Focusing on Children in the President’s Budget

Last week, Senator Robert Menendez (D – N.J.) introduced a bill that would ensure that the president’s annual budget includes specific information on federal funding for children. The “Children’s Budget Act” (S. 3277) would require that the various sources of federal funding that go to children be analyzed, aggregated, and displayed as part of the President’s Budget Request which is released every February.

We believe that this is a good idea. Including information specifically on funding for children’s programs would help increase transparency as well as focus attention on funding for children, an area that is too often overlooked.

Federal funding for children is spread through many different departments and agencies, so it’s currently difficult to tell just how much we spend on kids. Education funding alone includes more than 80 different programs. An alyasis that would identify and aggregate the different funding sources would be useful.

Understanding and tracking how much is being spent over time can be particularly challenging. Including easily accessible information on funding for children’s programs on a regular basis will help provide a clearer picture of current priorities as well as trends in federal spending.

There’s a precedent for the kind of reporting Menendez’s bill envisions. For example, there is a requirement the President’s Budget include a special analysis that pulls together all the disparate sources of spending for homeland security. If we are going to get a better understanding and focus attention on how much our country spends on security, it seems like a good idea to also get information for how much we are spending on our children.

A number of states, such as Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Ohio, have already implemented children’s budgets. Oklahoma’s report provides an idea of the type of information these reports can provide. Cities such as Philadelphia and Washington DC also use children’s budget’s to get a clearer picture of funds serving youth. For those at the state or local level interested in learning more, The Forum for Youth Investment has created a toolkit for how to go about creating a map of resources for children, families, and youth.

Co-sponsors of the bill include Senators Bingaman (D – N.M.), Casey (D – P.A.), Clinton (D – N.Y.), Johnson (D – S.D.), Lautenberg (D – N.J.), and Sanders (I – VT). The bill was introduced to the Senate Budget Committee last week but with Congress heading off for summer recess shortly it’s unlikely the bill is going to get anywhere this year. Finding some bi-partisan support will be key to moving it forward next year.

Having this type of budget information would certainly make our job a bit easier when the president releases his budget in February. But that’s not the main reason we like this idea. We hope that providing policymakers with increased data and information about federal funding for children’s programs will help them make more informed decisions. We also hope that providing this information will allow the public and the media to gain a better understanding of how children fit into our budget priorities.