Bush’s 2007 Budget Could Force Connecticut to Cut Programs
By Adam Kredo
WASHINGTON, Feb. 28 – In the next five years, Connecticut could lose more than $401 million in federal aid if Congress fully adopts President Bush’s fiscal year 2007 budget proposal, according to a report by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
The report, which examines proposed cuts to 16 federal aid programs over the next five years, found that nearly half of the overall reductions in domestic discretionary funding proposed by the President for 2007 would come from such programs, including Community Development Block Grants public school aid.
The bulk of the cuts will occur after 2007 and grow deeper each year, reducing Connecticut’s supply of federal money, according to the report, which was published last week. This would place the burden of the cost for such programs onto the state. If Connecticut decides against a tax hike, the report estimates, many aid programs could be significantly reduced.
For the last 25 years, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, which calls itself nonpartisan, has done research on how national and state fiscal policies affect low-income people.
The center’s report estimates that over the next five years, more than $151 million could be cut from educational grants to Connecticut for programs such as education for the disadvantaged, special education and school improvement programs.
Cuts to education would hurt not only Connecticut’s children, but also the economic future of the state, said Ellen Scalettar, senior policy fellow for Connecticut Voices for Children, a children’s advocacy group.
“The cuts are continuing to grow while our population is continuing to grow, so we’re moving in the wrong direction” Scalettar said in a telephone interview Tuesday.
Commenting in a press release when the proposed budget was made public in early February, Joshua B. Bolten, director of the Office of Management and Budget, said, “When President Bush gave me guidance on what the 2007 budget should look like, he directed me to focus on national priorities and tighten our belt elsewhere.”
As the Bush Administration adheres to this plan, the center estimates that Connecticut could lose $9.3 million in Community Development Block Grants in 2007. By 2011 the program could lose $61 million.
Rep. Christopher Shays, R-4, disagrees with cuts in the program, saying in a statement he would prefer to see the grants augmented.
“While we need to rein in our spending, the President’s proposed budget puts too much of the burden on our urban areas,” Shays said. “As Congress reviews his proposal, I will look for wasteful spending as well as areas that funding should be increased.”
Earlier this year, in a letter to Bush, Shays and 28 other members of Congress urged full funding for the community development grant program in the 2007 budget proposal.
A report titled Major Savings and Reforms, published earlier this month by the Office of Management and Budget, said that the administration is reducing funding for the community development programs because of what the report cites as ineffectiveness and “lack of a clear purpose.” Moreover, the office concludes, the program fails to “produce transparent information on results.”
Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn, said in a statement that he does not agree with many of the President’s proposed cuts.
“Shortchanging vital investments in housing initiatives, community development, public safety and medical care means that Connecticut families will have to face cutbacks in the availability of decent housing in safe neighborhoods, as well as reductions in quality health care,” Lieberman said.
Another program that would face major cutbacks is Community Oriented Policing Services – a law enforcement program that, among other things, provides technology grants to state and local law enforcement for equipment to assist with crime fighting. Under the current budget proposal, these technology grants would be completely eliminated.
The Office of Management and Budget report, again citing ineffectiveness as the main reason for elimination, said “the program has not been able to demonstrate its impact on crime.”
Norwalk Police Chief Harry Rilling said he is disappointed by the proposed cuts and disagrees with the office’s conclusions.
He said in a telephone interview, “You cannot evaluate or estimate the things that you prevented.”
Rilling wondered aloud, “What would that increase [in crime] have been if they had not given these grants to police departments?”
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates that Connecticut could face a $32.3 million cut over the next five years to the Public Housing Capital Fund, and $40.1 million over five years to the Low Income Home Energy Assistance program. Both programs aim to support Connecticut’s neediest citizens.
During a press conference to unveil the report, Robert Greenstein, the center’s executive director, said that the government has been shifting program costs to the states for the past several years through reductions in grants.
“The federal government doesn’t have clean hands here,” Greenstein said.
But the Office of Management and Budget disagrees with the center’s study.
Scott Milburn, a spokesman for the budget office, said in a statement that the center “is a liberal think tank that opposes every effort to control domestic spending. It has made these same false predictions in the past that it knows have been proven wrong.”
Milburn said that two years ago the center predicted the President’s budget would require deep reductions in programs for veterans, low-income mothers and children and special education. According to Milburn, the President’s subsequent budgets have instead increased spending for all of these programs.
“The country can meet the goal of cutting the deficit in half and still invest in key programs for vulnerable Americans, and our recent budget history supports this,” Milburn said in the statement.
