Conference Report on S. 1281, National Aeronautics and Space Administration Authorization Act of 2005
CONFERENCE REPORT ON S. 1281, NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION AUTHORIZATION ACT OF 2005 -- (House of Representatives - December 17, 2005)
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Mr. CALVERT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for the time.
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Chairman Boehlert for his leadership and guidance, for the great job in making sure that we are here today, and I certainly want to thank Ranking Member Gordon and Ranking Member Udall for their leadership and support, also. I want to commend the Members of the Science Committee on both sides of the aisle for a job well done. I also want to thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) for his guidance and assistance and all his staff working together diligently for long hours to assure that this NASA authorization bill could be accomplished this year. This is the first time since the year 2000 that NASA has had an authorization bill and we have been able to complete it. This bill provides the agency with the rules and tools they will need to succeed.
This is a crucial time for the agency as it is going through a major transition. Our bill represents the first time that the President's Vision for Space Exploration has been fully endorsed by both Houses of Congress. When the President sends to Congress his budget for fiscal year 2007, today's backing by the Congress can only help us to increase the support for our Nation's civil space program and for the Vision for Space Exploration. We also seek equivalent strategic plans for aeronautics and science parts of the budget.
NASA represents only seven-tenths of 1 percent of the Federal budget and is an investment in our Nation's future. Even in this time of budget deficits, the United States cannot abandon NASA's research and technology and its exploration programs. It is not in the American spirit to shy away from this investment in our global leadership.
This bill also authorizes for the first time a competitive prize program at NASA based on the very successful X-Prize. This program will allow NASA to award prizes for those technologies that are useful for NASA's mission. This prize program will encourage our best and brightest scientists, engineers and entrepreneurs to pursue technologies that NASA will need to pursue our Nation's dreams of exploration.
I am pleased that we are doing a 2-year bill through 2008, and we in the Science Committee look forward to providing oversight and authorization appropriate when needed. I want to urge my colleagues to vote yes on this truly bipartisan conference report. We owe it to the administration, to our national space enterprise and to the American people to pass this NASA authorization bill this year.
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