Monday, December 2, 2002

BY JEANNINE AVERSA THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON -- The last time Andrew Jackson got a makeover, he ended up with a big head, slightly off-center. This time, he will get a little color. The most noticeable features of the last redesign of U.S. currency -- the oversized, off-center portraits -- produced all kinds of derisive nicknames: funny money, Monopoly money, cartoon money. Color is coming, and government money makers are hoping for a warmer reception for the changes. The new $20 bill, with its public unveiling set for the spring, is supposed to be in circulation as early as next fall. Jackson is first in line for a makeover. After the new $20 bill makes its debut, the new $50 bill (Ulysses S. Grant) and the $100 bill (Benjamin Franklin) follow within 18 months. In the works is a five-year effort, costing up to $53 million, to educate people about the changes. An important goal is to help distinguish between genuine greenbacks and bogus bills. To give the new bills color, the Bureau of Engraving and Printing has had to buy five printing presses, to operate in Washington and at a bureau facility in Fort Worth, Texas. To run the new presses, bureau director Thomas Ferguson said, some workers are being trained, and a few new people have been hired. The Fort Worth plant is being expanded, providing room for the new presses and space for public tours. Adding color to the notes is a challenge. "It is new, and anything that is new provides another opportunity to do well -- or not," Ferguson said. Green and black ink is now used on neutral-colored paper. With the makeover, color tints will be added in the neutral areas of the note. Ferguson would not say which colors will be used, but said they will vary by denomination. Money makers want the new notes to have an American look and feel.

"When we look at something as fundamentally revolution- ary as adding color, going from a currency system that has been monochromatic certainly for all of our lives, our parents' lives, . . . we want to do it in a responsible way that recognizes that tradition," Ferguson said. "So that when people around the world see that first new U.S. $20, they will know it as a U.S. $20."

-- Anonymous, December 02, 2002