AIP FYI #33: Science Committee Democrats’ Views on S&T Request

Every year, the House Science Committee responds to the administration’s
budget request with a document known as the “Views and Estimates.” This
report is written by the committee chairman and the Majority staff, and is
usually endorsed by most if not all of the committee’s members who are in
the majority. FYI #32 provided excerpts from the Majority’s FY 2004
report.

Although the Science Committee is bipartisan in its approach, the Ranking
Minority Member and his staff have usually issued their own version of the
Views and Estimates. Ranking Minority Member Ralph Hall (D-TX) did so
earlier this month. Excerpts from this document, signed by 20 of the
committee’s Democratic 22 members, follow. The full document can be read at
http://www.house.gov/science_democrats/welcome.htm

RELEVANCE OF THE PROCESS:

“We generally agree with the policy guidance offered by the Majority in
their Views and Estimates to the Budget Committee on the FY04 budget for
civilian R&D. Those Views start with a global observation about the
importance of adequate funding for science and technology, but the document
is actually silent on what level of funding the Majority believes would be
adequate. Instead, we are left with a collection of program-level
recommendations done up department-by-department. That leaves us wondering
what use the Budget Committee can put this document to as it looks for
guidance on, for example, funding levels for Function 250 over the next five
years. There is a fundamental disconnect between the purpose of composing
Views and Estimates and the content of the Majority’s report.

“But this is nothing new. Each year for the past decade we have seen the
Views and Estimates move further from their intended purpose of providing a
solid, analytical, five-year recommendation to the Budget Committee. . . .
”

FUNDING RECOMMENDATION:

“The Administration’s overall request for R&D amounts to a 4.8% increase
over the FY2003 appropriated levels and yet that appears inadequate. Under
the President’s request, many programs would receive less funding in FY2004
than in FY2003. The Department of Energy’s civilian research programs, the
National Institutes of Standards and Technology, the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency and the
Departments of Agriculture, Interior, Veterans Affairs and Education would
all face R&D cuts from the 2003 appropriated level if the President’s
request were enacted. Perhaps most tellingly, non-defense, non-NIH research
in the President’s budget grows by just 1.6% from the 2003 enacted level –
below the level of inflation. It seems a mistake then to stay wedded to the
President’s numbers. More than a mistake, it might be irresponsible. The
reality is that the appropriators have been pushing for strong growth in R&D
accounts; R&D increased by 13.8% from 2002 to 2003. On top of this, there
is near-unanimous agreement that the need for national security-related
research continues to grow, and there is a consensus that we should be
investing more in the physical sciences and in such areas as energy and
environmental technologies. Further, while we can’t say what impact the
Columbia tragedy will have on NASA’s budget, we can guess that more money
rather than less will be needed at the agency. In light of these factors,
it would seem reasonable to recommend an increase in the overall R&D funding
in the 8% to 10% range compared to the FY2003 enacted levels. It seems
impossible to do the things we know we need to do in R&D with anything less
than that, unless we are now willing to start sacrificing biomedical
research. As to outyears [beyond FY 2004], we would like to believe that
increases for security and physical sciences could decline slightly, say to
the 5% to 7% range in the four subsequent years.”

The Democrats’ Views and Estimates also discuss “Metrics in the President’s
Budget,” stating, “We fully support the effort to identify reasonable
measures of performance for programs, both to give program managers useful
tools for evaluating progress and to provide policy-makers in Congress and
elsewhere with insight into the Administration”s budgetary decisions.
However, we remain skeptical that this Administration has demonstrated the
utility of metrics in producing sound budgeting decisions.”

In a subsequent section on earmarks, the document concludes, “However, we
say to our friends at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue that, if you
don’t like earmarks, don’t fund them. Most earmarks do not exist in law.
They are contained, by and large, in the detailed report language that
accompanies appropriations bills. Report language is not binding on an
agency. The ultimate responsibility for earmarks lies with the
Administration that cuts the check. From a political perspective, we
understand why no one in the [White House’s] Old Executive Office Building
wants to start telling Appropriators they won’t get their earmarks, but if
you really believe them to be such a problem, perhaps you should swallow
hard and start drawing lines in the sand.”

Richard M. Jones

Media and Government Relations Division

The American Institute of Physics

fyi@aip.org

(301) 209-3094