Panel chiefs agree on first responder formula fix

The top leaders of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee have moved closer to a House proposal and the Bush administration's position on distributing funding to first responders.

The committee had planned to mark up the "compromise" version Thursday but is postponing the meeting until next week for the funeral of Pope John Paul II.

Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Chairwoman Susan Collins, R-Maine, and ranking member Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., have proposed a "sliding scale" guarantee for every state, with 0.55 percent of the amount allocated guaranteed and up to 3 percent for larger states based on population factors.

Their original bill preserved the 0.75 percent base currently used to allocate funding to states and local communities -- a formula that has been widely criticized for directing too much money to low-risk states. House Homeland Security Chairman Chris Cox, R-Calif., negotiated a bill last year with his House colleagues that would set a minimum of 0.25 percent for each state and up to 0.45 percent for certain border states. The administration's proposed fiscal 2006 budget set a 0.25 percent minimum. Senate committee aides said 19 large states would receive higher minimum funding under the "sliding scale" formula. Presumably, that means New York, New Jersey and other densely populated areas. Cox in an interview Tuesday said he is "absolutely certain that we have common ground."

The House and Senate versions would allocate a majority of the funding based on the terrorist threat but disagree on the distribution structure and amount each state would receive.

An aide for the House Homeland Security Committee said while the new Senate version "comes a long way to the Cox approach," he said it is "not a true reduction in the minimum" amount. The aide argued that the Senate bill, which combines all three existing first responder grant programs and applies the 0.55 base to all of them, would distribute larger sums that are not based on terrorist threats. The House and the administration would retain separate grant programs and limit the 0.25 percent guarantee to the state grant initiative program. Under the president's budget, that program would receive $1 billion next year. All three grant programs combined would receive $2 billion under the president's budget.

The aide said Cox and the administration would first determine how much each state should receive based on risk and vulnerability. If that amount is below the 0.25 percent minimum, funding would be bumped up to that level. Funding for the other two initiatives -- the high-risk urban area and law enforcement programs -- would be based solely on risk and vulnerabilities.

The Collins-Lieberman bill also restructures applications for urban cities to favor a regional approach. It would allow cities to team up with other jurisdictions to receive more funding. The measure also authorizes an increase in overall first responder grant funding to $2.9 billion for the next two years. It includes accountability and transparency provisions to address reports of funding being misused.