Sunday night at 8 p. M. Eastern on cspans q a. Next, a panel looking at ways to improve the budget process held before the House Committee on modernization of congress. Congress. The meeting will come to order. Without objection the chair is authorized to declare a recess of the committee at any time. This hearing is entitled recommendations from previewing the budget and appropriations process. A look at the work of the select Committee Budget and process reform and i now recognize myself for five minutes to give an opening statement. The 104th congress which convened in 1995 was the last to pass all Appropriations Bills prior to the start of the fiscal year. That was almost 25 years ago. Most house members serving today have never seen a process that works the way its supposed to where stand alone bills are passed on time. And the joint select committee on budget and appropriations process reform on which i served, along with my colleague rob woodall was established, and the committee was charged with making recommendations for the budget process. The act of establishing such a committee is acknowledgment the process isnt working the way it should. Article 1 section 9 of the constitution says no money should be drawn from the treasure, but by law. This power of the purse is a part of the constitution and constitutionally mandated check on executive power. And when Congress Fails to pass on time, it cedes power to the executive branch. Congress has passed resolutions since 1998. Last year, passed 5 crs and this Year Congress passed three. Thats a lot of time spent dealing with funding decisions, but think of all the Time Congress would have to focus on other legislative duties if Appropriations Bills were passed on time. Making decisions how to allocate funding for federal programs is tough work, but its congresss job. The American People deserve a fully funding government and funding the government is arguably congresss most important job. While the joint committee did not pass a bill, it provided frame work for thinking about reform today. Members. Committee engaged in serious discussions what it would take to fix the budget and appropriations process and many of the ideas that came out of those discussions are well worth considering and thats our intent today. To talk about problems with the process and potentially areas of agreement where both parties in chambers can find common grounds. While were focusing on the work of the joint select committee we dont need to limit our selves to the recommendations that that committee considered. Im looking forward to a lot of ideas from our Witnesses Today and particular will i grateful to our appropriations chair, and our former budget chair mr. Womack who tag teamed for that committee. With that ill invite our vice chair tom graves for opening remarks. Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member for joining us today and the witnesses that are going to be with us and taking time to speak with us today. As cochairs of the joint select committee i know you worked really, really hard to fix our current funding process and i hope today you know that this hearing is proof that your work lives on. It was not for naught. We are going to work with you and continue building on your work from last year. This select committee has that opportunity and to build on your foundation and so im glad youre here to take a part be a part of this today and i know that we all want to solve this and hopefully today we can gather ideas and kind of taxol this complex issue. When it comes to the current funding process in congress, i think we all know we can do better. The American People our constituents, they expect us to do better and that were charged with this important responsibility of using taxpayer dollars wisely and effectively and ive looked forward to our success as we move forward, mr. Chairman. Each party, each chair and each runs into a wall of this each time it seems the last couple of years. As one of our Witnesses Today, mr. Owens, has illustrated to the joint select Committee Last year, to you alls joint select committee more than 20 years since all preparations bills were passed prior to the start of the fiscal year and just 27 of senators have seen the process work and for house members its only been 16 . We have a lot of appropriators in the room today, myself and the chairman as well. And so i know this problem is personal to each of us, so, as well as to our two at the panel here. Obviously appropriators as well. Its been tough for all of us to spend hours in markups and negotiations, and see our work get chewed up by the process. Its tough to see it discarded by a continuing resolution and tough to go through this year after year after year. So we all have different backgrounds, different perspectives and philosophies, what we have in common is were trapped in this broken funding process together and i think todays hearing in a bipartisan spirit we get to pick up on efforts you left us with last year, hopefully well get a chance to fix this and get out of this broken cycle were in. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I look forward to the hearing. Thank you, we have five witnesses and on the first panel we have representative anita lowey, and representative steve womack, Ranking Member on the House Committee on budget. Both served as cochairs on budget and appropriations process reform and i have Great Respect and admiration for both of your leadership so thank you for that. And particularly despite this being a very busy week, the theyve generously agreed to provide five minutes of testimony and once theyre finished well give them back their precious time and move onto the next panel. With that, chairman, youre recognized for five minutes. Chairman kilmer, vicechairman graves and members of the select committee, i am pleased to join you this morning to frankly speak with you in a room thats very familiar, familiar faces and to be here alongside Ranking Member womack, who served with me as the cochair of the joint select committee on budget and appropriations process reform in the 115th congress. While concerns over a partisan process for Senate Consideration prevented that committee from reporting out recommendations, House Democrats have used the first nine months of our new majority to make important improvement to the budget and appropriations process. I am very pleased to say that one of the most important changes that i advocated for in the joint select committee raising unworkable budget caps, was achieved on a bipartisan basis in july. Because of speaker pelosis strong leadership, the bipartisan budget act allows us to invest for the people and increase funding for education, health care, and human services. In addition, the bipartisan budget act suspended the debt ceiling, removing this source of uncertainty for families, businesses, and communities across the country. However, as i recommended during the joint select committee process, i would prefer to go further and completely repeal the debt ceiling. It serves no useful purpose other than to create opportunities for brinksmanship that threatens our nations credit and the health of our economy. In addition to the bipartisan budget act we have also made important changes to house rules. When our democratic majority took office in january, we adopted a meaningful pay as you go rule that shuts the door on reckless policies like the g. O. P. Tax scam. As chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee ive restored the longstanding practice of adopting 302b allocations before reporting appropriation bills, an important step toward transparency. To build on these successes and charting a more respected and responsible course for the American People, there are two key legislative changes that i propose making when i led the joint select committee, that would help improve the budget and appropriations process. Moving from an annual to a biannual budget solution, requiring resolution in the first year of congress and allocations for both the first and second years of the biannium and to facilitate actions even if a budget resolution is not adopted, ideally by allowing for concurrent resolution, dealing with 302a allocations only. Although these are outside the scope of this select committee, it is worth noting that i also favored two changes to senate rules that would both the fiscal responsibility in both chambers. Restoring the conrad rule, a senate rule that prevented reconciliation lapgs from increasing the deficit in the first ten years and adding a new 60vote point of order in the senate against reconciliation instructions and a budget resolution that called for a net deficit increase. In addition, i support technical improvements to better handle cap adjustment items, change the process of calculating baseline projections of emergency spending, and expedite the administrations provision a full year bugetary data. However, even with these changes, the most important element to a successful budget and appropriations process is political will. Im proud that our democratic majority has shown that political will and taking all responsibilities seriously. Thats why our chamber is far ahead of the senate in processing appropriation bills this year finally, id like to discuss the elephant in the room, congressionally directed spending. This select committee on the modernization of congress is tasked with strengthening this institution. Nothing could strengthen the article 1 branch of government more than restoring congressionally directed spending. It is imperative that congress exercise its constitutional responsibility in determining how and where taxpayer dollars that we appropriate are spent. The end of congressionally directed spending has led to diminished comity in the house and transferred our authority to the executive branch. Returning to earmarking under a strong set of rules to ensure transparency and prevent abuse, would be of immeasurable benefit to this house and to the American People. I hope that we can do so in the months ahead. Thank you for inviting me to testify and best of luck with the select committee. Thank you, madam chair. Thank you for your leadership. Rep womack, youre now recognized for five minutes. Thank you, chairman kilmer, vicechairman graves and members of the select committee. I appreciate the opportunity to before before you today. Id like to share some perspectives on the work of joint select committee on budget and process reform which i was privileged to cochair with the distinguished leader of the House Committee last year. I look forward to a productive discussion. Many members of the house voiced frustrations about the broken budget process. Our current process was written in the 1970s. It has been updated with very minor revisions on a few occasions. It does not align with the dynamics of the modern congress, however. Last year the joint select committee was tasked with producing legislation to reform the budget process with an equal number of republicans and democrats and super majority voting threshold. Five republicans and five democrats, ten out of 16 members. But still a requirement of five members from each party. This structure guaranteed a concensus driven product. We ultimately produced a bipartisan bicameral reform. Annual reconciliation, ensuring realistic deadlines for congress to complete its budget and appropriations work and requiring a joint Budget Committee hearing on the fiscal state of the nation, why did we fail . We obtained bipartisan and bi cameral support, but didnt reach the super majority threshold. Some members voted no, some voted present, a number of those members indicated support for the underlying bill, but voted present due to an unrelated disagreement among senate leadership. However, the final proposal was developed with input from all the members, the cochair agreed to the base text and additional amendments were added in the markup with a super majority vote, some with a unanimous vote. Bipartisan ideas were found and those should continue to be explored by future reformers. Besides examining the process i was pleasantry surprised at republicans and democrats in the house and senate came into deliberations to talk about the debt. To be clear, our group did not try to identify policies to reduce the deficit by a certain amount. What we did discuss extensively is the fact that congress does not use its existing procedures to reduce the debt. We could use regular order or reconciliation, but we simply dont. Members expressed interest in a third route one that is perhaps bipartisan or bicameral. Sheldon whitehouse was in this area. And since its football season, try to get some first downs rather than try to throw a hail mary like we do so often. The joint select Committee Work product represents a bipartisan and bicameral reform. Second we should focus on budget process not budget outcomes. Outcomes are specifically levels of funding or proposals to reduce the deficit by a certain amount. Process is now congress determine how much to spend or how to determine what policies to enact to reduce the deficit. Id like to see us modern issize our procedures and set up congress for success regardless who happens to have the majority at any given time. My goal is to get something enacted into law that improves our process. Im willing to work with both republicans and democrats in the house and senate to try to do so. Finally its important to acknowledge the importance of the senate in this puzzle. In that vein i c congratulate for reform ideas earlier this summer. Before i conclude let me anecdotally say this, theres no better poster child for the challenge confronting the congress of the United States of america than where we happen to be today on funding the government in the beginning of the fiscal year that is less than two weeks away. I challenge this committee and all willing participants in the congress to find solutions that can put congress back on the track of doing arguably a most important work and i yield back. Thank you, i wanted to again express my gratitude to you both. Youre two of the busiest people in these marble buildings and the fact that you were willing to give us your time and wisdom, im very grateful for. So, thank you. Thank you. And with that, well now move on to our second panel. Our first witness is matthew owens. Mr. Owens is executive vicepresident and vicepresident for federal relations at the American Association of universities. Where he provides strategic leadership and management to the associations priorities. Mr. Owens also serves on the leadership counsel at convergence, a nonprofit that convenes rids individuals and organizations with divergent views to build trust and alliance on critical issues. In this capacity he served on the building a better budget process to address the often dysfunctional budget process. The project participants reached concensus on five proposals to improve the process that congress use toss manage the 4 trillion dollar annual budget. William hoglund is a senior at the Bipartisan Center and helps to manage fiscal help and policy analysis. Mr. Hoglund searched 33 years in the federal government including 25 years on the u. S. Senate staff. From 20032007 he served as the director of budget appropriations in the office of Senate Majority leader bill frist. And the impact of major legislation and helped to coordinate budget for the senate leadership. 19822003 mr. Hoglund served as a staff member of the Budget Committee reporting to u. S. Senator pete dimminchi. And finally a specialist in the government and fps division at congressional service. Lynch joined crs in 2007 as a pel management fellow and trier to coming to crs worked in the maryland general assembly. Witnesses are reminded your oral testimony will be limited to five minutes and without objection statements will be made part of the record. Mr. Owens youre recognized for five minutes to give oral presentation of your testimony. Thank you for your opportunity to testify before this important panel. Im encouraged your work to modernize congress for ways to improve the broken process. Ive seen it function in my work for Research Universities over the past decades. Student Financial Aid decisions are held up and important medical research is delayed and made more complex and time consuming because congress does not complete in a timely and predictable manner. It wastes time and taxpayers that would be in the universities. The first proposal is called budget action plan. It synchronizes the process with the electoral and governing cycles and calls on each new congress to adopt a twoyear budget that a site into law by the president. The budget action plan is three required elements in one optional provision. It sets discretion in levels for two years. It lets the debt limit by any shortfall agreed to in the legislation. Third, it authorizes public back report to analyze the impact that enactment of the budget would have on the longterm fiscal outlook. Additionally the plan allows congress to option to one reconciliation bill per fiscal year. Our second proposal requires cbo to produce a physical state of the nation report. It would be issued during the president ial election cycle and outline keith information about our finances including but not limited to longterm projections for debt, deficits, interest payments, revenues and spending, breakdown of all major Revenue Sources tax expenditures and essman shortfalls and longterm spending programs. This report would be widely distributed and provided, provide information in reader from the ways to allow nonwashington insiders to better understand the budget. We believe this report would provide a full picture of the nations finances, elevate discussions about the budget and help voters make more informed choices. Our third proposal seeks to reinforce importance of the longterm effects the budget decisions. We propose every four years gao revie