DHS Budget Bill Passes First Hurdle

The Homeland Security Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee marked-up and passed to the full committee the FY 2011 DHS Budget Bill. The meeting was moved up one day from what I had reported earlier this week. That bill has yet to be introduced so there is no bill number or printed version of the bill available yet. All we really know to date comes from the Subcommittee web site. Chairman Price provides an overview of the proposed bill, noting that it is a bipartisan bill with much input from Republican members. He talks about a number of dollar adjustments to many high-profile programs but does not mention chemical security issues. A chart providing a comparison of high-level dollar amounts between the passed bill and this years spending and the Obama budget request shows where the $43.9 billion is going. Infrastructure Protection would receive $330,342,000 a decrease of almost $17 million over FY 2010 but only $3.4 million less than what the Administration requested. No telling where the cutbacks come from at this point. The Subcommittee report also provides a table of earmarks that are included in the legislation at this point. The number can probably be expected to grow. An article on GovExec.com notes that this is the first FY 2011 budget bill to make it out of a subcommittee in either house. Maybe this bill can make it through the entire process before the legislative branch completely shuts down for electioneering.