October 10, 2005

Due to the Columbus Day holiday and district work period, Congress has recessed until Monday, October 17.

CONGRESSIONAL SCHEDULE

Congress will face a heavy legislative agenda when they return from their week long recess on Monday, October 17. Agenda items include the FY 2006 appropriations, budget reconciliation, a Supreme Court nomination, hurricane relief efforts, and other items. With regard to appropriations, the process must be completed before the current continuing resolution (CR) expires on Friday, November 18. The House has completed its 11 spending bills, and the Senate has finished 9 of its 12 bills. Two spending measures have been signed into law (Interior-Environment and Leg Branch), and the homeland security appropriations conference report was passed last week.

The House and Senate will also take up a reconciliation package set forth in the FY 2006 budget resolution, calling for savings of $35 billion over five years in mandatory spending. Authorizing committees are expected to report their proposals to the budget committees by October 19. The Committees will then draft up a reconciliation bill the week of October 24.

A second phase of tax relief legislation is being worked on in both the House and the Senate to aid the victims of Hurricane Katrina and business that employ and assist them. Both chambers hope to have relief packages on their respective floors the week of October 17.

The Supreme Court nomination of Harriet Miers will also be addressed in the Senate, while the House schedule includes immigration reform and legislation to curb methamphetamine abuse.

CONGRESS PASSES FY 2006 HOMELAND SECURITY APPROPRIATIONS CONFERENCE REPORT

Last week, the Senate passed (by unanimous consent) the conference report to the FY 2006 appropriations bill (H.R. 2360) for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The measure recommends $30.8 billion in discretionary funding for DHS operations and activities, and $1.1 billion in mandatory spending. It provides $3.3 billion for first responders. The House adopted the conference report on Thursday, October 6, and the President is expected to sign the measure. The conference report also includes:

$550 million for the state Homeland Security grant program, with each state receiving a minimum of 0.75 percent and the remainder distributed at the discretion of the DHS Secretary ($1.085 billion in FY 2005);
$1.155 billion for the high-density urban areas, including $765 million for urban area security grants ($885 million in FY 2005), $150 million for rail security (same as FY 2005), $175 million for port security ($150 in FY 2005), and $65 million for infrastructure protection;
$40 million for implementation of the REAL ID Act;
$655 million for firefighter grants ($715 million in FY 2005);
$400 million for state and local law enforcement terrorism prevention grants (same as FY 2005);
$5 million for trucking security (same as 2005), and $4 million for HAZMAT truck tracking and training;
$5 million for training state and local officers to enforce immigration laws;
$185 million for Emergency Management Performance Grants ($180 million in FY 2005);
$1.77 billion for the disaster relief fund ($2.042 billion in FY 2005);
$200 million for the flood map modernization program (same as FY 2005); and
$20 million for the Urban Search and Rescue Teams ($30 million in FY 2005).

The conference report also includes a provision that requires the Secretary of Homeland Security to take tourism into consideration when allocating certain discretionary grants to states, a provision that Nevada's congressional delegation pushed to include.

SENATE REAUTHORIZES THE VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN ACT

Last week, the Senate passed by voice vote a bill (S. 1197) to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act of 1994. The measure would now allow men to qualify for the program's benefits and would authorize federal authorities to obtain DNA samples from suspects detained or arrested for inclusion in a national database. However, the bill was amended on the Senate floor to allow individuals who are arrested but not charged with a crime to have their DNA expunged from the database. The amendment also would permit states to only submit DNA samples from foreigners, and would not allow voluntary samples to be submitted to the database. In addition, the amendment would make it more difficult for immigrant victims of domestic violence to use their abuse as grounds for immigration benefits. S. 1197 also would establish a new tribal deputy director in the Office on Violence Against Women to address domestic violence with American Indian tribes on reservations.

Last month, the House passed a Violence Against Women reauthorization measure (H.R. 2876) as part of their Justice Department reauthorization bill (H.R. 3402). The Senate has not considered a Justice Department reauthorization bill.

KATRINA RELATED HOUSING LEGISLATION PASSES HOUSE

Last week, the House passed three housing-related bills in response to the housing needs of Hurricane Katrina survivors. The Hurricane Katrina Emergency Housing Act, H.R. 3894 was approved by a 418-0 vote. The measure would grant the Secretary of HUD temporary waiver authority of certain eligibility requirements under the Section 8 voucher program; authorize the HUD Secretary to directly administer vouchers if a Public Housing Authority is unable to do so; direct HUD, the Department of Defense, the Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Government-Sponsored Enterprises to compile an inventory of facilities in the affected areas that can be used for temporary and permanent housing; and require the Government Accountability Office to report to Congress on the state of emergency housing disaster plans.

The House also passed the Rural Housing Hurricane Relief Act, H.R. 3895, by a vote of 335-81. The bill gives the Rural Housing Services (RHS) the authority to convert voucher funds attached to rural housing projects that are no longer habitable because of the hurricanes into temporary housing assistance; expand the flexibility of the RHS by temporarily eliminating the limitations on the number of housing vouchers it can issue; and amend the single family housing guaranteed loan program by expanding refinancing to include loans for housing repairs and rehabilitation.

And finally, the Hurricane Katrina Emergency Relief CDBG Flexibility Act, H.R. 3896, was approved by a vote of 415-0. The bill would temporarily remove the public services cap on Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds and temporarily waive (for one year) the public hearing requirement so that communities affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita can expedite the disbursement of CDBG funds.

HOUSE GOP LEADERS MAY POSTPONE RECONCILIATION

House Republican leaders may postpone the October 17 deadline for authorizing committees to report their reconciliation packages of proposed spending cuts by at least one week. This action would allow more time for committees to consider new Republican leadership plans calling for an additional $15 billion in savings from mandatory programs (for a total of $50 billion) and an across-the-board cut in fiscal year 2006 spending. House leaders are also considering additional spending cuts to offset any new mandatory spending for hurricane relief and a package of rescissions to previously appropriated funds to offset reconstruction costs. The Senate has not announced any further changes to its reconciliation schedule.

PAYMENT ERROR RULE FOR MEDICAID AND SCHIP RELEASED BY CMS

The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) recently released an interim final rule that outlines how the agency intends to measure payment errors in both Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). This interim rule is follow up to a proposed Payment Error Rate Measurement (PERM) rule that was released by CMS on August 26, 2004, to comply with the Improper Payments Information Act of 2002. According to this most recent notice by CMS, substantial changes were made in its approach since the August proposed rule. Most notably, the new interim final rule proposes that instead of requiring states to produce error rates, a federal contractor will conduct reviews and produce the error rates to CMS. Because of the substantial changes since the proposed rule in August, CMS is accepting comments on the interim final rule for 30 days. Comments can be submitted electronically on the CMS web site.

For a list of this week's federal grants, please visit our website at www.nevadadc.org