Ridge hints at border agency consolidation

White House Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge on Tuesday signaled to local and state emergency personnel that new recommendations for reorganizing federal immigration and border agencies might be coming.

"As part of our consideration of the new 21st-century border, we are presently considering a range of options that goes from simply a new technology architecture that puts it all on the same database to a series of consolidations that could ultimately involve four or five departments," Ridge told a gathering of the National Emergency Management Association (NEMA). "We'll be making a recommendation to the president in the near future."

He added that current responsibility for border security is too scattered among agencies. "There is no line of accountability," he said. "As you take a look at 21st-century borders, you have got to have somebody in charge."

While Ridge provided no details on what the recommendations may encompass, he did take the opportunity to emphasize that state and local officials will be essential personnel in implementing the national strategy to shield the United States from potential terrorist attacks.

He said health officials and the "first responders" to emergencies will play critical roles. "First-responder money is substantial--$3.5 billion--and it will be for equipment and training," he said. Ridge added that state and local officials also need to help the federal government organize "real-time, real-world exercises" to prepare for various threats.

States need "comprehensive" plans for spending security funds, Ridge said, and he warned that Congress will be looking to those frameworks as a guide when it allocates homeland security money. He also said a critical component of security would be increased information sharing at all levels of government.

"We need to a better job of getting more information down to the local level, and we need to do a better job of getting information from the local level up," he said.

Ridge praised NEMA for its prophetic work and recommendations on national security, noting that two years before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the organization had proposed creating a "single point of contract" within the federal government to coordinate security and anti-terrorism efforts. The group also had argued that any initiatives to prevent attacks require clear objectives on how to spend security funds, a key feature in Ridge's remarks.