Norton to Offer an Amendment Today to CR to Allow the District to Spend Its Local Funds
Norton to Offer an Amendment Today to Continuing Resolution to Allow the District to Spend Its Local Funds for the Remainder of the Fiscal Year
February 28, 2011
WASHINGTON, DC -- Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) will offer an amendment to the short-term continuing resolution (CR) at the Committee on Rules emergency meeting today at 5:00 p.m. in room H-313 of the Capitol to allow D.C. to spend its local funds for the remainder of the fiscal year, avoiding the possibility of a District government shutdown if Congress fails to pass an appropriations bill by March 18, when the short-term CR expires, or thereafter.
"We are hopeful that my amendment will take the D.C. government out of this congressional dispute, whenever and however it ends," said Norton. "It should be unthinkable for the federal government to harm the fragile economy of a local jurisdiction for any reason. Count this congressional fight as just one more reason that the District needs to have autonomy over its local budget." Norton's budget autonomy bill came closer to passage during the recent congressional lame-duck session than ever before.
Although Norton has believed all along that the political risk of a federal shutdown would foreclose it, she is continuing to work with the House, Senate, and the Administration to take the necessary precautions to protect the District government from a shutdown.
Norton's full statement follows.
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Statement of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton on Further Continuing Appropriations Amendments, 2011 Committee on Rules
February 28, 2011
My amendment would prevent an unintended catastrophe for the 600,000 residents of the District of Columbia, as well as for the federal government, by authorizing the District to spend its own local taxpayer-raised funds for the remainder of fiscal year 2011. If this joint resolution becomes law without my amendment, the District of Columbia government would shut down if the federal government shuts down after March 18, 2011.
Although the District raises and manages its own $8 billion budget, Congress technically appropriates these local funds to the District, a holdover and throwback to the pre-home-rule period. Under both the current short-term continuing resolution and this joint resolution, the District's authority to spend its local funds expires when these resolutions do. Members who were not here during the last federal government shutdown are probably unaware that the District government was forced to shut down, too, because, although the District government had passed its budget months earlier, Congress had not yet voted for final approval. I am grateful that after the first of several government shutdowns and partial shutdowns, Speaker Newt Gingrich and I worked together to ensure that the District remained operating. The dispute now, as then, over the federal budget has nothing to do with the District's local funds. I do not believe any member wants to shut down the D.C. government and bring a large, complicated city to its knees because of a purely federal matter, and I cannot believe that any member would object to this amendment to keep the city open and allow it to continue spending its local funds for the remainder of this fiscal year. D.C. residents are not alone in relying on vital District services. Federal officials, including the president, federal buildings, foreign embassies and dignitaries, and businesses rely daily on the city's services, as well.
When a reporter inquired last Friday, House Appropriations Chairman Hal Rogers said that the District should be able to spend its local funds if the federal government shuts down, but not, of course, the limited direct federal funds it receives. My amendment authorizes only the city's local budget. I urge its inclusion in this joint resolution.