Domestic Spending to be Removed From Emergency Supplemental

Posted on July 21, 2010October 17, 2012

House leaders appear poised to acquiesce to the reality that the Senate lacks the votes to include funding for domestic priorities, such as saving K-12 teacher jobs and filling the Pell Grant shortfall, in the fiscal year 2010 emergency supplemental spending bill that is being considered on Capitol Hill. The supplemental spending bill is primarily intended to provide necessary funds for military efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as for disasters in the Gulf of Mexico and Haiti. Fiscal conservatives object to adding funds to the supplemental for domesitic priorities that are not paid-for by cuts elsewhere.

House leaders are now looking for other legislation to attach the education spending to… However, with their month-long recess now less than two weeks away, it’s unlikely that the situation will be quickly resolved.

Congress Returns to a Packed Three Week Agenda

Posted on July 12, 2010October 17, 2012

This week, Congress returns from its week-long July 4th state/district work period (recess) with a long list of things to do before it breaks again for 5 weeks at the end of the month. Foremost on the to-do list is passage of the FY10 supplemental spending bill that contains funding for military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, and emergency relief operations in Haiti and the Gulf of Mexico, as well as a total of $14.95 billion to save K-12 teacher jobs and sure-up the Pell Grant program in the House version. The addition of $23 billion for education and other domestic discretionary spending in the House bill is certain to complicate the pathforward for the legislation. Fiscally conservative members of both chambers oppose the expansion of the supplemental beyond the wars and disasters, despite the fact that some of the additional domestic spending is paid for by rescissions to unobligated funding made available in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The House and Senate face a very real deadline, as Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has stated that if a bill is not approved soon the agency will have to begin furloughing civilian employees and withholding pay for active duty military in August -an outcome that is virtually certain to be avoided. As a result, an outcome on the FY10 supplemental spending bill should be a few weeks away if the House intends to break by July 31st as is currently the plan.

The FY11 appropriations process will continue to limp along this week, as House and Senate Appropriations Committees will consider spending bills. Few, if any, FY11 bills are likely to come to a full vote in either chamber before the August recess.

Other issues for consideration on the Hill in the coming weeks include: Senate reauthorization of the America COMPETES Act, which authorizes annual increases for the NSF, DoE Office of Science, and NIST; final Senate approval of the financial overhaul bill; Senate committee consideration of clean energy legislation; and another attempt in the Senate to extend unemployment benefits. Some of these bills may need to wait for West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin to appoint a temporary replacement for the late Robert Byrd -expected in the coming days. The nation’s governors continue to push for a two quarter extension of the enhanced Federal Medical Assistance Percentage provided under ARRA. However, a path forward has yet to emerge from the Senate. The provision would mean $480 million for the State of Washington.

FY10 Supplemental Bill

Posted on June 30, 2010October 17, 2012

House Democrats intend to bring a scaled back version of the FY10 supplemental spending bill to the floor by the end of this week, with aid to school districts to prevent teacher layoffs reduced from $23 billion to $10 billion. The teacher funding is intended to help prevent layoffs for 140,000 school employees next year. The latest draft also includes funding for Pell Grants to address an unanticipated current year shortfall but the amount was reduced to $4.95 billion from $5.7 billion in this latest version. The Senate version of the bill does not including funding for K-12 teachers or for Pell Grants.

FY11 Appropriations Update

Posted on June 30, 2010October 17, 2012

On Tuesday, the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Justice-Science approved its FY11 draft bill, which would provide $60.5 billion in discretionary spending. The draft measure would provide $3.9 billion (6 percent) less than 2010 levels, mostly because of the significant increase provided last year to perform the census, and just $2.7 million less than President Obama requested. House Appropriations Chairman David Obey (D-WI) has said that discretionary spending in all of this year’s House appropriations bills, except for Homeland Security, will fall below the president’s request. The draft bill would, however, provide a healthy boost for most of the agencies and programs under the Commerce Department, including $5.5 billion in discretionary funding for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) representing a 17 percent increase above FY10 levels. The bill funds the Administration’s request for $26.4 billion for science programs, including $7.4 billion for the National Science Foundation (NSF).

Two additional markups are scheduled for today in the House: Agriculture and State-Foreign Operations.

FY11 Appropriations Process Moving Forward

Posted on June 28, 2010October 17, 2012

Members of Congress face a busy week as they attempt to advance some major bills before the start of the July Fourth recess. At the same time, the FY11 appropriations process may also begin to gear up this week and move forward after the July recess period.

House Democrats would like to approve the FY10 supplemental budget by the end of this week, which would provide critical war funding as well as some other “emergency” funding including money to help states prevent teacher layoffs. Democratic leaders are considering using a process where two separate votes would be taken; one for the war money and another for all the other funding. The supplemental plan now being circulated by Democrats would total $61.5 billion, and would include $10 billion to prevent K-12 teacher layoffs and $4.95 billion for Pell grants. The Pell grant funding would help fill a hole in the president’s budget request for FY11, and effectively free up discretionary spending for this year’s appropriations bills.

Meanwhile, we may see action on the FY11 appropriations process this week as the House Appropriations subcommittees begin to consider a series of FY11 spending bills. House appropriators could have half their bills approved at the subcommittee level by the end of the week, with five markups scheduled. The Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee approved its draft last week, and the following five subcommittees are set to meet in coming days: Commerce-Justice-Science (Tuesday); Agriculture and State-Foreign Operations (Wednesday); and Legislative Branch and Transportation-HUD (Thursday). However, most of these bills are not expected to be considered on the House floor before November, necessitating a long-term continuing resolution (CR). Republican appropriators have already signaled that they intend to offer amendments at the subcommittee mark-ups as they may not get another chance to express their concerns about federal spending until after the mid-term elections.

The Senate may also begin to move a few of their own spending measures. The Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee has suggested that a couple of the FY11 spending bills would be considered this week but the schedule is still unclear at this point. If markups for spending bills are scheduled this week and the committee follows past practices, both a subcommittee and full committee markup would be held for the bills considered.