White House Threaten Veto on House FY 2017 E&W Bill

Posted on May 24, 2016

This week, the House is expected to consider on the House Floor HR 5055, Energy and Water Appropriations for FY 2017. The bill provides a total of $37.4 billion in funding subject to discretionary caps for FY 2017 for the Energy Department and federal water projects, $259 million more than comparable FY 2016 funding and $168 million more than requested. On a programmatic level, after factoring out rescissions and other scorekeeping adjustments, it provides a total of $37.7 billion to the departments and agencies funded by the measure, $350 million more than the current level and $88 million more than requested. Compared with current funding, the measure increases funding for the Army Corps of Engineers by 2%, nuclear weapons activities by 4% and fossil fuels energy research by 2%. It decreases funding for nuclear nonproliferation programs by 6%, the Bureau of Reclamation by 10% and research on renewable-energy programs by 12%.

The White House has issued a veto threat though a Statement of Administrative Policy (SAP) late yesterday. The Administration cites the failure to adequately or robustly fund energy research accounts. This is not the first, nor likely the last veto threat of the fiscal year.

Read the SAP here.

House FY2017 CJS Mark Up Tuesday Morning

Posted on May 23, 2016May 24, 2016

The full House Appropriations Committee will mark up the FY2017 CJS bill tomorrow at 10:30am EST, more details can be found here.

The Committee Report is here, and the legislative text can be found here.

Overall, the legislation contains $56 billion in total discretionary funding, an increase of $279 million over FY2016 and $1.4 billion above the President’s request for these programs. Big bumps were given to Department of Justice programs, which received $29 billion, an increase of $347 million above the FY2016 enacted level including large bumps given to the FBI, DEA, ATF, and the Executive Office for Immigration Review. Within this funding, priority is given to critical activities that protect the safety, rights, and property of individuals and families across the nation. The bill includes $103 million for programs to help stem this abuse – the full amount recently authorized by the House-passed Comprehensive Opioid Abuse Reduction Act of 2016. This includes funding for activities such as drug courts, treatment, and prescription drug monitoring.

Other highlights include:

National Science Foundation (NSF)

For NSF, the FY2017 bill would fund the NSF at $7.407 billion, $57 million less than FY2016 enacted. Under NSF, Research and Related Activities would receive $6.08 billion, a $46 million increase and Education and Human Resources would be level-funded at $880 million.

Unlike the House’s FY2016 CJS mark, there is no language on funding levels for specific directorates.
Major Research Equipment and Facilities Construction (MREFC) would receive $87.1 million, a $113 million decrease from the FY2016 enacted amount.

Included in the committee report is language of note on both Peer Review and Grant Abstracts.

“Peer review.—The Committee has long been supportive of NSF’s peer review process to identify and recommend funding for scientifically meritorious research. NSF’s ability to fund cutting-edge research helps keep the United States at the forefront of research across all scientific disciplines, which in turn builds the technological capabilities that underpin economic growth and prosperity.”

“Abstracts.—The Committee directs NSF to continue its efforts to ensure that award abstracts clearly explain in plain English the intent of the project and how the project meets both the intellectual merit and the broader impact review criterion. Improving the peer review process and project abstracts are critical to protecting NSF’s stellar scientific integrity. The abstracts serve as a public justification for NSF funding decisions by articulating how the project serves the national interest, consistent with the Foundation’s mission as established in the National Science Foundation Act of 1950 (42 U.S.C. 1861 et seq). The Committee believes that abstracts should explain how a project increases economic competitiveness in the United States; advances the health and welfare of the American public; develops an American STEM workforce, including computer science and information technology sectors, that are globally competitive; increases public scientific literacy and public engagement with science and technology in the United States; increases partnerships between academia and industry in the United States; supports the national defense of the United States; or promotes the progress of science for the United States.”

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)

For NASA, the bill would provide $19.5 billion, a $223 million increase from the FY2016 enacted level. The Science Directorate would receive $5.597 billion, an increase of $8 million. Space Grant would be level-funded at $40 million. Aeronautics would receive $712 million, an increase of $72 million and Space Technology would receive $739 million, a $52 million increase.

National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)

The legislation contains $5.6 billion for NOAA, which is $185 million below the enacted level and $268 million below the President’s request. Funding is targeted to important priorities such as the National Weather Service, which receives $1.1 billion – $12 million above the President’s request.

The bill also includes full funding for the continuation of the current Joint Polar Satellite System weather satellite program and the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite program to help maintain and improve weather forecasting to warn communities about potentially devastating natural disasters.

To make these investments, the bill reduces funding in lower-priority NOAA activities such as climate research, ocean services, and others.

Programs of note include:

National Ocean Service’s Integrated Ocean Observing System Regional Observations received $31.5 million, which is a $2 million increase.
The Office of Ocean and Atmospheric Research’s Climate Laboratories and Cooperative Institutes account received $50 million, which is a $10 million cut from FY2016. That said, there is interesting language regarding this account included in the Committee report (see below).

Also included was language of note on Extramural Research, NMFS Cooperative Research, OAR’s Independent Analysis, OAR’s Weather and Air Chemistry Research, OAR’s Labs and Cooperative Institutes, and language on Ocean Acidification.

“Extramural research.—The Committee believes that NOAA benefits from collaboration with academia and the private sector through cooperative institutes and competitive research. These relationships build broad community engagement, leverage external funding for mission-oriented research, strengthen the science within NOAA, and advance scientific knowledge.”

NMFS

“Cooperative research.—The recommendation includes $12,000,000 within Fisheries Data Collections, Surveys and Assessments for cooperative research, which shall be used to support external, independent data collection and other research. The Committee expects that all funding provided shall be used for cooperative fisheries research and not for NOAA activities or administrative overhead costs. NOAA shall submit a report no later than 90 days after enactment of this Act listing all cooperative research grants funded in fiscal year 2016, to include the amount, the fishery, the type of information collected, and the expected uses for that data. The Committee is concerned that cooperative research is not ingested into fishery stock assessments in a timely manner. The report shall address NOAA procedures and timeframes for making use of this independent fisheries research.”

OAR

“Independent analysis.—NOAA is encouraged to increase funding for academia to perform independent climate model evaluation studies and to enable the production of atmospheric data sets from satellite observations for such studies. Satellite observations of the atmosphere provide information that is critical in the interpretation of Earth-based observations and in the evaluation and improvement of climate model simulations.”

“Weather and Air Chemistry Research.—The Committee includes $118,158,000 for Weather and Air Chemistry Research, an increase of $15,000,000 above fiscal year 2016, and encourages NOAA to continue research efforts that lead to near-term, affordable, and attainable advances in observational, computing, and modeling capabilities to deliver substantial improvements in weather forecasting for the protection of life and property. NOAA shall substantially accelerate the transition of its research to operations in ways easily adopted by the operational forecasting community.”

“Laboratories and Cooperative Institutes.—The Committee recognizes the important role that the coordinated NOAA Laboratories and Cooperative Institutes play in fulfilling NOAA’s Mission Goals and Strategic Plan. To continue to fulfill NOAA’s mission, NOAA should enhance its support of advanced monitoring and predictive modeling to explore deep water issues and their effect on the U.S. coastline. The Committee encourages NOAA to expand the role Cooperative Institutes play in fulfilling this role, and to consider how additional Cooperative Institutes, or consortia partners, could strengthen NOAA’s ability to support this monitoring and modeling.”

“Integrated Ocean Acidification Research.—The Committee encourages NOAA, in coordination with the Office of Science and Technology Policy, to implement a program to competitively award prizes under the Stevenson-Wydler Technology Innovation Act of 1980 (15 U.S.C. 3719) to stimulate innovation to advance the understanding, research, or monitoring of ocean acidification or its impacts; or to develop management or adaptation options for responding to ocean acidification. In prize competitions, the Committee encourages NOAA to prioritize communities, environments, or industries that are in distress due to the impacts of ocean acidification.”

“Adaptation and mitigation for ocean acidification.—The Committee encourages NOAA to continue to develop ocean monitoring and modeling capabilities, as well as vulnerability assessments, necessary to support research on innovative methods to mitigate and adapt to ocean acidification, such as biological uptake and iron fertilization. As GAO noted in its 2014 report on ocean acidification, the Federal Government has yet to develop adaptation and mitigation strategies as required by the Federal Ocean Acidification Research and Monitoring Act of 2009. The Committee encourages NOAA to actively pursue the research necessary to develop these strategies.”

House Keeps Moving on Appropriations

Posted on May 23, 2016October 5, 2016

This week, the House is expected to move the FY2017 E&W bill on the Floor while the House Appropriations Committee is expected to mark up FY 2017 CJS and T-HUD bills in full committee and FY 2017 Interior in subcommittee.

The House FY2017 E&W bill provides a total of $37.4 billion in funding subject to discretionary caps for FY 2017 for the Energy Department and federal water projects, $259 million more than comparable FY 2016 funding and $168 million more than requested. On a programmatic level, after factoring out rescissions and other scorekeeping adjustments, it provides a total of $37.7 billion to the departments and agencies funded by the measure, $350 million more than the current level and $88 million more than requested.

Compared with current funding, the measure increases funding for the Army Corps of Engineers by 2%, nuclear weapons activities by 4% and fossil fuels energy research by 2%. It decreases funding for nuclear nonproliferation programs by 6%, the Bureau of Reclamation by 10% and research on renewable-energy programs by 12%.

Democrats object to several policy provisions, including those that would prohibit funding for certain regulatory activities and those that would require that water in Northern California be diverted south for agricultural and other uses. The bill is expected to be considered under an open rule.

More information about the House FY2017 CJS and Interior bill will be posted as it is made available.

What We’re Reading This Week, May 16-20

Posted on May 19, 2016May 19, 2016

Here’s a selection of articles the Federal Relations team is enjoying this week.

Chaos Ensues – The House floor devolved into chaos and shouting on Thursday as a measure to ensure protections for members of the LGBT community narrowly failed to pass after Republican leaders urged their members to change their votes. Read more at The Hill.

Choiceless – The $10 billion Veterans Choice program, created two years ago, was supposed to cut down on wait times and let veterans see private doctors, but now, the faltering program needs an overhaul as numbers, including waits, have skyrocketed. Read more at NPR.

Mo’ Money, But Still Less in Schools Than Before – the Center for Budgeting and Policy Priorities has a new report out on the trends of state support for public institutions. Though some states have begun to restore some of the deep cuts in financial support for public two- and four-year colleges since the recession hit, their support remains far below previous levels. In total, after adjusting for inflation, of the states that have enacted full higher education budgets for the current school year, funding for public two- and four-year colleges is $8.7 billion below what it was just prior to the recession. Read the report at CBPP.

STEM – The third annual U.S. News/Raytheon STEM Index, out this week, says the US is probably going to have to depend on foreign workers to fill future STEM jobs. The number of graduates who earned STEM masters’ and doctorate degrees rose by 6 percent in 2015. STEM hiring also increased, but there’s still a shortage of STEM workers. Read more at US News.

Alpha Trump – A controversial long-form piece on how Donald Trump has treated women who have worked for him, dated him, or just been in his orbit. Read it at the New York Times.

Legacy Building – The Administration is a flurry of activity as various agencies finalize a host of regulations— nearly one-third faster in its final year than during the previous three — all to beat a May 23 deadline to prevent a President Donald Trump from overturning them. Read more at Politico.

Boom and Bust – The Corinthian Fifteen— students of the now defunct for-profit college who organized a “debt strike,” refusing to repay their student loans even at the risk of going into default—were among the millions of students who enrolled at for-profit universities during the last ten years. Students who went to these schools have come to account for a disproportionate share of the country’s unpaid student-loan balance; they also default at higher rates than other students. So theses student have been bearing a particular burden in the broader student-debt crisis, which has, since 2010, seen student loans overtake credit-card debt and car loans as the second-largest form of outstanding debt in the US. Read more in The New Yorker.

Due Process and Sexual Assault – Citing an erosion of free speech and due process on college campuses, a group of 21 law professors on Monday released an open letter alleging that the U.S. Department of Education has unlawfully expanded how colleges must define and respond to allegations of sexual assault and harassment. The same argument has been made frequently in recent months by Republican lawmakers who say that the department’s Office for Civil Rights illegally created new regulations through a series of documents instructing colleges how to handle cases of sexual misconduct. Read more at Inside Higher Education.

Potty Breaking the Federal Funds – The federal government says that as a condition of receiving federal funds, schools must comply with Title IX, which says schools may not discriminate based on a student’s sex. How would that impact state and local schools that receive federal funds? Read more at CNN.

Top 7 – Justice Scalia’s absence continues to loom over the court in many ways. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court still has some vital cases on the docket, and no near term replacement to take the split from 4-4. Read more about the cases in Vox.

Majestic Squirrels – UC Berkeley researchers are researching the communication habits of squirrels, and apparently they’re a lot like us! They too get annoyed when you take their stuff away. Read more at Slate.

House Releases FY2017 CJS

Posted on May 17, 2016

The House Appropriations Committee today released their FY2017 Commerce-Justice-Science (CJS) appropriations bill that would provide $56 billion, which is a 0.5 percent increase from current spending, and $1.4 billion over the Administration’s request.

The bill, which will be marked up in subcommittee Wednesday, would give modest spending boosts to several law enforcement agencies including the FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration.

In science related topics, NASA would receive $19.5 billion, which is a $223 million increase and $1.2 billion above the President’s request. The bill includes $5.6 billion for NASA Science programs – $8 million above the 2016 enacted level and $295 million above the Administration’s request. This targets funding to planetary science, astrophysics, and heliophysics to ensure the continuation of critical research and development programs, while reducing funding for lower-priority research.

However, the NSF would see a slight funding dip; it will get $7.4 billion, which is $57 million below FY2016 andl and $150 million below the Administration’s request. That said, NSF would receive a $46 million increase for research and related activities to $680 million, including funding for programs that relate to STEM education. Offsets for the increase are in targeted reductions to equipment and construction costs.

Of note, the legislation also includes several conservative policy provisions, including a prohibition on the transfer or release of Guantanamo detainees into the United States, language designed to protect gun rights, and anti-abortion rights provisions. All provisions nearly guaranteed to warrant a veto threat from the White House.

Read the overview here.

Read the text of the legislation here.