Advocacy at a Glance

Advocacy at a Glance offers you the bullet point summary of current advocacy issues associated with the goals of the Alliance for a Stronger FDA.

• House Passes FY 18 Omnibus Appropriations Bill Including Ag/FDA Funds. While the Continuing Resolution (CR), which was passed by Congress and signed by the President last week, funds the government until December 8th, Congress still must pass funding for the full Fiscal Year 18 (FY 18). Earlier this week, the House passed HR 3354, which contains the full-year FY 18 funding for the entire federal government (i.e., what would otherwise be in 12 separate bills). With the House passage, the appropriations process squarely moves to the Senate, where committee work is being completed, and a floor strategy remains unclear.

• Congress Must Deal with Budget Caps Before Finalizing FY 18 Appropriations To complete FY 18 appropriations, the House and Senate will need to agree on funding levels, policy riders, and what to do with the spending caps in the Budget Control Act of 2011 (BCA). Specifically, the House omnibus exceeds the defense spending cap by $72 billion and would trigger an estimated 13% sequester of FY 18 defense funding. To avoid this, Congress will have to amend the spending caps in the BCA, leaving open the possibility that an increase in non-defense spending might be paired with the likely increase in defense funding.

• GSA Looking at FDA’s Long-term Space Requirements. As previously reported, the General Service Administration has begun the process of updating FDA’s master plan with an eye to determining whether and how, over the next 15 years, the White Oak campus could hold up to 18,000 employees (a combination of existing staff, moving programs from leased space, and new hires). This week’s Analysis and Commentary discusses the process and looks at some of the options under consideration.

• Alliance Plans to Be on the Hill on September 19th. Meetings have been set up to thank lawmakers for supporting FDA in the FY 18 cycle and to lay the groundwork for the FY 19 cycle.  Every Alliance meeting on the Hill is also an opportunity to remind Congress of the breadth and depth of support for a well-funded FDA.