Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Last Week in Washington - 3/30/09
Budget resolutions will be moving in both the House and Senate next week. Please help ward off cuts to domestic discretionary spending and increases in tax cuts in the Senate.
The House and Senate will take up their respective versions of the budget resolution this week. We are not expecting difficult amendments to be offered during the House debate, so the “ask” for moderate legislators is to support the final resolution.
The Senate debate is likely to be quite contentious and votes on a number of difficult amendments are expected. The “ask” for moderate Senators is to oppose any amendment to cut discretionary spending or increase tax cuts, especially if those tax cuts are not assumed to be paid for.
Brief summary of House and Senate resolutions. Both resolutions would facilitate legislation to carry out President Obama’s main initiatives: health care reform, climate change/energy legislation, strengthening education, and start to address the long-term fiscal problem.
Discretionary: The House resolution reduces non-defense discretionary (including international) funding by $7 billion below the President’s request. The Senate resolution reduces non-defense discretionary spending by $15 billion below the President’s request. The remaining increases are quite modest when put into proper perspective.
The House budget resolution assumes domestic discretionary (excluding international) funding would be increased by 3.5 percent above 2009 levels, taking into account inflation and factoring out a must-do increase for the decennial Census and a technical increase for a Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loan program.
The Senate budget resolution assumes an increase of just 1.5 percent over last year’s levels, taking into account inflation and factoring out a must-do increase for the decennial Census and a technical increase for a Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loan program. (The President would provide an increase of 3.9 percent for domestic discretionary programs, making the same adjustments for inflation, the Census and FHA loan guarantees.)
Mandatory: The House resolution includes “reconciliation instructions” to the Energy and Commerce and Ways and Means Committees for health care reform legislation, and to the Education and Labor Committee, for higher education, presumably to accommodate the President’s proposal to end the Family Federal Student Loan program and use the savings to increase federal Pell grants. The Senate resolution includes no reconciliation instructions, but this will be an open issue for conference. If the reconciliation process is triggered, it mainly affects consideration of legislation in the Senate. The time for consideration would be limited, the types of provisions that could be included would be limited as would the types of amendments that could be offered, and the bill could not be filibustered, so only 50 votes would be needed.
Both the House and Senate resolutions include a number of deficit-neutral reserve funds for health care reform, climate change/energy, child nutrition, and higher education.
ACTION STEP Please contact Senator Voinovich and urge him to:
1) oppose further cuts in the discretionary spending levels; and
2) oppose any increases in tax cuts, especially in the estate tax, beyond what’s assumed in the resolution.
The decisions that get made this week could have a significant impact on policies that help the most vulnerable people in this country. So please weigh in to ensure the best possible outcome! If you need more info, contact me at ecampbell@communitysolutions.com.
The House and Senate will take up their respective versions of the budget resolution this week. We are not expecting difficult amendments to be offered during the House debate, so the “ask” for moderate legislators is to support the final resolution.
The Senate debate is likely to be quite contentious and votes on a number of difficult amendments are expected. The “ask” for moderate Senators is to oppose any amendment to cut discretionary spending or increase tax cuts, especially if those tax cuts are not assumed to be paid for.
Brief summary of House and Senate resolutions. Both resolutions would facilitate legislation to carry out President Obama’s main initiatives: health care reform, climate change/energy legislation, strengthening education, and start to address the long-term fiscal problem.
Discretionary: The House resolution reduces non-defense discretionary (including international) funding by $7 billion below the President’s request. The Senate resolution reduces non-defense discretionary spending by $15 billion below the President’s request. The remaining increases are quite modest when put into proper perspective.
The House budget resolution assumes domestic discretionary (excluding international) funding would be increased by 3.5 percent above 2009 levels, taking into account inflation and factoring out a must-do increase for the decennial Census and a technical increase for a Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loan program.
The Senate budget resolution assumes an increase of just 1.5 percent over last year’s levels, taking into account inflation and factoring out a must-do increase for the decennial Census and a technical increase for a Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loan program. (The President would provide an increase of 3.9 percent for domestic discretionary programs, making the same adjustments for inflation, the Census and FHA loan guarantees.)
Mandatory: The House resolution includes “reconciliation instructions” to the Energy and Commerce and Ways and Means Committees for health care reform legislation, and to the Education and Labor Committee, for higher education, presumably to accommodate the President’s proposal to end the Family Federal Student Loan program and use the savings to increase federal Pell grants. The Senate resolution includes no reconciliation instructions, but this will be an open issue for conference. If the reconciliation process is triggered, it mainly affects consideration of legislation in the Senate. The time for consideration would be limited, the types of provisions that could be included would be limited as would the types of amendments that could be offered, and the bill could not be filibustered, so only 50 votes would be needed.
Both the House and Senate resolutions include a number of deficit-neutral reserve funds for health care reform, climate change/energy, child nutrition, and higher education.
ACTION STEP Please contact Senator Voinovich and urge him to:
1) oppose further cuts in the discretionary spending levels; and
2) oppose any increases in tax cuts, especially in the estate tax, beyond what’s assumed in the resolution.
The decisions that get made this week could have a significant impact on policies that help the most vulnerable people in this country. So please weigh in to ensure the best possible outcome! If you need more info, contact me at ecampbell@communitysolutions.com.
