(The following story was found on the Washington Post’s website on February 4 .)
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Bush’s $54.3 billion budget for the Department of Transportation budget in general would provide some increase for most programs, although not as much as some lawmakers have called for.
The highway trust fund would gain $600 million extra a year by putting the tax on gasohol into the fund instead of into the general treasury.
Amtrak’s budget would grow to $900 million, at least $600 million less than Amtrak President David Gunn says he will need to avoid a shutdown.
— Don Phillips
Agriculture Secretary Ann M. Veneman released what she called a “constrained” budget for 2004 yesterday that provides $74 billion for farm programs, food safety, conservation, nutrition, rural housing and food aid abroad.
The figure is 1.9 percent above last year’s budget, but the bulk of the increase is required by laws such as the Food Stamp Program and the 2002 Farm Bill. To implement the farm bill Congress approved in 2002, the department set aside $3.5 billion for conservation programs that protect wetlands, ground water, grasslands, wildlife habitat and other environmentally sensitive lands.
Discretionary programs — such as acquisition of private lands — would be cut by $300 million, to $20.2 billion.
The Consumer Federation of America vowed to fight a USDA plan to use new fees on meatpackers to pay for an increase in the food safety program. CFA’s Carol Tucker Foreman said the GOP-controlled Congress would be unlikely to approve the added fees, leaving the program with less money than last year.
— Dan Morgan
The Commerce Department’s spending authority would rise 5.2 percent, to $5.4 billion, under Bush’s budget, with much of the increase going to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
The White House said NOAA needs more funding — $3.325 billion in spending authority, a 6 percent increase over the estimated 2003 level — to improve severe-storm forecasts, the satellite infrastructure needed for weather and climate prediction, and fisheries and ocean programs. Partly offsetting that boost is a proposal to end the Advanced Technology Program, a Clinton administration favorite that helps fund promising high-tech ventures.
The Census Bureau budget would be reduced but Bush proposed to spend $147 million for the second of two new census buildings in Suitland, Md.
— Paul Blustein
The Department of Defense budget would grow by $15.3 billion, or 4 percent, from $364.6 billion to $379.9 billion. The proposed spending package would fund the F/A-22 stealth fighter and virtually all other new weapons systems in development and commit billions more to emerging technologies required to “transform” the military for the digital battlefield.
Big winners include shipbuilding at seven new ships and a budget of $12.2 billion, $2.7 billion more; missile defense at $9.1 billion, $1.5 billion more, and the Special Operations Command at $4.5 billion, $1.5 billion more. Overall, spending on procurement would increase from $70 billion to $72.7 billion, and spending on research and development would rise from $56.8 billion to $61.8 billion.
— Vernon Loeb
Proposed increases in the Title I program for disadvantaged students, in special education and in Pell Grants account for the 5.6 percent increase in the budget for the Department of Education.
Overall, the Bush plan includes $53.1 billion for education. Democrats say the increase is not as large as it appears because $1.9 billion of the $2.8 billion increase is slated to pay off past shortfalls in the Pell Grant program for low-income college students.
Also, Democrats complained, the $22.7 billion budgeted for funding the No Child Left Behind school law is only 1.9 percent greater than the amount budgeted when Congress passed the law in 2001.
The budget includes $75 million for pilot school choice and voucher programs, some of which could be administered by nonprofits.
— Michael Fletcher
Bush would increase the Energy Department budget’s by $1.3 billion, or nearly 6 percent, to $23.4 billion, with the largest boosts earmarked for military and civilian nuclear power priorities.
The National Nuclear Security Administration would get $925 million more, for a total of $8.8 billion, primarily for nuclear weapons production, cleanup of domestic nuclear weapons sites and construction of a South Carolina plant to convert nuclear warhead material into power plant fuel.
An additional $591 million — the same as last year — would be spent on building a nuclear fuel storage repository at Yucca Mountain, Nev.
— Peter Behr
EPA has undergone belt-tightening, but Administrator Christine Todd Whitman urged environmentalists not to be hasty in criticizing the agency’s budget of $7.6 billion, which, she said, “reflects the administration’s promise to leave the environment cleaner than when we got here.”
Among other things, the money would finance work on Bush’s “Clear Skies” initiative, aimed at reducing health-threatening airborne pollutants from utility plants and factories. The administration requested $2.2 billion for basic clean air, clean water and anti-pollution programs — nearly $200 million more than last year.
But those increases are more than offset by a $350 million reduction in funding requested for grants to states and communities for clean water initiatives, such as sewer construction.
Pro-environment lawmakers criticized a proposed $117 million increase in funding for the Superfund hazardous waste removal program as inadequate.
— Dan Morgan
The Department of Health and Human Services’ request of $537.6 billion represents a 7 percent increase, but most of the higher spending is driven by mandatory expenditures for Medicare and Medicaid, the giant health insurance programs for the elderly and poor that account for 81 percent of the department’s budget.
The budget includes a $6 billion down payment in an ambitious 10-year $400 billion plan of “Medicare modernization” that would provide a prescription drug benefit and make other changes.
Bush proposed to restructure Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, giving states the option of accepting federal funding in a single bloc grant and providing more flexibility for the states to decide how to spend the money. Overall, discretionary funding would grow by $1.64 billion, or 2.6 percent, to $65 billion. This includes $3.6 billion for bioterrorism programs and a $100 million increase, to a total of $125 million, to combat diabetes, obesity and asthma. The budget calls for a $33 million cut in budget authority for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but officials said actual CDC outlays in the next fiscal year will increase by $61 million.
— Edward Walsh
The president calls for $36.2 billion to be spent on the new Department of Homeland Security, an increase of about 7.4 percent beyond the amounts proposed for this year for the agencies that are being melded into the new department. Nonetheless, these increases are nowhere near as dramatic as the much larger budget increases in the first year and a half following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
The most striking areas of increase include $829 million to perform intelligence analysis and assess the nation’s infrastructure, such as transportation and water systems, which amounts to an increase of $652 million, or 370 percent over fiscal 2003, and $803 million proposed for anti-terrorism research and development, which amounts to a 43 percent rise over 2003.
Bush asked for $3.5 billion for “first responders,” such as police, fire and emergency medical personnel — the same he requested a year ago but which Congress has not passed so far.
— John Mintz
The budget calls for a slight increase of 1.3 percent, for a total of $31.3 billion, for the Department of Housing and Urban Development. The proposals include higher spending to increase the supply of affordable housing and encourage home ownership, and a revamping of the housing-voucher program that provides rent subsidies to low-income families.
Spending for the HOME Investment Partnerships Program would increase by $113 million, to $2.2 billion. Local jurisdictions use money from the program to provide more affordable housing.
The budget includes $200 million, the same as this fiscal year, to help low-income families with the down payment for a first home.
— Edward Walsh
The Interior Department would get nearly $10.6 billion, up from about $10.2 billion estimated for the current year, including full funding of $900 million for the Land and Water Conservation Fund to support conservation programs.
There is also additional money to improve management of Indian trust funds, including $481 million, an increase of $168 million, to correct problems in trust programs to meet U.S. District Court mandates. The budget includes $1.08 billion, an $180 million increase, to work on eliminating the National Park Service’s maintenance backlog.
In addition, the budget calls for exploration and, “environmentally responsible development of the most promising oil and natural gas reserve areas within a small portion of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.” While the plan is controversial in Congress, the budget assumes that the first oil and gas lease sale would be held in 2005 and bring in $2.4 billion in new revenue.
— Judy Sarasohn
The Justice Department’s budget authority would remain essentially flat under Bush’s budget, at $23.3 billion. The amount takes into account the impending transfer of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, which is moving to the new Homeland Security Department, and the move of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to Justice.
The Justice budget includes $600 million in additional funding for anti-terrorism programs; $326 million for more prison beds and other corrections programs, and more than $200 million extra for antidrug and DNA analysis programs. Justice would also dedicate $24.5 million for more FBI agents, prosecutors and others to battle corporate fraud, officials said.
The FBI was a big winner, with an increase of nearly 10 percent, to $4.6 billion, including funding for more than 1,900 new agents, analysts and other personnel.
Losers include the Drug Enforcement Administration, whose budget would remain flat, and the Community Oriented Policing Services program, which includes no new hiring grants.
— Dan Eggen
The Labor Department is seeking only minor increases in its $56.2 billion budget request.
“Our country’s most important priority continues to be our nation’s security,” said John Henshaw, assistant secretary for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
The biggest single initiative is the $2 billion to fund Bush’s proposal to establish Personal Re-employment Accounts for unemployed workers. They would allow job-seekers to receive as much as $3,000 for training and support services, such as child care. The agency is proposing modest increases in pension oversight and worker safety.
The budget includes a $12 million increase for the Pension and Welfare Benefits Administration. The president’s budget would also cut federal unemployment taxes paid by employers, now limited to $56 per worker, by 25 percent.
— Kirsten Downey
The State Department is once again one of the few clear winners, reflecting the star power of Secretary of State Colin L. Power. Spending for the department and key international affairs programs would climb by $3 billion, an increase of 20 percent.
State alone would have an increase of 6.8 percent in budget authority. A big chunk of the new money is $1.3 billion for the proposed Millennium Challenge Accounts, which would tie aid to countries to their meeting judicial and economic criteria. The accounts would grow to $5 billion in 2006.
The budget would also create a $200 million fund for famine aid, boost spending for a new Middle East democracy initiative, to $145 million, and expand spending on combating the spread of AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean. The budget would cut aid to Russia and other countries of the former Soviet Union by 24 percent, to $576 million.
— Glenn Kessler
The Treasury Department’s budget would shrink by about a third compared to last year, as many of its law-enforcement agencies or parts of them — including the Secret Service, the Customs Service and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms — are shifted to the Homeland Security and Justice departments. Comparing this year’s budget to the portion of last year’s that covered agencies that remain in Treasury, including the Internal Revenue Service, outlays would rise about 3.5 percent to $11.4 billion. Funding for the IRS would rise slightly, to about $10.4 billion, and the agency would add about 1,000 employees.
— Albert B. Crenshaw
The Department of Veterans Affairs budget totals $63.6 billion, with almost all of a projected $2.1 billion increase in discretionary spending earmarked for the agency’s overcrowded health care system. The budget includes $27.5 billion in health care spending, a $1.9 billion increase, one of the largest ever, officials said, and a 7.7 percent increase over the amount Congress is expected to provide for the VA health care system during the current fiscal year. Slightly more than half of the VA’s budget consists of mandatory spending for entitlement programs such as disability and pension payments to veterans.
— Edward Walsh