In the past two years, Congress has taken an ax to its own budget, shaving off more than 5 percent from its spending levels to serve as an example of the belt-tightening standards it seeks to impose governmentwide.

But that zeal for savings could soon cripple the agencies that help Congress balance the budget. Officials from both the Government Accountability Office and the Congressional Budget Office told lawmakers yesterday that they are struggling to keep up with congressional requests as their staff numbers dwindle.

CBO Director Douglas Elmendorf painted a grim picture of the future if budget cuts continue. He proposed a fiscal 2013 budget of $46.6 billion -- an increase of 1.9 percent over this year -- but even that will mean cutting seven employees from a full-time staff of 235 analysts.

The demand for CBO reports, he said, exceeds "by a substantial margin" what his diminished staff can accomplish.

"I want to emphasize all of us at CBO continue to make every effort to serve you and your colleagues as effectively as we possibly can with whatever resources we are given," Elmendorf told the House Appropriations Committee subpanel tasked with setting Congress' budget. "But I don't want to hide the fact that fewer analysts will mean fewer estimates, fewer reports on budget and economic policy."

The legislative branch budget -- which includes agencies like CBO, as well as lawmakers' office budgets -- represents less than 1 percent of total appropriations. But it often faces more scrutiny because of its symbolism: If Congress can't cut back, how can it expect others to exercise fiscal restraint?

The omnibus passed in December cut the legislative branch budget by 5 percent, and yesterday, GAO, CBO, the Government Printing Office and the Library of Congress detailed how that has affected their operations. All asked for modest budget increases -- except for GPO, which asked for no increase.

This year, Rep. Ander Crenshaw (R-Fla.), who heads the legislative branch subpanel, asked agencies to review their budgets line-by-line to identify savings that could keep their funding levels as close to static as possible.

"I think everybody knows that these cuts don't come without pain," he told agency officials at yesterday's hearing. "We are all in the same boat together."

Agencies reported a variety of creative actions to save money, from cutting back on publication subscriptions at CBO to attracting more tenants (and thus rent) at GAO. GPO, which asked to keep its budget of $126 million, has cut back on hard copies of congressional documents and is hoping to save money as it transitions to becoming a digital agency.

But at GAO and CBO, employees seem to have taken the brunt of the cuts. Elmendorf said his agency would be eliminating across-the-board salary increases for the third year in a row in 2013, while Comptroller General Gene Dodaro said more than 40 employees accepted early retirements and buy-outs. Both have also stopped replacing most of those who leave the agency.

Dodaro is hoping to reverse that trend next year, requesting a budget of $526.2 million, or a 2.9 percent increase over this year. That money would help the agency ensure its staff does not dip below 3,000 -- the lowest level since 1935.

"I feel like a college football coach where you don't bring in any freshman or sophomore classes and the seniors are about to leave and you're looking at the juniors and saying, 'Boy you guys better work hard,'" Dodaro said. "It's important for the long-term health of the Congress to have a viable, vital GAO and we can't do that if we're staggering" hires.

Lawmakers rely upon GAO to essentially oversee the rest of the government. Agency analysts identify wasteful programs, audit financial systems and follow the implementation of new laws. On the energy and environment front, for example, GAO has recently released reports on the Department of Energy's Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (E&E Daily, Jan. 25), U.S. EPA's chemical risk assessment program (E&ENews PM, Jan. 9), and the Bureau of Land Management's handling of reclamation costs (Greenwire, Dec. 22, 2011).

House and Senate committees request such reports, but the agency is taking longer to get to them. A GAO spokesman said the average time to start "priority requests" is four months. The agency has also decreased its estimate of the amount of waste it unearths; officials estimate GAO saves $81 for every $1 spent, rather than the previous four-year record of $91.

"I do think your agency is a good example of agencies in government where it's entirely possible, maybe even likely, that sometimes we're penny-wise and pound foolish," said Rep. David Price (D-N.C.). "Because I'm sure there's staff consolidation and staff attrition that can occur, but that represents studies not done, analysis not available, information not there to be acted upon by the Congress."

Sequestration -- or the across-the-board cuts mandated by the debt ceiling deal -- remains another threat. Agency officials said such cuts on top of their current scale-backs could be detrimental to their operations.

In an interview after the hearing, Crenshaw said the affects of the potential cuts are still unclear.

"It would exaggerate the impact that we're seeing now," he said. "Without sacrificing quality ... typically we have less people, and we're going to have less work product."