The House could move forward as early as next week with a fiscal 2014 continuing resolution, a spokeswoman for the House Appropriations Committee said Friday.
While no final decisions have been made, the measure will be introduced once House leaders set aside time to debate and vote on the measure, Jennifer Hing said, adding that the committee could know by Monday. Although the CR’s duration is also unsettled, the panel’s chairman, Hal Rogers, R-Ky., is seeking a short-term “clean” measure that would keep agency funding at current post-sequester levels, she said.
The stop-gap spending measure will likely be needed to avoid a partial government shutdown when the new fiscal year begins next month. Lawmakers have not given final approval to any of the dozen full-year appropriations bills otherwise needed to keep agencies in operation. In a schedule released late Friday afternoon, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., indicated that a CR will be on the House’s agenda next week.
After their customary August break, both House and Senate members return to Capitol Hill next week.
At Taxpayers for Common Sense, a watchdog group that monitors spending legislation, Vice President Steve Ellis said he had heard that a CR could last about two months. Although several weeks remain in this fiscal year for lawmakers to act on full-year spending legislation, Ellis said, “When you have absolutely no prospect of success in getting any bills done, it’s like, ‘Why wait?’”
Original Publication URL: http://www.federaltimes.com/article/20130906/CONGRESS01/309060004/House-could-vote-CR-next-week
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