Bush Budget Cuts Emergency Preparedness

WASHINGTON, D.C. - President Bush targeted scores of federal programs on Monday to make room for his $1.6 trillion tax cut, proposing to slash funds for emergency preparedness, urban police patrols, energy conservation and pediatrician training.

"Washington is known for its pork. This budget funds our needs without the fat," Bush told reporters as his administration sent Congress a 2,500-page document filling in the fine print of the $1.96 trillion rudimentary budget he outlined in February.

Democrats balked, saying Bush's proposals would cut bone as well as fat, and noted that the Senate already had repudiated part of Bush's tax plan by trimming it back to $1.2 trillion.

Bush urged reductions in 10 of the government's 25 major agencies. The deepest are at the departments of Agriculture and Transportation.

From Streets To Schools

Many programs put in place by former President Clinton were targeted, including a 17 percent cut in his program to put 100,000 new police officers on city streets. Part of the savings would be redirected to beefing up security at the nation's schools.

The budget calls for a $35 million cut in a program to help train pediatricians and other health professionals at children's hospitals.

Bush's budget also would trim environmental and energy-conservation programs, limit Space Station research, and slash programs to help Russian nuclear scientists find civilian work and to boost economic development in poor neighborhoods.

Project Impact

The budget also would eliminate the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Project Impact, a $25 million effort to help communities get ready for natural disasters.

The first announcement that the program was being cut came just after the 6.8-magnitude Nisqually earthquake on Feb. 28.

Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., believes the funding saved lives and prevented what could have been greater destruction. She introduced a measure Thursday to protect the program, which the Senate passed Friday.

Bush's earlier "budget blueprint" said Project Impact "has not proven effective."

Seattle's Project Impact program was launched in January 1998 during a seven-city pilot program. The program is a public-private partnership designed to promote safer homes, schools and businesses before natural disasters occur.

Nationally, Project Impact now includes 250 cities. The measure passed Friday by the Senate now goes to a House and Senate conference committee.

For More Information

White House -- www.whitehouse.gov
Seattle's Project Impact -- www.ci.seattle.wa.us/projectimpact
FEMA's Project Impact -- www.fema.gov/impact