Congressman Adriano Espaillat, who represents New York’s 13th congressional district (NY-13) which includes parts of The Bronx and Manhattan, and who is a member of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, released a statement on April 10 praising U.S. President Joe Biden’s fiscal year 2022 discretionary funding request, which aims to reverse decades of disinvestment and prioritize initiatives that the congressman said will help working families and the vulnerable.

“The coronavirus pandemic has exposed serious needs in New York and across the country. President Biden’s funding request takes important steps to meet these needs and set our nation on a course for a better future,” Espaillat said. “As a member of the House Appropriations Committee, which sets federal funding, I look forward to working with President Biden to fund critical priorities that will make a difference for our country.”

According to Espaillat, since 2011, austere budget caps imposed by the Budget Control Act have limited the amount of funding that Congress can provide for critical needs. With the budget caps expiring this year, Congress can now allocate funding increases for various important initiatives. As a member of the House Appropriations Committee, Espaillat will have a leading role in determining how that federal funding is spent.

Among its many important proposals, Espaillat said the Biden administration’s budget blueprint invests in:

* Good schools: Historic funding for education, including a $20 billion increase for high-poverty schools.

* Pell Grants for DREAMers: Supporting the higher education of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) students with access to Pell Grants.

* Building Institutional Capacity in Higher Education: HBCUs, TCUs, MSIs, and low-resourced institutions including community colleges to help institutions serve underserved students to be successful and graduate from college.

* Increasing STEM participation through the National Science Foundation: $100 million – nearly a 50 percent increase – funding for programs to increase participation in science and engineering of individuals from racial and ethnic groups traditionally underrepresented in these fields.

* Child care: Helps more families afford quality child care with a $1.5 billion increase.

* Healthier communities: Addresses crises exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic doubling prior funding to $1.6 billion.

* Prioritizing research and interventions to reduce Black and Minority Maternal Mortality: $200 million to reduce maternal mortality and morbidity rates nationwide and increasing actionable data with robust Maternal Mortality Review Committees and Obstetrics Management Strategies programs for providers working with expectant mothers.

* Public health and medical research: Strengthens the nation’s public health infrastructure with a record $8.7 billion for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, $6.5 billion for ARPA-H – a new lifesaving medical research initiative, and $10.7 billion for opioid prevention and treatment.

* Housing: Expands vital Housing Choice Vouchers to 200,000 more families and expands Homeless Assistance Grants to support more than 100,000 additional households, helping solve the nation’s housing crisis.

* Community Modernization: Increased funding for Community Development Block Grants in communities facing persistent poverty and historic under – and disinvestment.

* Safer neighborhoods: Fosters safer communities by providing $209 million civil rights enforcement, $1 billion for gender-based violence prevention, and $2.1 billion for gun violence prevention to foster safer communities.

* Worker protection: Protects workers’ wages, benefits, and rights with an increase of $304 million, 17 percent more than last year, for worker protection agencies.

* U.S. Leadership on Climate Change: A whole-of-government approach that will help protect our environment for future generations, with a $14 billion increase over last year and reestablish U.S. commitment to combating the climate crisis and strengthening our relationship with global allies

* Nutrition: Strengthens the nutrition assistance safety net to combat rising rates of hunger and nutrition insecurity and expands local food systems with nearly $4 billion in new investments.

* Infrastructure: Rebuilds crumbling infrastructure with increased funding for roads and bridges, transit systems, and water systems.

The budget request is currently in the first phase of the appropriations process. In the coming months, the congressman said he will work with colleagues to review the request, and formulate appropriations bills that fund individual federal agencies. Later in the year, funding legislation will be considered by both the committee and the House of Representatives.