Hard Work, Many New Allies, and Good Senate Friends Yield Good D.C. Markup in Senate Subcommittee

September 14, 2011

WASHINGTON, DC – Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) today was pleased that the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government markup of its Fiscal Year 2012 Appropriations bill was uneventful inasmuch as no anti-home-rule riders were offered as amendments. The exception that Norton worked for in today's routine markup was the $65 million for General Services Administration (GSA) construction and acquisition projects. This funding was particularly important in light of the fact that no funds were appropriated for GSA construction projects in the House bill. Because GSA says that the Department of Homeland Security headquarters construction is its first priority, Norton is hopeful that much of the funding will go to this project. If so, the GSA appropriations, combined with the $56 million provided in the Senate Homeland Security Appropriations bill, could help avoid a slowdown of the project, although the $1.2 billion that Norton secured in the first big DHS construction appropriation will continue funding construction at the site for some time.

The bill also included $122.6 million for the D.C. government, of which $90 million is for education and school improvement, including for the D.C. Tuition Assistance Grant Program (DCTAG).

Norton cautioned that, despite the good news that came out of today's subcommittee, there is no guarantee that riders will not come up in the full Senate Appropriations committee markup scheduled for this Thursday at 2:00 p.m. in room 216 of the Hart Senate Office Building. However, thousands of calls and emails have been made to the Senate Appropriations Committee by DC Vote, pro-choice groups, and many others among the 100 organizations that began helping the Congresswoman this year to get a clean D.C. appropriation. Norton is working with Senate appropriators and the coalition of 100 national and local groups to prevent anti-home-rule riders from being attached to what is now a clean Senate D.C. appropriations bill and to remove the anti-choice rider placed on D.C.'s budget in the House bill.

"Today's markup yielded good news for D.C.," said Norton, "and we have taken many steps, working with our allies to get a 100 percent clean bill."

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