Jeff Bingaman United States Senator from New Mexico

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Jeff Bingaman today applauded passage of a budget blueprint for fiscal year 2009 that works to bolster the flagging economy by investing in energy, education and infrastructure.

The Senate-passed FY 2009 Budget Resolution provides $2 billion in discretionary funding for renewable energy and energy efficiency programs (wind, solar, geothermal, biofuels, and weatherization assistance), $2.7 billion for investment in “green jobs”, and a reserve fund that can be used in the future to extend and expand renewable energy tax incentives like the renewable energy production tax credit and the solar investment tax credit.

Bingaman reported that the Budget Resolution also provides for an increase for education and training funding of $8.8 billion above the level of funding requested by the White House.

The budget blueprint bumps up funding for transportation by almost $4 billion and provides $6.5 billion to fully fund highway and mass transit systems and allows for increased spending for Airport Improvement and “ready to go” infrastructure projects – state and local projects that could begin construction almost immediately but cannot proceed because of a backlog federal funding.

“This Budget Resolution invests billions of dollars in infrastructure, “green energy” initiatives and education – all with an eye toward turning around our ailing economy,” Bingaman said. “The priorities set out in this budget blueprint will help us create jobs now and in the future, and I think it’s a wise investment to make in our country.”

The Budget Resolution also bolsters funding for health care. For instance, it contains an amendment Bingaman wrote that provides a reserve fund to help low-income seniors pay for their cost-sharing in the Medicare program including the prescriptions they receive through Medicare Part D and outpatient services they receive through Part B, and to improve outreach and enrollment in Medicare’s low-income programs.

It also contains reserve fund championed by Bingaman to block a series of controversial Medicaid regulations issued by the Bush Administration over the last year, including one that would devastate the healthcare safety-net by decreasing federal Medicaid support to New Mexico by more than $160 million during the next year.

An amendment Bingaman cosponsored increases funding for Indian Health Services by $1 billion. The program has been underfunded for years; currently health care expenditures for Native Americans are less than half of what the country spends for federal prisoners.

The Budget Resolution also contains an amendment Bingaman wrote, and which was cosponsored by Senator Pete Domenici, that sets funding levels for the Department of Energy’s Office of Science at $4.722 billion and for the National Science Foundation at $6.854 billion. This funding helps meet the goals of the America COMPETES Act, a new law written by the two New Mexico senators that focuses greater attention on scientific R&D, and math and science education.

Other amendments of interest:

• Plan to increase COPS funding to $1.5 billion

• Proposal to provide $950 million for the SCAAP program

• Plan to increase the Byrne/JAG grant program to $906 million

When reconciled with the version passed by the House of Representatives, both chambers of Congress will use the Budget Resolution as a blueprint for preparing the spending bills that fund the federal government.