CONGRESS WRAPS UP FY2005 APPROPRIATIONS

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER: CONGRESS WRAPS UP FY2005 APPROPRIATIONS

December 1, 2004

On November 20, the House and Senate adopted H.R. 4818, the Consolidated Appropriations Act for fiscal year 2005 by votes of 344-51 and 65-30, respectively.  Weighing in at more than 20 pounds, the $388.4 billion omnibus spending bill wraps together the nine appropriations bills Congress was unable to complete prior to Election Day. 

In order to avoid a threatened presidential veto, House and Senate negotiators who wrote the bill agreed to hold overall growth in domestic spending to less than one percent, the effects of which are readily apparent.  Budget cuts were taken at the National Science Foundation, the Environmental Protection Agency, programs at the Housing and Urban Development and State Departments, and the Federal Aviation Administration.  Most other federal departments received only nominal increases.

Any new funding initiatives that found their way into the omnibus legislation were paid for by a government-wide across-the-board cut of 0.80%.  These include the president's Millennium Challenge foreign aid initiative, research on hydrogen-fueled vehicles and the Marriage and Healthy Families program, which supports teenage abstinence and responsible fatherhood. 

In order to give OMB additional time to review the details of the massive spending bill, Congress also adopted a continuing resolution through December 3.  That continuing resolution, as it turns out, helped avoid a train wreck at the last minute, when senators discovered a provision had been slipped into the bill that would have given the chairmen of the Appropriations committee the right to obtain—and presumably disclose—an individual's or company's federal tax return.  To remedy the problem, a separate concurrent resolution was passed by the Senate that would rescind that authority before it takes effect.  The House will pass the resolution within the next few days.