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NY Sun- An Uproar Greets Decision to Trim New York Defense
Thursday June 01, 2006From NY Sun:
An Uproar Greets Decision to Trim New York Defense
BY DAVID LOMBINO - Staff Reporter of the Sun
June 1, 2006
URL: http://www.nysun.com/article/33670
The federal government said it was increasing funding to
Rep. Peter King, a Republican of Long Island and the chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, said that the cuts - a reduction of about 40% from
"DHS and the Administration have declared war on
Senator Clinton, who did not mention the cuts in her acceptance speech at the state Democratic Convention in
The city's slashed allocation was part of a total of $757 million in urban anti-terror grants distributed to 46 cities for the fiscal year 2006.The amount of money available to cities nationwide was down 14% from last year. The grants for
The city grants were part of $1.7 billion in grants dispersed across 50 states, down about 30% from last year.
Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday that the city's preparedness for a terrorist attack is not related to the amount of money it receives from the federal government. He said that the city equips itself with the tools it needs, and later seeks the maximum reimbursement from the federal grants.
Still, Mr. Bloomberg said the city should have received a lot more money and questioned the common sense of the allocation.
"When you stop a terrorist, they have a map of
A senior congressional aide familiar with the grants said that part of
A city official said that applications for federal grants are initiated at the agency level - like the police or fire departments - and funneled through the city's Office of Management and Budget.
An assistant secretary at Homeland Security, Tracy Henke, told Fox News that the grants reflect the fact that terror risks have changed and the department has better risk assessment capability and insight today than it did one or two years ago. Ms. Henke said that
Last year,
In the latest round of grants, the cities with the largest percentage increases in funding are Jersey City/Newark,
A widely circulated memo from the Department of Homeland Security that assessed
Rep. Anthony Weiner, a Democrat of Brooklyn and
"It is clear whoever wrote that memo is documenting what we long thought about the DHS: They don't know their rear end from their elbow when it comes to assessing what is at risk," Mr. Weiner told The New York Sun.
"Secretary Chertoff has had enough time. There has to be some level of accountability," Mr. Weiner said.
Rep. Joseph Crowley, a Democrat of the
"This is a slap in the face and a stab in the back," Mr. Crowley said.
The state of
A White House spokesman directed calls to the Department of Homeland Security.
A spokesman for Homeland Security, Russell Knocke, told the Sun that
Mr. Knocke said that the department must "look at the national picture" and that "we are not fighting yesterday's war, but the current threat picture."
He stopped short of saying that New Yorkers should breathe easier based on a lower risk assessment. "We urge New Yorkers to continue to be vigilant," Mr. Knocke said.
"We knew upfront that people weren't going to like it," he said. "We're okay with that because we believe what we are doing is right."
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