Under current law, organizations in certain states that provide services to youth, the elderly, and the disabled have limited access to information from national criminal background checks. (Those organizations typically review the backgrounds of prospective coaches, employees, and volunteers.) S. 705 would require the Department of Justice (DOJ) to establish a program to allow such organizations to obtain information from criminal background checks in the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) fingerprint database.
Based on an analysis of information from DOJ, CBO estimates that implementing the new program would cost less than $500,000 annually; any such spending would be subject to the availability of appropriated funds. In addition, the bill would result in more background checks carried out by the FBI. The FBI collects fees to cover its costs for those checks; the fees are classified as offsetting collections and are credited to the agency’s salaries and expenses appropriation. CBO estimates that the collection and spending of additional fees under S. 705 would have no significant net effect on discretionary spending in any year.
Enacting S. 705 would not affect direct spending or revenues; therefore, pay-as-you-go procedures do not apply. CBO estimates that enacting S. 705 would not increase net direct spending or on-budget deficits in any of the four consecutive 10-year periods beginning in 2028.
S. 705 contains no intergovernmental or private-sector mandates as defined in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act.
On April 6, 2017, CBO transmitted a cost estimate for H.R. 695, the Child Protection Improvements Act of 2017, as ordered reported by the House Committee on the Judiciary on March 22, 2017. The two pieces of legislation are similar and CBO’s estimates of their budgetary effects are the same.
