Panel to speed federal first responder funding

The Homeland Security Department announced the appointment Monday of 20 top state and local officials to a new panel that will seek to speed the flow of federal terrorism response funds to local officials.

The creation of the panel, which is chaired by Governor Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, followed months of squabbling between state and local officials over what Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge last month called a state-level "logjam" preventing federal funds from reaching community emergency responders.

The U.S. Conference of Mayors said in a January survey that 76 percent of cities polled had received no money from the Homeland Security Department's largest first-responder programs. Many state-government advocates have rejected blame for the problem, charging among other things that local officials have misunderstood the grant process.

Romney adviser John Cohen, a homeland security expert who is the governor's staff contact for the task force, said the funding problem is "extraordinarily complex" and that the group will not seek to assign blame for delays in the pipeline.

"It is a flawed assumption to try to level blame on one party. What we're finding is that there is a whole series of reasons why this money is not finding its way to where it needs to go. … It's not accurate to say that the sole reason why this money has not gotten where it needs to go is because state governments have dropped the ball," Cohen said.

Among reasons for funding delays, Cohen cited lengthy state procedures, including legislative involvement in grant allocation, and county and local procurement systems and administrative procedures.

The task force, which has been meeting for about two weeks and is expected to issue recommendations to the department within two months, brings together governors, mayors, county executives and other officials in a bid to "examine the funding process and ensure that Department of Homeland Security funds move quickly to local first responders," the department said in a press release. It said the group would address "impediments to the efficient and effective distribution of state and local homeland security funds."

"The Department of Homeland Security shares the concerns of communities anticipating these funds. … The task force will put homeland security dollars into the hands of first responders more rapidly," Ridge said Monday.

One official familiar with the task force's work said the group was convened for political as well as policy reasons. "From the standpoint of the administration," the source said, "they want to be able to demonstrate that they are getting this money out the door from their bank and getting it into the hands of local communities." At the same time, the source said, opponents of the administration will cite the funding delays as an example of a flawed federal approach to homeland security.