AAS Public Policy Blog

Tune in to C-SPAN tomorrow morning, because H.Con.Res. 375, honoring the goal of the International Year of Astronomy, is scheduled for floor time. You can see the full House schedule (PDF link) via the House Majority Leader’s site.

Update It should be taken up around 10:45AM, but that’s an estimate. These sort of bills pass by voice vote, so it will go by quickly.

Update II The resolution was taken up and passed by voice vote under suspension of the rules.
C-SPAN has a nifty archive site of today’s events. You can see the IYA resolution pass here. Unfortunately the CSPAN flash player isn’t embedable, or I’d have the video here on the post. Any web gurus out there who can figure out how to capture this video into another format (C-SPAN footage of the Congress is in the public domain), let me know.

Update III I have to say I’m impressed with the C-SPAN site. But they seem to prefer to chop up the segments by speaker, and the links include start and stop timecodes, which is why the clip may have stopped before Rep. Giffords finished speaking. I believe I have tweaked the link above so you can view through the end of the debate now.

That said, you can also view the segment by speaker, with transcript.

• Rep. Lampson (D-TX)
• Rep. Feeney (R-FL)
• Rep. Giffords (D-AZ)

The AAS is very grateful to Rep. Giffords and her office for sponsoring and helping move this resolution forward, to the staff of the House Science and Technology committee, and to Rep. Lampson and Rep. Feeney for their kind words and support on the floor.

The National Science Foundation has an excellent statistics in the appendices to the 2008 Science and Engineering Indicators Report.

I used the excel versions of Tables 4-1, Gross domestic product and implicit price deflators: 1953–2007, and Table 4-32, Federal obligations for total research, by detailed S&E field: FY 1986–2007 to produce this chart:

To be clear, I took the constant 2000 dollar values for Physics and Astronomy and Physical Sciences spending from Table 4-32, and divided those into the constant dollars GDP number from Table 4-1.

Click on the image for a larger version.

Download a High Resolution PNG here

According the data, all Physical Science spending in 2005 is equal to Physics spending alone 20 years ago. Grim.

Or more specifically they passed “Motion To Concur In House Amdts To Senate Amdt To House Amdt To Senate Amdt To H.R. 2642.” As described previously, this includes funding for the NSF, NASA, and DOE Office of Science.

The money is included in a very broad war supplemental funding bill negotiated between the White House and the House of Representatives.

FYI has an excellent summary of NASA funding in the Commerce, Justice, Science appropriations bill in the Senate. You can also read the entire Senate Report.

I’ll try to write more about this later in the week - for now I will, like the FYI newsletter, quote the introduction to the Senate report.

NASA’s vision for space exploration maps out an aggressive role for the United States in manned space exploration. However, the potential costs are substantial and will likely be very difficult to maintain at the current estimated funding levels. In addition, the Committee feels strongly that NASA must show its commitment to those human spaceflight activities already underway. The Shuttle program and the construction of the International Space Station [ISS] continue to be the primary focus of the Nation’s manned space flight activities. Nevertheless, the replacements for the Space Shuttle’s manned and heavy lift capabilities must also be considered as part of any plan for continued human access to space but not to the detriment of existing obligations.

The Committee is concerned that NASA will neglect areas that only tangentially benefit, or do not fit within, the exploration vision. The Committee believes that NASA must work diligently to balance existing programs and priorities with its plans for the future. Counterbalancing future priorities against current programs places existing research and expertise in jeopardy and risks squandering significant Federal investments that may be essential to the exploration vision.

In addition, the Committee is concerned that the strong, balanced science program that has served the Nation so successfully for many years is being left behind rather than being nurtured and sustained. That science program has been based on a set of carefully crafted scientific strategies that are founded on scientific and technical merit, relevance to overall national needs, and broad consultation with the scientific community.”

Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) introduced H. Con. Res 375 to the House last week, a concurrent resolution honoring the International Year of Astronomy and encouraging the public to attend IYA activities. You can read resolution text here.

In the span of a minute, the Senate Commerce, Justice, and Science committee passed the Senate version of the NASA Authorization Bill of 2008. You can read the committee press release here.

When the text of the bill is available online, I’ll update this post.

The compromise supplemental funding bill does indeed include money for science. Specifically:

• NASA - The amended bill includes $62,500,000 for Science, Aeronautics and Exploration.
• NSF - Research and Related Activities - The amended bill includes $22,500,000 for Research and Related Activities, of which $5,000,000 shall be available solely for activities authorized by section 7002(b)(2)(A)(iv) of Public Law 110-69. This is for the Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research, or EPSCOR.
• NSF Education And Human Resources - The amended bill includes $40,000,000 for Education and Related Activities of which $20,000,000 is for section 10 of the National Science Foundation Authorization Act of 2002 (42 U.S.C. 1862n–1) and $20,000,000, is for activities authorized by section 10A of the National Science Foundation Authorization Act of 2002 (42 U.S.C. 1862n–1a). This is the Robert Noyce Scholarship Program
• DOE - Science - The amended bill includes an additional $62,500,000 for Science. The Department of Energy is instructed to utilize this funding to eliminate all furloughs and reductions in force which are a direct result of budgetary constraints. Workforce reductions which are a result of completed work or realignment of mission should proceed as planned. This funding is intended to maintain technical expertise and capability at the Office of Science, and may be used for National Laboratory Research and Development including research related to new neutrino initiatives. Funding for research efforts shall not be allocated until the Office of Science has fully funded all personnel requirements.

The bill should be voted on in the House today or Friday, and then will be considered in the Senate.

Updated - You can see the text of the amendments yourself at the Government Printing Office (PDF) view of the Congressional Record.

Also, my favorite part of the Congressional record daily digest for June 20 is this:

Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2008: The House agreed to the Senate amendments to the House amendments to the Senate amendment with an amendment, made in order by the rule and printed in H. Rept. 110-720…

That is a lot of amending.

The NASA Authorization Bill,HR 6063, passed the House yesterday by a vote of 409-15. The bill authorizes (but does not appropriate) higher funding for NASA, and spells out the agencies mission as the agency prepares for a new administration in 2009.

Noteworthy in the bill:

• Budget Authorization 12.8% higher than the President’s request
• Support for a strong suborbital program including sounding rockets and balloons
• Addresses the need to reform ITAR, which inhibits international scientific collaboration
• Recognizes the importance of Decadal surveys and other community-based decision making processes.

The Senate has yet to introduce a NASA authorization bill.

This was in today’s monthly AAS electronic newsletter, but it’s worth posting here too. The Decadal Survey process is underway, and nominations of candidates for the chair are being solicited from the community. You can read the full announcement at the Board of Physics and Astronomy page, and submit nominations through that page, or to astro2010@nas.edu.

The New York Times has an article and quotes from a joint interview on the three Ph.D. physicists in the US House of Representatives. Those would be Rush Holt, (D-NJ), Vern Ehlers (R-MI), and the the newest addition, Bill Foster (D-IL).

Now we just need an astronomer in there.