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Volume 7, Number 22
May 15, 2013

Editor: Mark V. Sykes
Co-Editors: Melissa Lane, Susan Benecchi
Email: pen_editor at psi.edu

o---------------------SPECIAL REPORT AND ANALYSIS---------------------o

NASA OPERATING PLAN FOR FY2013 TO TARGET PLANETARY OVERALL, CUTS 
RESEARCH AND COMPETED MISSIONS 

CALL TO ACTION: CONGRESSIONAL HELP IS NEEDED, AND CALL NASA TO TASK

Mark V. Sykes
Planetary Science Institute

In his FY13 budget request, President Obama proposed the NASA Planetary 
budget be cut by more than 20% from its FY12 level (From $1.5B to less
than $1.2B). Under the initial Continuing Resolutions covering the 
first half of the fiscal year, the Administration chose to operate NASA 
Planetary at this reduced level. Congress restored more than $222M of 
the President's cut in its FY13 appropriation passed on March 21 and 
signed into law by the President. Congress's action is now being 
reversed by NASA and others in the Administration through the 
preferential application of rescission and sequestration cuts of more 
than 15% to the NASA Planetary Science budget.

When Congress allocated additional funds, it also specified how they 
were to be spent in support of Planetary Science Research, Discovery, 
New Frontiers, Mars Exploration (including MAVEN, MSL, and other Mars 
activities including a future mission), and Outer Planets (including 
studies in support of a future Europa mission). Under section 505 of 
the law, no project can be eliminated or changed by more than 10%, 
unless House and Senate Committees on Appropriations are notified 15 
days in advance. That means that if NASA decides the political 
consequences are minimal, it can pretty much do what it wants as long 
as notice is given - and that is what is happening.  

After removing essentially all of funds added by Congress to Planetary
Science, NASA and and others in the Administration have further chosen 
to reallocate significant funds from present planetary research and 
Discovery budgets to pay for new studies in support of a future Europa 
mission. The next Discovery call will certainly be delayed. The impact 
to research programs will be severe - further reduced selection rates 
can be anticipated. Might existing awards be retroactively reduced? 
Damage is made worse by the fact that these cuts are being implemented 
in the final months of the fiscal year. 

Congress does not compel this action. This is a policy choice of NASA 
and others in the Obama Administration.

The Operating Plan has yet to be submitted to Congressional Committees
on Appropriations. It was due on May 10th. I have obtained detailed 
information on its content from several source documents that 
collectively reveal a fairly stable state of development with very 
small tweaks in recent weeks. 

A summary of the Operating Plan and its effects are given in the table
below. Each row corresponds to a budget line given in the FY13 budget
bill passed by Congress on March 21. Lunar Quest and Technology were 
not specifically called out (hence the brackets). 

FY13P = President's proposed budget for fiscal 2013 (the breakdown of
        Outer Planets in the President's FY13 budget proposal is 
        inferred from information in the proposed Operating Plan).
        This is the budget under which NASA Planetary Science has 
        been operating since October 1, 2012.
OP    = Operating Plan for fiscal 2013, with rescission and 
        sequestration applied, to be submitted to Congress 
Delta = OP - FY13P
Cong  = Appropriated budget signed into law (without rescission and 
        sequestration)
%Cong = Percentage change in appropriated budget proposed by NASA 
        Operating Plan including rescission and sequestration

Note: All numbers are in $millions. At this point, I expect only small
adjustments prior to the submission of the Operating Plan to Congress. 
My apology for any scrivener's errors.

Note: DELTA IS PARTICULARLY IMPORTANT, because it indicates the amount
of funding being removed or added to the current budget by the
operating plan. A negative indicates funding that must be removed from 
a program over the next four months (the end of the current fiscal 
year).

Note: I understand that the apparent MAVEN reduction is not a cut. It 
reflects the timing of expenses. These funds continue to be book-kept 
within Mars exploration with little change to the overall current 
budget level - though Congress directed a major increase, which has 
been removed.

                            FY13P   OP   Delta   Cong   %Cong

PLANETARY SCIENCE          1192.3 1196.0  +3.7  1415.0  -15.5

Planetary Science Research  188.5  174.5 -14.0   192.0   -9.1
Discovery                   189.6  162.9 -26.7   244.0  -33.2
New Frontiers               175.0  162.7 -12.3   175.0   -7.0
Mars Exploration            360.8  357.6  -3.2   450.8  -20.7
- MAVEN                     146.4  127.4 -19.0   146.4  -13.0
- MSL                        65.0   63.8  -1.2    65.0   -1.8
- Other Mars Activities     149.4  166.4 +17.0   239.4  -30.5
Outer Planets                84.0  147.8 +63.8   159.0   -7.0
- Europa (OP Flagship)     [  3.0]  69.7 +66.7    75.0   -7.1
- [Other OP Activities]    [ 81.0]  78.1  -2.9
[Lunar Quest]                61.5   67.0  +5.5
[Technology]                132.9  123.4  -9.5


CONGRESS SHOULD GIVE NASA SPECIFIC DIRECTION FOR A REVISED OPERATING 
PLAN

(1) Rescission and sequestration should not be preferentially applied 
to NASA Planetary Science and should not exceed 8%.

(2) Cuts should not result in any Planetary budget line being reduced
below the President's FY13 budget request, under which the Planetary
Science Division has been operating since the beginning of the fiscal
year.

(3) Priority should be given to stabilizing research and data analysis
programs and improving their selection rates, as well as advancing the 
date of the next Discovery call.

CONTINUING EVERY LINE AT OR ABOVE THEIR CURRENT FUNDING LEVEL WOULD BE 
CONSISTENT WITH THE LAW.

This would avoid further damage to existing programs (beyond that 
already suffered in the first half of the fiscal year) while allowing 
augmented activities to realize benefit from funds remaining above the 
President's budget request after rescission and sequestration is 
applied to the higher budget that was passed by Congress and signed 
into law.

The planetary community did a great job convincing Congress of the need 
to take the action it did. There was large support from both Senate and 
House, Republicans and Democrats. We need once more to engage our 
elected representatives to preserve what has been a crown jewel of 
American initiative and achievement - the US solar system exploration 
program.

Contact the Chairs and Ranking Members of the House and Senate 
Appropriations Subcommittees on Commerce, Justice, Science and 
Related Agencies and tell them that a 15% reduction of the FY13 NASA 
Planetary budget and the damaging reallocation of resources across 
that budget after reductions is not acceptable. Contact your 
Representative and Senators and ask them to add their voice to yours 
in these requests. 

The Subcommittee chairs are:

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (Chair)
202-224-5202 (Subcommittee #)
202-224-8858 (Mikulski FAX)
senator@mikulski.senate.gov

Sen. Richard Shelby (Ranking Member)
202-224-5202 (Subcommittee #)
202-224-3416 (Shelby FAX)
senator@shelby.senate.gov

Rep. Frank Wolf (Chair)
202-225-3351 (Subcommittee #)
202-225-1808 (Subcommittee FAX)
frank@wolfforcongress.com

Rep. Chaka Fattah (Ranking Member)
202-225-3351 (Subcommittee #)
202-225-1808 (Subcommittee FAX)
chaka.fattah@mail.house.gov

Other members of the Senate subcommittee may be found at:

http://www.appropriations.senate.gov/sc-commerce.cfm

Other members of the House subcommittee may be found at:

http://appropriations.house.gov/about/members
/commercejusticescience.htm

It has been suggested to me by Congressional staff that comments
should also be directed to NASA. 

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden 
charles.bolden@nasa.gov
202-358-1010

Associate Administrator for Space Science John Grunsfeld
john.m.grunsfeld@nasa.gov
202-258-3889

This operating plan has yet to be submitted to Congress. In 
anticipation that whatever is sent will see the bright light of day,
I hope that NASA and the rest of the Administration will reconsider
their current plans and make rational modifications consistent with 
the above. 


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