CAA News Today

In early February, President George W. Bush’s fiscal year 2004 budget was released, which calls for increases to both the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) over their 2003 amounts.

The NEH in particular has received the largest requested increase in several years’-Bush is asking for an additional $25 million for the endowment’s We the People initiative on American history, culture, and civics. The president has also requested a total of $117 million for the NEA in the coming year, which is a very modest increase in the endowment’s budget over the previous year, and will only account for mandated cost-of-living increases.

Congress will draft its own version of the president’s budget over the next several months, with the goal of having it finalized in October 2003.