Funding authorization for the Victims of Child Abuse Act programs expired with FY2005. Congress nonetheless provided FY2006 funding for these programs in the conference report to H.R. 2862 ( H.Rept. 109-272 ), which was signed by the President on November 22,2005 ( P.L. 109-108 ). That law provided for a 0.28% reduction in all the discretionary fundingamounts provided in the bill. Subsequently, Congress approved a conference agreement to theDepartment of Defense Appropriations Act ( H.R. 2863 , enacted as P.L. 109-148 ),which includes a 1% rescission in nearly all FY2006 discretionary appropriations. Each of theVictims of Child Abuse Act programs is discretionary and subject to this combined 1.28% reductionin FY2006 funding. (Both laws stipulate that these reductions are to be applied proportionately toall accounts and activities funded.) Unless otherwise noted, the FY2006 appropriations levelsdiscussed in this report estimate the effect of this 1.28% reduction on each of the programs assuminga proportionate application of the reduction. Children's Advocacy Centers. Neither the Housenor the Senate followed the President's FY2006 budget request to significantly reduce funding forChildren's Advocacy Centers (and its related training and technical assistance). Congress provided$14.8 million in FY2006 appropriations for this program rather than the $11.8 million proposed bythe President. The conference report ( H.Rept. 109-272 ) accompanying this FY2006 appropriation(and as adjusted proportionately by the 1.28% funding reduction) specified that, of this amount,$12.6 million is for Children's Advocacy Centers and $2.2 million is for specialized training andtechnical assistance. For FY2007, the Administration has again requested reduced funding for theprogram, totaling $11.679 million. (2) Court Appointed Special Advocates. The House,Senate, and President proposed roughly the same FY2006 funding levels (ranging between $11.846million and $11.897 million) for the Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) program. Thefinal estimated FY2006 funding level for this program is approximately $11.745 million. ForFY2007, the Administration has proposed $11.750 million in CASA funding. Training for Judicial Personnel and Practitioners. Floor amendments approved in both the House and Senate (to their respective versions of H.R. 2862 ) would have significantly raised the funding levels for Training for JudicialPersonnel and Practitioners for FY2006. (3) However, conferees to the Department of Justice AppropriationsAct stripped this extra money from the final agreement, and the FY2006 appropriation for thisprogram is estimated as $2.258 million. For FY2007, the President's budget requests $2.263 millionfor this program. Congress often uses the expiration of a program's funding authorization to both amendprogram authority and extend funding authorization. Children's Advocacy Centers. Legislation toreauthorize grants to support Children's Advocacy Centers has not been introduced in the 109thCongress. However, the Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act( P.L. 109-162 ) includes an authorization of $7.5 million (in each of FY2006-FY2010) for specializedtechnical assistance and training programs related to the purposes of Children's Advocacy Centers. The Victims of Child Abuse Act provided an authorization of $5 million (for each ofFY2004-FY2005) for grants to "national organizations" to provide technical assistance and training... for the purpose of improving the quality of criminal prosecution of [child abuse and neglect]cases." As recently enacted, P.L. 109-162 stipulates that the training and technical assistancefunding authorized for FY2006-FY2010 is "in addition" to any other funding under the Victims ofChild Abuse Act for this purpose, and that this new funding authorization is specifically for grantsto the American Prosecutors Research Institute (APRI). (There are currently no other fundsauthorized for this purpose.) Congress has often -- via appropriations conference report language --made grants to APRI out of this funding authority. However, funds provided under this authorityhave not been exclusively devoted to that organization. (See the program discussion under Children's Advocacy Centers below for more information.) During the first session of the 109th Congress, bills that sought to ensure funds would be sentto the APRI were introduced in the House ( H.R. 3687 , by Representative Gutknecht)and Senate ( S. 885 , by Senator Dayton), and the provisions of these bills have nowlargely been approved as part of the Violence Against Women and Department of JusticeReauthorization Act of 2005 ( P.L. 109-162 ). (However, Senator Dayton's bill would have furtherprovided that in each of FY2006 to FY2010, $4.5 million of the funds would be authorized forAPRI's National Center for the Prosecution of Child Abuse, while the remaining $3.0 million wouldbe authorized for APRI's National Child Protection Training Center at Winona State University. (4) ) Court Appointed Special Advocates. TheViolence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act of 2005 ( P.L. 109-162 )also amended the CASA program and reauthorized its funding for FY2007-FY2011. (As notedabove, FY2006 funding for CASA was provided in P.L. 109-108 despite the lapsed fundingauthorization.) Legislation to amend CASA and reauthorize its funding had earlier passed the Senate( S. 1197 ) as part of a bill to extend Violence Against Women Act (VAWA)programs. (5) S.1197 would have raised the annual funding authorization for the CASA program to $17million for FY2006-FY2010. By contrast, P.L. 109-162 reauthorizes funding for CASA for fiveyears but maintains the FY2005 funding authorization level of $12 million and changes the first yearof the extension to FY2007. Like S. 1197, however, P.L. 109-162 clarifies that fundsprovided for CASA may be used to "initiate, sustain, and expand" CASA programs. (Prior lawgenerally limited the purpose of these funds to initiating or expanding CASA programs.) Also, likeS. 1197, the final legislation authorizes state and local CASA programs to request criminalbackground checks for prospective volunteers from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) andstipulates that programs that make such a request are required to pay for "reasonable costs"associated with the FBI check. (6) Finally, P.L. 109-162 includes two provisions that were not in S.1197. These are: 1) a requirement the Inspector General of the Department of Justiceprepare a report on the CASA program that looks at the types of activities funded by the NationalCourt-Appointed Special Advocate Association since 1993 and compares outcomes in cases whereCASA volunteers are appointed to assist children to those where no CASA is appointed; and 2) aprohibition on the use of funds provided under this authority for lobbying. (7) Training for Judicial Personnel and Practitioners. No legislation to reauthorize funding for grants to provide Training for Judicial Personnel andPractitioners has been introduced during the 109th Congress. The House and Senate Judiciary Committees reported the 1990 legislation that establishedthe Victims of Child Abuse Act and, in general, those committees have exercised jurisdiction overits programs. In both 1994 ( P.L. 103-322 ) and 2000 ( P.L. 106-386 ), reauthorization of funding forthe Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) program and for the Training Program for JudicialPersonnel and Practitioners occurred as part of the legislation creating and amending the ViolenceAgainst Women Act (VAWA). While the 2005 VAWA reauthorization extends CASA fundingauthorization (FY2007-FY2011) it does not do so for the judicial training program. Neither does the legislation that reauthorizes VAWA include reauthorization of theChildren's Advocacy Centers, although it does include reauthorization of training funds related tothe work done by the centers (FY2006-FY2010). Past reauthorizations of Children's AdvocacyCenters have occurred as part of separate legislation and in different years. The 1992 amendmentsto the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act ( P.L. 102-586 ) rewrote and reauthorized theoriginal provisions of the Victims of Child Abuse Act to authorize the current Children's AdvocacyCenters and related training program. The 1996 amendments ( P.L. 104-235 ) to the Child AbusePrevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) (which was handled by the committees that are currentlycalled House Education and the Workforce and Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions)extended this authorization without any changes to the program. (8) The program's fundingauthorization was expired from FY2001 through FY2003, although the program continued toreceive funding. In 2003, a House floor amendment to the legislation that would become P.L.108-21 (PROTECT Act) reauthorized funding for the program in FY2004 and FY2005. Regional children's advocacy centers, local children's advocacy centers, and related technicalassistance and training (to improve the quality of criminal prosecution of child abuse cases) areauthorized under Subtitle A (Sections 213, 214, and 214A) of the Victims of Child Abuse Act. Funding for these programs is authorized under Section 214B of this subtitle.