Pelosi Statement on Senate Amendment to Cut HIV/AIDS Funding for San Francisco and Other Areas

[The Straight Story]

Pelosi Statement on Senate Amendment to Cut HIV/AIDS Funding for San Francisco and Other Areas

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

Contact: Brendan Daly/Nadeam Elshami, 202-226-7616

Washington, D.C. – Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued the following statement in response to today’s Senate vote in support of an amendment to the fiscal year 2008 Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill that reinstates severe, destabilizing HIV/AIDS funding cuts in 11 jurisdictions, including San Francisco:

“Although San Francisco developed the model of community-based care that served as the basis for the original Ryan White CARE Act, our City’s needs are still severe. AIDS continues to be the City’s second leading cause of premature death and nearly 23,000 San Franciscans are currently living with HIV/AIDS – more than at any point in the history of the epidemic.

“I will work with the Appropriations Committee to maintain this critical protection in conference. Given that Senator Enzi misrepresented the impact of the House stop-loss provision – it will not take away funding away from other areas – I urge Senators who voted in favor of the amendment to reconsider their vote and instead support removing the Enzi amendment in conference.”
* * *

Background information:

Carefully negotiated provisions were included in last year’s Ryan White reauthorization to protect jurisdictions that receive funding under Title I of Ryan White from severe funding cuts that destabilize existing systems of care people living with HIV/AIDS rely upon for access to medications and primary medical care. Unfortunately, those protections have proved inadequate, and 11 jurisdictions saw their funding slashed, including six that lost more than 20 percent of their funds. The “stop-loss” language included in the House Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill would reduce those cuts to a manageable level that jurisdictions could realistically absorb in one year. San Francisco’s funding, for example, would still be cut by $2.3 million under the House bill. However, it is more realistic for the City to absorb a $2.3 million cut rather than the existing $8.5 million cut announced by the Bush Administration earlier this year.

The amendment offered today by Senator Mike Enzi (R-WY), which passed by a vote of 65-28, would reinstate those severe cuts. While advocating for passage of this amendment, Senator Enzi and other proponents mischaracterized the impact of the House language. It does not take resources from other jurisdictions. Speaker Pelosi worked with Chairman Obey to ensure a significant increase for Title I that would both reduce cuts to a manageable level for these 11 jurisdictions and still ensure increases for other jurisdictions.

As a result, even after $9.3 million is used to fulfill the requirements of the stop-loss provision, there is still a $23 million increase for Title I in the House bill. This is the largest increase for Title I since fiscal year 2001. GAO's recent findings confirm that in addition to benefiting the 11 jurisdictions whose cuts are reduced through the stop-loss, the House bill also increases funding for 42 of the remaining 45 jurisdictions that qualify under Title I. The very minor cuts projected in three jurisdictions are all less than 0.01 percent. This one-time fix does not change the underlying formula. It has no impact on the rest of the reauthorization period, which goes through 2010.

Senator Enzi made it appear as though jurisdictions would receive a cut as a result of the stop-loss by comparing what they would have gotten if the increase had been $32.3 million ($23 million plus the $9.3 million for the stop loss) with the admittedly smaller benefit of the $23 million increase. $23 million is still the largest increase for Title I in seven years. It is not accurate to say the House language takes money from other jurisdictions – there is a large increase for these jurisdictions under the House bill with or without the stop-loss provision. The stop-loss is needed to reduce cuts for 11 jurisdictions to manageable levels that can be absorbed in one fiscal year without destabilizing the HIV/AIDS care and treatment services that thousands of people in San Francisco and across the country rely upon to stay healthy.

http://www.house.gov/pelosi/press/releases/Oct07/aids-funding.html

[rateyes]

1. Well, it looks like Representative Pelosi is looking out for her own

district. Too bad that SPEAKER of the WHOLE House Pelosi isn't doing the same when it comes to issues that affect us all.