Chapter 98. To authorize the Secretary of the Treasury to provide hospital and sanatorium facilities for discharged sick and disabled soldiers, sailors, and marines
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CHAP. 98.— An Act To authorize the Secretary of the Treasury to provide hospital and sanatorium facilities for discharged sick and disabled soldiers, sailors, and marines. March 3, 1919.[[H. R. 13026](/us/bill/65/hr/13026).][[Public, No. 326](/us/pl/65/326).] *Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled*,Hospital facilities.To be furnished discharged sick and disabled soldiers, etc.That the Secretary of the Treasury be, and he is hereby, authorized to provide immediate additional hospital and sanatorium facilities for the care and treatment of discharged sick and disabled soldiers, sailors, and marines, Army and Navy nurses (male and female), patients of the War Risk Employees, etc., entitled.Insurance Bureau, and the following persons only:
Merchant marine seamen, seamen on boats of the Mississippi River Commission, officers and enlisted men of the United States Coast Guard, officers and employees of the Public Health Service, certain keepers and assistant keepers of the United States Lighthouse Service, seamen of the Engineer Corps of the United States Army, officers and enlisted men of the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey, civilian employees entitled to treatment under the United States Employees’ Compensation Act, and employees on Army transports not officers or enlisted men of the Army, now entitled by law to treatment by the Public Health Service.
Sec. 2.Public Health Service.There are hereby permanently transferred to the Treasury Army camp hospitals, etc., permanently transferred to.Department for the use of the Public Health Service for hospital or sanatoria or other uses the following properties, with their present equipment, including sites and leases, or so much thereof as may be required by the Public Health Service, including mechanical equipment in connection therewith, and approaches thereto, with authority to lease or purchase sites not owned by the Government, as follows:
Hospitals, with such other buildings and land as may be required, at Camp Cody (New Mexico), Camp Hancock (Georgia), Camp Joseph E. Johnston (Florida), Camp Beauregard (Louisiana), 1303 Camp Logan (Texas), Camp Fremont (California), and nitrate plant, Perryville (Maryland), and such hospitals, with other necessary buildings, hereafter vacated by the War Department, as may be required and found suitable for the needs of the Public Health Service for hospital or sanatoria purposes.
And for the purpose Amount authorized for remodeling, etc.of such remodeling of or additions to the above-named plants as may be required to adapt them to the needs and uses of the Public Health Service, the sum of $750,000 is hereby authorized. Sec. 3.The Secretary of War is hereby authorized and directed Hospital equipments, etc., transferred from Army.to transfer without charge to the Secretary of the Treasury for the use of the Public Health Service such hospital furniture and equipment, including hospital and medical supplies, motor trucks, and other motor-driven vehicles, in good condition, not required by the War Department, as may be required by the Public Health Service for its hospitals, and the President is authorized to direct the transfer to Lands, buildings, etc., to be transferred.the Treasury Department of the use of such lands or parts of lands, buildings, fixtures, appliances, furnishings, or furniture under the control of any other department of the Government not required for the purposes of such department and suitable for the uses of the Public Health Service.
Sec. 4.So much of the Battle Mountain Sanatorium at Hot Hot Springs, S. Dak.Sanatorium of Volunteer Soldiers’ Home, may be used.Springs, South Dakota, the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, with its present equipment, as is not required for the purposes for which these facilities were provided, is hereby made available for the use of the Public Health Service for a period of five years from the approval of this Act, unless sooner released by the Surgeon General of the Public Health Service.
Sec. 5.The Secretary of the Treasury is hereby authorized to Hospitals and sanatoria.Authorization of additional contracts with.contract with any existing hospital or sanatorium, by lease or otherwise, for immediate use, in whole or in part, of their present facilities, so as to provide bed capacity and facilities for not exceeding one thousand patients, and for such purposes the sum of $300,000 is hereby authorized. Sec. 6.The Secretary of the Treasury is hereby authorized, if in Corpus Christi, Tex.Purchase of hospital at, authorized.his judgment the same will be for the best interests of the Government from the standpoint of cost, location, and of the emergency needs of the Public Health Service, to purchase the site, buildings, and hospital facilities and appurtenances, at Corpus Christi, Texas, known as General Hospital Numbered 15, and for such purpose the sum of $150,000 is hereby authorized.
The sum of $1,500,000 is hereby authorized to be held as an emergency Emergency fund for purchases of land, buildings, etc.fund for the purchase of land and buildings suitable for hospital and sanatoria purposes, which the Secretary of the Treasury is hereby authorized to select and locate, and to make additions and improvements suitable to adapt them to the uses of the United States Public Health Service, if in his judgment the emergency requires it. Sec. 7.By the construction of new hospitals and sanatoria, to Construction authorized, of buildings, roads, equipment, etc.include the necessary buildings with their appropriate mechanical and other equipment and approach work, including roads leading thereto, for the accommodation of patients, officers, nurses, attendants, storage, laundries, vehicles, and live stock on sites now owned by the Government, or on new sites to be acquired by purchase or otherwise, at the places hereinafter named: *Provided*, That if the *Proviso*.Projects not deemed acceptable may be rejected, and others selected.Secretary of the Treasury shall make a finding that any hospital project hereinafter specifically authorized is not to the best interest of the Government from the standpoint of cost, location, and of the emergency needs of the Public Health Service, he is hereby authorized to reject such project or projects and to locate, construct, or acquire hospitals at such other locations as would best subserve the interest of the Government and the emergency needs of the Public Health Service within the limits of cost of such authorization. 1304 Cook County.
Ill. Contract for hospital buildings in, accepted.a.At Cook County, Illinois, by taking over the land and executing the contract for the construction thereon of hospital buildings specified therein of a certain proposed contract executed by the Shank Company, August thirty-first, nineteen hundred and eighteen, and in accordance with such contract and the plans and specifications, identified in connection therewith August thirty-first, nineteen hundred and eighteen, by the signature and initials of Brigadier General R.
C. Marshall, junior, Construction Division, Quartermaster Department, United States Army, by Lieutenant Colonel C. C. Wright, and the Shank Company, by George H. Shank, president, Cost.at the cost stated therein, namely, $2,500,000, with such changes in said plans and specifications as may be required by the Secretary of the Treasury to adapt said specified buildings to the needs and purposes of the Public Health Service, at a total limit of cost not to exceed $3,000,000. Changes to be made, on execution.b.In carrying the foregoing authorization into effect, the Secretary of the Treasury is authorized to execute the contract with The Shank Company hereinbefore specified, with such verbal changes as are made necessary by a change m the contracting officers, and to assume all obligations in said contract contained, and to purchase materials and labor in the open market, or otherwise, and to employ laborers and mechanics for the construction of such buildings and their equipment as in his judgment shall best meet the public exigencies, within the limits of cost herein authorized.
Dawson Springs,Ky.Donated land, etc.c.At Dawson Springs, Kentucky, on land to be acquired by gift, the necessary buildings for a sanatorium having a capacity of not Cost.less than five hundred beds. The sum of $1,500,000 is hereby authorized for the construction of such sanatorium. Norfolk, Va. Cost.d.The sum of $900,000 is hereby authorized for the construction, including site, of a hospital plant complete at Norfolk, Virginia. District of Columbia.Cost.e.The sum of $550,000 is hereby authorized for the construction, on land owned by the Government, on a site to be selected by the Secretary of the Treasury with the approval of the President, of a hospital plant complete in the District of Columbia or vicinity.
Marine Hospital,Stapleton, N. Y.Cost.f.The sum of $190,000 is hereby authorized for additional hospital accommodations, including such minor alteration in and remodeling of existing and authorized buildings as may be necessary to economically adapt them to the additional accommodations herein authorized for the Marine Hospital at Stapleton, Staten Island, New York, PublicLaws,2d sess., p. 467.the sum appropriated for additions to the said hospital by the Act approved March twenty-eighth, nineteen hundred and eighteen, is authorized to be expended in full without the construction of psychiatric units.
Sec. 8. General construction, equipment, etc., conditions.In carrying the foregoing authorization into effect, all new construction work herein authorized shall, as far as feasible, be of fire resisting character, and the Secretary of the Treasury is authorized to enter into contracts for the construction, equipment, and so forth, of such buildings on Government owned lands, or lands acquired for such purpose, to purchase materials and labor in the open market, or otherwise, and to employ laborers and mechanics for the construction of such buildings and their equipment as in his judgment shall best meet the public exigencies, within the limits of cost herein authorized.
Sec. 9.Appropriations for construction, equipment, etc.For the purpose of carrying the foregoing authorization into effect, there is hereby appropriated, out of any moneys in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, to be immediately available and remain available until expended, the sum of $8,840,000, and for furniture and equipment not otherwise provided for, the sum of $210,000; in all, $9,050,000. Sec. 10. Technical, etc., services, to be regardless of civil service laws, etc.And the Secretary of the Treasury is hereby authorized, in his discretion, to employ, for service within or without the District 1305 of Columbia, without regard to civil-service laws, rules, and regulations, and to pay from the sums hereby authorized and appropriated for construction purposes, at customary rates of compensation, such additional technical and clerical services as may be necessary, exclusively to aid in the preparation of the drawings and specifications for the above-named objects and supervision of the execution thereof, for traveling expenses, and printing incident thereto, at a total limit Limit.of cost for such additional technical and clerical services and traveling expenses, and so forth, of not exceeding $210,000 of the above-named limit of cost.
All of the above-mentioned work shall be under Supervision.the direction and supervision of the Surgeon General of the Public Health Service, subject to the approval of the Secretary of the Treasury. Sec. 11.There is hereby appropriated, out of any moneys in the Public Health Service. 1919.Treasury not otherwise appropriated, for necessary personnel, including regular and reserve commissioned officers of the Public Health Service and clerical help in the District of Columbia and elsewhere, and maintenance, hospital supplies and equipment, leases, fuel, lights, and water, and freight, transportation, and travel, and reasonable burial expenses (not exceeding $100 for any patient dying in hospital), $785,333 for the fiscal year ending June thirtieth, nineteen hundred and nineteen.
Approved, March 3, 1919.