Elmont Online

ALBANY -- Congress will use a parliamentary trick Thursday to pass a bill re-stuffing the Federal Emergency Management Agency's coffers before it runs out relief money needed by victims of tropical storms Irene and Lee.

After weeks of disputes, including partisan votes last week that left FEMA running on fumes and, once again, revived fears of a government shutdown, the House and Senate agreed to include $2.65 billion for FEMA.

Republicans who control the House attached their aid package to a larger stopgap spending bill, called a continuing resolution, that first failed, then passed, last week. Its aid package did not contain funding for farms like a competing plan in the Democratic-controlled Senate did, and it offset the FEMA money with a $150 billion cut to the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program.

In a compromise, the Senate dropped the agriculture funding and the House dropped the offset. The Senate passed the bill in such a way the House can adopt it without recalling its members to Washington. A real vote will occur next week -- the temporary spending bill runs through Nov. 18.

U.S. Rep. Chris Gibson, R-Kinderhook, said he's happy with the outcome because, "the aid was uninterrupted in coming to the victims ... I feel comfortable we're going to continue to have that aid uninterrupted."

Gibson said he intends to vote for the larger bill next week, and will push to have the agriculture funding included in the federal government's next spending bill, which must be adopted by Nov. 18.

"I feel satisfied talking with our leadership that they're going to address our concerns in November when we bring forward those final appropriations," Gibson said. "We need to get into streams to remediate and attenuate the possibility of future floods."

U.S. Rep. Paul Tonko, D-Amsterdam, is less assured.

Spokesman Beau Duffy said Tonko is "undecided" on how he will vote next week, because, "he still feels it's not enough and that there are no provision there for farmers and the small businesses, so it's still painfully short of where he needs to be."

"He's still looking at it," Duffy said. "He wants to make sure that the money is flowing, he just wants to make sure it's a solution that fits the disaster."