Commerce Department Proposes
Shutting Down NTIS
The Commerce Department has proposed shutting down the National Technical Information Service because its function of reselling government documents “is no longer needed in this day of advanced electronic technology.”
To demonstrate the changes leading to the decision, Commerce Secretary William Daley noted that a recent report can be downloaded from the department’s Web site at no cost rather than ordered for a $27 free through NTIS. In 1987 Congress ordered NTIS to become self-sustaining, but the agency’s sales have dramatically declined over the last six years. Daley’s August 12 announcement follows reports that Congressional appropriators decided not to fund an extra $2 million to supplement the NTIS budget.
“This was a tough decision to make, but sound management dictates that we cut our losses and recognize the technologically advanced environment we live in,” said Daley. The department will send Congress proposed legislation closing the agency and transferring its archives to the Library of Congress.
The move follows the Commerce Department's decision to cancel NTIS’s involvement in a fee-based service that searches government Web sites and databases after critics charged that the project violated the Clinton administration's promise to make the Internet and government data more accessible.
Posted August 23, 1999.
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