S.Amdt. 847

SA 847. Mr. UDALL (for himself and Mr. Heinrich) submitted an
amendment intended to be proposed by him to the bill H.R. 2810, to
authorize appropriations for fiscal year 2018 for military activities
of the Department of Defense, for military construction, and for
defense activities of the Department of Energy, to prescribe military
personnel strengths for such fiscal year, and for other purposes; which
was ordered to lie on the table; as follows:

At the end of section 3201, add the following:
(b) Certification of Sufficiency of Budget Requests.--Not
later than 10 days after the date on which the budget of the
President for a fiscal year is submitted to Congress pursuant
to section 1105(a) of title 31, United States Code, the
Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board shall submit to the
congressional defense committees a letter--
(1) certifying that the requested budget is sufficient for
the conduct of the safety reviews that the Board intends to
conduct in that fiscal year; or
(2) if the Board is unable to make the certification
described in paragraph (1), including a list of such reviews
and the estimated level of additional funding required to
conduct such reviews.
(c) Sense of Congress.--It is the sense of Congress that--
(1) the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board was
chartered by Congress with an important mission to provide
independent recommendations and advice to the President and
the Secretary of Energy to protect public health and employee
safety at defense nuclear facilities of the Department of
Energy;
(2) the role of the Board has necessarily evolved as the
mission of the Department has changed over time, but the
Board will continue to be vitally important as the Department
continues major efforts to modernize the nuclear weapons
stockpile and update its infrastructure in the 21st century;
and
(3) any significant change to the Board and its mission can
only be considered by the Board as a whole with oversight by
Congress and requires legislative changes approved by
Congress.
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