House Science Committee Off to a Fast Start
New House Science Committee Chairman Robert Walker (R-PA) is off to a quick start with his new committee. In only the first few days of the 104th Congress, he held an organizational meeting and then adeptly chaired a hearing the next day. Walker has announced plans to mark up draft legislation on a hydrogen energy research bill, and risk assessment legislation, later this month.
On January 6, the administration’s top science officials testified at a three hour hearing on what Walker said was a “focus on the long term.” First to testify was OSTP Director John Gibbons who said in his written testimony, “a government role is...vital in promoting technologies that are critical to economic growth, the creation of good jobs, and meeting the common needs of the nation, but cannot attract adequate private investment.” He continued, “many economic studies have shown that federal money invested in science and technology brings, on average, a 50 percent rate of return to U.S. society.” Gibbons lauded investments in fundamental research, and cited the link between science and technology. He highlighted the importance of basic physics research in magnetic resonance imaging, transistors, and materials.
In discussing the administration’s support of basic science and applied research, Commerce Secretary Ron Brown testified, “we should recognize at the outset that the Contract with America would jeopardize that technology policy.” Brown cited the proposed elimination of the Advanced Technology Program and a NOAA budget freeze.
NSF Director Neal Lane’s written testimony discussed an area of considerable debate, saying, “NSF support of research focuses almost exclusively on answers to fundamental questions that defy our ability to predict the outcomes. Still, it is important to recognize that taxpayer-funded fundamental research can and should have a conscious relationship to the nation’s priorities and societal needs. This does not mean a narrowly directed agenda of targeted research, but rather, a program of fundamental science and engineering that clearly is in and for the national interest, in its most comprehensive interpretation.”
Responding to public and congressional sentiment for the downsizing of the federal government, NASA Administrator Daniel Goldin testified, “We’ve started a revolution at NASA.... We’re downsizing. We cut our five-year budget projection by 30%. We’re replacing big, expensive projects with smaller, more efficient ones. We’re in the midst of a zero base review that puts everything on the table. No program is sacred. We’re looking at everything NASA does.”
DOE Secretary Hazel O’Leary was unable to testify. Her Statement for the Record said, “As one of the nation’s major supporters of federal research and development, the Department of Energy has a wide range of extremely exciting R&D programs under way that hold the potential to contribute in important ways to a better future.” Citing the department’s statutory missions, she referred to DOE’s involvement in “fundamental science in areas that underlie these missions areas, including high-energy and nuclear physics.”
Questions from committee Members covered many topics. Rep. George Brown (D-CA) criticized the administration for using overly optimistic, unrealistic funding scenarios. Rep. Tim Roemer (D-IN) had concerns about the NASA budget, saying, “I don’t know how we do it, Mr. Goldin.” In response to a question, NSF Director Lane admitted that the agency was facing the prospect of lower future budgets. Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) asked about undergraduate science education programs being shortchanged.
A new committee Member, Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-KS) asked Director Gibbons about the ability of the federal government to manage large programs, citing the SSC. Gibbons responded by saying that efforts to internationalize the collider were “too little, too late.” Gibbons said high energy physics research continues, noting the Fermilab upgrade, B Factory, and that “we are attempting to become a part of the large international consortium” on the Large Hadron Collider. Rep. Vernon Ehlers (R-MI), a physicist, criticized U.S. science policy for “focusing on the immediate term.” He said the nation’s commitment to basic research was “faltering,” saying “I am particularly disturbed at what has happened in the past few years. I don’t engage in Senate bashing, but I will use an example of the Senate Appropriations Committee, with their strong emphasis on strategic research.... I think there’s a real danger of cutting into important funding for basic research.” He called for a “coherent congressional science policy.”
In responding to Ehlers, Gibbons cited the strong case made for basic research in the OSTP report, “Science in the National Interest.” Gibbons stated that the administration has strongly supported basic research during this constrained budget climate, and “it has held a priority, even to the point of taking money away from other activity.” Lane discussed NSF support of fundamental research, such as the LIGO and Gemini telescope projects.
In his concluding remarks, Chairman Walker offered insight into a philosophy that is likely to reverberate throughout the science committee during his chairmanship. He stated, “It seems to me that what we have to do if we’re going to begin to restructure government in ways that make sense for twenty years out, we have to get past the idea of thinking of all these things as government programs. We have to begin to think about a society restructured where science is integral part of addressing that whole panoply of economic interests, but also it goes to the very nature of our culture as well....”
