Unauthorized Appropriations and Expiring Authorizations

134 Pages·2011·0.87 MB·English

by  Congressional Budget Office

JANUARY 2012
Unauthorized Appropriations and
Expiring Authorizations
(In This Version, Appendix Material Is Sorted by
Appropriations Subcommittee)
CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES
Notes
Numbers in the tables may not add up to totals because of rounding.
In separate versions of this report, the listing of public laws in the appendixes are
displayed in three ways—by House authorizing committee, by Senate authorizing
committee, and by appropriations subcommittee. Each entry is listed only once—
generally under the primary committee to which the bill was referred.
Preface
This report by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) satisfies the requirements of
section202(e)(3) of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act, as amended.
The report, which must be completed by January 15 of each year, is intended to assist the
Congress by identifying authorizations of appropriations that have expired or that will expire
this year.
The Scorekeeping Unit of CBO’s Budget Analysis Division prepared this report under the
direction of Janet Airis. The other members of that unit are Edward Blau, Joanna Capps,
Virginia Myers, Mark Sanford, Esther Steinbock, and Adam Wilson. Mary Froehlich of CBO
and numerous staff members of Congressional committees provided assistance.
Jeanine Rees edited the report, with assistance from Leah Mazade, and Maureen Costantino
prepared it for publication. Linda Schimmel handled the print distribution, and Ernestine
McNeil assisted with the electronic distribution of the document. It is available on CBO’s
Web site, www.cbo.gov. Questions about the report should be directed to Janet Airis at
[phone].
Douglas W. Elmendorf
Director
January 2012
CBO
Contents
Overview 5
The Role of Authorizations 5
Listings of Unauthorized Appropriations and Expiring Authorizations 6
Programs Funded in Fiscal Year 2012 with Expired Authorizations of Appropriations 7
Authorizations of Appropriations That Expire on or Before September 30, 2012 7
Appendix A: List of Programs Funded in Fiscal Year 2012 With
Expired Authorizations of Appropriations 15
Appendix B: List of Authorizations of Appropriations Expiring
During Fiscal Year 2012 105
Tables
1. Summary of Fiscal Year 2012 Appropriations with
Expired Authorizations, by House Authorizing Committee 9
2. Summary of Fiscal Year 2012 Appropriations with
Expired Authorizations, by Senate Authorizing Committee 10
3. Summary of Fiscal Year 2012 Appropriations with
Expired Authorizations, by Appropriations Subcommittee 11
4. Summary of Authorizations of Appropriations Expiring on or
Before September 30, 2012, by House Authorizing Committee 12
5. Summary of Authorizations of Appropriations Expiring on or
Before September 30, 2012, by Senate Authorizing Committee 13
6. Summary of Authorizations of Appropriations Expiring on or
Before September 30, 2012, by Appropriations Subcommittee 14
CBO
JANUARY 2012 UNAUTHORIZED APPROPRIATIONS AND EXPIRING AUTHORIZATIONS 5
Overview
As required, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reports each January to the
Congress on the following:
 All programs and activities funded for the current fiscal year for which autho-
rizations of appropriations have expired, and
 All programs and activities for which authorizations of appropriations will expire
during the current fiscal year.
Those requirements are specified in section 202(e)(3) of the Congressional Budget
and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (Congressional Budget Act).1
The Role of Authorizations
The term “authorization” is used to describe two types of laws. One is an “organic,” or
“enabling,” statute, which creates a federal agency, establishes a federal program,
prescribes a federal function, or allows a particular federal obligation or expenditure
within a program. That type of authorization may allow a federal agency, program, or
function to continue indefinitely or only for a specific period. Such an authorization
may constitute direct spending (also known as “mandatory spending”) if it provides
the direct authority to draw money from the Treasury to implement the statute, or it
may simply specify a purpose for which a subsequent appropriation is made available.
This report focuses on the second type of law described by the term “authorization”: a
specific provision that authorizes the appropriation of funds (generally providing for
what is known as “discretionary spending”) to carry out the program or function
established in the enabling statute. Such a provision constitutes guidance to the
Congress regarding the amount of funding that will be necessary to implement the
enabling statute.
An authorization of appropriations may be contained in an enabling statute or may be
provided separately. Such an authorization may set a specific dollar amount (definite
authorization) or allow the appropriation of “such sums as may be necessary”
(indefinite authorization) and may be permanent, multiyear, or annual. For the
purposes of this report, an appropriation is considered unauthorized when it is made
available for a program after that program’s authorization of appropriations has
expired. This report does not address appropriations that have never been authorized.
1. See H. Rept. 99-433, at 114 (1985), the conference report accompanying the Balanced Budget
and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985, which amended the Congressional Budget Act to
include the requirement for this report. The stated purpose of the requirement is “to help Congress
use the early months of the year to adopt authorizing legislation that must be in place before the
regular appropriation bills can be considered.”
CBO
6 UNAUTHORIZED APPROPRIATIONS AND EXPIRING AUTHORIZATIONS JANUARY 2012
House and Senate rules—dating from the 19th century—contain restrictions on the
consideration of appropriations that are unauthorized, although the rules and their
application are different.2 Whether an appropriation is unauthorized and whether it is
a violation of a House or Senate rule are determined by the Speaker of the House or
the Presiding Office of the Senate, respectively, on advice of the respective House’s
Office of the Parliamentarian. Although this report is intended to aid the Congress by
identifying those authorizations of appropriations that have expired or will expire this
year, it is not—and should not be considered—definitive with respect to the
application of House or Senate rules.
Listings of Unauthorized Appropriations and
Expiring Authorizations
This report covers all programs funded through the annual appropriation process that
at one time had an explicit authorization of appropriations that has since expired
(seeAppendixA) or will expire this year (see AppendixB). Each listing includes the
number and name of the public law containing the last authorization, the last year
in which the authorization was in effect, and the amount (definite or indefinite)
authorized in that year. In separate versions of this report, the listings of public laws in
the appendixes are displayed in three ways—by House authorizing committee, by
Senate authorizing committee, and by appropriations subcommittee. Each entry is
listed only once—generally under the primary committee to which the bill was
referred.
The information in this report is drawn from CBO’s Legislative Classification System,
a database reflecting all public laws that contain nonpermanent authorizations of
appropriations—up to and including laws enacted during the first session of the
112th Congress.
In general, House and Senate rules require the appropriations committees, in their
reports on general appropriation bills, to identify any programs that are funded in the
bills but lack an authorization—including programs for which an explicit
authorization of appropriations has never been enacted. This CBO report, as specified
by law, covers only programs that at one time had an explicit authorization that either
has expired or is scheduled to expire. Many laws also establish programs with an
authorization of appropriations that does not expire. The reports of the
appropriations committees as well as this report exclude programs with that type of
authorization because its effect is permanent.
2. See Rule XXI of the House Rules and Manual, H. Doc. 110-162, at 836–891; and Rule XVI of
the Standing Rules of the Senate, S. Doc. 110-9, at 11–12.
CBO
JANUARY 2012 UNAUTHORIZED APPROPRIATIONS AND EXPIRING AUTHORIZATIONS 7
Programs Funded in Fiscal Year 2012 with
Expired Authorizations of Appropriations
AppendixA lists the programs and activities funded by an appropriation for fiscal year
2012 whose authorization of appropriations has expired. If the applicable 2012
appropriation law or its legislative history provides an explicit amount of funding for a
program, that amount is shown under “Unauthorized 2012 Appropriations” in
AppendixA. If no specific amount is provided (as in the case of a small program that
is funded at an unidentified level in a large appropriation account, or a program that is
funded in several appropriation accounts), CBO determines whether the program is
still being funded and, if so, how much is allocated for it. If that amount cannot be
identified, the listing notes that the specific dollar amount of the unauthorized 2012
appropriation is “not available.”
The Congress has appropriated about $261 billion for fiscal year 2012 for programs
and activities whose authorizations of appropriations have expired (see Tables 1, 2,
and 3). In 2010, the last year for which appropriations information was provided in
this report, about $291 billion was appropriated for programs whose authorizations
had expired. The 2012 amount is lower primarily because several agencies or
programs were reauthorized in 2010 and 2011, including the National Aeronautics
and Space Administration (about $14 billion appropriated in 2010), the Special
Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (about $7 billion
in 2010), the Department of Energy science program (about $5 billion in 2010), and
the Indian Health Service (about $4 billion in 2010).
Several large agencies or programs have expired authorizations, including the National
Institutes of Health (with appropriations of $31 billion for 2012), the Coast Guard
(with appropriations of $10 billion for 2012) and the Community Development
Block Grant program (with appropriations of $3 billion for 2012). Other large
appropriations with expired authorizations include programs authorized in the
Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act of 2005
(Public Law 109-162, $26 billion), the Quality Housing and Work Responsibility Act
of 1998 (P.L. 105-276, $25 billion), and the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001
(P.L. 107-110, $24 billion).
Authorizations of Appropriations That Expire on or
Before September 30, 2012
For certain programs and activities, the authorization of appropriations expires by the
end of fiscal year 2012. (AppendixB shows the amounts authorized to be appropriated
in 2012 for the expiring programs and activities, not the amounts actually
appropriated for that year.)
Definite authorizations (specifically, those contained in laws under the jurisdiction of
House and Senate authorizing committees) that will expire by the end of this fiscal
year total about $708 billion (see Tables 4, 5, and 6). Most of that amount, about
$663 billion, is authorized in a single law, the National Defense Authorization Act for
CBO
8 UNAUTHORIZED APPROPRIATIONS AND EXPIRING AUTHORIZATIONS JANUARY 2012
Fiscal Year 2012 (P.L. 112-81). Typically, authorizations for defense funding are
renewed annually.
Some of the other definite authorizations for programs that are expiring at the end
of2012 include provisions in the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007
(P.L.110-140, with authorizations of $4.9 billion), the Health Care Safety Net Act of
2008 (P.L. 110-335, with authorizations of $4.9 billion), and the Food, Conservation,
and Energy Act of 2008 (P.L. 110-234, with authorizations of $1.1 billion). In
addition, in the past few months, lawmakers have enacted temporary authorizations
that will expire during fiscal year 2012. They include authorizations for surface
transportation programs and programs of the Federal Aviation Administration
(through March 31, 2012).
CBO
JANUARY 2012 UNAUTHORIZED APPROPRIATIONS AND EXPIRING AUTHORIZATIONS 9
Table 1.
Summary of Fiscal Year 2012 Appropriations with Expired
Authorizations, by House Authorizing Committee
Amounts Appropriated
House Committee Number of Lawsa (Millions of dollars)b
Agriculture 8 37
Education and the Workforce 27 42,594
Energy and Commerce 55 47,156
Financial Services 16 31,238
Foreign Affairs 25 39,585
Homeland Security 7 189
House Administration 4 81
Judiciary 28 27,584
Natural Resources 54 2,677
Oversight and Government Reform 10 92
Science, Space, and Technology 16 5,718
Small Business 2 535
Transportation and Infrastructure 31 12,527
Veterans Affairs 11 51,014
Ways and Means 4 131
____ ________
Total 259 261,158
Source: Congressional Budget Office.
Note: This table shows only those committees that have jurisdiction over authorizations that have
expired but have received appropriations for 2012; therefore, not all House committees are
included.
a. This column includes laws with expired authorizations of appropriations for definite or indefinite
amounts. The total is less than the sum of the entries because public laws containing
authorizations that are under the jurisdiction of more than one committee are counted only
oncein the total.
b. Amounts specified in statute or legislative history.
CBO
10 UNAUTHORIZED APPROPRIATIONS AND EXPIRING AUTHORIZATIONS JANUARY 2012
Table 2.
Summary of Fiscal Year 2012 Appropriations with Expired
Authorizations, by Senate Authorizing Committee
Amounts Appropriated
Senate Committee Number of Lawsa (Millions of dollars)b
Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry 8 40
Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs 16 31,225
Commerce, Science, and Transportation 40 14,370
Energy and Natural Resources 28 10,684
Environment and Public Works 42 6,190
Finance 6 131
Foreign Relations 24 39,585
Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions 54 79,370
Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs 13 282
Indian Affairs 11 69
Judiciary 30 27,584
Rules and Administration 4 81
Small Business and Entrepreneurship 2 535
Veterans Affairs 11 51,014
____ ________
Total 259 261,158
Source: Congressional Budget Office.
Note: This table shows only those committees that have jurisdiction over authorizations that have
expired but have received appropriations for 2012; therefore, not all committees are included.
a. This column includes laws with expired authorizations of appropriations for definite or indefinite
amounts. The total is less than the sum of the entries because public laws containing
authorizations that are under the jurisdiction of more than one committee are counted only
oncein the total.
b. Amounts specified in statute or legislative history.
CBO