Senate Passes HR 152

This afternoon the Senate passed HR 152, the Disaster Relief Appropriations Act, 2013, by a largely partisan vote of 62 to 36. It had earlier turned back an amendment by Sen. Lee (R,UT) by a similar vote. That amendment would have off-set part of the cost of the bill by imposing an across the board FY 2013 spending decrease of 0.46%.

As expected there was no attempt in the Senate to modify the bill to address the issue of the impact of Sandy on the security measures at government regulated facilities. Facilities covered by rules such as CFATS or MTSA will not receive any special assistance to re-establish security measures that were damaged by the storm. Nor were there any requirements laid upon the regulating agencies to determine the extent of potential damage to those security measures.

President Obama is expected to sign HR 152 quickly.