Labor, Health, and Human Services & Veterans Appropriations
On November 15, 2007, the House fell two votes short of overriding the President's veto of the FY 2008 Labor-HHS Education Appropriations bill, H.R. 3043. The House passed the final bill on November 6, and the President vetoed the bill on November 13. The measure includes the Military Construction-VA Appropriations bill. Both of these measures passed the House and Senate with strong bipartisan majorities.
This bill provides the largest increase for veterans in history, rejects the President’s cuts to needed resources for health care, education, job training, and home heating assistance, and makes critical investments in our future. The President has approved 27 previous appropriations bills that were combined in this fashion by Republican congresses.
Veterans Services
- Increases the VA budget by $6.6 billion above the FY07 level, the largest single increase in the 77-year history of the Veterans Administration, $3.7 billion above the President’s FY08 request.
- Includes $2.6 billion more than President for veterans health care to treat 5.8 million patients, including about 263,000 Iraq and Afghanistan veterans.
- Reducing the Backlog of Veterans Benefit Claims. Provides 1,800 claims processors to reduce the huge number of veterans (400,000) waiting for their earned benefits.
- VA Health Facilities Maintenance. Provides $500 million above President’s request for much-needed maintenance of VA health care facilities. A recent VA report outlined 1,000 specific problems at VA facilities around the country.
- PTSD and TBI. Increases funding within all the health accounts for mental health, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Traumatic Brain Injury to ensure the poly-trauma centers and Centers of Excellence for Mental Health and PTSD are fully operational. One-third of veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan face mental health challenges, and up to 300,000 returning troops are expected to suffer from TBI.
- Medical and Prosthetic Research. Invests 16 percent more for medical and prosthetic research, instead of accepting cuts in the President’s budget.
- All of the major veterans’ groups strongly endorsed the House and Senate passed bill – including the Veterans of Foreign Wars, American Legion, Disabled Veterans of America, Paralyzed Veterans of America, Military Officers Association of America, Association of the United States Army, National Association for Uniformed Services, and AMVETS – calling it a “major victory” and an “impressive commitment” to our veterans.
Strengthen Our Military
- Military facilities. Provides better barracks, housing and training facilities when troops return from combat through an unprecedented $21.5 billion investment in military construction, family housing, and BRAC ($306 million more than the President’s request).
- Adding troops. Provides funds to grow our military forces and begins the process of adding 65,000 Army, 27,000 Marine, and 9,000 National Guard and Reserve troops.
- Child development centers. Includes $129 million to construct 16 new child development centers for military families.
Expand Educational Opportunities
- No Child Left Behind. Provides an increase of $1.6 billion over 2007 and $579 million over the President’s request for No Child Left Behind programs. Title I. Gives 117,000 more low-income children extra help with reading and math than the President with an increase of $1.8 billion over 2007 for Title I.
- Teacher quality. Strengthens teacher quality by providing an increase of $150 million over 2007 and $250 million over the President’s request for teacher quality grants;
- After-School Care. Provides after-school opportunities for an additional 130,000 students through an increase of $100 million over 2007 and the President’s request for after-school programs.
- Children with disabilities. The bill rejects the President’s cut and instead provides an increase of $509 million over 2007 for Individuals with Disabilities Act. This investment reverses a two-year decline in the federal contribution toward the rising costs of special education for 6.9 million children with disabilities. Under the Republicans, the federal contribution for special education fell from 18.6 percent in 2005 to 17.2 percent in 2007, leaving states struggling to meet these costs.
- College. With the $125 increase in this bill, the maximum Pell Grant for college will have been raised from $4,050 in 2006 to $4,925, a $875 increase under Congressional Democrats. This would benefit more than 5.5 million students struggling to get into the middle class.
- Head Start. The Conference agreement rejects the Bush proposal to deny Head Start services for 13,500 kids and provides $254 million over Bush and $154 million over FY07.
Better Health Care
- Expanding health care/community health centers. To address the 46.6 million Americans without health insurance, the conference agreement enables community health centers to serve an additional 1.2 million uninsured Americans by investing 11 percent more than 2007 and the President’s request.
- New investments in life-saving medical research. Medical research at NIH offers hope to millions of American families – with groundbreaking research into diseases such as cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, and Parkinson’s. For FY 2008, the President proposed a cut of $480 million below 2007. Instead, this bill provides an increase of $1.1 billion over 2007 – allowing NIH to support 1,400 more research grants than the President.
- Expanding health care/state programs. Provides $50 million for a new initiative of state health access grants – providing start-up grants to states that are ready with plans to expand health care coverage to targeted groups and $50 million for an initiative to assist states in providing high-risk insurance pools to support affordable insurance for almost 200,000 people who are medically high-risk.
- Rural health. Rejects the President’s $142 million cut and provides $24 million over FY07 for health services to 775,000 rural residents in underserved areas and to support over 1200 small, rural hospitals.
Strengthen the Skills of America’s Workers & Worker Safety.
- Overall funding. Rejects the President’s budget proposal to slash vital employment and training programs by $722 million – leaving Americans who want to succeed in the 21st century workforce without vital services they need.
- Job training and employment assistance. Rejects the President’s proposal to cut worker training and employment assistance by 18 percent -- thereby maintaining these critical services for 173,000 adults, youth and dislocated workers.
- Worker safety. To prevent tragedies like the Sago mine incident and strengthen enforcement of worker health and safety laws neglected over the past six years, the agreement increases funding for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (3 percent) and the Mine Safety and Health Administration (13 percent).
Other Priorities
- Investing in community services. Rejects the President’s proposal to eliminate the vital $630 million Community Services Block Grant, which local communities use to help low-income families get on their feet, such as funding child care, job training, and nutrition – instead providing $665 million.
- Help with home heating bills. The President’s budget proposes cutting Low-Income Home Energy Assistance (LIHEAP) by $379 million. The bill rejects this cut – instead providing an increase of $250 million over 2007, enabling 600,000 more families to receive LIHEAP assistance than in 2007 and 1.5 million more families than the President.