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B-195492 1 (1980-03-18)

handle is hein.gao/gaobabizo0001 and id is 1 raw text is: DTir= - No CUJATI-ON kiL /,7(_ 4. COMPTROLLER GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES 494 WASHINGTON. D.C. 205411' ,4. B-195492 March 18, 1980 y,~~-l The Honorable William Proxmire United States Senate -1' Dear Senator Proxmire:, . This is in response to your request concerning the Cooperating Associ- ation Fund (Fund) of the National Park Service. The Secretary of the n interior maintains the Fund, also known as the Director's Discretionary F1und, under authority of 16 U.S.C. § 6.7(1976) which permits him to accept lands., rights-of -way, buildings or other property- and money which may be donated for the purposes of the national park and monument system. • You suggest that monies in the Fund are not donations but are assess- ments collected from the cooperating associations and used for improper 'purposes. The cooperating associations are. non-profit organizations. which assist the Park Service by selling various interpretive publications and : , souvenirs. You state that the Fund is: ' * * * merely a way around the Appropriation and Budget process. The funds are not gifts but an assess- ment of one-half of one percent from the non-profit vendors of the Park Service. The monies are then used for travel, entertainment, Congressional lobbying, etc., p - : : l' beyond the amounts provided by Congress. Your first point is important because if the monies are assessments, they would be treated differently from donations. Donations, under 16 U.S.C. § 6, are to be placed in trust and used for several purposes of the national park and monument system. Assessments, on the other hand would be considered to be revenues of the national parks which would have to be Covered into the Treasury as miscellaneous receipts. 16 U.S.C. § 452i(1976); see also 31 U.S.C. § 484 We considered a similar issue in 25 Comp. Gen. 6371(1946). In that Case, a sum of money collected by the Park Service for the privilege of filming motion pictures in a national park was determined to be a fee or charge instead of a donation. • We said: Essentially, 'donations', 'gifts', or 'bequests' are gratuitous conveyances or transfers of ownership in property without any consideration. In constrast, the funds here involved represent a payment in consideration / 7 c-

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