Appropriators fail to fully fund security center

House and Senate appropriators are refusing to match President Bush's request for the Homeland Security Department's operations center, which links federal agencies and state and local officials during emergencies.

The center runs all day, every day and has been described as "Wall Street at 4 o'clock" by Director Matthew Broderick. It serves as the "primary national-level hub for operational communications, information sharing and situational awareness for all information pertaining to domestic incident management," according to the House Appropriations Committee report on the Homeland Security spending measure for fiscal 2006.

Yet the appropriators declined to meet the president's request to increase funding for the center from $35 million in fiscal 2005 to $61 million in fiscal 2006. The additional $26 million would be divided between the center's programs -- $13.4 million to expand the homeland security information network and $12.9 million to enhance the center's systems and operations, according to the administration's budget proposal.

The House bill would provide $56 million, and the Senate version would allocate $40 million.

The House passed its measure for the department in May. The Senate this month is expected to consider the version approved by the Senate Appropriations Committee. The two chambers must negotiate on final spending numbers for the department before sending a bill to the president.

In the president's budget proposal, the department said it would continue to expand connectivity on its homeland security information network -- a sensitive, but unclassified network -- to include one-third of the nation's counties. Last year, the department plugged every state and heavily populated urban cities into the network.

House appropriators said they deducted $5 million from Bush's request because the department has not provided a five-year implementation plan for the center that appropriators required in last year's spending measure. "Without the implementation plan, the committee cannot determine if the requested increase in funding is the most efficient use of the limited resources available," they argued. The Senate report declined to provide an explanation for its reduction.

Senate appropriators also rejected Bush's proposal for a new information-sharing and collaboration program, which would define more efficient practices for information-sharing processes among federal, state and local officials, as well as the private sector. House appropriators met Bush's request of $5.5 million for the initiative.

House and Senate appropriators fully funded Bush's request of $143 million for an emergency-preparedness telecommunications program, including the national communications system and an initiative to wirelessly link key personnel and government officials during a national crisis. The funding allocation would be $1.9 million less than provided last year.