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92–257 PDF 2004

S. HRG. 108–344

TERRORISM: FIRST RESPONDERS

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON TERRORISM, TECHNOLOGY 

AND HOMELAND SECURITY

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

SEPTEMBER 3, 2003

Serial No. J–108–35

Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah, Chairman 

CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa 

ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania 

JON KYL, Arizona 

MIKE DEWINE, Ohio 

JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama 

LINDSEY O. GRAHAM, South Carolina 

LARRY E. CRAIG, Idaho 

SAXBY CHAMBLISS, Georgia 

JOHN CORNYN, Texas 

PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont 

EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts 

JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., Delaware 

HERBERT KOHL, Wisconsin 

DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California 

RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin 

CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York 

RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois 

JOHN EDWARDS, North Carolina 

BRUCE ARTIM, Chief Counsel and Staff Director 

BRUCE A. COHEN, Democratic Chief Counsel and Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON TERRORISM, TECHNOLOGY AND HOMELAND SECURITY

JON KYL, Arizona, Chairman 

ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah 

ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania 

MIKE DEWINE, Ohio 

JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama 

SAXBY CHAMBLISS, Georgia 

DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California 

EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts 

JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., Delaware 

HERBERT KOHL, Wisconsin 

JOHN EDWARDS, North Carolina 

STEPHEN HIGGINS, Majority Chief Counsel 

DAVID HANTMAN, Democratic Chief Counsel 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

STATEMENTS OF COMMITTEE MEMBERS 

Page

Biden, Hon. Joseph R., Jr., a U.S. Senator from the State of Delaware ............. 11

Feingold, Hon. Russell D., a U.S. Senator from the State of Wisconsin ............. 28

prepared statement .......................................................................................... 40

Feinstein, Hon. Dianne, a U.S. Senator from the State of California ................. 3

Kyl, Hon. Jon, a U.S. Senator from the State of Arizona .................................... 1

prepared statement .......................................................................................... 42

Leahy, Hon. Patrick J., a U.S. Senator from the State of Vermont, prepared 

statement .............................................................................................................. 44

Schumer, Hon. Charles E., a U.S. Senator from the State of New York ............ 31

WITNESSES 

Clarke, Richard A., Senior Advisor, Independent Task Force on Emergency 

Responders ............................................................................................................ 15

Cox, Hon. Chris, a Representative in Congress from the State of California .... 5

Posner, Paul L., Managing Director, Federal Budget Issues and Intergovernment Relations, Strategic Issues, General Accounting Office .......................... 17

Rudman, Hon. Warren, Chair, Independent Task Force on Emergency Responders ................................................................................................................ 12

Turner, Hon. Jim, a Representative in Congress from the State of Texas ......... 8

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD 

Clarke, Richard A., Senior Advisor, Independent Task Force on Emergency 

Responders, prepared statement ........................................................................ 36

Posner, Paul L., Managing Director, Federal Budget Issues and Intergovernmental Relations, Strategic Issues, General Accounting Office, prepared 

statement .............................................................................................................. 47

Turner, Hon. Jim, a Representative in Congress from the State of Texas, 

prepared statement .............................................................................................. 71

(1)

TERRORISM: FIRST RESPONDERS 

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 2003 

UNITED STATES SENATE, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON TERRORISM, TECHNOLOGY AND HOMELAND

SECURITY

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, 

WASHINGTON, D.C. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:19 p.m., in room 

SD–226, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Jon Kyl, Chairman 

of the Subcommittee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Kyl, Feinstein, Leahy, Biden, Feingold, and 

Schumer. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JON KYL, A U.S. SENATOR 

FROM THE STATE OF ARIZONA 

Chairman KYL. Good afternoon. The Subcommittee on Terrorism 

and Technology will come to order. One of our first panelists is not 

here, but I think in view of time we are going to begin and I will 

begin with my opening statement. 

Let me say preliminarily that this Committee has been blessed 

with cooperation of experts in the past, but today we have really 

the most expert panel that we could have on the subject before us, 

the subject of first responders. I just want to thank all of our witnesses today for their willingness to be here and to edify the Committee on this most important topic. 

Let me begin with my statement. Senator Feinstein is in the 

ante room and she will be here very shortly to give her statement 

and then we will call upon our first panel. 

Of course, we know that first responders are the police and the 

firefighters and the emergency medical technicians. Our first witness, Chris Cox, Representative Cox, has said that first responders 

are the backbone of our communities. We post their names and 

numbers on our refrigerators because we rely upon them to help 

us in an emergency. They are our heroes in times of crisis. Indeed, 

during the September 11 attacks, the police and the firefighters led 

evacuations from the World Trade Center, helping an estimated 

15,000 people escape safely. 

So, today, our Subcommittee will examine the report of the Independent Task Force on Emergency Responders, sponsored by the 

Council on Foreign Relations. We will hear from these noted experts, as I have said. 

On the first panel, we will hear from the Chairman and Ranking 

Member of the House Select Committee on Homeland Security, 

Representative Chris Cox, and Jim Turner, the ranking Democrat 

2

on the Committee. Chairman Cox has a proposal titled ‘‘Faster and 

Smarter Funding for First Responders,’’ which is based on the following principles. 

Threat analysis: Federal grants should be distributed based on 

an authoritative assessment of where the risk is greatest. Rapid 

funding: Funding should get to its intended first responders as 

quickly as possible. Regional cooperation: Funding priorities should 

reward communities that successfully develop interoperability 

plans and work across jurisdiction lines. 

On the second panel, we will hear from, as I say, three of the 

most expert people we could call upon here. First, Senator Warren 

Rudman, the Chairman of the Independent Task Force on Emergency Responders; Dick Clarke, the Senior Advisor to the Council 

on Foreign Relations. 

At the outset of its report, by the way, the Council makes the 

point, and I am quoting now, ‘‘The United States must assume that 

terrorists will strike again, and the United States remains dangerously ill prepared to handle a catastrophic attack on American 

soil’’—a pretty serious statement. 

According to the report, there are two major obstacles hampering 

America’s emergency preparedness efforts: lack of preparedness 

standards and stalled funding for emergency responders. One of 

the Council’s recommendations to deal with the problem of stalled 

distribution is that the system for allocating scarce resources 

should be based less on equally dividing the spoils and more on addressing identified threats and vulnerabilities. 

According to the report, and I am again quoting, ‘‘To do this, the 

Federal Government should consider such factors as population, 

population density, vulnerability assessment, and presence of critical infrastructure within each State.’’ I agree with that and look 

forward to hearing the witnesses discuss that. 

Finally, the Subcommittee will hear from Dr. Paul Posner, of the 

General Accounting Office. At the beginning of his written testimony, Dr. Posner makes a similar point and he writes, again 

quoting, ‘‘Given the many needs and high stakes involved, it is all 

the more important that the structure and design of Federal grants 

be geared to fund the highest-priority projects with the greatest potential impact for improving homeland security.’’ 

It seems that, as Chairman Cox has said elsewhere, the pipeline 

is a big part of the problem. Indeed, in its report the Council says, 

again quoting, ‘‘In some respects, there is no natural limit to what 

the United States could spend on emergency preparedness. The 

United States could spend the entire gross domestic product and 

still be unprepared, or wisely spend a limited amount and end up 

sufficiently prepared.’’ 

If it does the former, I submit that it just throws money at the 

problem and then the result will be, as the Council observed, ‘‘The 

United States will have created an illusion of preparedness based 

on boutique funding initiatives without being systematically prepared. The American people will feel safer because they observe a 

lot of activity, not be safer because the United States has addressed its vulnerabilities’’—I think a wise conclusion. I agree, 

therefore, that the Government needs to spend its money more 

wisely. 

3

One example of this, a potential wise use of resources, is a proposal called Project Zebra. Project Zebra is a medically-based bioattack detention and warning system which could detect and monitor infections from biological attacks and quickly communicate the 

results across the country. 

Rather than attempting, at great and maybe even prohibitive 

cost, to set up sensors across the Nation—many believe that that 

would be infeasible—Project Zebra would quickly determine whether symptoms of patients presenting themselves to emergency rooms 

were the result of normal diseases or from biological agents. 

As for the pipeline and the formulas, there is an experience in 

Arizona that I just thought I would share with you that illustrates 

at least part of the problem. 

Recently, the Department of Homeland Security classified Pima 

County, Arizona’s population level the same as Maricopa County’s. 

They are quite different. As a result, Pima County is scheduled to 

receive an additional $1.3 million beyond its allowed formula grant. 

Well, Pima County is located on the border with Mexico and it 

has very urgent first responder and border enforcement needs. So 

the county has dedicated, but not yet spent, this windfall of first 

responder funds. The county officials are hopeful they will be able 

to keep those inadvertently promised funds from DHS. 

My point here is obviously that was simply a mistake. What we 

need to do is focus where the targeted needs are and where the 

highest risk is and direct our funding most there. Of course, I 

would contend that border counties fall within that category of high 

risk, by definition, and should receive a significant part of first responder spending, and not by accident. 

In any event, in closing I again thank the witnesses for being 

here. I would like to thank Senator Feinstein, as usual. The basic 

idea for conducting this hearing at this time came from Senator 

Feinstein, and on this issue and every other in this Subcommittee 

she has been enormously helpful and very constructive to work 

with. 

Senator Feinstein.

STATEMENT OF HON. DIANNE FEINSTEIN, A U.S. SENATOR 

FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman, and I 

think you know that I find it a privilege and a delight to work with 

you, and I thank you very much for calendaring this hearing. 

I also want to welcome the two specialists—I am sure there are 

others in the House—Congressmen Cox and Turner. We look forward to your comments on homeland security. And, of course, Warren Rudman, who I think has appeared before this Subcommittee 

now three times. 

Chairman KYL. At least three times. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. At least that, and is greatly respected. Also, 

Dick Clarke and Paul Posner, as well. 

Now, I would like to take a little different tack in my opening 

comments because of something you said, Senator, that there are 

targeted needs and the money needs to be directed toward these 

targeted needs. So the first point I want to make is that the formula under which these monies are distributed really fails to do 

4

that. Wisconsin, for example, gets about $35 per person. California 

gets $5 per person. The GAO has looked at this and found that the 

formula really doesn’t see that money goes where the needs are. 

The second point I would like to make is that the Council on Foreign Relations Task Force report entitled ‘‘Drastically Underfunded, Dangerously Unprepared,’’ is the first systematic attempt 

to estimate national homeland security needs. It determined that 

first responders have unbudgeted needs that total about $100 billion. Others agree with that, and I just want to mention a few 

other findings that are borne out to support what the task force 

has done. 

In March of 2003, the Conference of Mayors said that cities are spending an additional $70 million per week on personnel costs 

alone just to keep up with security requirements. 

FEMA conducted a study and reports that only one-fourth of all 

fire departments can communicate with other first responder safety 

employees—only a quarter, and that is because of the inoperability 

of communications equipment, which we have tried to do something 

about in the supplemental appropriations bill. So that is a huge 

problem because you have an episode and everybody reports to a 

site and nobody can talk with one another. Only one-fourth of fire 

departments can communicate. According to the Coast Guard, our ports need $1.1 billion for sea- port security this year and $5.4 billion during the next 10 years. 

In spite of this, as we all know, the President did not request any 

money for port security grants or any form of assistance to our 

ports in fiscal year 2003 and 2004. 

The American Public Transportation Association testified earlier this year that we need $6 billion in transit security, primarily in 

the areas of communications, surveillance, detection systems, personnel, and training. GAO recently reported, and I quote, ‘‘Insufficient funding is the most significant challenge in making transit 

systems safe and secure.’’ In eight of the ten transit agencies surveyed, GAO found that $700 million was needed just in those eight 

to improve security. 

Using EPA data, the GAO found that 123 chemical facilities 

across the country, if attacked, could inflict serious damage and expose millions of people to toxic chemicals and gases. There are 

3,000 chemical facilities in 49 States that, if attacked, could affect 

more than 10,000 people each. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that it will cost $80 million just to conduct vulnerability 

assessments associated with these chemical plants. 

So I think there is really little question that we need to do more. 

I know, as you said, some of the money hasn’t been spent, but the 

point that I am trying to make, and what I hear from police and 

fire and mayors and county supervisors everywhere is that we don’t 

have the money to do what the Federal Government wants us to 

do. So I look forward to the testimony. 

Chairman KYL. Thank you, Senator Feinstein. 

Now, our first panel, and if I could ask both Representative Cox 

and Representative Turner to have a seat. They are well known to 

all of us. Congressman Christopher Cox is serving his eighth term 

in the United States House of Representatives representing the 

48th Congressional District of California. He is Chairman of the 

5

House Select Committee on Homeland Security. He is also Chairman of the House Policy Committee. I referred earlier to the very 

important legislation which he has introduced and hope that he 

will refer to. 

Representative Jim Turner is serving his fourth term in Congress representing the 2nd Congressional District of Texas. He is 

the Ranking Member of the House Select Committee on Homeland 

Security, also a member of the House Armed Services Committee, 

where he has served as the Ranking Member of the Terrorism Subcommittee. 

Gentlemen, I welcome you both. 

Representative Cox. 

STATEMENT OF HON. CHRIS COX, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Representative COX. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and 

Senator Feinstein. We are, my Ranking Member and I, very 

pleased to be here with Warren Rudman, Dick Clarke, and Jamie 

Metzl because we, as you, are relying upon the very same experts. 

This study leads to certain predictable destinations and I think 

that the advice that you will receive on the next panel will be well 

worth listening to. 

We are here approximately on the 2-year anniversary of the September 11 attacks which, when they occurred, drew immediate attention to the urgent role of first responders—the police, the firefighters, the emergency medical teams—who are always the first 

on any crisis scene. 

After that, the Nation’s attention has also focused on the deficiencies in information-sharing within our Government, within the 

Federal Government, between and among FBI, CIA, and the other 

intelligence agencies, and also between Washington and State and 

local government. 

Together, these two crucial elements—first responders and intelligence of homeland security—are inextricably linked because information about an attack that reaches the front lines of local authorities in real time could potentially reduce its impact, if not stop it 

entirely. 

In the 2 years since September 11, the focus on first responders 

has generated a growing awareness that Federal money isn’t reaching the first responders where it is needed. Our House Committee 

on Homeland Security has held hearings here in Washington and 

in the field, and the answers have come back routinely and predictably. Even though Congress has appropriated $14 billion in first responder monies since September 11, time and time again the people whom you would expect to have that money at the local level 

do not have it. 

While much of the discussion has focused on calls for ever higher 

levels of spending, Mr. Chairman, as you pointed out, an even 

greater problem—and, Senator Feinstein, you in your opening 

statement pointed out this same problem—is that information 

gathered by counterterrorism experts, at significant taxpayer expense it is worthwhile to add, is ignored in the disbursement process. 

6

The present grant system for first responders is similar to the 

one that the Federal Government uses for paving roads and responding to mudslides. Political formulas based on parity and population rather than intelligence on terrorist plans and intentions 

determines where the billions go. Such an archaic approach to the 

challenges posed by international terrorism is courting disaster. 

In Washington, once it became clear that important first responder needs were going begging, the usual political blame game 

ensued. The politically expedient course, of course, was to demand 

that the Department of Homeland Security use the dozens of existing formulas, the ones that it inherited from the 22 agencies that 

were folded into DHS, so that the money could go quickly. 

But these were complicated and eccentric formulas. They were 

complicated and eccentric because they were built by the political 

class to meet political needs. Thus, the grant formula for fighting 

fires now serves double duty for homeland security. But this and 

other such formulas have nothing to do with objective measurements of the relative risks of terrorism attack. 

Inserting intelligence into the equation for our emergency responders is an area where Congress—the Senate and the House, 

this Subcommittee, our Select Committee—can and should exert its 

influence. If Americans are to be protected against the next terrorist attack, local police, firefighters, and emergency medical personnel must be prepared as never before. They must have the 

equipment and the training to respond to a variety of new threats, 

in addition to the more traditional emergencies. 

All sides are agreed that this takes money, and Congress has 

thus far responded. Since that terrible day in September 2 years 

ago, as I mentioned, Congress has appropriated over $14 billion for 

first responders alone. That is an increase of over 1,000 percent. 

Even for Washington, this is an incredible amount of money. 

But the fact that such large sums are involved only accentuates 

the importance of spending this money wisely. It is a truism that 

if you send the money to the wrong place, then the important needs 

are underfunded no matter how much you spend. That means all 

funds should be disbursed on the basis of hard-nosed threat assessment. 

Currently, Federal funding for first responders is parceled out 

among the States with a guaranteed minimum for every State, presumably because every State has two Senators. One obvious distortion is that California receives less than $5 per person in first responder grants, as Senator Feinstein has just pointed out, whereas, 

for example, Wyoming receives over $35. The same result obtains 

in other large States, including New York. 

Equally unjustifiable, however, is that with rare exception the remainder of the funds are allocated only according to the population. 

While larger concentrations of population may indeed be terror targets, this is a very unsophisticated approach to what should be an 

intelligence-driven process. 

Small-population farm States such as Iowa and Nebraska can legitimately claim attention because of their responsibilities for the 

Nation’s food supply. Regions such as Alaska and Wyoming that 

have few people are thick with defense assets, energy, and other 

productive infrastructure. Sorting out these competing claims must 

7

be achieved through rigorous threat assessments, not political 

tradeoffs. 

Just as rickety as the funding formulas and just as much in need 

of reform is the grant application process for first responder monies. Currently, applicants are forced to follow a convoluted 12-step 

process in order to receive a portion of the money that Congress 

has already made available to them. 

Localities wait months to be reimbursed for funds they have already been forced to spend by Federal mandate. This outdated 

grant system results in delays and funding distortions that do 

nothing but exacerbate the risks we face. 

Expending extravagant amounts to purchase items we don’t need 

in places that don’t need them is not homeland security. It does not 

protect those who are most at risk. To determine how to prioritize 

our first responder grant assistance, sound threat assessment must 

be the basis for Federal grants. 

Here is how it could work. States, as well as multi-state and 

interstate regions, would determine their vulnerabilities on an ongoing basis. Simultaneously, the Federal Government would complete and constantly update its national vulnerability assessment. 

States and regions that develop their own homeland security first 

responder plans would be able to apply directly to the Department 

of Homeland Security to meet their specific regional needs. 

The Department would match the State and local vulnerability 

assessments against all the Federal Government knows about our 

terrorist enemies and our National vulnerabilities. Federal first responder grant assistance would flow to where the risk is greatest. 

With the Homeland Security Act, Congress and President Bush 

took prompt and definitive action to break down legal and cultural 

barriers to information-sharing. Now, the FBI, the CIA, and dozens 

of other Federal, State and local intelligence and law enforcement 

agencies are sharing data on terrorists and their plans. This is a 

good start. 

The grant-making process for our first responders deserves 

equally decisive action. And let’s be clear: our enemies have no political two-stepping process to perform. There is no confusion on 

their end. They are focused on one objective only, to inflict fear and 

panic on our citizens, kill our loved ones, and destroy our economy 

and our way of life. 

This is no overstatement. There is no need for drama. We can 

and we must start to make sense of the way we fund our first responders, the men and women upon whom we all may 1 day rely 

for our lives if we are to prevail in the war on terror. 

Congressman Turner and I are committed to doing this in the 

House. We know you are committed to doing this as best we can 

in the Senate, and we look forward to working with you in this 

process. 

Thank you very much for the opportunity to testify. 

Chairman KYL. Thank you, Chairman Cox. I think some more sophisticated observers might find it a little odd that a Senate Subcommittee would actually be calling upon our colleagues in the 

House for their best judgment on things, and I hope this reflects, 

first of all, our willingness to acknowledge that there is a lot of wisdom on the other side of the Capitol, and, secondly, that we are all 

8

in this together. We have a lot to learn, I know, from our colleagues in the House of Representatives, and so we are very happy 

to have you here. 

Representative Turner. 

STATEMENT OF HON. JIM TURNER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS 

Representative TURNER. Mr. Chairman, Senator Feinstein, thank 

you. It is always an honor for those of us in the lower House to 

be invited to the upper chamber. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. It is nice to see humility. 

[Laughter.] 

Representative TURNER. We do appreciate the opportunity to be 

here, and it is a pleasure to share this time with my Chairman, 

Chris Cox. 

As you said, Senator Kyl, the effort to protect the homeland is 

a bipartisan effort and it has been an honor to serve with Chairman Cox. 

We all know that as we convene this meeting, it is very likely 

that someplace in this world a terrorist group is planning their 

next attack on America. While it is true that the first line of defense against Al-Qaeda is fought abroad, the focus of our hearing 

today is clearly upon being prepared in the event terrorists do overcome our best efforts to defeat them and attack America again. 

The first reports that I have gotten from the front lines here at 

home are not encouraging. I have talked with a lot of State and 

local officials, first responders who have come to Washington, men 

and women who are responsible for our safety. In many instances, 

they tell us that they have yet to hear from the Department of 

Homeland Security. They are clearly not receiving the kind of information, the kind of assistance, the kind of coordination that 

needs to be there in order to make the critical security decisions 

within their own communities. They are looking for answers, they 

are looking for funding, and it is our responsibility under the Constitution to preserve and protect the national defense and to ensure 

that they get that help. 

A lot of folks also are wondering about the homeland security advisory system, the color-coded system, and what does it really 

mean. When do we really act based upon what we hear and what 

action should we take? 

One message is clear to me. We must move much faster and we 

must be much stronger in our efforts to defend the homeland, faster in getting the vital information that we need to the front lines 

of those first responders, stronger in our efforts to train and to 

equip the men and women on the front lines, those firefighters, police, emergency management personnel, and health care workers. 

We must be more vigorous in our efforts to prepare our communities to face the threats from those who seek to do us harm. 

Last June 29, the Council on Foreign Relations Independent 

Task Force on Emergency Responders released a report that you 

will hear about in the second panel today entitled ‘‘Emergency Responders: Drastically Underfunded, Dangerously Unprepared.’’ I 

want to commend Senator Rudman, Richard Clarke, and Jamie 

9

Metzl for their work on this outstanding document. It clearly was 

a wake-up call for America. 

According to the data provided to the Council on Foreign Relations Task Force by leading emergency response officials, America 

is still falling an estimated $98 billion short of meeting the critical 

emergency responder needs over the next 5 years. As Senator Feinstein cited, there are many other estimates, all of which are large. 

But it is important, I think, as Chairman Cox indicated, that we 

emphasize that money alone is not the only issue that we must address. I must say, in addition to funding and formulas, there are 

a host of other issues that must be addressed in order that we be 

responsible and accountable with regard to our effort to defend the 

homeland. 

The Council on Foreign Relations report stated that there are 

two major obstacles that hamper America’s emergency preparedness efforts. First, it is impossible to know precisely what is needed 

because there is a lack of common understanding about the essential capabilities each community needs to respond to a catastrophic 

terrorist attack. Second, according to the CFR report, funding for 

emergency responders has been stalled due to a slow distribution 

of funds by Federal agencies and bureaucratic red tape at all levels. 

The work of this bipartisan task force makes it clear to all of us 

that we must move faster and we must be stronger to prepare our 

communities and protect America. We must make the same commitment to our local responders that we have always made to those 

who fight our battles abroad, our military forces, where we always 

say we want them to have the best training and the best equipment that we can provide. That same commitment must be made 

to those first responders. 

It is time, I think, Senators, to look at a comprehensive change 

in the way our preparedness programs are working. Secretary 

Ridge announced a few positive steps yesterday, but there remain 

several critical security gaps that must be addressed immediately. 

First, under Section 201 of the Homeland Security Act, the Department, and specifically the Information, Analysis, and Infrastructure Protection Directorate, referred to as the IAIP, has the 

responsibility to, one, carry our comprehensive assessments of the 

vulnerabilities of this Nation’s key resources and critical infrastructure; two, to detect and assess terrorist threats to the United 

States; and, three, integrate this information to identify priorities 

for protective and preparedness measures throughout the Nation. 

Unfortunately, none of these tasks have been completed. The Office of Information Analysis, which is, as you know, an entity within the IAIP, is what I call the nerve center of that new Department. Its work should drive every action and every priority of that 

Department, as well as the efforts being carried out at the State 

and local level. 

It is only by matching the threats against our vulnerabilities that 

we can direct homeland security planning efforts and prioritize 

funding. Today, we have millions of dollars being spent in the 

name of homeland security through a myriad of grant programs. 

But until we establish the priorities through the proper analysis of 

10

our threats and our vulnerabilities, we will not be targeting the 

funding to remedy our greatest vulnerabilities first. 

Our security gap, then, is really that we do not know what we 

really need. The Department of Homeland Security has not worked 

with State and local governments to determine, based on threats 

and vulnerability assessments, the essential capabilities our communities need to prepare for terrorist attack. 

No one has said to the first responders, this is what we think is 

the basic minimum, essential level of preparedness. And because 

we do not know what equipment, planning, training, and personnel 

are truly needed, we certainly do not know the cost. 

There is an urgent need, in my view, to establish a task force to 

determine the minimum essential capabilities for our first responder community. In my view, this task could provide clear guidance on the necessary skills and resources required to prevent, prepare for, and respond to terrorist attacks. 

Communities could then create preparedness and response plans 

based on the local, regional, and Federal capabilities. The establishment of minimum essential capabilities would give the Department of Homeland Security and the Congress the funding requirements for the future. That is the first gap. We need to know what 

we need. 

The second gap is that the first responder grant system is broken. I share the sentiment of my Chairman, Chairman Cox. The 

current grants do not target the greatest needs and they take too 

long to reach first responders and they are overly bureaucratic. We 

need to fix this. We need to take many of the grant programs that 

are currently administered and fold them into a single grant program on terrorist preparedness. The traditional all-hazards grant 

programs like COPS and the FIRE grants, in my judgment, should 

be preserved. 

Finally, I think we lack the standards for first responder equipment. State and local agencies across the country are purchasing 

equipment to prepare for a terrorist attack, but they have no guidance on what or how much they should buy. There are hundreds 

of thousands of companies willing to sell them all kinds of products—air filters, weapons of mass destruction detectors, protective 

gear, emergency medical supplies, and on and on. You have had 

many of those vendors in your offices, as have I. 

We have an information vacuum and the Department of Homeland Security should be providing assistance to first responders to 

identify the standards that do exist and work to set standards that 

don’t exist. This is a task that we must direct the Department to 

carry out. 

Finally, we desperately need terrorist threat information that is 

not currently readily available. We must make the homeland security advisory system meaningful and we must tell our State and 

local officials what the real information is that prompts the Federal 

Government to alert us to a higher level. 

The security gaps that we have must be addressed immediately, 

and next week I and many members of the Homeland Security 

Committee in the House will introduce legislation to address these 

shortfalls. Our legislation will be designed to identify the preparedness needs of our communities and create plans to meet those 

11

needs. It will maximize the effectiveness of every tax dollar spent 

on emergency preparedness because we will be able to spend the 

right amount of money on the right priorities. And it will strengthen the Federal, State and local partnership in the fight against terrorism by improving our communications capabilities and our 

threat warning system. 

Again, I want to commend the Council on Foreign Relations for 

their report, for the information that it has given us, and the 

prompting that it has given each of us as Members of Congress to 

move faster and to be stronger in this war on terrorism. We all 

know, Mr. Chairman, our enemies will not wait, and we know that 

we cannot wait either. 

I thank the Chairman and the Ranking Member for the opportunity to testify and we would look forward to any questions that 

you may have. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Turner appears as a submission 

for the record.] 

Chairman KYL. Well, thank you very much, Representative 

Turner. Senator Feinstein and I served together on the Intelligence 

Committee. She is still on the Committee and verifies, without 

going into any detail whatsoever, that the warnings from the report 

that there will be more attacks and that they could be extraordinarily serious, based on the intelligence, must be taken very seriously. 

So I think what both of you said hits the nail right on the head, 

and I hope that the signal we send by asking you to be our first 

witnesses that we are going to work together in a bipartisan way, 

in a bicameral way, because we are all in this together, will send 

that very strong signal. I commend both of you for the work that 

you have done on this. I know we are going to be working very 

closely together on the future. 

Senator Biden has joined us. 

Senator Biden, would you have anything to add for this panel before we call the next panel? 

STATEMENT OF HON. JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., A U.S. SENATOR 

FROM THE STATE OF DELAWARE 

Senator BIDEN. Just to thank the panel, our colleagues. You have 

done a great deal of work, both of you, on this. 

I would just underscore the one thing that was implied by Congressman Turner’s comments. It is not going to be someone wearing night vision goggles and special forces who is going to run 

across the terrorist who is about to take action here in the United 

States. It is going to be a cop. We are cutting cops. 

It seems to me absolutely brainless, on my part, to think that we 

would be cutting the amount of aid we are giving directly to local 

law enforcement at a time State and local budgets are being absolutely eviscerated. The Foreign Relations report points out that in 

the 25 major cities, the number of cops is down, the number of law 

enforcement officers is down. It seems to me totally counterproductive. I don’t know why we can’t walk and chew gum at the 

same time in this business. So I hope we will get that straightened 

out before we get too carried away with what else we are doing. 

12

Again, you guys are doing great work. You have done as much 

work or more work than anybody else in the Congress and your 

input and your testimony is much appreciated. I thank you very 

much for doing that. 

There is an old joke in my State. It is a little, tiny State and 

there is upstate and downstate. All of our States seem to be divided 

and we call it upstate and downstate my way. Those who are, 

quote, ‘‘down home’’ always say that the trip for meeting upstate 

is twice as far up as it is back. I know that it is twice as long a 

walk across as it is back, and we appreciate you making that effort 

and coming over here. Thank you very much. 

Chairman KYL. Thank you. 

Senator Feinstein. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to 

add my voice to thank you very much. I think you are right on on 

the threat level, and one of the things that has impacted me is the 

threat targets are pretty well-known. You can pretty much figure 

out with respect to Al-Qaeda how they work, where they go back, 

you know, some of these things. Maybe we should find a way to 

work together to be able to change that formula and base it on the 

threat level and specific targets, and see that those targets are protected. 

I just wrote a letter asking some that I know about be protected 

and didn’t get a response that is suitable, and I really don’t think 

our Government is prepared to face the specific threat target with 

what it needs to do to provide some layers of protection for people. 

I think we get so sanitized with grants and things that are kind 

of on paper instead of the real world out there. So I would like to 

see if we couldn’t come together some way in a classified setting 

where we could discuss this a little bit. 

Chairman KYL. Just one quick question, Chairman Cox, for you 

on the status of your legislation. Any idea when you will have action on the legislation? 

Representative COX. Yes. As Congressman Turner just mentioned, we are moving forward this month with legislation. We 

hope to have hearings this month, possibly complete a markup 

even this month, and we are hoping for legislative action in this 

session of the 108th Congress. 

Chairman KYL. Thank you. We will obviously make our transcript available for you, too, if that will help. 

Thank you again, both, for being here very, very much. 

Representative TURNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Representative COX. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman KYL. Let’s ask our next panel to step forward—Senator Rudman and Mr. Clarke and Dr. Posner. 

Since I already described the bona fides of our witnesses here, 

I am going to get, in the interest of time, right to them. 

I think, Chairman Rudman, it would be appropriate to call upon 

you first. Let me do that. 

STATEMENT OF HON. WARREN RUDMAN, CHAIR, 

INDEPENDENT TASK FORCE ON EMERGENCY RESPONDERS 

Mr. RUDMAN. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and 

Senator Feinstein, and my friend, Joe Biden. You know, I was just 

13

sitting here watching this exchange between the Senate and the 

House and it just reminds me that if I have learned anything from 

the time I served here, it is that a few people, well-motivated, wellinformed, well-staffed, can make a big, big difference. We have all 

seen it over and over again. Somebody dedicated to getting something done can get it done. And I am very encouraged by hearing 

the testimony of Chris Cox and Jim Turner, as well as the members of this Committee. 

You know, this is my third appearance here and I never expected 

in my life to become an expert in this subject. It started, of course, 

as you well know, with Hart-Rudman, which sadly predicted what 

eventually happened. The first Council on Foreign Relations report 

we entitled ‘‘America: Dangerously Unprepared,’’ and we decided to 

follow it up with this report. 

What I am going to do in a few minutes is just highlight some 

of the important things that we believe you ought to pay a lot of 

attention to. 

Chairman KYL. Excuse me. By ‘‘this report,’’ this is the report 

you are referring to? 

Mr. RUDMAN. That is correct. 

Chairman KYL. ‘‘Emergency Responders: Drastically Underfunded, Dangerously Unprepared.’’ 

Mr. RUDMAN. We are going to do that and then my colleague, 

Dick Clarke—and there is nobody with a more distinguished career 

in this area than Dick Clarke and we were just so delighted that 

he was willing to help on this. 

To tell you about the task force briefly, it is in the report, but 

we had a former Secretary of State, two former chairmen of the 

Joint Chiefs, a former head of the FBI office in New York, a Nobel 

laureate in bioterrorism, and the heads of the National Football 

League and the National Basketball Association. Why them? Because they deal with huge venues with a great many people. The 

bottom line is that we got incredible cooperation from every first 

responder organization in the country. 

Dick is going to talk more about the process and the national 

standards, so let me just get right to some things that I would like 

to share with you that I think are probably the most important 

findings, and finally recommendations that we came up with. 

Let me say that these are kind of bullets. You know them, but 

some people don’t know them. They are worth repeating. Senator 

Feinstein has already referred to some of these things in her remarks. 

On an average, fire departments in this country have only 

enough radios to equip half of the firefighters on a particular shift. 

They have no interoperability with other organizations. They only 

have breathing apparatus for one-third of the people on a shift, and 

only 10 percent of fire departments in the United States have the 

personnel and equipment to respond to a building collapse. 

One of the fascinating things about 9/11 is the ratio of killed to 

wounded was totally reversed. In most national disasters or natural disasters or combat disasters, you will have a much higher 

percentage of wounded, putting tremendous stress on the health 

system, as opposed to those killed. In this case, there were relatively few number of people horribly injured, but relatively few 

14

compared to those who died. People got out of the building, and 

those who didn’t died. There were very few people to treat. 

In the next event—and I am convinced there will be a next 

event, whatever time cycle these people work on, whether it be conventional explosives, chemical, or biological—we just cannot afford 

to have these emergency responders unprepared because we then 

will have a much higher casualty ratio than we should have. 

Police departments don’t have protective gear against weapons of 

mass destruction in most large cities. Public health laboratories 

don’t have the basic equipment to diagnose what it is they are dealing with, and most cities don’t have the equipment to deal with 

hazardous materials unless they are very large, sophisticated cities 

such as New York or Los Angeles or Boston or Philadelphia. Most 

places just don’t have that kind of equipment. 

We looked at the finding issue and as Dick Clarke will mention 

in his remarks, people said, well, no, that is the wrong number. 

Well, maybe it is. We do know this, that nobody knows what the 

number is; nobody knows what the number is. 

One of the things that we strongly believe is that Congress ought 

to mandate as soon as possible the setting of national minimum 

standards for first responders. We certainly do that now with our 

fire departments. The underwriters bureau and the insurance companies decide what is a minimum standard for a fire department, 

or a police department in some cases. We don’t have that here. We 

ought to know what that is because you can’t allocate money even 

under the Cox-Turner plan unless you have standards at which you 

can measure what you are going to be doing. 

We believe that urban search and rescue capability is grossly underfunded. I have spoken about communications. Emergency operation centers ought to be regionally located. We have got to have 

more national exercises so when the real thing unfortunately happens, people know what they are doing. 

We have to enhance emergency agricultural and veterinary capability because undoubtedly we will see an attack on the national 

food supply at some point. And we have to have a surge capacity 

in the hospitals. If we don’t have that, then we are going to have 

even more casualties than we would otherwise. 

Finally, we made a number of specific recommendations. We believe that Congress ought to establish a very different system for 

allocating scarce resources. You have already heard about that 

more eloquently than I can say it. We think this is absolutely vital; 

that, plus setting of the standards. 

Secondly, we believe the United States House of Representatives 

ought to transform the House Select Committee on Homeland Security into a standing committee, not a special Committee that 

could be done away with. We believe the Senate should consolidate 

all of these issues before the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee in terms of the general oversight of the individual agencies, 

not to cut out other committees where they have appropriate business, but to streamline the process. 

We ought to require that the Department of Homeland Security 

work with other Federal agencies to make sure that their grant 

programs are synonymous and synchronous and work together. I 

have talked about the prioritization. 

15

Finally, we do believe that the Department of Homeland Security 

ought to move the Office of Domestic Preparedness from its present 

location in the Bureau of Border and Transportation Security to 

the Office of State and Local Government Coordination in order to 

consolidate oversight of grants to emergency responders because, 

like everything else, there has got to be strong oversight of this 

money. How often have we seen money in grant programs going 

out for a good purpose and was misspent by people who just didn’t 

know how to spend it or had other motivations? So we think the 

oversight is very important. 

Let me simply wind up by saying to you that when we sent these 

brave men and women that we have in Iraq right now into harm’s 

way, we made sure that they had the finest chemical, biological, 

and communications gear that this country could afford. There was 

no holding back. Whatever they needed, they got. 

I think it is grossly unfair to ask policemen and firemen and 

emergency workers to have any less because we know from experiences in our own communities, no matter what the risk, no matter 

what the personal jeopardy, policemen, firemen, and emergency 

workers will go into the maelstrom to try to save lives. We ought 

to make sure that at least they can talk to each other, that they 

are well equipped and they have been adequately trained. When 

you read through the whole report, that is the essence of what we 

are saying. 

Again, thank you for inviting us. It is always a privilege to appear here, and let me repeat how I started. I do believe that people 

who are motivated and dedicated to get something done can get it 

done. You can get this done. I am sure of it. 

Chairman KYL. Thank you very much, Senator Rudman. Sometimes, too, it just takes somebody that can separate the wheat from 

the chaff and get right to the point. It sounds very clear and very 

simple when you say it. I suppose when we go back and try to do 

all of this stuff, it will all of a sudden get very complicated. But 

you are always very good at getting right to the point and I think 

that is what is going to be especially useful to us here. Thank you. 

Mr. Richard Clarke. 

STATEMENT OF RICHARD A. CLARKE, SENIOR ADVISOR, 

INDEPENDENT TASK FORCE ON EMERGENCY RESPONDERS 

Mr. CLARKE. Mr. Chairman, it is an honor to be before this Committee again and I just want to say on a personal note before I 

begin that when I was in the White House under Democratic and 

Republican administrations, long before this issue was sexy or popular I could count on you and Senator Feinstein. I am glad to see 

that you are persistent and diligent on this issue because there is 

still a lot of work to be done. 

I will try to be brief and to the point and talk only about one 

thing and that is program planning, budgeting, process, and standards. We began asking the question how much is enough in the 

Pentagon in 1961, under Bob McNamara, and there was a great 

book published that year called How Much Is Enough about Pentagon budgeting. 

We have established over the years in the Pentagon a system of 

trying to figure out how much is enough. Now, we could all disVerDate 0ct 09 2002 15:56 Mar 04, 2004 Jkt 092257 PO 00000 Frm 00019 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\GPO\HEARINGS\92257.TXT SJUD4 PsN: CMORC
16

agree about how much is enough, but at least in the Pentagon 

there is a process that allows you to quantify and have empirical 

data about how much is enough. There is a process that the Pentagon does every year. It starts with a threat assessment. It then 

has the military services stating what they believe are the requirements that they need to have. 

Now, every year the Navy says it needs 15 carrier battle groups. 

We understand that and they are never going to get 15, but they 

say that is their requirement. That is fine, and then the Secretary 

of Defense says here are my priorities and here is how much money 

you are going to have. And then, finally, that turns into program 

decisions for specific programs. 

It is all done on three levels—a high budget, a medium budget, 

a low budget—and it is all done over 5 years so that we are able 

to have arguments not just that my number is better than your 

number, which is what is going on now in homeland security, but 

rather this program meets this requirement; it does so over this period of time, and this program is more important than that program. And we can move components of the defense budget around 

and it is a very rational process by comparison to what is going on 

now in homeland security. 

You don’t know how much is enough and we don’t know how 

much is enough. We have done a process, we have put a number 

on the table. The Homeland Security Department says it is way too 

big. They said we must have been trying to gold-plate telephones. 

Well, we are not trying to gold-plate telephones. We just want communications equipment that works. Tragically, it did not in New 

York on September 11 and that is why we lost so many members 

of the New York Fire Department, because the radios didn’t work 

inside the building. 

We want to be able to have an argument, not my number is right 

and your number is wrong, based on nothing or little or nothing. 

We want to have a process where there is empirical data and there 

are standards. What does every metropolitan area of a given size 

need for its hospitals, for its EMS, for its 911, for its public health 

system, for its police, for its fire department? We don’t have that 

data today. 

Now, if we could agree on targets, then we can talk about should 

we do that over 5 years or should we do it over 3 years. Should 

we do it first for cities of a million people or more and later for 

smaller towns? We don’t have that process. 

If there is one thing this Committee, and I hope Chairman Cox’s 

Committee could do this year that will make the process better 

next year, it is legislatively require the Department of Homeland 

Security to come in with a program planning and budget process, 

not unlike the Pentagon’s, that tells us what the threat is, what 

the requirements are to meet that threat, and what alternative 

numbers are so that we can say we are going to do so much this 

year and we are going to have it done over 3 years or over 5 years 

against a set of defined standards. Mayors and Governors today 

don’t know how well prepared they are because they don’t know 

what the standards are because no one has told them. 

17

I think this is a non-partisan issue, I think it is an empirical 

data issue, I think it is a program and budget issue. Until we establish a system, we are probably just throwing away money. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Clarke appears as a submission 

for the record.] 

Chairman KYL. Mr. Clarke, thank you very, very much, and 

again welcome back to this Committee. You have provided this 

Committee with a great deal of both open-source and classified material over the years and we appreciate your assistance very much. 

Dr. Paul Posner, welcome and thank you for being here as well. 

STATEMENT OF PAUL L. POSNER, MANAGING DIRECTOR, FEDERAL BUDGET ISSUES AND INTERGOVERNMENTAL RELATIONS, STRATEGIC ISSUES, GENERAL ACCOUNTING OFFICE 

Mr. POSNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the opportunity. 

First, let me say that the Council’s report, I think, does the valuable service of setting the stage to really rethink how we design 

and manage a partnership because, as we know, this problem exceeds the capacity of any one level to address effectively. 

The report fills a void by highlighting significant gaps in preparedness, and the most important gap it really reveals is how little we know about something basic: how much are State and local 

governments spending on this function. I mean, there is a wide 

range, I think, $26 to $76 billion. We need to get better estimates 

of what is out there as we try to intervene in a targeted way to 

really make a dent in this problem. 

The second thing we don’t know is what should be spent to 

achieve a defined level of preparedness. Again, as the report notes, 

we can’t do this with any precision because we really lack the fundamental standards and goals to define how much is enough. 

I think the report performs the service of beginning a dialogue 

to develop a more systematic baseline. I won’t repeat what was 

said before, but there is a need for DHS and others to start this 

process. They could probably consult with other agencies who have 

been at this for a long time. We did a report highlighting best practices in needs assessments, thing like making sure that you subject 

needs to a kind of a cost/benefit test, making sure that you assess 

the needs against specific, discreet outcomes you want to achieve 

so that you are not just inventorying everything, but you are using 

some discriminate analysis. Those kinds of things are well-known 

and available to apply to this problem. 

Given the many needs and high stakes, it is all the more important that scarce resources at the Federal level be geared to fund 

the highest-priority projects with the greatest potential impacts on 

the problem. To do this, fundamental changes will be necessary in 

Federal grants for homeland security in three basic areas. 

One is the consolidation of fragmented programs, two is the better targeting of scare Federal funds, and three is providing accountability so that we know at the front end whether money is 

spent for purposes, not after the money has been spent. 

On fragmentation, we have got a table on pages 6 and 8 of my 

statement that lists 21 first responder grants across three major 

18

departments. Different recipients get these grants. Some are local 

fire departments, some are State fire marshals, some are State governments, some are public health departments. The point is we are 

empowering different actors with grants when we should be requiring them to work together. 

Second, different allocation schemes are spread widely across 

this 21, all well-intentioned programs, all established in different 

times, in different places, to deal with the same problem. 

And third is different requirements for matching, for other kinds 

of things, and the point is this has effects, real effects on performance. Some officials at the local level—I used to be one—might welcome this cafeteria approach to Federal grants. But I have had fire 

chiefs tell me they didn’t get in business to figure out how to use 

the catalog of domestic assistance; they got in business to save 

lives. This is creating real confusion and complexity, high administrative costs, and inhibits coordination. Most importantly, it is very 

difficult to package these things together to address unique local 

needs. 

These are longstanding problems in Federal assistance and many 

other areas. There are options for rationalization, including consolidation, most importantly. Whether we call it block grants, I think 

we are going to have to figure out a way to package and consolidate 

these grants with national standards. 

EPA has coined a concept called performance partnerships, 

where States are given the option of moving money around, but 

being held accountable for specific and discreet performance goals. 

Those are very important concepts we need to think about here. 

A second important issue is the targeting, and I won’t go into 

any more than what has already been said except to say needs are 

everywhere. The question before us with scarce funds is how to 

prioritize those needs, and I think that is the challenge that the 

Congress faces. States also face this challenge in their passthrough money. 

A third important area is fiscal provisions. How do we ensure 

that the scarce money we are spending is actually going to be used 

for homeland security and not supplanted and replaced where 

other State and local funds get reduced? That is a classic problem 

in grants. We have studies showing almost 60 cents of every Federal dollar gets substituted. We can protect that here, and it is very 

important if we want our money to really go further. 

The final most important point is accountability. This is the real 

key to sustaining over time what we are trying to do here and it 

is important to have a sustained effort. We have seen other programs fall by the wayside because they were unable to justify 

themselves and their contributions. We need to be able to not only 

have those goals and standards, but have accountability processes 

that tell us what we are doing against those standards every year. 

Those standards in an intergovernmental setting need to be developed in partnership with our partners in the community. 

State and locals are equally fragmented as we are at the Federal 

level. A recent Century Foundation report highlighted the systemic 

problems within regions, within governments themselves. This is 

no secret; coordination is a challenge everywhere. We can influence 

19

that. As we have done in transportation planning, we can do that 

here if we design these grants in the way we want to. 

So the point is we need to know more systematically what needs 

to be done. We need to design programs to better ensure that we 

will be, in fact, able to deliver on our promises, and ultimately the 

sustainability and public support for what we are doing rests on 

this. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Posner appears as a submission 

for the record.] 

Chairman KYL. Thank you very much, Dr. Posner. I think the 

combination of what all three of you have said is just very, very 

enlightening. Let me begin by asking a couple of questions here. 

Since you have all mentioned the problem of standards and accountability and getting the assets where they are most needed, I 

am wondering, after the Department of Homeland Security has undergone the kind of analysis and assessment that, Mr. Clarke, you 

referred to, if it then said to its top areas of priority, for example, 

we have decided that one of the top priorities is to get these radios 

that will all talk to each other even in buildings with a lot of concrete and steel, and so on, and we have said these are the top three 

cities whose fire and police departments need them—we have 

bought them; no problem with standards. We have said you are the 

top 20 cities to get them. We have prioritized and you can come 

and get them. No accountability problem; we have got the guys 

who will help train you. 

Granted, that isn’t politically as popular as handing out grant 

money, but might that be a better way to approach this than the 

grant approach that has been discussed? I ask all three of you. 

Mr. RUDMAN. Well, you know, obviously that hypothetical would 

work, but let me point out that if you set standards, let’s say, in 

the communications gear and said it has to meet this standard and 

we approve the following eight suppliers for that equipment and we 

are giving you a grant to buy ‘‘x’’ number of these, then that accomplishes the same thing. 

Incidentally, Mr. Chairman, if you would just allow me a brief 

diversion, I think I neglected to introduce, sitting behind me, Dr. 

Jamie Metzl, from the Council on Foreign Relations, who spearheaded this report. He is known to many of you and many of your 

staffs, and it would be negligent on my part not to introduce Jamie 

because his imprint is very much on this report. 

Chairman KYL. I appreciate that. 

Any other comments? Dr. Posner. 

Mr. POSNER. If I could just add, I think we have some choices 

in how we develop these standards. I mean, these standards could 

be focused on the kind of equipment you must have, or possibly a 

broader and more flexible way to do this would be to specify the 

outcomes we are trying to achieve. We want you to have interoperability. 

There are profoundly different ways this can be achieved. In fact, 

when you talk to fire chiefs, some of them don’t, in fact, repurchase 

equipment for every vehicle they have. In fact, they buy these software patches that tie in disparate radios through the op center and 

permit interoperability that way. 

20

The point is, I think, as we think we about standards, recognizing we are dealing with a very diverse community, highly different rural and urban kinds of providers with very different kinds 

of provisions—and we have done this with other areas like emergency medical services. We have different standards for rural 

versus urban areas. We need to think a little more discriminately 

about how we develop standards. One way to do this that gives 

flexibility as well as accountability is to think about the measurable outcomes we are trying to achieve in performance, and back 

from there. 

Chairman KYL. Mr. Clarke. 

Mr. CLARKE. Senator, I think the procedure you outlined would 

work on some unique pieces of equipment that we want everyone 

to have in a certain class of city. I will give you an example. 

Using Federal dollars, a mass decontamination fire truck was developed and the first one went to Arlington, Virginia. It is designed 

to be able to move several thousand people through an hour who 

have been hit by a chemical and it decontaminates them and moves 

them through out the other end. The truck opens up and becomes 

a facility. 

Now, we can give money to each of the States and hope that each 

State then gives the money to the cities, and hope that each city 

then buys such a truck. There is only one place to buy the truck. 

There is only one organization making it. So we could save a lot 

of time and a lot of effort, if we believe that every city of a certain 

size should have that, just to buy it and give it to them. But that 

doesn’t work for every piece of equipment. 

Chairman KYL. Let me ask one more question and then turn to 

the other panelists here. Obviously, some of the threat assessment 

and decision about where to put what kind of equipment will have 

to remain classified, or you are just signaling to the terrorists 

where they needn’t worry. So there will have to be an element of 

this that is not totally public. 

But subject to that caveat, could all of you be just a little bit 

more specific about the actual process for making the decision 

about how to prioritize this funding? 

The general outline of it, Mr. Clarke, you outlined and I think 

it is what all of you have talked about. You would want to get 

input from the local communities about what they think their 

vulnerabilities are, as Representative Cox talked about. But then 

let’s get real specific about how we would politically make these decisions, because obviously Flagstaff, Arizona, might complain that 

Flagstaff didn’t get anything, whereas Phoenix got all of this stuff, 

or whatever, and that makes political people nervous. 

So what is the best way to ensure that the best results attend 

and that we all can buy into them? 

Mr. RUDMAN. The vexing question that you raise—and, again, 

this is an open hearing, but I think I can say in an open hearing 

that there is adequate intelligence to do threat assessment on the 

capabilities and probabilities of chemical and biological attacks 

against this country. 

There is certainly no definitive information on nuclear incidents, 

be they conventional or dirty bombs, but we do know that there are 

a lot of radioactive substances that we knew existed at one place 

21

and various places particularly behind the Iron Curtain that aren’t 

there anymore, and that is a matter of public record. 

Now, when you look at that kind of a threat assessment, at least 

I reach the following conclusion. You need a minimum standard at 

least locally in large places and regionally in other places to deal 

with any one of those combinations. And I will add a fourth one. 

Large explosives of a conventional type can cause as much havoc 

in downtown Los Angeles or downtown Phoenix as almost anything 

else, and create enormous chaos and casualties. 

If you believe that terrorists’ design is to demoralize the American people—and that is obviously what it is—and to make us fight 

amongst ourselves and withdraw from the world, then they will use 

any one of those means they can in combination, if necessary, to 

inflict that. So my answer is that there is enough information 

known to decide how you are going to prioritize your funds. 

If you were to ask me, Senator Kyl, after looking at this for the 

last 5 years—if someone would say to me, you make the decision 

and you have unlimited money, I would do it in this way. I would, 

number one, make sure that communications were up to snuff and 

interoperable in every major city in America and then work down 

from there. 

Number two, I would make sure that there was chemical and biological equipment for the first responders and for the health laboratories to understand what they are dealing with. The third 

thing that I would do is make sure that the public health system 

had a surge capacity. 

Those would be my three priorities, which deal with all three of 

those possible threats. 

Chairman KYL. Thank you. 

Any other comments? Mr. Clarke. 

Mr. CLARKE. I agree with Senator Rudman’s priorities, but I 

would also say that, by and large, critical infrastructure targets 

correlate with population density. It is a good rule of thumb. It 

doesn’t always work, so if I were doing a formula, I would put most 

of the formula money into population density and then I would say 

you get additional points if you have a nuclear reactor in your 

town. If, as in Senator Biden’s case, you have a very large chemical 

plant that has some rather potent chemicals sitting there, that gets 

additional points. 

Chairman KYL. Excuse me, but in each of those cases, then, you 

would also insist that the money that is granted based upon that 

formula be directed to the threat against that particular kind of 

target? 

Mr. CLARKE. Against that particular facility, yes. It couldn’t be 

spent for anything, yes, but I think you can come up with a simple 

grant formula. But there is a key to this that is often overlooked 

because States give the money out now. The Federal Government 

gives it to the States and the States, in turn, give it out to cities 

and towns. 

Really, we need metropolitan concepts, and all too often the 

money goes to one city or one town in the metropolitan area and 

doesn’t build a metropolitan capability. I would like to condition 

some of the money going to metropolitan areas on the cities and 

towns cooperating with each other. 

22

As you know very well, there is a lot of political in-fighting between suburbs and core cities, and not always do we find their fire 

departments and police departments and hospitals cooperating 

with each other in planning or in developing capabilities. In some 

places that happens; usually, it doesn’t. 

There should be some incentive process or perhaps a withholding 

of money until metropolitan councils of government put together 

cooperative programs that take into account all of the assets available in the metropolitan area and have a metropolitan plan. 

Chairman KYL. Thank you. 

Dr. Posner? 

Mr. POSNER. Well, I think the process that has been described 

would be far more analytic than what we typically do in allocating 

Federal funds, and would be obviously very salutary. Typically, 

what we do is rely on proxies for those things. Now, here, I think 

density may serve as one proxy, but the extent to which we can get 

hard data on relative threats, relative vulnerabilities, and use that 

as a guide, I think we would be well ahead of the game. 

I also think it is very important to observe the role of the State 

here, the notion that we may need to give guidance as to how 

States pass money through, which right now, as you have indicated 

and as others have indicated, is a kind of a very understudied area, 

to understand how States are actually allocating those funds, and 

ultimately think about ways to involve the States and their capacity for coordination in allocating these funds. 

I know there is some sensitivity about whether the money goes 

directly to locals or goes through the State. One area we have seen 

a combination observed is in transportation, where the States are 

required to develop a statewide plan that lays out broad goals. 

Money can go directly to other recipients, but the project has to be 

contained in that statewide plan so that the plan becomes kind of 

a vehicle for coordination. 

Chairman KYL. Thank you. 

Senator Feinstein. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman. 

When I was mayor, I tried to do some of this and it was very 

interesting because we did it with the threat of major earthquake 

in San Francisco and realized that everything goes down. The new, 

fancy telephones go down absolutely, so you have no land line capacity. 

We finally had department heads that carried a radio and we rehearsed the radio every Monday morning at 7:30 to see that everybody was online and they carried that radio with them. Of course, 

in the days that followed, we built a new emergency communications center and communications became much more interoperable. 

But what really concerns me, because I have seen it now, is the 

panic that ensues when you can’t communicate, you can’t get information. You don’t know what streets to move in heavy equipment. 

You don’t know where to get that heavy, street-clearing equipment. 

You don’t know where to pick up your emergency off-duty police 

and fire. So all of that has to be pre-structured, written in a plan, 

rehearsed, and known. 

I think that the ideas that you have on pages 4 and 5 of your 

executive summary really constitute a bill, and so my question to 

23

you is would you be willing to work with us and we try to take 

these very concepts and put them into bill language? 

Mr. RUDMAN. We certainly would, Senator Feinstein, and we 

would also make available to you the people that we worked with. 

If you look at the index of who we worked with, I mean it is some 

of the people across this country, including from your State, that 

have extraordinary knowledge in this area. So the answer is obviously, if we could, we would be delighted to. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Great. 

A second question. With respect to interoperability, it is my understanding that for a couple hundred thousand dollars, a community can buy these vans and that these vans have the capacity to 

make existing systems interoperable. 

Have you looked at these? Do they work and are they adequate? 

Mr. RUDMAN. Well, they do, and I think Dick Clarke may know 

more than I, but I am aware of the fact that a number of cities are 

buying software conversions that enable them to not buy whole 

new radio systems, but small black boxes that go into these radio 

systems that make them interoperable at a fraction of the cost of 

tearing everything out and putting something new in. 

I think I am correct about that, Dick. 

Mr. CLARKE. I think that is exactly right. 

Senator Feinstein, you mentioned the San Francisco emergency 

communications facility which you helped to create. We went there 

as part of the study and what we found is that you are absolutely 

right. They are relying a lot on telephones, and the collapse of a 

few telephone buildings here and there, intentional or otherwise, 

and you are out of business. 

Yet, as we saw on 9/11, and as we saw during the Northeast 

power blackout, the Internet works even during these times of crisis. Yet, all too often there are no Internet communications available to fire and police. The chief of the fire department in San 

Francisco said he would love to be able, when they roll on a building with a fire truck, to have a computer in that fire truck and to 

be able to pull up the building plans from city hall that are on file 

so he will know what the building looks like before he sends his 

people inside. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. In other words, kind of like a basic car plan 

that police have. 

Mr. CLARKE. Exactly, but all too often we find in police and fire 

departments around the country that they are really still 20th century, that they are not using computer technology; they are not 

using IP, Internet protocol, devices. So there is a lot that could be 

done. I think that is why Senator Rudman says our first priority 

would be communications. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Just as a former mayor who dealt with this, 

I think that is right. 

Mr. RUDMAN. When people can’t talk to each other, there is panic 

that results if there is an emergency. It is absolutely essential and 

we think it is the number-one priority. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. I have watched as certain targets seem to 

crop all of the time, and yet nothing really changes out there to 

really deal with those targets, to make them less vulnerable. I 

24

think if we could just deal with the communications situation, we 

would be a lot better off with police and fire. 

So if you would work with us, maybe we should try to put something together and have the other Senators here, who I know are 

interested, work on it as well. 

Thank you. 

Chairman KYL. Thank you. 

Senator Biden. 

Senator BIDEN. Thank you very much for a very good report. 

Warren, I am sorry you are not still here. 

Mr. RUDMAN. I am not, Senator Biden. 

Senator BIDEN. Well, I am, but in a sense—and I am not attempting to be humorous; I am being very serious—because of your 

stature you have been able to take on a role not just on this report, 

but in other activities you have engaged in which quite frankly carries with it a greater credibility than if you were one of us still 

here, and it much appreciated. 

Mr. RUDMAN. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. 

Senator BIDEN. I want to thank all three of you and thank you 

for your good judgment in hiring Jamie Metzl. In the good old days 

when I was Chairman of the committee, I had enough money to 

have him on my staff. When we lost a third of our staff, that was 

what happened, but my loss has been your great gain. 

Gentlemen, I would like to raise a couple of points. First of all, 

we do have several models, not the same, but several models of 

how things work. We worked on this Committee for a long, long 

time trying to deal with law enforcement issues. We finally came 

up with a bill called the COPS bill, which has about a 1-percent 

overhead and worked pretty well, and very little loss of income. 

We concluded several things bipartisanly. One, if it goes through 

the States, it gets screwed up, not because the States aren’t competent, but because the States are just a replication of what we 

have here, and that is you are going to have the representative 

from Frankford, Delaware, who has one vote, along with a representative from the east side of Wilmington, Delaware, which has 

one vote, presenting the Governor with an ultimatum that if they 

don’t each get an equal share of the money that comes through, 

they are going to have a problem. 

State legislators are going to do what we would do had we had 

a higher body from which we got money. They are going to make 

sure that they do what you suggested, Dr. Posner, that they substitute. I found when I wrote the COPS bill that one of the reasons 

to write it the way I did was that the money I thought we were 

sending back to local law enforcement was going to pay public defenders and judges. 

The reason for that was legislators don’t want to use State tax 

money to pay public defenders and judges; they are not popular 

things to do. So the Federal Government would pay with money 

that was designed for the cops for the State judges and the public 

defenders, both of whom are very important, but they were things 

that they didn’t want to be on record as voting for. So the money 

wasn’t going to the cops. 

I have three areas I want to mention with you. What I find you 

at odds with yourself a little bit about generically, anyway, is this 

25

idea of giving flexibility, observing the State role and not wanting 

the money to be wasted, and at the same time talking about block 

grants. Block grants are a guarantee this money will be wasted, an 

absolute guarantee. I am willing to stake my political career on it. 

It is a guarantee that it will be wasted. 

I agree with my Chairman. He and I are in different parties, different philosophically, but on most of this law enforcement and terrorism stuff we have been on the same page. The role of the Federal Government, it seems to me, should be doing what we do best 

and let the States do what they do best. 

What we do best is with relation to terrorism because no State 

is capable of dealing with terrorism on their own, no matter how 

good they are, because it is international by definition, cross-jurisdictional by definition. So we should be the ones setting priorities, 

not the States. The States can set priorities of their own, with their 

own money. If they want to set priorities and they want to buy everybody a new engine, fine, they can do that. 

Out of the Department of Homeland Security, we should be saying this is the priority we have for allocating Federal monies, whatever it is. I happen to agree with Warren, or all three of you. Communications is right at the top of the list, but if we put this out 

in block grant money, you are going to find they are doing everything from paying for traffic lights to making sure that homeland 

security has a nexus to whether or not school nurses are trained 

in emergency preparedness, and everything in between. 

Mr. RUDMAN. Senator Biden, we agree with you. We don’t suggest block grants. 

Senator BIDEN. Okay. Well, I was a little confused, but I am a 

little confused, then, about observing the State role. I have no desire to observe the State role, zero, none, none, and not because I 

don’t have great respect for the States. The States can do whatever 

they want, but the States, it seems to me, if we are providing Federal monies, should have these standards. There should be standards against which we measure what we are going to do, and let 

me give you an example. 

In the COPS bill, we made a Federal judgment—and you voted 

for it, Warren; you are one of the few who did on your side. 

Mr. RUDMAN. I certainly was. 

Senator BIDEN. Here is what the Federal judgment was, that 

community policing was the sine qua non for dealing with law enforcement locally, and in order to get any Federal money, your entire department had to be engaged in community policing, a conceptual difference from the way all police departments were functioning up to then. 

So we leveraged 100,000 cops into 675,000 community police. 

There had been about 40,000 nationwide before. It was that the 

100,000 cops became community police. If you wanted to get any 

money for your department, you had to do two things: one, make 

sure, if you were authorized for 100 cops now, you did not get a 

single penny for cops unless it was for your 101st cop. 

Secondly, if you got money for your 101st cop, all 100 below it 

had to be moved into community policing, because that is what all 

the national survey data and the criminologists suggested, that 

26

that is the best way to deal with crime. And guess what? It 

worked. It is not the only reason it worked, but it worked. 

So what I am trying to get at here is it is much more complicated 

dealing with homeland security than just cops. I am not suggesting 

that is not true. What I am suggesting, though, is the identification 

of the vulnerabilities that are beyond the capacity of the States to 

deal with are ones which—and what has happened out there is the 

average American thinks the 106 or 108 nuclear power plants in 

America are secure. Not a damn one of them is secure. 

You mentioned my State. You can take off from Philadelphia, 

Pennsylvania, in an aircraft and before you get to 15,000 feet you 

can nose-dive into one of the largest nuclear power plants in America that is one of the most poorly-run in America, and nothing has 

been done to secure that plant in any way, any way at all, zero. 

You can get on this Amtrak train, and I know I am a broken 

record on Amtrak, and you go through a tunnel in Baltimore that 

was built in 1869, no lighting, no ventilation, no way out, no escape, no prospect of survival, none. They had a conventional fire in 

that tunnel and it closed down Baltimore—not the tunnel—it 

closed down Baltimore for a day-and-a-half, a conventional fire. 

So I don’t know why the Chairman’s suggestion isn’t a good one 

that we federally—not the Congress; we shouldn’t be doing this. We 

should be signing off on it; that the administration identify what 

are those vulnerabilities. We can parse it any way at all. We can 

say we want to make sure that every nuclear power plant is secure, 

or we want to make sure that every major chemical plant, or we 

want to make sure that every bridge or tunnel, whatever it is. 

Secondly, it seems to me that we ought to be able to say, which 

is the part that absolutely blows me away—whether you are right 

about your number exactly, the one thing I am absolutely right 

about is you are a hell of a lot closer to what the number is than 

what we are saying it is for homeland security. 

Mr. RUDMAN. I think that is probably true, Senator Biden. 

Senator BIDEN. I mean, it is not even close, and we have done 

other programs where urban and rural have not had a problem in 

dissemination of this funding. Let’s talk about first responders. If 

you let the department make its application against a standard for 

which they have to make the case to a reputable—and it is reputable—to a governmental agency here in Washington that says 

this meets the standard, this doesn’t meet the standard—and this 

is a question and I would like to ask if you considered this. It is 

not necessarily within your brief here. 

But one of the ways—and I know you remember, Warren—that 

we get States to sort of focus in on this stuff more tightly is when, 

in fact, the States have to kick something in as part of it; in other 

words, if the State has to come up with 10 percent, or 15 or 20 or 

5 percent of the funding for those things which affect—I mean, the 

Senator from New York just walked in. Every time we go on orange 

alert, there is no Federal cop that is guarding the Brooklyn Bridge 

or the Lincoln Tunnel and the cost to the City of New York goes 

out through the roof for all of this. 

Senator SCHUMER. Five shifts, seven hours, two at each end, 

twenty just for that. 

27

Senator BIDEN. So I guess what I am trying to say is that there 

may be a way that we can follow the Chairman’s lead here. I would 

like to see something come through here, not directing the States 

but directing the Federal Government to set down the priorities 

and the standards by which funding would be made available. 

The first thing is, as you said, Mr. Clarke, the threat assessment. 

That is what they do over there in the military. Everything flows 

from the threat assessment, and I would be interested in you working with us to help us out here, but the threat assessment is a little bit different in this sense, not giving a threat assessment from 

an intelligence perspective merely as to whether or not there is AlQaeda or any other organization out there that has a particular 

target, but a threat assessment based on vulnerability. 

Vulnerability seems to me to be the place that we could probably 

agree on that which is most vulnerable and which are not the most 

likely targets, not based on intelligence, but based on common 

sense. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out, if you 

want to take out a lot of people and you want to get involved with 

anthrax, sarin gas, some other chemical, or a dirty bomb, a good 

place is a place in the six tunnels under New York City where, 

every moment during a 12-hour day, you have as many people sitting in a train car as you have in 5 full 747 jets. If you want to 

get something done, that is a good place, that is a good place. By 

the way, I will get letters saying don’t tell the terrorists. The terrorists know this stuff; they know this stuff. 

So, anyway, I think it is a first-rate report. I would like to hear 

much more from you, Mr. Clarke, on sort of the methodology, along 

with Dr. Posner, about how you come up with a formula. But I am 

glad to hear the block grant route isn’t the place you are pushing. 

Mr. RUDMAN. Before they answer, I just want to tell Senator 

Biden that we certainly do not disagree with your view about block 

grants. Number two, we think that many of these grants ought to 

go directly to localities. Number three, I have always believed in 

matching funds because then you have some stake in it. 

Finally, the whole process we talk about here is threat assessment, however you want to do that, a setting of national standards 

and then meeting those standards. But I would defer to Dick 

Clarke and Dr. Posner on the other issues. 

Mr. CLARKE. Senator Biden, I completely agree that when I say 

a threat assessment, that is shorthand for threat and vulnerability 

assessment. We can’t determine grants based on FBI reports about 

is there an Al-Qaeda cell or not, especially since I don’t think the 

FBI has a clue, frankly, where the Al-Qaeda cells are. 

It doesn’t matter really whether it is Al-Qaeda or Hizbollah or 

whoever the next group is going to be. It matters whether or not 

there is a facility that is important, a critical infrastructure, and 

whether it is vulnerable to attack. 

I think if you want to give points out on the basis of such facilities as part of a formula for giving money to cities or metropolitan 

areas, I think that makes sense. We don’t have any particular brief 

for the money going through the States. We don’t say this in the 

study, but what our study indicated to us was that the States basically take a cut and slow it down. 

28

But I come back to the notion of doing this by metropolitan area. 

I mentioned a few minutes ago the mass decontamination fire 

truck that is in Arlington. Washington, D.C., doesn’t have one; it 

doesn’t need one because Arlington can be here in three minutes, 

across the bridge, assuming the bridge is still there. 

So we really need to take a look at the SMSAs, the standard 

metropolitan statistical areas, and say what does an SMSA of 1 

million need, what does an SMSA of 5 million need, tell them what 

they need, where it makes sense give it to them, give them the 

equipment, where that makes sense. 

Senator BIDEN. This is the only place, in my experience, where 

the State people are coming to us and saying, don’t just help us 

with money, tell us what we need, tell us what we need. 

Mr. CLARKE. The other thing we heard was, okay, we know we 

need ‘‘x,’’ but there are 400 companies that have sprung up overnight because they smell the scent of Federal money; tell us which 

one of this list of 400 companies makes a product that works, because cities and States can’t figure that out. 

Mr. POSNER. I want to make clear what I said in the statement 

that we don’t think a pure block grant works in this situation either, for the very reasons that you have said. There are very strong 

national goals and standards that we need to develop, and I think 

the States, as you say, agree with you. 

What we are trying to say is there is consolidation that is in 

order, because what we are saying is can you define national goals 

and standards, but give flexibility in terms of how you spend that 

money. What we are seeing right now is the 21 first responder 

grants are so narrowly defined. The local governments get this 

money for equipment. They already have the equipment and they 

want to use it for training and they can’t use it for training. So 

that is the concept we are trying to get across here. 

Senator BIDEN. We struggled with that in the COPS money, too, 

and we finally came up with a way to do that. You are right, I 

think. 

I thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman KYL. Thank you very much. 

Senator Feingold. 

STATEMENT OF HON. RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, A U.S. SENATOR 

FROM THE STATE OF WISCONSIN 

Senator FEINGOLD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank 

you and the Ranking Member for holding this important hearing, 

and I want to thank the witnesses for being here and for so clearly 

bringing to the attention of the Nation the dramatic underfunding 

of first responders. 

The title of the task force report, ‘‘Emergency Responders: Drastically Underfunded, Dangerously Unprepared,’’ says it all. Sadly, 

the conclusion of this report doesn’t really come as a surprise to the 

emergency responders that I talk to Wisconsin, who, like their 

counterparts throughout the country, simply do not have the funds 

to get the equipment and training they need for responding to a 

terrorist incident. 

First responders on whom we all depend need our help to be 

ready. We all know it, we all say so, but Congress and the adminisVerDate 0ct 09 2002 15:56 Mar 04, 2004 Jkt 092257 PO 00000 Frm 00032 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\GPO\HEARINGS\92257.TXT SJUD4 PsN: CMORC
29

tration have so far failed to provide the necessary resources. The 

big problem is that our priorities are out of line. Our budget 

choices do not reflect the passionate rhetorical flourishes that are 

so commonly employed here in Washington. 

We say this Nation’s number-one priority is the fight against terrorism. We all agree that first responders play a critical role in this 

fight. So why aren’t we acting like it? Why aren’t we working together with State and local governments to fill the 5-year, $100 billion shortfall found by Senator Rudman’s Independent Task Force 

on Emergency Responders? 

The problems facing first responders from the city of Kenosha, 

Wisconsin, for example, are emblematic of those facing first responders throughout the country. Two years after September 11, 

Kenosha emergency responders are still trying to get the updated 

integrated communications equipment they need, which you have 

been talking about. I have also heard from many fire departments 

throughout Wisconsin that have been trying to acquire much needed breathing apparatuses, but simply do not have the funds to do 

so. 

Police departments are also feeling the strain of added responsibilities to protect our Nation against a terrorist attack, while 

being squeezed for funding because the administration has drastically cut or eliminated crucial Federal funding programs. 

Former Green Bay Chief of Police James Lewis wrote to me on 

behalf of 20 other Wisconsin police chiefs earlier this year to express concern about cuts in the COPS, local law enforcement block 

grants, and Byrne grant programs. Particularly in rural areas, 

local law enforcement is heavily dependent on these funds. 

Chief Lewis wrote, ‘‘Without adequate Federal support, local law 

enforcement will not be able to continue its innovative approach to 

addressing local crime issues and facing the new issues of terrorism that are confronting our country.’’ I think Congress has to 

heed this warning before the next attack shows how shortsighted 

these cuts really are. 

So I do thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing. It is 

obvious that a lot of work has to be done to assist our Nation’s first 

responders, and now I would like to just ask a couple of questions. 

I would like to ask either Mr. Rudman or Mr. Clarke, in response 

to your report a Department of Homeland Security spokesman 

called your cost estimate for funding first responders, quote, ‘‘grossly inflated,’’ unquote. Others have said that funding levels should 

not be raised significantly because the funds simply could not be 

absorbed efficiently. 

Do you believe that emergency responders could efficiently use 

the funds you recommended they receive? Senator Rudman? 

Mr. RUDMAN. Well, we do, and let me comment on that comment. 

The curious thing about that comment was it was made at a time 

when the person making it could not have read this report. It was 

an instant comment, a typical defensive bureaucratic response by 

a public relations flack who should have been fired for what he 

said. He also said that we requested gold-plated telephones. If you 

consider we had two former chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 

a former Secretary of State, and a Nobel laureate, I mean really 

these are serious people. 

30

Having said that, we gave a range and we say that we really 

don’t know what that amount is. We know it is closer to our number than what is currently being spent. One of the reasons we 

think national standards ought to be mandated by the Congress as 

soon as possible is require national standards to be mandated, then 

you can add up the dollars and cents that it takes to meet those 

standards and decide how much you want to spend. 

But, no, there is no question. We worked with your constituents. 

We worked with the National Association of Firemen, police chiefs, 

emergency responders, and your hospitals associations from all 

over this country. If you look in the back of this book, you will see 

all of the people we worked with. They are very serious people who 

are faced with a daunting task who feel they are hopelessly unprepared to deal with it today. 

Now, before Senator Schumer came in, I made the observation 

that the kill-to-injured ratio in New York was backwards. In most 

instances where you have an event like this, you have thousands 

of people badly injured and a few hundred people who unfortunately die. In New York, it was quite different than that. 

In most events that I have seen scenario planning on, you have 

a much higher percentage of seriously injured people either with 

chemical or biological weapons or with conventional explosives and 

fire. It is absolutely essential that the people who are on the first 

line of defense—the policemen from Milwaukee, the firemen from 

New York, whatever—have the equipment to deal with it and the 

hospitals have the surge capacity to handle it. That is all we are 

saying. 

None of us know when it is going to happen, but, you know, we 

have a lot of fire departments in this country and sometimes they 

sit and play poker for three weeks in a row and then all of a sudden they have got their hands full night, after night, after night. 

Same situation. 

Senator FEINGOLD. Mr. Clarke? 

Mr. CLARKE. The criticism that our number is too high and their 

number is Goldilocks, is just right, I think, highlights what the 

problem is here. They don’t have a methodology. Until the Congress requires the Department of Homeland Security to have a 

methodology, we will continue to have these pointless arguments 

about my number is better than your number. 

This is not rocket science. Take the standard metropolitan statistical areas of various sizes, articulate a standard set of equipment 

and training and facilities that we want for each one of them for 

SMSAs at size A and size B and size C, cost out how much that 

will cost, do the addition and the multiplication, and you will know 

how much we need. We don’t know now because no one has done 

that, and I despair, frankly, of the Department of Homeland Security ever doing it unless you make them. 

Senator FEINGOLD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman KYL. Senator Schumer. 

31

STATEMENT OF HON. CHARLES E. SCHUMER, A U.S. SENATOR 

FROM THE STATE OF NEW YORK 

Senator SCHUMER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to 

thank you for the diligence which you have shown in holding hearings on this and many other subjects dealing with terrorism. 

I want to thank our witnesses, particularly Senator Rudman and 

Mr. Clarke. Dr. Posner is doing his job, but these two are sort of 

the Paul Reveres warning us about homeland security, an issue I 

have felt very keenly and very strongly about. And you are right; 

you can quibble with the number, but you can’t quibble with the 

idea that we are just not doing enough. 

I feel sort of, Mr. Chairman, that we are sort of maybe at a low 

point. We have Al-Qaeda on the run. Most experts say that they 

are weaker now than they were on 9/10, and the number of terrorist organizations that can do dastardly deeds is small. But it is 

going to grow because the very technology that blesses our lives allows small groups of people to do horrible things. For all we know, 

God forbid, the Chechans will decide we are the enemy and not 

Moscow, or the East Timorese or the skinheads in Montana. God 

knows. 

The sad fact of the matter is, Mr. Chairman, that if all of us in 

this room were at once bitten by an evil virus and we decided fanatically to devote the next 5 years of our lives to doing real damage here in the United States, the odds are too high we could succeed. That is the problem we face. 

I have been supportive of the President taking action overseas. 

I think it is the right thing to do. I have my disagreements with 

how he did it. But faced with the choice of doing nothing, as some 

in my party would recommend, or doing exactly what the President 

did, I would still to this moment choose to do what the President 

did. 

But on homeland security, they are not showing the same vigor, 

the same interest, the same pursuit, and I think a lot of it, frankly, 

when I talk to people in homeland security, is fiscally-related. It is 

not that they don’t want to do it; it is not even that they are ideologically opposed to doing it, but it is fiscally-related. 

Do either of you want to comment on what I had to say? And 

then I have a few questions. 

Mr. RUDMAN. I would agree with virtually everything you said, 

probably everything you said, Senator Schumer. You know, I don’t 

envy you the task you have up here this year. You are facing a 

$450 billion deficit which, in my view, could go to $6 or $700 billion 

in 2004 or 2005. You are talking about enormous expenditures for 

a new prescription drug program which both parties want, and you 

are faced with a homeland security issue which is in dire need. 

Now, how you juggle all of those I just don’t know, but that is 

why it is so essential—and it has been really Dick Clarke’s programmatic thinking, because that is the discipline he has had in 

Government for all the years he has served, and Dr. Jamie Metzl 

that convinced us that the most important thing to do, and we put 

it in the report, is to do a threat assessment based on a number 

of factors, as we have discussed here today, and then set some 

standards, plug some numbers into those standards, and at least 

you know what the number is. 

32

Maybe it is not 90; maybe it is 62, maybe it is 112. And then 

when you have that number and you look at prescription drugs and 

you look at Iraq and you look at Afghanistan, then you all decide. 

That is why we were all elected to this place at one time, to make 

those kinds of miserable decisions, but you have to make the decisions. 

You surely can’t make that decision based on throwing darts 

against the wall, which is essentially where we are right now. That 

is the single most important message that we bring here today. 

The report has a lot of good data in it, but to me that is the single 

most important message we have. 

Senator SCHUMER. Again, I am sure the Chairman and everyone 

who has been here before me would join me in thanking you because both of you now are private citizens and you are doing this 

because you care about America. You know, I wear this flag in 

memory of the 3,000 who were lost in New York. I don’t want anyone in the country to have to put on another flag to wear. 

I just have a few more questions—I know the hour is late, Mr. 

Chairman—of Mr. Clarke related to terrorism, although not necessarily to homeland security. 

Chairman KYL. Excuse me, Senator Schumer. Could I just interrupt you for one second? I want to make sure before I have to leave 

that Senator Leahy’s statement will be accepted for the record. The 

record will be left open for one week for questions of our witnesses 

and for other statements that anybody would like to make. 

At about eight minutes after, I am going to have to leave and I 

would like about one minute before I leave. But the floor is yours 

until—— 

Senator SCHUMER. So cut me off at 4:07, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman KYL. Good. Okay, thanks. 

Senator SCHUMER. I think we will have enough time; maybe not. 

And you may find this interesting because it is an issue—— 

Chairman KYL. I know I will find it interesting. 

Senator SCHUMER. No, but it is an issue you and I have been 

working on. Senator Kyl has been very, very out front in chairing 

hearings on Wahabi-ism and what it means and how we have ignored it. We hope to have more hearings on this issue. We even 

wrote an op ed together, which I heard while we were away got 

published in the Washington Post. 

There is a report out today about an article that is going to—or 

is, I think, being made public today or tomorrow in Vanity Fair, 

which has done pretty serious journalism, where you are quoted, 

Mr. Clarke, and I just wanted to talk a little bit about it. 

The basic thrust of the article is that right after 9/11, when no 

one was allowed to fly, some special planes were able to spirit 

Saudis out of the country; that it had top clearance, that some of 

the members on that plane were members of the bin Laden family. 

Now, let me posit that much of the bin Laden family is not allied 

with the terrorist bin Laden and, in fact, are part of the Saudi rulers or, you know, upper class, ruling class, whatever you want to 

call it. But two, at least, of those bin Ladens had been under some 

suspicion for other kinds of terrorist activities or supporting terrorism in the past. 

33

This reporter seemed to do a pretty good job. He interviewed 

some private investigators who received a call 2 days after 9/11 

asking them to escort Saudi students on a flight from Tampa to 

Lexington, Kentucky. He interviewed some airport officials who 

knew that the planes had gotten top, top, top clearance when no 

one else could fly, and a bunch of other people. 

Can you tell us what you know about this? You are quoted in the 

article, and again I think you are doing a service because one of 

the things the Chairman and I have felt is that we haven’t gone 

deeply enough and looked into enough the relationship between 

some in the Saudi leadership and terrorism. 

Mr. CLARKE. Senator, as I recall the event—as you know, I was 

the national crisis coordinator on 9/11 and 9/12, making a lot of decisions, or implementing a lot of decisions. I do recall the State Department coming to us that week, and I don’t remember what day, 

and saying that the Saudi embassy felt that, in the wake of the terrorism attacks, Arabs in this country, particularly Saudis, might be 

victims of retribution attacks. And they wanted, therefore, to take 

some Saudi students and other Saudi citizens back to the Kingdom 

for safety, and could they be given permission to fly even though 

we had grounded all flights? 

What I recall is that I asked for flight manifests of everyone on 

board, and all of those names to be directly and individually vetted 

by the FBI before they were allowed to leave the country. I also 

wanted the FBI to sign off even on the concept of Saudis being allowed to leave the country. As I recall, all of that was done. It is 

true that members of the bin Laden family were among those who 

left. We knew that at the time. 

I can’t say much more in open session, but it was a conscious decision with complete review at the highest levels of the State Department and the FBI and the White House. 

Senator SCHUMER. Now, in this article—and I don’t want to tear 

into the Chairman’s time here—he has a source, so who knows? 

But he says that the State Department did not—‘‘It did not come 

out of this place,’’ says a State Department source. ‘‘The likes of 

Prince Bandar do not need the State Department to get this done.’’ 

Then he quotes Special Agent John Ianorelli, of the FBI, saying ‘‘I 

can say unequivocally that the FBI had no role in facilitating these 

flights one way or the other.’’ 

Let me ask you, I guess, two questions. Are you confident, given 

your vast knowledge, that every person who was on—how many 

flights were there? The article is unclear. 

Mr. CLARKE. I believe there was one. 

Senator SCHUMER. Just one that stopped in all these places, because he names four or five cities. ‘‘The Saudi planes’’—he says 

plural; he uses ‘‘planes’’—‘‘took off or landed in Los Angeles, Washington, Houston, Cleveland, Orlando, Tampa, Lexington, Kentucky, 

and Newark and Boston.’’ 

How thoroughly were these people on this plane or these planes 

vetted? 

Mr. CLARKE. Senator, all I can tell you is that I asked the FBI 

to do that. I asked the director and the assistant director to do 

that. They told me they did it. I think the key thing here is that 

34

no one on those aircraft manifests has ever been subsequently 

wanted by the FBI for an interrogation. 

So the notion which this author perhaps is trying to paint that 

people who were involved in 9/11 or in planning terrorism somehow 

were allowed to escape, I think, is wrong. No one on those flight 

manifests has ever been designated by the FBI as having been involved in 9/11. 

Senator SCHUMER. But let me ask you this question. This is just 

a summary, so I haven’t read the article. It is what Vanity Fair 

puts out. My impression, or at least my assumption of why this 

was important was not necessarily that those connected with terrorism might have escaped, although who knows—but your word 

means a whole lot to me; I have such huge respect for you, and we 

knew each other even back in the Clinton days when we were talking about some of these issues—but rather that many of them 

might have been able to shed some light, particularly in the time 

thereafter, about what happened, what went on, et cetera. 

Do you know if we have made any efforts to question any of 

these people subsequent to their being in Saudi Arabia, given 

something you have acknowledged and we have all acknowledged, 

the lack of complete Saudi cooperation when we wished to question 

some people there? Have we tried, have we been successful? Do you 

have any knowledge of that? 

Mr. CLARKE. I do not know the answer to that, Senator. I would 

be guessing and I would rather not do that. But I would stress 

that, despite what the article may say, this decision was reviewed 

by the State Department and was reviewed by the FBI and signed 

off on by the FBI. All of the names on all of the flight manifests 

were checked before anyone was allowed to leave the country. And 

my specific question to the FBI was, if there is anybody you want 

to hold, hold them. 

Senator SCHUMER. And was anyone—sorry. I wouldn’t mind if 

you have your question and I could just continue for four or 5 minutes myself. 

Chairman KYL. Yes. Here is what I would like to do and see if 

it is okay with you, Senator Schumer. Obviously, we are deviating 

in this line of questioning from what the hearing was all about. 

Senator SCHUMER. It just was so officious. 

Chairman KYL. I understand, and I am fascinated by the pursuit 

of the issue as well, but Mr. Clarke wasn’t advised beforehand that 

we were going to get into this. 

Senator SCHUMER. Right. 

Chairman KYL. Here is what I would like to suggest. Since I 

have to get down to the White House and my car is leaving in just 

a second, I would like to just make a concluding comment and, 

with your permission, bring the hearing to a close, with the understanding that we will continue to converse with Mr. Clarke and, as 

events call for it—we are going to have a hearing a week from 

today, September 10, that is going to get back to the question of 

Saudi involvement and other related issues. 

Senator SCHUMER. That is just fine with me. 

Chairman KYL. We have plenty of time to pursue this, but I 

think, under the circumstances, if it is all right with you, that is 

the way I would like to deal with it. 

35

Senator SCHUMER. Well, I read this two hours ago. 

Chairman KYL. I have got it here and I think it is worth pursuing, but let’s give Mr. Clarke a little more time just to—— 

Senator SCHUMER. Would you be available tomorrow or the next 

day to talk about this? 

Mr. CLARKE. Yes. 

Chairman KYL. Let me, first of all, thank Senator Schumer. It 

has been a pleasure to work with him on these issues, and we do 

see eye to eye. We do have some more work to do and we will be 

having another interesting hearing a week from today on the morning of September 10. 

The one comment I would like to make, and Senator Rudman put 

his finger right on it, is obviously I would like to spend more 

money on defense, I would like to spend more money on lots of different things. We all would. Senator Schumer and I might well decide we would like to spend more money on homeland security. 

The only rational way to decide among all the competing interests is to have some kind of informed basis for evaluation, which 

is the great service that you have done for us to suggest that template for us to use, or the Department of Homeland Security primarily to use. And then the political decisions about how to allocate the money based upon that knowledge will be up to us as the 

political people and we will have to make our judgments one way 

or the other. 

I think that is one of the great services that you have performed 

in the report and in the conversation you have had. And, Dr. 

Posner, of course, this is right down your alley, as well. 

So I want to thank you all for your testimony. I have the feeling 

we are going to be doing some follow-up here. As we work on legislation, much like the House is doing, we are going to have to rely 

upon you for advice on how to put it together. 

So I think that is the way I would like to close this hearing, not 

to close the subject, but as kind of the second chapter. You wrote 

the first chapter, and then we will get to work on how to implement that and either call you back formally or informally, discuss 

with you and try to pursue it in that way. I just really appreciate 

all of the information that you have provided to us today. Thank 

you very much for being here. 

With that, the hearing will be closed. 

[Whereupon, 4:12 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 

[Additional material is being retained in the Committee files.] 

[Submissions for the record follow.]

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