Statement of Administration Policy: H.R. 5373 - Energy and Water Development Appropriations Bill, FY 1993

(Senate Floor)
(Sponsors: Byrd (D), West Virginia; Johnston (D), Louisiana)

This Statement of Administration Policy expresses the Administration's views on H.R. 5373, the Energy and Water Development Appropriations Bill, FY 1993, as reported by the Senate Appropriations Committee.

The Administration understands that an amendment may be offered that would place a complete moratorium on nuclear testing. The President's senior advisers would recommend that the bill he vetoed if such a provision were included in the bill.

Budget Priorities

The Administration is pleased that the Committee has restored funding for the Superconducting Super Collider (SSC). As discussed below and in the attachment, the Senate is urged to approve an environmental cleanup fee, and to reduce funding for the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and for low-priority projects of the Army Corps of Engineers.

Superconducting Super Collider

The Administration appreciates Committee action to include funding for the SSC and would strongly oppose an amendment to delete the funding. Elimination of funding for the SSC would constitute a major retreat from U.S. leadership in superconductivity. This action would have highly adverse consequences for America's competitive position not only in science but in a number of important energy technologies.

SSC-related research has spawned, and will continue to spawn, advances in many fields of technology, including accelerators, cryogenics, superconductivity, and computing. The program serves as a national resource for inspiring students to pursue careers in math and science. SSC-related work would support nearly 7,900 jobs in the United States.

Environmental Cleanup Fee

The Committee has rejected the Administration's proposal for an environmental cleanup fee that would generate $183 million in receipts. This fee would require owners or operators of domestic nuclear power reactors to share in the cost of environmental cleanup of the uranium enrichment enterprise, without this user fee, the taxpayers would be forced to pay 100 percent of this cleanup cost.

Superconducting Magnetic Energy Storage

The Committee's recommendation for the Department of Energy (DOE) includes $20 million to force DOE'S involvement with a continuing Department of Defense (DOD) program in superconducting magnetic energy storage. The current program is not relevant to the utility industry and would not provide the benefits cited by the Committee, it would force DOB into a program with out-year Coats of approximately $500 million, without any cost-effective benefit for the nation's energy security. The only real beneficiaries would be the two current DOD contractor teams, led by Ebasco and Bechtel. The Administration urges the senate to delete this provision.

Scoring Issues: Office of Nuclear Safety and Los Alamos Meson Physics Facility

The Administration is concerned about the Committee's proposals to shift funding for several activities from the domestic to the defense discretionary allocations under the Budget Enforcement Act (BEA). These proposals include:

• Shifting $65 million in budget authority for the Office of Nuclear Safety from Energy Supply, Research and Development, a domestic account, to Atomic Energy defense;
  
  
• Shifting $26 million in budget authority for the Los Alamos Meson Physics Facility (LAMPF) from General Science and Research Activities to Atomic Energy Defense. The majority of the LAMPF functions have been funded as civilian science activities since the mid- 1960's.

The Administration is continuing to review the appropriate BEA scoring of these activities, but currently classifies both of them as domestic spending.

Preliminary Scoring

On the basis of OMB's preliminary scoring (see table attached), the Committee bill exceeds the Senate 602(b) Allocation for domestic discretionary budget authority by $50 million and exceeds the outlay allocation by $60 million. The bill is within the allocations for defense discretionary budget authority and outlays.

Additional Administration concerns with the Committee bill are contained in the attachment.

Attachment

Attachment
(Senate Floor)

ADDITIONAL CONCERNS
H.R. 3373 — ENERGY AND WATER DEVELOPMENT APPROPRIATIONS BILL, FY 1993

MAJOR PROVISIONS OPPOSED BY THE ADMINISTRATION

A. FUNDING LEVELS

Department of Defense-Civil: Army Corps of Engineers

—   The Committee's funding of the Corps of Engineers program exceeds the President's budget request by over $90 million. The Administration objects to the Committee's once again offsetting increased work by unrealistically inflating savings and slippage. By including this $63 million financing gimmick, the Committee has masked the budgetary impact of its actions. This provision would make the already difficult job of managing the Corps program that much more difficult.

The savings and slippage would be subtracted from the amount allocated to individual projects. Local sponsors, who are now bearing a greater portion of project costs, would be required to finance some of the resultant project cost increases due to schedule delays caused by inadequate funding.

—   The Administration is pleased that the committee has funded the President's requested new construction starts — in particular, the major rehabilitation new starts. These projects are aimed at protecting America's existing investments in infrastructure.

—   The Administration is concerned that the Committee has reduced — and in some cases eliminated — requested funding for various programs of the Army Corps of Engineers. Instead, funding has been provided for lower priority activities.

The President's regulatory program budget request would provide for an increase in staffing to speed up the review and processing of regulatory permits. The Committee's funding reduction would only serve to decelerate regulatory permit processing. The research and development activities for which the Committee has reduced funding would provide important analytical information needed to make wise environmental investments.

—   The Administration objects to the Committee's deletion of 10 out of the 11 water resources project pre-construction engineering and design (PED) new starts contained in the President's budget request. Eight of the budgeted PZDs resulted from non-Federal, coat-shared feasibility studies, cost-sharing reforms were accompanied by a number of agreements intended to assure local sponsors that cost-shared studies would be accorded high priority for funding.

Department of the Interior: Bureau of Reclamation

—   The Administration objects to the Committee's failure to fund the proposed transfer of oversight responsibility for the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) dam safety program to the Bureau of Reclamation.

The Administration first proposed this transfer in FY 1991 after the Department of the Interior Inspector General reported that the BIA had not effectively managed the program from either an engineering or financial standpoint. BIA has made some improvement in its dam safety program, as documented in a recent GAO report. Nevertheless, the Administration believes that the best engineering expertise for accomplishing this important function lies in the Bureau of Reclamation.

The Secretary of the Interior should be allowed to exercise his management discretion on how best to use the technical and management expertise of the Bureau of Reclamation to ensure the timely correction of serious safety deficiencies at a number of high-hazard BIA dams. Indian tribes would participate in implementing corrective actions on reservation dams, through contracts or, if a tribe chooses, through consultation.

Department of Energy

—   The Administration objects to the Committee's $5 million reduction from the request for the new Fermilab Main Injector for high energy physics research. Funding at requested levels for this crucial investment in the nation's science infrastructure is needed to ensure America's competitive position in research and development in the future.

—   The committee report would shift $25 million within the civilian portion of the Environmental Restoration and Waste Management (ERWM) program to provide additional funds for the operation of the Fast Flux Test Facility. The Administration has made every effort to ensure that funds are available in the ERWM program to meet all legally mandated schedules and milestones. Shifting funds to reactor operations could cause the Department of Energy to miss milestones that are enforceable under the terms of compliance agreements. These are agreements that the Department has signed with EPA and state regulatory agencies.

—   The Committee bill funds all line items in the Multiprogram Energy Laboratories-Facility Support activity at the levels requested by the President and then reduces the activity overall by $20 million. With this provision, the Department of Energy would be unable to delete individual projects and would be forced to stretch the completion schedule for all projects.

—   The Administration objects to the committee's failure to fund the Presidential initiative ($10 million) to develop technology and systems for Moon and Mars exploration.

Other Independent Agencies

—   Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). The Committee bill would increase funding for TVA by 34 percent over the Administration's request. The increase would continue rural development activities that should be conducted by State or local governments. Further, this unwarranted increase in funding would maintain funding for fertilizer activities that the Administration believes should be made self-supporting.

B. LANGUAGE PROVISIONS

Department of Defense-Civil: Army Corps of Engineers

—   Many of the low-priority studies and construction projects contained in the Committee bill have specific funding levels and features prescribed in bill language. This would reduce programmatic flexibility and place an unfair financial burden on other projects when savings and slippage is allocated.

—   The Administration objects to language that would require the Secretary of the Army to place one-half of the Federal hopper dredge fleet in standby status for a one-year period. The Administration shares the Committee's desire to make more work available for competitive bidding by the private sector. However, keeping two Federal dredges in standby status would still entail Federal crew and maintenance costs, While at the same time contracting out the work that these dredges would otherwise perform. This would reduce the amount of dredging the Corps could finance with fixed FY 1993 appropriations and would result in only a small increase in the total amount of private sector dredging.

The Administration stands ready to work with the Committee to reduce the costs of the dredging program and to promote competition within the program in a way that avoids the high cost of keeping Federal dredges in a standby status.

Department of Energy

—   The Administration objects to Committee report language stating that a minimum of one FTB per $2.5 million of budget authority shall be allocated to the Department of Energy's (DDE's) Office of Environmental Restoration and Waste Management. This represents Congressional intrusion on Presidential prerogatives to set employment levels.

—   The Administration objects to the Committee's directing 00E to select competitively a commercial deployment contractor for the AVLIS Uranium Enrichment project. The Committee directs DOE to have this contractor on line by April 1, 1993, and to have this contractor direct several predeployment activities. Until the outcome of restructuring legislation is determined, the Administration believes that it is inappropriate for the Committee to be directing DOE to perform pre-deployment activities.

—   The Administration objects to section 304 of the Committee bill, which would establish certain racial, ethnic, and gender criteria for businesses and other organizations seeking Federal funding for the development, construction, and operation of the Superconducting Super Collider. A Congressional grant of Federal money or benefits based solely on the recipient's race, ethnicity, or gender is presumptively unconstitutional under the equal protection standards of the constitution.

The Supreme Court has held that race or gender preferences violate the constitution unless they are substantially related to the accomplishment of important goals. The provisions of the bill that employ racial, ethnic, or gender criteria would withstand constitutional scrutiny only if there were sufficient evidence to meet this exacting standard.

General Provisions

— The Administration objects to the language of section 505 of the Committee bill, which would bar the use of appropriated funds to conduct certain studies of the pricing of hydroelectric power. In signing the FY 1991 and FY 1992 Energy and Water Development Appropriations Bills, the President objected to language identical to the language in section 505 on constitutional grounds. The Constitution grants the President the authority to recommend to the Congress any legislative measures considered "necessary and expedient." Any restrictions on studies would be interpreted so MM not to limit the President's ability to carry out his constitutional responsibilities.

The attached data tables can be downloaded in PDF format by clicking this link