Advanced Federal Budget Process Current Budget Politics and the Federal Budget Process 2-day program (Our public course)
Get an advanced understanding of the budget process.
Is your staff fluent in "budget-ese"? Our faculty will bring their years of federal budget and teaching experience--and their budget savvy--to your organization and teach your staff how the federal budget process really works!
Learn the little-known tips and precise terminology that can help you follow--and protect--your budgetary interests. This program is for your staff who must:
Receive an overview of current budget politics and how federal budgeting works today.
Gain the knowledge to help increase your chances of boosting funds or staving off cuts.
Understand the budget resolution process as well as differences between, and the importance of, authorizations and appropriations.
Be able to recognize various budget documents and how to use them most effectively.
Learn principles and issues of transparency and accountability in the budget process.
Lunch and breaks will be scheduled as appropriate each day
Day One
Welcome and Introduction TheCapitol.Net
The Budget and the Economy
How the federal deficit was ended - and returned
Implications for the politics of budgeting
Federal Budget Phases and Time Frames
Presidential and agency formulation
Congressional action on the executive budget
Budget execution and control
Review and audit stage
Congressional Budgeting Today
The framework and basic concepts of budgetary accounting
The congressional budget process, key players and basic roles and relationships
The two federal budget processes: discretionary and mandatory spending
Budget authority versus budget outlays
STAGE I: The Congressional Budget Resolution and Reconciliation Process
The budget resolution as a legislative framework
How to interpret the budget aggregates, functional allocations contained in the budget resolution
Enforcing the budget framework through reconciliation
Why the budget resolution and budget enforcement rules no longer work
PAYGO
STAGE II: Authorizations
Key features and different types of authorization bills
The relationship of authorization and appropriations legislation and how differences between the two are reconciled
The trend toward annual authorizations and how this impacts power relationships in Congress
Day Two
STAGE III: Appropriations The traditional role of the House initiating appropriations bills; the rules and structure in place to move this "must pass" legislation through committee and floor consideration.
Changes in the appropriations process including Senate initiation of appropriations bills, and conflict in the appropriating process
How the various parts of an appropriations bill relate to one another
How to interpret the nuances of legislative language (expects versus directs, may versus shall, etc.) in appropriations bills and reports
Track Senate amendments to House-passed appropriations bills
How the Senate's lack of formal rules and structure impacts the path of appropriations bills through the Senate; the use of unanimous consent
STAGE IV: Final Actions on Appropriations
How differences between House and Senate legislation are reconciled
How to interpret the conference report and to determine the status of your program and final dollar amounts agreed to by the conferees
STAGE V: The Budget Execution Process
The flow of monies following the passage of appropriations including apportionment, allotments, obligations, and outlays by executive agencies
Tracking and controlling the budget
Accounting for budget execution
Executing budgets within the law
Transparency and Accountability in the Budget Process
Policy proposals and fiscal realities
OMB's tools for assessing program performance
Principles and issues in performance measurement
Break The Budget: Short- and Long-Term Prospects
Sample Agendas
Sample agendas of different versions of this program tailored for previous custom clients are available in Adobe PDF.
This program is most effective for between 15 and 50 attendees.
Not enough staff for a custom, on-site program? You can still train your staff at our public course.
Previous Clients
Variations of this program have been presented for federal agencies.
Our selected client list includes clients who have purchased custom training, sent staff to our public programs and who have purchased our publications.
The fee for this program depends on the location, number of attendees, length, and training materials. Call us for details, or complete our custom program information request for more information.
If you don't have enough people for a custom, on-site program, you can still train your staff at our public course.
The program fee includes pre-program development and design, materials for your internal marketing and promotion, all course materials, and faculty chosen for your topic and your audience at the time and location you choose.
Our custom program clients provide the classroom/meeting space, all audio visual equipment, any food and beverages, all registration functions, and travel arrangements for attendees. When the program is held outside the Washington, DC metro area, travel arrangements for faculty can be made by the client or by us.
We can also provide meeting space, audio visual equipment, food and beverage, registration, and travel arrangements, though this affects program cost.
TheCapitol.Net, Inc., is a non-partisan small business, and a Virginia corporation. We are registered with CCR. See our Capability Statement and our About Us page for more details.
TheCapitol.Net is a non-partisan firm, and the opinions of its faculty, authors, clients and the owners and operators of its vendors are their own and do not represent those of TheCapitol.Net.
All custom training from TheCapitol.Net is tailored for each organization and audience. Topics from this program can be combined with topics from our other programs and with topics from your existing training programs.
Public Course
If you don't have enough staff for a custom, on-site training program, you can still train your staff at our public course.
Our faculty for this program all have more than 15 years' experience working with the federal budget.
Internal Marketing
To help you publicize and market a custom program to your organization's audience, we can provide printed materials and language for your own internal promotion and publicity.