Are Department of Homeland Security Grants Politics As Usual?

Where should the money go?

On May 31, the Department of Homeland Security announced $1.7 billion in federal homeland security grants to cities and states for fiscal year 2006 – and set off a firestorm of criticism. The overall total fell, and both New York and Washington felt the pinch. 

One program in particular, the Urban Areas Security Initiative, which doles out millions of dollars using a risk-analysis formula, raised hackles. Its budget for high-risk cities dropped 14 percent to about $711 million. New York City, which receives the highest amount of any of the 46 urban areas in this program, will get only $124.5 million, down from $207.5 million last year, even as other cities, such as Omaha, Nebraska, got a boost to $8.3 million, up from $5.1 million last year.

New York’s city and state officials immediately cried foul. Mayor Michael Bloomberg told the Los Angeles Times on June 2 that the new distribution reflected “normal pork.” He claimed that political pressures rather than true risk played a large decision in the grant changes. “In many of the places where they got money,” he said. “There are close elections, either at the Senate level or at the House level.” Here's the full piece.

Michael Chertoff, the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, responded in a New York Times June 7th op-ed (registration required). He argued that the decision will “increase the nation’s overall preparedness” by redirecting some money to capacity-building initiatives in cities across the country. Chertoff said New York City will still receive more grant money than other cities in the Urban Areas Security Initiative program – 18 percent of the grants total.

Both New York senators, Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer, both Democrats, shot back in a letter (registration required) to the New York Times that New York City is the nation’s top target and that the money is necessary to support personnel costs, including training, to “stop terrorists before they strike.”

Another response (registration required) came from Mike Murphy,  a resident of Lincoln, NE. He said people should not “dismiss the importance of money for rural areas like Nebraska,” which he called a communications and transportation hub, as well as host to the Offut Air Force Base, the U.S. Strategic Command center based just outside of Omaha.

Michael O’Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, rounded the debate out in a Wall Street Journal op-ed (subscription required) piece, by saying that the department’s current risk-based formula for cities is the right approach. But, he wrote, the risk-based methodology should be used more widely in the other four Department of Homeland Security grant programs. More of the department’s $1.7 billion in grant money, O’Hanlon wrote, should be given to risky urban areas.

By Alexandra Poolos

What are your thoughts? Under the Urban Areas Security Initiative program, the New York City, Chicago, and Los Angeles-Long Beach areas will receive a total of $257.3 million in fiscal year 2006 – equal to 15 percent of the entire state and local grant budget of $1.7 billion. Is that too much, too little or about right? What do you think the criteria should be for deciding where the money goes? Share your comments below.

Comments

[fancypantscz]

The criteria for deciding where Homeland Security grants ought to be disbursed depends first and foremost on where American citizens have homes. Those places with high densities of homes inhabited by Americans should receive proportionally high levels of grants. It is also important that we adjust grant allocation according to what the grants were created to secure the homeland against. Since the Department of Homeland Security was created in reaction to the insecurity displayed on September 11, 2001, we can assume that the grants are meant to secure citizens from terrorists, airplanes, and skyscrapers. Therefore, high American home density locations near airports, flight corridors, urban business districts, and terrorists should have additional access to grants. It is important to note that this criterion brings to light a major flaw in the issuing of grants to meet our current homeland security needs. We don’t know where in the homeland terrorists are. This is largely the result of not having definitive parameters by which we can define precisely what a terrorist is. Terror is a feeling closely linked to the perception of personal security and given our goal of increasing homeland security by grant dispersal it may be efficacious to define a terrorist as a person who creates feelings of personal insecurity within American homes. Feelings of personal insecurity can be assessed indirectly by measuring levels of risk adverse behavior. Locations with a prevalence of homeowners insurance, flood and fire insurance, above average smoke detector and door lock sales, home security systems, and neighborhood watch programs should also be given special consideration for grants. One might be critical of placing much weight on such criteria because feelings of personal insecurity at home do not always arise from terrorists and may simply be the result of paranoia. However, people experiencing paranoia have a claim to insecurity relief as legitimate as those suffering from actual terror. It would be a mistake not to consider the fact that simply because a person is paranoid does not mean they are actually secure and without a very real need of a grant.

[Alexandra Poolos]

Thanks for your very interesting posting. Your view seems to fall in line with New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Senators Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer, who believe New York should get more homeland security funding because the city has millions of residents and is a clear terrorist target. The current risk-based analysis for homeland security funding does take into account population density and infrastructure considerations. Do you agree that New York should get more money?

As to your interesting analysis of resident paranoia and homeowner insurance, I wonder whether the higher rates of homeowner insurance can be attributed to the fact that those areas are where people are more wealthy and can afford paying for insurance.

Thanks very much for your thoughtful response.