REORGANIZATION PLAN NO. 3 OF 1966
Eff. June 25, 1966, 31 F.R. 8855, 80 Stat. 1610
Prepared by the President and transmitted to the Senate and the House of Representatives in Congress assembled, April 25, 1966, pursuant to the provisions of the Reorganization Act of 1949, 63 Stat. 203, as amended [see 5 U.S.C. 901 et seq.].
PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE
Section 1. Transfer of Functions
Sec. 2. Performance of Transferred Functions
The Secretary may from time to time make such provisions as he shall deem appropriate authorizing the performance of any of the functions transferred to him by the provisions of this reorganization plan by any officer, employee, or agency of the Public Health Service or of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare.
Sec. 3. Abolitions
Sec. 4. Incidental Transfers
As he may deem necessary in order to carry out the provisions of this reorganization plan, the Secretary may from time to time effect transfers within the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare of any of the records, property, personnel and unexpended balances (available or to be made available) of appropriations, allocations, and other funds of the Department which relate to functions affected by this reorganization plan.
[The Secretary and Department of Health, Education, and Welfare were redesignated the Secretary and Department of Health and Human Services, respectively, by 20 U.S.C. 3508.]
Message of the President
To the Congress of the United States:
I transmit herewith Reorganization Plan No. 3 of 1966, prepared in accordance with the Reorganization Act of 1949, as amended, and providing for reorganization of health functions of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare.
I
Today we face new challenges and unparalleled opportunities in the field of health. Building on the progress of the past several years, we have truly begun to match the achievements our medicine to the needs of our people.
The task ahead is immense. As a nation, we will unceasingly pursue our research and learning, our training and building, our testing and treatment. But now our concern must also turn to the organization of our Federal health programs.
As citizens we are entitled to the very best health services our resources can provide.
As taxpayers, we demand the most efficient and economic health organizations that can be devised.
I ask Congress to approve a reorganization plan to bring new strength to the administration of Federal health programs.
I propose a series of changes in the organization of the Public Health Service that will bring to all Americans a structure modern in design, more efficient in operation and better prepared to meet the great and growing needs of the future. Through such improvements we can achieve the full promise of the landmark health legislation enacted by the 89th Congress.
I do not propose these changes lightly. They follow a period of careful deliberation. For many months the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare and the Surgeon General have consulted leading experts in the Nation-physicians, administrators, scientists, and public health specialists. They have confirmed my belief that modernization and reorganization of the Public Health Service are urgently required and long overdue.
II
The Public Health Service is an operating agency of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. It is the principal arm of the Federal Government in the field of health. Its programs are among those most vital to our well-being.
Since 1953 more than 50 new programs have been placed in the Public Health Service. Its budget over the past 12 years has increased tenfold-from $250 million to $2.4 billion.
Today the organization of the Public Health Service is clearly obsolete. The requirement that new and expanding programs be administered through an organizational structure established by law more than two decades ago stands as a major obstacle to the fulfillment of our Nation's health goals.
As presently constituted, the Public Health Service is composed of four major components:
National Institutes of Health.
Bureau of State Services.
Bureau of Medical Services.
Office of the Surgeon General.
Under present law, Public Health Service functions must be assigned only to these four components.
This structure was designed to provide separate administrative arrangements for health research, programs of State and local aid, health services, and executive staff resources. At a time when these functions could be neatly compartmentalized, the structure was adequate. But today the situation is different.
Under recent legislation many new programs provide for an integrated attack on specific disease problems or health hazards in the environment by combining health services, State and local aid, and research. Each new program of this type necessarily is assigned to one of the three operating components of the Public Health Service. Yet none of these components is intended to administer programs involving such a variety of approaches.
Our health problems are difficult enough without having them complicated by outmoded organizational arrangements.
But if we merely take the step of integrating the four agencies within the Public Health Service we will not go far enough. More is required.
III
The Department of Health, Education, and Welfare performs major health or health-related functions which are not carried out through the Public Health Service, although they are closely related to its functions. Among these are:
Health insurance for the aged, administered through the Social Security Administration;
Medical assistance for the needy, administered through the Welfare Administration;
Regulation of the manufacture, labeling, and distribution of drugs, carried out through the Food and Drug Administration; and
Grants-in-aid to States for vocational rehabilitation of the handicapped, administered by the Vocational Rehabilitation Administration.
Expenditures for health and health-related programs of the Department administered outside the Public Health Service have increased from $44 million in 1953 to an estimated $5.4 billion in 1967.
As the head of the Department, the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare is responsible for the administration and coordination of all the Department's health functions. He has clear authority over the programs I have just mentioned.
But today he lacks this essential authority over the Public Health Service. The functions of that agency are vested in the Surgeon General and not in the Secretary.
This diffusion of responsibility is unsound and unwise.
To secure the highest possible level of health services for the American people the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare must be given the authority to establish- and modify as necessary-the organizational structure for Public Health Service programs.
He must also have the authority to coordinate health functions throughout the Department. The reorganization plan I propose will accomplish these purposes. It will provide the Secretary with the flexibility to create new and responsive organizational arrangements to keep pace with the changing and dynamic nature of our health programs.
My views in this respect follow a basic principle of good government set by the Hoover Commission in 1949 when it recommended that "the Department head should be given authority to determine the organization within his Department."
IV
In summary, the reorganization plan would:
Transfer to the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare the functions now vested in the Surgeon General of the Public Health Service and in its various subordinate units (this transfer will not affect certain statutory advisory bodies such as the National Advisory Cancer and Heart Councils);
Abolish the four principal statutory components of the Public Health Service, including the offices held by their heads (the Bureau of Medical Services, the Bureau of State Services, the National Institutes of Health exclusive of its several research institutes such as the National Cancer and Heart Institutes, and the Office of the Surgeon General); and
Authorize the Secretary to assign the functions transferred to him by the plan to officials and entities of the Public Health Service and to other agencies of the Department as he deems appropriate.
Thus, the Secretary would be-
Enabled to assure that all health functions of the Department are carried out as effectively and economically as possible;
Given authority commensurate with his responsibility; and
Made responsible in fact for matters for which he is now, in any case, held accountable by the President, the Congress, and the people.
V
I have found, after investigation, that each reorganization included in the accompanying reorganization plan is necessary to accomplish one or more of the purposes set forth in section 2(a) of the Reorganization Act of 1949, as amended.
Should the reorganizations in the accompanying reorganization plan take effect, they will make possible more effective and efficient administration of the affected health programs. It is, however, not practicable at this time to itemize the reductions in expenditures which may result.
I strongly recommend that the Congress allow the reorganization plan to become effective.
Lyndon B. Johnson.
THE WHITE HOUSE, April 25, 1966.