President
Bush Releases FY 2009 Budget with Significant Decreases, Level Funding Proposed for Most Drug and Alcohol Prevention, Treatment and Research
Programs
On February 4th, President Bush released his FY 2009
budget, targeting a number of federal programs for either elimination or substantial cuts. The 2009 fiscal year will run from
October 1, 2008 until September 30, 2009. According to the FY 2009 budget, most federal drug and alcohol treatment, prevention,
research and education programs received requests for nearly level funding or significant cuts.
Under the President’s FY 2009 request,
programs in the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) would receive funding cuts of $198 million, with nearly $99
million in cuts proposed to discretionary funding in the Centers for Substance Abuse Prevention and Treatment, and $126 million in proposed cuts to
the Center for Mental Health Services. Health and human service funding would be cut significantly under the
President’s budget, with approximately $1 billion proposed to be cut from both the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), and
the Administration on Children and Families (ACF). Programs receiving discretionary funding in the Department of Health and Human
Services would receive $2.2 billion in cuts under the FY 2009 budget. In addition, the President’s budget includes
proposals for nearly $200 billion in cuts to Medicare and approximately $17 billion in cuts to Medicaid.
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Under the President’s FY 2009 budget, drug and
alcohol prevention, treatment and research programming would receive the following amounts:
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The Substance Abuse Prevention and Treatment (SAPT) Block Grant would receive $1.779 billion, a $20 million increase over FY 2008
levels. However, budget documents from the Department of Health and Human Services indicate that this $20 million increase would
be used to support “supplemental performance awards” for the top 20 percent of SAPT Block Grant recipients that “demonstrate
superior performance in preventing and treatment substance abuse.”
The FY 2009
funding recommendation for CSAT would include:
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$56 million for substance use screening and brief interventions
in medical and other community settings; the Screening, Brief Intervention, Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) program received $29 million in FY
2008
The FY 2009
funding recommendation for CSAP would include:
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The Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities (SDFSC) State
Grants program, which supports community-based prevention programming through the Department of Education, would receive $100 million, a decrease of
$194.8 million. The President’s FY 2008 budget also included a recommendation that the SDFSC State Grants program receive
$100 million; in addition, the program was slated for elimination in the President's FY 2006 and 2007 budgets.
Additional detail about the FY 2009 budget will be shared by the
agencies in the next few weeks. The Congressional Budget Committees begin hearings on the President’s FY 2009 Budget this
week and Congress will begin developing its own budget in the coming months.
The President’s entire FY 2009 budget can be found at:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2009/.
A chart on the President's FY 2009 Budget Request For Drug and Alcohol
Prevention, Treatment, and Research Programming can be found at: February 2008 Budget Release Chart/LAC.
For further information, please
contact: Gabrielle de la Gueronniere, Deputy Director for National Policy, at gdelagueronniere@lac-dc.org or Nisha Thakker, Policy
Associate, at nthakker@lac.org.
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