Appropriations panel rejects proposal to transfer money between agencies

The House Appropriations Committee Thursday unanimously approved its amendment to the Homeland Security Department proposal, rejecting calls from the White House for broad authority to transfer large amounts of money between agencies.

Instead, the panel's proposal would stick to "regular order." Under the language, the committee would allow funds to be transferred if they would go to similar purposes, but the White House would have to seek congressional approval to increase funds or change the reasons for which they were originally appropriated.

Appropriations Chairman C.W. (Bill) Young, R-Fla., said the original Bush administration proposal-to allow the new secretary of Homeland Security to transfer up to 5 percent of any appropriation without congressional approval-would have "undermined the appropriations process" and given the White House the ability to "rewrite appropriations bills." Appropriations ranking member David Obey, D-Wis., agreed. "The question before us is are we going to turn [the proposed Homeland Security Department] into a $30 billion slush fund … or are we going to continue to insist that money be spent on activities that were appropriated" until the committee decides otherwise, Obey said.

The markup also gave appropriators a forum to air their concerns about the creation of the Homeland Security Department. Transportation Appropriations ranking member Martin Olav Sabo, D-Minn., said that given the problems associated with the new Transportation Security Administration, he feared that combining a lot of "troubled agencies" into one large department would be "nothing but chaos."

Obey, also a vocal critic of the president's unification plan, warned the GOP and Democratic leaderships to keep politics out of the issue and let committees use their institutional expertise to do their job. "There is a reason that the committees of the House are making their recommendations," Obey said.