Amendment 4561 – Requires public disclosure of all reports delivered to the Appropriations Committee, including the justifications of the President’s annual budget request, by the Department of Homeland Security unless such reports contain information that would compromise national security.

Few of these reports contain sensitive information involving national security but do contain information that may be of interest to the public, the media or lawmakers who are not members of the Appropriations Committee.  In the interest of transparency and accountability, this information should be available.

Amendment 4562 - Requires that any limitation, directive, or earmarking be included in the bill’s conference report.

This amendment will ensure every earmark or directive must be included in the final Homeland Security Appropriations bill and approved by both Chambers of Congress.  This will enable further transparency and debate on all spending in this appropriations bill and provide the American taxpayer an additional safeguard that their money is not wasted on unnecessary projects that jeopardize the nation’s fiscal health and the living standard of their children and grandchildren.

Amendment 4585 – None of the amounts made available to Coast Guard shall be used for the continuation of operations at LORAN stations nationwide.

The Coast Guard requested terminating the operations of the LORAN program in the President’s budget and instead asked for $11.8 million to LORAN signal termination and personnel reduction.  LORAN was once a very useful navigational system but since the full development of GPS in the mid 1990s, LORAN is no longer needed for as a primary or secondary navigational system.

Amendment 4590 – Increases funding to the DHS Office of the Chief Financial Officer (OCFO) by $1 million to be used for the purposes of complying with the Improper Payments Information Act of 2002.  The offset is taken from funds set aside for the Metropolitan Medical Response System (MMRS) which is on the President’s termination list.

Click here to read more background about all the Coburn amendments.