budget

Stay of Execution

UPDATED 16:00 PM EDT, April 5, 2013 | JOAN LOWY, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The closings of control towers at 149 small airports, due to begin this weekend because of government-wide spending cuts, are being delayed until June 15, federal regulators announced Friday.

The Federal Aviation Administration said it needs more time to deal with legal challenges to the closures.

Also, about 50 airport authorities and other "stakeholders" have indicated they want to fund the operations of the towers themselves rather than see them shut down, and more time will be needed to work out those plans, the agency said in a statement.

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UPDATED 14:59 PM EDT, April 1, 2013

Budget Staff Blues

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House says 480 workers on the president's budget staff have been notified they may have to take days off without pay because of a partisan budget stalemate.

Press secretary Jay Carney wouldn't say whether notices have gone out to other aides to President Barack Obama outside the Office of Management and Budget, including senior staff in the West Wing. But he says pay cuts remain a possibility for additional White House employees if a budget deal isn't reached.

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UPDATED 7:12 AM EDT, March 20, 2013

Lost in the Mail

Many Americans have stopped using the U.S. Postal Service in favor of private carriers like UPS and FedEx.  And now, it seems, so has the federal government.

In fact, despite spending $337 million last year on shipping, federal agencies only gave the financially troubled Postal Service $4.8 million in business - less than two percent.

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UPDATED 8:50 AM EST, February 14, 2013

Shrinking the Secret Service

Bracing for the possibility of budget sequestration next month, the Homeland Security Department is making plans to furlough as many as 1,000 Secret Service agents, officers and others employees, officials say.

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UPDATED 7:53 AM EST, November 20, 2012

Department of Everything?

Beer.  Dinosaurs.  Space travel.

Usually not words associated with the Pentagon.

But that's what Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., found when he took a look at some of the spending by the nation's military.

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