March 10, 2000

Robert S. Willard
Executive Director
National Commission on Libraries and
Information Science
1110 Vermont Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20005

Dear Mr. Willard:

The American Library Association (ALA) appreciates this opportunity to provide additional comments on the NCLIS "Emerging Consensus Position Paper" on the proposed NTIS closure and transfer. This letter is in follow-up to our letter to you dated February 29 and addresses some of the significant issues raised by others during the NCLIS comment period, including questions asked at the NCLIS open meeting on February 29.

Separation of powers
A concern has been raised about a possible "separation of powers" conflict in transferring NTIS or its functions to the Government Printing Office (GPO), an agency located in the legislative branch. The GPO is administered by the Public Printer, who is nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate, as are the Librarian of Congress and the Archivist of the United States. Executive branch agencies such as NARA and the General Services Administration (GSA) provide services to both the executive and the legislative branches as required by law. Moreover, the GPO currently provides support services for publishing and dissemination of government information for all three branches of government as required by the law.

In the past, some have been concerned about the perceived power of the Joint Committee on Printing (which has oversight responsibility for GPO) to veto decisions made by executive branch agencies without a vote of the entire Congress. In this case, however, transfer of NTIS responsibilities to GPO would require a vote of the entire Congress (and subsequent signature of the President). If GPO is given specific responsibilities subject to law and not subject to veto by one unit of the Congress, this concern about the separation of powers of the executive and legislative branches would be moot.

Further, ALA does not believe that the clearinghouse and public access functions currently performed by NTIS are intrinsically or solely executive branch functions. LC and GPO (legislative branch agencies) currently perform substantial information services and functions for other federal agencies. Moreover, as the branch of government closest to the people, Congress has an important role in ensuring local access to federal government information nationwide.

Capacity for electronic publishing
Comments from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Office of Solid Waste (OSW) against the proposed closure and transfer of functions of NTIS (dated February 22, 2000) suggest that if NTIS functions are transferred to another organization (e.g., the Library of Congress), then the production and distribution of CD-ROM products would be adversely affected. ALA believes that EPA's concerns underscore points made previously in our February 29 letter in support of GPO.

As the author agency for the "Test Methods for Evaluating Solid Waste, Physical/Chemical Methods" CD-ROM and other electronic titles, EPA/OSW has legitimate and serious concerns regarding placing NTIS functions with an agency that has the capacity for electronic publishing, dissemination, and sales. As noted in our February 29 letter to you, GPO has broad experience and expertise in the production, procurement, dissemination, and marketing and sales of electronic products. For more than a decade, GPO has produced and sold numerous CD-ROM titles for federal agencies, ranging from "HCFA's Laws, Regulations, and Manuals" (issued monthly) to the "Federal Acquisition Regulations" (issued quarterly). Other examples are listed at the GPO Access Web site, "CD-ROMs for Sale" at http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/sale/sale300.html.

Moreover, working with GPO to produce and disseminate this EPA CD-ROM likely would increase its availability rather than adversely affect it, as it would be included in Federal Depository Library Program. In addition to on-site public access at nearly 1,400 local depository libraries nationwide, the FDLP is an excellent outlet for the potential sales of electronic government information products. The success of the "Toxic Release Inventory," produced by GPO for another unit within EPA, is a good example of this.

Thorough and consistent cataloging
A question was raised at the February 29 meeting regarding the level of descriptive detail of the cataloging and indexing that GPO could perform if these functions were transferred from NTIS and whether this would be sufficient for sci/tech users. As a practical matter, GPO simply could continue the current cooperative agreements NTIS has with publishing agencies where agencies produce in-house indexing and abstracting for the NTIS bibliographic database. GPO currently cooperates with the Department of Energy in a similar manner, where DOE provides its indexing database to depository libraries and others. In addition, GPO could be funded to provide or procure library-oriented cataloging (as it does now for the NASA technical reports) and more technical sci/tech-oriented indexing and abstracting. Thus, access by specialized researchers and the public at large to these descriptive records (and, ultimately, the reports themselves) is increased by making the NTIS database accessible through the FDLP.

There is nothing inherently deficient in the MARC cataloging record or the use of AACR2 standards in describing sci/tech literature. Indeed, these standards, set by the library profession and used by the Library of Congress, the Government Printing Office, and most other libraries, will accommodate contents notes and abstracts, additional subject terms developed for scientific and technical reports by publishing agencies, and contractor and report numbers.

Short-term and long-term proposals for the future of NTIS
One final additional comment on the NCLIS "Emerging Consensus" paper: ALA believes that describing the alternatives for the future of NTIS functions as separate "short-term" and "long-term" categories may mislead some readers to assume that the "short-term" alternatives are only temporary and less viable in the long run. Quite the contrary may be the case as some of the suggested "long term" alternatives may require such extensive statutory revision, policy changes, and institutional modifications as to be prohibitive. While ALA agrees with NCLIS that the NTIS situation "must be regarded as part of the larger and longer standing Title 44 problem of ensuring effective, equitable, and efficient public access to government information," we restate our position that "In the final analysis, we believe the best alternative for a short and long term solution is the transfer of collections and service responsibilities to the Government Printing Office."

Once again, we thank you for the opportunity to provide additional comments, and we look forward to participating in the continuing discussion.

Sincerely yours,

Chadwick Raymond, Chair
ALA Committee on Legislation