Late Friday evening the office of Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE), who had been working to trim some spending from the Senate’s economic stimulus bill, released a statement with details on a compromise he and other senators reached on spending cuts. The $1.5 billion for NASA that Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) advocated, including $500 million to reduce the Shuttle-Constellation gap, had in the crosshairs of Ben Nelson, Susan Collins (R-ME), and other cutters. The compromise, though, leaves that $500 million intract, instead cutting $200 million of the $500 million sought for Earth sciences research:
| House | Senate Original | Senate Compromise | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Science | $400M | $500M | $300M |
| Aeronautics | $150M | $250M | $250M |
| Shuttle Replacement | $0 | $500M | $500M |
| Cross-Agency Support (Construction) | $50M | $250M | $250M |
| Office of the Inspector General | $2M | $2M | $2M |
Assuming this compromise does pass the full Senate, keep in mind that the Senate version will have to be reconciled with the House version, which provided $600 million for NASA, and none of that for human spaceflight.
The round numbers all around and willy-nilly cuts are very troubling. It’s likely that there’s no programmatics behind any of this.
What exactly are we losing (a satellite, schedule, number of grants, etc.) by taking Earth Science from $500M to $300M?
What exactly are we buying in Constellation (a few weeks of Ares I/Orion schedule, a few percent better probability of meeting that schedule, etc.) with an additional $500M?
And how much of this NASA funding will actually be spent in the next, say, six months, in the suppossedly critical time window for stimulating the economy?
Is any of this worth these dollars?
Or are we just throwing the incomes of our grandchildren at NASA field center pork to buy a few more votes for certain congressmen in the next election?
Bleah…
Considering recent history — particularly that of the so-called “Mikulski Miracle” (not) — if I was a betting man, I would bet that the $500M for shortening the gap will not make it through the conference.
The House will take its typical stance.
Mikulski (who will be in the conference) is not going to defend “shortening the gap” funding, when funding for Earth Science is being threatened.
Mikulski and House members will join forces to put money back in for Earth science.
Bill Nelson will not be in the conference.
I don’t see how the NASA funding holds up, considering the anger coming out of the House on what was cut by the Senate.
FWIW,
– Al
Here are some more numbers that might have some space implications. The columns are the same as in the original post.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Operations, research, and facilities $400M $427M $227M
Procurement, acquisition, & construction $600M $795M $795M
National Science Foundation
Research and related activities $2,500M $1,200M $1,000M
Major equipment and facilities construction $400M $150M $150M
Education and human resources $100M $50M $50M
Office of the Inspector General $2M $2M $2M
United States Geological Survey
Surveys, Investigations, and Research $200M $135M $135M
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The funding levels in the original post above are not the same as in the press release summarizing the bill.
The committee summary says the compromise is as follows:
Earth Science: $450M
Aero: $200M
Cross-agency: $200M
Exploration: $450M
Interestingly, the funding to close the gap is in the Exploration account (at elast it was in the original Senate bill), implying that they don;t intend to close the gap by extending the Shuttle. FWIW.
[…] evenly across science, aeronautics, human spaceflight, and NASA facility repairs; previously the entire $200 million was going to come out of science. A Senate Appropriations Committee press release has similar numbers. What’s not clear is […]