The National Science Foundation (NSF) has released details on how it will spend funding provided in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

Key points of the NSF plan include the following:

• NSF will use a large share of its ARRA funding to address the backlog of existing proposals.  The notice states, “With the exception of the Major Research Instrumentation, Academic Research Infrastructure and Science Masters programs, the majority of proposals eligible for Recovery Act funding include those that are already in house and will be reviewed and/or awarded prior to September 30, 2009…NSF also will consider proposals declined on or after October 1, 2008.”
• Proposals supported with ARRA funds will have to be expended in a timely fashion. The notice states, “Given the goals of the Recovery Act, awardees will be informed that they are expected to expend funds in a timely manner on allowable award costs and that NSF will be monitoring awards for expenditures. If, after 12 months, no allowable expenditures have taken place, NSF may consider reducing or terminating the award and reallocating the funds.”
• All grants issued with Recovery Act funds will be standard grants with durations of up to five years. The notice says this approach “will allow NSF to structure a sustainable portfolio.”
• Funding for new principal investigators and high-risk, high-return research will be a top priority for ARRA funding.

On March 19th, the Senate confirmed John Holdren as Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and Jane Lubchenco as Administrator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Both nominations had been placed on hold. Some senators attempted to bring about changes in unrelated legislative issues by blocking the nominations. However, the legislative tactic was dropped and the nominations moved forward without much objection to the actual nominees.

On the same day, NOAA budget officials expressed gratitude for the FY09 increase in NOAA research funding. By the end of April, NOAA should have details on its website about FY09 programs and projects funded. NOAA officials also expressed concerns about the ability of Grants.gov to handle the surge in traffic related to Recovery Act funding, given that the system experiences difficulties under normal circumstances. The possibility exists that grantmaking agencies could temporarily go back to a paper submission process. NOAA revealed that the FY10 budget development process is taking place slowly, and that the release of the President’s budget request could be after May 1st. NOAA remains undecided on how it will use much of the funding provided in the Recovery Act, but expects to release details by mid-April.

March 23-27 — Senate is expected to debate and vote on national service legislation (HR 1388).

March 25 — House and Senate Budget committees are likely to mark up their respective versions of a fiscal 2010 budget resolution.

March 25-26 — House is expected to debate and clear public lands legislation (HR 146).

In the Future

March 31 — Election in New York’s 20th District to replace Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand.

April 6-17 — Spring recess in House and Senate.

April 7 — General election in Illinois’ 5th District to replace Democrat Rahm Emanuel.

May 19 — Single-ballot primary election in California’s 32nd District to replace Democrat Hilda L. Solis.

Source: CQ

The National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges (NASULGC) has prepared the following summary of the March 19th House Science Committee Hearing on the use of funding for science provided in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

NASULGC Summary

The House Science Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight held a hearing on Thursday, March 19, on accountability and transparency related to investments of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funds in science.  Titled, “Follow the Money: Accountability and Transparency in Recovery Act Science Funding,” the hearing was convened by Subcommittee Chairman Brad Miller (D-NC) and attended by Ranking Member Paul Broun (R-GA), Rep. Kathy Dahlkemper (D-PA), and Rep. Brian Bilbray (R-CA).

The hearing was comprised of two panels:  1) “Senior Accountability Officers” responsible for planning for spending ARRA funds from the National Science Foundation (NSF), NASA, Department of Commerce (DOC), and Department of Energy (DOE); and 2) the Inspectors General from NSF, DOE, DOC, a representative from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) and a Research Fellow from George Mason University. Read more

The National Center for Research Resources, part of the National Institutes of Health, will hold a videocast on Monday, March 23, 2009, 1:00 – 2:30 p.m. EDT, to respond to questions about the application process for core facilities improvement projects (RFA-RR-09-007) and construction, renovation and repair improvement projects (RFA-RR-09-008). This session will replace the previously planned Web seminar that experienced technical difficulties. The videocast is open to the public.

Prior to the videocast, please review the NCRR staff slides from the March 16 Web seminar and the FAQs as many questions and answers already have been addressed and are available on our Web site.
• Overview Slides
• FAQ — Extramural Research Facilities Improvement Program (C06)
• FAQ — Core Facility Renovation, Repair and Improvement (G20)

If you have questions that are not addressed above, please submit them to constructionncrr@mail.nih.gov. This mailbox is open now, and will be open during the videocast. The videocast will be archived and available on the NCRR Web site after the session.

Videocast Details
Date: Monday, March 23, 2009
Time: 1:00 – 2:30 p.m. EDT
URL: http://videocast.nih.gov
Questions: constructionncrr@mail.nih.gov

To learn more about videocasting, visit videocast.nih.gov/faq. It is a good idea to visit this site prior to March 23 to make sure that you have the right software to view the videocast. For more information and updates about funding opportunities under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 visit NCRR’s ARRA information page, on the Web at www.ncrr.nih.gov/recovery.

The Roll Call newspaper, which is popular among DC politicos, recently released a ranking of the clout that the various state delegations hold in the 111th Congress. In determining the rankings, Roll Call staff assign points to each state based on several factors, including:

• size of the delegation
• number of full committee chairmen and ranking members
• number of Members on the most influential committees
• top leadership posts
• number of Members in the majority party
• per capita federal spending received
• seniority, and
• power rating of the opponents.

The state of Washington moved up one slot to 14 out of 50 for the current Congress. Washington made a dramatic jump in the ranking, from 30 to 15, after the 2006 election when the leadership of Congress changed parties. The top 3 states in the ranking have consistently included California, New York, and Texas -since the criteria utilized heavily favors large states. The Roll Call article, written with an admitted inspiration from the NCAA college basketball tournament, provides a colorful explanation of the ranking.

The beginning of the annual federal appropriations process is a popular time for association and university staff to visit Senators and Representatives to impress upon them the value that research and learning is adding to their particular fields.  The University of Washington is no exception.  The support of Members of Congress is necessary to ensure that adequate funding is part of the national budget. During the past several weeks, the Office of Federal Relations has been pleased to assist with the following DC visits:

Professor Ken Creager, Department of Earth and Space Sciences, attended a board of directors meeting of Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology (IRIS) the first week of February.  IRIS has a data management center located near the UW campus where it collects, stores, and distributes information from numerous seismic networks around the globe.  IRIS is funded by the National Science Foundation.  Professor Creager met with Washington state Members’ office to request additional funding (in the FY 09 Interior Appropriations Act) that will allow them to also manage the data generated by the US Geological Survey’s Advanced National Seismic System. 

Professor Bruce Balick, Department of Astronomy, and Vice Chair of the Faculty Senate, was in DC on February 20th to discuss with Members’ offices the goals of the UW’s Climate Action Plan (CAP).  The goal of CAP is to create an environmentally sustainable campus; UW has committed itself to this goal as part of the American College and University Presidents’ Climate Commitment. Professor Balick emphasized the need for long term federal strategy around climate change research and related funding opportunities.  He also offered the university’s expertise in development of this strategy.

Associate Dean Deborah McCutchen, College of Education, represented Dean Patricia Wasley, at the Advocacy Conference for Learning and Education Academic Research Network (LEARN) the end of February.  LEARN is a coalition of research colleges of education that advocates investment in multi-disciplinary research to advance the scientific understanding of learning and development.  Currently the Department of Education invests less than 1% of its overall budget to education research.  LEARN is requesting that amount be doubled.

Also at the end of February, Professor Uri Shumlak, Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics and Associate Professor Brian Nelson, Department of Electric Engineering, were here for Fusion Day.  The focus was on educating the Washington state delegation about fusion energy in general and specifically the fusion energy research that is being done at the UW.  The concern is that the Department of Energy continue to fund domestic programs and not international ones.

UW President Mark Emmert  and Randy Hodgins, Interim Vice President of External Relations and Director of State Relations, met with Members of the Washington state delegation on March 10th and 11th to discuss the university’s federal agenda issues and what they would like to see included in the FY 10 Appropriations budget.  Christy Gullion, Director of Federal Relations, accompanied them on the meetings to Capitol Hill.  The list of projects that the UW is requesting funding for in the FY 10 budget can be found on this website.

Also on March 11th Professor Anthony Geist, Chair of Spanish and Portuguese Studies, attended the 2009 conference of the National Humanities Alliance and met with staff on the Hill to ask for increased funding to support the humanities and the work being done at schools such as the UW.  The UW Simpson Center for the Humanities has focused on how digital technologies can transform the way knowledge is researched, taught, and shared.  The Center now has a $625,000 challenge grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to create the Digital Humanities Commons.  Each year four faculty members and four graduate students will be chosen to explore how the next generation of technology can change research and teaching in the humanities.  The goals of the Commons are to animate knowledge (add interactive features), circulate knowledge (to the larger public), and to understand digital culture. 

Note:  Please contact the UW Office of Federal Relations to assist in scheduling visits to Washington state delegation offices.  202-624-1420.

The Association of American Universities (AAU) and the Council on Government Relations (COGR) recently sent a letter to Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Directer Peter Orszag on the need to overhaul the Grants.gov system. AAU and COGR explain that Grants.gov, initiated as a unified grants application and submission portal, has proven unable to cope with the volume of grant submissions -even under normal circumstances. They go on to express that the volume of applications generated by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act will only worsen the situation.  Read more

House and Senate Budget Committees are on course to consider a fiscal year 2010 budget resolution during the week of March 23rd. A budget resolution sets parameters for the spending and tax provisions of the detailed appropriations bills that emerge from Congress. A budget resolution identifies priorities of the majority party for both the upcoming fiscal year and the future. The FY10 budget process will likely set the stage for several priorities inclusding an overhaul of the health care system, curbing greenhouse gas emissions through a cap-and-trade system, and making Pell Grants an entitlement. President Obama released a FY10 budget blueprint last month. However, a detailed budget request from the President is not expected until late April. Nonetheless, Democratic leaders in Congress hope to have a budget resolution passed by early April -ahead of a two week congressional recess. Passing a budget resolution may prove difficult this year, particularly in the Senate, as there is considerable disagreement over where spending should be cut going forward. The movement of actual appropriations bills will likely take place over the course of the summer and into the fall.

The Department of Health and Human Services has created an office to coordinate distribution of $137 billion provided in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. HHS to date has distributed $3.3 billion in Recovery Act funds to states for Medicaid. For more on HHS activities funded through the Recovery Act, visit www.hhs.gov/recovery.

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