Published November 1996 — Download PDF of the original newspaper column
Byrd's-Eye View By U.S. Senator Robert C. Byrd A Streamlining Success
The recently completed consolidation of the Bureau of Public Debt office in Parkersburg is an impressive success story for both the federal government and West Virginia. This most recent consolidation follows on an earlier consolidation, involving the Chicago Bureau of Public Debt office, which was undertaken with $ I million in federal funding I helped to obtain in 1972, and furthered by my pressing to expedite the move and to provide facilities to accommodate the Bureau's growth in Parkersburg. That consolidation resulted in the relocation of functions and jobs from the Bureau's Chicago office to Parkersburg, and it has helped to make the Parkersburg office an even more valuable component of the U.S. Treasury Department. Beginning in 1984, I added language to a series of appropriations bills urging the Treasury Department to transfer more of the Bureau of Public Debt's functions and jobs from Washington to the Bureau's Parkersburg office. In 1991, I was able to announce that the Bureau would, in fact, consolidate most of its operations in Parkersburg. At the beginning of that process, it was estimated that this consolidation would save the U.S. Treasury Department $5.9 million annually. Now that the effort has been completed, savings attributable to the consolidation are estimated at an impressive $15 million annually. With the consolidation now finalized, the Bureau of Public Debt has gained significant improvements in productivity and reduced space costs that have resulted in savings to the American taxpayer far beyond those projected when the consolidation was initially proposed. The merging of most of the Bureau of Public Debt's duties in the Parkersburg office and the transfer of 300 personnel to that office have also translated into benefits for West Virginia. Since the beginning of the streamlining, the economic impact by the Bureau on the Parkersburg community has doubled. In 1991, the Bureau's Parkersburg office employed about I, I 00 workers, and provided an annual boost to the local economy of about $40 million, including $28 million for salaries and $12 million for benefits, rent, utilities, and local purchases. Today, the facility houses about 1,400 full-time permanent employees with an estimated annual economic impact of $80 million in salaries, benefits, rents, utilities, and local purchases. Cost efficiencies and productivity improvements like those achieved at the Bureau of Public Debt in Parkersburg are demonstrative of the kinds of gains that are possible for the U.S. government and the American public from the consolidation of federal offices. The consolidation of the Parkersburg Bureau of Public Debt office is a real success story and I am proud that I helped to make it happen. November 20, 1996