Domenici Set for Conference Committee on Competitiveness Legislation
July 20, 2007
01:41 PM
WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Pete Domenici, ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, today said that he is looking forward to participating in a Senate-House conference committee to finalize legislation that will make America more competitive.
Late last night, Domenici was named a conferee to the panel, which is expected to meet next week. The conference committee is meeting to resolve differences between the America Competes Act (S.761), which passed the Senate in April, and the 21st Century Competitiveness Act of 2007 (HR.2272), which passed the House in May.
“At long last, I’m excited to be headed to conference committee so that we can finalize legislation that will make America more competitive in the global economy. The more I talk to our scientists and see the advances being made in other nations, the more convinced I am that our country must take action to harness our brainpower,” Domenici said.
“My goal in conference will be to make sure that the final version of this legislation utilizes our national laboratories and other resources to better educate our young people and make America a leader when it comes to developing science and technology,” he continued.
The Senate-passed America Competes Act makes a concerted effort to involve DOE’s national laboratories by establishing training and education programs at summer institutes hosted by the labs, and by creating partnerships between labs and high schools to build centers of excellence in math and science education. The bill also creates science magnet schools in which each national laboratory adopts a school to strengthen its math and science capability.
The bill would double the authorized funding for the National Science Foundation in five years and sets the Department of Energy’s Office of Science on a path to double over 10 years. It creates an Innovation Acceleration Research Program to encourage federal agencies to set aside more funds for research and development funding for high-risk, high pay-off research.
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