On August 1, the Senate voted on and passed – by a vote of 92-6 – a minibus that would include funding for the EPA in FY19. This minibus includes funding for Interior & Environment, along with funding for Financial Services, Transportation & Housing and Urban Development, Agriculture & FDA. Two weeks ago, the House approved funding for the Interior & Environment and Financial Services measures, but Transportation & House and Urban Development and Agriculture & FDA funding were not included in that minibus.
For the most part, the chamber sidestepped floor debate on dozens of contentious energy and environmental amendments filed by senators but never brought to the floor during more than a week of work on the bill (H.R. 6147). The Senate’s approval sets total EPA funding at just over $8 billion for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1.
With Senate approval, the next step is for both the House and Senate to resolve differences between their versions of the fiscal 2019 EPA-Interior funding. The House version, for example, would hold EPA funding next year at this year’s $8 billion level, slightly lower than the Senate amount.
The House EPA-Interior bill also includes several policy restrictions not in the Senate bill. They include a measure to roll back an Obama-era water rule, which would have expanded federal jurisdiction over certain waterways but that the Trump administration is already working administratively to achieve. (Bloomberg BNA, 8/1/2018)
By combining the four separate appropriations measures into one package, congressional appropriators hope to speed up passage of what traditionally were a dozen individual spending bills. However, as a reminder, upon the House’s return there will only be 11 legislative days until the end of the current fiscal year, there may still be need for a continuing resolution (CR) to keep the government funded until the House and Senate can get something to the President to be signed into law.
