ACTE Legislative Alert: Action Needed NOW to Oppose Inadequate House Budget Bill

April 4, 2006
ACTE Legislative Alert: Action Needed NOW to Oppose Inadequate House Budget Bill

THE ISSUE: The House plans to consider its version of the Fiscal Year (FY) 2007 budget resolution as soon as this Wednesday, April 5. Like the Administration’s budget request, the House budget resolution would cut overall funding for education, employment and training, and social services by nearly $5 billion. This would leave appropriators with no choice but to make deep cuts to many key programs – which could include Perkins.

Moderates Republican Representatives (see list below), led by Nancy Johnson, (R-CT), and Michael Castle, (R-DE), continue to urge for increasing discretionary spending in the budget resolution to protect domestic programs in health, education and other areas from likely funding cuts.

ACTION NEEDED: Please contact your Representative to urge him/her to:

· Oppose any budget resolution that will force harmful cuts to education.

· Support efforts to increase funding in the FY 2007 budget for education, employment and training, and social services.

If your member is one of the 23 Republican Moderate Representatives (see list below), please thank them for their efforts to protect badly needed federal funding for education, employment and training, and social services.

Please visit ACTE’s Legislative Action Center and connect with your Representative today!


BACKGROUND: Funding for Perkins has been threatened this year by the Bush Administration’s proposal to cut overall funding for education, employment and training, and social services by nearly $5 billion, and to completely eliminate funding for the Perkins program. The first step in the Congressional consideration of this proposal is passage of a budget resolution. The budget resolution sets the total dollars to be available for all the services funded by the federal government. While the budget resolution does not make decisions about individual programs, if the total is set too low, the budget resolution will force appropriators to cut programs in order to meet the amount budgeted under the budget resolution.

On March 16, the Senate passed its budget resolution, which included an amendment from Senators Specter & Harkin that – if included in a final budget resolution that passes both the House and Senate – would provide an additional $7 billion over the President’s budget request for education, employment and training, and social services programs.

On March 29, the House Budget Committee voted along party lines (22-17) to approve its version of the budget resolution. The House version includes $873 billion for discretionary spending, the same amount proposed in the Administration’s FY 2007 budget request and $16 billion less than the amount included in the resolution that passed the Senate on March 16.

House Republican moderates, led by Nancy Johnson, (R-CT), and Michael Castle, (R-DE), continue to demand more discretionary spending so that domestic programs in health, education and other areas do not face deep cuts for the second straight year.

Republican Moderate Representatives
Nancy Johnson (CT)
Fred Upton (MI)
Christopher Shays (CT)
Sherwood Boehlert (NY)
Jim Ramstad (MN)
Steven LaTourette (OH)
Todd Platts (PA)
Jim Gerlach (PA)
Bob Ney (OH)
Ray LaHood (IL)
Jon Porter (NV)
Rick Renzi (AZ)
JoAnne Emerson (MO)
John M. McHugh (NY)
Ed Whitfield (KY)
Health Wilson (NM)
John R. (Randy) Kuhl (NY)
Mike Castle (DE)
Rob Simmons (CT)
Joe Schwarz (MI)
Curt Weldon (FL)
Jim Leach (IA)
Wayne Gilchrest (MD)

Leglative Alert Information

We appreciate your efforts! For more information, contact the Association for Career and Technical Education's Public Policy Department, 1410 King Street, Alexandria, VA, 22315, 1-800-826-9972