Monday, January 7, 2008

Reduced U.S. funding for scientific research and education imperil budgets for NSF, NASA, NOAA, DOE's Office of Science, and UCAR/NCAR

The following letter is reprinted with permission of its author to highlight the serious underfunding of scientific research and the need for continuing advocacy.

Dear friends and colleagues,

As you no doubt read over the holidays, Congress has completed and the president has signed into law the federal budget for FY08. While the FY08 process started out with hopes for a strong budget for science, the political differences between the Congress and the Administration led to a collapse in the process which resulted in real reductions in Federal support for research and education. These reductions will likely affect many UCAR and NCAR programs negatively over the rest of the year.

The fiscal year began officially on October 1, 2007. Government agencies were kept operating through continuing resolutions, essentially at FY07 levels. Congress and the White House were $22 billion apart (Congress budgeting the higher numbers) on discretionary spending which includes the budgets for NSF, NASA, NOAA, and the Department of Energy’s Office of Science. Negotiations between the White House and Congress failed to bring about any compromise, with the president, helped by a core group of Republicans, holding firm to his top line request for overall spending of $933 billion. Given the Democrats’ slim margin of control in Congress, the Congressional leadership was unable to assemble a veto-proof majority and therefore could not overcome the threatened presidential veto of a funding bill that exceeded the president’s request.

NSF was an important part of the Administration’s multi-year American Competitiveness Initiative, and its budget was slated to double over the next several years. The FY08 outcome interrupted that progress and also eliminated improvements for other science agencies. The Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, Congressman David Obey (D-WI), indicated that Congress had to restore funding and "fill some of the unacceptable holes" in the President's budget request within an overall budget that essentially freezes discretionary spending. To do this, funding for many of the programs and initiatives supported by industry and the university community were reduced significantly below the levels recommended earlier this year.

NSF’s research budget will increase by only 1.2 percent over FY07, instead of the anticipated 8 percent increase. NOAA’s overall budget is $182 million below FY 2007. Recall that the FY 2007 NOAA budget was more or less frozen at the FY 2006 level. The DOE Office of Science budget received about half of its proposed increase with close to half of that modest increase for special congressional “earmarked” projects. The NASA Science Mission Directorate fares somewhat better with an overall increase of 5.4 percent over the FY07 level. The congressional attempt to supplement the NASA budget by $1 billion failed. For omnibus bill language and details on budget numbers for these agencies, please see the UCAR Government Affairs web site at http://www.ucar.edu/oga/html/budget/index.html.

Unfortunately, FY 2009 is not likely to be much better given the relationship that exists between the Congress and the White House and the fact that this is a Presidential election year. Nevertheless, it is my intent to continue to speak out, mobilize the atmospheric science community and work closely with the rest of the Nation’s research and education enterprise to convince our policy makers of the importance of investing adequately in science in order to meet our economic, environmental and health-related needs of our Nation.

Agencies are now putting together their FY08 work plans based on the new budget numbers and we must be realistic in our expectations given the disappointing outcome of the FY 08 appropriations process. UCAR and NCAR management will meet with agency leadership to continue to communicate and promote the importance of our scientific plans to the greatest extent possible. We will keep you informed of developments.

Sorry for the bad news.

Dr.Richard A. Anthes, President
University Corporation for Atmospheric Research
Boulder, Colorado

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