Senate rejects approps reorganization

WASHINGTON, Feb. 11 (UPI) -- Republicans on the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee have rejected a proposal that would reorganize the committee along the same lines as the House.

The members of the committee want its new chairman, U.S. Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss., to negotiate further with his House counterpart, U.S. Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Calif., because the current reorganization draft was unacceptable, Roll Call said Friday.

"At this point, we are not going to follow the House, and I don't believe that we should," said Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., who would lose his subcommittee chairmanship were the Senate to adopt the House's plan to cut the number of subcommittees from 13 to 10. Cochran held his views close to his vest, saying no decisions "big or little" had been made in the hour-long meeting with his committee colleagues.

House appropriators are scheduled to finalize their panel's new structure early next week, which has led some senators to conclude that, even if the total number of subcommittees in the Senate remains at 13, they will likely have to reshuffle their jurisdictions in order to make conference committees run more easily.