804 
transportation to that on land and air, and if you separate this or struc- 
ture it too strongly, you may lose something insofar as policy decisions 
on transportation are concerned. 
So what I am saying is in short, with NOAA you get better decisions 
in marine and atmospheric affairs. You have possible risks of poorer 
decisions in these other areas unless this is examined very carefully. 
Mr. Lennon. How has the Commission’s work reflected failure, say, 
of the Department of the Interior ? 
Dr. WENK. Well, first of all, I would like to go on record that I 
believe the Commission had a beneficial effect on affairs of Government 
as soon as it was formed because the kind of questions they were 
asking—even during their deliberations—because the kind of questions 
they were asking caused all of us to reappraise what we were doing. 
Mr. Lennon. For the first time in history, after the commission’s 
report, the Department of Interior established an Under Secretary for 
Marine Affairs, didn’t they ? 
Dr. Wenn. Well, they set up an office of Marine Affairs under an 
Assistant Secretary last fall. T am not sure what the causal relation- 
ships were here, but the coincidence is there. 
Mr. Lennon. Do you think that was because in the commission’s 
report it recommended that the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries and 
certain components of the Sports’ Fish and Wildlife be moved out of 
the Department of Interior into the NOAA? Do you think this moti- 
vated the Department of Interior to move in the direction of the marine 
area ? 
Dr. Wenn. I have to admit that is one possibility, Mr. Chairman, 
but there is another problem that exists within the Department of 
Interior. At the same time that you recognize the difficulty of having 
11 departments and agencies develop coherent and integrated programs 
across the Government, there is a similar problem within the Depart- 
ment of Interior on a different scale, because so many of their bureaus 
have some activity dealing with the sea, but might be following dif- 
ferent paths. There is a need to coor dinate the activities right within 
the Department of Interior and they recognize that. 
Mr. Lennon. Vice President Agnew, I believe, submitted to the 
President in his communication of May 29 or thereabouts, the position 
of certain of the principal agencies of the Federal Government. 
Dr. Wenk. That is correct. 
PROBLEMS IN REORGANIZATION 
Mr. Lennon. Their objections to the Commission’s report. The De- 
partment of Transportation was one of them, I believe, with respect 
to the proposal to remove the Coast Guard into what is suggested as 
NOAA. To what degree other than search and rescue, is the Coast 
Guard involved in transportation, like buses and trucks ‘and railroads 
are ? 
Dr. Wenx. The Coast Guard, I believe, has statutory responsibility 
with regard to approval of ship design for purposes of safety, and T 
believe also has responsibility to exercise some inspection in both ship 
construction and ship operation, so that they would be involved in 
those transportation related activities. 
Mr. Lennon. Here is a question that has been handed to me. I don’t 
have time to consider it before I pass it on to you. 
