Senate Approves Continued Space Station Funding

After an emotional debate over the nation’s future in space, the Senate voted Wednesday to continue funding for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s controversial, $30-billion space station Freedom.

By a 63-34 margin, the Senate rejected a spirited effort by Sen. Dale Bumpers (D-Ark.) to withdraw financial support for the planned orbiting laboratory, which is to be launched piece by piece in a series of space shuttle trips beginning in November, 1995.

“The vote reflects a commitment by members in the Senate to invest in America’s future,” said NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin. “Funding for NASA is . . . extremely important because it provides opportunity and hope for the future.”

The news was especially welcome in Southern California. McDonnell Douglas Space Systems Co. of Huntington Beach holds space station contracts worth about $3.5 billion, while the Rocketdyne Division of Rockwell International in Canoga Park has space station work valued at $1.6 billion.

The Senate’s decision to spend $2.1 billion on the space station in the 1993 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1, represents a major victory for NASA and supporters of the nation’s manned space program. The House in July voted to provide $1.7 billion for the project next year. The Bush Administration had asked for $2.25 billion.

Both California senators--Republican John Seymour and Democrat Alan Cranston--voted to continue the space station funding.

The difference between the House and Senate versions of the NASA appropriations bill, which also would fund federal housing and veterans programs, will be worked out by a conference committee in the coming weeks. The Senate set aside $14.17 billion for all NASA programs, while the House voted to spend $14.03 billion.

Bumpers and others argued that the space station is a luxury the nation can ill afford in times of record budget deficits and pared-back social programs.

“Every dollar we appropriate for the space station is a dollar that could be better spent reducing the deficit,” Bumpers said. “I think it’s time to come back to Earth.”

Bumpers and other critics cited a 1991 General Accounting Office study that concluded that the space station will cost $40 billion through the year 2000, when it is to be ready for occupancy by a four-member crew, and $118 billion to operate during the 30-year period ending in 2027. That is simply too high a price to pay, they said.

NASA, however, has said the station will cost $30 billion through the end of the century. The difference is largely due to differences in accounting for the cost of the 17 shuttle missions required to assemble the station in orbit. When it was originally proposed in 1984, NASA said the station would cost $8.3 billion.

Critics said that the station has been so stripped down in recent years to contain costs that it can no longer adequately carry out its planned scientific mission--microgravity and life science research. NASA, for example, originally planned facilities for eight crew members, but cut the crew size in half to save money.

Instead of building its own $40-billion space station, Bumpers said, the United States should negotiate with the Russian Federation to lease or purchase the five-year-old MIR space laboratory.

“You could probably get it for a year’s supply of TV dinners,” Bumpers said.

Bumpers’ amendment would have cut all but $500 million from the space station budget, using that money to shut down the program. A total of $262 million would have been transferred to veterans programs and the rest of the money--$1.3 billion--would have been spent on deficit reduction.

Supporters of the space station, led by Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.), argued that Bumpers and other critics miss the point.

To truly get a handle on the budget crisis, said Sen. Jake Garn (R-Utah), one of the station’s staunchest supporters, Congress must attack the two-thirds of the federal budget that goes to pay for so-called entitlement programs, such as Social Security and Medicare. Taking aim at the space station will hardly solve the problem, he said.