A late 2003 study by the U.S. Conference of Mayors showed 90 percent of cities have not received their share of $1.5 billion allocated by the nation's largest homeland security funding program. Additionally, a poll in 43 states recently showed that a third of counties nationwide still have not seen any federal funding for first responders. Feel safe yet?
A 2003 Report by the Council on Foreign Relations found wide ranging inadequacies in homeland security preparedness. Fire departments across the country have only enough radios to equip half the firefighters on a shift, and breathing apparatuses for only one-third. Only 10 percent of fire departments in the United States have the personnel and equipment to respond to a building collapse. Public health laboratories in most states still lack basic equipment and expertise to adequately respond to a chemical or biological attack, and 75 percent of state labs report being overwhelmed by too many testing requests. Most cities do not have the necessary equipment to determine what kind of hazardous materials emergency responders may be facing. Police departments in cities across the country do not have the protective gear to safely secure a site following an attack using weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Many police departments lack adequate detection and personal protective equipment and training for responding to chemical, biological, or radiological incidents.
A 2002 US Conference of Mayors/Cities United for Science Progress survey of 122 mayors from across the country found that mayors were less than 20 percent satisfied that their cities had adequate protective gear to respond to chemical or biological attacks, even though the same survey showed that the two greatest homeland defense concerns of mayors were the threats of a chemical or biological attack. Of all cities with eligible ports, only 42% have received grants to help with port security. Fifty eight percent of all US cities with ports eligible to receive port security grants reported to the US Conference of Mayors that they had not received funding under the program. Seven million cargo containers arrive in US ports each year, but as little as 2 percent of those are screened.
The US has 361 commercial ports and the Central Intelligence Agency recently concluded that the United States is more likely to be attacked with a weapon of mass destruction smuggled into the country aboard a ship than one delivered by a ballistic missile.
