Legislative Branch Appropriation FY24

House Legislative Branch Appropriation FY2024

Thank you for accepting my testimony on the Appropriation for the Legislative Branch  for Fiscal Year 2024. My testimony addresses the jurisdiction of the Subcommittee, the enactment of the appropriation and the funding of the District of Columbia. All funds for the Executive Office of the President and the Judiciary, the District of Columbia as well as certain items currently funded through the Interior Appropriation would be transferred to this subcommittee at their current level of funding plus any increases requested by the President, the Chief Justice and the Mayor of the District of Columbia. In addition, funding for an Administrator for the National Capital Service Area must be established in accordance with the Home Rule Act of 1974, with the main functions being coordinating federal law enforcement agencies from all departments with the Metropolitan Police and securing reimbursements to compensate for certain items having to do with operation of the seat of government in the District. Note that this testimony will also be provided to the Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee.

The rationale for moving the Executive Office of the President and the Judiciary to this appropriation is to assure that like the Congress, the Executive Office is fully funded in order to participate as an equal branch in the event of a government shut down. Given the rising levels of partisanship in this Congress, this possibility is not unexpected. Indeed, because the salaries of the President and Judges cannot be constitutionally reduced, the funding of their staffs must also be as sacrosanct as the funding of congressional staff. If the Legislative Branch goes first, the Executive must go with it.

The following items funded by the Interior and Environment Appropriation, have to do with the national capital area and should be funded by the subcommittee:

1. John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
2. National Capital Arts and Cultural Affairs
3. National Capital Planning Commission
4. National Gallery of Art
5. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
6. Smithsonian Institution

The District of Columbia was designed to be a creature of Congress. Congress has rarely provided adequate funding of this responsibility, however. While the advent of Home Rule, eventual statehood for Douglass Commonwealth and the decreasing amount of federal contributions has freed much of D.C.’s Budget (a term I coined as a member of the Stand Up for Democracy in Washington, DC Coalition), there are certain activities that require annual funding that have been ignored since the federal payment was ended and certain activities transferred to the federal government. Note that the failure to fund certain of these obligations has been negligent for almost fifty years. You have run up quite a tab. While we do not expect you to ever clear the balance, making things right from here on would be justified. There are only four of major importance.

1. The funding of Metropolitan Police activities in association with motorcades, particularly for the President. Indeed, rather unjustly, such funding was disallowed in amendments to the Home Rule Act without allowing the citizens of Washington to vote on such charter amendments. In no state or federal jurisdiction would such unaccountable governance be allowed. While in some states, amendments can occur if passed identically twice with an intervening election, the fact that District voters cannot vote for any voting member, much less all of them, implies that changes to the basic law, in essence the constitution, of the District must be put to a vote to be morally valid. The fact that the current regime of unaccountable governance has not been challenged in federal court does not prevent such a challenge from occurring in the future. Indeed, it is incumbent on the Council of the District of Columbia to place any such amendments on the ballot and to notify Congress of their approval or disapproval of the same. Once this action is taken, the Judiciary can settle the constitutional question.
2. Damage to District Roadways in and around the National Mall caused by the Congressional Steam Plant. This is one case where Congress is exacting tribute from District taxpayers for damage it is continually causing. Visitors to the District likely look at buckling roads and see it as a failure of local governance, which is the farthest thing from the truth.
3. Funding behavioral health intervention for homeless individuals, including veterans, who camp in the National Capital Service Area and in and around federal agencies, including providing housing first and continuing mental healthcare.
4. Funding mental healthcare for individuals who have been hospitalized at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital or other District of Columbia facilities, such as the Correctional Treatment Center and the arrest and incarceration of any violent protesters held in the District of Columbia jail awaiting trial for their involvement in the events of January 6, 2021. In the near future, this may include some members of the House and Senate, so funding this line item in this budget would be most apt.