The bill text of the Department of Commerce and the Workforce Consolidation Act was postedrnonline this week. This Senate legislation proposes to merge the Commerce Department and Labor Department;rnunsuccessful variations have been introduced in the past. Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., introduced S-rn1836 Dec. 17, and it was referred to the Homeland Security Committee. “The goal of this legislation is two fold: to achieve cost savings by combining duplicative functions, and to improve the quality of our country’srneconomic policies by ensuring a coordinated approach,” Burr said in a document providing backgroundrninformation on the bill. It would save billions of dollars, he said, citing the potential consolidation of 35 officesrninto 12 and the killing or reducing of funds for seven programs or initiatives. The new cabinet agencyrnthe bill proposes to create would be called the Department of Commerce and the Workforce. In an envisionedrnorganizational chart of the department, NTIA and the National Institute of Standards and Technologyrnwould report directly to the department’s secretary and deputy secretary. It would put the Small BusinessrnAdministration within the Commerce Department and move the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrationrnto the Department of the Interior, a news release said (http://1.usa.gov/1c522RI). The bill hasrntwo co-sponsors, Dan Coats, R-Ind., and James Inhofe, R-Okla.
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