Posted on 02/07/2003 6:58:56 AM PST by conservativecorner
The PIGs are at it again. The acronym stands for "Public Interest Groups," the major associations that represent the collective interests of state and local officials in Washington. Two of the largest PIGs are the U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM) and the National League of Cities (NLC). They have been hard at work lately, snorting at Congress to deliver more financial assistance to hard-pressed states and cities to pay for security upgrades in the post-9/11 world.
A recent USCM report claims that cities have spent $2.2 billion this year beyond regular expenses to beef up security, and the organization’s president, Boston mayor Thomas Menino, said that the cities "cannot continue to shoulder these costs alone."
Senator Hillary Clinton has rushed in to load up the PIGs’ feeding trough. Her "Homeland Security Block Grant Act," which she promises to introduce in the Senate when the new session of Congress convenes, would provide $3.5 billion for local anti-terrorism efforts. Under the formula in the Act, 70% of the funding would pass to about 1,000 counties and cities, with the remaining 30% transferred to state governments. The money would be used to hire additional police, fire and other emergency workers, as well as provide for equipment upgrades.
Politically, Senator Clinton’s proposal makes sense. She has had trouble with the cops and firemen who generally do not like her liberal ways, or her opposition to President Bush’s tough anti-terrorism policies abroad. In a remarkable appearance at Madison Square Garden for a 9/11-benefit concert, a crowd of New York’s Finest and Bravest booed her off the stage. Sponsorship of a $3.5 billion program targeted to this group is one step toward improving relations with this important constituency. The bill also takes the edge off her criticism of Bush’s Iraq policy. After all, a big check proves that Clinton is serious about homeland security. Finally, grants to state and local leaders builds good will with many of the same people who run local Democratic Party organizations, should Clinton ever decide to run for President.
The Homland Security Block Grant is good politics for Senator Clinton but bad policy for the rest of us, particularly New Yorkers, for three reasons.
First, the bill is loaded with pork for the PIGs. Population rather than true need drives the distribution of funds. Cow towns across the county facing no plausible terrorist threat will use this money to pay for protection they simply do not need. For example, Syracuse, Binghamton, Poughkeepsie and Schenectady will get a combined $2.4 million a year under the terms of her proposal.
But it is clear that Poughkeepsie and small towns like it are simply not in Al-Qaeda’s crosshairs.
Clinton fails to recognize that terrorism is a threat to global cities like New York, Washington, Chicago, and Los Angeles. New York City has already proven to be a target, but under Clinton’s proposal, it would get a measly $72 million. This amount is not enough for the most targeted city in the nation.
Second, the terms of the Homeland Security Block Grant Act allow municipalities to waste the money. The Act covers budget items like overtime pay and purchase of mundane equipment like squad cars for the police. Clinton herself is billing the Act as a way to soften the blow of New York City’s fiscal crisis. Local governments will simply absorb the new funding without changing their current practices.
Finally, and most importantly, anti-terrorism experts and the intelligence community should be allowed to decide where the money goes. Local emergency systems may need to be beefed up, but not all of them, across the board. Experts with the new Department of Homeland Security can make the best assessments of vulnerabilities and threats and send the aid to where it is needed the most. Experts will target the money in accord with need; Congress will squander the money in accord with politics.
Whenever the PIGs want something, suspicions should be aroused. They have a track record of crying wolf, and using national crisis as a pretext to demand money from Washington. During the riots of the 1960s, mayors like John Lindsay, acting as national urban spokesman, forecast chaos without massive federal rebuilding assistance. During the period of great inflation and low growth in the 1970s, the PIGs said that the cities would all go bankrupt without help. And in the 1980s, the PIGs predicted that addicts and drug dealers would bury the cities unless the federal government saved the day. These periods were all tough times, but the cities rebounded because they corrected deficiencies in local administration and turned to their states for help. There is a proper role for the federal government to provide state and local aid for homeland security, but we should not let special interests or opportunistic politicians in Congress define it. Let the judgments of anti-terrorism experts dictate where the federal aid should go.
#### Richard M. Flanagan is assistant professor of political science at The College of Staten Island, City University of New York.
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