Mr. CRAMER. So it is true to say that even the present procedures and practices, even after all this information has been called to their attention, their answers to the 21-question PPM and 35-question PPM, they have not conformed sufficiently for this to be approved ?

Mr. DALHOUSE. They have not conformed fully; no, sir.

Mr. CRAMER. Have you had occasion to check the answers to the questions to determine whether what is reflected in those answers is a statement of fact or not?

Mr. DALHOUSE. The division right-of-way officer, who is, which is the present title for the appraiser, is making current checks of those procedures as compared to the answers. His recent reports have pointed up that in some instances the State is not entirely following the procedures as prescribed.

Mr. CRAMER. Do you have a copy of that letter that was submitted in reply to the submission of the 35-question PPM 244?

Mr. DALHOUSE. I don't quite understand.

Mr. CRAMER. Do you have a reply of the Bureau indicating that they were not sufficient? Do you have that document?

Mr. DALHOUSE. Here in front of me?

Mr. CRAMER. Yes, available for examination, possibly for the record. Do you have it with you?

Mr. DALHOUSE. No, sir; I don't have the letter with me. The letter which we wrote to the State commenting on their 35 questions—no, sir, I do not have it here with me.

Mr. CRAMER. Indicating their answers were insufficient.

Mr. DALHOUSE. That is right, sir; I don't have the letter with me at the moment.

Mr. CRAMER. I suggest we get that and review it and determine whether we want to make it part of the record, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. DALHOUSE. I would be pleased to furnish the committee with a copy of that letter.

Mr. GRAY. All right. (See appendix B.)

Mr. CRAMER. I am reading from PPM 21-4.1, page 3, paragraph 4(a), subparagraph—this is paragraph (c):

If at any time the division engineer has reason to believe the practices and procedures actually applied by the State are not in accord with those accepted by the administrator or are otherwise not acceptable he shall notify both the commissioner of public roads and the State highway department. Further Federal payment for cost of right-of-way acquired as of date of such notification may thereupon be suspended and settlement for payments made or to be made will be as approved by the administrator following the review of the facts pertaining to the matter.

Is that what is happening in West Virginia ?

Mr. DALHOUSE. No, sir; we have not deferred the payment of vouchers, except that we have recovered from the State on current vouchers payments which have been made and which we have found to be unsupported.

Mr. CRAMER. Current vouchers of both the previous and present administration; is that correct?

Mr. DALHOUSE. Yes, sir.

Mr. CRAMER. How much money does that involve? How much money has been recouped, recovered.

Mr. DALHOUSE. I don't have that information as to the total amount that has been recouped.

Mr. CRAMER. But under these regulations the commissioner could, could he not—that is, the administrator—could suspend all right-ofway payments until they conform? Mr. ĎALHOUSE. He certainly could; yes, sir.

Mr. CRAMER. But he hasn't done it. And as a matter of fact, it is indicated further, as a matter of policy, that something should have been done by the Bureau long before this, in view of the reports, don't you think? The reports that were made way back in 1958, 1959 ?

Mr. DALHOUSE. There were certain steps taken that I have been able to find in the review of high-of my files, sir.

Mr. CRAMER. You mean taken by the State ?

Mr. DALHOUSE. Taken by the State, in cooperation with the previous division engineer. There have been steps taken since the conference of April 1961 which we hope will lead to better practices by the State road commission in the acquisition of rights-of-way.

Mr. CRAMER. That is all, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. CLARK. Mr. Chairman, I would just like to ask a question. You were discussing a few moments ago about States conforming to this new PPM. Aren't there a lot of States that have not conformed to this new 35 question PPM?

Mr. DALHOUSE. Mr. Clark, I don't know. My operations have been limited to West Virginia. The new PPM came out on December 30, 1960, I believe, and if I recall correctly, sir, the State of West Virginia submitted the answers to their questions sometime in February 1962. The date of that memorandum is December 30, 1960. Is is PPM 21-4.1.

Mr. GRAY. Any other questions? You are excused, Mr. Dalhouse.
Mr. DALHOUSE. Thank you, sir.
Mr. GRAY. Thank you very much.

Mr. David Levin, Chief of the Highway and Land Administration Division, U.S. Bureau of Public Roads, Washington, D.C. Please come forward. Please face the committee and raise your right hand.

Do you solemnly swear that the testimony you are about to give before this special subcommittee shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?

Mr. LEVIN. I do.
Mr. GRAY. Please be seated. Mr. May.

Mr. May. Mr. Levin, you are presently serving with the Bureau of Public Roads?

TESTIMONY OF DAVID LEVIN, CHIEF OF THE HIGHWAY AND

LAND ADMINISTRATION DIVISION, U.S. BUREAU OF PUBLIC
ROADS, WASHINGTON, D.C.
Mr. LEVIN. Yes, sir.
Mr. May. In what capacity ?

Mr. LEVIN. I am Chief of the Division of Highway and Land Administration, recently it has been renamed the Special Studies Staff.

Mr. MAY. What is the function of that division?

Mr. LEVIN. Among other things, and for some years we have been researching into State highway laws, right-of-way laws and practices seeking to upgrade the efficiency and quality of these State right-ofway laws and practices.

Mr. May. Would you for the benefit of the committee discuss your background, Mr. Levin?

Mr. LEVIN. Yes. I am presently secretary of the AASHO Rightof-Way Committee; I am also chairman of the Highway Research Board Land Acquisition Committee; I happen to be serving also as chairman of the Committee on Condemnation and Condemnation Procedure of the American Bar Association; also vice chairman, I guess they call it, of several committees of the American Right-of-Way Association.

I have been with the Bureau about 2412 years in the same capacity. Mr. May. What sort of education do you have, Mr. Levin?

Mr. LEVIN. Well, I have got a B.A., M.A., L.L.B., and Ph. D; I am also a CPA from the State of Wisconsin.

Mr. May. Now, Mr. Levin, in your service with the Bureau, you have gone to some of those States that have run into some difficulties in connection with their land-acquisition programs, have you not?

Mr. LEVIN. Yes, sir.

Mr. May. In an attempt to help the State and, of course, help the Bureau ?

Mr. LEVIN. Yes.
Mr. MAY. Would you name a few?

Mr. LEVIN. Well, I have been in Indiana, in Florida, and I am currently working in Massachusetts, until I was asked to go into West Virginia.

Of course, in connection with other kinds of activities I have been in most of the other States, too, in connection with assisting them in upgrading their right-of-way laws and things of this kind.

Mr. May. You performed service and a person like yourself and your staff would be made available by the Bureau to the States when they so request, is that right?

Mr. LEVIN. Yes, sir.

Mr. May. Were you requested by the present commissioner of the State roads commission in West Virginia to go to West Virginia and help him with some problems?

Mr. LEVIN. Yes, Commissioner Sawyers got in touch with the Federal Highway Administrator and he in turn asked me to go to West Virginia, which I did.

Mr. Mar. As a result of your studies in West Virginia, were you able to come up with a kind of suggested master plan for the State road commission?

Mr. LEVIN. Yes. The commissioner of West Virginia was very sincere. He sought help to upgrade his right-of-way operations; so he asked me to come.

I found the commissioner and all of the other officials that I had any contact with very cooperative. As this committee and its talented staff well know, this right-of-way business is a very complex one, and it consists of many elements. I don't think it can be said that appraising as such alone constitutes the right-of-way problem.

Actually, there are probably 20 or more elements which in the aggregate constitute the right-of-way activity.

So what I did in West Virginia, as what I have sought to do in most of the other States where I have been asked to go in is to take a look at each of these elements and to first find out what was going on and then to seek to evaluate them and make suggestions for betterment in a spirit of helpfulness, not in a spirit of inquisition or anything like that.

Now, the first thing that we generally inquire into, and I guess this starting at the beginning, is the right-of-way organization.

In West Virginia, we found that the right-of-way function was performed, as has already been read into the record here, by the legal and right-of-way division. This, incidentally, as you know, is one of eight major divisions in the commission as a whole. The thing that struck us from the start was that there are two important functions linked together here—legal and right-of-way. Now,

admittedly, there is a connection between legal and right-ofway. There is also a connection between right-of-way and engineering; in fact, if you look at it very carefully you are aware of the fact there is a functional connection between all of the major elements of the highway department activity and right-of-way. But, of course, this doesn't mean that they should all be grouped together.

As a matter of fact, the mere fact you have got eight divisions is evidence of the fact you want to separate these major functions. So that that became apparent at least in terms of the operations of most of the other States.

The suggestions that we made, and the standard for evaluation, are not the standards that I personally subscribe, that I personally have cooked up out of my own imagination; these, gentlemen, are the standards which the States, you might say, in the aggregate or a majority of them have found to be the best operationally. They are practical standards and not standards derived from cloud nine.

Most of the States, accordingly, have in the past separated right-ofway from all the other functions. So that one of the things that I have suggested to the commissioner for his consideration is that a separate right-of-way division be set up, apart from legal, apart from engineering and apart from everything else. This has some real advantages, at least a good many States that have used it have found it to be advantageous. I have a lot of respect and esteem for Mr. Bias who presently heads up legal and right-of-way division and my suggestion on this point doesn't in any way detract from his fine talents.

It is just if you separate this, you have the opportunity instead of having one talented man head up both legal and right-of-way, you have the opportunity, if you have an appropriate salary structure and appropriate tenure to go with it, you have the opportunity to have two talented people to ride herd on two important functions in the departments and all of those things made sense.

Now, aside from right-of-way—incidentally, I have suggested a moderate reorganization of their right-of-way functions in this new right-of-way division. I have suggested seven major sections.

They already have five of them, at least on paper, so what I am really adding are two additional ones and a rearrangement of these. I have also suggested, of course, the employment of a top flight talented, competent, experienced right-of-way division director, and then under him there would be three assistant directors.

One assistant director would be in charge of the right-of-way engineering functions. These would be to ride herd on the right-of-way plats and descriptions and participated-in location.

Another section that this director would have responsibility for would concern public utilities.

Now, both of these have engineering orientation, that is right-ofway engineering orientation, so it makes sense functionally to put them together under one assistant director.

The second assistant director would be one for appraising and negotiation, and, of course, this man would be the keyman in the organization under the director, because he would have charge of perhaps the two most important functions, appraisal and appraisal review, and negotiation, and because these also are tied in with training I have also included a little section on the right-of-way training, research and a right-of-way library.

Then the third assistant director would be in charge of property management, title searching and examining, and relations with the legal department, assuming that condemnation would continue to be handled by the legal division of the commission.

Now, this and of itself, or any good organization doesn't guarantee success; that is, you can sometimes have a fancy paper organization, gentlemen, and yet the thing will not operate properly.

And one of the reasons that it may not operate properly is that you don't have the right kind of persons. You don't have talented, competent people in that fancy organization.

Sometimes you find a poor organization that will work very well, and this is because you have got top flight men operating that organization, in fact, they have such talents, some men, and we have this in some cases, too, that they would make any kind of an organization work.

So that the second important element that we felt was important, was not only a good organization, but a sound and competent staff.

Now, one of the ways of getting this, of course, is to offer adequate salaries. So we took a look at the salary scale in West Virginia, and sought to compare it with right-of-way salaries in the regional areas and also nationally. We have these data available, and I made them available to the commissioner, and I am confident that he is going to try to do something about it.

For example, we recommended a salary scale for the director of right-of-way in the vicinity of $12,000 to $13,500 a year. Now, the present

Mr. MAY. How much is it now?

Mr. LEVIN. The present director of the legal and right-of-way division gets salary in the range of $9,000 to $12,000 a year but we feel that it is really, Mr. Joseph, who is the man in charge of the actual right-of-way operations itself, whose salary is comparable to the general range. His salary is $8,100 to $10,800. So that you have a substantial disparity there.

Let me just name you other salaries in this general area of West Virginia. In New York, for example, the top right-of-way man there gets $16,800 to $19,500.

In New Jersey, it is $13,200, and I am rounding these out, to $17,200. In Virginia it is $9,200 to $11,500. In Maryland, it is $9,700 to $12,100.