Senators Question FDA About Reduced Funding for State, Local Food Safety Programs
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A letter signed by four U.S. senators was recently sent to Jim Jones, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) Deputy Commissioner for Human Foods, about the agency’s plans for reduced funding for state and local food safety programs. The letter was signed by Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-Connecticut), Tina Smith (D-Minnesota), Cory Booker (D-New Jersey), and Dick Durbin (D-Illinois).
FDA’s Budgetary Constraints for State and Local Food Safety Activities
Mr. Jones has addressed this budgetary challenge in previous stakeholder engagement meetings. In an April 2024 webinar hosted by the Alliance for a Stronger FDA, Mr. Jones explained that, over the past five years, FDA has given states approximately $119 million annually for their food safety initiatives—$36 million more than the agency actually accounted for in its yearly budgets ($83 million), because FDA was pulling from surplus money in the budget that was otherwise going unused. Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 is the first year in five years that the states are not receiving this extra funding. This will result in what is effectively a 30 percent reduction in funds from FDA given to its state partners for food safety functions.
During another webinar in October, Mr. Jones shared that FDA and state public health agencies are currently in discussions about how their limited funds could best be spent to ensure priority work is carried out. However, he also recognized that the challenge is regrettable, and shared that, although FDA is talking to appropriators and looking inside the agency for resources, he is “not optimistic” about the outcomes of either of those two strategies.
According to the Senators’ letter, FDA has also significantly reallocated funding meant for the Office of Inspections and Investigation (OII), formerly known as the Office of Regulatory Affairs’ Office of Training, Education, and Development (ORA’s OTED) by about 65 percent or $10 million. This department is responsible for training of investigators and inspections at the federal, state, and local levels.
Senators Press FDA for Answers
In the Senators’ letter to FDA, they cited that state and local agencies perform the majority of food inspections, including 50 percent of food processing facility inspections, 90 percent of produce safety inspections, and 100 percent of retail food inspections. In this context, the Senators underline that the U.S. House and Senate included language in their FY 2025 draft appropriations bills directing FDA to maintain funding for state and local programs.
“While we appreciate that you may need to occasionally reallocate resources based on programmatic needs, we are concerned that the full impact of the proposed cuts to state and local programs has not been taken into account and that the agency has failed to fully consider alternative options,” the letter stated. The senators went on to ask FDA to answer five questions, requesting a response by February 16, 2025:
- Where have the funds intended for OII been reallocated?
- With the proposed $34 million reduction to state and local programs, has OII and the Human Foods Program (HFP) determined which state-led food safety initiatives will no longer be funded and how these activities will be handled by current OII/Human Foods Program (HFP) staff?
- What activities has the agency undertaken to revise processes, reduce bureaucracy, and improve efficiency during the implementation of the new HFP that now includes OII?
- What are the specific number and cost of OII investigator positions for domestic and foreign inspections, as well as the number of supervisory staff and their pay history?
- Has the agency cross-referenced the functions and responsibilities of HFP with OII to determine what programs are no longer necessary, and has the agency determined what programs can be cut with minimal public health impacts?
Data shows that FDA has been falling short of its inspection targets for years. In a January 2025 report published by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), it was revealed that the agency has not met its Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA)-mandated inspection goals since 2018. FDA officials told GAO that the agency needs more inspectors to meet its targets.
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