D.C. Notebook | Dicks sends Smithsonian a message

In early June, an irate Smithsonian volunteer wrote to The Washington Post, "outraged" that Rep. Norm Dicks was "punishing" the Smithsonian by cutting its budget.

Dicks, D-Bremerton, isn't normally on the radar screen with the public in D.C.

But as chairman of the House Appropriations committee that handles the Interior Department budget, he's in the middle of the battle over a couple of scandals and assorted disasters at America's museum. Last week, he sent the Smithsonian a message.

The Smithsonian's director, Lawrence Small, was pushed into resigning in March after members of Congress, including Dicks, said they wanted to review his stewardship.

Small, a multimillionaire, was alleged to have spent lavishly on entertaining and other events, and rolled up $2 million in expenses. His housing allowance was $1.15 million over his six years in office; in return, he allowed the museum to throw events at his 6,500-square-foot home, according to news reports.

The museum's director and another employee were already paid higher salaries than the president of the United States, Dicks complained. Small's total compensation package for 2007 was $915,698. Questions about the Smithsonian's direction, described as "corporate mentality" in the media and on Capitol Hill, had been building.

In 2002, the museum added the name "Behring Center" to the National Museum of American History after one of its benefactors, Ken Behring, the man who sold the Seattle Seahawks to Paul Allen.

The museum agreed to co-sponsor a movie about creationism funded by the conservative Seattle Discovery Institute in 2005, but decided to withdraw after an outcry from scientists, universities and politicians.

In April 2006, Small signed a controversial deal the museum had with Showtime TV to give the cable channel exclusive access to treasures considered public.

Historians and documentary makers, including Ken Burns and Michael Moore, were furious, concerned that their ability to film archive material would be shut down. Dicks and the top GOP lawmaker on the appropriations committee asked for a full airing of the contract and warned Small against similar future endeavors.

The Smithsonian's inspector general quit around that time, complaining that Small had asked her to drop an audit she was conducting.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, complained that Small had a "Dom Perignon lifestyle" that the museum was helping underwrite.

Small resigned in March with no severance package; the business director he brought in who did the Showtime deal resigned in April.

Their mandate had been, as news reports said, to bring more private funding to the Smithsonian collection of museums, which gets about 70 percent of its funding from the federal government and whose many branches are free to the public.

Dicks has had several meetings with Smithsonian officials and the acting director since April. He said in an interview that they seem to understand the problem on their hands, and he feels "they are going in the right direction."

But when he brought down the gavel for his committee's appropriations bill markup, he had cut $26 million -- 4 percent -- from their budget, "based on significant problems of governance and fiscal policies at the institution."

He did however, give the National Endowment for the Arts and the Humanities more than the president's budget requested, by $35 million and $19 million, respectively, to "help these programs to recover from deep cuts over the last decade."

Dave Reichert , R-Auburn, pushed through an amendment to the hotly contested Homeland Security appropriations bill June 12. It hit a wall when the House folded its tent Wednesday at 2:07 a.m.

The Reichert amendment would restore $9.9 million to the intelligence budget by lifting the money from the management pot.

DHS management is widely considered by Congress and watchdogs to be top-heavy and uncoordinated.

Reichert scored a coup when he persuaded Democrats Rick Larsen of Lake Stevens and Adam Smith from Tacoma to stick with him, citing the chance to slash DHS administrative funds.

The bill itself is mired in policy and money wars. But on Friday, on their way out the door, the House approved the full bill with Reichert's amendment, 268-150. All the delegation Democrats supported it; the state's other two Republicans, Doc Hastings of Pasco, and Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Spokane, did not.

The president has threatened to the veto the bill, which exceeds his budget request by $2.1 billion. Republicans have enough votes to help him.

Alicia Mundy: 202-662-7457 or amundy@seattletimes.com