former speechwriter for president richard nixon, including pat buchanan, reflect on their careers and how they helped shape the public perception of the administration and policies. it is co-hosted by the richard nixon foundation and george washington university. live coverage begins at 2:00 p.m. eastern tomorrow. >> the c-span networks provide coverage of policy, public affairs, non-fiction books, and american history. it is all available on radio, television, on-line, and on social media at networks. find are content through the video library. we take it on the road with our bus, bringing it to your community. we are now available in more than 100 million homes. created by cable, provided as a public service. >> republicans can win a the

2012 election if they can make it about politics. there were several stops in new hampshire. our is considering running for president in 2012. and he has some remarks. this is about one hour. [unintelligible]

>> welcome. this is my wife. >> hi. i have a wife of [unintelligible]

[unintelligible] how are you doing? great to see you. thanks for having me. >> governor. meridian, mississippi, 1982. naval air station. >> we teach you how to fly? >> you did. >> looks like it worked. >> i miss ad few birds and a few people. >> we're not very good at that. >> i'm the manchester committee chairman. pleased to meet you. mike and i go back a long ways. >> great guy. >> good to see you here in new hampshire. >> i'm pleased with the response. i'm haley. >> i'm mark. >> glad to see you. thank you for coming. >> glad you came out. >> governor barbour pleasure to

meet you. >> we try hard. >> some things have turned out. >> welcome to new hampshire. >> thanks. >> good to meet you. >> hi jason. thank you for coming. >> welcome to new hampshire. >> thank you. i'm glad to be here. get a picture? sure. come on. >> if we're squinting it's because of the sun. >> i'm very vermont. >> great. had a nice visit yesterday. >> i'm haley. >> hi governor. i came tonight because i said guy always says something smart on tv. >> hopefully i'll keep up that record. >> hey. >> good to see you. >> hour doing? >> my wife betty. >> i'm haley. how are you doing? i married over my head too. >> i certainly did. >> glad you know that.

>> mark of a good man. >> is barbara french? >> the barbours were huegenots and they left during the counter reformation and went through holland, probably. but my family went to scotland and then to northern ireland. you know, the english hated the scots and hated the irish so the scots would kill each other. my great-grandfather dime the u.s. in the early 1840s from dery. >> did he settle in the south? >> actually came to pittsburgh. he had a brother, seventh of seven brothers who came to the united states. he had a brother in pittsburgh. parent didn't like that because he only stayed a year. he went to mem fwris he had another brother. he was a young man and worked and i hardware store. and then ultimately after the

civil war moved to mississippi. but it's an old french huegenot name. when you go to ireland or to the midlands of the uk, people will notice that -- they refer, that's a huegenot name. for us it's not. but i don't know why they never changed the spelling like everybody else. how goes it? >> it goes well. good luck to you in your legislative session. i know there are challenges. >> we got finished. >> up >> are. >> i had to go home for a couple of days and then -- but we got it straightened out and a couple of days later they passed the budget and closed the doors. >> okay. very early. >> state day of prayer that they've gone home. >> very good. >> we actually finished the first week in april. that's our statutory -- >> you meet every year, annual

session? >> annual session. next year we'll have a new legislation. this is our election year. that session lasts 125 days because they allow home to have time to organize. the other three years is 90-day sessions, first tuesday in january and it end the first sunday in april. you know, generally. >> have a little time. good luck. >> i was over at your legislature today. >> it's a different cat, kettle of fish. >> somebody was nice enough to show me that beautiful house chamber but i said it would be the third largest theater in mississippi. i can't imagine. we have 122 which seems to me in the hours seems to be mighty big but 400? >> wonderful. >> good luck to you buddy. >> good luck. we'll listen to your remarks. >> if you run count on me.

>> betty great to see you. i have a piece of advice for your husband don't let them take your picture without her. >> try to get her into every picture. >> somebody gave me that advice and it's helped me with more than anything. marshall would beat me by 20 points. >> whoever replaces you will have to fill a big pair of shoes. >> thank you very much. >> i'm haley. >> >> thank you very much for saying that. we're trying to do the right

things. >> that is chris coming in the door. >> oh. i was always impressed with how you managed the rnc. you did a great job in 1994. >> i met jason. what do you do? >> i kind of run a department. >> good, good. y'all make resistors? like wire resistors? sorry. do you know howard industries? they make transformers? >> i have heard of them. >> do you work together?

>> we are tiny compared to them. >> thank you for coming. >> i met you in louisiana. i came here to hear your accent. have a question for you. are you going to take them la r later? >> yeah. >> john claiborne. >> how are you? nice to meet you. thank you for coming out tonight. >> my mother was born in your area, down in jackson. >> how did you get here? >> my father was in the army. >> pretty part of the world. >> it is. >> pretty today.

thank you for coming. i want to be sure i have spoken to everybody. >> kathy is my wife. >> when you said kale -- thank you. she's great. >> she is. >> i'm virginia. thank you for coming. >> i'm tickled to be here. >> i saw your beautiful chamber today. 400 people. wow. >> third largest in the world. >> i told them that it would be the third largest theater in mississippi. i'm tick toled to see you. i'm doing great, how are you

doing s doing? beats the alternative right? >> there was a "new york times" columnist who wrote a book where he said that the first thing i do every morning is to see if my name is in the obituaries because if it is i it is now my distungt pleasure and honor to present our guest, governor haley baley barber of mississippi. >> thank you for letting us be here.

i did a radio show this morning. he finished our interview by asking me what he said was a weird question. you know, you are the second person that i know who is from yazu city, mississippi. and he was pausing to see and immediately i said of course, jer jerry moses, catcher for the red sox and he howled into the line, laughing. you're right. that is exactly who i know from yazu city, mississippi. that's why i have heard of your hometown. that reminded me, it would be great if i could get my old hh school friend, we played on two state baseball championship teams together. i pitched and he caught. mostly he hit.

hard. but i got him on the phone. so jerry, thank you for coming, buddy. [ applause ] i had to prove when i got here why was i a red sox fan. the truth is i was not a red sox fan because he signed in 1964. he signed with the red sox because of my mother who was a red sox fan, and when it all came down for him to make a decision, he didn't have any choice. he had to sign with the red sox. so we -- i'm glad you're here. great to see you, old friend.

jerry and i have in common that we both married over our heads. i would like to talk a little bit but mostly save time and answer questions. i want to talk to you very directly about the stakes in the 2012 ection. and what i think is the path to victory for republicans. i've been around politics for a long time. heady stuff or more. i will tell you that. i was chairman of our party from 1993 to 1997. i have been governor in my eighth year. i can tell you i have heard

repeatedly, often daily something in the last year and a half or two years that i never heard during e depths of water gate, during the height of the vietnam war, during the jimmy carter malaise. people say to me that i'm afraid my children and grandchildren will not inherit the same country that i did. i hear that from executives and professionals. but i hear it from nurses and firemen and schoolteachers. particularly from small business people and employees of small business people. they understand that the country can't continue on a course that we followed for the last two years. primarily they see that through the lens of spending. wh the government spends $3.8

trillion as president obama's budget is for this coming year, .8 trillion and the government is only going to take in $2.2 trillion, a 1.6 trillion $deficit? people understand, if you did that in your business, pretty soon you could write a book about it. it would start at chapter 11. the american people get it. they also understand it is not just a matter of this enormous spending driving up the deficit. make no mistake. that is what drives up the deficit. when the government sucks out of the private economy, how does the private sector grow?

how do the government create more jobs when the president says yesterday he wants to put a trillion dollars of new taxes on the american economy? did you see how he framed it? he said that the republicans wanted to spend a trillion dollars on tax cuts for the rich. as if this is the government's money. as if it's not your money, but it's the gornment's money that you're going to spend by letting the people who work and earn the money keep it. that's about as fundamental a statement of the difference between i believe is right for america and wt this administration believes. because they obviously believe that all money belongs to the government if the government is willing to spend our money by

not taking it from us in taxes. the fact of the matter is the government doesn't have any money except what it takes from the private citizens and businesses of this country. the more it takes, the less we are able to grow the economy. our first priority should be to have economic growth and job creation. if you want to deal with the deficit, let's grow the economy at a much faster percentage and let revenue go up that way. i can remember when the left would snicker at our notion of growing our way out of the deficit. i can tell you this, we can't spend our way out. in my state, the first four

years i was governor, state income went up 40% without raising anybody's taxes. we did it by economic growth and having more taxpayers with more taxable income. that's the private sector that did that. it wasn't the government that did that. the president's government growth programs are never going be a substitute for real economic growth. i understand that bigger government means a smaller economy. this is a state that has been based on that. i remember when governor taxes would say that low taxes are a

result of low spending. there's an idea. it was all about growth and job creation. it was about spending, taxes, energy, health care. regulations. the american people agreed with the republicans. that's why we won 60% of independents. not just republicans but 60% of independents because we made the cam pap about the issues. >> when you repeatedly say that spending on titlements is unsustainable and propose to do nothing about it. you can understand like the american people said.

spending on entitlements is unsustainable. here is something, do something about it. anybody who stands in front of you and talks about getting control of spending or getting the balanced budgets by redung spending and doesn't take into account what we're going to do about entitlements is just pulling your leg. i was pleased. some people can disagree with me.

there is not enough spending in the non-defense discrionary catego that they made all the ts out of to really be a big deal in the budget. that single got us not just to first base or got us headed in the right direction. it changed the direction of government spending regardless of how many billions of dollars. but the real issues are going to come up on debt ceiling. when we have multiple as much leverage and on the budget for 2012. that's when the real -- the real spending will be in play. and we will see if the president's speech yesterday in which he talked about saving $2

trillion on spending, he talked about saving a trillion dollars on lower interest rates. tens of thousands of more small businesses across the united states. afterall the people in the highest individual income tax brackeare about 80% small busine businesses. at least two-thirds, probably higher than that. how are they going to hire more people or grow their busine if we stick them with their share of a trillion dollar tax increase? well, our plan is not to go that way. to make the savings in spending not to raise taxes.

that's obamacare. i have been around health care reform debates for a long time. when i was chairman of the party, clinton care was on the front burner. i never heard anybody say is that they want to make the cost go up but that's what obama's plan does. makes health insurance premiums go up. that's why republicans, among other reasons, want to repeal it. the house has voted to repeal it and we need to repeal it. but another big element of this, how do we expect to hire more people. whether it is tax policy, spending policy, health care

policy, in every case they all impede what should be our first goal, economic growth and job creation. that is before you ever talk about energy. as you watch gasoline blow past $4 a gallon to lord knows where, you know, i would just remind you that in one sentence is to increase the price so americans will use less of it. therefore in their mind, less pollution. that's not energy policy, that's environmental policy. if you think i'm -- if you think i'm pulling your leg here, let me just say go back and read the speech that steven chu, the secretary of energy made in california in 2008 in which he said, and i paraphrase is we need to get the price of gas in the united states to where it is in europe. 8 or $9 a gallon is where it is

in europe. they may need that in berkley but we don't need that in biloxi. i can tell you that right now. that's where we're going and it's not an accident. when they shut down the gulf of mexico. when you have got enormous proven reserves in alaska. when it's harder to get a permit to mine coal than it is to get a heart transplant it's pretty easy to see that this is not only their policy, this is the one policy they got that's working. the cost of energy is going up. i believe we need exactly the opposite energy policy. our energy policy should be more american energy. when the british landed in jams

town they looked over the rail and they saw abundant american energy in the form of timber and wood. we need more oil. we need more natural gas. we need to make sure that liberal opposition to hydraulic fracturing, the new technology that has increased our natural gas supplies so tremendously by making gas available that we di't know we would be able to produce economically. we need to make sure that that doesn't slow down. we have commercial scale carbon

capture see question ration. we need to learn to burn it cleaner but at the same time we are the saudi arabia of goal and on our way to become that of natural gas. there is no reason f us to be so energy dependent. the president's policy is less american energy and more expensive american energy as a way to reduce imports. i want to share more about who haley barber is. if we make the 2012 election about policy and show the clear differences between what obama has done and tried to do and

what we believe in and would do and what our house is working towards, then we will win this election. the democrats will try to make it about anything but policy. they will try toay the republicans don't care about poor people. republicans don't care about children. republicans don't care about sick people. republicans are bought off by big business, small business, agriculture, whatever. this is an administration that has a habit of politicizing every subject and we saw that in spades yesterday. he said we're un-american because in his mind, not having a trillion dollars in new taxes on the american people was

un-american. we can have honest disagreements and we do and if we will make the campaign about those, we will win because th american people know we're right. can't take anything for granted and we got to start here. if i run for president, i will make a decision by the end of the month. if i run for president, then i have to compete for new hampshire. that's fine. this is going to be a critical state in the november election of 2012. i think new hampshire could be one of a small handfuls of states that decides whether we have a new republican president or whether barack obama gets four more years. whether i win the primary or not

i'm going to try to win new hampshire in november 2012. any republican candidate needs to do the same thing. this state is very important in that regard. if i end up running, kathy, you will see me back. i am very grateful to you and your family and to krl for letting mee here. and with that i'm going to stop and shut up and be glad to take questions. thank y'all. [ applause ] >> we have something in common. i'm from southern new hampshire, y'all. i won't even need an interpreter. i'm going to ask a question from the other side. they tried to turn it into something ugly.

i want to know how you will handle it when they try to turn it into something ugly again. >> i was asked about my childhood, raised by my brother. she never remarried. i had great friends who could catch and hit. i wouldn't give anything for it. does that mean everything was perfect in the south? of course not. we have made real changes that have been a big plus. we like to show those off.

they want somebody. they are tired of happy talk. they want somebody who would trust the public enough to tell the truth. let's talk about what we will do about the problem rather than entitlement spending is unsustainable, let's talk about something else. >> my name is wayne. rr i want to thank you for embracing diversity. i think it speaks volumes about the kind of man that you are, the kind of pern that you are and that inner self and i want to say thank you. >> thank you very much. let me say we run state government of mississippi to try to put the best people in the

best place. it happens that the colonel isr reason he is there is because he is the best person. you are very nice to say that. and the other thing about him is he is a pretty good tight end. >> the thing about the bp oil spill, it was a huge calamity for us economically because, no offense, but 24 hour cable television, at least once an hour every day 24 hours a day,

seven days a week for about four months showed the worst scenes from louisiana and gave the american people the impression that the whole gulf of mexico is ankle deep in oil. the fact of the matter is it wasn't. we had a good defense planor mississippi. my 80 mile coastline we closed one three mile stretch of beach one time overnight. we were catching a lot of it while it was still in the oil. every other part we cleaned up that day. and didn't have to -- we had to move people around on the beaches sometimes. and bp paid for all of that, as they should have, by the way. we wou enjoy themselves and not fe for the families. i think now that the public has

the realizationhat the beaches are clean, the water is clear, the fish something great, we have never had one seafood sample since the oil spill. not one seafood sample that failed testing. and i tell people we got fish that are bruised from being sampled so often. we are doing more spling than we have ever dreamed of many the past. i say that. i want to give you one caveat. that's the facts as they exist today. we don't know over the next year or two or three what might be discovered down in the gulf that is not apparent today. so we have got big teams of the finest scientists of all of the gull states and people from the other places in the country that are studying this constantly. the biggest thing for us has been the economic disaster of

crushing our tourist season. a litt different for louisiana. they were closer to the well. the oil that got to them s wet, brown oil. by the time it got to us it had deteriorated that it was tar balls. little kd of feel like tar. you just pick them up. you got close the border, control the border. there will not be anything done until that happens. therare a whole lot of people that no matter how they feel about guest worker programs or this or that, they're not going to do anything until the borders are close d the t obama

administration has not closed the border for that reason. they think they have got a big political issue. they are not going to give up a political issue by doing what needs to be done. i should note about 40% in the united states illegally actually came here legally. and the second thing that i think we should do that no administration has done republican or democrat, when somebody comes here on a temporary visa, we should have a system to keep up with them. you can swipe your card through the bank or swipe it through many, many other places and that can be used if you are set up the way to do it to say where you are. i mean, it has to be set up that way.

if you're here on a temporary visa, you got to check in. no big labor requirement. we don't have to hire a bunch of people. if you are supposed to be working in bostonnd for two weeks you are in seattle, maybe we should see if you are on vacation or doing something differen those two things are just -- without them, i don't think anything is going to happen. once we get the border controlled, then we need to think about what are we going to do about 12 or 14 million people here illegally and what are we going to do about the need for labor that we have in a lot of places in the united states. we are not immune to wha is

happening in europe. we will have a labor shortage in the united states down the road. you know, i may not still it's not going to happen. ma'am? they talked about lewis allen from mississippi. dean of a lion talking about? liberty mississippi.

do you know who i am talking about? i guess i will change my question. lewis -- i will make it related to that. lewis allen is a black man who was killed in the 60s in mississippi and it seemed like in mississippi they were not doing as much as they could to solve that problem. i wanted to get your feed back and ask you to respond. >> i am totally ignorant of it. as you may know, in the last 15 years or so, there has been an effort made by prosecutors, state prosecutors and federal to re-open old cases you know, buy ron was convicted in one of those cases but i don't know who lewis aen is. >> what about the rebel flag in

your state flag? >> my state voted to keep the flag. voters voted on it and that's that. >> did you see that and comment on that? >> i didn't see that particular quarter. i seen several reports. >> is that a real cut. >> probably can reprogram. once you take it off, it's gone.

they can't -- they can't wool around spending it for some other purpose. they can't reprogram it. as i said earlier, it's $38 billion, $28 billion or $68 billion it's not really the point. those numbers are such a tiny tiny part. remember that all of -- all of non-defense discretionary spend chg is all this bill dealt with, that all of that is about 15% of the federal budget give or take. the real money is elsewhere. and of course the republicans and i think rightly put $5 billion extra in this spending bill to be sure that the military would get paid tween now and the end of the year. that's something i would favor.

the defense department budget should get smaller. about cutting other spending. quoted as saying they have been giving so much money ty have forgotten how to budget. they overpaid on contractor $200 million and didn't find it until the audit. and this is a department that the general accounting office said under republican and democrat congresses has become unauditable. i was real proud. they cut dod 1978.

that doesn't mean we have to give the pentagon a a blank check. . >> we don't have to do the ability. step up to the plate. you can save money over there and do just as well. >> they don't think it's possible politically. what do you think about a balanced budget amendment.

>> we will. >> deterrent for big deficits. and it does. i was elected, our budget was 20% out of balance. we spent 20% more in recurring expense expenses. the constitute constitution for the bujts shortfall. took us two years to get out from under it but we did it without raising taxes. the fact that there was a balanced budget law was helpful in keeping it from getting

worse. so, i don't think we ought to let people think it's the end all be all. ma'am? >> as president what would you do about the abysmal state of education in this country? >> slip that up under there. we need to judge them by the results of our children. some of the ones who spend the most produce the least, have the

lowest scores. some things we need to do about education. we need to -- because there are a lot of kids who are smart kids. weneed to get them. i called three car dealers in jackson, mississippi. $70 thousand the year. which is more than double the

average private sector worker in mississippi. now just suppose reeves, who is mine and -- marsha and i have been married 40 years. imagine ifhen he was 18 he decided to go holmes community college and study to be an auto mechanic. what would they have said there? marsha, what's wro with him? because we have sigmatized skilled and careers in skills. to expose kids to careers other than going to college. something i would have never believed. they are bored or th don't see what it's got to do with them. now for the university headed

students, we need to make it harder. we need more advanced placement, tougher standards, higher standards. we're in a global battle for talent in the world. we're in a global battle for talent. see it right here. i mean, the biggest thing and i think i have done economy for mississippi is to work to improve the quality of our work force. we doubled what we spend on it and given it more emphasis. we have tried to destigmatize work force frtraining. we have got to get our kids back where we are not on the bottom. it is about so much more than money. you asked me about immigration?

somebody did over here. for highly trained, high skilled professionals, really. we run out after about three months every year. we need to have about five times more visas. when a kid from india goes to mississippi state university and gets a phd in engineering, most likely he is going to go home. he will start a business in mumbai that employs 1,000 people. you know why? we won't let him stay. we ought to staple a green card to his diploma and every other phd in science and engineering. let them go memphis and start a business that employs 1,000 people. we forget we're in a global war

for talent. we should never forget that. thank you. >> if i may take another moment of your time. i would like tthank you all for coming and participating and giving a traditional new hampshire welcome to governor haley barber. i would like to thank the media for their coverage of the event and helping keep the public informed. i would like to thank all of our volunteers and donorand those of you watching. governor barber, if you could come up, i have a special thank you that comes with the message. >> just knock that bottle of water over. >> we will fix that later. to send you home with something to remember us by, i have been asked to give you this special

gift that is a new hampshire made maple syrup proudly produced by the thompson family and the message that comes with it is it is in the honor of t great former governor of

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[captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] 1] this is where we got to make real sangs. and if they believe we won't do it, i think we shouldn't do it but i don't say we can't do it because if they're not willing to make the right concessions, then the blood will be on their hands. >> thank you. >> thank you for coming.

>> i moved up here in 1992. we retired out of dc. i worked with ronald reagan in 1985, 86. and bush sr., yeah, yeah. thanks for coming. >> great fun. >> good, good. and i love mississippi. i used to date a guy in mississippi. >> we're all pretty cool. >> i know it. i know it. >> you have a different hat for every single day of the year. >> i have 700 hats this was my great grandmother's.

>> it has a little pizaz. >> i'm known as the hat lady. they never interview me but they pan the hat. >> i can't get in the frame at all. >> thank you for being a part of this. >> thank you for coming. >> i hope it was food for thought. >> it is. very good. >> we will. we will. >> if we don't, i think we're cooked. >> going to come back often. >> thank you very much. >> if you -- i have been trying to for ten years i have been a state rep to get the civil services healthier. >> that would be mad at you.

>> you know what i'm going to suggest? maybe in front of the u.s. flag here? >> yes.

>> i'll be the center piece. funny.

>> we're going to go the airport. got time to stop along the way? wel get in a little visit away from tv caras and microphones? >> sure. we got time. >> okay.

>> thanks so much. >> i don't know how you do it, guy who is conservative in the limelight for so long. reminds me of john mccain. to be real conservatives and you stand up for your views. really appreciate it. >> there are some people who do like me. >> you can tell because they ask you serious questions. >> thank you.

>> how are you? >> i'm good. >> you look like a million bucks. >> so do you. you've lost some weight. you look ten years younger. >> i have t lose aut 20 more. >> i'm trying myself. i get on the treadmill an hour every day. >> wow. >> just trying. trying to eat healthy. >> it's hard. >> how are the grandkids? >> half of them are coming home for easter. >> oh, good. >> going to take his wife and kids out at virginia, they have a big easter egg deal out there. >> we're going through the same

thing. our kids have all kinds of things to do. so we have to realize we have to start doing things together, you know, because my little grandkids are? spor in sports. >> they're older, right? >> 21 down to three. . >> w have five on one. oldest will be six. so we have a lot more flexibility. >> -- coaching my grandson, staying at disney world. the 11-year-old. >> youet with him, they're follow. >> okay, got it.

>> gre to see you. thank you for coming. >> that's why i stood away. >> a ltle graph tags over this sway. >> would you like a water? >> that you think. all that chocolate i know is

great. i have to get a little something. >> somebody has to eat it. >> take it home. >> put it in your pocket. >> governor, nice to have you here. >> srted years ago with ross. he's the guy right here.

>> i was in california, my cousin -- when they were doing the nafta stuff, ibm was trying to get that contract -- the other reason they didn't get it because in tt contract down in mexico, there was a whole area

set up, all the drug points. >> really. >> and i know that from when we used to chase them down. i got ann order from ronald reagan to take pictures all up and down the border. i called some guys up, they were sitting there on the tarmac, i said do you want to be it one of these? mexicos has its problems and it's infringing on our border. and you're right. pull out the national guard. has infringing on our border. and you're right. pull out the national guard. military is the fourth leg. >> can be done, got to be done. >> that was what we were originally set up for.

a face doesn't need to be an imrialist nation. we can't be the police. we can't afford it. >> and you got to get going. >> good to see you, governor. thank you very much. >> great to see you. from katherine condon and the

arlington superintendent mr. patrk hallen nan. i hope, too, they're ready for very robust and direct questions. these officials will address ongoing discrepancies and issues relating to the 2010 army inspector general's investigation into misconduc at arlington. i anticipate a number of members from other committees may wish to participate. therefore, absent any objections i ask for unanimous consent they be allowed to participate and also be provided with an opportunity to ask questions. before he we get started with testimony, i'd like to share a story with you that highlights why i'm absolutely committed to addressing this issue. it's a story about an american hero who has dedicated his life to our nation and to others who serve. his name is paul buca. in 1970, army captain paulbuca

received the medal of honor in vietnam. captain buca distinguished himself by risking his life to save the lives of his fellow wounded soldiers. captain buca's story is the reminder of the thousands of other brave men and women in our nation's military who serve quietly and honorably, who all too often go unrecognized for their service and sacrifice and who willingly give up their lives in defense of freem for all of us. mr. buca continues his life of service and has spoken on the issues that have plagued arlington, an he has stated, there is no place in the united states that is as committed to perfection as arlington. and, as a result, no solution to the issues or challenges at arlington can be accepted that strives for something less than perfection. the guardians of arlington are the men and women of the old guard. it is their self-imposed dedication to perftion from their performance of duty to their lifelong commitmento service that sets them apart.

they established the standard for everyone who would pass among them and for those over whom they stand guard. those who they protect and guard, those who lie beneath the whit markers so neatly placed across that hallowed ground, have a contract with all of us. their sacrifice on behalf of our nation was perfect in all respects, and it is our responsibility to similarly strive for perfection as well. there is no question that the department of army recognizes the importance of resolving outstanding accountability. however, progress towards full restoration and resolution of these issues has been unsatisfactory and is in no way commensurate with the service and sacrifice of our fallen heroes. our expectation is that each and every family affected by this scandal will have their issues addressed and hopefully their faith restored as a result of our work here today. our nation's heroes deserve

better. today this committee is demanding perfect. i now turn to the ranking member mr. cooper for h remarks. mr. cooper? >> thank you, mr. chairman. in the interest of time, i'd like to insert written statement in the record. i commend you for holding this hearing. i'm sorry we have to have it, but i'm dedicated to working with you to make sure we solve these problems. >> thank you, mr. cooper. i appreciate that. with that, we are going to begin our first panel of witnesses. before hearing from our army representatives we're going to go to colonel koch. he has taken time out of his busy schedule to travel from his home in north carolina to be with us and share his experiencement i can't think of a better way to start a discussion about accountability than to hear from colonel koch. i appreciate him taking the time. we had a few minutes before the hearing to meet and talk and learn more about him and his commitment to our nation and his family. with that, i'll turn it over to

you, colonel, and ask you to give us your thoughts, concerns and ideas about the current state of affairs the at arlington. i know you have some personal information there that is very compelling and useful to us as members of this committee. >> thank you. i was goi to say i have good news and bad news. the bad news is i feel like the guy who was given the last cigarette and ready to be blindfolded. the good news is i don't notice any of you having any rifles so i think i'm pretty safe. and i guess that's going to be the only humor i come up with. i guess that's very lile humor, but at least i guess it a good start. what i'd like to talk about not a military hero but the wife of these heroes and the wife of all of the military folks who are also buried at arlington. arlington gives us the opportunity to have our wives with us for eternity, and i

think that's great. this is my wife. excuse the shaking. when you get old, that's what happens. and this is her grave site as it was before august. and the back of it has the location, section 66, 1180. and for many years -- she died in 2005 -- i sent flowers to that location. just to show you, in summer and in winter. and and in june or july of last year i started reading about some problems at arlington, but none of them seemed to be associated with section 66 so it didn't bother me. i guess it should have anyway, but it didn't. and later on all of a sudden it

started spreading to other sections, and then i started getting concerned. and arlington cemetery gave us a phone number to call. and i called that number and i said, i'd like to know if my wife is actually buried where you say she is, based on what i've been reading? and they took my information and said they'd call me back. about a wk to ten days later theyalled me back and said, no problem, we checked all our records, everything is fine. well, at was good. i felt good about that because i had been visiting her regularly and everything was good. about a week later, i got a call from an army officer saying, we have a problem. he explained it this way, and i have here a picture of the three grave sites that were affected by this. there's my wife's as an army staff sergeant and a navy

commander's wife. what he tolde was the wife of the army staff sergeant had her husband's grave site dug up to prove that he was, in fact, buried there. and when they dug it up, they found a wooden casket, only he had been buried in a metal casket. and somehow they realized that my wife had been buried in a wooden casket and so they went one grave site over and dug in my wife's grave site and it was empty. so they went one grave site the other way and they found the urn the woman had been yes mated for the wife of the navy commander and dug deeper and found the staff sergeant's casket. my understanding is that he is now buried somewhere else at arlington. my wife, they left her in the new grave site and she is -- and

put a new headstone on her where she was originally supposed to be buried they buried someone else. now, over that almost five years i sent flowers, as you could see, i sent wreaths at christ s christmas. i even took her mother up there so she could see her daughter's grave site. and all she saw was a head ston and an empty grave. so i went from being elated when i was told everything was okay to bng very, very sad -- maybe "sad" is the wrong word, but i was no longer elated. so what happened next is everything looks the same with the headstone, only now on the back it's got section 66 1181 instead of 1180 because she's

moved over. i put thisne in there because this is the first flowers that i sent her, and i knew she was there. no longer was i sending flowers to an empty grave. and i found a picture i think in a newspaper th kind of tells the story better than i can. i think it's a beautiful picture. but if you look, right behind this headstone, the front headstone, is where my wife was supposed to have bn buried. and you'll notice there's no headstone back thereme. she's now over here with her new headstone. so it kind of tells the story of what went on at arlington during this time. and i guess -- i've been interviewed by several news media, and i've told the same story. i was asked what do i expect to get out of this hearing.

and i said, i guess two things. i wasn't going to mention two things. i only was going to mention one, but i think i better mention two. first of all, i wanted people out there to know that there is a problem at arlington. a lot of people probably read about it but there may still be families out there that are goin to visi an empty grave or a grave with supposed to be john smith and it's mary jones. i think that needs to be corrected as best they can. and thether part is, the people that were in charge that caused all this, from my point of view and from what i've been able to read, have been given a slap on the wrist. and i don't want revenge. i want justice. i think that's the only fair thing that we, the people who have been inlved in this -- and it's not just me. there are many others that have been through similar situations -- expect from arlington, the army, and i guess

from the congress. with that, i'll take any questions. >> thank you, colonel koch. we really appreciate you taking thtime to share your story with us. it's very heart wrenching to go to arlington and believe your wife was in one place and she was not. we appreciate your service to our nation. i want to begin by asking you how you felt after you first realed that through the years your wife wasn't located where she was supposed to be and what your feeling was there as far as the trust that you had in arlington and the expectation that you had with the folks there at arlington and how that cemetery is run. >> well, the first thing, like i say, i was elated because there were no problems. and when i got the second call, i think i was in shock at first. then i guess i was angry.

and then i got over that and said, i think it's time something is done. first i'm i went to arlington i was a gh school senior. and watching or wandering through all those grave sites, it was awesome. and i've been to se cemeteries in super also from world war ii. if you've ever been to them, it's a similar type situation. you get the same feeling. but this is in our own country. this is our major national military cemetery, and it's not something we should be putting up th. and i guess, having been in the air force for 30 yes, i'm not as emotional externally as some people are. and i don't apologize for that. i just know that after ifound out about this and was home, it was harder beingome than it

was before i had found out. >> thank you. let me ask, from your perspective today, in what you went through and the efforts to resolve this problem, do you feel, number one, that you were dealt with fairly and that the problem was directly addressed and that it was solved in the best way possible? and, secondly, do you believe, based on your experience, that the folks currently at arlington have the wherewithal to continue to manage that facility the way it needs to be managed? >> well, for your first question, when we had the burial for my wife, everything went well. everything was perfect. except it was done after some very heavy rain so we never did get to see the casket lowered into the ground, which probably

was good. but there was -- i mean, when you walked on the grass, it was slish slish slish. so we never did get to see it buried and there was a little card that i had her name on where she was supposed to be buried. now, whetherhat was 1180 or 1181 i don't remember. but we were treated well at arlington. everything went smoothly. we had an air force sort of honor guard of pallbearers. i can't say anything bad about that whole situati. the only thing bad i can say about that process was not arlington's fault. it was the va. my wife as a minister. they wouldn't let me put reverend under her name. and onhe new headstone they let me put "reverend" on it but they put it under my name. so i want you all to know i'm not a reverend. my wife was. as to what they're doing today, having read some things about

it, i think they're probably going in the right direction. they have a terrific task. i don't know how they're ever going to go back. i think i mentioned to you earlier that the only way i can see to solve the problem is do dna testing on every body in arlington, and we know that's never going to happen and it's not something that is even i don't think financially possible. but w do you know that this person that's in this grave, even though it's a yun for one grave versus headstone, it's the right person? i don't know how they're going to figure that out. >> i think that's something compelling that this nation needs to be assured and that is it there's 100% certainty about every grave and every set of remains there at arlington. i think that's something we owe to our men and women in uniform obviously. from your standpoint, do you see there are more things at

arlington, they can do to restore the trust not only of the mr members of the military families and those buried there but of the american people. >> i think it would be nice if there was some way they could maybe notify the families of all the people there that they've had problems, that people should check and make sure their loved one is there and see if they can somehow work that out. like i say, if the lady had not had her husband dug up, this is something i've been thinking about, and, say, 20 years from now i died and they dug up the grave site to put me in it, expecting my wife to be there and it was empty, what would happen? would they just put me in there and bury it and say, okay, 's all done or would they have gone and checked and said, she's over here and buried me over there. i don't have an answer to that.

maybe they can answer that one for you. but that's looking out a long time -- hopeful a long time in the future. but, yeah, i don't know everything they're doing so i can't answer for what the people at arlingtong are ton are doing right or 25% right or 50% right. >> thank you, colonel. i'll turn to mr. cooper. >> thank you, chierman. thank u, colonel. i'm grateful to your service for our nation. i'm sorry you've been treated this way. nobody should have to undergo this. this will probably go down as one of the biggest snafus in the history of the u.s. army to have allowed arlington cemetery, the most honored and sacred of places to be mismanaged in this fashion. so we are working on a bipartisan basis to make sure these problems are are corrected as quickly as possible. i hope that we can get a handle on this immediately if not

sooner. already there have been years of problems a s delays. we just regret the experience that you face. so if there necessary anything we can do, we're there for you. thank you, sir. >> i would say the thing youan do is keep after them. don't let them stop. keep after them. make sure they're doing it just likeou're doing today. and don't let up now. facetiously, earlier today i met some air force guys and they asked me why i was here and i told them. i also told them, i said, if the airs for air force were in charge of arlington this wouldn't have happened. >> colonel, i think you have my commitment, mr. p cooper's kmemt and the members of the committee's commitment that we will not rest until we have absolute certainty of the remains and everything managed there and the mismanagement of a arlington. >> can i say one thing also?

ask the media to keep it up also. >> we will definitely do that. mr. conway? >> i don't have any qstions other than i came in right in kind of the -- are you comfortable your wife is buried where you believe she's buried? did i understand that? are you comfortable that your wife is pwri buried where you believe she's buried? >> i'm probably 98% or 99% sure. i'll tell you, when they notified me, i called the funeral director that haled her burial and funeral. and i said, how do you identify bodies a how does arlington do did? and the man told me that the funeral parlor has to put little tag or something in the casket that has name and date of birth and arlington puts a little tag on the casket externally. so i called arlington and said,

i was told that this happened and the answer i got was, we are doing it now, which implies to me that they were not doing it prior to that time, which was probab in august or september. >> well, there's no delicate way to ask this. during part of this process, did they determine your wife's remains were in that casket? did they open it up? >> they did nothing to do that. they never told me they did anything, but they assumed because it was a wooden casket and apparently there's not that many okayeden caskets buried there, and it was in the general area of where she was supposed to be. >> okay. >> i don't have 100% proof. let ame put it that way. i kin of feel comfortable that it's okay, but i couldn't say 100%. >> well, my apologies. i'm sorry this happened as well.

i buried a wife also one time and so i've got a sense of what you went through, what you've gone through. i'm sorry you went through that. i yield back. >> thank you, mr. conway. mr. young? >> connell koch, thank you so much for your service and i, of course, mean your military service but also your presence here today. i appreciate receiving your testimony and i guess i wanted to express to you the gratitude i have for some of the real human impact that these complications have created for you and others around the country. and i just would like to say one of the things i think i will be focused on moving forward as we try to rectify these issues is enis suring that the concerns of our surviving military family members are addressed throughout the process that we're ivolving you as we make such important

decisions as disinternment, reinternment and we draw on your wisdom and frankly your feels as we try to handle these matters delicately. there's some organizations out there that i've become aware of that have provided some thoughts on how we might involve you in the process moving forward, the tragedy assistance program for survivors has a number of good suggestions i think. perhaps we can talk about implementing some of those. really i just want to say thank you, sir. you are doing great credit to the military services and to our citizenry by your presence and testimony here today. god bless you. >> excuse me. could i say one thing? >> yes, colonel. please. >> i've got to remember trouble when you get old, you forget ings faster than you should. let me think about it.

i'll think about it. >> we will come back to you, i guarantee. guarantee. mr. rooney? >> sir, when you say the people that were responsible for the errors -- i'm sorry, i came in late. if i could ask a question before i ask a backup question, when your wife -- when you were at the site and you say that it was raining and you didn't actually see the casket go into the ground, how did it go from there to not going into the ground there, if you could back up? i apologize for coming in late and i didn't hear if you said that in your opening testimony. what's your understanding of how there was a mix-up? >> i don't have an angs fswer f that. i don't know how it got mixed up other than the fact -- see, it wasn't just my wife's that was mixed up. it was also the staff sergeant. it was also the navy commander's

grave site. so really there were three grave sites in that one area. so apparently some of the worker bees must have either not follow the procedures or did something they shouldn't have or didn't have some supervisor or something there to make sure they did it right. how they got it wrong i don't note because like i say there was a card there with her name on it. the thing i didn't know is whether it was the correct grave site or not. because we couldn't even bring the casket up to that location it was so wet. >> and, sir, you say in your testimony that those that were responsible for this received a slap on the wrist. do you know what entailed? what was the slap on the wrist? >> my understanding is they were given letters of reprimand. in the last paragraph i believe of the letter of represent ary mand it said, this will be taken out of your records when you

retire. in other words, once they retired, it was as if this whole situation never occurred. >> thank you, sir. mr. chairman, i yield ck >> all right. thank you mrshgs rooney. mr. kaufman. >> thank you, mr. chairman and colonel koch, thank you for your service to our country and willingnesses to come before this committee. again, my apologies for what's occurred to you and your family. help me out here. i unrstand there was inclement weather so because of that you didn't see your wife's dafkt go into the ground. is it normal procedure in arlington that in weather conditions where there's not increment weather that one would observe thathe family would

observe the casket going into the grave site? >> i really can't answer that. think you should ask -- >> very well. that will be a question we raise to the staff at arlington. what was the attitude, in your communications with the staff at arlington, the graves registration staff or whatever if there's a civilian term for it i'm not familiar with it. tell me about the course or the conduct of those communications. i mean, were they bureaucratic? were they sympathetic? how would you describe them? >> certainly they were sympathetic. when i spoke with the funeral director, he said, well, it's probable apply going to be several weeks before we'll be able to do the burial. and the night that we had the viewing in raleigh, he came to

me and said, it's going to be on the 6th of january and she had died on the 20th of december. so it was probably as quick as i would have evenhought of. the man that dealt with us the day of the actual burial was as nice could be. like i say, the only complaint i had was not at that point with arlington, it was with the va and my concerns about the headstone. then the burial itself, as far as it went -- >> when you were first notified, the communications at the point in time where you realized there was a problem and you had contacted the staff at arlington, tell me about those communications and how they went. >> i went back too far i think. >> that's fine. >> it was an army lieutenant colonel. he he callede up, left me a message and said something like,

we've got a problem. no. he said, please cal this number. when i called him, he then told me there was a problemment he explained it to me exactly. now i remember what i was going to mention to mr. young. they dug up my wife's grave an someone said, i thought that was illegal to dig up a grave without permission. and i don't know if that's true or not. they'd have to ask the legal people, but that was the concern more people had than i did. anyway, everybody i dealt with in the building where they bring the families, everything there was fine, had no problems. they escorted us to our cars, took us out to the grave site, waited for us, went back. showed us how the car should be settle u set up. i have no complaints about that part of it. the lieutenant colonel was very nice. he explained it. he did not try to make excuses.

he said, here's the fact. i think that's at i like about the military. they don't try to make excuses. they tell you the facts. if you don't like the facts, tough luck. but yeah, everything from that point of view was i think okay other than the fact that i didn't like what he was telling me. >> sure. >> not how he was telling me but what he was telling me. >> would the gentleman yield just for a moment? >> yes. >> sir, you indicated, just to make sure we have this correct here, that your wife's remains were dug up without any consultation with you? is that correct? >> not exactly. what it was was they dug up the grave site where she actually s, which was the staff sergeant's grave site, so they had permission of the wife of the staff sergeant to dick dig th -- dig that up. then they went to my wife's grave site and dug that up not

knowing if she was ere or not until they dug and found she wasn't. >> thank you. i thought i missed something there. i appreciate that. troubling nonetheless. >> mr. chairn, i yield back. >> thank you, mr. coffman. mr. runyon. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i know some of the other members may wonder why i'm sitting down here. i'm a member of hask but also chairman of the veterans committee, disabilities and memorials. oversight of our scemeteries an arlington is one of my primary issues i deal with. colonel koch, thank you for your service and thank you for sharing your story with us. you know, it was literally my second month in office and i had a similar constituent complaint much like you had. i've since been over to

arlington and it was fixed rapidly. i think many people in this complete comforted in knowing i think we're moving in the right direction. and i look rward to their testimony, but in the situation i would like to smair the stwenlt i had. i had a gentleman reach out to my office the first of march that his nephew came down to visit his grandfather's grave site athere was a different headstone on the grave site. it was shocking to hem. i reached out to lington, they fixed the problem, identified the problem, and it was obviously a human error issue that had happened when someone had buriedtheir spouse along with them and it got put in the wrong part of the graveyard. but it was fixed. i look forward -- appreciate the opportunity to be here, but i look forward toackling this also on the va side with several

mo hearings to make sure we're moving in the right direction. because stories like yours, unfortunate unfortunately, they're not one of a kind. they happen all the time. that's really why we're having this hearing. thank you again for sharing your story with us today. >> thank u. >> i yield back. >> the va cemeteries appear to be run pretty well, from what i understand. maybe ey're smaller, maybe they're not in such a situation that maybe it's easier to handle. but i was goi to say in the military i was a navigator in vietnam and we always had checklists. you would have the checklist and you would check things off. now, i don't know if arlington has a check list. i hope they do. and it says, call this person, check, we did this, initial it. here's who did it.

call this person, dig a hole -- a grave site. sorry about that. but do each step of the process and have somebody sign off on it. at the end, the last guy signs off and says, these are all done. now you know this person is buried at this section, this grave site. everybody has done their part. we don't have to worry about that one. we can check that one of. let's go on to the next one. >> mr. chairman, you yield for a one second? >> yes, please. >> just to let you know, colonel, we stole the superintendent to arlington from the va. i yield back. >> thank you, mr. runyon, appreciate you joining this, your interest in this. we look forward to making sure those issues there at arlington with indeidre solved. colonel, thank you so much for taking your time. i do want to offer to the committee members if anybody has addional questions, now would be the time to pose them.

if not, we would move again into recess. i would opt floor for questions. >> mr. claireman, if i could. >> yes. >> colonel koch, when you were told that the identification card -- that the identification card was supposed to be placed in the casket again? what was their response again, that they just started doing that, or sometime after your wife passed they started doing that. what's the response again? >> the card from the funeral director apparently -- the funeral director told me by law they have to put that inside the casket. the one yien yout side, it sound as if they had done it for a while and they stopped or they never done it even though people thought they were doing it. >> thank you, mr. chairmanful i

yield back. >> i'm not going to be able to make it back for the next panel so i just wanted to stay, colonel, thank you for your testimoniment i think that the thing that gets me personally so upset about your situation and the situation that mr. runyon is talking about is, you know, if you go to arlington and you go to the changing of the guard and the tomb of the unknown soldier and the reverence we have for soldiers or servicemen that we don't know quite --we're not quite sure who they are, but we have that p much respect our see the president last year going up to dover air force base and the somber mood of those soldiers coming home. and yet we make what could very well just be human error

there's no excuse. we revere so many who died for this country, that we would have so much honor and pomp and circumstance for the changing of t the guard but at the same time making these mistakes in the same place, same venue, it's unconscionable and i'm sorry you had to go through ths, on behalf of myself and i'm sure the rest of this body. and i'm sorry i'm not going to be here for the next block, but i hope everything ismoving forward squared away. >> i think we have more than one unknown soldier in arlington now. there may be multiples spread out over the whole cemetery, unfortunately. >> yes, sir. thank you. >> all right. thank y, colonel koch. any other questions for the colonel? >> mr. chairman, just very quickly. when was your wife buried again intern? >> she died on december 20th and

was buried on the 6th of january. they died in 2005 on the 20 th f december and was buried january 6th in 2006. >> in the associated graves of the -- i think you talked about a staff sergeant and a commander's wife? >> commander. >> do you remember at all when they were interned? >> no, i don't. >> all right. >> thank you, mr. coffman. colonel koch, thank you again. we appreciate your time. we know this is a very difficult situation for you to come in here and share your expeence but it's extraordinary helpful to us to have an experience, a face, a person associated with the issues we're dealing with at arl ton the i deeply, deeply appreciate thatment thank you for taking your time coming here from north carolina and sharing what i know is a very personal situation with us.

>> well, thank you for inviting me, and i don't know if anybody saw, but there was a picture up there of my wife and i. and that was the last picture ever taken of her. there it is. she was a very beautiful lady, and i still miss her. but i've gotten over some of it. you never get over it all. you get over a little bit of it, and i wish she were still here and i didn't have to sit here and talk about her. thank y'all for inviting me. >> we'll keep you and your wife in our prayers. thank you for sharing with us today. with that, i'll recess the oversight armed services subcommittee while we vote on the floor. we'll reconvene five minutes after the vote on the floor. fr

the superintendent of arlington national cemetery. >> panel witnesses, miss condon, mr. hallinan and mr. schneider. we welcome you to the committee and look forward to your opening statements. miss condon, we'll begin with you. >> mr. chairman and distinguished members of the subcommittee, thank you for the

opportunity to provide an update on arlington today. i am joined today by mr. patrick hallinan who is the superintendent of arlington and mr. karl schneider who is the principal deputy assistant secretary of the army for manpower reserve affairs. as the executive director responsible for both u.s. soldier and airman's home national cemetery and arlington national cemetery, i want you to know that the army is committed to rendering public honor and recognition through dignified burial services for members of our armed services and their loved ones. on behalf of the cemeteries and the department of the army, i would like to thank congress for the support that they have provided over the years, but in particular, sir, i would like to thank you and the members for the support you have provided mr. hallinan and i in our first ten months on the job. as executive director, i report directly to the secretary of the army. and it is my responsibility now to effectively and efficiently

develop, operate, manage, and administer both of the cemeteries. mr. hallinan is the superintendent is responsible for the daily operations. i know that the past serious mismanagement of arlington national cemetery has caused great consternation to the american public, to congress, but, most importantly, to our veterans and their loved ones. the news reports combined with the inspector general report have shattered the trust in arlington. i am here today to personally tell you that arglington cemetey has the full support of the army, and we are moving forward to fix the problems found by the inspector general. and we will comply with the legislative requirements that will continue to correct the mistakes of the past, while ensuring future strong management, oversight, and, most importantly, accountability. in less than a year we have

taken several steps to address the past issues, including rebuilding the workforce, overhauling the automated internment scheduling system, establishing a consolidated call center, implementing a financial management system and a procurement system, and employing a new chain of custody for procedures that weren't there before. arlington national cemetery as you know conducts 27 funerals a day. we consider it part of our sacred trust to ensure that each funeral is executed with utmost dignity and respect. every funeral receives mr. hallinan and my full attention to detail. daily operations are critical to maintaining one of the unique traditions of arlington national cemetery, multiple, simultaneous, private grave site internments with full military honors. neither the importance nor the complexity of this tradition can be overstated. to establish accountability while maintaining these

traditions, standards were developed throughout the operations which didn't exist before. in addition, we have procured new equipment. we are training the workforce to implement the standards that we've put in place, and we are now holding our supervisors and leaders accountable for the operations. arlington national cemetery is truly about those who have served. it provides a means for families, friends, and the country to honor our fallen veterans. hence, customer service is a critical priority, because our goal is to help each and every family come to closure. while we are making progress to date to improve service to our veterans and their loved ones, improvements still must continue. we firmly believe in continuous process improvements, and we are working every day to establish and improve feedback mechanisms to increase our understanding of family needs and concerns.

one of the biggest concerns upon arrival were the paper records and the lack of any backup of this information. we've been able to recover images from the efforts in 2005, to scan the records that were beginning in the civil war. these images have been integrated with va's records in our internment schedule system records into a searchab ablable database that now provides both a digital tool and, more importantly, a backup for the vast majority of those authoritative records. this database will be expanded and is forming the basis for the accounting effort that's been mandated by public law. we hope that we can highlight today the actions that we have taken to change and demonstrate the progress that has been and continues to be made to restore the nation's confidence in arlington national cemetery. mr. chairman, this concludes my testimony. >> thank you, miss condon.

i will offer an opportunity to mr. hallinan or mr. schneider have any opening comments they'd like to make, i'll take them at this time. >> mr. chairman, distinguished members of the subcommittee, i thank you for the opportunity to speak to you about arlington national cemetery. i was appointed the superintendent of arlington national cemetery on october 10th, 2010, and i served as the acting sum of arlington national cemetery since june 6, 2010. this is my first opportunity to speak before congress. miss condon and i started at arlington national cemetery on the same day. i came over as a subject matter expert on the detail. at the request of the secretary of the army and the direction of the secretary of the va, to provide assistance with cemetery operations. i was formally the director of fuel programs for the national cemetery administration department of veterans affairs, and in that capacity i was responsible for policies, procedures, their implementation and development on cemetery operations and provide guidance to all national cemeteries. i also had oversight

responsibility for 131 national cemeteries, 5 memorial service networks and helped to establish the national training academy for the national cemetery administration. i bring my commitment and that expertise to arlington national cemetery. i began my career, mr. chairman, in federal service as a marine, on my honorable discharge from the marine corps, i took a position with the national cemetery administration as a temporary caretaker. my entire life has been devoted to cemetery operations. as i look back on my 37-year career, i view my appointment as sum of arlington to be the high point. i am committed to being a part of a team that fixes the many problems that we're all aware of. and some we may also discover. as miss condon mentioned in her testimony, in less than one year, 10 months, we have taken several steps to address the problems. we've introduced industry standards, national standards

that the va has used at their cemeteries and other national cemeteries that private industry use. we sent our employees out for professional training. we're training our employees on site. we purchased new equipment. we're providing the leadership and direction that they need. i am personally out on a daily basis, no matter the weather conditions, snow or rain, directing, leading, guiding, coaching, mentoring, holding the supervisors, the team leaders, and the entire workforce accountable. i will say that the workforce has responded in a positive manner, and i have seen improvements. while i freely admit there is much improvement to be made. arlington national cemetery is hallowed ground. it is the place where america's heroes lie in rest. as a veteran, as a father of a marine, and most importantly as a person who has dedicated his

entire life to service to our military families, i am honored to be the superintendent, and i am committed to fix the mistakes of the past and restore the public faith and trust in the operations of arlington national cemetery. i thank you for allowing me to be here today. >> thank you, mr. hallinan. mr. schneider? >> mr. chairman, i don't have a statement. i am here, though, as the army's senior career civilian personnel. i have over 30 years of service with experience both military and civilian personnel, and the secretary of the army has asked me to appear here today to answer your questions about the personnel actions related to arlington national cemetery. happy to take your questions, sir. >> thank you, members of the panel. we appreciate your opening statements. and at this point we'll begin the line of questioning. i want to begin with you, miss condon, and i'll move over to mr. hallinan. full faith and trust in arlington national cemetery is i

think critical not just to the men and women that are interred there but to this nation. it is a symbol of what is right and what is just and how we honor the fallen. my question is this -- we have heard from the secretary when he testified before the full committee, and his words were he pledged to do everything necessary and possible to right the unimaginable and unacceptable wrongs that have taken place. that means 100% accountability, 100% auditing to make sure that everything at arlington both past and present is beyond reproach. it seems to me that now we learn that the army doesn't plan on following up with that promise, that there's not going to be 100% certainty in identification of remains, we won't use every means possible to make sure that we take up the concerns of families that may not know with certainty the placement of their

loved ones there. also, it's clear to me today by both the secretary and the army inspector general not being here for this hearing that they don't take this very seriously. and i'm wondering from your standpoint, i'll first ask, is the army really serious about 100% accountability and making sure that we do everything to assure that there is not a single set of remains there that's misidentified, misplaced, and that families have full closure on that? and is it difficult for you to work under a circumstance where you come here, obviously you're committed, but it doesn't seem like the secretary or the ig are taking this seriously, it must be kind of frustrating for you not to have the people above you taking this issue at arlington seriously. and i will look for your comments. >> sir, i can tell you personally that the entire army, to include the secretary and the inspector general, do take the issues at arlington -- >> miss condon, i hate to say this, but words fail in this situation. it's obvious that they have something better to do today

than to make sure that arlington is beyond reproach with how we treat the men and women who have served this nation. what else on their schedule can be more important than that? it's obvious that they don't get it. and i know it's frustrating for you to work under those conditions, and words fail. actions speak louder than words. >> and, sir, actions do speak louder than words, and you have the commitment of mr. hallinan and myself that we truly are putting together the steps that need to be taken to do the accountability at arlington. i'd like to use the analogy that when we started in june, we were almost -- we moved into a house that didn't have a foundation. there wasn't an i.t. infrastructure. there wasn't the accountability. there wasn't the standards and procedures. so, what we've had to do was to build that first. and now we are working on the plan to truly move to do the accountability.

>> will we be assured that not only going forward that we have the accountability, but that accountability will be held in context of what's happened in the past? i think that's critical for families to have closure and to make sure, too, that the wrongs of the past are righted in relation to making sure we assure families with 100% certainty about the identification, the location, of their loved ones. >> and, sir, we will work for the accountability from june 10th forward, when mr. hallinan and i started, and we will work on every grave site in arlington. >> very good. mr. hallinan? >> in support of what miss condon has stated, you have our commitment, sir. the subcommittee, the families, and the american public that we will correct the problems of the past and ensure that from an operational standpoint, from a maintenance standpoint, that arlington is run to the highest

standards. and we also have a focus on customer service, the need to be compassionate, the need to be sympathetic, the need to be understanding, realizing that there are real operational systemic issues that need to be repaired and fixed, but at the same time we do not lose a sense of the families you're dealing with and the grief and the trauma they may be going through. >> thank you. mr. schneider, can you comment on the accountability element? obviously there have been wrongs in the past. can you update us on where the army is? obviously the inspector general is doing something, hopefully he's doing something, maybe he's not, maybe that's why he's not here today. maybe you can give ussen update to make sure that folks are held accountable for the mistakes of the past. >> the frustrating thing about that, i'm sure it's frustrating for the committee, it's frustrating to us, the superintendent and the deputy superintendent as soon as the report, right after the report was delivered to the secretary, retired. and our jurisdiction to take any

adverse action against them evaporated the day that they retired. >> well, i understand that the retirement was not necessarily a voluntary retirement. but anyway, that being said, it is perplexing i think to both the committee, subcommittee, and the public that a letter reprimand was in the file to be removed six months later and that's the extent of how folks in the past have been held accountable, and i would want to know from you where is the progress with the inspector general? we hear that there's an ongoing investigation. can we expect that to come to a conclusion? can we expect actions from that investigation? >> again, i think what you can expect -- yes, i think that will be brought to conclusion. although i haven't -- i don't tract the inspector general investigation. what i can tell you is, the secretary has told all of us that he expects accountability to be one of our top priorities. and to the extent that the inspector general report identifies either poor performance or misconduct, the

secretary will expect us to ensure that,ability abilthat, held. the frustrating thing is that the way the civil service laws works, the tools we have available to us, especially when people are retirement eligible, once they retire, we have no control. we have no control of when they retire. they can retire at any time. and once they retire, we lose the opportunity to do anything more to hold them accountable. for example, with the letter reprimand to the superintendent, that was as much as the secretary could get done before he retired. >> isn't it correct, though, that that is limited to administrative procedures to folks that behave, if there's criminal behavior there, they fall under the criminal statutes, so that doesn't exempt them from their senior executive service from being prosecuted if they are found to be criminally -- criminal wrong doing and >> what the criminal command does is they coordinate with the u.s. attorney who has

jurisdiction and it's up to the u.s. attorney to obviously decide if it's a civilian. if it's military, it's under the military chain of command. and with civilians it would rest with the u.s. attorney and for the case of arlington, probably the eastern district of virginia. >> is the inspector general pursuing all courses of action concerning past actions there by personnel both civil and criminal? of course, on the civil side obviously that would be the administrative element that you speak of, but even on the criminal side? >> if they discover criminal activity, they turn it over to the army's criminal investigation committee -- >> i guess the question is, are they looking at the potential for criminal activity there? >> sorry. i think whenever they find criminal activity, they turn it over to the cid, and i think they're committed -- i guess what would be best to do is to get for the record exactly what the department of the army inspector general is doing in this area so you can see exactly where they're at. >> i think that would be nice, mr. schneider. we'll certainly submit some questions in writing, although

it would have been nice for the inspector general to be here today. as i said, obviously, he doesn't feel it's very serious, so we will certainly pose some formal questions to him and gauge his seriousness with this -- with this effort. >> yes, sir. >> one other line of questioning, and then i'm going to turn it over to the other members of the committee. normally if you look at situations throughout other parts of the military, there's a certain standard and procedure that folks go through, and i know that you all had spoken of the heavy workload that's there and the things you have to deal with each and every day, the maintenance and the burials and those kind of things. but it seems to be standard practice in other branches of the military when you have something of this magnitude that happens, in this instance, i think a tragedy, and whether it's a plane going down in another branch of the military, whatever, normally those branches have a stand-down. they say, okay, we're going to stand things down. we're going to really get down to what caused this problem. it doesn't seem like in this

situation that there's been a stand-down, that there's been the direction or the redirection to say not only are we going to make sure that things are happening properly going forward, but that we're going to make sure that those problems that have happened in the past are taken care of. if you look at stand-down procedures throughout the military, that's normally the course of procedure. i'd like your comments on why in this situation there doesn't seem to have been a stand-down that not only addresses things going forward. and like i said, i want to give you all credit for the things that are going on, going forward, although i still think there are things that need to happen there, but what has happened with problems that occurred in the mast and how do we resolve those particular issues? >> sir, if i could, i'm very familiar with stand-down procedures in the military, and i like to think that mr. hallinan and i really did that. in order for us to do all the changes that we are making going forward, we had to correct those issues in the past, and that is what we have been doing. >> very good.

mr. young? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i want to thank our panel for being here today. mr. hallinan, i'm a marine, too, and i know you understand the ethics semper fidelis, for those who are watching the hearing today, the origin of sempe semper fidelis, the marine corps motto, it takes to the seriousness with which marine corps regard loyalty to their fellow marines. it extends not only to the living, always faithful, even extends to those who happen to pass away, on the battlefield, and it's the marine corps tradition even under the most difficult of circumstances to retrieve those who have departed in service to our country from the battlefield, even if that requires great danger to our fellow soldiers. i think that speaks to the sort of commitment all of us have as a country to those who have departed and all of their families.

in this case we know we have unmarked and mismarked graves, we have the existence of a mass grave. so many other things that it sort of boggles the mind here, and we're working here constructively i hope to address these problems. i am quite disappointed as a member of this subcommittee that invitations went out to the secretary of the army, the army inspector general, and i want to say it puts all of you in a very difficult position, because one of the first things a young lieutenant learns in the military is you can delegate responsibility, but not accountability. so, any inadequacies we might discover here today are not -- don't just reside with you. ultimately accountability, we understand, is a bit higher in the food chain, and hopefully we can -- we can speak to the ig and the secretary in due course. we can honor the memory by dealing with the grief and trauma, as mr. hallinan put it, of family members. and what i want to most learn

about from you is whether you individuals, mr. hallinan, miss condon, mr. schneider, have reached out to each and every family that's been impacted by this scandal. and if so, how that has taken place and any other details that you think might be useful to this panel. >> sir, if i could start. each and every time that we have discovered a discrepancy in arlington, the first people that we do contact are the next of kin. >> when we do discover the discrepancy, if there is an issue with the grave site, we are required to contact the next of kin. we cannot arbitrarily go into a person's grave site, so we are trying to be -- we are being transparent. we are contacting the families. >> and does that involve sending a letter, or through what means do you contact the family members? >> sir, we try to contact them via phone so that we talk to them rather than a letter. and if we cannot reach them by telephone, we follow-up with a

letter. >> and presumably we have a log, records, of all the contacts that have been made and the results of said contact? >> sir, for all the scr discrepancies, you know, most of them have been via telephone and we've been very fortunate to contact the next of kin. >> are -- is there a further plan of engagement of family members moving forward? and if so, what is that plan? >> sir, one of the things that mr. hallinan and i have done is we have had a town hall with goldstar families, and what it was, it was our opportunity to have those family members who have lost a loved one talk to us about what they would expect the new leadership team at arlington to discuss with them and any other family member that is in a situation that we have encountered to date. >> as someone who holds many town hall meetings, i know those are useful, but their reach can sometimes be limited.

so, what sort of participation do you have in these town hall meetings? and what proportion of the overall family universe that's been impacted by this tragedy does it touch, your town hall? >> sir, that town hall meeting was put on by taps, and that was the organization that i think did send a letter to you, congressman. and it was the first -- they were the ones who orchestrated our first town hall. the means that we're trying to do to reach our family is via our website, you know, that is one of the means of communication that we are using for any issue that we have at the cemetery. and we're constantly trying to improve that medium as well. >> now, i know websites, many of us check them regularly especially when they have valuable content. but i know many people do not, and they're not comfortable with computers, perhaps don't even own them. so, are you doing other things in addition to updating a website to keep the family members engaged and fully informed of progress? is there a help line?

is there an intermediary between government, which sometimes can be a sterile organization, and the impacted families? >> yes, sir. as a matter of fact, on the first day on the job when the inspector general hit, we immediately set up a call center hotline, and it was a telephone -- where members who read this in the media could call us. we now have a consolidated call center, which is a toll-free number for anyone who can call in to the cemetery. that didn't exist before. prior to mr. hallinan and i and the call center, we really couldn't tell you how many people were trying to contact the cemetery, whether it was for something as simple as a direction to get a parking pass or if they truly had an issue or if they were going to schedule a service for their loved ones. right now we receive over 200 phone calls a day into the cemetery, which 45 of those are for families who are trying to schedule services to have their

individuals buried. so, that is the means that we are -- that the call number at the call center, weens every call now that comes in to the cemetery. >> can you speak to any specific programs or things that you've implemented to ensure continuous improvement of engagement and information being passed down to the families? for example, surveying them, asking them what sorts of improvements you might make to better inform them of future developments? >> and, sir, we are working on that. as i said, we are trying to build a foundation. what we had to really do is to build the i.t. architecture in the cemetery to even have the means to put out a survey electronically, but that is one of the future plans that we are having. we are also putting out a new burial guide that truly is a guide that will really answer a lot of the questions that individuals have that before they just didn't have a place to

go, which will lay -- which will outline all of the places of how you can contact anyone in the cemetery. >> and, finally, i'm curious about a related matter. i know many family members care deeply about the mementos that are left at these grave sites, particularly military grave sites. there's a real history of that. does arlington national cemetery now operate some sort of system for protecting these mementos, properly cataloging them, and then allowing family members to access them, this information, in a reliable way? >> sir, the mementos are collected in section sixes, which is where most of the current casualties from the wars are. and we have our center for military history is collecting those mementos and cataloging them, and that is one of the long-term plans that is on my plate to decide how do we long term, you know, capture those mementos and how, you know, for

future generations so that we don't lose that. >> so, that process has not been fully developed as yet, is that correct? >> right. it is still a pilot, but we are still collecting the mementos and cataloging them, but we've not finalized, you know, what we're going to do for the future on that. >> do you have a time frame by which you intend to implement? >> sir, i don't have the exact date, but, you know, it is something that i will take as a do-out and i will work with the center of military history, you know, what is the best time to transition for that. >> well, i will, and i know many of my colleagues will, continue to keep their finger in the pulse of all of these different lines of inquiry, and i expect you'll keep us informed every step of the way. >> certainly will. >> all right. thank you much. >> thank you, mr. young. mr. coffman? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i understand we've changed leadership at the very top. and -- but yet there were whole

echelons of subordinate leadership that were complicit in these activities that are still there. i mean -- i mean, i just find that -- that stunning. i mean, this is an organization that is rotten to its core. this is an organization that has conducted itself really -- or i think the best way to describe it is a culture of in incompete, not only would the uniform code of military justice been used fairly dramatically, but at all echelons of subordinate leadership they would have been relieved, they would have been gone. you know, i tell you, this -- this organization -- and i'm a combat veteran.

i can tell you does not reflect the values of our military. they do not honor our military and their sacrifices. and they need to go. and so i'm going to -- i'm asking you, what actions are being taken to change leadership at every level to get rid of these people who have done these things and start over again? >> sir, if i may, in fairness to the workforce, they weren't trained to do the job. and i'll let mr. hallinan follow-up on that since he's in charge of that. they were not trained. i will give an example of one of the supervisors who we recently sent to the va training center. it was the first time he was sent to training in 20-some years of employment at the cemetery. there weren't standards, there weren't procedures, and they

weren't held accountable. the thing that mr. hallinan is doing is giving each and every one of the work force the tools to do the job correctly -- >> so, you're saying the things that occurred are okay, basically, you're defending the actions that were taken by this work force, are you not? >> sir, i'm not defending the mistakes that were made in the past -- >> but it's really okay what they did, because we can just kind of explain it away. is that what you're saying? >> no, sir, that's not what i'm saying. >> that's what i'm hearing. >> mr. congressman, may i take part of that question, please? >> please. >> it's not okay. and it's not acceptable. if there was any criminal wrongdoing, if the ig investigation comes back and provides recommendations about misconduct, we'll address it. a blind eye will not be turned. people will be held accountable, the employees that miss condon were speaking to, were not provided leadership, those real

combat veterans, my fellow marine in the back, no leadership, no guidance, no direction, absolutely no training. they're one person deep out this. it's a very difficult and challenging situation. but i can assure you with 100% confidence under our watch, if they do not respect and honor the service of our veterans, if it is misconduct or if it is a performance issue, it will be addressed. >> will you referenced some rancor, and i can tell you the leadership that i'm seeing here at arlington couldn't leave starving troops to a chow hall. that's fundamentally not the issue. you reference a rancor, every marine has basic values and understands the basic mission. what you're telling me that the people were so poorly led that they didn't understand what they were supposed to be doing, is that correct? >> what i'm saying, congressman, we need to change that culture. >> well, i don't know how you can -- >> there was -- there's been an

identified and definitive problem, no doubt. we all know this. we need to change that culture and instill a culture of professionalism and honoring our veterans and caring. and we do that individually and personally by setting that standard and providing that leadership, and that is what's happening today. >> you don't honor veterans and their families by leaving people in place that had disgraced their member. you get rid of them, and you bring in people that have the integrity, without supervision, you know, that certainly can independently perform their job and understand -- understand -- the sacred nature sacred nature of that ground. because obviously, the culture of arlington today does not understand that. and that is a tragedy.

and i just don't see -- maybe we need another change in leadership at the top. because i don't think you all get it. i just don't think you get it. i don't think you get how these families are affected. i just don't think you get it. that's what i'm hearing today is you don't get it. that you really fundamentally at the end of the day don't care that yo that. that you're brureaucrats in place. we need to honor the veterans. we need to honor their families. we need to honor the sacred ground of arlington and i can tell you that we need leadership that respects that. mr. chairman, i yield back. >> thank you. mr. runnion? >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank both of you for coming here again today. many of my colleagues may not know. i know chairman does. i had a visit out there and i

said earlier in mid-march, understand my colleagues' frustration but i also know that this -- there's a reason why these people are here. because of precisely what you're very upset about and what we're all frustrated about. and just kind of touch on that. i think we touched on that when i met with you out there but has there been a dramatic turnover in the work force since you guys took your positions? >> sir, since we've taken over, we have had 15 individuals who have retired or transferred to other positions. but we have also as part of the manpower survey we have -- we're told there's 57 more people that we really needed to run the cemetery effectively and efficiently. we have managed to hire 22 more individuals. we have 24 active recruitments on the street to bring in the new team to run arlington.

>> and of your knowledge, since you were either on an interim basis or permanent, has any incident like this happened under your watch? >> what type of incident, congressman? >> i think -- anything. >> performance issues? yes. >> issues that we would have with burials or loved ones being there and noticing things. >> yes. >> they have been created under your watch. >> yes. we have had two incidents of gravesites misassigned. >> and that is poor -- that is -- i know we spoke out there of part of your process of setting up the parameters and basically trying to go to a digital system to where it's more at your fingertips. there's paper involved. how is that process going and how are quickly are we moving there? because i don't know if many of

the members know that most of what had -- most of the records out there are basically in a card catalog system and it's basically ancient. and it -- i know you guys are addressing that but just fill us in on how that procedure is moving forward. >> sir, that procedure is moving forward. what we are doing is -- that is part of the accountability that we are doing by the public law. what we have do to do is we are going to rescan all of our records. we are doing that. we are tying that to a digital flyover of each and every grave site so we truly will have a digital process for our recordkeeping at arlington and if i could go back on the question about the mistakes that have happened and mr. hallinan didn't touch on the burial mistake. the new standards and procedure that is we have in place, the work force when they made that mistake immediately notified, you know, the chain of command

that there was a switch in the two gravesites so that the procedures that we are putting in place are working because the workforce when they made a mistake came forward to the leadership. i don't know if you want to expound on that, mr. hallinan. >> in the misassignment of the grave sites what we found in the past would not be reported to the leadership and the leadership was divided as part of the i.g. report, inspector general's report. in this ins instant they did come to me and even though the procedures were put in place are new and they have been trained to those procedures when they made the mistake, they came forward and let myself personally know an i let miss condon know and we corrected the mistakes. >> thank you very much. and you know, with what's happened out there, i think you guys are living under a microscope. it's a very ambitious undertaking. i wish you all the best and we

have to do this because it is truly for our heroes i thank you very much for your testimony. i yield back, mr. chairman. >> thank you. sir? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i want to thank you for holding this hearing and paying attention to this all-important issue. the lapses that took place at -- at arlington and how we get this right. i know that the folks at the table are new to the positions and they're charged with trying to make things right and i want to thank you for the work you're doing. i like many of my colleagues and the american people were appalled at the lapses that had taken place and how remains were not properly handled, and that things that -- wrong grave site burials and remains in the wrong place. totally unacceptable. we have an obligation not only to obviously support our war fighters and certainly support our veterans, particularly those

disabled, but the ultimate sign of respect, of course, is how we treat our soldiers at the end of the lives and how they are -- the remains are properly handled afterwards so i'm grateful that we're paying attention to this issue of making things right at arlington. i'll have several questions for the record, mr. chairman. just one question for purposes of this hearing right now. first of all, i understand that it's the army that basically is responsible for arlington national cemetery. around the country, the veterans cemeteries from what i understand are mainly handled by va. could you give me the pros and cons of the army continuing to have jurisdiction oversight and operation and control over arlington national cemetery

versus the va? what are the pros and cons of either method if we were to transfer jurisdiction to the va? >> like me to answer that first? >> being a former va employee, until recently, congressman, and responsible for the 131 national cemeteries that are highly maintained with a dedicated workforce, arlington national cemetery is maintained and operated to those same consistent standards. arlington national cemetery and speaking to something that the chairman spoke to earlier in one of his questions is unique. can we stand down? should it be taken in and dry docked and overhauled? not an option. we have families, 27 internments. arlington is unique. arlington national cemetery conducts over 3,000 ceremonies, has dignitaries, heads of state around the world to pay respects

to the america's fallen, service men and women. arlington also provides graveside service which va cemeteries do not. and additionally washington, d.c. and the cemetery is one of the most visited tourist spot in the country. there is no other va cemetery like that. these complexities are challenging. and they're very real. one thing i would like to add for the record. s that the families that miss condon and i have dealt with, because we do get feedback on a daily basis from the families that come in and out, and they encourage us. through difficult times for us they're encouraging us to correct and fix the problems. the families we have met and spoke with and specifically the goldstar parents we met with, their feelings on that issue, mr. congressman, i was on the

defense as a va employee and felt quite passionately and that the arlington should be under the va. and lastly, and miss condon can follow up, i believe based on being on the ground and dealing with these issues that the army has the resources, has the commitment to fix the past mistakes and to operate arlington national cemetery effectively into the future. >> sir, if i can add, the mistakes that happened in arlington being broken, the army needs to fix it. when things are broken in the army, the army needs to fix the issues that happened in the past and then, you know, the decision once it's fixed then we can make the decision on if, you know, arlington should remain under d.o.d. which i agree with mr.

hallinan because of the uniqueness of all of the things we do at arlington that it should be a d.o.d.-run cemetery. >> very good. i thank you for your answers. this committee takes this issue of getting things right at arlington very seriously and does every member of congress and we are going to continue to provide aggressive oversight. mr. chairman, i want to thank you again for holding this hearing and my colleagues in participating in the hearing and the folks at the table and as i said, i know you're new in your positions and charged with getting things right at arlington and look forward to continuing to work with you. there's no greater sign of respect of how we treat your soldiers at the end of the life and internment and want to provide the ultimate respect. thank you. i yield back. >> thank you. we appreciate you joining us today at the hearing. i want to do a couple of follow-up questions.

first, you talked about discrepancies. have you identified exactly how many discrepancies exist and is there a plan of action to address those? >> sir, when we do our accountability effort that we're mandated by law, when we check all of the records with the actual grave site, the plan -- that should identify where we may have potential discrepancies in the cemetery. when we do that, then we will address each and every one of those discrepancies and as we stated before in the first course of action if we find a discrepancy is we'll contact the family that is are involved. >> when you do you expect to complete that evaluation of the entire cemetery to discover the full content and magnitude of the discrepancies that exist? >> sir, as you know, the public law says i have to do that by december 22nd of this year and we are on the way of putting forward the plan and the starting effort to do just that.

>> so you expect to comply with that by december 22nd? >> sir, i will -- we'll do our best to comply by that date. >> okay. >> and if -- >> i would like for you to say you will accomplish it. >> yes. >> doing your best is great but accomplishing it is what we all want. >> got it, sir. >> thank you. thank you. i wanted to ask, too, i know there's obviously a wide scope of problems, discrepancies, issues. have you all contemplating putting together a panel of experts of all areas to do an independent look at the things that you face, the recordkeeping system, the identification of remains, the operational issues there? have you thought about doing that rather than continuing to do it internally because it seems like internally we continue on a weekly basis to learn more and more about the thing that is are going on there? so i'm wondering if it may not be time to have an independent panel come in and take a look. >> sir, as you know, we are in the process of nominating for

the arlington commission. i didn't know about the members nominated and actually on board. that was one of the reasons for putting that independent commission together. the secretary directed that and that is what we are going to be using, the independent commission for, is that outside look of the issues at arlington and they could recommend other views that they feel that need to be -- to make sure that mr. hallinan are doing all that we need to do. >> so the independent commission, the independent commission will be looking at existing operations but when l they also be looking at discrepancies in the past and what should be done to mix those discrepancies and then will they also look at the problem operationally with conduct of personnel there at arlington? >> sir, you know, since the commission isn't started yet but those are probably very good agenda items to put on the commission to look at or to recommend -- issues that we

should have perhaps other commissions look at. >> is there a date certain for the commission starting its work? >> sir, we're putting together the nomination packages and forwarding them through the process and i don't know when all of those will be approved and vetted but we're trying our best to get it done within the next several months. >> all right. we would like more specificity on that. the urgency is before us. i think the public wants to see things done and obviously people there to provide that guidance, that independent commission that the secretary puts in place i think timeliness is of the essence so i would certainly i think very, very important. i want to go back to mr. schneider. we cannot understate the efforts of the ig looking at the past performance there of employees, and again, as more and more of this comes to light, just as mr. coffman said it's beyond me that somehow there wasn't significant

wrongdoing. i don't want to prejudge people but i can tell you externally looking at this it sure appears to me there's more than just oversight or mistakes being made there. that this type of action and behavior if it's not criminal sure seems that way so i want to get a little more definition about where the ig is in that investigation, when they hope to come to some kind offen collusion, when we can hope to hear something. i hope this isn't an effort where this is a marathon where the ig's just trying to continue to push this into the future and hopefully that the issue will go away because from this committee's standpoint, the issue is not going away. >> well, i think two things. number one, i think we get it that it's not going away and this committee's not going to let it go away. secondly, we owe you an answer on where the ig's going, when the ig expects to be completed with its work. my belief is the ig will take it wherever it goes and if criminal activity is identified, it will

be turned over to the criminal investigators for them to work through their process. again, if it is military people, it would be under the uniformed code of military justice. civilized, title 18 and handled through the u.s. attorney's office. >> we can hope to get something definitive out of the ig -- >> this will be number one on my agenda. >> very good. we would like to hear from them and submitting some questions for the record. >> yes, sir. >> to the ig and asking that they respond within a short time period, we'll put it like that. i wanted to follow a little bit further up on the question because i think it's very, very pertinent. there's been a lot of suggestion and calls from veterans that have said, hey, you know, the cemetery there may be better run by the va for a variety of reasons and i respect mr. hallinan's viewpoint of that having worked on the va side and come over to the arlington side

but the question always comes up, the army's mission is winning wars and not running cemeteries w. the problem that is have occurred there, the question then becomes, are we better off going to the va, especially with the magnitude of the cemeteries that they manage to look at how do we re-establish faith, how we re-establish trust there at arlington? i wouldn't expect anything other than to say the army can do the job but i also want, too -- i know professionally both of you have seen operations both in the va and the army. and i know that they're obviously some ideas you will have there and say keep it in the army but i do want to get your thoughts of what strengths do you see the va bringing to the table in the way that they run their facilities? and i want to put that in context to understand what might

be still lacking there at arlington. >> sir, if i could start on that one, first of all, right now i think if we were to transition today to a -- to the va, i think the turmoil that that would cause at arlington would probably impact our veterans and their families to a great extent and what we need to do is to -- as i stated before, is to put together those standards and procedures and fix the issues and then make the determination on where arlington should go. >> okay. very good. mr. hallinan, i know you elaborated on that. >> i think the army should fix the problem. i think we should restore some faith and trust of the families and then that decision can be made by this body or another committee or body if that's the correct course of action but i think for the here and the now

we need to correct and move -- needs to move arlington forward. >> okay. very good. >> can you clarify when you said that changing from the army to the veterans administration might cause turmoil for the veterans and families? >> sir, because one of the things that mr. hallinan and i have experienced as we are putting and implementing the new changes and standards and procedures and getting the workforce to adapt to the new accountability that we're doing, i think if we were to take the workforce that we have now and to put a whole new leadership team in there would create a turmoil and chaos that would impact our veterans and their families and the services that we provide at arlington today. >> you believe there's a level of incompetence beyond what's been done? you have to be kidding. you can't be serious about that. the fact is the united states army and god bless it as an organization, i was once a

soldier, but it's demonstrated such a level of incompetence in the management of arlington that it needs to step aside and let the veterans administration lead and serve the veterans and their families and end this turmoil. i yield back, mr. chairman. >> thank you. i want to follow up on one additional question, also. you talk about making sure that you are identifying these issues going forward, making sure you're taking care of them. in context of doing 27-plus burials a day. my question is this. it seems like in that context you would want to have a team that does nothing but implement these improvements, taking up these discrepancies and it's great to say we are dealing with 27 burials but if you're serious about getting this done, is there a -- are there plans and putting in place a team to say your job is to do nothing but fix the past wrongs, make sure that the -- there's 100% certainty in the identification and location of remains, to get

the paper system into a decisional form? we met several members of the army working on that but my question is, will we have a by fir kated process? >> sir, as a matter of fact, we are putting together a task force headed by a colonel who was a signal officer to address solely the accountability aspect of the cemetery. >> okay. very good. >> sir, one issue, one issue i'd like to add on to and something we were talking about before is sharing of information and skill with the department of veterans affairs. maybe we should have some army employees go off and work at va for a while, have some va employees come and miss condon and i have talked about the need for military officers, army officers to be assigned at arlington and i think it gets to what mr. coffman was talking about, no kidding, we need people and gosh, if we could get

men and women, officers who have served in iraq and afghanistan to come in and help us make sure we do the right thing, i think that would be something that we want to do so i'm going to work with miss condon from the personnel side and see if we can make that happen. >> and sir, if i may add to that, we did add military spaces to our structure and it has truly made all of the difference in how arlington is operated when you really as contrlonel k but a colonel calling you and telling you have an issue and that's truly been one of the improvements that i think is important at arlington. >> very good. thank you, miss condon. any other questions? okay. well i want to conclude by thanking the witnesses for coming today. we are going to place great attention on the efforts there at arlington. i hope that you will pass on to the secretary and the army

inspector general that we missed having them here today. and we are going to continue to place a focus on this issue. again, to make sure that there is no question left at arlington that any family has with the location or identification of remains there. i think that is critical. and i want to close with a quote from colonel koch in his testimony. i think it's very compelling and the best way to close and to denote the challenges ahead. colonel koch said this. he said i think we have more than one unknown soldier at arlington now. i think that we want to make sure that we go back to only having one tomb of the unknown there at arlington. ladies and gentlemen, thank you all so much for joining us today. i want to remind the committee members that you have 14 days by which to submit additional questions to submit to the army for hair answtheir answers and forward to having some quick

responses to those questions as we submit them to you. thank you and with that this subcommittee's adjourned. bif

>> next, q&a. and then your calls and comments on "washington journal." tonight a look at the president's fiscal commission and the economy. first there will discuss the recommendations. in comments from lawrence summers. that is 8:00 eastern on c-span3. >> throughout the entire month of april, we will focus on the winners of the student kim competition. ies onimited documentary' themes such as washington d.c. through my landens.

you can watch videos any >> this week on "q&a," andrew ferguson of the weekly standard talks about all the issues he faced helping his teenage son get into college. it is all in his new book called "crazy u -- one dad's crash course in getting his kid into college." >> andrew ferguson, your book is called "crazy u -- one dad's crash course in getting his kid into college." when you think back over this experience, what are the moments that are in your head? >> well, there is a whole series of moments which i would like to forget. i had to record them anyway. the one that sticks in my mind the most was saying goodbye to my son and dropping him off at college. the book takes us all the way from the beginning of even

looking at colleges and thinking about colleges to getting him in, and then dropping him off at school. it was the culmination of all these 18 months of worrying and anxiety. for a parent, is a very bittersweet feeling. on one hand, you showed the kid out the door and he is on his own, and on the other hand, you don't really want to see the kid go. it is sort of all parenthood in miniature. as i say in the book, to be a parent means you are training the people you cannot live without to live without you. that is exactly what happens when you say goodbye. >> simon and schuster put together what is called a pr vehicle for you to promote this book. i think i even heard you saying you have not seen -- you cannot find it in the book, the

dedication. let's run this. ♪ >> i am andrew ferguson, author of "crazy u -- one dad's crash course in getting his kid into college." this is the kid. when i start to think about the whole admissions process, the kind of effect it had on our relationship, i start to think of some of the things that didn't happen. there was no homicide involved. >> no strangling. >> there were no nervous breakdowns i think in the end, we were pretty much better off than we were before, because we no longer had to worry about getting into college.

>> there were times when i just would not want to see him because i knew that every time i saw him he would bug me about doing my essay or doing some work on my application, or why was not i doing it at that time. >> it was hard to judge his direction because he would just be pacing around in circles behind me the entire time. >> he could never tell what direction i was moving because it was circular the whole time. the other thing is when i would not walk by and harass him. you would go to sleep. or turn on espn. >> this book closed in march of 2010, so it is a year ago. when did your son go to his school? >> the previous september. he matriculated in september of

2009, so this was all taking place in 2008 and 2009. >> what does the word matriculate mean? >> i cannot explain it, sorry. i still remember from school, they said i was matriculating on a certain date. you're supposed to do that in public? he was enrolled. he showed up at school in september of 2009. >> i don't know that i have ever seen a video like this one. is this the new world? >> yes, i think they had us do that a couple of months ago, and i did not know that it had ever gotten done. it is supposed to make people want to buy the book. i am not really sure how that works. >> when did you know you had a book? >> that was pretty early on. i didn't know what i was in for.

as i say in the book, all of a sudden, my son started getting solicitations in the mail, these big, fat, viewbooks they are called. they are like brochures on these really thick papers. it was so tasty looking. very expensive packages they were sending him. when i thought back, nothing like that had happened to me when i was thinking about college in the mid-1970's. it dawned on me that this was a very different process than what it was. of course we have friends who were just starting to percolate with a little bit of anxiety about it themselves. i went looking for a book. there are tons of books on college admissions. i could not find any one that sort of satisfied what i was looking for. i did not want it to be morose

and lugubrious, but on the other hand i wanted it to have a few tips that i could trust. so i thought, i would just write it. >> you went to occidental college in california. what year did you graduate? >> 1978. >> you say that $5,100 was the tuition then when you were in school. for a year? >> my last year, that was the total room and board and tuition. >> you said applied to inflation it would be $16,000 today, but it is well over $40,000. >> now you see why i did the book. i had to figure out a way to pay for my son's college education. >> what is the reason for that, beyond inflation costs? >> it is the question -- it is the $55,000 question that every parent faces in our situation, which is how you pay for it? why is it so expensive? i could not get a straight

answer. there have been some studies done, but mostly academics have shied away from the subject, for obvious reasons. they don't want to talk bad about the boss. what few studies i could find were not that helpful. finally, i found a guy who is a professor at ohio state, an economist. he has studied the economy of higher education so thoroughly that every president of a university hates him, because he actually applied a skeptical eye to this. i went to see him, and i said tell me the answer to the question that nobody will answer for me, which is why do they keep raising the prices? he said because they can. he said because they can.