SENATE COMMITTEE ADOPTS HEALTH, EDUCATION SPENDING BILL

July 15, 2005

The Senate appropriations committee on July 14 approved a $145.7 billion the Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill for fiscal year 2006 (H.R. 3010).  With the help of a creative budget mechanism, the committee was able to pass a bill that is $2.7 billion higher than what the House adopted and $3.7 billion more than the president's request.  The mechanism temporarily moves Supplemental Security Income (SSI) payments for one day, from the last day of fiscal year 2006 to the first day of fiscal year 2007, technically resulting in $3.3 billion in savings.

CDC, NIH, and health professions gain some ground

A number of Public Health Service programs benefit from the new-found monies.  The Centers for Disease Control and prevention would be funded at $6.2 billion, an increase of nearly $1.5 billion over fiscal year 2005 funding, and $1.9 billion more than the president's request.  The total includes $1.7 billion for infectious disease control, $974 million for health promotion and disease prevention, and nearly $1.6 billion for terrorism preparedness and response.  The Senate committee bill also restores $100 million to continue the preventive health block grant that the president proposed to eliminate.

The National Institutes of Health also benefited from the committee's budget mechanism, receiving $29.4 billion, an increase of just more than $1 billion over the agency's fiscal year 2005 level and $905 million more than the president sought.  The increase, about 3.7 percent, is slightly higher than the medical research inflation index.  In its report, the committee noted that given the threats of disease, emerging infectious agents and bioterrorism, "now is not the time for retrenchment; rather, it the time to exploit fully any opportunity that could lead to improved health."

The committee bill restores $454.3 for Title VII health professions training programs, which were all but eliminated in the president's budget and the House bill, including $90 million for training in primary care medicine and dentistry.  The committee also boosted funding for the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), providing $323.7 million along with language urging AHRQ to rely more on investigator-initiated research.  The committee also vote $3.4 billion for substance abuse and mental health services, slightly less than the fiscal year 2005 level.

Education funding boosted; public broadcasting restored

Both education and public broadcasting fared better in the committee measure than in the House bill approved last month.  Department of Education programs would be funded at $63.7 billion, an increase of $4.5 billion over the fiscal year 2005 level and $501 million more than the president's request.  The lion's share of the increase, about $4.3 billion, is to make up a shortfall in funding for Pell grants to college students.  In addition, the committee voted to raise the maximum Pell grant to $4,050, as proposed by the president. 

The committee also recommended $11.8 billion for special education programs, an increase of $100 million over last year.  Nevertheless, the federal contribution towards special education at the local level dropped to 18 percent, the lowest in 10 year.

One day after holding a hearing on the controversy swirling around the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the committee voted to continue the program at $400 million, while providing an additional $35 million for digital conversion and $40 million to upgrade the public broadcasting satellite system.

Next steps

It's difficult to predict when the committee bill will be debated on the Senate floor.  Only two weeks remain before Congress begins a month-long recess.  If floor consideration is put off until the fall, the anticipated battle over filling the Supreme Court vacancy could create some political obstacles.  And if that happens, Congress may be forced to fall back on an omnibus appropriation, as it has for the past few years.