SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1924.

NATIONAL PARK SERVICE.

STATEMENTS OF STEPHEN T. MATHER, DIRECTOR; ARNO B. CAMMERER, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR; AND H. M. ALBRIGHT, SUPERINTENDENT, YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK.

CLAIMS.

I. M. CHANCE, GLACIER NATIONAL PARK.

The CHAIRMAN. You are asking for a deficiency of $72 for I. M. Chance, Glacier National Park, for 1919. Who is Mr. Chance?

Mr. MATHER. Mr. Chairman, I will ask you to allow Mr. Cammerer to explain these items, because he is more familiar with them than I.

Mr. CAMMERER. Mr. Chance is one of the residents near Glacier Park. This item is due to the nonpayment of some bills that were incurred on account of fire fighting in that park, and in that connection we have a peculiar situation.

During the year 1919 we had a tremendous amount of forest fires, and our superintendent, when he found his funds running short in June, decided to hold some vouchers over, intending to change the dates, and, I think, to pay them in July.

Of course, when Mr. Albright, our representative, got out there on that, Mr. Albright found these vouchers in the drawer. We immediately stopped payment and had the vouchers go through the regular channels, getting the money in the form of a deficiency appropriation.

We immidately started proceedings against the superintedent and tried to get a grand jury indictment against him, but the United States had not lost any money so we could not get the indictment. This is the one item out of those which was left over.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you mean they were beating the Government out of a couple of thousand dollars?

Mr. CAMMERER. No, sir; I would not say that. His appropriation lapsed on the 30th of June and he did not have enough money to pay off these labor vouchers. He intended to pay them in July, out of the new appropriation.

The Government did not lose any money, but when we found out what he was doing we stopped that and had the vouchers go through under the general routine and according to the fiscal years in which the obligations were incurred. We paid the others several years ago.

The CHAIRMAN. Why has this one been delayed?

Mr. CAMMERER. This one came in later, and through some fault the man did not present it at the time. We put the matter up some months ago to the General Accounting Office, but they said the appropriation had been exhausted and they would not submit it as a deficiency, stating that was our function.

The CHAIRMAN. Would there have been any money to pay this if it had been presented in time?

Mr. CAMMERER. No, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. It would not have been paid at the time?

Mr. CAMMERER. No, no more than the others. They all had to go through in a deficiency.

Mr. CRAMTON. The deficiency you asked for at that time was not sufficient to include this?

Mr. CAMMERER. No. These people were local people. They did not know what the procedure was which was involved in this matter, and some of them thought when they were not paid that the money was lost. But we intended to make an effort to get their claims paid, as they were just.

The CHAIRMAN. If you knew it, why did you not submit it at the time you submitted the others?

Mr. CAMMERER. There was some trouble in connection with the liability accounts at that time. This is the only one left that we have any record of.

The CHAIRMAN. So this was because of the fact that you did not have any system up there?

Mr. CAMMERER. That was partly the case.

The CHAIRMAN. Have you changed that method?

Mr. CAMMERER. We have changed it absolutely, and our records are in fine shape now. We have a good system, but you have got to get good men to run the system, if you want to have the system work. We have a good bookkeeper now.

Mr. ALBRIGHT. The situation in Glacier Park was that we had a man there from the time the park was established in 1910, but he left to go to the war, and these deficiencies occurred while he was out of the service.

We have several temporary clerks during that year, and the superintendent went out all over the country in order to pick up a force. He hired people wherever he could get them, everybody he could find in the mountains, to do this work. But he did not keep a record of it; he did not note down the names of anybody he hired.

So when the vouchers came in long afterwards, they came from people who claimed they had been hired. The superintendent said he had hired them, but there was no record in the office to show that. The CHAIRMAN. These men were just hired for that special work? Mr. ALBRIGHT. Yes, sir: they were just hired for that fire-fighting work. There were some of them who supplied some things, but practically all of that was for labor.

GRAND CANYON RAILROAD CO.

The CHAIRMAN. You have another item for the Grand Canyon Railroad Co., Grand Canyon National Park, for 1921, amounting to $60.15. Were they fighting fires?

Mr. CAMMERER. No; all these items are due to administrative difficulties that we have had at the Grand Canyon and Glacier parks. The CHAIRMAN. Do you know that these amounts are correct?

Mr. CAMMERER. Yes, sir; I have certified vouchers here. In connection with this Grand Canyon situation, the appropriation act passed by Congress in 1923 shows that the appropriation for construction for the National Park Service shall be immediately available.

In that year, however, due to changes made in the Senate, the appropriation for the Grand Canyon did contain a specific authorization for construction..

In the other past appropriations that year and since, we had for administration, protection, and maintenance a certain sum; then we have some for construction, making the total for the park. In that year the fund for administration, protection, maintenance, and improvement in the Grand Canyon was carried in one item, amounting to $75,000.

Our superintendent at that time, who has now gone, understood the language "immediately available" to cover all construction that we had specified in the statements made to the committee.

So, toward the end of the year we found out that his bills were coming in which were not payable under that act. We immediately checked up with him and we found that he himself had been carrying all construction items on his books as immediately available.

Mr. CRAMTON. Has the Comptroller General held that under the language for improvement in the Grand Canyon the items for construction are immediately available?

Mr. CAMMERER. They are immediately available where you specify them exactly.

Mr. CRAMTON. The general provision was that any appropriation in the act providing for new construction was immediately available. Here is a general appropriation which included administration, protection, maintenance, and improvement. If you submit to him bills for certain physical improvements or new construction, does the comptroller hold that that appropriation is not immediately available?

Mr. CAMMERER. He says that although there was $2,000 which was chargeable to the next fiscal year, which he allowed to go through, he did not think it was intended by the committee to allow a general wording like that to stand above specific wording.

Mr. CRAMTON. Of course, the situation was that in all the park items we provided separately for new construction, just as in the case of the Grand Canyon; but in the Senate, the whole item was stricken out because of the attitude of Senator Cameron; and when it was restored in conference the language was modified so that a basic sum was provided for administration and construction, which included language for improvement, under which new construction would be authorized. But, as you say, in the fiscal year 1923, it was different. But I think that is a very far-fetched ruling by the comptroller.

Mr. CAMMERER. Of course, when we found out that they were not following the comptroller's construction of that wording we immediately stopped that. But in the meanwhile they had spent some of it, and we could not take $1,568.81 which was properly chargeable to 1923 and charge it to the next year.

Mr. CRAMTON. You mean properly chargeable to 1922?

Mr. CAMMERER. That is right. So we told them that we would just reserve $1,100 from the next year's funds, and we would not allow them to spend it, but to partly make up for that amount this year we are going to reserve the rest, so that there will not in effect be an increase in our appropriation.

Mr. CRAMTON. You propose to turn back out of the 1923 and 1924 appropriation an amount equal to what you are asking for here for 1922?

Mr. CRAMMERER. That is right. These were honest mistakes. There was about $400 of that total sum which was due to this. When our last superintendent came down there we had had a lot of trouble with the clerks. They did not want to stay. They changed frequently. One clerk came in one day and left the same evening. We found some vouchers stuck behind the radiators, and we had to send a man from Washington to inspect the office and clear up the books. There was about $468 of that. But we will reserve the entire amount in our funds.

Those are the facts, Mr. Chairman. We are not particularly proud of that record, but we had no way of checking up until these things came to our attention in Washington; and when that happened we made reservation of funds to cover these liabilities for return to the Treasury.

Mr. ALBRIGHT. I may say, in connection with what Mr. Cammerer said in reference to providing clerks in the field, it is the endeavor to get clerks with the proper knowledge and experience in Federal work; and after those men get their instruction in the main office at Washington they are sent to us. But it happens very often that when a man is sent out from here, after he has been in the field for awhile, he becomes dissatisfied with the climate or with living conditions around the park and he resigns; and then we have to begin all over again to organize the office force in the field.

Mr. CAMMERER. It is easier for us to get a superintendent than to get an assistant superintendent. The glamor of scenery wears off after a while and they leave the service. But we have a good man there now. We picked him up when the War Department was letting their men go. We found out this man was a good accountant; and he has proved to be a good man. All these men are personal selections of mine from hundreds of applicants, under Mr. Mather's direction, so that we may be sure to get the best we can find.

CALIFORNIA HARDWARE CO.

The CHAIRMAN. Is the item for the California Hardware Co., Grand Canyon National Park, 1922, $33.69, in the same class as the others?

Mr. CAMMERER. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. They are all the same class of items?

Mr. CAMMERER. Yes, sir.

Mr. MATHER. They all make up the total of $1,568.81.

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK.

REPAIRS OF ROADS, BRIDGES, AND RETAINING WALLS.

The CHAIRMAN. You have an item for the Yellowstone National Park, Wyo., for repairing damage caused by floods and washouts to roads, bridges, and retaining walls in the Yellowstone National Park and to the road leading out of the park from the east boundary, for which you ask $27,700.

Mr. MATHER. Mr. Chairman, we are fortunate at this time in having with us Mr. Albright, who is the superintendent of the Yellowstone Park, and he can explain in detail the reasons for this request, which is a deficiency item.

Mr. ALBRIGHT. The general outline of this matter is covered in General Lord's letter to the President submitting this item.

During the season of 1923 the States of Colorado and Wyoming suffered more from cloudbursts than at any time in the previous records of the Weather Bureau. The park suffered less than the surrounding States. In Wyoming roads and bridges were damaged to the extent of $200,000. On the night of July 22, 1923, a storm passed over the park which did damage which we estimate will require at least $27,700 to repair. We have done some temporary repairing, in which we have practically repaired all the damage done in the park itself. This deficiency item is to cover damage done on the Cody Road, which leads to the park from the east.

The CHAIRMAN. That leads into the park; it is not in the park? Mr. ALBRIGHT. It is not in the park.

The CHAIRMAN. Do we have jurisdiction over that?

Mr. ALBRIGHT. Yes, sir. It runs 28 miles outside of the forest in the Shoshone National Forest on the north side, and it also extends 30 miles over the road on the south side.

The CHAIRMAN. Why does not the State of Wyoming pay for that? Did Congress authorize that?

Mr. ALBRIGHT. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. It is a national forest?

Mr. ALBRIGHT. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Are there any trees on it?

Mr. ALBRIGHT. Yes, sir; there are lots of trees in these forests. Mr. CRAMTON. You are not able to get the Forest Service to spend anything on these roads?

Mr. ALBRIGHT. Not on this particular section. They do maintain all the other roads in the national forests, but these roads which are connected with the national park roads have always been considered as being more economical for us to take care of. We have to take care of the roads inside the park, and so far as the matter of going over the line is concerned, it is simpler for us to do that work than it is for them to move in their equipment. The CHAIRMAN. Is there much travel over this road?

Mr. ALBRIGHT. There is very large traffic. For three years previous to last year, more people went in, in private automobiles, by way of the Cody entrance, than any other entrance. Last year there were very few more cars that went in by the north entrance. This is the most heavily used entrance; it is a part of the national park-to-park highway, which is the road between the various parks. We took in over $50,000 revenue at this gateway.

Mr. CRAMTON. That is for automobile licenses?

Mr. ALBRIGHT. For automobile licenses. We took in altogether 195,000 in license fees.

The CHAIRMAN. People are not allowed to go into the park in automobiles, unless they have an automobile license from the park? Mr. ALBRIGHT. That is correct. We charge $7.50 for that. The fees this year will run to about $250,000.

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