Budget boosts and cuts: An agency-by-agency breakdown

Here's a rundown of proposals in President Bush's fiscal 2002 budget for various departments and independent agencies:

Agriculture

Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman Monday released the details of the proposed $68.2 billion FY02 USDA budget, of which $49.9 billion is mandatory spending for farm programs and nutrition and $19.1 billion is discretionary spending.

The total budget is $6.35 billion lower than FY01. It includes an additional $32 million to increase inspection personnel at U.S. ports of entry to protect against animal and plant diseases such as foot and mouth disease.

The additional inspection funds come from user fees charged to airline travelers arriving in the United States, which the Animal Plant Health and Inspection Service (APHIS) increased from $2 to $3 a year ago. The authorization would enlarge the current inspection force of 3,200 by adding 127 permanent officers and technicians, 27 dogs, 173 temporary inspector positions and 20 veterinarians.

An APHIS official said most of the increase in inspection would be permanent because of increased commerce and global trade.

The budget also zeroes out the Rural Telephone Bank, along with several popular environmental programs administered by the Natural Resources Conservation Service. The budget includes no money for emergency assistance to farmers, but Veneman noted farmers would be eligible for money under President Bush's emergency reserve fund.

Education

President Bush's FY02 budget proposal would increase Education Department funding 11.5 percent to $44.5 billion from $39.9 billion in FY01 and would give states new flexibility on how those dollars are used in exchange for requiring annual testing of students between third and eighth grades.

Title I programs, the largest chunk of federal school dollars, would increase by $459 million to just over $9 billion, while teacher quality and training programs would increase $375 million to $2.6 billion.

The administration's budget also would provide $320 million to help states develop and implement the annual state reading and math tests and $900 million to create a new reading initiative in schools.

The budget includes a $1 billion increase for special education grants to states for a total of $7.3 billion and also provides a $1 billion increase for Pell Grants to support a maximum grant of $3,850. The budget consolidates nine education technology programs in the department and creates an $817 million fund for states to use in their poorest districts for technology needs.

Energy

The Bush administration proposed trimming 2 percent of the Energy Department's budget to $19.2 billion as part of an FY02 budget that Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham hopes will "send a clear signal that change is on the way."

Abraham, unveiling the budget proposal Monday, said the White House seeks to "moderate discretionary spending while continuing to meet critical challenges in national security, energy, science and environmental quality."

As part of the moderation, the White House requested an 8 percent cut in funding for energy resources programs, including a 13 percent reduction in energy efficiency and renewable energy spending. Traditional fossil energy programs, in contrast, would receive a 1 percent boost.

Abraham defended the cuts by saying the administration plans to shift resources to proven programs. In fact, DOE officials handed reporters a Los Angeles Times article alleging that energy research spending has yielded few results.

Said Abraham, "Continuing and expanding programs that have been in place as the country drifted to the brink of an energy crisis does not appear to be a wise course of action."

However, the White House did call for several new programs, including a $150-million-a-year Clean Coal Power Initiative to develop cleaner, coal-fired power technology.

Environmental Protection Agency

EPA's proposed $7.3 billion budget for FY02 is almost a half billion dollars leaner than the agency's current operating budget and emphasizes transferring cash and power to states for enforcing environmental laws and assessing their own pollution problems.

The proposal includes $3.3 billion in grants for states, tribes and local governments, an increase of about $500 million over the current budget.

"As a former governor, I can tell you the states have done a great deal," EPA Administrator Christine Todd Whitman said. "And many of them are very sophisticated in their approach to protecting the environment ... With a little help from Washington, a lot more can be accomplished."

Two new $25 million grant proposals for enforcement and information technologies will provide the "sophisticated states" with tools to expand their programs, she said.

While the spending plan might make some state environmental officials happy, it is likely to be greeted by howls on Capitol Hill. It eliminates about $500,000 in congressional earmarks. A program for monitoring water quality along swimming beaches that Congress authorized last year at $30 million would get $2 million, and an effort to protect the nation's estuaries authorized at $35 million would get $17 million.

Whitman said that--aside from congressional earmarks--her proposal is slightly larger than the one proposed by the Clinton administration last year. "When you look at it in comparison with other departments and agencies, we are doing well," she said.

Health and Human Services

President Bush's proposed FY02 budget for HHS would boost discretionary funding for the department by $2.7 billion, or 5.1 percent. But much of that increase goes for larger programs, including a 13.5 percent increase for the National Institutes of Health, and 13.6 percent for the Agency for Healthcare Research Quality, thus masking cuts to smaller programs.

Among the cuts, Bush's budget reduces federal aid by more than half for the training of doctors, nurses, and other health professionals, from $353 million to $140 million. The budget proposes to reduce a variety of rural health programs, including cutting funds for "telehealth" from $36 million to $6 million.

While the budget would increase funding for community health centers by $124 million, it would eliminate the $125 million Clinton administration "community access program," which seeks to coordinate care between those centers, hospitals and other providers of healthcare "safety net" services.

As previously disclosed, the budget would cut funding for graduate medical education in children's hospitals from $235 million to $200 million, and it would cut the maternal and child health services block grant from $714 million to $709 million.

At the department's budget briefing, HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson angrily challenged press reports about some of the cuts.

"This budget substantially increases the investments the federal government makes in children ... to suggest otherwise is completely inaccurate and without factual foundation," he declared.

Justice

The department proposed a FY02 budget of $24.6 billion, an increase of less than 1 percent over the FY01 budget of $24.2 billion.

The department reallocated $2 billion to areas it deemed to be priorities, including $950 million for detention and incarceration, $370 million to upgrade law information technology, $154 million to combat gun violence, $121 million to fight illegal drugs, $110 million to fight terrorism and computer crime and $106 million for increases in civil rights-related funding.

Among the areas cut to make room for the new funds were a $525 million "truth-in-sentencing" incarceration program, $201 million in reimbursements for telecommunications providers to comply with the 1994 digital wiretap law, $145 million from the COPS program, and $100 million for federal law enforcement officials to communicate via radio.

The department also proposed 17 percent increase in funding for the Antitrust Division to $141 million from $121 million, but agency officials attributed the hike to the increase of antitrust merger review filing fees.

Labor

Labor Secretary Elaine Chao pledged the department's top priority will be enforcement and worker protection. "Businesses will be assisted in complying with laws," she said. "And laws will be enforced, using common sense--not just a reflexive, one- size-fits-all approach."

The department's FY02 budget maintains labor law enforcement agencies at FY01 levels. In addition, Chao said the department plans to put more emphasis on prevention and compliance assistance, "not just after-the-fact enforcement."

Notwithstanding Chao's assertion that enforcement will be a priority, the budget provides for reductions in full-time- equivalent employees for the Employment Standards Administration, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the Mine Safety and Health Administration. The total request for the department for FY02 is $44.4 billion in budget authority. The request for discretionary programs is $11.3 billion, which is $564 million below FY01 levels.

Transportation

President Bush proposed a $59.5 billion transportation budget that includes more than $1 billion in funding for Federal Transit Administration new starts--mostly in New Jersey and California--and full funding for both the Aviation Infrastructure and Reinvestment Act and the Transportation Equity Act.

The overall number represents an increase of 6 percent over last year's funding, if one-time FY01 projects are subtracted. But with those projects included, the growth is only about 1 percent.

The proposed budget includes over $7 billion to improve transportation safety--an 8 percent increase over last year. It also includes more enforcement and $56 million for new infrastructure at the Mexican border, as well as $145 million for the President's plan to increase the availability of transportation alternatives for people with disabilities.

The budget also includes funding for implementing the TREAD Act that will go toward updating tire safety standards, increasing crash data collection and developing new safety tests.

"The United States enjoys what I believe is the safest and the best transportation system in the world," Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta said at a budget briefing. "There is no question that we face capacity and safety challenges. The funding requested in the FY02 budget will help us to address those challenges and save lives, relieve congestion, reduce environmental impacts, and [provide] greater mobility for all Americans."