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President’s Budget Features Support for D.C. Budget and Legislative Autonomy and Full Funding for Norton’s D.C. Priorities

February 9, 2016

WASHINGTON, D.C.—Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) said today that she was gratified that President Obama’s fiscal year 2017 budget, his final budget, contains the major funding and policy priorities for the District of Columbia that she requested, including pro-home-rule provisions to allow D.C.’s budget and laws to take effect immediately upon passage by the city. Norton was particularly pleased that the budget provides full funding for ongoing construction at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) complex at St. Elizabeths in Ward 8, which ensures the project will move forward without delay and is on track to be finished by fiscal year 2021. The budget also removes the riders included in the fiscal year 2016 omnibus appropriations bill that prevented D.C. from using its local funds to tax and regulate the sale of marijuana and from spending local funds on abortion services for low-income women.

“President Obama’s final budget not only funds our major priorities for the District, but once again demonstrates the President’s full support of self-governance for the District with budget and legislative autonomy and the removal of all politically-motivated anti-home-rule riders,” Norton said. “After several years of congressional delay, the President’s full funding of the DHS consolidation in Ward 8 will not only save millions in taxpayer funds, but also will bring jobs and economic development to communities east of the Anacostia River that need them most. I will be working throughout the year to get the House and Senate to pass these critical funding levels and policy provisions.”

DHS consolidation at St. Elizabeths in Ward 8, the largest federal construction project in the nation, would receive $267 million in General Services Administration funding and $199 million in DHS funding. The fiscal year 2017 amount would allow three additional DHS agencies to relocate to St. Elizabeths—the Federal Emergency Management Agency, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and Customs and Border Control. To date, Norton has secured over $2.16 billion for DHS construction at St. Elizabeths.

The budget provides $40 million for Norton's D.C. Tuition Assistance Grants (DCTAG) program, matching the historic amount Norton got enacted in the fiscal year 2016 omnibus, and will enable D.C. students to attend public universities and colleges nationwide for around the cost of in-state tuition. DCTAG has doubled college attendance in the District. Norton said she was especially pleased that the President’s budget does not impose new means testing for DCTAG, maintaining the fiscal year 2016 omnibus’s $750,000 level. Norton negotiated the fiscal year 2016 level up from the $450,000 means testing proposed by the President’s fiscal year 2016 budget. For students who begin college in or after school year 2016-2017, those in families with taxable annual income of less than $750,000 would be eligible for DCTAG. The budget also provides $20 million for D.C. public schools and $20 million for D.C. public charter schools.

The budget provides $14 million for the DC Water and Sewer Authority, the amount included in the fiscal year 2016 omnibus, that Norton said is critical for ongoing work to control flooding in the city and clean up the Anacostia and Potomac rivers and Rock Creek.

The budget also provides $749 million for consolidation of the Federal Bureau of Investigations headquarters, moving the project forward and getting D.C. closer to reaping increased revenue from economic development at the Hoover Building site.

Other Norton priorities in the president's budget include the eighth $150 million installment for the Washington Metro Area Transit Authority (WMATA); $20 million for D.C. for costs associated with the 2017 Presidential Inauguration; $5 million to combat HIV/AIDS in the District; and $450,000 for the Major General David F. Wherley, Jr. District of Columbia National Guard Retention and College Access Program for tuition for D.C. National Guard soldiers. The budget also includes $9 million in new funding for the redevelopment of the site of the Federal City Shelter.

This is the third presidential budget ever to include both budget and legislative autonomy for D.C. The President’s budget states that, consistent with the principle of home rule, the Administration will work with Congress and the Mayor to increase and enhance D.C.’s local autonomy.