National Association of Counties * Washington, D.C.      Vol. 33, No. 23 * December 10, 2001

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Clinton introduces
anti-terrorism block grante

By Donald Murray
associate legislative director

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Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) has introduced anti-terrorism block grant legislation, the Homeland Security Block Grant Act (S. 1737), to assist local governments in combating the threat of terrorism.

NACo’s Task Force on Homeland Security in October called on Congress to “enact a new local anti-terrorism block grant at a minimum of $3 billion to comprehensively fund county and municipal law enforcement and public safety agencies and programs.”

The task force urged that “funding decisions under the block grant should be made countywide as an outgrowth of the existing ‘all hazards’ emergency management planning process.”

The legislation authorizes $3 billion in grant funds over a one-year period. Seventy percent of the funds will go directly to any local government that is a “qualifying community,” defined to include any city with a population of 50,000 or more that is in a metropolitan area or any county that is in a metropolitan area. Close to 900 counties can be found in standard metropolitan areas. The remaining 30 percent of the funds will go to the states for the purpose of distributing funds to smaller counties and cities.

NACo has specific concerns with respect to the formula for distributing the funds, the lack of incentives for promoting city-county and multi-county collaboration, and the bill’s general failure to link funding to planning for the prevention of terrorist attacks, said NACo Executive Director Larry Naake.

Under the provisions of the legislation, the Attorney General of the United States determines the amount of money cities and counties receive. While local planning is a requirement of the act, the amount of funding is based entirely on the population of the city or county. The county, however, is not permitted to count its municipalities as being part of its population. Thus, the formula assumes that counties only function in the “out-county” areas.

Among the purposes for which the grant funds can be used are the following:

• fund additional law enforcement, fire, and emergency resources, including overtime expenses
• purchase and refurbish personal protective equipment for fire, police and emergency personnel and acquire state-of-the-art technology to improve communication and streamline efforts
• improve cyber and infrastructure security, such as water treatment plants, distribution systems and other water infrastructure, nuclear power plants and other power infrastructure, tunnels and bridges, oil and gas pipelines and storage facilities, and chemical plants and transportation of hazardous substances
• assist local emergency planning committees so that local public agencies can design, review and improve disaster response systems
• assist communities in coordinating their efforts and sharing information with all relevant agencies involved in responding to terrorist attacks
• establish timely notification systems that enable communities to communicate with each other when a threat emerges, and
• improve communication systems to provide information to the public in a timely manner about the facts of any threat and the precautions the public should take.

Grant recipients will be required to match only 10 percent of the public safety block grant received. Severely distressed local governments will be exempt from the 10 percent matching requirement.

Local governments will not be able to use block grant funds to supplant their pre-September services, but they will be able to use the funds to address any post-Sept. 11 needs and to pay for additional services required since Sept. 11.

The U.S. Department of Justice will serve as the administering agency, but will be required to consult in all respects with the Office of Homeland Security, and, as appropriate, other federal agencies.

Grant recipients must submit a public safety action plan explaining how block grant funds will be used to prepare and respond to terrorist threats. Within six months of receiving funds, grant recipients must report to the Attorney General regarding the improvements made in public security resulting from block grant funds.