White House, Congressional Leaders Agree to Budget Deal, Avert Shutdown

After several long weeks of negotiations, the White House and House Republicans announced in the late hours of April 8 that they have agreed on a budget deal that would fund the government through FY 2011. The deal would cap 2011 appropriations near or below $1.050 trillion while cutting domestic and foreign aid by approximately $38 billion from the rate of spending at the beginning of this Congress. Additional details of the deal have not yet been released and it is unclear how deep the cuts will affect the major portions of Federal funding for construction projects nationwide. The deal was announced in a joint statement by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker John Boehner, which said, "We have agreed to an historic amount of cuts for the remainder of this fiscal year, as well as a short-term bridge that will give us time to avoid a shutdown while we get that agreement through both houses and to the President. We will cut $78.5 billion below the President’s 2011 budget proposal, and we have reached an agreement on the policy riders. In the meantime, we will pass a short-term resolution to keep the government running through Thursday. That short-term bridge will cut the first $2 billion of the total savings." In order to get the deal passed through regular order, Congress late last night passed a short-term budget deal that keeps the Federal government funded through the rest of the coming week. Final passage of the FY 2011 budget would be voted on by the time that extension expires. Previously, AGC issued guidance to assist contractors engaged in work with the Federal government should the government shutdown. AGC now looks forward to examining the FY 2011 budget deal in detail and will continue to advocate for sound investment in our nation's infrastructure as consideration of the FY 2012 budget commences. For more information, contact Marco Giamberardino at (703) 837-5325 or giamberm@agc.org.