Results tagged “homelandsecuritysecretary”

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced New York City will receive $153 million - up from last year's $61 million - in transit security grants. Wow - all we can do is remember Chertoff's 2005 remark, when trying discussing how security funding would be allocated, "The truth of the matter is, a fully loaded airplane with jet fuel, a commercial airliner, has the capacity to kill 3,000 people. A bomb in a subway car may kill 30 people. When you start to think about your priorities, you're going to think about making sure you don't have a catastrophic thing first."

Chertoff but were unable to convince him to raise New York's anti-terror funding. Secretary Chertoff repeated said the he was not there to talk about money, but Spitzer says, "he knew we were going to raise" the issue. Yeah - if you're a federal official walking into a room with the Governor and Senators of a state that has been vocal about how the government has shortchanged it, you can guess what will be discussed.

There was a suspicious package in Times Square this afternoon. The NYPD shut down Times Square briefly as they investigated the object at 42nd and 7th Avenue. And the package turned out to be a red backpack forgotten by its Brooklyn owner. D'oh!

Yet another intriguing chapter in the life of former police commissioner Bernard Kerik: WNBC reports that he rejected a plea deal from the feds. The deal would have allowed Kerik to plead guilty to tax fraud and illegal eavesdropping - plus serve jail time - and in return, the feds would have dropped their criminal probe. And the probe includes quite a laundry list: "allegations of mortgage fraud, tax fraud, conspiracy to eavesdrop and making false statements on his application to become U.S. Homeland Security Secretary."

Concerned about a reduction in federal anti-terrorism funds, governors Eliot Spitzer of New York and Jon Corzine of New Jersey held a press conference yesterday at the Hoboken Terminal to urge Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff to not reduce funds. Federal counter-terrorism aid to New York City decreased by almost half last year, while in New Jersey aid to six northern counties was increased but funding was slashed for the rest of the state.

Remember how this summer, the Department of Homeland Security reduced the amount of anti-terror funding NYC would get? Sure, NYC was still getting most of the funding, but funds were being increased in less risky areas with, well, influential politicians. And then the press had a field day with how Homeland Security didn't think there were any national monuments or major buildings at risk? And then Homeland Security claimed that NY State and NYC didn't file their request properly?

New York politicians on the Hill are doing their happy dance: The Department of Homeland Security will give $26 million in port funding for this year, which the NY Post reports is a 400% increase over last year's port funding. Remember how earlier this summer the DHS released it/s budget, and New York City's (and DC's funding) was cut by 40%? Granted, the overall DHS budget was lower, but when you drastically cut back on two big terror targets, people wonder what's going on.

- The DHS tried not to be political about things!Okay, many of these points are fair, but we do think that when the city pays about $10.9 billion more in federal taxes than we get back from federal spending, our agencies needs more resources. And Gothamist thinks it's totally fair for our politicians and newspapers to make a big deal about the cut in funding, as getting 40% less than last year (yes, yes, other cities are getting less) is news. If anything, Chertoff's duty as the Secretary of Homeland Security is to really convince the President of how important the funding is, and then have the President push his Republican-led Congress to help out Homeland Security initiatives more.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg said he spoke to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff Thursday night and told him "for sure" that he disagreed with the urban area funding. On his radio show, the Mayor said, "I just think the ways they went about it was wrong. I think some factual things were wrong -- forget about the fact that they didn't have the right number of financial institutions or didn't know there were any significant targets in New York City -- just the quality of the report." (You can download an MP3 on the show here.) At any rate, Bloomberg and Chertoff plan to speak again on Monday, which makes Gothamist think some city staffers are working overtime this weekend.

The Department of Homeland Security cut the yearly antiterrorism budget for the "Urban Area Security Initiative" and New York and DC got the shaft, with their funds cut by 40%. New York City, which had received $207.6 million last year, will now get $124.5 million (DC went from $77.5 million to $46.5 million), while cities like Omaha, Louisville, Atlanta, and Jacksonville are getting more; ost notably, Jersey City/Newark got a 44% increase in funds, for a total of $34 million (probably for port security). Naturally, NY State politicians freaked out, with Representative Peter King calling this "a knife in the back to New York" and fuming, "They have cut $80 million in funding to NYC. Meanwhile, they gave a $21 million limousine contract to the company that was driving pimps and prostitutes around." Now, Gothamist understands that the overall budget was cut and the cities that had been getting lots of money before would take a hit. And, naturally, it's important to make sure cities like Chicago and LA gets the aid they need. But Omaha?

Since the Wall Street Journal broke news that the Transportation Safety Administration is considering to allow small knives and scissors on planes, some people are freaking out. For instance, take our former Police Commissioner (and almost Homeland Security Secretary) Bernard Kerik, who told Fox News, "I just hope this isn't a sign of the times, which is [that] four years after Sept. 11, [we've become] complacent and less vigilant." While the TSA says that the flying environment is much better these days and that's why they are considering taking the tiny sharp items off the list, it might have more to do with money and convenience, as it takes screeners longer to check those items. One can only assume that the TSA believes airplane cockpits are totally reinforced and that the flight attendants can be collateral damage should anything, God forbid, happens.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced that a Homeland Security representative would be placed in New York in order for the police and feds to have "one voice." This move is seen as a way to address the should we freak out or not subway threat two weeks ago. Hmm, a couple months on the job and finally he realizes there needs a rep in one of the country's biggest possible terror targets - nice thinking! Chertoff will also place a representative in LA, but Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco - they just don't make the cut, probably because the DHS wants to control the media. Anyway, the Police Commissioner's statement makes us laugh:

"Certainly we welcome anybody here. We reserve the right to make a decision on deploying our resources to protect New York City. So I don't know about any sort of joint announcement. But we certainly welcome communication with Homeland Security - we need a strong relationship."

The MTA will be paying for the additional police presence in the subways, according to Mayor Bloomberg. Police overtime to put one police officer on every train is costing the city $1.9 million a week, and Bloomberg said, "Let me give some credit to the MTA. They're willing to do this. They have some money. The governor has pushed them," even though he hasn't been happy about the MTA's footdragging on spending security funds. During his weekly radio talk, Mayor Bloomberg also said he "couldn't disagree more" with Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff's decision to focus on securing airline travel. Many of our commenters have questioned our anger at Chertoff's remarks, and there were quite a few valid points, but Gothamist thinks that this quote from the NY Times' Sewell Chan's Week in Review piece (which is a helpful overview of mass transit security) sums it up:

The United States mass transit system also lacks the aviation system's built-in security: limited accessibility, a ticketing system that requires identification and a single governing agency, the Federal Aviation Administration. By contrast, the Federal Transit Administration has little say over security policies. That's left to the country's 6,000 mass transit agencies.

He's only been the Department of Homeland Security Secretary for a couple months, but Michael Chertoff is a real dumbass. Chertoff, you're not going to win any fans by saying, "The truth of the matter is, a fully loaded airplane with jet fuel, a commercial airliner, has the capacity to kill 3,000 people. A bomb in a subway car may kill 30 people. When you start to think about your priorities, you're going to think about making sure you don't have a catastrophic thing first," no matter how true it may be. Because when there are millions of people who use mass transit on a daily basis just to get from here to there. Commuters in the area are angry, as well as quick to conjure up worst case scenarios. One man tells Newsday, "To me, Penn Station -- it's just a matter of time. I think more than 30 people would die from a bomb." And the Straphangers' Gene Russianoff says, "He obviously doesn't ride the train. It's staggering what damage an explosion might do at Grand Central or Penn Station... the real risks are in transit. It just couldn't be clearer than day." The American Public Transportation Association also condemned Chertoff's remarks, stating, "'To say that a terrorist attack on a subway is less important than an attack using a commercial airline is another example of how the federal government treats the millions of public transportation riders as second-class citizens when it comes to security."

The Daily News has great coverage, especially since they're crowing from breaking much of the story. The NY Times pondered about who Kerik's nanny is and here's Newsday's special section dedicated to the the Kerik mess; also check out Kerik's bio at Giuliani Partners and his love nest via Curbed.

The NY Times has a profile of Kerik, and his story is definitely the stuff of a movie (his mother abandoned his family when he was 2, and he later found out that she was a prostitute, perhaps killed by her pimp). Which is probably why, when Kerik published a book, The Lost Son: A Life in Pursuit of Justice, Oprah Winfrey featured him on her show. Kerik looks like he's had a lucrative career on the speech circuit; according to the Washington Speakers Bureau, Kerik was making $25,000-40,000 per speech, with topics like "My Time in Iraq," "Crisis Management," and an overview of the WTC attack.

With the convention winding down, the coverage is turning to examine how the protests and police have coexisted these past few days. The NY Times goes through the NYPD's tools of the trade when dealing with protests, and Newsday looks at how protesters are able to inflitrate Madison Square Garden, in spite of the GOP's best efforts, like yesterday's AIDS' activists who disturbed Andy Card's speech. Standard Deviance does some down and dirty research into who exactly was the protester that was arrested during Cheney's speech. Protesters are also taking responsibility for the theft of the American flag on the Brooklyn Bridge. The ransom note of sorts on indymedia demands that Mayor Bloomberg, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, FBI Director Robert Mueller, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge and President Bush resign in exchange for the flag. The Daily News points out "If protestors accomplished the theft, they would have to have been skilled climbers or crazy, or perhaps both."

Local media's convention coverage:

More terror alert fun: Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge was in town, meeting with NY officials (like Commissioner Kelly, the Mayor, and Governor Pataki, above photo; the Times articles notes that meetings like that make the Mayor seem aligned with the Bush administration, which poses other issues for the Mayor's reelection effort), and he defended the terror alerts, which may have been outdated. Newsday on NYers dealing with "another day, another terror threat". And like many of the other NY politicians, Senator Hillary Clinton is asking Washington for more terror funding. Finally, check out the city's Office of Emergency Management site. Do you have a go bag?

Of course, the convention is causing all sorts of chaos in others ways: NJ commuters can't take the NJ Transit into Manhattan - they'll be going to Hoboken first then taking the PATH in. the NY Times' map showing where and when the various parties are being held during the Republican National Convention is more like a "Places To Avoid" guide. cityrag has been following the terror drills in midtown (with lots of photos, like the one above). Honestly, Gothamist thinks we see a terror drill every day. Wednesday, about thirty police cars, lights and sirens blazing, sped down Sixth Avenue, and this morning, fifteen police cars were parking themselves in a special formation near Grand Central. What happening?

Mayor Bloomberg testified that more federal money would need to be directed to NY and NYC. He also addressed criticism of the recently-unveiled NYPD-FDNY emergency respose plan, saying critics didn't really understand the plan. Secretary Ridge hedged his bets, saying the new plan "seemed like a step in the right direction."