House Committee Funding Requests and Authorizations, 104th-115th Congresses
Released: 2019-01-04T00:00:00

House Committee Funding Process

Pursuant to House Rule X, clause 6, the Committee on House Administration (CHA) reports an omnibus, biennial "primary expense resolution" to cover the expenses of each standing and select committee, except the Appropriations Committee. The resolution is based in part on committee requests for funds to cover their necessary expenses for the two years of a Congress. The budgetary requests include estimated salary needs for staff, costs of consulting services, printing costs, office equipment and supply costs, and travel costs for committee members and staff. Some costs, such as pension and insurance contributions for committee employees, are paid from other appropriated funds, and are excluded from committee budgets.

Some committees discuss and approve their proposed budgets at committee organization meetings. Committee chairs normally introduce House resolutions to provide their committees with the requisite funds for the two years of the Congress. These individual resolutions are then referred to the Committee on House Administration, which may hold a public hearing on the committee's request. The chair and the ranking minority member from each committee typically testify at these hearings.

The chair of CHA then typically introduces an omnibus funding resolution, which, after its referral to the CHA, typically serves as the legislative vehicle for a full committee markup. The measure is then considered by the House.

Table 1 provides the requested and authorized levels of funding for committees for the 115 th Congress. Table 2 through Table 12 provide committee funding requests and primary expense resolution authorizations in nominal dollars for House committees in the 104 th -114 th Congresses. Table 13 through Table 23 provide the authorization levels, calculated in constant (January 2017) dollars, for the 104 th through 114 th Congresses. All tables calculate the absolute and percentage differences between the total requested and the total authorized funding levels.