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Category: Higher Education

House Considers Charitable Tax Extenders

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Last week, the House voted to renew most extenders for one year — restoring them for the current 2014 tax year so that companies and individuals can make use of the breaks when filing their 2014 tax returns. The Senate expects to clear that measure in the coming days.

Today, the House considered HR 5806, the Support America’s Charitities Act, which would make permanent a number of popular charitable tax provisions related to food contributions, conservation property and contributions from certain retirement accounts to charitable entities..

The measure’s provisions were previously passed by the House as part of December’s one-year tax extender bill (HR5771) passed last week. This measure, however, makes these provisions permanent.

Of not for universities,  the legislation would make permanent the rule allowing certain tax-free distributions from individual retirement accounts (IRAs) for charitable purposes. Taxpayers must be at least 70-and-a-half years old and make distributions of $100,000 or less per year directly to a qualifying charitable organization.  According to the House Ways and Means Committee, in the first two years that the IRA provision was available, it led to more than $140 million in charitable donations, with the median gift just under $4,500. The Joint Committee on Tax has previously estimated that enacting this provision would reduce revenues, and thus increase federal budget deficits, by about $8.4 billion over 10 years.

The measure is noncontroversial and is expected to pass under suspension of the rules. It is unlikely the Senate will consider the bill. The Administration issued a Statement of Administrative Policy against the legislation, which included a veto threat.

Congressman Rush Holt to lead AAAS

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Congressman Rush D. Holt, Ph.D., who is retiring from the U.S. House of Representatives at the end of this year, has agreed to become chief executive officer and executive publisher of the Science family of journals for American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS),

He will succeed Alan I. Leshner, Ph.D., who had previously announced that he would be stepping down as AAAS CEO.

Congressman Holt has represented Central New Jersey (12th District) in Congress since 1999. He earned his B.A. degree in physics from Carleton College in Minnesota, and he completed his Master’s and doctoral degrees at New York University. In 1982-83, while he was teaching physics and public policy at Swarthmore College, Holt was selected by the American Physical Society to receive a highly competitive AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellowship. 

On Capitol Hill, Holt has established a long track record of advocacy for federal investment in research and development, science education, and innovation. Over the course of his career, Holt has held positions as a teacher and as an arms control expert at the U.S. State Department. From 1989 until 1998, he served as Assistant Director of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, the largest research facility of Princeton University. As a result of his alternative-energy research, Holt in 1981 was issued a patent on an improved solar-pond technology for harnessing energy from sunlight. He also famously beat IBM supercomputer Watson in a “Jeopardy!” exhibition game intended to promote innovation.

Holt, a research physicist and former teacher, will serve as the 18th chief executive of the 166-year-old non-profit, non-partisan AAAS after his legislative term ends, during the association’s 2015 Annual Meeting, February 12-16, in San Jose, Ca.

HELP Committee Passes ESRA

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This morning, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee marked up a bill to reauthorize the Education Sciences Reform Act or ESRA. The Senate Committee passed voice vote a bipartisan substitute amendment that closely tracks the House-passed version of this bill, H.R. 4366, the Strengthening Education through Research Act. The House passed the bill in March of this year.

ESRA authorizes education research activities at the Institute of Education Sciences, which is the research arm of the Department of Education.

The Senate version of ESRA represents a bipartisan, bicameral agreement on H.R. 4366.  After it is approved by the full Senate, the House is expected to approve the Senate’s changes to the bill before it goes to the President.

The schedule for Senate floor action and final House action is not yet clear. It is unlikely the bill receive final Congressional approval before the November elections.

House Passes VA Conference Report

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The conference report to accompany H.R. 3230 (reported earlier on the Federal Affairs Blog) was adopted by the House – 420 Yeas, 5 Nays.

The Senate is expected to pass it later this week.

McCaskill Introduces Sexual Assault Legislation

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Today US Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO) is introducing The Bipartisan Campus Accountability and Safety Act. The legislation will address sexual assault on college and university campuses throughout the nation. The bill has bipartisan support with sponsorship from Republican Senators Heller (R-NV), Grassley (R-IA), Ayotte (R-NH) and Rubio (R-FL) and Democratic Senators Blumenthal (D-CT) and Gillibrand (D-NY). Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) will introduce a companion bill in the House.

Key provisions of the bill include:

  • Establishing new campus resources and support services for student survivors of sexual assault.
  • Ensuring minimum training standards for on-campus personnel.
  • Creating new historic transparency requirements.
  • Increasing campus accountability and coordination with law enforcement.
  • Establishing enforceable Title IX penalties and stiffer penalties for Clery Act violations.

Earlier this summer, McCaskill held a series of roundtable discussions on campus sexual assault and requested over 400 colleges and universities complete a survey on the topic as well.