42 U.S.C. § 19133 — Initiative coordination

(a) Interagency committee — Acting through the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the President must designate an interagency committee to coordinate Initiative^* activities as appropriate. OSTP must co-chair it, and the OSTP Director^* must choose an additional co-chair from the committee's members. The committee oversees the Initiative's planning, management, and coordination. This section does not define “Initiative.” The committee must:

(1) coordinate federal engineering-biology research, development, and other Initiative activities;
(2) establish and periodically update the Initiative's goals and priorities;
(3) develop, no later than 12 months after August 9, 2022, and update every five years after that, a strategic plan. The plan must be submitted to the listed House and Senate committees and must:

(A) guide Initiative activities toward the goals and priorities established and updated under paragraph (2); and
(B) describe:

(i) the Initiative's support for long-term interdisciplinary engineering-biology research and development funding;
(ii) its support for education and public outreach;
(iii) its support for research and other activities on ethical, legal, environmental, safety, security, and other appropriate societal issues related to engineering biology, including an applied biorisk-management research plan, recommendations for integrating security into biological data access and international reciprocity agreements, recommendations for restructuring manufacturing to support engineering-biology research, development, and scaling-up initiatives, and an evaluation of existing biosecurity governance policies, guidance, and directives to create an adaptable, evidence-based framework for emerging biosecurity challenges caused by advances in engineering biology;
(iv) how the Initiative will move results from laboratories into applications for society's benefit and United States competitiveness; and
(v) how the Initiative will measure and track engineering biology's contributions to United States economic growth and other societal indicators;

(4) develop a national genomic sequencing strategy so engineering-biology research fully uses plant, animal, and microbe biodiversity, as appropriate and without compromising economic competitiveness, national security, or the privacy or security of human genetic information, to improve long-term engineering-biology innovation and competitiveness in the United States;
(5) develop a plan to use federal programs, such as the Small Business Innovation Research Program and the Small Business Technology Transfer Program, as described in section 638 of title 15, to support the activities in section 19132(b)(3) of this title; and
(6) when carrying out this section, consider the recommendations of the advisory committee^* established under section 19134, the workshop results under section 19132, existing reports on related topics, and the views of academic, state^*, industry, and other appropriate groups.

(b) Quinquennial report — Beginning with fiscal year 2023 and every five years after that for ten years, the committee must prepare and submit to the listed House and Senate committees a report containing:

(1) a summary of the agency budget supporting the Initiative for the current fiscal year, including spending for each participating agency and for developing and acquiring research facilities and instrumentation; and
(2) an assessment of how federal agencies are carrying out the plan under subsection (a)(3), including:

(A) the amount and number of awards under the Small Business Innovation Research Program and Small Business Technology Transfer Program supporting the Initiative;
(B) the amount and number of projects funded under joint solicitations by at least two participating agencies; and
(C) the effects of newly funded Initiative projects.

(c) Initiative Coordination Office:

(1) In general — The President must establish an Initiative Coordination Office with a Director and full-time staff. The Office must:

(A) provide technical and administrative support to the interagency committee and the advisory committee established under subsection (a) and section 19134;
(B) serve as the contact point for federal engineering-biology activities for government organizations, academia, industry, professional societies, state governments, interested citizen groups, and others to exchange technical and program information;
(C) oversee interagency coordination, including encouraging and supporting joint agency solicitation and selection of funding applications, as appropriate;
(D) conduct public outreach, including sharing the advisory committee's findings and recommendations, as appropriate;
(E) coordinate ethical, legal, environmental, safety, security, and other appropriate societal input; and
(F) promote access to, and early use of, technologies, innovations, and expertise from Initiative activities across federal agency missions and systems and in United States industry, including startup companies.

(2) Funding — The OSTP Director, coordinating with each participating federal department and agency as appropriate, must develop and annually update an estimate of the funds needed to carry out the Office's activities. The Director must submit the estimate, with an agreed summary of each agency's contribution, to Congress as part of the President's annual budget request.

(3) Termination — The Office ends 10 years after August 9, 2022.

(d) Rule of construction — Nothing in this section may be interpreted to change the policies, processes, or practices^* that individual federal agencies had in place on the day before August 9, 2022, for conducting biomedical research and advanced development, including soliciting and reviewing research proposals from outside the agency.