Signs of Innovation in NASA Budget
The FY2005 NASA budget proposed by the White House earlier this week includes some items long sought by those in the space community who have been urging greater government enabling of the entrepreneurial private sector.

The Alternative Access program, now known as Crew & Cargo Services, is funded under Code M (Human Spaceflight) under the ISS line-item (pdf). The description states:

It is necessary for NASA to establish a transportation capability or crew and cargo for the space station program after the Shuttle is retired. NASA intends to meet this need through the
purchase of services for cargo and crew transport using existing and emerging capabilities, both domestic and foreign.

Also, in the Human and Robotic Technology line item (pdf), there is an initiative called 'Centennial Challenges' which is a fund ($20 million in FY2005) to award prizes for innovative solutions to spacefaring technological challenges.:

The Centennial Challenge Program is an experimental approach to stimulating innovation and competition in technical areas of interest to NASA. In commemoration of the Wright Brothers' seminal flight at Kitty Hawk, the Centennial Challenge program will establish purse awards for a portfolio of technical accomplishments that could advance the state of civil space exploration and aeronautics.

If these initiatives are followed through, it will indicate that NASA is starting to reform its way of doing business and looking beyond traditional bureaucratic practices to meet the challenge of human exploration of the Moon and beyond.