ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries


C&RL News ■ July/August 2000 I 611

Washington Hotline

Lynne E. Bradley

There are only around 30 legislative days left 
to the second session of this 106th Congress. 
With the July 4 recess, timeout for the political 
party conventions, and Labor Day recess, there 
is little time to get much work done betw een 
now and October, when the Congress wants 
to go hom e to campaign. This kind of legisla­
tive session requires an “end gam e” strategy, 
needing library advocates to stay informed of 
the important legislation and maintain constant 
grassroots pressure on their representatives and 
senators to support library positions.

Appropriations
The main work that Congress m ust complete 
is FY2001 Appropriations. At this writing, li­
brary supporters are waiting for floor votes in 
the House o f Representatives on the Labor- 
HHS-Education appropriations bill, H.R. 4577 
— which contains the main library funding for 
the Library Services an d  T echnology Act 
(LSTA). The Senate version is bill S. 2553-

ALA  and other library advocates have been 
fighting for LSTA funding at the full level re­
quested by the Clinton Administration: $173 
million. This compares with the House level 
of $168 million and the Senate level of $170 
million. A filtering amendm ent, which w ould 
require that blocking and filtering software be 
installed in libraries and schools, to use fed­
eral funding for computer-related activities, is 
still pending. In previous efforts, this am end­
ment, sponsored by Rep. Ernest Istook (R-Okla- 
homa), has been removed but in this conten­
tious election year, it is unknow n w hether the 
library community and others will succeed at 
cutting this out of the Labor-HHS-Education 
appropriations bill.

The Federal Depository Library Program 
(FDLP) and other funding at the G overnment 
Printing Office were targeted for severe cuts 
by the House Appropriations Committee ear­
lier this spring. The House bill, H.R. 4516, pro­
poses a cut of 25% to GPO, which translates 
into a 62% cut to the FDLP by eliminating most 
printing functions at GPO. This w ould require

Lynne E. Bradley is Office o f Government Relations director 
o f ALA’s Washington Office: e-mail: leb@alawash.org

the FDLP program to become exclusively elec­
tronic. The proposed House cuts w ould also 
eliminate the regular printing of compilations 
to the U.S. Code. This is just one example of 
important access to governm ent information 
that w ould be lost to the American public, 
unless they can pay private sources or have 
full electronic access. The legislative branch 
appropriations also cover the Library of Con­
gress, the Government Accounting Office, and 
other congressional agencies and expenses.

The Senate Appropriations Committee was 
far m ore reasonable. The comm ittee voted 
unanimously on S. 2603 to support level fund­
ing for all legislative branch agencies. Level 
funding for GPO w ould still cause serious cuts 
in several areas, which is why supporters have 
been pressing for passage o f the Senate pro­
posal.

Database legislation
With Congress involved with these and sev­
eral other appropriations bills that must be 
passed before Congress can go sine die or into 
final recess in October, there is less opportu­
nity for votes on other issues, such as the du­
eling database bilks. ALA and its allies have 
supported the “good" database bill, H.R. 1858, 
which is more reasonable and balanced in its 
approach to providing additional protections 
to databases in the electronic environment. The 
“bad” database bill, H.R. 354, is overbroad and 
problematic for the library community. Aca­
demic librarians have been especially helpful 
in seeking support for the preferred bill and 
arguing against the offensive bill.

Check the ALA Web site for legislative up­
dates on these and other issues at: h ttp :// 
w ww .ala.org/washoff/.

At this site, readers can find the latest re­
ports from the online newsletter, ALAWON, 
issue briefs, and other information posted about 
all of these issues. You can also find a link to 
the online ALA Legislative Action Center, which 
helps advocates send personalized printed or 
electronic letters to their respective senators 
and congressional representatives by provid­
ing sam ple letters and messages and a zip- 
code link to identify congressional offices, ■

mailto:leb@alawash.org
http://www.ala.org/washoff/