u s senate committee on appropriations

WASHINGTON — Lawmakers return to Capitol Hill on Monday amid a backdrop of world crises and a looming showdown over immigration but are set to focus most of their time this month on keeping the federal government running through the end of the year.

The new superintendent of the Naval Academy said Thursday that the institution is a national leader in confronting sexual assault and sexual harassment among students, and should be helping other schools tackle what he described as a widespread problem.

The U.S. Coast Guard's shipyard in Curtis Bay has nailed down some new work in the next five years, signing a memorandum of understanding to provide ship maintenance for the Atlantic fleet of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The General Services Administration released a long anticipated list of sites on Tuesday it said could accommodate the FBI's requirements for a new home to replace the 39-year-old J. Edgar Hoover Building in Washington. Two of the properties are in Maryland — one in Greenbelt, the other in Landover — and a third is in Springfield, Va.

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski will introduce an emergency spending bill on Wednesday to deal with the flow of minors crossing the border that slashes $1 billion from President Barack Obama's original request but that does not include provisions to speed deportations for the children.

Here in Maryland we are at the epicenter of the debate to fully fund the fight against HIV/AIDS. That is because Maryland Sen. Barbara Mikulski chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee, which largely controls the federal government's AIDS budget.

The federal government will run out of money to deal with the influx of Central American children crossing the U.S. border illegally this summer if lawmakers fail to approve $3.7 billion in emergency funds, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson told a Senate panel Thursday.

President's failure to address security threat posed by illegal immigration is disastrous

President Barack Obama asked Congress Tuesday for $3.7 billion in emergency funding to address the influx of children from Central America entering the country illegally, a first step in what the White House described as a broader effort to speed deportations.

Maryland Sens. Ben Cardin and Barbara Mikulski toured Baltimore's 99-year-old Montebello water treatment plant Monday to draw attention to the needs of municipalities nationwide for federal help to upgrade their aging infrastructure.

While Morgan is encountering an obstacle or two on the path toward further developing its research mission to become Maryland's premier public urban comprehensive research university, the payoff to the state from our success is already plainly obvious. The millions we now bring into the state yearly accrue many benefits. This funding is supporting economic activity in the city of Baltimore and statewide, through the impact it has on new business creation, local employment and sales and services.

While Morgan is encountering an obstacle or two on the path toward further developing its research mission to become Maryland's premier public urban comprehensive research university, the payoff to the state from our success is already plainly obvious. The millions we now bring into the state yearly accrue many benefits. This funding is supporting economic activity in the city of Baltimore and statewide, through the impact it has on new business creation, local employment and sales and services.

WASHINGTON -- Environmental advocates say a spending bill set for review in the Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday could reopen a fight over whether the Environmental Protection Agency may regulate pollution entering small headwater streams that feed into larger bodies of water, including the Chesapeake Bay.

A budget amendment expected in the Senate Appropriations Committee would kill 30 years of protections for small headwaters streams that feed the Chesapeake Bay.

Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake — who has gained a national reputation for welcoming Hispanic families to the city — joined a growing chorus of Maryland officials Tuesday raising concerns about a proposal to turn a vacant office building into a shelter for immigrant children.

Restrictions on sleep-deprived truckers like the one who injured comedian Tracy Morgan should not be eased by Congress

Over the past quarter-century, veterans appropriations bills have been passed on schedule only three times. For the other 22 years, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has had to wait days, weeks and often months before knowing what its funding would be.

U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski introduced legislation Thursday to reduce a backlog in veterans' claims and build a $120 million cybersecurity training facility at the Naval Academy.

After multiple failed attempts, the potato industry is once again leading a charge to allow white potatoes in WIC food packages, despite more than eight years of research conducted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and Institute of Medicine determining that WIC participants already consume enough potatoes in their diets. In a statewide survey among Maryland WIC participants, 15 percent of 6- to 8-month olds and 24 percent of 9- to 12-month olds consumed white potatoes, often French fries,

Gov. Martin O'Malley and Lt. Gov. Anthony G. Brown joined the state's two U.S. senators and two of its congressional representatives Monday to tout the advantages of a Greenbelt location for the nation's new FBI headquarters.

Child care workers would undergo stiffer background checks and states would spend more to improve the quality of day care under a sweeping, bipartisan bill crafted by Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski that is set for a vote in the Senate as early as this week.

A $1 trillion spending bill passed by Congress late Thursday, averting another federal shutdown and funding the federal government through October, directs tens of millions of dollars to the port of Baltimore and will keep FAA towers open across the state.

Mikulski first bill appropriations chair

WASHINGTON — Needle exchange advocates are urging lawmakers to use an upcoming must-pass budget bill to lift the decades-old prohibition on spending federal funds for clean syringes that are distributed to drug users, supporters of the effort said Thursday.

Facing a backlash from veterans, lawmakers in both parties — including several in Maryland — are reconsidering a cut to military retiree pensions that they approved last month as part of a rare bipartisan budget agreement.

In November, a bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced legislation known as the Strong Start for America's Children Act that would pave the way for a state-federal partnership that would provide Maryland and other states significant resources to create, strengthen and expand quality preschool programs.

A bipartisan budget deal aimed at calming debates over U.S. fiscal policy for the next two years cleared a key vote Tuesday in the Senate, reducing the risks of another government shutdown and spending cuts that would have had an outsized impact in Maryland.

WASHINGTON — Lawmakers return to Capitol Hill Monday to begin a critical week of budget negotiations with wide-ranging economic implications for Maryland — on issues from Baltimore harbor dredging to pre-school classrooms to the Eastern Shore's poultry industry.

WASHINGTON -- The 16-day shutdown of the federal government last month resulted in $2 billion in lost productivity and, at its peak, left 40 percent of the federal workforce furloughed, according to a report released by the Obama administration Thursday.

Without including a word in the bipartisan budget deal that reopened federal agencies on Thursday, Maryland Sens. Barbara A. Mikulski and Ben Cardin paved the way for a 1 percent pay raise for federal workers — the first such increase in three years.

Congress Wednesday night approved a bipartisan deal to reopen the government and extend the nation's $16.7 trillion debt ceiling into early next year, a measure that will send tens of thousands of federal employees in Maryland back to work.

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski, chairwoman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, said Wednesday that the deal approved by Congress to reopen the federal government would also allow President Barack Obama to go foward with his plan to offer a 1 percent pay raise to federal employees.

Lawmakers in Congress were scrambling late Monday to settle on legislation to end the latest budget showdown even as federal agencies prepared to cut services and furlough hundreds of thousands of federal employees.

Republicans in the House of Representatives were set to approve a government funding bill Saturday that would delay the nation's health care law for one year — inching federal agencies closer to a shutdown analysts predict would have a significant economic impact in Maryland.

As the Oct. 11 release date of the new movie "Captain Phillips" approaches, Baltimore-based officials with the International Organization of Masters, Mates & Pilots hope to capitalize on the publicity to highlight the importance of the merchant marine — and full funding of their mission.

In a letter sent Monday to the secretary of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, Maryland's senior senator calls on the VA's Baltimore office to develop an action plan within 10 days to improve its "lackluster" approach to an initiative designed to speed up the time it takes to process disability claims.

The dean of Maryland's congressional delegation and a prominent voice in the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski, said on Monday that she supports giving President Barack Obama authorization to strike Syria.

WASHINGTON -- The dean of Maryland's congressional delegation emerged from a classified briefing Thursday persuaded that Syrian leader Bashar Assad was responsible for last month's chemical weapons attack but undecided on whether a U.S. military strike is the best response.

The port of Baltimore won a $10 million federal grant to build more access to rail, expand storage at Fairfield Marine Terminal, and help widen the channel at Seagirt Marine Terminal to accommodate bigger ships.

Adversarial system depends on adequate resources for both sides

How can The Sun leave Barbara Mikulski off its 50 Women to Watch list?

Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski used a speech on the Senate floor Wednesday to join in calling for a federal review of safety procedures on the Chesapeake Bay Bridge.

Mary Theresa Nipwoda, a lab technician at Aberdeen Proving Ground, did what she could to prepare for the 20-percent pay cut she knew was coming this week.

The head of the nation's medical research agency and leaders of Johns Hopkins hospital and medical school warned Monday that progress in fighting diseases could be slowed, jobs lost and scientists driven overseas unless across-the-board federal funding cuts are reversed.

The Senate Appropriations Committee will consider a 10-point plan this week to address the claims backlog at the Department of Veterans Affairs, Chairwoman Barbara A. Mikulski said Tuesday.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers pressed the Obama administration on Wednesday to reduce the backlog of disability claims at the Department of Veterans Affairs by improving cooperation between the agencies that have a role in the process.

Five air traffic control towers in Maryland that had been slated to shut down in June as a result of federal budget cuts are now expected to remain open, federal officials said Wednesday — easing fears that the closures could have backed up traffic at BWI Marshall Airport.

Rise of special interest money revealed by Mikulski's fundraising success

WASHINGTON — In addition to having a hand on the nation's checkbook, Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski is reaping a political reward from her new assignment as chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee: A significant increase in campaign cash.

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs announced Friday a plan to fast-track disability claims at least a year old, a move that advocates expect will bring relief to Maryland servicemen and women who face one of the largest backlogs in the country.