OTHER SERVICES The Senate requires sound internal administration and technical support services for the orderly, controlled, and cost-effective management of its legislative support and administrative operations. These functions assure that administrative records and documents are informative, accurate, and timely. The objective of the Committee on Rules and Administration and the Sergeant at Arms in providing these computerized support services is cost-effective operation of the Senate. Bill Drafting The computer assisted bill drafting system for the Legislative Counsel provides the ability to draft, edit, revise, and type legislative measures rapidly for use by Senators and committees. Legislative measures and committee prints prepared on the ATEX system are created in a format compatible for electronic composition by the Government Printing Office. Committee Assignment Model This system analyzes committee assignments within the Senate's present rules and evaluates the impact of actual or proposed changes on a specific committee's overall structure and on individual Senators. Equipment Inventory Equipment Inventory Records Management System (EIRMS) provides information to support the equipment inventory functions of the Sergeant at Arms. Hearing Transcripts This system allows committees to order hearing transcripts from commercial reporting firms on magnetic tape in a format compatible for electronic composition by the Government Printing Office. Payroll/Personnel The Payroll/Personnel System provides comprehensive retrieval, update, payment, and reporting functions to the Disbursing Office for payroll and office personnel data. Police Systems/Parking Permit This system provides the Senate Parking Office with an on-line query capability for parking information and a variety of monitoring and statistical reports. Telephone Directory Assistance System This system allows for maintenance of the telephone numbers, office locations, and directory preparation for the Senate Telephone Exchange. Text Editing and Electronic Printing A terminal oriented text editor (ATMS) provides the ability to enter and edit text on a computer and to direct the text to various computer printer devices, as well as electronic composition devices at GPÓ. Several Senate documents, such as Committee Calendars, Index to Vote Tally, Index to Senate Record Votes, and Summary of Legislative Achievements are prepared using this technology. Vote Tally A record of all quorum calls and record votes occurring on the Senate floor is maintained by the Bill Clerk via terminals and accessed by the Democratic Policy Committee and the Republican Policy Committee. Voucher System A Voucher System facilitates on-line processing of textual data used by the Disbursing Office to produce the semi-annual Report of the Secretary. TRAINING AND USER ASSISTANCE Training and user assistance is provided by the Sergeant at Arms for Legis, Scorpio, and ATMS (phone 224-1517). The Senate User Support Group will answer general questions, respond to terminal difficulties, and provide assistance to accessing the computer. Training courses are available for these systems that include personal instruction, training manuals, and experience using the system via terminals. CMS training is provided to offices by the CMS-SUR staff (phone 224-5912). Questions concerning policy on computer usage should be directed to the Committee on Rules and Administration (224-9078). (32) INFORMATION RETRIEVAL SERVICES Under the direction of the Secretary of the Senate, the Senate Library provides information retrieval services for offices that do not have direct access to certain information. Each of these information services is described below. Requests for information may be made in person or by phone using the number indicated. Legis/Bill Status Phone 224-2971 The bill status system is an automated legislative information service which provides a current digest of the contents and status of legislation in both Houses of Congress. This information is especially useful for finding legislative histories of bills and resolutions beginning with the 93rd Congress, lists of bills on a given subject, bills sponsored by a particular Senator or Representative, and statistical data on the quantity of legislation in various categories. Library of Congress Data Bases Phone 224-7106 The Library of Congress maintains an automated information system containing several data bases to which the Senate Library has access through a computer terminal. These data bases include the Legislative Information File (beginning with the 93rd Congress), the Bibliographic Citation File, the Major Issues File, the Congressional Record Abstracts File, the National Referral Center Resources File, the Library of Congress Computerized Catalog, and the Machine Readable Čatalog (MARC). Micrographics Publications The Senate Library has an extensive collection of Congressional publications, newspapers, magazines, and other materials on microfiche and microfilm. The Library's microfiche are 4x6 inch sheets of film which contain up to 98 pages of text. The user of the microfiche collection may either read the materials on a microfiche reader in the Library's Micrographics Center or borrow a portable reader from the Library to use in his/her office. The materials on microfiche can be reproduced on reader/printers located in the Senate Library. О |