The top-line numbers for the FY 2012 “minibus” are as follows:

NSF: $7.03 billion, $173 million above FY 2011.
NASA: $17.8 billion, $648 million below FY 2011 (the Science account within NASA, was increased 3%, and the James Webb Space Telescope that was cut in the House and funded in the Senate, received the $529.6 million needed to stay on task for the 2018 launch date).
NOAA: $4.89 billion, $306 million above FY 2011.
NIST: $751 million, $33 million above FY 2011.
NIFA: $1.215 billion, $128 million below FY 2011.
OSTP: $4.5 million, $2.1 million below FY 2011.
USPTO: $2.7 billion, $588 million above FY 2011.

On our radar screen is the Grant Reform and New Transparency Act of 2011 (Grant Act- HR 3433). This piece of legislation was recently marked up by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, with the intention of directing agencies to establish a uniform standard for how they notice, award and disclose the billions of taxpayer dollars spent each year through the 1,670 discretionary grant programs. Some provisions that will likely receive scrutiny are the single website for grant opportunities and making public, detailed information on the grant application and review process.

What happens now that the “Super Committee” was unable to reach a deficit reduction deal? Sequestration! Although this measure won’t take affect until January of 2013, it appears that some members of Congress will be looking for ways to avoid significant cuts. The most concerning cuts are those to the defense discretionary spending and the impact on the military. However if the focus is solely on defense than this could lead to additional cuts in non-defense discretionary spending, where most of our research support derives from.

Upcoming  ‘minibus’ activity is rumored to include the Energy and Water bill and possibly another short-term continuing resolution (CR) to fund the government past the November 18th deadline for the current CR.

The Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction is moving slowly with deficit reduction negotiations, despite the enormous amount of recommendations that have already been sent.

And with the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction’s November 23rd deadline looming, House and Senate leaders are nervous about the possibility of sequestration. The sequestration was defined in the BAC that was passed in August, which placed a trigger for automatic cuts to domestic and defense spending that would be implemented starting in FY 2013, if the committee does not reach a deal.

Both chambers will be in session next week and there is hope for passage of at least one minibus, with the possibility of a conference soon after.

The Senate Appropriations Committee released its FY 12 Interior and Environment spending bill and the full Senate began consideration of a three-bill minibus that includes Agriculture, Commerce, Justice and Science and Transportation, Housing and Urban Development.

With about a month left in government spending authority, lawmakers may attach a new stopgap spending measure to the minibus. In the meantime, Appropriators are still hoping to clear several smaller packages of spending bills rather than relying on an omnibus bill to wrap up FY 12 spending before the holidays.

The House Appropriations Labor, Health and Human Services (HHS), and Education subcommittee released its draft FY 2012 spending bill. Mark up of the bill has yet to be scheduled, which makes it more likely for the bill to get rolled into a larger FY 2012 omnibus spending bill. Highlights of the draft bill include:

Pell Grants – The maximum Pell Grant award is continued at $5,550. In addition, the bill includes reforms to the program to reduce costs by $3.6 billion in the next year alone. These reforms include: limiting the lifetime eligibility for Pell Grants to 6 years (down from 9 years); rolling back recent and unnecessary changes to the qualification formula; eliminating eligibility for students who attend school less than half time or students who do not have a high school diploma or GED; and better targeting the funding to the neediest students.

National Institutes of Health (NIH) – The bill provides NIH with $31.7 billion in program funding, which is $1 billion (3.3%) over last year’s level and the same as the request. In addition, the bill includes $193 million for the National Children’s Study, $488 million for Clinical and Translational Sciences Awards, and $331 million for Institutional Development Awards (IDeA) programs. The funding level in the bill will support the request level of at least 9,150 new and competing research project grants, an increase of about 450 from the fiscal year 2011 projection.

In the meantime though both chambers need to consider a short-term continuing resolution (CR). The House failed once in passing their CR and narrowly passed another version on Friday. But the House CR was DOA in the Senate, rejected by a vote of 59 to 36. With out the inclusion of disaster relief funding, the Democrats are digging in their heals. And without an offset by cuts in other programs the Republicans are digging their heals in too.

So with House Members back in their home states for a week long recess, the Senate stayed and passed a very short-term CR (through October 4, 2012) that the House is expected to take up on Thursday the 29th of September.

Will the House members come back and vote, or will the Senate be stuck with a government shutdown? Or will the Senate get stuck and pass the House CR (the one they voted down), in order to avoid a government shutdown? Stay tuned as this drama unfolds!

NSF- $6.698 billion overall, a $162 million cut from the FY 11 level.

NASA- $17.9 billion overall, a $509 million cut from FY 11 level with the James Webb Space Telescope funds restored.

NOAA- $5.02 billion, an increase of $434 million above the FY 11 level.

Defense basic research (6.1) comes in at $2.082 billion, an increase of 6.9% over the final FY 11 level.

And at long last the America Invents Act (otherwise known as patent reform)was passed and is expected to be signed by the President Friday Sept. 16th. The biggest change is in how patents are awarded, moving from the current “first-to-invent” policy, to a “first-to-file” standard. Other measures in the bill allow the PTO to set its own fees, hire more people and make the necessary technical upgrades to move along through the back-log of applications.

Meanwhile the House has passed six of 12 spending bills so far and have left the Interior and Environment bill hanging. Four more measures have been approved in House appropriations committees or subcommittees, but have yet to make it to the floor. The Transportation-HUD bill was marked up in subcommittee last week, leaving only the Labor-HHS-Education bill, which was set for mark up but canceled at the last minute.

The week of Sept. 19th, there will be a vote on a “Clean” Continuing Resolution that is expected to run through November 18th. The resolution will provide funds for programs at the level in the FY 11 CR, with all funding levels reduced by 1.409%. This would bring funding down to $1.043 trillion, the total amount agreed to in recent debt ceiling legislation. This link to the press release gives more detail- http://appropriations.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=260104