sweetpea
02-10-2004, 02:32 PM
received info from an email from November Coalition...
Budget increases for 2005 Drug War
Bush's 2005 budget includes a 5% increase for the DEA ($66 million). Most of the increase goes to add more agents to bring the agency back up to pre 9/11 staff levels. The WOD lost 500 FBI agents after 9/11 so the budget increases the DEA agent staffing to make up for the loss. They are adding $35 million on 2005 to add 100 agents and support staff. They also added $4 million to free up 77 agents from desk work. It was not clear to me how they could claim that this added staffing exceeds the pre 9/11
staffing considering they are not getting any of the FBI agents back.
DEA Budget (in millions)
2001 2003 2004 (est.) 2005 (est.)
$1,383 $1,566 $1,586 $1,662
There was also a large increase for Organized Crime & Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) for 2004 and a smaller increase for 2005:
OCDETF budget (in millions)
2001 2003 2004 (est.) 2005 (est.)
$325 $368 $550 $581
These two budgets combined make up $2.24 BILLION in Justice Dept. WOD spending for 2005.
Justice Dept. support for state and local assistance has dropped by 53% since Bush came into office, a decrease of 2.35 billion. I am not sure how much of this goes to drug enforcement.
State and Local Assistance budget (in millions)
2001 2003 2004 (est.) 2005 (est.)
$4,420 $3,490 $3,022 $2,063
Justice Dept. budget increases also include $70 million for drug courts, $76 million for Residential Substance Abuse Treatment (RSAT) programs for prisoner's and $10 million for an additional 71 Assistant U.S. Attorneys and related support staff.
The White House also claims that DEA made improvements
in reducing the availability of drugs. You may remember that DEA received a "results not demonstrated" grade in the 2002 Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART) assessment which focuses on results. The grade for 2003 is "adequate" primarily due to "revisions to DEA's strategic plan to include appropriate long-term and annual performance measures." There is no mention of specific
statistics or evidence of improvement of results. Instead they only talk about how DEA has added performance measures.
The PART assessment recommends:
"Provide an additional $35 million for DEA's Priority Targeting initiative and related activities. Conduct an independent evaluation of DEA's drug enforcement responsibilities. Refine estimates of drug availability and validate the process to establish annual and long-term performance goals."
The performance measures would be a very interesting area to file a FOIA on. It would be interesting to see how DEA measures its "results" given their history of growing massively without producing better results. I am sure they will prop it up somehow to seem like they are making progress.
A summary of the DOJ 2005 budget can be found on the
White House web page at:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2005/justice.html
Budget increases for 2005 Drug War
Bush's 2005 budget includes a 5% increase for the DEA ($66 million). Most of the increase goes to add more agents to bring the agency back up to pre 9/11 staff levels. The WOD lost 500 FBI agents after 9/11 so the budget increases the DEA agent staffing to make up for the loss. They are adding $35 million on 2005 to add 100 agents and support staff. They also added $4 million to free up 77 agents from desk work. It was not clear to me how they could claim that this added staffing exceeds the pre 9/11
staffing considering they are not getting any of the FBI agents back.
DEA Budget (in millions)
2001 2003 2004 (est.) 2005 (est.)
$1,383 $1,566 $1,586 $1,662
There was also a large increase for Organized Crime & Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) for 2004 and a smaller increase for 2005:
OCDETF budget (in millions)
2001 2003 2004 (est.) 2005 (est.)
$325 $368 $550 $581
These two budgets combined make up $2.24 BILLION in Justice Dept. WOD spending for 2005.
Justice Dept. support for state and local assistance has dropped by 53% since Bush came into office, a decrease of 2.35 billion. I am not sure how much of this goes to drug enforcement.
State and Local Assistance budget (in millions)
2001 2003 2004 (est.) 2005 (est.)
$4,420 $3,490 $3,022 $2,063
Justice Dept. budget increases also include $70 million for drug courts, $76 million for Residential Substance Abuse Treatment (RSAT) programs for prisoner's and $10 million for an additional 71 Assistant U.S. Attorneys and related support staff.
The White House also claims that DEA made improvements
in reducing the availability of drugs. You may remember that DEA received a "results not demonstrated" grade in the 2002 Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART) assessment which focuses on results. The grade for 2003 is "adequate" primarily due to "revisions to DEA's strategic plan to include appropriate long-term and annual performance measures." There is no mention of specific
statistics or evidence of improvement of results. Instead they only talk about how DEA has added performance measures.
The PART assessment recommends:
"Provide an additional $35 million for DEA's Priority Targeting initiative and related activities. Conduct an independent evaluation of DEA's drug enforcement responsibilities. Refine estimates of drug availability and validate the process to establish annual and long-term performance goals."
The performance measures would be a very interesting area to file a FOIA on. It would be interesting to see how DEA measures its "results" given their history of growing massively without producing better results. I am sure they will prop it up somehow to seem like they are making progress.
A summary of the DOJ 2005 budget can be found on the
White House web page at:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2005/justice.html