Mr. GAYDOS. Isn't it a fact-I don't know if I am accurate or not but I am asking you-based upon your information that most of the waiting periods may vary from 3 days to a week, but there is no compensation for that waiting period?

Mr. WHITEHURST. That is correct.

Mr. GAYDOS. Do I understand your statement to suggest that the 3 days should not be compensated for, or do you pick those 3 days up later on?

Mr. WHITEHURST. You pick it up later on if the claim is in fact found to be valid.

Mr. GAYDOS. I had some reservations. We passed the amendment in this same committee several years back, a year or two ago, when we did provide for the 45 days, and we did have debate in this committee and we did have debate on the floor, as to the effect of that amendment, and apparently from your statement and also previous statements by other witnesses, some of our colleagues who have taken the time to come over on this important subject, in unison everyone seemed to have a feeling that the 45-day waiting period that we are talking about is more detrimental than advantageous for the overall benefit of the program, fairness and things of that nature.

Do you agree with that?

Mr. WHITEHURST. I Would defer to the wisdom of the subcommittee.

Mr. GAYDOS. You are very kind.

You state your office now has 102 claims. Where do most of those claims come from; the shipyards; from plants?

Mr. WHITEHURST. Yes, shipyard, naval air rework facility, a few from the Public Works Center in Norfolk. I would say that 90 percent of the claims came from those three installations, probably most of them from the Norfolk Naval Shipyard. Of course admittedly they are situations where workers are in a noise environment and have been for some time. A shipyard is not the quietest place in the world.

Mr GAYDOS. What kind of treatment did you get from the administration when you made complaints as you indicate in your statement?

Mr. WHITEHURST. We would write, and we would begin by writing the individual and the particular part of the department where the claim had been sent. Calls would be made by my staff. I have written numerous letters. I have pleaded, cajoled, did everything but threaten violence. I have gone the full gamut, pleading for some action. I have made insistent calls.

Mr. GAYDOS. Did anybody treat you discourteously?

Mr. WHITEHURST. On several occasions my staff reported to me that they received very short answers, but usually it was just lethargy. Nothing occurred.

Mr. GAYDOS. Did you issue any threats that were strong or bitter? Mr. WHITEHURST. I will show you some of those letters too, Mr. Chairman, but I would prefer to do it in closed session.

Mr. GAYDOS. You mentioned in your statement you have a case of a widow, who after she got her claim approved, had her payments from the Civil Service Commission stopped automatically.

Mr. WHITEHURST. Yes.

Mr. GAYDOS. I am presuming it was on the assumption that substitute payments would be made and then they were not made. Mr. WHITEHURST. That is correct.

Mr. GAYDOS. You complained about that also.
Mr. WHITEHURST. I complained about that too

Mr. Chairman, if you could imagine what it was like all these years fooling with this thing, and not getting anywhere, and finally when you all decided to have these hearings, it was the light at the end of the tunnel for us. We said at least someone in the House or in the Congress is going to do something to unscramble this mess and we will have a chance to go and lay this horror story out. I have talked to Congressman Bob Daniel's office when we were having all this trouble. I went to him and I said"Are you having any better luck?" He said “No.”

Mr. GAYDOs. Who is that?

Mr. WHITEHURST. Congressman Robert Daniel. The shipyard is actually in his district, but our districts are contiguous, so I have a lot of my constituents who work there, and so I know he has had this same problem, and he has also blasted OWCP for their delays. Mr. GAYDOS. Did he complain informally or formally to my predecessor, Mr. Daniels of New Jersey?

Mr. WHITEHURST. I can't recall. I think all of my correspondence so far has been directly with the agency. Mr. GAYDOS. Mr. Myers.

Mr. MYERS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Congressman, I would like to ask one question with reference to the 123 additional employees that would be coming up. You say you don't feel that that would be sufficient to handle the mammoth caseload.

How many do you think would be; do you have any idea?

Mr. WHITEHURST. I am not sure. I am not in a position to give a statement on that. I would say this: If we don't see some sharp improvement in the near future, it would be an indication of one of two things: either the people so employed are not competent to handle this work, or that they are short on hands to do it.

Mr. MYERS. Also in regard to the computerizing of the case handling process, what is your feeling on that? Have you been in and reviewed how they handle the casework or how it is filed? When you call over there and they can't find a folder, do you know anything about the reason for that?

Mr. WHITEHURST. No, I have not gone over there, and perhaps that is something I should have done. My administrative assistant and I perhaps should have done this. I believe, however, it is a function that this committee could undertake, and I believe it should have people who are competent to make an estimate of what their flow is when a case comes into the basket. I know that I have talked to our local people, and I happen to know one of the women in Norfolk who receives the cases initially. She said that she too has had difficulties with the OWCP office here in D.C., in trying to get cases processed. A worker who is waiting for his claim to be settled obviously goes to the point where he first submits it, and inquires as to why he is not getting any action. I know that these employees at

the federal installations in Norfolk who first receive claims have experienced similar frustration. So I don't think the problem is in the local offices. I think it is here in D.C.

Mr. MYERS. Thank you. I know the committee at our last hearings had discussed privately with the chairman about that information. I am sure we are going to be looking into it, checking the computerization thoroughly, because I think that is where some of the problems lie.

Mr. WHITEHURST. You know when you are continually told this has been misplaced or this has been lost

Mr. MYERS. That is the thing.

Mr. WHITEHURST. I think all of us lose an occasional letter. I have had files of one or two constituents that have been misplaced and lost. But, when it happens regularly, you really wonder what is going on in the agency.

Mr. MYERS. That is the way I feel.

Thank you.

Mr. WHITEHURST. Yes, sir.

Mr. GAYDOS. One question, Congressman.

You make a statement also that we have heard so many times before that the pesonnel over there seem to be incompetent, grossly incompetent.

Do you have evidence of that?

Mr. WHITEHURST. I can't draw any other conclusion when cases go on for 3 or 4 years. Why does it take so long? Let's take the hearing cases, for example. I don't want to pass final judgment on the formula that is used to determine whether or not a person deserves a particular sum of money. But it does seem to me once it reaches the main office, which has a set of standards that have either been met or not met, it should be fairly routine to make an evaluation and pass on it. Why does it take so long? Why does it take over a year to process a claim like this? I simply don't understand it.

Consider, for example, in our own offices the amount of mail that we get every week, with the staff that we have, and the answers that we are able to provide back to our constituents. You know perfectly well that if we kept our constituents waiting 6 months or a year, none of us would be here very long. We pride ourselves in our office in receiving a letter in the morning and having an answer out in the afternoon. I don't understand, with all of these claims coming to OWCP, why they cannot be processed any more promptly. It is a mystery to me. I would be interested, if you go to OWCP and trace a case through, where the particular stumbling point is.

Mr. GAYDOS. If I understand you correctly then, there is no other agency that has been behaving as badly or is so much in need of correction than this agency in your experience.

Mr. WHITEHURST. They get the brass ring, they really do.
Mr. GAYDOs. Mr. Zeferetti.

Mr. ZEFERETTI. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

One of the things we have heard over and over again is incompetency of the worker. I don't know whether it is the incompetency of the worker or the administration, or the policy of the department, or the procedures of the department, because some

of the testimony has indicated that there is never a follow-up on any case. It is handled by one person today, another person has it tomorrow, somebody else the next day, so again I think some of the efforts should go toward better administration.

Mr. WHITEHURST. If you will yield at this point, I am aware of some examples of that. My constituents have told me "I talked to this person, I talked to that person, I talked to someone else." That may be part of it too.

Mr. ZEFERETTI. I feel that individually the workers are trying, but because the caseload has tripled since this 45-day benefit has gone into effect, I think adminstratively they haven't been able to cope or set out any kinds of procedures that would make it run smoothly. I agree with you, this 123 additional personnel may not do a thing if in fact they don't set out some procedures that are going to be effective.

Another question I would like to ask you is about the medical review system. As it is now, I think when there is some doubt, they send it down to medical evaluation.

Do you feel that possibly they should have a doctor in place where each case goes in and gets a validation, so to speak? Mr. WHITEHURST. That might be the answer to it.

When we saw the abnormal number of hearing loss claims surface, I thought there was something very peculiar about this. Subsequently, I received, as I mentioned in my testimony, several Calls from constituents who were outraged because they heard some of the cynical comments being made by some of their co-workers about how easy it was to get a hearing loss approved. Consequently, I called the General Accounting Office and asked GAO to look into possible abuses in the hearing loss claims. The GAO representatives responded by stating they were already investigating this subject. I said "I would be very interested in getting your report. I would like to know what someone goes through in processing a hearing loss claim. I suspect that the medical evaluation isn't tight enough." Heaven knows, nearly everybody suffers some hearing loss as they get older, so I am not sure that the standard now used to measure hearing loss is appropriate."

I could be mistaken about this. I think the person has the right to go to his own doctor or any doctor. However, I don't think the government has had a tight enough rein on these claims. So, I would expect that if we had one or possibly two designated physicians for this purpose in an area, they could handle it very well. Mr. ZEFERETTI. The reason I bring that up is because on the State level it is done that way.

Mr. WHITEHURST. Yes.

Mr. ZEFERETTI. It seems to run a lot more smoothly.
Mr. WHITEHURST. Yes.

Mr. ZEFERETTI. And they get taken care of quickly.

Mr. WHITEHURST. Yes.

Mr. ZEFERETTI. I am just wondering whether or not we could institute the same kinds of standards.

Mr. WHITEHURST. I would certainly encourage that. This is the very point that I made with the General Accounting Office officials who came to see me. If the GAO finds the current standards deficient, it should recommend changes.

Mr. ZEFERETTI. With hearing losses in the yards especially, are there regulations as to the noise levels that are there? Is it something that is so prevalent that maybe the problem is the standard of noise levels within the yard?

Mr. WHITEHURST. Of course a lot of these fellows have worked there for 20 or 25 years, long before we had EPA and OSHA decibel levels that were permissible. Some are riveters and others work in close proximity to boiler plants and similar noisy areas. I have been through some of these shops, and they are noisy. There is no question about it. But, now workers are advised, of course, through OSHA regulations and so forth to wear ear plugs and to take a variety of safety precautions. There are measures that can and should be taken by the employee to protect himself from excessive noise that could be damaging to his hearing. A similar situation exists with respect to asbestosis. For years, as you know, workers were exposed to fibrous material and were not aware of the threat. Years later, the danger is discovered and the workers by that time have lung difficulties.

Mr. ZEFERETTI. I have just one last question, Mr. Chairman, and that is this: I would like to, if possible, take some of the files of some of the cases where there has been an apparent negligence shown. Mr. WHITEHURST. I will just be pleased.

Mr. ZEFERETTI. And make them part of the record also, Mr. Chairman, and hopefully we may be able to do something about some of the incidents.

Mr. WHITEHURST. Would you like me to select about a dozen files and have them sent over to you?

Mr. ZEFERETTI. I would any way, Mr. Chairman, with your approval.

Mr. GAYDOS. Without objection, if our colleague would be so kind as to peruse his files and maybe pick out 12 to 15 so our record wouldn't be overlabored, we will include them in the formal records so our colleagues would have the benefit of a typical case. If you would do that, it would be of great service.

Without objection, on the motion of Mr. Zeferetti, it is so ordered. [The information referred to follows:]