Historic aircraft carrier to become anti-terror command post
Congress is planning to spend $31 million in fiscal 2005 to lay the groundwork for turning the USS Intrepid -- the WWII aircraft carrier turned historic landmark and museum in New York City -- into a permanent command center for government agencies in the event of terrorist attacks, CongressDaily has learned.
The funds are contained in the $388.4 billion fiscal 2005 omnibus measure that has been sent to President Bush. House Appropriations Chairman Bill Young, R-Fla., inserted the funds into the measure in conference for the stated purpose of "planning, design and reconstruction of Pier 86 in New York City," where the Intrepid is located. The city has condemned the pier for safety reasons and declared areas off limits to visitors.
A person familiar with the effort said the pier "is in disarray" and the funds are needed to begin construction of an "alternate emergency management headquarters for the government." The source declined to be identified because the plans have not been made public and involved parties who "haven't signed the final documents." The source did say the facility would include 100,000 square feet of office space with state-of-the-art communications equipment.
The facility would be similar to the FBI's temporary headquarters on the Intrepid after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, when agency employees were forced to evacuate their offices. About 750 agents, as well as more than 400 police officers, were stationed on the Intrepid, which served as a helicopter landing strip. Some 500,000 telephone calls were fielded in the ship's makeshift offices.
Young's relationship with the Intrepid goes back several years. In August he was awarded the Intrepid Freedom Award, which according to the museum's Web site "is presented to a national or international leader who has distinguished himself in promoting and defending the values of freedom and democracy, the core beliefs of our nation." Past recipients of the award include former Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Bill Clinton, Vice President Cheney, and foreign leaders such as former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and former Russian President Boris Yeltsin.
Young also was among the many GOP lawmakers who were feted on the Intrepid during the Republican Convention in New York this past summer.
The $31 million appropriation would be in the form of a grant to the Hudson River Park Trust, which was created in 1998 by GOP Gov. George Pataki to finance preservation of the city's aging piers.
House VA-HUD Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman James Walsh, R-N.Y., and Rep. John Sweeney, R-N.Y., worked with Young to secure the money in conference. The funds will come from HUD's $4.7 billion fiscal 2005 Community Development Fund budget. The account funds programs ranging from grants to Indian tribes to 1,086 earmarks for local projects such as homeless shelters, parking garages, playground equipment and swimming pools.