Today, the Senate took action to pass a two-year budget deal that was negotiated between House and Senate leadership and the White House.  The measure gained passage in the House earlier this week.  President Obama is expected to sign the deal when it reaches his desk.  Once adopted, the budget agreement provides the framework for the final FY 2016 appropriations bill, which must be negotiated before December 11, 2015.  RCRC is advocating for Congress to fully fund and permanently authorize the Federal Payment in Lieu of Taxes program as part of their FY 2016 appropriations funding measure.

The broad outlines of the deal are as follows:

  • The negotiated agreement increases discretionary spending by $80 billion above sequester-level spending caps with the increase split evenly between defense and nondefense programs. Sequester relief of $50 billion would be applied to fiscal 2016 and $30 billion for fiscal 2017.
  • The deal includes an additional $32 billion in Overseas Contingency Operations war account funding, split evenly between fiscal 2016 and fiscal 2017. That means spending would rise by $66 billion above the caps for fiscal 2016 and $46 billion above the caps for fiscal 2017.
  • Some of the offsets include selling off some of the Strategic Petroleum Oil Reserve and Spectrum auctions.
  • A debt limit increase that would last until March 2017.
  • Other components of the legislation include addressing a looming increase in Medicare Part B premiums for about a third of the program's beneficiaries and making legislative changes to extend the solvency of the Social Security disability insurance trust fund.