Jones, Hon. Jesse H_ Kappler, Charles J. Kerlin, Malcolm (January 2). McLaughlin, Hon. Charles F. Leiserson, William M. Parker, Henry C. Randolph, Hon. Jennings. Rolph, Hon. Thomas.. Schell, S. D. Smith, E. S Snow, William S.. Snyder, Baird.. Stone, J. Austin_ Walling, L. Metcalfe.. Wender, Harry S. Warren, Laura E. Wheeler, Dan H. Zimmer, Verne A.. 695 700 587 722 343 612 352 357 513 500 401 709 405 357 724 335 728 547, 576 728 457 311 727 642 362 317 609 630 431 443 611 606 673 511 315, 379 685 396 534 627 515 389 354. 303 683 362 713 299 TO TRANSFER FROM THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA DEPARTMENTS, OR BUREAUS THEREOF, AND INDEPENDENT AGENCIES TO OTHER LOCALITIES TUESDAY, DECEMBER 2, 1941 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC BUILDINGS AND GROUNDS, Washington, D. C. The subcommittee met at 10 a. m., Hon. Le Roy D. Downs (chairman) presiding. Mr. Downs. The committee will please come to order. We will hear this morning from representatives of the various divisions of the Department of Labor. We will hear first Mr. Zimmer, of the Division of Labor Standards. Will you give the reporter your full name and the position you occupy? STATEMENT OF VERNE A. ZIMMER, DIRECTOR, DIVISION OF LABOR STANDARDS, DEPARTMENT OF LABOR Mr. ZIMMER. Mr. Chairman, my name is Verne A. Zimmer; I am Director of the Division of Labor Standards in the Department of Labor. Mr. Downs. I presume you are familiar with this resolution on which we are holding hearings. The resolution provides for an investigation of the feasibility of decentralization of the various departments. This is the first hearing we have had with representatives of the Department of Labor. We will hear representatives of the various bureaus in the Department of Labor on this question, some of them today and some of them tomorrow. I understood you to say you are a Director of the Division of Labor Standards. Mr. ZIMMER. Yes, sir; I have a general understanding of what the resolution is about, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Downs. You may proceed. Mr. ZIMMER. Mr. Chairman, the Division of Labor Standards was created by Miss Perkins 8 years ago as a service and promotional agency. It has no administrative functions whatever. We have two principal activities at the present time, as reflected in the amount of the Budget. One is the apprenticeship unit, which was put over into our Department 5 years ago by the Congress, and which originally started in the Youth Administration. That is now the major single function, with an appropriation of something like $700,000 for the current year. In the promotion of apprenticeship, it is a part of the Government's operations under the defense program by supplying a greater number of skilled workers to the industries. It is tied in very closely with Mr. Dooley's training within industry, and also ties in very closely with the vocational educational program and with the Youth Administration, all three of which, in addition to ourselves, receive appropriations for the training of youth. We are essentially a promotional activity. We try to get the labor groups and management to agree upon apprenticeship programs, in setting up standards applicable in each trade. We have under that unit five regional offices for convenience in doing the field work. One of the offices is at Boston, one in Harrisburg, one in Denver, which is the office farthest away from Washington, and we also have an office at Madison, Wis., and at Austin, Tex. In all instances we have at each place a rather modest local headquarters. We have very little staff in any one of those offices. The man in charge of the regional office is required to do a considerable amount of traveling around in his district. So far as moving that particular unit out of Washington is concerned, moving it into the field, I cannot visualize it without almost a complete disruption of our program, since it requires constant contact with the other three agencies in the same field. Of course, another reason why we have always recognized the desirability of having the apprenticeship activity centered here is because all of the labor groups are centered in Washington, or their representatives are here, and apprenticeship promotion requires constant collaboration with those representatives. That, in essence, is the situation in respect to apprenticeship. We have in the entire division in the Department here around 104 persons in the Labor Department Building, where we have approximately 11,674 square feet of office space. That includes store and stockrooms, and what we call "under the eaves" rooms. They have no windows in them, but we have recently had to fit up one of those rooms and use the skylights in place of windows. Of the total amount of 11,674 square feet the Apprenticeship Division occupies about 4,300 square feet. Our apprenticeship staff in the field today is about 170 persons. The other and second most important function of the Division today is the work of the safety unit. About a year and a half ago we launched a national safety program in the defense industries. We have in that unit about 35 paid people in the field. I had better explain at this point that up to the time when we had the defense activities we never had any field people in the health and safety unit. In setting up this largely volunteer program we have put on more than 400 special agents at $1 a year, who are safety engineers in the big industries and who serve us as counselors, who contact all defense contract plants trying to sell them on safety and pointing to the importance of conserving the present supply of skilled workers. Last spring Congress gave us $200,000 to bolster and augment the volunteer service, and out of this fund we have now around 35 people scattered around the country in about eight regions, including stenographers, with one man assigned to each of the eight regional directors, with an average of practically one person in the more important industrial States on a salary. In connection with the safety function of our unit, we constantly have occasion to contact and collaborate with certain other Government operations, in the O. P. M., and so forth, including the Priorities Division. We have recently had a great deal of contact with the Priorities Board because of the curtailing of the safety equipment material. We have of necessity constant contact with representatives of the Office of Education. Last summer one of our staff contacted over 50 engineering schools around the country and secured their agreement to set up safety training classes within the program authorized by the Office of Education, for the training of technicians. Today we have 5,500 plant workers, such as foremen and superintendents, in these schools, which are financed out of the funds made available by the Office of Education. That program requires almost daily contact with some of the officials in the Office of Education. Under the instructions of the President 4 years ago my division has rendered continuous assistance to the Interdepartmental Safety Council, one of whose functions is to quicken interest in improving hazard and accident control in Government operations. In connection with the national safety program we are tied in very closely with the Public Contracts Division. We get notice of contracts from Mr. Walling's division daily and send them to the field so that the field men may contact the plants quickly. In connection with the safety program we have frequent contact with the statistical accident reporting unit of the Bureau of Labor Statistics in the Department of Labor. Another function that ties us in here in Washington with the other departments is the work of getting out safety promotion pamphlets dealing with special forms of hazards. In doing that we have to have frequent consultations with representatives of the Public Health Service, the Bureau of Standards, and also the Bureau of Mines. Also, in the safety promotion work we have collaborated very closely with the Army and the Navy. In fact, my division was largely instrumental in getting out this year the safety code covering construction in Federal operations, now used by the Quartermaster Corps of the Army, and I think also by one or two other branches of the Army, as well as the other operating units agencies. That is the picture, so far as the major activities of the unit are concerned. The safety operating force now in Washington in the Labor Department building occupies around 2,500 square feet, including one of the rooms I referred to, that we call "under the eaves" rooms. The other operations of the Division can be generally termed a legislative information service. In that field we have a rather small force, as you can see from these tables. The work largely involves special analyses of labor legislation, its effect, desirability, and uniformity among the States. Usually, our contracts are with the State administrators and the State labor groups, although in certain phases of it we have continuous contact with the national labor organizations. For example, it is the function of the Division to organize and to service the annual national conference on labor legislation, and to do the follow-up work with the interim committees usually set up. Also, in the Division we get out an annual analysis of State labor laws and legislation. We service through correspondence, and sometimes through field visits, State labor groups working on some par |