News

House-Passed FY 2012 Homeland Security Appropriations Bill Decimates First Responder Assistance

Published Date: 06.28.2011

Amendment restores $320 million of $460 million in cuts to AFG and SAFER; USFA funding hits new low

Earlier this month the House of Representatives passed H.R. 2017, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Appropriations Act of 2012. The bill provides a total of $40.592 billion for DHS, a reduction of 2.6 percent from the $41.661 billion appropriated for FY 2011. Included in the bill is funding for emergency responder grant programs like the Assistance to Firefighters Grant (AFG) and the Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response (SAFER) grant, which award grants directly to local fire departments to help pay for apparatus, equipment, training, and staffing.

H.R. 2017 as introduced by House Homeland Security Subcommittee Chairman Robert Aderholt (R-AL) would have reduced funding for AFG and SAFER from $405 million each in FY 2011 to $200 million and $150 million, respectively, an overall reduction of $460 million or 56.8 percent. An amendment offered by Congressmen Steven LaTourette (R-OH) and Bill Pascrell (D-NJ) to restore $320 million in combined funding for AFG and SAFER was adopted by a vote of 333-87. The National Volunteer Fire Council (NVFC) issued an Action Alert to our members encouraging them to contact their U.S. Representatives to urge them to vote for the amendment.

Despite passage of the LaTourette-Pascrell amendment, H.R. 2017 reduces funding for AFG and SAFER by $70 million each, to $335 million respectively. The 17.3 percent cut to AFG and SAFER is mild compared to the treatment that other first responder grant programs receive in H.R. 2017. In total, the bill reduces funding for FEMA’s various first responder grant programs, including the State Homeland Security Grant Program, the Urban Areas Security Initiative, and Citizen Corps, from $2.229 billion to $1 billion. Essentially, the entire reduction in DHS spending is achieved by eliminating funding for first responders.

“This isn’t just a situation where we have to take our lumps along with everyone else in a difficult budget year,” said NVFC Chairman Philip C. Stittleburg after H.R. 2017 was introduced but before it was considered by the full House of Representatives. “This is the Majority on the House Appropriations Committee targeting fire service programs for vicious cuts at a time when so many departments are struggling financially because of the economic downturn.”

The NVFC, along with other major national fire service organizations, has sent letters to the Chairman and Ranking Member of the Senate Appropriations Committee and the Subcommittee on Homeland Security Appropriations asking that AFG and SAFER funding be restored to $405 million each, the same as in FY 2011.

In addition to the massive cuts to AFG, SAFER, and the other first responder grant programs, the House-passed DHS Appropriations bill reduces funding for the U.S. Fire Administration (USFA) by $3.05 million to $42.538 million. This would represent the lowest funding level in more than a decade for USFA, which as recently as FY 2004 was funded at $57.4 million.

“Just two and a half years ago Congress reauthorized USFA and approved a funding level of more than $76 million for FY 2012 while expanding the Administration’s core mission to encompass wildland firefighting, hazardous materials response, and emergency medical services,” said Stittleburg. “Now, with USFA fully engaged in implementing an enlarged portfolio of responsibilities, this Administration and the U.S. House of Representatives is proposing to slash their funding to its lowest level since 1999.”

“There is no fat to be trimmed from the USFA budget,” Stittleburg continued. “This proposed cut would result in service reductions that would be felt painfully in communities and fire departments across the country.”

For their part, the Committee explained the need to cut DHS funding in the Committee Report on H.R. 2017 by equating the dangers posed by terrorism with the dangers posed by the budget deficit:

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) serves a vital role in countering the persistent threat from terrorism. However, the United States now faces an equally significant and perhaps broader threat from an unprecedented fiscal crisis – a dire budgetary situation which has the potential to undermine the Nation’s economy as well as its security.

The Committee’s decision to extract the entirety of the DHS cuts out of funding allocated to first responders was the result of a determination that these programs have not produced tangible results, according to the Committee Report:

…the Committee conducted a thorough analysis of the Department's functions and prioritized funding for essential, frontline operations and critical programs that are demonstrating tangible results. By contrast, programs and activities that have underperformed or have not measurably furthered the homeland security mission have received substantial reductions in their annual appropriations.

This rationale is difficult to understand applied to a program like AFG, which in 2007 received a 95 percent effective rating, the second-highest rated program in DHS behind only the Secret Service. AFG and SAFER are unique among DHS grant programs in that they provide funding directly to local emergency response agencies (rather than to state governments to be distributed). Grant criteria is developed by fire service professionals representing a wide range of disciplines, and funding is allocated based on need through a competitive process by which panels of firefighters review and rank each application.

With H.R. 2017 passing the House, the focus now moves to the Senate where the Appropriations Committee will likely introduce its own DHS spending bill later this year. The NVFC will be working with the Committee and other members of the Senate to ensure that first responder programs are adequately funded. Sign up to receive Action Alerts from the NVFC when important votes take place or legislation benefitting the volunteer fire service is introduced, and use our Capwiz service to quickly and easily contact your U.S. Representative and Senators to ask for their support.

Media

Search