House chairman to try again to give president broad reorganization powers

House Government Reform Committee Chairman Tom Davis, R-Va., is pushing to give the president more power to reorganize federal agencies and is working to educate his Senate colleagues who scotched his plan last year.

Davis is seeking a broad approach, giving the executive branch power to reorganize all federal agencies. Last year, a Davis proposal to allow the president to restructure intelligence agencies was included in the House version of the intelligence overhaul bill, but Senate conferees removed it.

"There is still some educating left to be done in the Senate, since some have the initial resistance to the idea, as those in the House once had," Davis said in a statement. "While we made progress during the conference, time ran out before an agreement could be reached."

Davis' committee held hearings last spring showing examples of overlap among federal agencies to sway reluctant House members to reinstate the authority to allow the president to submit reorganization proposals for an up-or-down vote in Congress.

The mechanism was used by previous presidents to create the Office of Management and Budget and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

"Our strategy of educating members before acting worked in regards to the executive reorganization authority since the House approved the language in the 9/11 bill; that wouldn't have happened if we didn't lay the foundation for it," Davis said.

In speeches, Davis is touting the idea of giving the president the power to remake the entire federal bureaucracy. "Congress is not terribly well-equipped to tackle organizational challenges: Too much turf, too many egos, far too much time," he said.

But some worry the proposal could be a back way to eliminate federal jobs and an abdication of congressional responsibility. Davis could face such objections from members of his own committee.

At the markup of the intelligence overhaul bill, Rep. John Tierney, D-Mass., offered an amendment to strike Davis' provision. That amendment was narrowly defeated on a near party-line vote, with Rep. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., joining Democrats. House Government Reform ranking member Henry Waxman, D-Calif., sees the proposal as giving the president a blank check to reorganize the executive branch, a Democratic committee aide said.