In 2011 Congress passed the Budget Control Act (BCA) which imposes caps on discretionary programs, reducing their funding by more than $1 trillion over the ten years from 2012 to 2021.   As many may recall, the act also established the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction (the “Supercommittee”).  The BCA tasked the committee with developing a plan on how to reach the $1 trillion reduction goals and also established a back-up “sequestration” procedure to increase the incentive on the committee to reach a compromise. The Supercommittee failed to achieve its goal, and as a result, sequestration – a form of automatic cuts that apply largely across the board – is now scheduled to occur beginning in January 2013.

In early August President Obama signed into law HR 5872, the Sequestration Transparency Act. The act requires the administration to report, within 30 days of the act, the impact of the looming across-the-board cuts set to take effect January 2013. President Obama believes that both parties can compromise and avert across-the-board cuts; however, both parties have reached no such deal.

Last week the Office of Financial Management (OFM) in Olympia circulated a memo to all state agencies asking that we be prepared to develop proposals for service reduction should the act take effect in January. Evergreen is currently analyzing how sequestration would affect our institution, and will be prepared to respond to OFM if the need arises.

The Government Relations office will continue to monitor Congress’ efforts and report as information becomes available.