Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, February 8, 1991 TAG: 9102080759
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-4 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
And then 381 pages later, there was a line that caused their hearts to skip a beat: $678 million less to help the poor pay their heating bills.
The tradeoff is just one of many illustrations in Bush's $1.45 trillion spending plan of a dominant new theme in budgeting forced by deficit-reduction rules Bush and lawmakers agreed to last fall.
Limits have been placed on spending, and any increases in one program must be balanced out by cuts elsewhere so the budget shortfall will not increase.
The budget document also shows how Bush chose to highlight new spending initiatives while giving less prominence to the cuts offered to pay for them.
Administration officials and congressional Republicans say the mixture of spending increases and cuts is sound budgeting and decision-making.
"Going forward in the future now, we're simply going to have to make the cloth fit to the size of the coat," is how Treasury Secretary Nicholas Brady described things when Bush unveiled his budget on Monday.
But many Democrats picking through the 3-inch-thick volume say it is rife with spending increases and cuts that seem contradictory.
"This budget has some fundamental inconsistencies in many human services programs," Sen. James Sasser, D-Tenn., the Senate Budget Committee chairman, said Thursday.
For example, Bush would:
Spend $1.9 billion to create new programs to help the poor buy their public housing units. But he would reduce by $657 million - to $367 million - funds for housing the elderly and handicapped, and eliminate the $734 million program for building new public housing units.
Create a new program distributing $690 million to school districts for educational innovations. But he would cut the $84 million program for aiding public libraries to $35 million.
Start a new $171 million program aimed at preventing infant mortality in 10 cities with the highest death rates among babies. But he also would end the $436 million program by which grants are distributed to local governments for various health programs.
Bush and his defenders argue that the budget proposal simply follows the new rules set by last fall's $500 billion, five-year deficit-reduction measure. The procedures not only cap spending for domestic, defense and foreign aid programs, but prohibit budget-writers from switching money from one category to another.
They say that by living within the agreed-on spending caps, they are doing two things: reducing this year's record $318 billion budget gap and forcing lawmakers to choose their priorities.
Sen. Pete Domenici of New Mexico, ranking Republican on the Budget Committee, said he and Bush favored increasing spending for scientific research, children and energy.
"But to pay for them, he had to look at the programs that we have in existence and say which ones ought to be reduced, eliminated or changed so we save some money," Domenici said. "Frankly, that to me equals deciding priorities, making choices."
"That's the best part of this; it will force Congress to set priorities," said Rep. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., a member of the House Budget Committee. "If we don't like [Bush's] priorities, we can set them differently."
But for Democrats, the blueprint is an exercise in bad choices.
"They've given a huge increase to space," Rep. Dale Kildee, D-Mich., also on the House budget panel, said of the $1.7 billion increase to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. "Mrs. Murphy doesn't need an increased space program. She needs to heat her home."
The budget book containing all these proposals is designed to highlight the new spending and attract less attention to some of its cuts.
Bush does state on the fourth page of the volume that cuts are needed to pay for spending increases. And the first pages contain charts stating where savings would come from in Medicare and other benefit programs.
But receiving more prominence are sections that emphasize the president's spending initiatives.
Opening chapters detailing spending increases have titles such as "Investing in Human Capital and Reforming American Education" and "Focusing on Prevention and the Next Generation."
It is not until nearly 400 pages into the document that the chapter "Improving Returns on Investments" details which domestic programs will be reduced or eliminated.
by CNB