Senator offers alternative appropriations overhaul

In an effort to preserve her status as a Senate Appropriations subcommittee "cardinal," Senate Military Construction Appropriations Subcommittee Chairwoman Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, floated a plan Thursday to establish a new 13-subcommittee structure that would enable existing chairs to keep their gavels but still match up cleanly with the House's 10 new subcommittees in conference.

She offered the proposal during a meeting in which Senate appropriators made it clear they are unlikely to reduce their number of subcommittees. If both chambers stand their ground, a year-end omnibus spending bill is practically guaranteed.

"The Senate will most likely have 13 subcommittees and we will meet up with the House in about eight months," said a Senate Republican aide.

If the Senate were to follow the House, Hutchison -- who is widely expected to be a Texas gubernatorial candidate in 2006 -- would emerge without a gavel. "What I want is for everybody to be whole," she said.

Hutchison would not comment on specifics of her proposal, but sources familiar with the details said it would keep the Veterans Affairs and Housing and Urban Development departments and related agencies together, as in the current VA-HUD bill, but split off environmental programs and science programs, including NASA -- of vital interest to Texas -- into a new subcommittee.

Hutchison's attempt underscores the continued frustration on the part of Senate appropriators, who remain opposed to going along with the plan of House Appropriations Committee Chairman Jerry Lewis, R-Calif.

Hutchison distributed her proposal at a meeting Thursday in which Senate Appropriations Chairman Thad Cochran, R-Miss., tried to come up with a consensus on how to respond to the House committee's reorganization. Asked what transpired, Cochran said, "No decisions, big or little." Other senators emerging from the private session said resistance to the House plan had not abated.

Under Hutchison's plan, the District of Columbia and Legislative Branch spending bills would be grouped with the federal judiciary, which would move from the current Commerce-Justice-State spending bill. The Environmental Protection Agency would move to the Interior Subcommittee, as in the House plan.

The plan was greeted with skepticism by other Senate appropriators, including VA-HUD Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Christopher (Kit) Bond, R-Mo., who would be most affected. A Bond spokesman called it "Tom DeLay-lite," a reference to the feeling among some on both sides of the aisle that the House majority leader -- in whose district the space facility is now located -- is driving the reorganization process to protect NASA funding.

Of particular concern is Lewis' proposal to shift nearly $40 billion in Defense spending bill accounts into a new Military Quality of Life and Veterans Affairs Subcommittee. Splitting funds for housing and health care from other Defense bill accounts could result in logistical delays, Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, said Thursday.

Stevens said he discussed the matter with Pentagon officials this week. "We think it could lead to people in uniform getting two checks, and that's a very cumbersome thing to do," he said.