Additional Senate Appropriations Report Language on NSF
In addition to the recommendations contained in Senate committee report (Senate Report 103-137) on the future of the National Science Foundation, the following selected recommendations and instructions were included. Education recommendations will be covered in FYI #118. For background on this report, see FYI #116.
NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION, COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATION:
“The Committee recommends an appropriation of $2,981,997,000 for the NSF for fiscal year 1994. This amount reflects an increase of $248,449,000, or 9 percent, above the fiscal year 1993 level.
“The Committee notes that its investment in the NSF for fiscal year 1994, by providing an appropriation of nearly $3,000,000,000, is significant given that the VA, HUD, and Independent Agencies Subcommittee 602(b) allocation increased by just over 2 percent in new budget authority available for all agencies it funds. Given the uncertainty over the Foundation’s future direction, the Committee has emphasized funding for math and science education, and revitalizing the Nation’s academic infrastructure. Basis research activities will grow slightly better than the expected rate of inflation.”
RESEARCH AND RELATED ACTIVITIES, COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATION:
“The Committee recommends an appropriation of $1,940,000,000 for research and related activities of the NSF. This amount is $81,000,000 above the 1993 level, $264,800,000 below the budget request, and $105,000,000 below the House allowance.
The Committee recommends the following changes to the budget request:
-$210,000,000 as a general reduction, taken at the Agency’s discretion, subject to normal reprogramming guidelines.
-$50,000,000 from activities connected with the Foundation’s role in high-performance computing. None of this reduction should be taken from the request for the NSFNET or those program elements closely related to industry. The Committee has taken this reduction out of concern over the Foundation’s inability to articulate specific, quantifiable, and measurable goals for its activities in high performance computing, for which more than $600,000,000 has been appropriated over the last 3 fiscal years. Should the Foundation articulate more specific milestones prior to conference with the House, the Committee will revisit its recommendation. Any such milestones should include specific links to the national information infrastructure initiative.
+$1,000,000 for a grant to the National Academy of Public Administration review of NSF’s various research centers, including, but not limited to, its science and technology centers, its engineering research centers, and its supercomputer centers. The Committee has been concerned that the many NSF-supported centers, which have grown in large numbers over the last decade, have not sufficiently identified and developed their goals, objectives, and annual milestones.... Due to the limited constraints on research funds in fiscal year 1994, the Committee is recommending bill language that will result in a no new centers policy for the year.”
“Major research equipment. -- The Committee expects that from within the funding made available, work on all three major research facilities in the mathematical and physical sciences will continue to remain on their current schedules. The Committee anticipates addressing this in the annual operating plan....”
“Indirect costs. -- The Committee has taken a longstanding interest in the issue of indirect costs. It believes that significant, positive steps have been taken during the last 2 years...it sees little value in having the General Accounting Office conduct yet another study of this issue as proposed by the House. [The report then refers to changes in OMB Circular A-21.] The Committee believes that the cumulative effect of these steps has been to correct any problems that existed, and that no additional reforms are needed at this time....”
ACADEMIC RESEARCH INFRASTRUCTURE, COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATION:
“The Committee recommends an appropriation of $125,000,000 for academic research infrastructure....This amount provided is $75,000,000 above the 1993 enacted level, and $70,000,000 above the budget request and House allowance...All funds are to be awarded on a merit review basis.
“The Committee expects that cost sharing will remain a fundamental element of the NSF facilities program...[but] the Committee expects the NSF, in issuing its guidelines for the distribution of these funds in 1994, to establish cost-sharing limits that reflect the different category of institution involved.”
“The Committee has provided for a substantial increase in this activity because of the large need for facility modernization and equipment replacement that exists...The Committee notes that until substantial efforts are made by the Federal Government, working with States and institutions of higher learning, to address this important area for the Nation’s infrastructure, the tendency to earmark funds for specific academic facility projects will continue through the annual appropriations process. In this year’s VA-HUD appropriations bill, however, the Committee has chosen not to do so, even though it received funding requests for many facilities....
“To address this crisis, the Committee directs the Foundation, working with the Office of Science and Technology Policy, to develop, for concurrent submission with the fiscal year 1995 budget, a 5-year strategy, including funding needs, to tackle the facility and instrumentation needs in a comprehensive fashion....The Committee believes the NSF, because of its long-standing role in the promotion of both basic research and eduction, with a strong commitment to merit-based selection, should be the predominant, if not exclusive, agency to administer such a program.”
