September 10th, 2013 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
Congress returned from its August recess yesterday to a mountain of unfinished business. With 22 days remaining in the fiscal year, Congress plans to go all in and be in session for nine of them.
Nine days to:
United States Capitol Building (Photo credit: Jack’s LOST FILM)
- Avoid a government shut down by passing a FY 2014 budget;
- Address the federal debt limit or face a default on federal debt;
- Reach agreement on the farm bill which expires September 30th; and
- Syria.
As is often stated in ads for investment products, past results do not guarantee future performance. However, I think we can go out on a limb here and state that recent Congressional performance is a pretty good indication of how well this will go. And as Congress muddles through these high profile issues, other important issues could continue to be neglected.
A laundry list of important infrastructure related, science and research related, and math and science education related issues linger on the back burner. Some of them have been back there for
many years. Reauthorization of the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA), addressing the shortfall in the Highway Trust Fund, reauthorization of the nation’s research enterprise including both the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), addressing Science-Technology-Engineering-Mathematics (STEM) educational programs, reauthorization in the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program (NEHRP) and the National Windstorm Impact Reduction Program (NWIRP) represents a
partial list of issues Congress needs to address.
The last session of Congress, the 112th, was the most unproductive ever (or at least since 1948, when we started measuring these things). Eight months in, the 113th looks like it could be even worse (or better, depending on how you view what Washington should — or shouldn’t — be doing.) Twenty-two bills have been passed by Congress and sent to President Obama for his signature since Congress convened in January.
While this torrid pace of inactivity could well continue, ASCE will continue to press Congress on these issues. That message will be louder and more effective, if they hear from you too!
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May 13th, 2013 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
Draft legislation is being circulated by new
House Science Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX) which would require all research funded by the
National Science Foundation (NSF) to be certified to “advance the national health, prosperity, or welfare” and “secure the national defense” of the United States. The NSF must certify that each funded project is of “the finest quality, is groundbreaking, and answers questions or solves problems that are of utmost importance to society of large.”
House Science Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The draft legislation has drawn a vigorous response from the scientific committee. A letter to Smith from six former NSF Directors stated, “ We believe that this draft legislation would replace the current merit-based system used to evaluate research and education proposals with a cumbersome and unrealistic certification process that rather than improving the quality of research would do just the opposite. The history of science and technology has shown that truly basic research often yields breakthroughs – including new technologies, markets and jobs – but that it is impossible to predict which projects (and which fields) will do that. Progress in science requires freedom to explore important questions regardless of where the answers may lead. Over the years, federal funding of basic research, using peer review evaluation, has led to vast improvements in health care, national security, and economic development.”
The draft also drew a sharp response from Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX) the top Democrat on the Committee. In a letter to Smith, Johnson called the draft legislation “the first step on a path that would destroy the merit-based review process at NSF and intrudes political pressure into what is widely viewed as the most effective and creative process for awarding research funds in the world. It is this process that has supported the growth of the American research university system, and it is this process that has established the American research enterprise as innovation of our age.”
ASCE has joined with other scientific and engineering organizations in a letter to Smith urging him to withdraw the proposed legislation.
A copy of the current draft of the legislation is here.
Tags: congress, national science foundation, stem
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