This is a document assembled Commerce Department staff on March 28, 1966 compiling a series of documents relating to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ evolving cost benefit standards for projects. The cover memo notes that the issue had recently been elevated to the Presidential level with a February 28, 1966 letter from 16 members of Congress to President Johnson and a response from the Bureau of the Budget. Budget apparently would not give Commerce a copy of the letter to the President or the BoB response – however, the letter to Johnson was found in some Congressional committee files elsewhere and can be found here.

Section 7 of the Department of Transportation Act, as proposed by the White House, would have given the new Secretary of Transportation the authority to rewrite these standards, and it became a major problem for the legislation.