WASHINGTON - House and Senate negotiators are close to agreement on a new five-year farm bill that would provide $10 billion in new money for farm and nutrition programs and include some money for a new permanent disaster aid program, South Dakota lawmakers said Thursday.
The Democratic chairmen of the two agriculture committees tentatively signed off on the additional spending Wednesday, and the chairmen of the House and Senate tax committees are expected to decide by today how they would raise the money to pay for it, Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin, D-S.D., said.
The House last year approved a farm bill that was $5.9 billion more than the $286 billion price tag lawmakers tried to stick with when they began working on the farm bill. The Senate approved a bill that was $13.3 billion more than the baseline. Under House rules, all new spending must be offset by either reducing government spending elsewhere or by raising new revenues. President Bush vowed to veto both bills because, he said, they used budget gimmicks and tax increases to offset the additional spending.
"There have been promising improvements this week that lead me to believe we may have a bill in place before the current (farm bill) expires on March 15," said Herseth Sandlin, a member of the House Agriculture Committee. "If not, only a short-term extension may be necessary."
Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., who sits on the Senate agriculture committee, said Republicans on the committee have tentatively agreed they could live with the $10 billion in additional money. The hard part will be finding a way to pay for it that will satisfy enough House Republicans to get a veto-proof majority, Thune said. The Senate already has enough votes to override Bush's threatened veto, Thune said.
"(The White House is) still saying, `If you don't do this, if you don't do that, we'll veto the bill,' " Thune said. "If we come up with something that's a common-sense proposal that strikes a compromise ... I think we can come up with a bill that might be veto proof."
Agriculture leaders in the House seem to finally have come around to the idea that the final bill must have some money in it for a new permanent disaster aid program, Thune said. The Senate provided $5 billion for the disaster aid program, while the House did not provide any money.
"We've really insisted on that," he said. "In the Senate, both Democrats and Republicans are really adamant that there's got to be a disaster title. That's something the House ... was willing to give away in the deal they struck with the White House (two weeks ago)."
Herseth Sandlin said the amount probably won't be close to the $5 billion called for in the Senate bill, but at least it would be something.
"We all understand the importance of moving toward a permanent disaster program, but we also know we're working within the tight budget constraints that we faced with the threat of the White House veto," she said. "It's a positive development if we can include some amount to at least establish the program and then work from there as we move forward."
Contact Faith Bremner at [email protected]Argus Leader
