Special Congressional Budget Reform Committee Soon to Issue Initial Proposal

As shared by Politico Pro:

“The chairman of the committee tasked with revamping the federal spending process outlined four major changes this morning and resolved to mark up the proposal during the second week of November.

Rep. Steve Womack (R-Ark.) told reporters that leaders of the special committee formed this year to ‘fix’ Congress’ budget process are putting the finishing touches on legislation expected to include ‘biennial budgeting’ language that would force Congress to set spending caps for two years at a time, rather than one.

The proposal would not include a ‘biennial appropriations’ change, however, meaning lawmakers would still have to clear spending bills each year to dole out federal funding.

An aide for Womack’s co-chair, Rep. Nita Lowey, said the New York Democrat has only agreed so far to the biennial budgeting idea and that staff are still negotiating other points of a bipartisan plan.

Womack said he is also seeking rules that would set the country on a ‘glide slope’ for keeping down the national debt, while taking into account gross domestic product. And he wants to include language to ‘hold Congress’ feet to the fire’ by preventing lawmakers from leaving town until spending bills are cleared each year.

Like Congress did this year in passing several ‘minibus’ packages for fiscal 2019, the chairman said the panel will encourage spending leaders to continue to bundle funding bills in small batches.”

ANCOR is sharing this news because of how the federal budget cycle can generally affect federal agencies, including those relevant to the I/DD community, and also play a significant role in how much attention Congress has bandwidth to give to other issues.