Homeland Security bill would reorganize federal first responder programs

The White House and the Senate have agreed to a major shake-up of federal programs that provide anti-terrorism training to thousands of "first responders" in state and local governments as part of the homeland security bill now being considered by the Senate.

The reorganization, which is part of the homeland security bill passed Wednesday by the House, takes anti-terrorism training duties away from the Federal Emergency Management Agency and puts them in the Border and Transportation Security division of the Homeland Security Department.

Specifically, the deal carves out the Office of National Preparedness from FEMA and places it under the Office of Domestic Preparedness (ODP), which will take the lead in training and equipping thousands of "first responders" in the new department. The ODP is currently in the Justice Department, but it would move to the Border and Transportation Security Division of the Homeland Security Department under the legislation.

The arrangement is a major victory for Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., and other Senate appropriators, who have fought for months with the White House over the structure of federal first responder programs. Most senators favored keeping first responder programs at the ODP, while the Bush administration pushed to have them put in FEMA's Office of National Preparedness.

The White House proposed shifting ODP's programs to the FEMA office in its fiscal 2003 budget. It also tried to move both ODP and anti-terrorism programs at the Health and Human Services Department to FEMA in its homeland security legislation.

But these proposals went nowhere in the Senate, where many members believe the ODP is the logical office to distribute federal assistance to first responders. The office has provided training programs and distributed grants for equipment to states since 1997, developing close relationships with many first responder associations in the process.

On Sunday, the White House agreed to a proposal backed by Gregg and 38 other senators to make the domestic preparedness office the lead office for first responder assistance in the homeland security department, according to Senate staffers involved in the process. This proposal was then added to the Homeland Security bill.

"We're very excited that ODP will have a major role in fighting terrorism," said a Senate staffer.

Supporters of the ODP also were pleased. "We have a longstanding history of working with the Justice Department and ODP, and FEMA has not had a longstanding role; they've been new to the game," said Dean Cooter, director of governmental affairs at the National Sheriffs Association, which receives ODP grants to provide first responder training to sheriffs.

FEMA was not involved in the final negotiations, according to Senate staffers and sources inside the agency. Officially, FEMA would not comment on the reorganization. But a FEMA official noted that the entire agency, including the Office of National Preparedness (ONP), would still be shifted to the Homeland Security Department under the arrangement.

"I wouldn't say we're losing ONP because it's all under the homeland security umbrella," said the official.

Other FEMA officials expressed concern with the proposal, which splits responsibilities for emergency preparedness across two divisions of the new department. "It's separating terrorism out from all other hazards," said one official. "To break off one piece of preparedness doesn't make a lot of sense; it's not what's done at the state and local levels."

FEMA has long advocated an "all-hazards" approach to domestic preparedness, where state and local officials use similar techniques to respond to natural disasters and acts of terrorism. "We cannot have two different methods of responding to natural disasters and terrorism," said ONP Director Bruce Baughman in a September interview with Government Executive. "It's a waste of taxpayer dollars, frankly."

FEMA still stands to inherit some domestic preparedness programs under the House-passed bill. The agency will absorb HHS' Office of Emergency Preparedness, which distributed $1.1 billion in grants earlier this year to help state public health departments prepare for bioterrorism attacks. It will also still coordinate the federal government's response to terrorist attacks.

Gregg and other Senators did not urge that the HHS office be moved to the ODP, according to Senate staffers.

FEMA also may try to use reorganization authority provided in the homeland security legislation to retain ONP after the new department is created, according to sources inside the agency and in the Senate.

In September, Baughman said that moving all the domestic preparedness offices into FEMA would allow the agency to consolidate and streamline federal preparedness programs, making them easier to use for state and local officials. All major first responder offices would still be in the Homeland Security Department under the House-passed bill.

The federal government has been trying to coordinate federal first responder programs since 1998, when the Justice Department created the National Domestic Preparedness Office in the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The office has been defunct since last year and has no employees, but it never has been officially closed. Even though it is empty, the FBI office would move to FEMA under the homeland security legislation being considered by the Senate.