By Adam Mann
It’s been a volatile week in the US capitol as legislators work to pass a continuing resolution. HR 1, to fund the federal government for the current fiscal year. During a House debate on 16 February, Rep. Anthony Wiener (D-NY) introduced an amendment to the bill that would transfer $298 million from NASA to the Department of Justice’s Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS), which provides funding for local police forces. The amendment passed 228 – 203 during the afternoon’s recorded vote.
Weiner admitted that he was reluctant to decrease NASA’s funding but that preserving the COPS hiring program, which would allow for an extra 1330 local police to be hired or rehired in 2011, was a higher priority.
“Do I like the idea we have to take it from NASA space exploration? I don’t know any of the crime statistics on Mars, and I’m interested, but it’s a bad choice,” he said during the floor debate. “If any of you like space exploration, so do I. In a way, I’m playing the game too. I’m taking from one place to give to another. But I do believe it’s in the interest of all of us to try to set these priorities straight.”
As other House members pointed out, the money would come not come from manned exploration but from NASA’s cross-agency support budget, which the NASA Authorization Act funds at $3 billion. This section of the budget is used for operations and maintenance at NASA’s field centers and for construction and restoration of infrastructure.
“This isn’t even like real stuff at NASA. It’s not the fantasy about going to Mars or any of the other things they’re engaged in for many billions of dollars,” said Peter DeFazio (D-OR) “Go home and explain that to your constituents… you have to say, Hey, it’s the cross-agency support budget at NASA, and when the criminal is breaking down your door, call NASA,” he added.
DeFazio also called the cross-agency support budget a “slush fund” and said it had grown in the last two years from $550 million to its current state.
As well, during a hearing last week, Paul Martin, NASA’s Inspector General, said that 80% of NASA’s buildings are more than 40 years old and the agency spends approximately $2.5 billion annually just “fixing roofs and plugging holes.” Replacing them with upgraded buildings would be a potential source of cost savings for the agency, he said.
Other members spoke up for the necessity of the cross-agency budget. “Cutting funding for this account will only make NASA’s maintenance backlog worse and will impede NASA’s mission,” said Adam Schiff (D-CA), though he also voiced support for Wiener’s amendment.
In a separate debate, Pete Olson (R-TX) introduced an amendment to reallocate $517 million from NASA’s climate science spending to operations for human spaceflight. Olson had been one of among six House members who wrote a letter to Appropriations chairman Hal Rodgers asking for this policy change. The amendment failed to pass.
The debates all foreshadow the potential battle to fund the federal government before a 4 March deadline that could force a government shutdown. Once complete, the House bill will move to the Democrat-controlled Senate and must eventually be signed by President Obama, who has already stated that he would veto the bill if it slashes funding for programs that would drive economic growth or create jobs.