During this election year, lawmakers are showing slight restraint in writing the earmarks in the FY 2009 spending bills, according to an analysis by Taxpayers for Common Sense (TCS) ( click here for the new database ). The House has increased the number and value of earmarks at about the same rate.  The Senate has cut earmarks by 16% in the spending bills in terms of total dollars. The analysis is based on all the bills that have passed full committee and are awaiting action in both chambers. 
 
TCS analyzed the available House and Senate Fiscal Year 2009 spending bills and found that earmarks decreased by more than 15% in the Senate and increased nearly 7% in the House compared to the same appropriations bills at the similar point last year. The House increased the number of projects in these bills by 5% from 4,149 in 2008 to 4,367 in 2009 and the Senate reduced total projects from 4,313 in 2008 to 4,093. To some extent this represents the Senate restraining their irrational earmark exuberance of last year. In the six bills that were available for both chambers, the Senate still outstrips the House in total earmark cost: $5.86 billion to $5.12 billion.
 
One of the more remarkable shifts is a $426 million drop in Senate earmarks for the Transportation-Housing and Urban Development spending bill (the House bill hasn’t been considered yet). This is at least in part due to the cratering of the Highway Trust Fund , which is fueled by the gas tax. Overspending in previous years, coupled with the precipitous drop in gas tax receipts as motorists drive less, has drained the fund and well for earmark spending. The only other bill to have a similar fall on a percentage basis was the Commerce-Justice-Science spending bill , which also fell more than 30%, or $228 million.
 
There are twelve final spending bills for the federal government. So in turn, there are 24 final House or Senate bills. Congress has only released 15 of those bills. With so many bills not considered, including the Defense spending bill that includes more earmarks than each of the House and Senate passed bills, much can still change. And that assumes that the spending bills will move under relatively regular order.
 
The slight progress made on reducing the total costs of earmarks will be eliminated the longer we wait to pass the 2009 spending bills. The most likely scenario is a major omnibus spending bill during the first days of the 111th Congress. So any earmark reductions we are seeing in August are likely to be negated by an avalanche of earmarks that always accompanies major omnibus spending bills.