Budget deal maintains OSHA funding

Washington – The 11th-hour budget deal (.pdf file) that averted a government shutdown last week maintains OSHA’s current level of funding for the rest of the fiscal year.

Since the beginning of FY 2011, OSHA has been operating under its FY 2010 budget through a series of short-term funding resolutions.

The budget agreement reached April 8 to fund the government through the rest of FY 2011 – which ends Sept. 30 – would provide OSHA with $558.6 million, the same amount it had in FY 2010. At press time, a vote on the budget was forthcoming.

The funding falls $14.5 million short of the $573.1 million President Barack Obama previously requested for FY 2011, but is greater than what the House originally proposed. Under that proposal, the agency would have taken a $99 million cut, which OSHA officials warned would have led to severe cutbacks in funding for enforcement, state programs and the agency’s website.