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HOUSE PASSES LABOR, HHS AND EDUCATION BILL (07/14/2003)
The Labor, Health and Human Services (HHS), Education appropriation bill passed by the House reveals a lack of commitment to education, providing everyone the tools to succeed, keeping low-income families warm, and preparing for bio-terrorism. Talk is cheap without the resources to make it real.

HEAD START AND BLOCK GRANTS (07/14/2003)
The Bush administration and House leadership are proposing to block grant the Head Start program in eight states. This means states can use federal funds for their own early-childhood education programs and would no longer have to abide by national standards.

LOW-INCOME FAMILIES STILL BEING HELD HOSTAGE (07/14/2003)
Extension of the child tax credit remains stalled with the House determined to add more deficit-deepening tax cuts.

State Supported Colleges and University See Massive Tuition Increases (07/14/2003)

States continue to feel the impact of low revenue and a lack of support from the federal government. As a result, many state-supported colleges and universities have seen dramatic budget cuts in recent years. In an effort to minimize the damage, colleges and universities are approving skyrocketing tuitions. An informal scan of recent headlines (see below) shows some of the steep increases, with most in the double digits extending up to 28%.


Economy and Jobs Watch: Unemployment Up, Minimum Wage Down (07/14/2003)
Unemployment Up

The first week in July brought more bad news about the weak labor market. The Bureau of Labor Statistics announced that the unemployment rate for June rose by 0.3 percentage points to 6.4 percent - a nine year high. Total employment declined this last month for the fifth straight month, with 30,000 lost jobs. Since the start of the recession, total employment has declined by 2.6 million and the private sector has lost 3.1 million jobs. This may be the first administration since Hoover’s where total employment has dropped.


FOIA Officers Meet Over News of Secrecy (07/14/2003)
The principal administrative Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) officers gathered on June 25th for a conference on the relationship between homeland security matters and FOIA. Homeland security matters have been among the leading rationales used for recent broad restrictions in public access to government information.

Public Meeting for National Infrastructure Advisory Council (07/14/2003)
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced in the Federal Register that the National Infrastructure Advisory Council (NIAC) will hold a public meeting on the security of information systems for critical infrastructure on Tuesday, July 22, 2002. The Council advises the President on issues around security of information systems relating to the critical infrastructure supporting sectors of the economy including banking, finance, transportation, energy, manufacturing, and emergency government services.

Critical Infrastructure Information Docket (07/14/2003)
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) recently finished receiving public comments on its proposed rule for the handling of Critical Infrastructure Information (CII). While the June 16th deadline for comments was over a month ago, DHS is still not providing access to the public comments it received, nor has the agency announced any plans to do so.

Head Start Group Wins Victory on Lobbying Rights (07/14/2003)
On July 2nd, the National Head Start Association (NHSA) won a big victory for nonprofit advocacy rights in its lawsuit against the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). After a June 30th hearing in federal District Court, HHS agreed to withdraw a May 8 letter to Head Start grantees that contained confusing and inaccurate information about grantees’ right to lobby on Head Start issues. The letter threatened sanctions against programs and parents who engaged in lobbying activity. HHS sent the corrected letter on July 2nd to all Head Start programs.

Senate Votes to Overturn Global Gag Rule (07/14/2003)
On July 9th, the Senate voted 53-43 in favor of an amendment to the foreign aid bill that allows federal grantees doing international work to use non-grant funds to provide information about abortion or advocacy on abortion rights. Current policy is known as the “global gag rule” because it bans international aid groups that provide abortion information from receiving federal grants. President Bush issued this policy in a memorandum sent to the Agency for International Development within days of his inauguration.

New Study on Foundation Payout Continues Controversy (07/14/2003)
The National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy (NCRP) released a study on the impact pending legislation could have on grant amounts awarded by private foundations. The study, titled A Billion Here, A Billion There: The Empirical Data Add Up is available in PDF format on the NCRP website. A press release summarizes their findings.

PAC Data Now Searchable on IRS Site (07/14/2003)
Soft money disclosure information became searchable and downloadable on the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) site July 1st, meeting a deadline set by Congress last November. The disclosure information is reported to the IRS by political action committees (PACs) under a law passed in 2000. The website only allows searches of reports that filed electronically. Over the past two years, most reports have been filed on paper and are available in PDF format. Beginning this month, PACs that raise or spend more than $50,000 a year will be required to file their reports electronically, so that the amount of searchable information will increase over time.

Federal Grant Streamlining Update (07/14/2003)
The federal government is moving forward with implementation of a 1999 law requiring streamlining and simplification of the grants process. In late June, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) published four announcements in the Federal Register on policies to standardize information and formats for grant announcements, and increase the threshold for organization-wide audits for grantees from $300,000 to $500,000. A policy requiring grant applicants to have a Dun and Bradstreet DUNS number after October 1, 2003 was also published.

FDA Relaxes Standards for Health Claims on Food Labels (07/14/2003)
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently announced its intent to relax restrictions on food manufacturers for making claims about the health benefits of products.


EPA Misleadingly Pads Enforcement Record (07/14/2003)
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), under the leadership of the Bush administration, has misrepresented its record of criminal enforcement and overstated its successes in cracking down on polluters, according to an investigative report by the Sacramento Bee.

Administration Hides Favorable Data for 'Clear Skies' Alternative (07/14/2003)
The Bush administration recently attempted to hide an analysis showing that a rival Senate plan would achieve greater public health and environmental benefits than the president’s Clear Skies Initiative, at only a slightly higher cost.

GAO Finds USDA Breaking Rules by Promoting Tobacco Exports (07/14/2003)
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is helping American tobacco companies promote their products overseas despite congressional restrictions banning such activity, according to a recent report by the Government Accounting Office (GAO).

FDA Requires Food Labels to List Trans Fatty Acids (07/14/2003)
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently issued standards requiring labels to list the amount of trans fatty acids in foods -- helping consumers make better-informed decisions about products they eat.

GAO Finds Oversight of Medicaid Waivers Lacking (07/14/2003)
The Bush administration, through the use of waivers, has given states flexibility in administering Medicaid, but has failed to adequately oversee these programs, according to a recent report by the Government Accounting Office (GAO).

Proposal to Cut Overtime Pay Elicits Huge Response (07/14/2003)
More than 75,000 people have written to the Department of Labor (DOL) in response to its proposed changes to overtime standards -- the most mail the agency has received on any similar issue in at least a decade, according to the Washington Post.


New Guidelines Open Door to Logging (07/14/2003)
The U.S. Forest Service and the Department of the Interior (DOI) recently issued joint interim guidelines to implement stewardship contracts that allow timber companies to harvest trees in exchange for broadly defined “land management services” -- opening the door to increased logging in forests.


Feedback Meeting on ECHO (07/14/2003)
On July 8th Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officials from the Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance (OECA) met with various environmental and public interest groups to hear feedback on the Enforcement and Compliance History Online (ECHO) project. JP Suarez, the Assistant Administrator for Enforcement and Compliance Assurance, chaired the meeting.

EPA Refuses to Release RMP Data (07/14/2003)
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has denied OMB Watch’s request under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) for Executive Summaries of the Risk Management Plans (RMPs). This marks the first instance, of which OMB Watch is aware, that EPA has denied a request for information specifically collected to inform the public about homeland security risks they face.

Another Court Denies Secrecy of Cheney Files (07/14/2003)
In a 2-1 ruling last Tuesday, a federal appeals court rejected Vice President Dick Cheney’s request to keep documents about his energy task force secret. The decision upholds a lower court ruling that ordered the limited release of documents in a discovery process. Justice Department lawyers defending Cheney then approached the D.C. Court of Appeals to halt that order. The Court of Appeals agreed with the lower courts ruling, stating that current laws would safeguard genuinely privileged information.