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Post: Spy Agency Hoards Secret $1 Billion

WASHINGTON (AP) - The super secret agency that manages the nation's spy satellite program has built up unspent funds totaling more than $1 billion
without informing Congress or even its supervisors at the Pentagon and CIA, according to a published report.

The Washington Post cited unidentified Capitol Hill sources in Sunday editions as saying the ability of the National Reconnaissance Organization to put
away so much money from its classified multibillion-dollar budget reaffirmed concerns that intelligence agencies sometimes use their secret status to avoid
accountability.

The Post said the funds, called a "pot of gold" by one Senate aide, were discovered after the Senate intelligence committee raised questions more than a year
ago about a $300 million new headquarters building the agency was building in suburban Virginia.

The committee determined that the agency, not generally known to Congress, was using base operating funds it already had without seeking a specific
appropriation for the building.

The pool of unspent money accumulated as a result of NRO's practice of having Congress pay in advance for multiyear, billion-dollar-plus satellite
programs, the Post quoted CIA Director John Deutch as saying in an interview. Agency managers let incoming funds pile up when spending on contracts took
place at a slower pace than planned.

Although he said a CIA inquiry found nothing illegal about how the NRO handled the money, Deutch told the Post he put a new chief financial officer in at
the agency and ordered a "separate budget scrub" of all its programs.

NRO's funding is part of the Pentagon budget, but many of the agency's intelligence programs are under CIA supervision.

The Post said one congressional aide put the total of unspent funds as high as $1.7 billion, but that others said it could turn out to be less than $1 billion.

It said Deutch declined to put a figure on the unspent money.

Story Number: 00598 Story Date: 9/23/95

This material may not be redistributed. Copyright 1995. The Associated Press. All rights reserved.