C&RL News April 2019 240

Kevin Maher is deputy director of public policy and 
advocacy at ALA’s Washington Office, email: kmaher@
alawash.org

W a s h i n g t o n  H o t l i n eKevin Maher

ALA’s FY 2020 appropriations 
campaign kicks off
ALA’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2020 congressional 
appropriations campaign began in March, 
and ALA urges all its members to partici-
pate by using ALA’s action center (ala.org 
/takeaction) to contact their elected leaders 
ask them to invest in libraries. 

Off to a late start
This year’s appropriations campaign kicks 
off later than in recent years, another victim 
of the longest federal government shutdown 
in U.S. history. The traditional appropria-
tions cycle starts in January, right after the 
release of the White House budget propos-
al to Congress. This budget is a statement 
of the president’s spending priorities and 
prompts Congress to respond as part of their 
Constitutional duty to appropriate funds for 
the federal government.

The FY 2020 budget process, however, 
is unique. The 35-day partial government 
shutdown stalled much of the work needed 
to craft a budget document. One of the agen-
cies impacted by the shutdown, the Office 
of Management and Budget (OMB), plays a 
central role in developing the administration’s 
budget. Shutdown rules prohibited OMB from 
working on any “nonessential” activities, 
which included working on FY 2020 budget 
documents. 

Congressional appropriators will begin 
work on the FY 2020 spending bills as soon as 
the president submits his initial budget outline 
to Congress, which was slated for the week of 
March 11. ALA expects that libraries will, for 
the third year in a row, again find themselves 
targeted for elimination by an administration 
that fails to grasp the central role libraries play 
in communities across the country.  

As disappointing as it will be if (or more 
likely, when) the White House recommends 
elimination of funding for Library Services 
and Technology Act (LSTA) and Innovative 
Approaches to Literacy (IAL) program, the 
bipartisan support in Congress for these pro-
grams over the past two years gives reason 
to hope. 

Take action to #FundLibraries
The “Dear Appropriator” campaign, where 
advocates call on their elected federal lead-
ers to sign letters in support of LSTA and IAL, 
remains an important effort to defend federal 
funding for libraries. The success of library 
advocates in adding signatures to these let-
ters sends a strong signal to Congress that 
libraries are important in communities. 

Two letters in support of LSTA and IAL 
began circulating in the House in March. The 
House LSTA letter, led by Representatives Raul 
Grijalva (D-AZ) and Don Young (R-AK), calls 
on Congress to provide at least $206.3 million 
for LSTA. A second House Dear Appropriator 
letter in the House, led by Representatives 
Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX), Don Young 
(R-AK), and Jim McGovern (D-MA), calls 
on Congress to provide at least $27 million 
for IAL. Companion letters in the Senate are 
scheduled for release later in the month. 

Over the next few months, the House 
and Senate will work on their respective 
12 spending bills, with the goal of bringing 
those bills to the House and Senate floors 
by mid-summer. Once appropriations are 
approved by each chamber, the real work 
of negotiations on a final budget begins 
for Congress—and more targeted advocacy 
begins for ALA. 

To see your representative and senators’ 
history of signing “Dear Appropriator” letters, 
visit ala.org/fundlibraries, where you’ll also 
find information such as legislators’ social 
media handles and creative ways to advocate 
for libraries. 

mailto:kmaher%40alawash.org?subject=
mailto:kmaher%40alawash.org?subject=
ala.org/fundlibraries