased 19 percent over fiscal year 1998, and we fear a similar increase this year. To respond to this critical need, the Library requests $1,033,788 to keep this five-year program on track If we cannot move expeditiously in these few specially-targeted areas, senior staff are likely to retire without being able to impart their specialized subject and language skills to the next generation.

The Congressional Research Service also faces serious challenges to ensure its capacity to continue, without interruption, its legislative support of Members and committees on all public policy issues. Half of CRS' staff will be eligible to retire by 2006. Since 1996, CRS has used a risk assessment process in order to identify specific subject areas where staff were likely to retire in the next few years. Based on this assessment, CRS projects reduced analytic capacity in a significant number of subject areas as early as calendar year 2000. These losses will accelerate and, by 2004, will affect almost every area of legislative support to the Congress. Rebuilding this capacity requires a multi-year transition period during which new staff develop the breadth and depth of knowledge of specific issues and master the legislative process. CRS has developed a three-phase plan to begin hiring replacement staff using the Graduate Recruit Program, the Law Recruit Program and the Presidential Management Intern Program. In fiscal year 1999, the Congress appropriated $435,858 to support hiring of ten staff. In fiscal year 2000, an additional $559,052 was initially provided to support the hiring of another ten staff, but because of the across-the-board spending cut, this amount was reduced to $288,325, which supports the hiring of five additional staff. In fiscal year 2001, the Library is requesting $1,130,772 to hire the third phase of the program and to restore the positions lost in the fiscal year 2000 rescission. With this funding, CIRS will be able to continue to provide uninterrupted policy analysis to the Congress.

Finally, the Law Library estimates that 59 percent of its foreign law specialists will be eligible to retire by fiscal year 2004. The recruiting and training of foreign legal research specialists with both unique language skills and foreign legal expertise require a lengthy time period. To ensure the continuity of congressional services in many foreign jurisdictions of interest to the Congress, such as Arabic-speaking nations, China and Taiwan, and Japan, the Law Library is requesting $404,322 and six FTEs to hire and train foreign law specialists.

Security of Library Staff, Collections and Facilities

During 1998, the Congress approved supplemental appropriations totaling $16,975,000 for the Library's physical security. The law included funding for fiscal years 1999 and 2000 to increase the Library's police staffing. The fiscal year 2001 budget requests permanent funding of $2,530,886 to sustain the increased police staffing originally approved two years ago, which is essential to protect the Library's staff, collections, and facilities.

The supplemental provided funding for physical security, but the supplemental did not provide funding for collections security. For the fiscal year 2001 budget, the Library is requesting an increase of $4,449,718 to improve bibliographic and inventory collections security controls, which have been identified as a significant deficiency by auditors and security consultants. Key elements of this major request include tracking books at the item level from the point of receipt through various processing steps to the Library's secure storage areas; conducting a physical inventory of the Library's 18 million book collection; and converting card files contained in the Law, Music, Geography and Map, and Rare Book reading rooms into automated format accessible through the Library of Congress Integrated Library System (LCILS). The LCILS provides an excellent tool to capture, for the first time, item-level information for much of the Library's collections, as well as to flag problems such as the non-receipt of expected serials. Establishing item-level inventory control, a fundamental part of the Library's approved security plan, has now been made possible with the implementation of the LCILS.

Congress approved funding for the LCILS with the understanding that the Library would develop a detailed cost-savings plan, "return" those accrued savings to the Congress, and request new authority to use any savings realized from the LCILS. Accordingly, the Library is incorporating $1,991,842 (a cumulative savings of $2,530,000) of LCILS-related savings in this fiscal year 2001 budget. At the same time, we are requesting new funds for the important collections security requirements outlined above, which the LCILS -- for the first time -- makes feasible for the Library to undertake. When these security initiatives are implemented, the Library will be better able to answer with assurance the key questions, "What do you own?" and "Where is it?" and to both identify and obtain missing serials before they go out of print or become extremely expensive to purchase. The Library requests that the Congress re-invest LCILS-related savings into collections security to better secure the Library's priceless collections.

Preservation and Storage of the Collections

A primary mission of the Library is to preserve its vast and largely irreplaceable collections for the benefit of the Congress and the American public. A priority of the Library's preservation efforts is deacidification of a significant portion of materials printed on paper with high-acid content since the middle of the 19th century. The Library has in place a successful mass deacidification program using the Bookkeeper process, which has been supported using no-year funding since 1997.

This Committee has been a stalwart supporter over the years of the Library's program to develop an effective, inexpensive method of solving one of the most pressing problems libraries have faced in the late 20th century: deacidifying the paper used since the mid-1 9th century for books, periodicals, maps, manuscripts, and other paper-based collections. The fiscal year 2001 budget requests an increase of $1,215,801 to make mass deacidification a permanent part of the Library's preservation program. The Library estimates that 5.3 million existing books (out of the entire classified book collection of 18 million items) and that an annual addition of 1 00,000 books are printed on acidic paper.

The fiscal year 2001 budget request proposes to establish an overall 30-year (one generation) plan to deacidify older books as well as the new, acidic acquisitions. The plan scales up to $5.7 million by fiscal year 2005 to fund the capacity to deacidify annually 300,000 books and 1,000,000 manuscript sheets.

Equally critical for preserving the Library's collections is providing environmentally safe storage. The Library continues to work closely with the AOC and their contractors to ensure that the first storage module at the Fort Meade, Maryland campus meets the necessary environmental requirements to house and preserve the transferred collections and that materials handling will be as efficient as possible. The Library is very pleased that later this year, we will be able to begin using the space at Fort Meade made available by the Congress for storage of Library collections. The module will house 2.2 million items of paper-based material, primarily books, shelved on wide-span shelving by size in containers.

As overcrowding in collections storage areas on Capitol Hill becomes more serious each day, speedy completion and occupancy of the first module at Fort Meade is a high priority. To fund an accelerated transfer program enabling the Library to secure, track and move 4,000 items daily for a period of two-and-a-half years, the Library's fiscal year 2001 budget requests an increase of $824,648 and 22 FTEs. In addition, the Library is requesting $707,265 and 12 FTEs to fund start-up costs for Module Two. Because most of the materials to be transferred to this second module come from the Library's unique, special "gold" collection areas, substantial advance work is required to place these heritage assets in containers that meet the highest preservation and security standards. The Library has developed a cost-effective "handle it once" approach for this activity and requests funding in fiscal year 2001 so that the collections can be made ready for prompt transfer to Module Two immediately upon its completion.

Finally, the Library's fiscal year 2001 budget requests an increase of $501,160 and 12 FTEs to fund the shifting of collections on Capitol Hill, which will be made possible by the transfer of materials to the Fort Meade storage. At the present time, more than 50,000 items are stacked on the floors of Capitol Hill storage areas. A three- year program to shift all of the collections remaining on Capitol Hill is needed to relieve overcrowding in many areas and improve the storage conditions. Although the Library was able to open splendid new reading rooms for the foreign-language collections when the Thomas Jefferson Building renovation was completed in 1997, it was neither fiscally nor logistically possible to move the collections served through the Asian and African/Middle Eastern reading rooms from the John Adams Building at that time. The completion of Fort Meade Module One will enable the Library to initiate a 3-year project to improve the preservation and security of these valuable Capitol Hill collections and to resolve long-standing reader complaints about slow service.

Law Library

The Law Library of Congress maintains the largest collection of legal materials in the world and also houses a unique body of lawyers trained in foreign legal systems to supply legal research and analysis, primarily for the Congress, on the laws of other nations, international law, and comparative law. More than 200 jurisdictions are covered by Law Library specialists, some 80 percent of the sovereign entities of the world that issue laws and regulations. The Law Library utilizes this talent to maintain and develop the breadth and depth of a demanding collection, as well as to provide reference services whenever either chamber is in session (as mandated by the Congress). These are daunting responsibilities. The U.S. Courts, the executive branch, and the legal community also depend heavily on the Law Library's collections and the unique expertise of its foreign legal staff.

The Law Library has been creative in attempting to meet its responsibilities, particularly with the development of its Global Legal Information Network, but funding for nine FTEs ($503,124) is crucially required. The funding would ensure adequate staffing for research and reference services, improve the processing of incoming legal materials and retrieval services, and improve administrative capabilities.

Copyright Office

The Library's Copyright Office promotes creativity and effective copyright protection -- annually processing approximately 620,000 claims (representing more than 900,000 works transferred to the Library) of which more than 590,000 claims are registered for copyright. The Office also records approximately 16,500 documents with more than 200,000 titles and responds annually to more than 436,000 requests for information.

The Copyright Office increased statutory fees for registration and recordation services on July 1, 1999. (The basic filing fee for registering a claim increased from $20 to $30.) 1 am pleased to report that the Copyright Office is forecasting that fiscal year 2000 receipts will meet the budgeted level of $20.8 million and is projecting a slight increase to $21 million for the fiscal year 2001 budget. As more experience is gained under the new fee schedule, the Library will advise the Committee of any changes in our projections.

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act, "DMCA," enacted at the end of the 105th Congress, gave the Copyright Office many new duties and responsibilities. The Register has elaborated on these legislative changes in her statement before this Committee. One major change is a new type of protection for the original designs of the hulls of boats. Registration is required and there are complicated cancellation procedures. The Copyright Office, following the adoption of new regulations and practices and a new registration form, made the first such registration in July 1999. On November 29, 1999, the Copyright law was amended to extend the compulsory license for retransmission of network and superstation signals by satellite carriers for another five years, and the royalty rates were significantly reduced. The Copyright Office is in the process of implementing this new law. The fiscal year 2001 budget request includes an increase of $150,000 to enable the Office to meet better its compulsory licensing responsibilities.

As part of the Library's digital futures initiative, the Copyright Office is requesting an increase of $80,135 for one additional FTE to continue work on CORDS, including activities related to a joint digital repository project. A coordinated effort between the Copyright Office and the Library's digital program is critical for the protection of copyright owners and for access by Library users. - National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped

The Library administers a free national library program of Braille and recorded materials for blind and physically handicapped persons, through its National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (NI-S). Under a special provision of the U.S. copyright law and with the permission of authors and publishers of works not covered by the provision, NLS selects and produces full-length books and magazines in Braille and on recorded disc and cassette. Reading materials are distributed to a cooperating network of regional and subregional (local, non-Federal) libraries where they are circulated to eligible borrowers. Reading materials and playback machines are sent to borrowers and returned to libraries by postage-free mail. Established by an act of Congress in 1931 to serve blind adults, the program was expanded in 1952 to include children, in 1962 to provide music materials, and again in 1966 to include individuals with other physical impairments that prevent the reading of standard print.

The fiscal year 2001 budget maintains program services by funding mandatory pay and price level increases totaling $1,181,339. The budget also supports the exploration of alternative digital technological possibilities that would provide a less costly, more efficient, internationally acceptable, user-friendly delivery system. Funding the fiscal year 2001 increase is necessary to ensure that all eligible individuals are provided appropriate reading materials.

Library Buildings and Grounds

The Architect of the Capitol (AOC) is responsible for the structural and mechanical care and maintenance of the Library's buildings and grounds. In coordination with the Library, the AOC has requested a capital budget of $9,590,000, an increase of $4,959,000. The AOC capital budget includes funding totaling $5,835,000 in appropriations for four projects that were requested by the Library. The AOC deferred one Library-requested project, air conditioning improvements costing $350,000, until fiscal year 2002.

The largest Library-requested project, amounting to $5 million, is for the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center in Culpeper, Virginia. The Congress approved the initial matching appropriated share for the Center in fiscal year 2000, and the fiscal year 2001 request would continue to build towards the Federal share of $16.5 million (25 percent) for renovating and equipping the facility. The owner of the facility, the Packard Humanities Institute, has now with extraordinary generosity offered to provide up-front funding to facilitate timely completion of the entire project, with the understanding that the government will pay up to $16.5 million (25 percent of the projected $66 million cost) at the time the property is transferred to the AOC. We have informed both our authorizing and appropriations committees about this offer, which will accelerate dramatically the completion of this much-needed facility. To achieve the public portion of this match in a timely manner, the Library is requesting $5 million for fiscal year 2001. The other three Library-requested projects support the preservation of the Library's collections and space modifications in the James Madison Building. Library-requested projects, as well as AOC identified projects, are prioritized based on critical need and in accordance with both the Library's Strategic and Security plans.

I urge the Committee to support the Architect's Library Buildings and Grounds budget, which is critical to the Library's mission.

During fiscal years 2000 and 2001, the Library will continue its participation in planning for the proposed Capitol Visitor Center. Since 1991, the Library has worked with Members of Congress and the Architect of the Capitol as an integral part of the Visitor Center. The Library offers unique resources for contributing to the mission of the Visitor Center through facilities that will permit both sharing the Library's incomparably rich collection of recorded performances in the performing arts and displaying the primary materials of American history in the Library's collections. The Library has emphasized to the members of the Capitol Preservation Commission the importance of that part of the Visitor Center design plan that includes the construction of a tunnel connecting the Center to the Thomas Jefferson building, thereby permitting all-weather direct access for the Congress to the Members' Room, for the Congressional staff to the Library's resources, and for the public to the exhibitions and public spaces in the building so beautifully restored by the Congress.

James Madison Building Workstation Modernization Project

The Library is requesting an increase of $433,500 to complete its accelerated workstation modernization project in the James Madison Building by 2004. In fiscal year 2000, the Congress approved $878,040 for this replacement program. Improving workstation design reduces the risk of injuries and increases staff productivity. An increase in funding would complete the project by 2004 instead of 2006, which the current level of resources would permit.

Proposed Legislation

The 105th Congress approved a revolving fund to improve the accountability and statutory authority for the Cooperative Acquisitions Program. We are seeking similar authority during the 106t' Congress to modernize the business operation and enhance Congressional oversight of the Library's other cost-recovery services. Our draft legislation also enhances the continuity of the Library's Trust Fund Board and modernizes an archaic statute governing our Cataloging Distribution Service. This legislative proposal, which we are working on through the Library's oversight committees, is our top legislative priority for the 106th Congress. Passage of this legislation would cap our long-term efforts to put the Library's financial operations on firm footing.

The Library is also seeking an amendment to the statute authorizing the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center in Culpeper Virginia (2 U.S.C. 141 note) which would allow a limited exception to the act's reimbursement prohibition. This would allow us to take advantage of an unprecedentedly generous private funding offer and permit us to complete the project a full three years earlier than now scheduled with a savings of $6.5 million.

In its first session, the 106th Congress enacted legislation directing the Library to oversee the publication of a chronological, illustrated history of the House of Representatives. We have begun the process of establishing an advisory board and consulting with publishers. We will be working with the Committee on House Administration and are pleased to be integrally involved in this worthwhile project.

The Library's Bicentennial

We have crafted -- largely with privately raised funds -- a multi- faceted Bicentennial program "to inspire creativity in the years ahead by stimulating greater use of the Library of Congress and libraries everywhere." A centerpiece is our "Local Legacies" project to document unique local traditions from congressional districts throughout the nation for possible inclusion in the American Folklife Center's collections and in the National on-line Library. Other Bicentennial projects include: reconstituting Thomas Jefferson's original library through private donations; a "Favorite Poem" project spearheaded by the Library's Poet Laureate; and a national photography contest, "Beyond Words: Celebrating America's Libraries," jointly conducted with the American Library Association. The program also includes a commemorative stamp, commemorative coins, exhibitions, publications, symposia, and Bicentennial-related activities at libraries nationwide.

The Bicentennial theme of Libraries-Creativity-Liberty was reflected in our first two Bicentennial exhibitions, The Work of Charles and Ray Eames: A Legacy of Invention (American creativity) and John Bull and Uncle Sam: Four Centuries of British- American Relations (materials from the Library of Congress and British Library). The first of our major Bicentennial symposia, Frontiers of the Mind in the Twenty-First Century, was held at the Library and cybercast nationally in June 1999.

The concept of "Gifts to the Nation" is central to the Bicentennial effort. The Library itself is a Congressional "Gift to the Nation." Sharing the Library's collections and information about the Congress with Americans in their local communities through an expanded National Digital Library is the Library's major gift to the nation.

Summary

We ask the Congress to support the Library's -- and America's -- digital future, as well as its traditional services provided in Washington, D.C. The Library's digital responsibilities impose on us a new mission-critical workload, which we cannot fund by diverting resources from our equally critical traditional services of acquiring, cataloging, preserving, serving, and storing artifactual materials. Our traditional role will not diminish (indeed, print publishing is significantly increasing). The digital future will enable the Library to expand greatly our direct contribution to K-12 education and to the American public. Providing free, electronic access to knowledge and information for life-long learners everywhere is essential to the future of our democracy. Free, high-quality content from America's library is bridging the digital divide -- the growing division in the U.S. between information "haves" and "have-nots."

By funding the Library's fiscal year 2001 budget request, the Congress would make possible our digital future and support our traditional services -- enabling the Library of Congress to continue in the new era ahead its dedicated service to the work of the Congress and to the creative life of the American people.