Senate Budget Bill
Posted by Barb Haxton on April 26, 2010 under News | 
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Senate Committee Passes Budget with Tight Restraints on Spending
Congress took its first step in the budget process when the Senate Budget Committee passed its FY 2011 budget with a vote of 12-10 on April 22, with Senator Feingold (D-WI) joining all Republicans in opposing the bill. Unlike the President’s budget, which was released in February, Senate and House budgets do not provide program-by-program funding levels for discretionary (annually appropriated) programs. Instead, they provide an aggregate funding level. The Senate Committee budget would provide $1.124 trillion to fund discretionary programs, $4 billion less than the $1.128 trillion provided in the President’s budget. The Senate assumes that the savings will come from international and State Department funding. Under both the President’s and Senate’s budgets, funding for military, homeland security, international and veterans (‘security’ programs) would be allowed to grow above inflation for the next three years. “Non-security” discretionary programs – these include many human needs programs in areas like housing, job training and employment, community services and pre-K through secondary education – would be frozen for three years, with no adjustment for inflation. The freeze is not applied across-the-board, so some programs can receive more funding while others decrease. For a more detailed description of funding in the President’s budget see the Human Needs Report for March 1.
The President had left room for some expansion in annual appropriations by shifting some funding from the discretionary to mandatory budget categories. (Mandatory programs do not need annual appropriations; for definitions of these terms, see the CHN glossary.) The President moved $2 billion for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) and all funding for Pell Grants to the mandatory category. The Senate Committee does not make this shift. After adjusting for the change, the Senate budget assumes $5.5 billion more in Pell Grant costs plus the $2 billion for LIHEAP will have to be covered within the same total figure proposed in the President’s budget. This will require cuts beyond those in the President’s budget to discretionary non-security programs. (See chart comparing programs in the President’s budget with FY 2009 and FY 2010 funding levels.)
