The Office of State Federal Relations produced a report on the President’s FY 2011 Budget Submission. The report states: On February 1, the President submitted a $3.83 trillion budget request for Fiscal Year (FY) 2011. Revenue estimates for FY 2011 stand at $2.57 trillion, resulting in an estimated deficit of $1.26 trillion.
Compared to FY 2010, government spending will increase by 3.04% under the President’s proposed 2011 budget, while receipts from taxes and other revenue would increase by 18.6%.
For state governments, the proposed budget provides a six-month extension of Federal Medical Assistance Percentage (FMAP) relief at a cost to the federal budget of $25.7 billion. The proposed budget also extends unemployment benefits with $18 billion and provides $1.4 billion to the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) emergency fund.
Highlights from the OSFR report:
• Increased taxes on oil, gas and coal producers totaling $2.8 billion.
• $23 billion saved through health insurance reform in 2011.
• $7.6 billion to fully fund Special Supplemental Nutrition Programs for Women, Infants and Children (WIC). Also fully funds the National School Lunch Program and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
• $418 million in loans and grants to expand broadband access in rural communities.
• $50 million for a new “Healthy Food Financing Initiative” to bring grocery stores and other healthy food retailers to underserved communities.
• $250 million for continued support of mental health and traumatic brain injury research. $1 million for the Riverside General Hospital in Houston, for the treatment of psychological health issues.
• A $3 billion increase in funding for K-12 education programs authorized in the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), including $900 million for School Turnaround Grants. Also, the Administration will request as much as $1 billion in additional funding if Congress “successfully completes an overhaul” of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA).
• Included in the $3 billion for ESEA programs, $1.35 billion for the Race to the Top program, which was created by a $4 billion appropriation in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The program would be modified to allow school districts to apply directly for the funds (currently, funds are only available to state governments).
• Included in the $3 billion for ESEA programs, $500 million to continue the Investing in Innovation program.
• $950 million in competitive grants to states and school districts to recruit, prepare, retain, and reward effective teachers and principals.
• $210 million for Promise Neighborhoods, an initiative that integrates school reform with family supports and effective community services.
• $490 million for charter schools and other autonomous public schools.
• Consolidates 38 K-12 programs into 11 new programs and eliminates six others that duplicate local or state programs or have not had a significant measurable impact, for a savings of $122 million. The budget would also eliminate 571 earmarks for a total savings of $217 million.
• $36 billion in new loan authority – for a total of $54.5 billion – to expand support for DOE loan guarantees for nuclear power facilities.
• $8.1 billion, an increase of $750 million, to maintain and improve the nuclear stockpile’s safety, security, and effectiveness with more extensive life extension programs, to improve nuclear infrastructure, and to promote initiatives in naval reactors work.
• $5.1 billion for the Office of Science, including $1.8 billion for basic energy sciences to discover new ways to produce, store, and use energy.
• $4.7 billion in clean energy technology investments, including nearly $2.4 billion, an increase of $113 million, for energy efficiency and renewable energy programs including solar energy, biofuels and biomass R&D, advanced vehicle technologies, and energy efficient building technologies.
• $545 million for advanced coal climate change technologies for carbon capture technologies with broad applications to advanced coal power systems, existing power plants, and industrial sources.
• Perhaps most notable for Texas, the budget includes the repeal of tax incentives and research funding for domestic oil and gas production. The budget eliminates twelve tax breaks for oil, gas, and coal companies, closing loopholes that will raise $36 billion over the next decade.
• The Administration is also seeking to eliminate a $500 million oil and gas research program headquartered in Sugar Land, Texas. The program gets its funding from federal royalties for oil and gas production on federal lands and has supported research at the University of Texas, Texas A&M University, and Rice University.
• The budget also includes a placeholder for cap-and-trade legislation and explains that the Administration expects a climate bill to be deficit neutral. This marks a significant change from the FY 2010 budget, which assumed a cap-and-trade program would raise $650 billion over ten years via the auction of emission credits, with the money paying for middle-class tax cuts and investments in clean energy technologies. The budget calls on Congress to set up a “comprehensive market-based climate change policy” to curb heat-trapping emissions.
• The budget request reflects the Administration’s plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the range of 17% in 2020 and more than 80% by 2050.
• $3.3 billion for the Clean Water and Drinking Water State Revolving Funds (SRFs) for states to provide low-interest loans to communities to finance wastewater and drinking water infrastructure.
• $1.3 billion to states for water pollution control grants, air quality management grants, and state greenhouse gas programs. This includes $427 million – a $45 million increase – for state water pollution control grants.
• $215 million to accelerate and expand brownfields cleanup.
• $21 million to implement the Mandatory Greenhouse Gas Reporting Rule and ensure the availability of high-quality emissions data.
• $56 million (including $43 million in new funding) for the EPA and states to address climate change through regulatory initiatives to control greenhouse gas emissions.
• $32 billion for the National Institutes of Health, an increase of $1 billion to expand biomedical research. The increased funding is expected to be focused on genomics, translational research, and science to support the health care overhaul, global health and reinvigoration of the biomedical research community.
• $25.5 billion for a six-month extension of the ARRA temporary increase in the Federal Medicaid Match.
• $110 million for health information technology research and coordination and $286 million for comparative effectiveness research started under ARRA through the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.
• Emphasis on preventing fraudulent payments in Medicare, Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program.
• Extends the ARRA expansion for Head Start and Early Head Start, providing an increase of $1.6 billion for child care.
• $2.5 billion emergency fund for the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) block grant
• $4.4 billion for Community Development Block Grants (CDBG), an increase of $70 million from FY 2010.
• $2.04 billion for a comprehensive approach to combating drugs and crime and an additional $54 million to expand the Drug Enforcement Administration’s El Paso Intelligence Center.
• Creation of a $4 billion National Infrastructure Innovation and Finance Fund, which would leverage private capital for large-scale projects. Eligible projects would include capital projects or a unified program of smaller related projects, generally not less than $25 million, which are primarily for a highway, tunnel, bridge, transit, commuter rail, passenger and freight intermodal facilities, passenger rail, including Amtrak, freight rail, airports, aviation, ports and maritime investment. Project size may be less than $25 million for the funding of significant projects in smaller cities, regions, or states.
• $1 billion for high-speed trains. Out of last week’s announced high-speed rail grants totaling $8 billion from ARRA and the allocated $2.5 billion for the current budget year ending on September 30, Texas received $11 million for two rail projects.
The budget does not propose a new surface transportation authorization. Instead, it suggests extending the current authorization through March 2011, during which time the Administration will work with the Congress to reform surface transportation programs and put the system on a viable financing path. The budget describes its $43 billion estimate for highway spending in 2011 as a placeholder; it is not intended to reflect a funding strategy that the Administration and Congress necessarily should or will adopt for the long-term reauthorization. The budget suggests that maintaining baseline spending on highways will require more transfers of cash from the US Treasury.
For a complete copy of the report, visit: http://www.osfr.state.tx.us/News/Feb%202%202010.pdf