The largest House office building is at risk of “catastrophic system failure,” Architect of the Capitol Thomas Austin is set to warn lawmakers this week in a push to double his office budget in the coming fiscal year.
Austin, scheduled to testify before House appropriators on Wednesday, singled out the Rayburn House Office Building as the “top priority” for building renovations for fiscal 2027, warning the building is “at a serious juncture.”
“Based on my personal observations and evaluation of the facility assessments, I am most concerned with the level of risk of a catastrophic system failure in Rayburn in its current state,” he said in his prepared testimony, while warning that “time is of the essence to address risks to operational reliability, life safety, and the continuity of congressional operations.”
The testimony goes on to describe “aging mechanical systems, persistent leaks, and structural issues” that Austin said make “a full-scale renovation essential.”
His testimony also notes “a concerning uptick in frequency of mechanical, electrical, and plumbing issues in the facility” and “frequent elevator and escalator outages, major mechanical failures, multiple fire incidents, and dozens of water intrusions costing over $2 million in emergency repairs and necessitating immediate hazardous material abatement and the displacement of multiple Member of Congress.”
Austin cites the state of the building, which first opened in 1965, as a key factor behind his agency’s request for $1.6 billion in funding for fiscal 2027. The ask is almost double the $812 million that Congress provided for the current fiscal year.
Another factor driving the requested funding boost, Austin said, is a backlog of deferred maintenance stemming from “facility repair projects from prior years that were not funded.”
Funding hearings pick up
As House appropriators try to get a jump-start on fiscal 2027 spending bills, the Legislative Branch Subcommittee is also scheduled to hear from several other agency heads this week, including those at the Government Accountability Office, Congressional Budget Office and Capitol Police.
The GAO is calling for a 5.9 percent increase in appropriations for fiscal 2027, which would bring its funding level to $860 million. However, total budget authority would sit at $910 million under the proposal, the agency noted in its request, which factors in $50 million offset by receipts, including rental income and training fees, and supplemental funding.
Acting GAO Comptroller General Orice Williams Brown called for cutting her agency’s workforce by about 4 percent, allowing for 3,210 full-time-equivalent positions — a 10 percent drop from the fiscal 2024 level.
Brown said the staffing cut is needed despite the proposed funding increase as the agency tries to absorb the cost of inflation, rising health care benefits and other personnel costs in recent years.
The request comes as the agency has gone months without a permanent leader after its previous chief, Comptroller General Gene L. Dodaro, left in December following a 15-year stint in the post.
CBO Director Philip Swagel will press for a 2 percent increase in funding for the budget scorekeeper agency, or $1.5 million higher than current levels. The request would bring total funding to $76.3 million for fiscal 2027. A bulk of the increase would go toward hiring new staff, the CBO said, as well as increases in salaries and benefits for current employees and enhanced information technology.
And Capitol Police Chief Michael Sullivan, in testimony set for Tuesday, will propose more than $1 billion in funding for fiscal 2027, according to a prepared statement.
Sullivan said the request will include $734 million “to fund salaries and benefits, $273 million to fund general expenses, and $15.7 million in multiyear funding to support security enhancements.”
Part of that request, Sullivan said, will go toward beefing up lawmakers’ protection, as he warned of the “alarming rate” at which threats against members continue to climb. The request also “includes funding to onboard personnel solely dedicated to communicating case investigation information to Member offices,” he said.
Architect of the Capitol Thomas Austin’s name has been corrected in this report.
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