ICC met last month to analyze Bush's budget request

Because of the late release of President George W. Bush's fiscal year 2002 budget request, ASME's Inter-Council Committee met late last month to analyze the president's budget submission in greater detail, and to write the mechanical engineering chapter in the annual report of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Research and Development fiscal year 2002.

Details on that meeting may be obtained from Patti Jo Snyder at (202) 785-3756 or at snyderp@asme.org.

Budget process for 2002 is off to an unusual start

Customarily, the president submits his budget request for the following fiscal year to Congress no later than the first Monday in February. House and Senate appropriations subcommittees then schedule public hearings for late March to mid-April, to give stakeholders an opportunity to testify in support of, or in opposition to, specific programs and initiatives.

ASME's Washington Center, in anticipation of the upcoming public hearings, convenes a meeting of the Inter-Council Committee on federal research and development (ICC), a group of ASME volunteers who take responsibility for monitoring the budget request as it supports the research and development (R&D) programs of the science and engineering mission agencies.

ICC members analyze the budget request and prepare testimony for submission to the appropriate House and Senate appropriations subcommittees.

This year, however, is an anomaly. House appropriations subcommittees began hearings on the government's fiscal year 2002 budget in mid-March despite the fact that the president would not submit his fiscal 2002 budget request to Congress until early last month. As a result, stakeholders, including ASME, had to scramble to prepare testimony on the general merits of, or problems with, programs in key science and engineering mission agencies.

ASME testifies on critical need for aeronautics R&D ...

Appearing before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Veterans Administration, Housing and Urban Development and Independent Agencies on March 22, ASME's Adnan Akay warned that "reducing federal funding for aviation research will jeopardize the nation's leadership in providing the technologies needed to develop next-generation aircraft, improve aviation safety and reduce risk in the U.S. air transport infrastructure."

Speaking on behalf of the Society's Aerospace Division, Akay, vice president of ASME's Environment and Transportation Group, also cautioned that declining federal support for NASA aeronautics research would diminish the ability of U.S. universities to attract and train the next generation of aeronautical engineers and scientists.

Akay urged that NASA undertake high-risk, potentially high-payoff R&D, noting that the U.S. commercial aviation industry focuses the vast majority of its research dollars on projects that affect near-term profits.

... and on the need for funding research at Defense department

A week later, Harry Armen, testifying on behalf of the ICC, appeared before the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee to discuss the role of research at the Department of Defense (DOD), the benefits derived from that research and the importance of increasing funding for fiscal 2002.

"In 1998, the Defense Science Board recommended that the research programs of DOD should consistently be about 3.5 percent of the total defense [budget]," Armen said. "We believe this is a worthy target, which would result in an investment approaching $11 billion for fiscal 2002."

Noting that today's research, particularly basic research, largely determines the technological advancements a decade or more from now, Armen cautioned appropriators not to neglect funding of research in engineering and the physical sciences. He asked them to recognize that "[a] balanced portfolio of research and advances in engineering and physical sciences is essential for maintaining U.S. technological leadership in areas critical to defense."

Copies of both statements may be viewed at www.asme.org/gric/ps01.html.

— Mary Legatski
ASME Government Relations

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