[ RadSafe ] Better Nuclear Detectors Needed, DHS Deputy Nomin ee Says

[Bradt, Clayton]

How about a formula based upon tax receipts instead of population? Those
parts of the country that generate the most revenue for the federal
government, and hence home to the most productive infrastructure and
inhabitants would receive the most protection.  After all, protecting our
nation's most vital assets is the whole purpose of homeland security. 

Clayton J. Bradt, CHP
Principal Radiophysicist
NYS Dept. of Labor
phone: (518) 457 1202
fax:     (518) 485 7406
e-mail: clayton.bradt at labor.state.ny.us


-----Original Message-----
From: Gerry Blackwood [mailto:gpblackwood at sbcglobal.net] 
Sent: Tuesday, March 08, 2005 2:28 PM
To: Rad Safe
Cc: Iosif Izrailit; Leon Ryrakhowsky; Leon SFS
Subject: [ RadSafe ] Better Nuclear Detectors Needed, DHS Deputy Nominee
Says


Better Nuclear Detectors Needed, DHS Deputy Nominee Says

By Joe Fiorill
Global Security Newswire


WASHINGTON - A new unit in the U.S. Homeland Security Department will seek
to bolster funds and speed research for improved nuclear detection
technology at entry ports, Homeland Security Deputy Secretary-designate
Michael Jackson said yesterday (see GSN, March 3).

Homeland Security's new Domestic Nuclear Detection Office is expected to be
at the center of the department's nuclear response strategy, said the
nominee, a former deputy transportation secretary who was most recently
chief operating officer of AECOM Technology Corp. He cited better detection
capabilities as one important aspect of the work.

"This has been one of Secretary [Michael] Chertoff's early briefs, and he is
strongly supportive of the effort," Jackson said when Senator Norm Coleman
(R-Minn.) asked about the program at a hearing of the Senate Homeland
Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

President George W. Bush's fiscal 2006 budget proposal for Homeland Security
stipulates creation of the new office and includes $262 million to research
and develop better port-of-entry radiation detection devices.

If confirmed, Jackson would replace James Loy as second-in-command at the
young department. He told senators yesterday that he views the post for
which he is nominated as that of a chief operating officer, a "strategic
thinker" and "change agent" who is "customer-focused," "action-oriented" and
"constructively impatient."
Senators Renew Push for Risk-Based Response Grants 

Recurrent themes of senators' questioning during the confirmation hearing
included the department's much-maligned funding formula for state and local
emergency response.

The formula has so far been based heavily on population and per-state
minimum payments, but critics from all quarters have called for an approach
that would direct more money to locations facing demonstrated threats and
vulnerabilities.

Committee Chairwoman Susan Collins (R-Maine) yesterday criticized the
department for a "lack of strategic planning" that she said prevented
resources from being distributed effectively, adding that Bush's fiscal 2006
proposal would cut emergency response funding to "inadequate" amounts.

A White House budget summary indicates the fiscal 2006 proposal includes
$3.6 billion for "state and local first-responder grants and other
assistance" but seeks to "restructure" $2.6 billion of that amount to give
the department more latitude to target spending to areas where it sees the
greatest risks. 

Among changes involved in the restructuring is a reduction in the percentage
of the overall grant budget that each state receives as a baseline from 0.75
percent to 0.25 percent. The move is intended to free up more funds to be
allocated on the basis of risk, Homeland Security Office for Domestic
Preparedness spokesman Marc Short said today.

"We would still provide a baseline, but it's a smaller baseline," Short said
in a telephone interview.

In addition, the proposal seeks to combine a number of federal programs -
protecting ports and public transportation systems, for example - so that
funds may more freely be moved among them depending on the latest threat
information.

Senior committee Democrat Carl Levin (Mich.) yesterday called the declining
amount of grants "deeply troubling" but praised Homeland Security for moving
toward more risk-based spending.

"That is a positive move, certainly an improvement over the formula which
has been used to allocate this funding, which has yielded inequitable
results," Levin said, expressing hope that legislation enshrining the new
approach would be passed this year.

Collins and others in Congress have for nearly two years sought to obtain
passage of such legislation. When Congress in December 2004 approved
legislation implementing the recommendations of the federal 9/11 commission,
proponents of first-response funding reform for a time believed their
legislation would be inserted into the 9/11 bill. Ultimately they succeeded
only in placing in the plan a "sense of Congress" statement in support of
their effort.

"It is the sense of Congress that Congress must pass legislation in the
first session of the 109th Congress to reform the system for distributing
grants to enhance state and local government prevention of, preparedness for
and response to acts of terrorism," reads the bill, which Bush signed into
law Dec. 17. The White House cited that language in documents describing its
restructuring of state and local Homeland Security grants for fiscal 2006.

The committee could approve Jackson's nomination this week, Collins said



"Dante once said that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who
in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality."