US slashes Hub grants for security
Antiterrorism funds cut by nearly a third
WASHINGTON -- The Boston area this year will receive nearly one-third less federal grant money to help buy equipment and train emergency workers for possible terrorist attacks, the Department of Homeland Security announced yesterday.
The federal government will give Boston and its surrounding communities about $18.2 million in urban area antiterrorism grants, down from about $26 million last year. As a whole, Massachusetts will receive about $41 million from several homeland security grant programs, down from $58.8 million last year, the department said.
The cuts were echoed in other major cities as well. The two cities that were attacked by terrorists on Sept. 11, 2001 -- New York and Washington, D.C. -- lost about 40 percent of their funding. At the same time, several smaller cities, including Louisville, Ky., and Omaha, saw their funds rise.
Homeland Security officials said the smaller grants to major cities were the result of two factors: Congress cut about $500 million from the overall grant budget this year, including about $100 million from the program that funded high-risk urban areas.
In addition, officials said, the department used a new system for evaluating applications for grant money. The formula employed a more sophisticated analysis of the risk posed by a potential terrorist attack, as well as the quality of the proposed spending plans submitted by each applicant city.
Boston has used its federal grant money to fund extra training and drills for police and firefighters, improvements to the security of roads and bridges that may be potential targets, and upgrades to communication systems.
Funds have been used for one-time expenses including 2,000 radios to enhance interagency communications and for ongoing programs such as the Boston Regional Intelligence Center that tracks crime data in nine Boston-area cities. City officials said last night they are not sure exactly how the cuts will affect those programs.
``It's too early to tell how this will impact specifically our current activities," said Seth Gitell , spokesman for Mayor Thomas M. Menino.
Menino said this year's funding will be enough to address the city's ``most critical needs," but he called on the federal government to reverse the nationwide cuts.
``While these resources will be put to good use and help Boston stay a national leader in preparedness, I strongly encourage the administration and the congressional leadership to restore [the cuts] from the urban areas program," Menino said in a statement released last night.
Officials did not explain in detail why the new risk-based formula resulted in fewer dollars being allocated to major cities that lost funds, or how various funding proposals were evaluated. As a result, the cuts provoked expressions of outrage and bewilderment from lawmakers representing such areas.
The Republican chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, Peter King of New York, called the decision to cut New York City's grants ``indefensible and disgraceful." King has previously attacked the Bush administration over its handling of other homeland security issues, including the failed deal to put six major US ports under management by a Dubai company.
``New York City has been attacked twice and is doing more than any other city in the country to defend itself and our nation," King said in a statement. ``As far as I'm concerned, DHS and the administration have declared war on New York City, and I am going to fight this as hard as I possibly can. This raises very serious questions about the quality and sincerity of management at every level of the department."
Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, was more restrained, but agreed with King that the system for allocating grants was broken.
``Although this clearly falls short of what we'd hoped for, these funds will allow the Commonwealth to strengthen its security preparedness and response capability," Kennedy said in a statement. ``However, we shouldn't be cutting homeland security funds to high-risk cities like Boston, New York, and Washington, D.C."
The cuts in homeland security grants to major urban areas came as a surprise. Despite the smaller amount of funds available for the program, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff had announced six months ago that he was changing the grant program to steer a greater proportion of money to higher-risk cities.
The Urban Area Security Initiative grant program, which provides financial assistance to help cities improve their security by funding programs to purchase such priorities as chemical suits and to train emergency responders, has been politically controversial since its start.
Congress created the program after the 2001 terrorist attacks. Initially, just seven major cities were eligible for the funds, and Boston didn't make the cut. But lawmakers from around the country pressured the administration to add their home cities to the list, which soared to 50 in 2003.
Boston was among those added to the list. It received $16.72 million in 2003, $19 million in 2004, and $26 million in 2005, according to the office of US Representative Edward Markey, Democrat of Malden.
The Sept. 11 Commission and many homeland security specialists have criticized the program for years, saying the government was spreading grant money around too thinly among less-risky cities when it should instead be concentrating funds on big cities where it is more likely that international terrorists would attempt a catastrophic attack.
In January, Chertoff announced the department would trim the list of cities eligible for grants for new projects this year from 50 to 35. Cities dropped from the list -- such as Tampa, Baton Rouge, and Buffalo -- would be able to receive funds only to complete projects already underway. Boston remained on the list.
The department, however, later added to the list three cities that had not previously been eligible for funds at all -- Fort Lauderdale, Orlando, and Memphis -- saying that they could be attractive terrorist targets. The addition meant that three more cities would be competing for a share in the shrinking pool of funds.
``Fort Lauderdale and Orlando are high tourist destinations, and Memphis has a lot of transportation and cargo going through that area, so those are some of the examples of why the risk-based approach said they might be added," Jarrod Agen , a Homeland Security spokesman, said yesterday in an interview. 