Bill-by-bill look at 2007 appropriations

Passed the House May 23; passed the Senate Appropriations Committee June 22. $16.9 million for the Agriculture Department's CIO office, compared with $16.3 million in 2006, a $639,000 increase.The Common Computing Environment would get $69 million, $40 million less than in 2006. Congress also expects USDA to acquire geospatial data and geographic information systems, a critical part of CCE, with the appropriations.The National Animal Identification program would receive $33.1 million.USDA would have to receive congressional approval to transfer money from the capital fund for financial-management modernization and IT services. No funds may be used to buy IT systems or upgrades without the approval of the CIO and Executive Information Technology Investment Review Board, lawmakers said.In total, the Food and Drug Administration, an agency of the Health and Human Services Department, would get $1.5 billion, an increase of $71.6 million over this year and $1.9 million below the president's request. Appropriations bill passed House June 20. Senate Appropriations Committee to hold hearing July 20. Authorization bill passed by the Senate June 22, the House May 11. While the Defense Department is preparing to extend its online travel system to 11,000 sites and 3.2 million users by the end of September, the Senate has backed a plan to halt funding for the $474 million Defense Travel System.In an amendment to S 2767, the fiscal 2007 Defense authorization bill, lawmakers voted in favor of charging user fees, similar to the structure of the General Services Administration's E-Travel program.DOD's contract with Northrop Grumman for DTS expires in September. The Senate amendment was proposed by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), but would still need to be voted on by a House-Senate conference committee and signed by President Bush. DTS is now operational at more than 90 percent of DOD's major installations.Some other highlights of the Senate's $517.7 billion authorization bill: a sign-off of $85.7 billion in procurement funding, a $2.8 billion increase over President Bush's request; $74.2 billion for research, development, test and evaluation, a $1 billion increase; and $50 billion in emergency supplemental funding to support operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and the global war on terrorism.In HR 5122, the House's version, lawmakers decreased the Army's Future Combat Systems program request by $325 million. The House also expressed concern that while the Army is developing its Warfighter Information Network-Tactical (WIN-T) program, the network that will run the tactical systems that constitute FCS, the service also is currently procuring the Joint Network Node, with no visible plan to transition from JNN to WIN-T.The House recommended $80 million in cuts to the Transformational Communications Satellite program (TSAT), $15 million in cuts from the Net-Centric Enterprise Services program, a $70 million slash from the Navy-Marine Corps Intranet program and a $30 million reduction from the Space-Based Radar program.R&D for Future Combat Systems was approved at $3 billion, roughly $326 million below the president's request. Lawmakers said the reduction was due to development and contracting delays. Still, the recommended amount for FCS represents an increase of $227 million above 2006.The House slashed the Space Radar program by $66.4 million, and if the budget is ultimately approved, TSAT would receive a $100 million deduction in funding. Passed the House May 24; passed the Senate subcommittee June 27. In the House version, the National Nuclear Security Administration would receive $89.7 million for cybersecurity activities, including an extra $1 million for CimTrak cybersecurity software from Cimcor of Merrillville, Ind.The Senate allocated $695 million for NNSA to purchase the first petaflop computer for the U.S. This will be the fastest computer in the world.It also would give NNSA $670.7 million for Sandia National Laboratory to encourage the development of technology-based security solutions to increase the margin of security and reduce costs. Passed House June 9. Senate Appropriations Committee was scheduled to mark up the bill late last week. This bill funds a wide variety of foreign-aid programs and provides support for various international organizations. The Agency for International Development would get no funds for new projects and no increases for existing projects. The House approved $13.3 million for IT improvements, a $16 million decrease from the administration's request. Passed the House June 6. Passed the Senate Appropriations Committee June 27. Both chambers would give more money to the Homeland Security Department for IT programs. For example, the House bill called for 100 percent screening of cargo entering the country via Customs and Border Protection's Automated Targeting System. The Senate would provide the U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology program with $399.5 million for 2007, or $62.9 million more than this year.The House was relatively frugal with U.S. Visit, providing $362 million for the program, about $25.8 million more than this year.The Senate subcommittee cleared $975.2 million for the department's headquarters operations, which includes the CIO office and the Office of the Chief Procurement Officer, or a $76.9 million increase from this year.The Senate pinpointed strong funding for immigration benefits processing, allocating $134.9 million for immigration benefits processing. The House came in with a lower figure in that area, clearing $114 million to support immigration verification systems. The House provided $115 million in new funding for the SBInet border technology project. Together with existing appropriations, the project will receive $215.8 million.The appropriations committee condemned uncertainties about the SBInet procurement. It withheld $25 million until DHS submits a certified technology plan.The House approved $451.4 million for IT improvements in Customs and Border Protection, much of which will go to build the Automated Commercial Environment system. That was $9.7 million less than the administration requested for the customs IT automation.The House cleared $92.2 million for cybersecurity work in the Preparedness Directorate, $211,000 less than the 2006 figure.The House took a very harsh view of IT upgrades in Immigration and Customs Enforcement, totally eliminating spending on the work and zeroing out the 2006 appropriation of $39.7 million. The House approved a $20 million appropriation for the Transportation Worker Identification Credential project and noted that the administration expects to combine that with $20 million in TWIC user fees. Passed the House May 18. Passed the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee June 27. The Senate subcommittee would allocate $980 million for Interior's technology-laced Geological Survey, $18.3 million above the 2006 level. The House targeted its USGS technology funding partly by recommending $113.7 million for enterprise information, $2.5 million above the budget request and $67.3 million above 2006. Part of the change reflected a shift of funds from one computerized mapping program to another.In the Bureau of Land Management, the House allocated $17.5 million for land and resource information systems, the same as the budget request and $364,000 below the 2006 level. The Senate bill targeted $793.3 million for the Environmental Protection Agency's Science and Technology account, a $62.5 million increase from the 2006 law and $5 million above the administration's request. Most of the technology spending for these agencies was embedded within other programs. Passed the House Appropriations Committee June 13; full House vote still pending; Senate has not received the bill. This bill is perhaps most famous for its harsh language prohibiting funds in the bill from being spent on any e-government initiatives without a reprogramming request and a cost-benefit analysis from the lead career project manager.Also, the bill granted the Labor Department's IT Crosscut initiative'a program the agency uses for IT projects that have agencywide use'$28 million, provided that, again, none of the funds go to e-government projects. This amount is under the supervision of the CIO's office.Elsewhere, the bill would be kind to health IT projects, providing HHS' Health Resources and Services Administration an overall budget of $7.1 billion, which was $524 million more than it received in 2006 and $778 million above the administration's request.The bill would grant $98 million for the National Coordinator for Health IT, with $86.7 million available in budget authority and $11.9 million in program evaluation. In total, this amount is $36.7 million above this year's appropriation but $17.8 million below the administration's request. Passed House May 19; the Senate Appropriations Committee has not acted yet. For Veterans Affairs' IT systems and telecommunications support, the bill would provide $1.3 billion, $45.3 million more than the budget request and $88.5 million more than this year. The bill also recommends $21.7 million in other accounts for IT in support of credit programs and $4 million in excess revenues from three insurance funds for IT support.In the House report, the committee recommended an additional $45.3 million to be centrally managed by the Office of the CIO, to continue the Regional Data Processing Center consolidation initiative.VA may not use funds without congressional approval, which hinges on the department meeting a fairly long list of accountability requirements. Passed the full House June 14; awaiting Senate action The House would cut the administration's $5 million request for the E-Government Fund to $3 million.Also, the bill would not contain funding for the Office of Personnel Management's Retirement Systems Modernization project. The White House asked for $26.7 million in its fiscal year 2007 request.The House would allocate $1.4 million for OPM's Human Resources Line of Business project and $6.9 million for the agency's Enterprise Human Resources Integration project.And as in years past, the bill dismissed language that would have let OMB use $40 million of surplus funds in the General Supply Fund to finance e-government activities.Elsewhere, lawmakers signed off on a provision requested by the administration to merge the General Services Administration's General Supply and IT funds into the new Acquisition Services Fund, which correlates with the agency's reorganization and creation of the Federal Acquisition Service.The legislation also would grant $45.4 million for the National Archives and Records Administration's Electronic Records Archive, an electronic archiving system for government documents. This is an increase of $7.9 million from 2006, according to the House report.Transportation's CIO office would get $12.2 million up from $11.7 million in 2006.For Treasury, the House gave $212.3 million for the IRS' Business Systems Modernization, provided that the agency meets capital planning and investment control review measures, and several other requirements. The total would be about $13 million more than this year.Treasury would receive $21.2 million for the Treasury Foreign Intelligence Network, an intelligence system critical in the fight against terrorist financing. House Appropriations Committee cleared a bill on June 20. The Senate is waiting on House action. The FBI's Sentinel case management program would receive $100 million next year.The committee is extending its oversight of Sentinel and other IT programs, asking for high-level reviews to ensure compatibility with the agency's enterprise architecture.The FBI also would receive $125 million for information-sharing technology, including the Joint Automated Booking System, Justice Consolidated Office Network, Litigation Case Management System, the agency's Public Key Infrastructure and its Unified Financial Management System.Justice would get $89 million for tactical wireless communications, which includes the Integrated Wireless Network program. This is $149,000 above 2006, but $217,000 below the administration's request.The bureau also would receive about $150 million for the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System.The committee would allocate $100 million to the Law Enforcement Technologies and Interoperable Communications program.The draft House bill would provide $6 billion for the National Science Foundation, a $439 million increase. The bill eliminated 11 relatively small programs, including some specialized scholarship grants.The National Institute of Standards and Technology would receive $627 million.Census would receive $75.4 million for automated data collection and support for the 2010 Census.The committee recommended $5.3 million for the White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy, $124,000 below current funding and the same as the request.The bill also would withhold $5 million from agencies that do not increase telecommuting opportunities for employees.