Department Of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2006
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2006 -- (Senate - July 12, 2005)
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Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, my friend from California, as well as the Senator from New Jersey, have both referred to a memo the Congressional Research Service put together for Senator Lautenberg. First, let me say I have not seen this memo despite my staff repeatedly requesting a copy from Senator Lautenberg's office. The memo appears to have been widely distributed to the press but, unfortunately, the Senator has chosen not to share it with the two sponsors of the amendment.
Why would that be? Perhaps it is because the last time my colleague from New Jersey asked CRS to put together a memo attacking S. 21, we quickly discovered it was based on fatally flawed assumptions.
The memo purported to show that S. 21 would lead to less risk-based funding than under current law, but that was just plain wrong. And CRS, once the analysts talked with my staff, agreed they had made a mistake. In fact, CRS issued the memo I hold in my hand correcting the flawed conclusions of the Lautenberg memo.
I ask unanimous consent that the CRS analysis be printed in the RECORD.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:
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Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, as I understand it, the latest CRS analysis--as I understand it from press accounts since, again, the Senator has not been willing to share it with my office--is once again flawed. It does not take into account the sliding scale minimum allocation that is included in the Collins-Lieberman amendment.
This sliding scale minimum distributes 10.7 percent of the funds in our bill based on population and population density. Those are two risk factors that are used by the Department of Homeland Security to distribute risk-based funds.
I note, because I want to give credit where credit is due, that the proposal for this sliding scale minimum came from our colleague, a senior member of the committee, Senator Levin of Michigan.
Let's look at the real numbers. The fact is there is a doubling in the amount of money that is based on risk under our amendment. The legislation before us emphasizes risk-based funding and doubles the amount of money compared to current law that would be allocated based on risk.
The Committee on Homeland Security has done a great deal of work on this formula. I think we see today the problems that occur when we try to write a formula not in committee, not based on careful hearings, input from all interested parties, two markups, 3 years of deliberations by the committee, but instead try to cobble together an amendment on the Senate floor.
I have heard again today the comparison that Wyoming gets more money on a per capita basis. The Senator from California, my friend and colleague, made that argument. Over and over again we hear the argument that homeland security dollars are unfairly allocated because less populous States generally get more per capita than more populous States. But the truth is, that argument does not hold water.
What is the point of that argument? That homeland security dollars should be distributed on a per capita basis rather than risk and a minimum free each State? The fact is, risk-based allocations lead to per capita disparities as well.
Let's take the District of Columbia as an example. I think every single Member of this distinguished body would agree that the District of Columbia, despite its relatively small population, is an extremely high-risk area. In fact, the District of Columbia gets by far the most on a per capita basis, nearly $217 per resident, because it is a small population, high-risk area.
Taken to its logical conclusion, the argument of these advocates is fewer dollars to the national capital region. The fact is, distributing funds based on risk does not necessarily lessen the per capita disparities among recipients.
We took a look at the distribution of fiscal year 2005 urban area security initiative funds which are allocated based on risk. What we found were the same or even greater levels of per capita disparities compared to an analysis of the urban areas and State grant funds combined. For example, Boston received nearly $48 per capita, where Houston, with over three times the population, received under $10 per person. Los Angeles received about $18 per capita; Pittsburgh, $29.
The point is, moving from a formula to a risk-based distribution does not necessarily bridge those per capita divides.
Second, let's look at what this is really all about. Under S. 21, the amount the small States would be guaranteed beyond their per capita shares amounts to less than 3 percent of the funds that are allocated--3 percent. Let's use the real example.
S. 21 would authorize $2.9 billion for homeland security grants. The total that small States are guaranteed in excess of their per capita share is just $85.4 million out of that $2.9 billion. Here is the chart that demonstrates what this allocation is all about.
In contrast, the 19 most populous States receive some $619 million in guaranteed funds under the bill, seven times more than the less populous States are guaranteed beyond their per capita share.
In short, we are not talking about a major redistribution of homeland security dollars.
The fact is also that the potential of terrorist attacks against rural targets is increasingly recognized as a national security threat. I quoted yesterday the Harvard study that talked about rural areas facing unique and profound homeland security challenges. Bioterrorism, an attack on our food supply, where would those most likely occur? The food supply is outside our urban areas. A great many power grids, water supplies, nuclear plants--all of those are outside of urban areas.
Likewise, a report from the RAND Corporation, prepared for the National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism, assessed how prepared State and local law enforcement is. It noted that homeland security experts and first responders have cautioned against an overemphasis on improving the preparedness of large cities to the exclusion of small communities or rural areas.
The report recognized that much of our Nation's infrastructure and potential high-value targets is located in rural areas.
The Department of Homeland Security said that it is well known that terrorists choose to live and train in small and rural communities.
Communities that my friends from California and New Jersey would say are at no risk, they are low risk, they should not receive risk money. These small and rural communities are where the terrorists live, train, and hide.
That is why law enforcement has overwhelmingly endorsed the Collins-Lieberman amendment. We have letters from the National Troopers Coalition, the Grand Lodge Fraternal Order of Police, the National Association of Police Organizations, the International Union of Police Associations, the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the United Federation of Police Officers, the International Brotherhood of Police Officers, the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives, the International Association of Fire Chiefs.
All of these groups representing law enforcement and representing our firefighters are endorsing the approach taken in the Collins-Lieberman amendment. One reason they do is for the first time we are going to have standards, we are going to tie spending to standards, and we recognize that the first responders in each and every State deserve our support.
We need to bring every State up to a minimum level of preparedness, and we are not there now. That is why the National Governors Association and the National Emergency Management Association strongly endorse our approach.
Over and over again we hear from these organizations that the funding formula proposed in the Collins-Lieberman amendment ``promotes a better level of preparedness and brings some predictability to States for planning purposes.'' That is from the National Troopers Coalition.
The Fraternal Order of Police says our legislation--this is the Collins-Lieberman legislation--recognizes the fact that the majority of Federal funds have been previously directed toward recovery response operations, too often at the expense of the efforts to prevent future attacks. Ensuring that all communities achieve and maintain the appropriate response-and-recover capacity for terrorist incidents is a critical component. However, it is the goal of law enforcement to ensure that we never have a terrorist incident to respond or recover from. We want to stop the attack before it even occurs.
Those are important advantages of the Collins-Lieberman approach. The accountability measures in our bill are absolutely critical and are missing from the Feinstein-Cornyn-Lautenberg approach.
We know there has been wasteful funding. We cannot tolerate inappropriate and wasteful spending of critical homeland security funds. That is why we have strong accountability measures in the Collins-Lieberman proposal, measures that are lacking completely from the alternative put before us today. These accountability measures will ensure that no longer will homeland security funds be spent to purchase air-conditioned garbage trucks in the State of New Jersey--that is the kind of wasteful spending that we want to guard against--or leather jackets for the District of Columbia. Instead, spending would be tied to achieving essential capabilities for our first responders to meet national preparedness goals.
This is a carefully thought out bill. It is a comprehensive bill. It reflects many hearings and input from the first responder community.
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Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, the Senator from New Jersey is mistaken in saying this bill provides less risk-based assistance than the legislation reported from the committee in April. It does not. The Senator is in error. It is exactly the same as the committee-reported bill, which was reported without dissent on a voice vote.
The fact is, the Collins-Lieberman amendment doubles the funds that would be distributed based on threat, risk, and consequences while maintaining a predictable and meaningful level of funding for each State.
For the Nation to be prepared, all States must achieve a baseline level of essential capabilities. The Federal Government is a partner with our State and local governments and with our 9 million first responders in this regard. Unfortunately, what we are seeing today is a regrettable and corrosive argument that is pitting urban centers against rural States. Our bill does not do that. We have carefully crafted a compromise that ensures that every State receives a baseline level in order to recognize that every State has homeland security needs and vulnerabilities and that first responders throughout the country need to be properly equipped, trained, and supported.
We know the terrorists traveled through, trained in, and stayed in rural States. Two of them left from my home State of Portland, ME, to begin their journey of devastation and death on September 11. A predictable stream of funding is essential to achieving the goals, but the fact is, S. 21 doubles the amount of money for risk-based funding compared to the current law. If one looks at this chart, the Senator from New Jersey repeatedly ignores the 10.7-percent distribution, which was Senator Levin's proposal, which means that risk-based factors account for more than 70 percent of the funding. That is more than double what is involved in current law.
So we have doubled the amount of money that would be allocated based on risk factors while maintaining a steady, predictable base line funding so that all States can achieve a level of preparedness. Again, the Senator from New Jersey----
Mr. LAUTENBERG. Will the Senator yield?
Ms. COLLINS. I will be happy to yield once I conclude my explanation.
The Senator from New Jersey again ignores the amount of money in this bill that would go to the law enforcement terrorism prevention program, which would be authorized for the first time in this legislation. Prevention takes a back seat to responding to a terrorist attack, and that is why virtually every police association in this country has endorsed the Collins-Lieberman bill, virtually every one, because of our emphasis on prevention as well.
The National Association of Police Organizations wrote: Unlike other homeland security grant proposals, S. 21 ensures that the prevention of terrorist attacks, not just response efforts, receives a significant share of homeland security funds.
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Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, before the Senator from California leaves the floor, let me say I admire the Senator from California, who is one of the most careful, thorough Members of this body.
The point that I was trying to make, and perhaps not as artfully as I should have, is that the Homeland Security Committee has held extensive hearings on the Homeland Security Grant Program. I am not aware of other committees in the Senate having done that. We have held extensive hearings over 3 years. We drafted a bipartisan bill. We received input from a number of groups. We have had two different markups, and the bill was reported unanimously last year, with only Senator Lautenberg in dissent this year. So our bill has had a great deal of consideration. That was the only point I was trying to make.
As the Senator knows, I have a great deal of admiration for what a careful legislator she is.
Mrs. FEINSTEIN. If I might say, Mr. President, I have great admiration for the Senator from Maine in the way she has conducted herself and the leadership she has shown.
Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, let me clear up a couple of misperceptions surrounding this debate. First of all, this debate is not about big States versus small States, although it certainly sounds that way.
Our amendment, for example, is cosponsored by both Senators from Ohio and, in fact, was heavily influenced by and contributed to by the Senator from Michigan, Mr. Levin. I ask unanimous consent he be added as a cosponsor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Ms. COLLINS. One reason our amendment bridges the small State-big State divide is that unlike the alternative amendment, the underlying bill, or current law, our amendment breaks away from a one-size-fits-all approach by establishing this sliding scale minimum allocation. Does a more populous State require more funds to achieve adequate levels of preparedness and prevention? The answer is yes, which is why the 19 most populous and densely populated States would get a higher baseline allocation than the .55 percent that other States would achieve. That includes the State of New Jersey, I would note, which receives considerably more.
Second, the underlying bill is not a middle point between the amendment that Senator Lieberman and I have offered and the Feinstein-Cornyn amendment. In fact, the underlying bill in our amendment includes substantially the same type of baseline allocation for most States. The difference is that under our amendment, the 19 most populous and densely populated States would receive a greater baseline allocation.
If you take into account the sliding scale minimum, which neither of my friends on the other side of the aisle have taken into account when they look at our bill, our amendment and the underlying bill allocates substantially the same amount of funds based on risk.
When we talk about the significance of preventing the next terrorist attack, it is important to note that terrorists have been proven to use staging areas away from the most obvious targets. So while New York City, Los
Angeles, and Washington, DC, are clearly targets, let us not forget that opportunities to catch terrorists, to stop them, exist in places such as Portland, ME; Norman, OK; and Norcross, GA.
As a recent publication of the International Association of Chiefs of Police notes:
Several of the terrorists involved in the September 11 attacks had routine encounters with State and local law enforcement officials in the weeks and months prior to the attack. If State, tribal and local law enforcement officers are adequately equipped and trained, they can be invaluable assets in efforts to identify and apprehend suspected terrorists before they strike.
Let's again look at some of the facts. As the 9/11 Commission report notes, terrorists trained and operated in different parts of the country to prepare for and carry out the September 11 attacks. For example, two of the terrorists were pilots and visited the flight school in Norman, OK. Norman is also where Moussaoui and another terrorist resided while attending school. Two of the terrorists stayed in Georgia, visiting such small communities as Norcross and Decatur before living in Stone Mountain, GA.
Although the 9/11 Commission found no explanation for these travels, the terrorists' mobility reveals an unpredictable pattern that shows that their presence was not confined to large cities. Over and over again, if you look at the list from the 9/11 Commission, you will see that the terrorists trained and lived in rural America, in small communities. As I have said earlier, this issue is very real to us from the Northeast, from the State of Maine in particular, because two of the terrorists started their day on 9/11 from the Portland, ME, airport.
Over and over again, we have seen, from law enforcement, warnings that we need to pay attention to prevention, and that is exactly what this bill does. Local police departments and sheriff's offices provide the bulk of law enforcement services to rural communities, and they are severely constrained by a lack of resources. That is why so many law enforcement groups have endorsed the Collins-Lieberman proposal.
There are other challenges; for example, to our food supply. But I see the Senator from Connecticut is now on the floor, so I yield to him the remaining time before we return to the Reid amendment.
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