The Trump administration has proposed eliminating the Social Innovation Fund (SIF) and cutting the evidence-based Teen Pregnancy Prevention (TPP) program in a package sent to Congress covering the budget for the remainder of the current fiscal year, according to a report in Politico.
Congress must pass legislation funding federal agencies by April 28. Overall, the White House is proposing $18 billion in cuts across a variety of federal programs. The federal government is currently operating under a continuing resolution that was passed late last year.
The proposal also recommends cuts for several education programs, but the Education Innovation and Research (EIR) program, the successor to i3, is not among them. Some have speculated that the EIR program is being preserved to help fund the administration’s student voucher initiative.
To become law, the proposals must be approved by Congress. However, according to Politico, those prospects appear to be poor:
[T]he latest request for cuts — which would be absorbed over the five months left in the fiscal year — could prove to be too little, too late from the White House. Lawmakers have indicated they are prepared to reject Trump’s calls to gut programs they deem important.
Nevertheless, according to The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, “It is a strong signal to Congress of what programs the Administration is willing to cut and as such has implications not only for the current debate on the remainder of FY 2017 funding, but for FY 2018 appropriations.”
Language from the detailed proposal is below. The administration is proposing eliminating SIF and cutting spending on TPP by about half.
- Social Innovation Fund: “The Social Innovation Fund is not authorized and it is not a member-based program, which puts it at odds with the larger mission of CNCS. It would be better to build the evidence base for programs through the agencies with expertise in the types of interventions being funded rather than through an agency focused on national service.”
- Teen Pregnancy Prevention (TPP) Program: “The TPP program is a competitive grant program that supports evidence-based innovative approaches to teen pregnancy prevention. This level would reduce funding to current TPP grantees by about half. State and local entities can use the evidence base built by the TPP program in their efforts to continue to reduce teenage pregnancy rates.”
Related
- OMB Memo Signals Possible Elimination of Social Innovation Fund (February 18, 2017)
- Trump OMB Nominee May Support Reworked Evidence-based Budget Tool (January 27, 2017)