In late October 2012, Hurricane Sandy impacted a wide swath of the East Coast of the United States. President Obama had, as of January 31, 2013, declared major disasters for 12 states plus the District of Columbia under the authority of the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (42 U.S.C. 5121 et seq.). The Obama Administration submitted a request to Congress on December 7, 2012, for $60.4 billion in supplemental funding and legislative provisions to address both the immediate losses and damages from Hurricane Sandy, as well as to mitigate the damage from future disasters in the impacted region. The Administration's proposal included $47.44 billion in funding for a range of disaster assistance, and $12.97 billion specifically for mitigation of damage from potential future storms and flooding. Budget authority of $55 billion was requested as emergency funding, while $5.4 billion was requested as disaster relief under the Budget Control Act (BCA). On December 17, 2012, S.Amdt. 3338 , entitled the Disaster Relief Appropriations Act, 2013, was introduced as an amendment to H.R. 1 of the 112 th Congress. This bill was a continuing resolution that had previously passed the House of Representatives, and served as the Senate legislative vehicle for disaster relief supplemental appropriations. On December 19, the amendment was withdrawn and S.Amdt. 3395 , with the same title and overall cost, was offered in its place. This legislation would have provided $60.41 billion in supplemental appropriations for disaster assistance, as well as a suite of legislative provisions that included reforms to disaster assistance authorities. The Senate amendment did not explicitly separate all its mitigation provisions from other relief appropriations, although it did reference some funding as being for mitigation. Budget authority of $55 billion in the legislation was designated as emergency funding, while $5.379 billion in funding for the Disaster Relief Fund would have been designated as being for disaster relief under the BCA. A budget point of order was upheld against part of the legislation, removing the emergency designation from $3.461 billion of construction funding for the Army Corps of Engineers. The Senate made several changes to the amendment (which was passed by voice vote), and then passed the supplemental appropriations legislation on December 28, 2012, by a vote of 62-32. The House did not act on the legislation before the end of the 112 th Congress. However, one facet of the Obama Administration's request did become law during the 112 th Congress. The Administration had sought a legislative provision to increase the bond limit for the Small Business Administration's Surety Bond Guarantees Revolving Fund. A provision increasing the bond limit to $6.5 million, and up to $10 million if a federal contracting officer certified it was necessary, was included in P.L. 112-239 , the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013. On January 4, 2013, the House and Senate both passed H.R. 41 , legislation providing an additional $9.7 billion in borrowing authority for the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), which had been a part of the Obama Administration's request. The President signed it into law as P.L. 113-1 on January 6, 2013. H.R. 152 , which included another portion of the Obama Administration's supplemental request, was introduced on January 4, 2013, and an amendment was filed that same day that included additional portions. The House Appropriations Committee described H.R. 152 as including $17 billion "to meet immediate and critical needs," and described the amendment as including $33 billion "funding for longer-term recovery efforts and infrastructure improvements that will help prevent damage caused by future disasters." On January 7, an amendment in the nature of a substitute to H.R. 152 which contained some minor textual changes, along with a restructured "long-term recovery" amendment, was posted on the House Rules Committee website. The House took up the legislation on January 15, 2013. The amendment with long-term recovery funding passed with several amendments, and the amended bill passed the House by a vote of 241-180. The rule for consideration of the bill combined H.R. 219 , a House-passed package of legislative provisions reforming disaster assistance programs, with the appropriations legislation upon engrossment of H.R. 152 , and sent them to the Senate as a single package. The Senate passed H.R. 152 unchanged on January 28, 2013 by a vote of 62-36, and it was signed into law as P.L. 113-2 the next day. Table 1 below outlines the Obama Administration's request for supplemental funding and mitigation funding in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, and the congressional response to those requests. All figures are in millions of dollars of budget authority. The Obama Administration's request is shown by appropriations subcommittee in Table 1 . Unlike in the Administration's request, no distinction is made in this table between requested mitigation funding and recovery funding. A breakdown of the Administration's request that illuminates the Administration's separate request for mitigation funding is included in CRS Report R42869, FY2013 Supplemental Funding for Disaster Relief . Headers in bold italics note the appropriations subcommittee of jurisdiction, followed by the department or independent agency in bold capitals. Two columns then specify where a given appropriation is going, by bureau, if applicable, then account or program. The Obama Administration's request is next, in millions of dollars of budget authority, followed by the appropriations that would have been provided if Senate-amended H.R. 1 from the 112 th Congress had been enacted. This is provided only for historical reference, as the bill expired with the end of the 112 th Congress. The last column reflects the amount of funding provided in H.R. 152 as it passed both House and Senate and was ultimately signed into law. Where accounts are funded through transfers, that number is shown in the table and the donor account is reduced accordingly. Note that all funding levels in the enacted column show the resources provided by P.L. 113-2 : those resources were ultimately reduced by the sequestration required on March 1, 2013, under the provisions of the BCA, as amended. That sequestration required the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to implement across-the-board spending cuts at the account and program level to achieve equal budget reductions from both defense and nondefense funding, under terms specified in the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985 (BBEDCA), as amended by the BCA. The amount and implementation of those reductions was unclear at the time P.L. 113-2 was enacted. The Budget Control Act (BCA) changed the way Congress accounted for federal funding for disaster response and recovery. In previous years, Congress provided funds over and above limits on discretionary appropriations by designating additional appropriations as being for emergency needs. Budget authority provided in this manner did not count against funding limitations on discretionary spending in budget resolutions. Although the BCA included legislation allowing for emergency appropriations, the new law included provisions that outlined separate treatment for disaster relief, as distinct from emergency funding. Funding designated as disaster relief in future spending bills could be "paid for" by adjusting upward the discretionary spending caps. This allowable adjustment for disaster relief is limited, however, to an amount based on the 10-year rolling average of what has been spent by the federal government on relief efforts for major disasters. This disaster relief allowable adjustment for FY2013 was $11.8 billion. Under the continuing resolution signed into law on September 28, 2012 ( P.L. 112-175 ), the amount of disaster relief (as defined under the BCA) that would be provided if the resolution were extended for the full fiscal year was $6.4 billion. This was the first time under the BCA that in the wake of a major disaster more relief funding was sought than could be accommodated under the allowable adjustment. The Administration proposed designating all of the supplemental funding it sought as an emergency requirement, with the exception of a portion of the request for the Disaster Relief Fund (DRF), which would be designated as being for disaster relief under the BCA. The Administration noted in the letter accompanying the request that it was unclear how much of the disaster relief allowable adjustment might be available pending the finalization of general FY2013 appropriations, and that therefore these numbers could require adjustment. Senate-passed H.R. 1 proposed that $5,379 million in DRF funding be designated for disaster relief under the BCA, with all but $3,461 million (for Army Corps of Engineers construction activities) of the remaining funding in the bill designated as emergency funding. P.L. 113-2 contained $41,669 million in emergency funding, $5,379 million for the DRF designated as disaster relief, and $3,461 million for Army Corps of Engineers construction activities that would count against the discretionary budget caps. One potential method for accommodating disaster response and recovery costs beyond the allowable adjustment for disaster relief would be offsetting the additional spending through rescissions or other means that would reduce the net budgetary scoring of the bill. Traditionally, supplemental funding for the DRF has been treated as emergency spending—it was not counted against discretionary budget caps, nor was an offset required. However, supplemental spending packages have at times carried rescissions or transfers that have offset, to one degree or another, the budgetary impact of other forms of disaster assistance that could be defined as "disaster relief" under the BCA. Of the 59 bills passed with supplemental appropriations from 1990 to the end of 2012, 6 were fully offset by rescissions. Only one of those actually provided net additional resources for the DRF—the Emergency Supplemental and Rescissions for Antiterrorism and Oklahoma City Disaster, 1995 ( P.L. 104-19 ).