Biophysical Society Newsletter - June 2015

10

BIOPHYSICAL SOCIETY NEWSLETTER

2015

JUNE

Public Affairs

which the Society is a member, released statements opposing the bill. The Society also sent a letter to the Chairman Smith and Ranking Member Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX) opposing the bill. The bill was approved by the full House on May 20. There is currently no timeline for this bill or similar legislation to be introduced in the Senate. Society Expresses Concern about Restrictions on Federal Employee Travel On Tuesday, April 21, the BPS joined 125 other organizations in sending a letter to Congress expressing concerns about the impact of Admin- istration regulations and legislative initiatives related to government travel on the science and engineering enterprise and the pace of innovation. The signatories on the letter collectively represent hundreds of thousands of scientists, engineers, and mathematicians—many of whom work for the federal government—across a broad spectrum of disciplines. The letter follows up a report by the General Accountability Office (GAO) that found the restrictions on travel have negatively impacted the federal scientific workforce and a Washington “ ...government employees now must wait 3-9 months to get approval to attend a meeting rather than a few weeks . ” Post article on that report. Current policies are reducing government scientists’ and engineers’ participation in scientific and technical confer- ences while the administrative cost of oversee- ing these activities has increased significantly. In addition, government employees now must wait 3-9 months to get approval to attend a meeting, rather than a few weeks. The letter explains that these delays prevent many government scientists and engineers from accepting key speaking roles and lead to increased travel costs associated with last-minute bookings. Further, the reductions in

House Science Committee Approves America Competes Reauthorization Bill On April 15, Science, Space, and Technology Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX) intro- duced the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2015, which would reauthorize the Na- tional Science Foundation (NSF), the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science, and National “ Specifically, the bill funds NSF by directorate rather than as a whole, allowing Congress to direct funding to areas of science that it finds most worthy. ” Institutes of Standards and Technology (NIST) for FY 2016 and 2017. The full Science, Space, and Technology Committee approved the bill on a party line vote on Wednesday, April 22. While the bill authorizes small increases for some research, it includes several provisions that the Biophysical Society finds troubling. Specifically, the bill funds NSF by directorate rather than as a whole, allowing Congress to direct funding to areas of science that it finds most worthy. In the case if this reauthorization bill, it significantly cuts funding for social and behavioral science and geophysical science research at the NSF. The bill also requires NSF to explain how each individual grant funded by the agency is in the national interest. At the Department of Energy, funding is to the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) would be cut significantly. The Coalition for National Science Funding and the Energy Sciences Committee, both coalitions of