USA Budget for 2007

The $2.77 trillion budget plan emphasizes spending on the country’s fight against terrorism, while deeply cutting domestic programs. 141 domestic programs will be reduced. The Agriculture Department is hit with the third-largest percentage decrease in spending of any department.

Among the agencies to come under the knife would be Commerce’s biggest, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which would suffer a 4.3 percent cut, to $3.681 billion. Nearly $440 billion defense budget contains $110.8 billion for military personnel, including a modest 2.2 percent pay increase, as well as $84.2 billion for weapons systems and $73.2 billion for research and development. The growth in defense spending has slowed compared with earlier this decade, suggesting the defense buildup that began in 1999 and accelerated in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks is winding down.

The $63 billion budget eliminates 42 programs — including parent-resource centers, vocational programs and drug-free schools. The department budget is essentially flat. The budget adds money to research some alternative fuel technology. Environmental groups said the funding increases are insufficient. The agency took another financial hit with a proposed budget of $7.32 billion for fiscal 2007. By contrast, Bush proposed spending $7.62 billion last year and $8.37 billion for fiscal 2004.

The president proposes increasing the Department of Homeland Security’s budget of $31 billion for fiscal 2007, by $177 million. Homeland Security would spend $869 million to add 1,500 border patrol agents and 6,700 detention bed spaces. Congress requires adding 2,000 agents per year. The $33.6 billion budget for the Housing and Urban Development Department is a decrease from 2006 that is largely felt in HUD’s signature program for distributing grants to states and cities for urban development.

The administration is proposing to hold the budget for the department and for its main subsidiary, the Internal Revenue Service, essentially flat for the coming year. The Department of Veterans Affairs would see one of the biggest increases in discretionary spending for any agency: a boost of $2.6 billion to $35.7 billion. Most of the spending goes to health care — the department expects to treat 5.3 million veterans next year.

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