Media Update: Anti-Terrorism Funding Criticism Continues

From some unlikely sources, the way that the Department of Homeland Security calculated risk+need to come up with funds for preventing terrorists strikes in the U.S. continues to be found to be riddled with flawed logic:

• The conservative National Review called Chertoff's process "indefensible" and complained that "low-risk cities like Louisville, Charlotte and Omaha can receive 40% increases - or, for that matter, any of this money at all."


• The non-partisan Congressional Research Service flagged potential problems with Chertoff's approach in January. In a report on his plan to award funds based on need as well as risk, CRS pointed out that the 9/11 Commission recommended that the funds be handed out based on risk only and warned that adding need could mean cities with a lower risk of attack would be included in the program. "By coupling need with risk," the report said, the department "might be providing funding to states and urban areas that do not have a high risk of terrorism."


• Democratic Rep. Carolyn Maloney of New York was more blunt. "Either they had an idiotic plan to slam New York or they are just completely incompetent," she said. "Neither of those scenarios make me feel any safer."

Link back to our original post on this subject.