SPACE.com -- NASA Budget Faces Vote in House

Surprise Bipartisan Support for NASA Budget in Congress

House Democrat Turns on NASA

White House Vows To Fight NASA Budget Cuts


	NASA Budget Faces Vote in House By Jonathan Lipman Special to space.com posted: 10:20 am ET 09 September 1999

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WASHINGTON (States News Service) - The House of Representatives is scheduled to vote by the end of the day Thursday on a spending bill that could cut up to $1 billion from NASA's funding.

Since it returned from recess, the House has been debating the VA-HUD Appropriations bill, which includes the NASA budget.

On Wednesday, the House voted down several amendments to the bill, some of which were designed to provide more funding to NASA, and others that tried to take additional funding away from the space agency.

One amendment, sponsored by Rep. James Rogan, R-Calif., would have shifted $95 million from the Environmental Protection Agency to NASA.

Rep. Dave Weldon, R-N.Y. was disappointed when the amendment failed by a vote of 235 to 184. "I think it will be good for NASA supporters around the country if we can plus up NASA just a little bit in the House," Weldon said before the vote. "If it goes down I think it sends the wrong kind of message."

An attempt by Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, to boost NASA's human spaceflight budget also failed.

On a more positive note for NASA, the House voted down an attempt by James Roemer, D-Ind., to completely cancel all funding for the International Space Station and shift it over to various other programs in the VA-HUD bill.

In the end, Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said the evening's debate left him "optimistic" for the agency's eventual level of funding.

Hoyer said the defeated amendments that would have further reduced NASA funding would send a message "that we don't want the cuts and we don't want the offsets. That there's not enough money in this bill. That robbing Peter to pay Paul, when Peter didn't have enough money to begin with, just isn't going to do it."