Senate and House Approve Funding for more C-17A Production

Roughly $2.5 billion in funding for the production of 10 C-17s has been approved during negotiations between members of the Senate and House as a hotly debated defense budget inches closer to President Obama's desk.

The funding, approved on a 281-146 vote in the House this week, is a significant increase from the roughly $650 million approved by the chamber earlier this year. At the time, the House had approved money for production of just three C-17s, which are built at a plant in Long Beach employing some 5,000 workers.

Negotiations will continue in the coming week on the "appropriations" portion of the nation's defense budget, which specifies exactly how money - including the $2.5 billion earmarked for C-17 production - will be spent.

Congresswoman Laura Richardson, D-Long Beach, said support for the 10 C-17s appears strong in the House, though a final vote on defense budget appropriations will reveal just how strong.
The overall defense budget, which went through weeks of debate on the Senate floor in September and early October and ultimately passed on a 93-7 vote, breezed through the lower house much more quickly, ending with an agreement that C-17 funding as championed by Senate leaders would be included.

The House defense budget also included money for port infrastructure and security, which Richardson said should help fund long-overdue projects like bridge replacement, channel dredging, roadway improvements and security upgrades in the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles. "Ports are a vital component of our economy, and in times of war, the role of ports is to connect our forts," Richardson said. "That's why I was committed to ensuring that the final defense bill contained adequate provisions to ensure that the infrastructure surrounding ports, like the Port of Long Beach and the Port of Los Angeles, is second to none."

In coming weeks and months, Richardson is expected to play a larger role in distribution of federal defense, infrastructure and security funds. On Oct. 6, Richardson was appointed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, to serve on the Department of Defense Authorization Act committee, which includes a select group of House and Senate members tasked with reconciling differences in the defense spending bills approved in each chamber.

The final defense budget - and its accompanying appropriation directives - are expected to reach Obama's desk in coming weeks. Though he has publicly criticized Congress for including funds to continue C-17 production, which Defense Secretary Robert Gates insists should end in 2011, Obama has not threatened a veto.

The C-17 has seen widespread use in recent years, carrying troops and military cargo to Iraq and Afghanistan, and has been used extensively to help deliver relief supplies in the wake of natural disasters, including the recent earthquake and tsunami that devastated Samoa and neighboring Tonga.

(Kristopher Hanson - Long Beach Press Telegram)