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Release Date: February 1, 2008
For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
Contact: 202-282-8010
Secretary Chertoff: Good morning, everybody. We are here to announce the release of our guidance for 14 different grant programs for the fiscal year 2008. As you know, Congress appropriated money for fiscal year 2008 very late last year, in late December. So we’re now really coming out a little over 30 days later with this first round of guidance.
Now, this year Congress allocated over $3 billion to fund these programs, including $1.69 billion for the Homeland Security Grant Program, which is up $32 million from last year; and $852 million for the various Infrastructure Protection Programs, which reflects an increase of almost $200 million from last year.
It’s important to note that this guidance that we’re going to be releasing today is an important element of our strategy to work with state and local partners to strengthen their capabilities and reduce vulnerabilities in our communities across the country.
This guidance is more than just instruction on how to apply for money. It sets national priorities, it builds on the progress we’ve made over the last several years, and it helps to shape our country’s preparedness and protection programs.
This year we’ve seen an overall increase in – of $376.3 million as compared to last year. And since 2002, if you total up all the money that’s been distributed or will be distributed in homeland security grants, it will be about $22.7 billion – that’s “billion” with a “b.”
By any measure, even in Washington, that’s a very significant investment made by this administration with the support of Congress. And in a broader sense, this over $22 billion demonstrates how far we’ve come over the past five years in getting this process off the ground and getting resources into the hands of our city, state, county, fire, police, and emergency management partners around the country.
Let me give you a few examples. Chicago has established a fusion center that has connected Illinois state and local law enforcement agencies to the federal government. This is designed to improve accurate and timely sharing of information. Chicago is also establishing an early warning system that will enhance their ability to quickly inform the public about any major event. This system will broadcast real-time information to all major networks at a moment’s notice, and provide information to the public about routes, affected areas, and travel problems.
With our fiscal year 2006 Homeland Security funding, the New York Urban Area has provided land mobile radios to all local first responder vehicles. And Houston has utilized its Homeland Security funding since 2004 to enhance interoperable communications capabilities. Houston’s upgrades have provided interoperability for all radio and mobile terminals between Rosenberg, Texas and the surrounding jurisdictions within the Houston urban area.
Now, I do want to emphasize that these grants are not just about how much money a city, or a state, or an organization gets each year. It’s about working together to lower our overall risk, and to build national capabilities. And, of course, risk is not static; it changes from year to year. Threats change, and as we reduce our vulnerabilities, the vulnerabilities change, as well. The idea is, as we strengthen ourselves in some respects, in future years we’ll be able to move the money to new areas to reduce vulnerabilities in those, as well.
Now, before we get into the specifics of our priorities for 2008, I want to talk about some of this year’s changes, because we did make some changes between this year and last year. And some of those are based on legislation that Congress passed late last year. Others of the changes reflect changes in the risks and threats that we face.
You will see, first of all, that we have added 14 new cities who are now eligible for funding in our – under our Urban Areas Security Initiative Program, also known as UASI. This brings the total number of cities up to 60. This was in response to provisions in the 9/11 Commission Act, passed by Congress in 2007, that altered the way urban areas are defined, based upon population, density and several other factors. It is important to note, however, that no cities that were on the list last year were removed from the list this year.
There’s also a new Freight Rail Security Grant Program designed to reduce vulnerabilities in the transportation of potentially dangerous materials.
Our Operation Stonegarden, which allows us to fund local law enforcement when they work with our border patrol on border security, has been significantly expanded. Again, this reflects a major initiative in border security. This program allows local governments to work with us and to have additional capabilities that will support our National Border Patrol Strategy.
The REAL ID program, designed to move us towards secure national standards for driver’s licenses, includes an additional $48.5 million designated by Congress to help the states continue to move forward with this program.
In all, if you look at the grants that are available this year, there will be up to $359 million available to assist states with REAL ID implementation. This includes money carried over from last year that hadn’t been expended – the additional, almost $50 million I’ve talked about – and then up to 20 percent of Homeland Security grants funds that states can use as well for REAL ID.
You’ll also note that there’s a change in the Law Enforcement Terrorism Protection Program. This year Congress reconfigured the program to require that at least 25 percent of UASI and at least 25 percent of State Homeland Security grants be dedicated to law enforcement activities. This replaces what was formerly a single line item for LETPP, but importantly, it provides for a $66 million increase, over last year’s amount, in terms of money to be dedicated for Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention Programs.
And finally, because we recognize that disasters and attacks don’t necessarily neatly arrange themselves within individual jurisdictional lines, the Regional Catastrophic Preparedness Grants reflect a new program that will enhance regional all-hazards planning.
So with that, now let me talk a little bit about the specifics with respect to money. Other than the changes that Congress has mandated, and some adjustments based on factual alterations in the risk picture, this year we have continued the major philosophical and strategic approaches that we initiated in 2007. This reflects our overall strategy of risk management, and putting resources where the threat is the greatest. It suggests that the approach we took in 2007, which was widely, I think, applauded, is the correct approach, and therefore one that we’re going to continue using. It also – and this is very important – injects an element of continuity into this process.
One of the complaints that we heard over past years was that as there are major changes in programs, it makes it difficult for communities to do planning. This year, by continuing along a path of risk-focused funding that we initiated in 2007, we are not only doing smart funding, but we’re doing funding in a way that reflects continuity and is going to help planning be a little bit more stable.
Another important process note is, notwithstanding the fact that Congress didn’t give us an appropriation until late last year, almost three months into the fiscal year, we turned around the grant guidance in less than a month. That is the fastest we have ever done. It reflects the fact that we’re better at what we do, we’re smarter with respect to understanding the risk, and that continuity allows us to build upon things that we’ve done in prior years without rediscovering the wheel.
Also, in terms of funding priorities, we’re continuing to focus on building critical national preparedness capabilities. Last September we released the National Preparedness Guidelines, which includes 15 National Planning Scenarios and the Target Capabilities List. That is designed to plan for the major types of challenges we could face, and to give clear guidance to states and localities about the kinds of things they ought to be acquiring so they can discharge their responsibilities.
Along the line of continuing to build critical national preparedness capabilities, just a few weeks ago we released the National Response Framework. Again, this, I think, was widely acclaimed as a sensible, clear statement of how we react in the case of an emergency disaster, or even a man-made terrorist attack.
All of these tools help us synchronize our national preparedness and planning efforts, and much of this year’s grant guidance is driven by these principles. We are continuing our focus, for example, on Improvised Explosive Device deterrence, prevention and protection. And we are continuing to focus on threats to public transportation, critical infrastructure sites – things like chemical facilities, seaports, power plants, and dams.
So now let me highlight where we are money-wise in terms of some of these particular grant programs. As you know, the Homeland Security Grant Programs, which this year will be $1.69 billion – an increase from last year – consists, itself, of a number of individual programs. One is the State Homeland Security Program: $862.9 million, which is aimed at building state and local capabilities through planning, equipment, training, exercising, and other efforts. The money this year is an increase of $353 million-plus, over last year.
Another very important program is our Urban Area Security Initiative program, which this year is $781.6 million, an increase of almost $35 million over last year’s. This is a particularly important risk-based program because it’s focused on the high-threat, high-risk, high-density urban areas.
This year, as last year, we’ve divided these cities into two tiers. Tier I is seven cities, the same seven as we had last year. And as was the case last year, those cities will receive 55 percent of the funds that are available in total for the program. The remaining 53 cities in Tier II will receive and share in the 45 percent of the funds that remain. And just to remind you, the top tier cities are Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles-Long Beach, the National Capital region, Jersey City-Newark, New York, and the San Francisco Bay area. So we’re being consistent.
But something else I want to emphasize is – again, listening to the requests and the advice we’ve gotten from our partners in these cities and in the states – Tier I and Tier II cities receiving this year’s money will be eligible to use up to 25 percent of UASI funds to support counterterrorism personnel costs. And eligible states will be able to use 15 percent of their state funding for personnel costs. This injects the kind of flexibility the communities have been asking for, but it retains a disciplined, capabilities-based focus, and makes sure that people are spending on terrorism priorities and not general law enforcement or general maintenance types of programs.
Again, Operation Stonegarden is now allocating $60 million to work with our border patrol for border states, on enforcement border security. And our Law Enforcement Terrorism Protection Activities have received an increase, which will be reflected both in the way UASI money is spent, and state money spent.
The other major announcements we’re making have to do with our various Infrastructure Protection Programs. Port security grant funding this year is up $76 million, over last year, for a total of almost $390 million. And again we’re moving with respect to tiers, with the top tier ports being Delaware Bay, Houston-Galveston, Los Angeles-Long Beach, New Orleans, New York-New Jersey, Puget Sound, and San Francisco.
And let me tell you, what these Group I port areas are receiving for fiscal year 2008 – what we’re anticipating they’ll receive as compared with last year. San Francisco Bay will go up from $14 million to $25.5 million. Los Angeles-Long Beach will have a 135 percent increase, more than doubling from $15.4 million to $26.3 million. Delaware Bay will be up 44 percent – $13.2 million to $19.1 million. New Orleans will go up again, more than twice as much – $12.7 million to $29.4 million. New York will increase from $27.3 million to $43.3 million. Houston-Galveston will double from $15.1 million to almost $31 million this year. And finally Puget Sound will increase from $17.3 million to $26 million.
In addition to these Tier I, or Group I, locations, there are 41 Group II port areas that will be eligible for $134 million in funding.
The second major Infrastructure Protection Program where we will be announcing specific sums that we anticipate distributing this year are our Transit Security Grant Programs. Again, this year there was an increase of $117 million to a total of $388.6 million.
Our specific allocations – again, because we do, again, use this risk-based tiering approach – focusing on the Tier I transit areas, we’re going to see increases across the board. San Francisco Bay is going to increase from $13.8 million to $28.2 million. LA-Long Beach – $7 million to $13.3 million. National Capital region will have a dramatic increase from $18.2 million to $38.3 million. Atlanta will increase from $3.4 million to $6.3 million. Chicago – $12.8 million in ‘07 will become $24.8 million in ‘08. Boston will go up, almost double, $15.3 million to $29.2 million. New York will have a very significant increase in transit funds – $61 million to $153 million. And Philadelphia will double – will almost double – from $9.7 million to $18.5 million. Additionally, 29 Tier II urban areas will be sharing in $36.6 million on a competitive basis.
Talking about Regional Catastrophic Preparedness Grants, which are a new program, $60 million will be used to advance catastrophic planning and incident preparedness in UASI jurisdictions. Again, the Tier I cities and the Tier II cities that will be receiving money include: Chicago, Houston, LA-Long Beach, National Capital region, northern New Jersey/Newark, San Francisco, Boston, Honolulu, Norfolk, and Seattle.
Now, let me stand back and just talk briefly about the process before I turn it over to Administrator Paulison. This is the fourth year I’ve been part of the process of awarding grants. It’s always a contentious process because everybody always gets, perhaps, more than they fear, but less than they want. But I will say that as I look back over the last four years, the process has been dramatically refined. It is much more risk-based. It’s much clearer in the guidance, it’s much more focused. Although I still hear those urban legend stories about playground equipment and leather jackets, the fact of the matter is, we’ve moved far away from the early days where grants were sometimes frittered away on things that were not meaningful in terms of capability improvement.
And the fact that this year we’ve been able to build on last year’s model, adjusting where Congress asked us to do so, but continuing in a fashion that emphasizes continuity, I think that’s a big bonus, not only for the speed and clarity with which we’re able to get our guidance out, but also in terms of the planning that communities are able to do. And we’re going to continue to build on those concepts – risk management, clarity and continuity – as this department moves forward in future years to make sure the money goes where people expect it go against the highest risks to build the best capabilities in accordance with a clear, focused and disciplined strategy.
Finally, as we continue to enhance the role of our department’s regional offices, as mandated by the Post Katrina Emergency Management Act, regional activities will continue to play an increasing role in administering grant programs and making sure that we are in close touch with our partners, delivering the best possible services that we can.
Now, what are the next steps? As many of you know, once the guidance is released, applicants have 90 days to submit their applications. They will then follow a peer review process for many of the programs, during which subject matter experts will work with their counterparts at the state and local level to assess the applications. There will be some back-and-forth, so we can help people maximize their application process and do the best that they can under the program. And then we’ll be making allocation announcements in about 90 days.
And with that, I’ll turn it over to Chief Paulison.
Administrator Paulison: Thank you, Mr. Secretary, I appreciate it very much. I’m really pleased to join Secretary Chertoff and my colleagues from TSA and the Coast Guard to announce this rollout, as the Secretary said, of more than $3 billion that will provide – be provided to our partners at the tribal, state and local governments, but also at the private and the non-profit sectors. They’re going to help us better prepare and protect our country not only in months ahead, but in years ahead.
These grants include programs that will protect our critical infrastructures like our ports, our rail lines and our roads, but also we’ll be able to work with those people to make sure that these resources are effectively and fully used.
The grants include programs that will protect our cities and also strengthen our borders. And we’ll work with our state and local governments, our law enforcement, our first responders, hand in hand, to make sure that we get that funding on the ground in a clear and quick manner.
These grants also include resources that can assist our volunteers that want to help through other programs, like our Citizen Corps program. We are committed to get these resources out quickly, as I heard the Secretary said, to the people on the ground who can put them to work in an effective manner.
With the more than $3 billion announced today, you heard the Secretary say that we put out more than $20 billion in this administration that’s already been allocated for these grants. Now, we really are putting our money where our mouth is.
Now, let me just stress a few items that – has already been mentioned. First, I want to talk about the Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention Program. This year Congress specifically provided for an allocation methodology which requires at least 25 percent of the Urban Area Security Initiative, and 25 percent of the State Homeland Security Grant Program, for these important things. You heard the Secretary say that’s a net increase to $66 million. That’s a total of $429 million that will be going to the law enforcement community. But it also allows us to put these monies at the states and cities where the risk is the highest in this country.
And again, while it’s not a specific stand-alone program, the monies that they’re going to receive, we’ll make sure that it goes where it needs to go. Our grants program directorate, our new program we put in place, will ensure that the states and the territories are compliant with this requirement so that money does get to the law enforcement community where it belongs.
Secondly, we’re – incorporated additional reforms and new programs that take in consideration our new congressional guidance, as well as input from our external stakeholders. Secretary Chertoff mentioned some of those changes already: the expanded Urban Area Security Initiative list, new formulas based on 9/11 Commission recommendations, and new programs for our Freight Rail Security, but also that are targeted to our – protecting our borders.
FEMA’s role in this – across this agency, our regional leaders and senior officials stand ready to help all of those partners who use these resources to make sure they reach the full potential. We have a cross-section of advisors that we brought into FEMA to handle these grants. Ross Ashley came in from the non-profit sector, and he handles our grants programs. Our Deputy Administrator of Preparedness, Dennis Schrader, came in from the state government of Maryland. We brought Rick Densi, the former fire – police chief – yes, he heard me say fire chief – (laughter) – police chief of Salt Lake City, is now my new law enforcement advisor. But we also have senior leaders from small state, and rural advocates, and also from our faith-based and our disabled communities, to make sure these grants not only go where they need to go, but they’re used properly.
The establishment of these FEMA grants directorate will provide a one-stop shop for people using the grants, and this new office will help us enhance the fiduciary management of these grants so we can standardize the grants manager process, standardize the policies, standardize the reporting process and the accountability, which is extremely important for all of these grants.
And by releasing the grants guidance early, it will allow the applicants more time to plan and more time to apply for the funding so we can award the grants sooner. We’re going to continue to emphasize customer service and interaction throughout this process, including a mid-year review to make sure that they’re on target with the grants.
These grants are being directed to enhance specific outcomes in areas such as: strengthening our preparedness planning, preparing against Improvised Explosive Devices, prevention activities, and also protection capabilities.
Based on the Post Katrina Emergency Reform Act, FEMA’s regional office will also have an enhanced and expanded role in administering these grants, which will give the states a direct place to go to, instead of having to call into the – inside the Beltway every time they have an issue.
Like you heard the Secretary say, they have 90 days to submit these applications. What I want to point out also, that the peer review involves people from law enforcement, from the emergency management community, and the Homeland Security community, as well as specialists inside the federal, state and local governments, to make sure we have a good, clear assessment of these grants, and then within that 90 days we’ll have these allocations announced.
This is a strong process. It’s going to lead to very good outcomes for this. We’re going to continue to work with our partners to make sure this process moves forward as smoothly as possible, and to make sure it’s transparent and swift as it can be.
We’re looking forward to working with this in the future. And I want to thank you for joining us today. And what I would like to do right now is turn it back over to the Secretary to answer any questions you might have.
Mr. Secretary.
Secretary Chertoff: All right. Yes.
Question: Last year, it looks like $364 million was allocated to this Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention Program. That, it would appear, has been – that line item has been zeroed out; the money redistributed to two other programs, with a requirement that those service the needs of the law enforcement community. Is that the correct understanding?
Secretary Chertoff: Here’s what Congress did. Congress, in the appropriation, said, instead of having LETPP as a separate line item, money that is in the State Homeland Program and in the Urban Area Security Initiative Program, at least 25 percent in each has to be spent in accordance with Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention. So it basically takes what used to be a stand-alone program, makes it part of two other programs, for a net increase of $66 million. It also tends to make it a little bit more risk-based than it was.
Yes.
Question: Mr. Secretary, can you explain – you were saying that more urban areas have been added to the UI?
Secretary Chertoff: Right.
Question: But doesn’t that conflict with the idea of prioritizing where the money should go in your risk assessment analysis?
Secretary Chertoff: Well, Congress mandated that we adopt a slightly different formula, in terms of population density and the geographical boundaries of an urban area. We applied Congress’s mandate, and that does result in additional urban areas being added. However, we’ve retained the Tier I/Tier II separation, the Tier I cities being the highest risk cities – and that remains at seven; it’s the same cities they were last year.
Yes.
Question: It sounds to me that there might be a shift going on from federal oversight to regional oversight. I’m wondering, then, what is the role of the federal government in this whole process, then, and how are you going to ensure that states don’t see these regional sites as just an increased middle-man between getting answers –
Secretary Chertoff: Well, the regional offices are part of the federal government; I mean, it’s part of FEMA, it’s part of DHS. It’s just that we’re moving the oversight closer to the people who are receiving the funds so that they don’t necessarily have to go to Washington; they can deal with somebody more closely. But it is still DHS.
Question: Are there additional Tier II cities, and does that mean that there’s – that it’s been determined that there is more risk to those cities, or that there is more money to distribute so that you can go deeper in the well?
Secretary Chertoff: The Tier I cities remain the same. Additional cities were added; they were added to Tier II. They were added because as Congress defined the contours of an urban area, we adopted Congress’s mandate and plugged it into our formula, and that brought more cities into it. So there will be more cities in Tier II.
Question: I guess what I’m getting at is, if I was to read that my city has suddenly appeared on this list –
Secretary Chertoff: It doesn’t mean that there’s a dramatic change in the risk to the city. It reflects the fact that what defines the city, the boundaries of the urban area, have been changed, to some extent, under their congressional mandates, so they’re somewhat bigger, they include more people. When you add more people and more density and other things into the formula, they then wind up in Tier II.
Yes.
Question: Mr. Secretary, I’m just wondering if you have any reaction to the Commission on National Guard and Reserve Preparedness saying that there are significant gaps in their preparedness. (Inaudible) to announce $3 billion of funding here; more money needs to go to them for their preparedness, and –
Secretary Chertoff: Well, of course, as you know, the funding for National Guard and DOD is a different department. I can just tell you from my standpoint – and I think this was recognized in the report that came out yesterday, which did talk about a lot of stuff in the pipeline – but we’ve been working with DOD, NORTHCOM and the National Guard on planning for domestic events over the last year and a half, two years, and they’ve been phenomenal partners with us.
We have a level of integration and planning with DOD that the country has never seen before, and it was a direct result of reforms we put into effect after Katrina. And the best example of that was the wildfires. We were very fast, being able to get DOD assets in to support civilian assets in California, when we had those events late last year.
Is there more work to do in planning? Absolutely. And one of the things we’re determined to do this year is continue to drive forward on our joint planning scenarios. But I have to say that a lot of progress has been made. And while obviously there’s more to do, I’m delighted with the kind of partnership we’ve had with DOD in homeland security.
Question: Mr. Secretary, yesterday you previewed an increase in – (inaudible) – enforcement and in border security. I was just wondering if you could tell us, in fiscal year ‘09 where you – we can expect to see some cuts in general.
Secretary Chertoff: We’re going to unveil the fiscal year ‘09 budget next week. So then you’ll get all the answers you want.
Question: Any hints?
Secretary Chertoff: No, I think my hinting was exhausted yesterday. And the rest of you are going to have – you want to keep some suspense in the process. But I think the paper today did reflect the fact that in general, homeland security funding will be up for fiscal year ‘09 in the President’s budget, compared to prior requests.
Question: The Inspector General came out with a report recently, taking a look at Colorado. It said that Colorado established a committee to review its homeland security grants in 2005. But they – the committee did not regularly hold meetings, it did not review grant applications, and had no – and had not formally – had not even formally reviewed the state’s homeland security strategy. Will that be a consideration in – will past performance of the states be a consideration in allocating these grants? Should it be? And could you address the Colorado matter specifically?
Secretary Chertoff: I’m not going to get specifically into Colorado. I think if you – I still see stories – not usually among you all, because you all follow it pretty closely – but I still sometimes see stories about, you know, oh, money is being wasted on parties and this and that. I know there were, back in year 2002, 2003, when a lot of money was being pushed out, there was a lot of uncertainty, and probably there were things that were spent that were not necessarily the best value added in terms of the programs. That’s why, if you stand back and you look at everything that we’ve done in the last three or four years, it’s been aimed at having clear standards, better discipline, and better accountability in the process.
So we have lists of capabilities – we basically – look, in plain English, what this means is, we tell everybody now, with a lot of precision, here’s the kind of stuff you can spend money on. And then when they submit their applications to get money under these programs, we evaluate and we see whether these applications make sense, in terms of what we lay out as capabilities you have to have, and responsibilities that you are obligated to perform. And if you are advancing those goals, then you get the money. If you’re coming up with things that don’t advance those goals, then you’re not getting the money.
And then with the – particularly with the regional – enhanced regional approach, since we now have target capabilities and commitments about what people are going to spend the money on, it’s easier for us to measure and validate that the money is being spent on stuff that actually is advancing homeland security.
So we’re certainly not going to punish people for things that happened years ago, when there was a great deal of uncertainty, and the whole process was beginning to get started. But I think we’re much better equipped now to get to assure the American public that while there is flexibility in the states choosing priorities, that flexibility is bounded by a clear set of required capabilities and planning documents, which are, each year, making this system clearer, more disciplined, and more focused.
Thanks everybody.
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This page was last reviewed/modified on February 1, 2008.