We feel we are here to exercise an evaluation process, to change the law and refocus if we can do a better job. The Appropriations Committees tend to be dominated by the problem of the total budget.

Now, if you are going to turn your fate over to the Appropriations Committees without benefit of hearings or support from the legislative committee, you may find your case is rather disabled in terms of the amount of money you need or want. To put it another way, having come before our committee, having justified the present expenditure of money and urged a program, having had our committee act to improve the law, you are in a much better position, then, to go before the Appropriations Committee and say, "Now here we have made these improvements. We think there have been discrepancies and problems in the past. We urge early appropriation of the money that is needed."

You have, in a sense, advocates from our committee before the Appropriations Committee for the same objective.

I say this to you not that I do not welcome your response, but simply as information to you, first of all, as to what the realities are in the House of Representatives particularly, which is jealous of its appropriations power, and secondly, to make a balance of the comments made about how it would be good if we had a 2-year advance.

Chairman PERKINS. I agree with the statement made by the gentleman from New York. You have to face this thing from the standpoint of reality.

We are hopeful that we will be able to see the Appropriations Committee act early in the year, in February or March, or by midApril under all circumstances. That would be, to my way of thinking, considering our legislative process, an ideal situation if we could extend an authorization here so that the Appropriations Committee would always have the authority to come along with an early appropriation.

I think that is what we are all working toward here. That is foremost in our minds.

Mr. PAGE. I think in our State, on a common school fund, we are having a problem right now in getting a commitment as to what the foundation level will be for the State of Illinois, with budgets being prepared and teachers negotiating contracts.

But it is important, whether it be the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, or your State programs, to know in March and April when these contracts are being negotiated. Teachers' salaries going up means you have to cut back in some other areas on the allocations which are paying the same salaries in the Federal programs as you do in the State programs.

Mr. ERLENBORN. Let me suggest at this point that I am aware of the fact that this committee should take periodic looks at this program in relation to the authorization. Would it not, however, be within this context proper for us this year to be considering the extension of the authorization for the fiscal year 1969? We are reviewing it now under a bill to authorize the extension beyond fiscal year 1968.

Chairman PERKINS. I am hopeful that the committee will approve an amendment extending the legislation to June 30, 1970. I expect

this year to take a good look at the programs authorized and where appropriate to strengthen them, enact amendments to the legislation even though the authorization does not expire.

I think we can amend the act more effectively if the authorization. extends into the future. We are not under pressure.

Mr. ERLENBORN. My suggestion is that we extend it 1 year at a time, but do it a year in advance instead of doing it at the time the authorization is expiring and, therefore, withholding action by the Appropriations Committee on the appropriation.

Chairman PERKINS. Last year we were able to get an extension of 2 years, which got us until June 30, 1968, although I sponsored and worked hard for a 4-year extension.

Mr. SPARKS. Mr. Chairman, if we could get this 1 year of leadtime, we would be able to plan more effectively and achieve some of the things you ask for.

Chairman PERKINS. You have a year's leadtime this year.

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir.

Chairman PERKINS. We hope to keep it that way.

Mr. SPARKS. If we can keep it this way, we can move in and operate our program much more effectively.

Mr. ERLENBORN. As I understand, the Office of Education, the administration, does not propose in the first session of the 90th Congress to come in with a bill extending the authorization.

Chairman PERKINS. Let me answer you by stating: First, when the bill was brought in here I stated publicly I intended to offer amendments extending the authorization.

Mr. GOODELL. I might point out that it is not going to do us very much good or you very much good if we authorize a year in advance and then pass a change in the law in September so that we have authorized funds for a year in advance and we change the allocation formula, as we did last year, change the rules of the game after your school year has started, which then requires the Office of Education to go back and redo all of the formulas and you may not hear until February or March again what your funds are going to be because of the changes made by Congress in the fall perhaps, in a continuing authorization here.

Mr. ERLENBORN. It would seem to me that if, when we did adopt those amendments last fall, we had made them applicable to fiscal year 1968 rather than fiscal year 1967, everybody would have been advised in advance. There would have been time to draft new rules and regulations. This was our trouble, making them applicable in the school year already underway.

Mr. GOODELL. We would have some difficulty limiting the effect of all amendments to a year hence.

Let me raise another side point here. I think the ultimate solution to your problem, lead time, flexibility and all the other aspects that have been raised here, would be if we could reach a stage where we allocate a specific amount of money back to the States for you to use as you deem appropriate either through a form of tax sharing or block grants.

Once it was authorized, it would doubtlessly be authorized on a permanent or semipermanent basis. There would develop an obliga

tion on the Appropriations Committee to make the money available and the tax-sharing proposal that I have mentioned would not go to the Appropriations Committee.

You would know, based on a figure well in advance, the money going to your State. The State would, in turn, allocate between education and municipal functions, and you would know again the allocation for your own State.

Another aspect that troubles me: It has come to my attention from a number of areas of the country-I will give you a specific instance. Under a title III application, a county was given a $300,000 grant for a 3-year period which involved remedial work in the early elementary grades, $300,000 for 3 years. Of that amount, $60,000 a year was for salaries of personnel that were added to administer the grant.

They had to buy a truck. They had a truckdriver. They had to rent quarters. It was a small county. When they got all through, more than 70 percent of the money, 70 percent of the $300,000 had been eaten up in salaries and overhead expenses.

I had a great many of the school people in that particular area, when I was talking with them, tell me if they could have had the $100,000 a year distributed to them, they had a large number of high-priority items they could have spent it on in terms of helping the youngster at the early elementary level who needed special care and special help. They resented very much the fact that 70 percent of the money was gone before they saw any of the new materials or other things that they wanted to help these youngsters.

As I say, I have heard this from a variety of sources, every area of the country, each example somewhat different. It seems to me a rather general commentary. I would like to hear your comments.

Mr. JOHNSTON. Šir, I would like to comment on this. I think this points up basically one of the things that we are all concerned about the same as you are. The allocation of funds under title III is not extremely large. If we want to give these supplementary services, then we ought to go to a long-range basis. Service to most of the school districts outside the larger cities really depends upon setting up an area concept to provide services for local school districts.

To do this on the basis that you have expressed is one thing, but to take these funds and start to develop a long-range approach that will serve many school districts on an area concept basis, you do not have to repeat some of the same things that you have indicated time and time again that you can make better utilization of the funds. I think this goes right back to one of the things that we were discussing on the statewide planning approach to this thing. The coordination of these funds between the various titles, in a particular area, is a little over $1,700,000 this year which can be utilized in many ways or wasted in

many ways.

But much of this, if it is used in conjunction with the other programs you can really build a service area for services back to local school districts on a permanent basis. Or you can set it up on an individual application where you can waste a lot of this money over a period of time also. This is one of the things that we are all concerned with, that as these funds become available we do not do it on a basis of 1, 2, or 3 years. We can take a look at a broad concept

of services back to school districts and build on it, using these funds constructively over a period of time.

Mr. GOODELL. Of course, in the instance I cited we could continue $100,000 per year appropriation for a number of years further and presumably the 60 or 70 percent for overhead will continue in this particular size county throughout the period. I don't know that extending the length of time would help much. I think extending the area might help.

Mr. JOHNSTON. I think this is right.

Mr. GOODELL. You wouldn't have to have as many administrators for a small amount of money that is being put into it.

Mr. JOHNSTON. I think you not only have to take into consideration this, but also the area and how many children it could serve economically and efficiently.

Mr. SPARKS. Title III, its purpose for innovative and exemplary services, there should not be prolonged continuation of this kind of effort. It certainly ought to be a practical type. There ought to be some promise of success, although I hope that some of the things we try out, when they do not prove to be effective we will discontinue them. But to evaluate any project in a very cursory manner would be very dangerous because it may need this extensive or more extensive employment of personnel and planning before such a project is initiated.

I would hesitate to evaluate any project that way without a thorough investigation of its purposes. It is easy for any individual to sit by and say, "We could use this more effectively if it were placed over here." But then it would not serve the purpose of title III, of going in here and trying out something that would prove quite effective if it were extended to a wider area and may prove more successful than some of the things we have practiced in the past. We certainly need to initiate change someway or other. I think this is an excellent way to do it if we do it thoughtfully and carefully, rather than just bulling our way ahead. I think that this type of thing may prove advantageous, although I will say some of the things we are trying under title III, as soon as we can we ought to get out of.

Mr. GOODELL. I will end with one more question. Do any of you have any suggestions as to how we can simplify or improve the process of application for funds under title I?

Mr. CHRISTIAN. There is one simple way that you pointed out, which is to have a census every 5 years instead of every 10. It would probably do more to speed up responsiveness to changing population characteristics all over the country and all kinds of things beyond education, by simply making the funds available to the Census Bureau to do a census every 5 years. We would automatically build in a better look.

Mr. GOODELL. This would affect the total funds available to the community, but I was more concerned here with the allocation of funds that you know the community is going to get, the allocation process for receiving those funds.

Mr. JOHNSTON. I think this program, like many other programs, you go through the first year or two of struggle; I think all States and the U.S. office require more things probably in applications than we

basically need. I think one of the main features of this program is good. It has made school districts one way or the other lay out on the table the education of deprived children, the programs they are not carrying on.

I think, as a matter of experience I would hope we would eliminate some of the paperwork that is actually involved in the applications. I think the second year's experience has been better than the first year's experience. Nevertheless, we all agree that this is a major problem. But to identify the educationally deprived and make them take a look at the type of education program that is going to meet the needs of these children, I think, is one of the more beneficial parts of this.

Now to get rid of some of the paper and some of the reporting funds is one that I think will take some time to work on. We need to eliminate them.

Mr. GOODELL. You all smiled and hesitated when I asked the question. I am sure you did so because you have heard many complaints such as we have heard from the local level that you people operating at the State level would not perhaps feel as strongly about as the local people do who have to fill out those forms.

Chairman PERKINS. The gentleman from New York has asked a most interesting question. I am certainly hopeful to hear some more encouraging comment and response to the gentleman's question than I have heard this far. He simply has asked the question, as I understood it, you had any ideas, if you knew of any ways that title I applications could be simplified, and that embodies the guidelines from the Office of Education to the State office.

Mr. GOODELL. That is correct.

Chairman PERKINS. Now I would like to hear your comments. If there are no comments on that, no suggestions, I would assume that the administration of it is just about perfect.

Mr. GOODELL. Now the gauntlet is down.

Chairman PERKINS. So let us hear your comments on that in response to the question from the gentleman from New York.

Mr. GOODELL. May the record at least indicate the wincing of the witnesses when you said "almost perfect."

Mr. JOHNSTON. Then I will reply a little more definitely, if this is what you want.

It is, of course, included in the guidelines. I think we all wish frankly that the reaction to some of the reports we have to make could be better. The local districts have the same type of responsibility. I think basically if the applications could get down to the point of believing and trusting that local education officials and State officials are just as concerned with wanting to help the educationally deprived as any one else in the United States is, then what we would need in this is to identify the children that need the programs, and identification of the programs. And this could be done a lot simplier than we do at the present time.

I think I have in my briefcase in the back of the room some 15 pages of comments from my staff on the reporting forms that are required by the U.S. Office of Education and embraced in the guidelines, including the financial reporting. I think there are a lot of materials asked for that it is nice to know, if you have the time and expenditure