House Appropriations Moves A Labor-HHS-Education Bill

The House Appropriations Committee acted on a Labor Department-Health and Human Services-Education Department bill last Wednesday. For the most part, the smaller child welfare programs that are dependent on the annual appropriations were flat funded. CAPTA state grants, CAPTA discretionary grants, Child Welfare Services, Promoting Safe and Stable Families (PSSF), we're all funded at last

The Adoption Funding Shortfall

The House Appropriations Committee Funds Adoption Opportunities at $39 million which is a rejection of the Administration’s proposed cut of $9 million. Adoption/Kinship Incentives is funded at $37.9 million, the same as last year. The lack of increase for Adoption/Kinship Incentives fund continues to build on a recent and growing problem of underfunding. Since its

House Appropriations: More Cuts for HHS

On Thursday, July 13, the House Subcommittee on Labor-Health and Human Services-Education approved an appropriations bill that would cut FY 2017 funding by an additional $5 billion.  While it provides an increase of $1.1 billion for the National Institutes of Health (NIH), rejecting the President’s request of severe cuts, it does little else for human

Child Care Aware Campaign

CWLA is part of the Child Care NOW! campaign led by the Woman’s National Law Center.  The Child Care NOW campaign joins together child care advocates and allies to focus on raising awareness among policymakers and the public about the child care challenges facing America today, including affordability, quality, and provider compensation. The campaign provides tools

House Budget Continues To Stall Over Demand for More Entitlement Cuts

House Budget Committee Chair Congresswoman Dianne Black (R-TN) continued to struggle with the most conservative members of her House Caucus over the level of mandatory and entitlement cuts. There seems to be agreement over discretionary (annually appropriated) spending.  Nondefense programs would be cut to $511 billion. (Under the existing Budget Control Act—BCA, the spending level

When CBO Becomes the Gospel on Spending and When It Doesn’t

The debate over health care has once again raised the specter of the role of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) with Members of Congress and the President assaulting the office because they don't like their non-partisan projections that are not favorable to their bill. It's an old Washington parlor game but if you looked closely,

Budget Battle Lines Being Drawn in House Committee

The House Budget Committee (and the Senate) is well behind schedule since resolutions are usually completed in April but the battle lines seem to have become bigger and harder over the past week. A little more than a week to ten days ago the outlines of a House Budget Committee deal seemed clear. What had

House Budget Resolution Unlikely This Week

As the week came to a close, Budget Committee leaders in the House of Representatives appear to be getting closer to a final deal. The budget resolution sets the spending levels for fiscal year 2018 and it can also set up another reconciliation instruction/bill that would ultimately have as its goal cuts to mandatory and

House Budget Resolution Unlikely This Week

This Wednesday is the target date for the House Budget Committee to move a budget resolution for FY 2018. At least that is the goal but it is still an open question as to whether or not they will meet that goal this week.  Since House leadership would like to pass the resolution in one

Capitol Hill Groups Lays Out Challenges for Families in Housing Struggle

On Tuesday, a coalition of groups including CWLA sponsored a Capitol Hill briefing, Understanding and Meeting the Needs of Families Experiencing Homelessness. The briefing included Mary Haskett (NC State), Carmela DeCandia (Artemis Associates), Grace Whitney (IMH-E Schoolhouse Connections), Preston Britner (University of Connecticut), Anne Farrell (Chapin Hall, Chicago) and Ruth White (National Council on Homelessness

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