House Group Proposes Shifting Earth Science Funds to Manned Spaceflight

February 15, 2011 at 11:56 am | Posted in Space Law Current Events | Leave a comment

by Sara M. Langston with the blog faculty

Source: Space News

WASHINGTON — A group of Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives is proposing to shift funds from NASA’s climate change research coffers to the agency’s manned spaceflight program, an effort they say could preserve what they described as the agency’s core mission even as the new GOP-controlled House seeks to make good on vows to roll back federal discretionary spending this year.

“With your help, we can reorient NASA’s mission back toward human spaceflight by reducing funding for climate change research and reallocating those funds to NASA’s human spaceflight accounts, all while moving overall discretionary spending toward [fiscal 2008] levels,” states a Feb. 7 letter to Rep. Hal Rogers (R-Ky.), chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, and Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.), chairman of the panel’s commerce, justice, science subcommittee that oversees NASA spending.

The letter was signed by Reps. Pete Olson (R-Texas), Bill Posey (R-Fla.), Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), Sandy Adams (R-Fla.), Rob Bishop (R-Utah) and Mo Brooks (R-Ala.). All hail from states with a major stake in U.S. human spaceflight. [Full story]