ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries


O ctober 1985 / 499

W A S H I N G T O N  H O T L I N E  Carol C. Henderson
Deputy Director 

ALA Washington Office

Recommendations developed by the ACRL Legislation Committee, endorsed by 
ACRL and ALA, and submitted jointly by ALA and the Association of Research 
Libraries were the basis of testimony by academic librarians before House and 
Senate education subcommittees in September. The hearings were on the Higher 
Education Act, the major piece of education (and library) legislation up for 
renewal this Congress. The ALA testimony:

1) Recommended need criteria for the HEA II-A college library resource 
grants. Grants of between $2,000 and $10,000 depending on enrollment range 
would go to libraries ranking below the norm in their institutional class when
scored for both "materials expenditures/FTE student" and "volumes held/FTE 
student." Maintenance of effort would be required. Insufficient 
appropriations would result in fewer, not smaller, grants to the most needy.

2) Recommended continuation of the II-B training (targeted over the past 
decade to minority recruitment) and research program.

3) Recommended continuation of the II-C strengthening research libraries 
program.

4) Recommended a II-D program of college library technology and coopera­
tion grants— a minimum of $15,000 for up to a 3-year period. One-third 
matching would be required.

5) Recommended authorization of $1 million under HEA VI (International 
Education) to strengthen collections of periodicals published outside the U.S.
at institutions with relevant collection strengths and commitment to sharing 
resources.

Testifying for ALA at House hearings September 6 were ACRL Legislation 
Committee Chair Nancy Kranich, New York University Libraries, committee member
Harold Shill, West Virginia University Library, and for ARL, Charles 
Churchwell, Washington University Libraries, St. Louis. ALA Legislation 
Committee member Nancy Eaton, University of Vermont Libraries, and ALA Board 
Member F. William Summers, Florida State University School of Library and 
Information Studies, were scheduled to testify September 19 at Senate 
hearings, along with ARL witness John McDonald, University of Connecticut 
Libraries.

Attendance at the House hearing was good, including Chairman Bill Ford 
(D-MI), ranking minority member Thomas Coleman (R-MO), librarian legislator 
Major Owens (D-NY), Terry Bruce (D-IL), Steve Gunderson (R-WI), and Timothy 
Penny (D-MN). Questioning reflected a congressional preoccupation with 
foreign competition and trade deficits. "Do our libraries have the infor­
mation the U.S. needs on technological developments in other nations?" "Do we
have data that measures our academic libraries against those of other 
countries?” Chairman Ford decried the perception that the U.S. doesn’t need 
anything foreign, while the Russians are reading everything we have.

Ford also donned his postal committee chairman’s hat and compared the 4th 
class library rate subsidy ($42 million) to HEA II grants ($7 million). He 
warned that as postal subsidies are cut, the library rate could be in danger, 
and urged librarians to support it strongly and to provide continuing up-to- 
date library postal cost data.