October 18, 2005

LEGISLATIVE UPDATE

Senate PASSES Commerce-Justice-Science Appropriations Legislation

On September 15, 2005, the Senate passed the fiscal year 2006 Commerce-Justice-Science appropriations bill, H.R. 2862, by a vote of 91-4. Floor action was dominated by Katrina-related proposals intended to speed assistance to hurricane victims and expand eligibility in programs such as Medicaid. However, despite the desperate need for funding for law enforcement in the areas affected by Hurricane Katrina, funding for state and local law enforcement programs continue to be left out in the cold.

This is not to say that Senators have not offered amendments to increase funding to state and local law enforcement officers. However, it seems as if returning funding levels for law enforcement grant programs will continue to be an uphill battle despite the obvious need for more money.

On September 8, Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D-DE) offered an amendment for emergency relief for Victims of Hurricane Katrina that would increase the COPS program funding to $1 billion, with $700 million going toward hiring and $300 million added to Interoperable Communications Technology. Current funding in the legislation for the COPS hiring program is at a very low $2 million dollars, and Interoperable Communications is at $37.5 million. NAPO continues to feel that these low funding numbers are unacceptable as state and local law enforcement are having to deal with more numerous dangers, such as terrorism and natural disasters, as proved in New Orleans over the past few weeks. This amendment was defeated by a vote of 41-57.

Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) proposed an amendment that would increase spending on communications equipment for police and rescue workers by $5 billion, stating that it was an emergency need in the wake of the hurricane disaster. However, Budget Committee Chairman Judd Gregg (R-NH) contested the amendment saying that Congress already planned to spend $2 billion on communications gear, and that Senator Stabenow’s amendment had little to do with disaster relief. The proposal was defeated on a 40-58 vote.

Not all first responder assistance amendments failed, however. In a voice vote, Senators agreed to boost spending on programs to combat rape and domestic violence, clean up methamphetamine labs, and help law enforcement agencies replace the defective Zylon® -

based bulletproof vests. Also among the amendments adopted was a proposal from Jim Talent (R-MO) to spend $5 million a year to create an “unsolved crimes” section in the Justice Department’s civil rights division, which would investigate civil rights crimes that happened before 1970 and resulted in deaths.

Senators Mark Dayton (D-MN) and Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) were successful in having their bi-partisan amendment to add an additional $275 million to the Justice Assistant Grants approved. This would bring funding for state and local law enforcement programs up to $900 million. NAPO endorsed this amendment and was thanked by Senator Dayton’s office for our help and support in getting this amendment added to H.R. 2862.

Overall, the Senate version of H.R. 2862 appropriates $52.4 billion in fiscal 2006, of which $48.6 billion is discretionary spending, for the Commerce and Justice Departments, as well as agencies such as NASA. The bill would provide $21.2 billion for the Justice Department, $7.2 billion for the Commerce Department and related agencies, and $16.4 billion for NASA.

Senate Adds Combating Meth to H.R. 2862

On Friday, September 9, 2005, the Senate unanimously adopted the Combat Meth Act (S. 103) as an amendment to the Commerce-Justice-Science spending bill. The amendment, offered by the sponsors of S. 103, Senators Jim Talent (R-MO) and Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), limits access to cold medicines containing pseudoephedrine, the primary ingredient used to make methamphetamine.

This amendment adopted by the Senate includes language approved by the Judiciary Committee at the urging of Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK), allowing states and localities to enact or retain standards and penalties that are tougher than the federal ones.

The House has a similar bill (H.R. 314) sponsored by Majority Whip Roy Blunt (R-MO), but the Senate version will likely be taken up during conference between the House and Senate appropriators.

NAPO has supported this legislation since it was introduced in the Senate in January 2005 and will continue to work to ensure that the amendment will become a permanent part of the conference report in order that state and local law enforcement will have every possible means to crack down on methamphetamine dealers.

SEPTEMBER 11 COMMISSION CALLS FOR OVERHAULS OF EMERGENCY RESONSE SYSTEMS

On September 14, 2005, the Sept. 11 commission released a report sharply criticizing the federal government’s handling of the response to Hurricane Katrina. The report renewed the commission’s calls for Congress to change the homeland security grant formula and create a more efficient emergency response system.

The report contained a few new recommendations, but it mainly reiterated ideas from its 2004 report that Congress and the Bush administration failed to enact. The commission is recommending that federal, state and local agencies have coordinated response systems that would allow them to avoid the miscommunication that not only hampered the response at the World Trade Center in 2001, but also hindered recovery efforts after Hurricane Katrina.

One recommendation, backed by a majority of the commission members, would block states and cities from getting homeland security grant funds unless they institute a unified emergency command structure. Another strongly supported recommendation is that the homeland security grants to states should be distributed based on risk of terrorism, rather than by population or mandatory minimum amounts to small states. Congress has greatly resisted these calls to overhaul the grant formula, but with the passing of S. 21 in the Senate and H.R. 1544, hopefully it is heading down the road to enacting the recommendation.

HOUSE APPOINTS NEW HOMELAND SECURITY COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN

Congressman Peter T. King, a Republican from New York, has been selected to take Christopher Cox’s place as the Chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee. This move gives the region most affected by the September 11 terrorist attacks a major advocate on a panel that oversees the nation’s domestic security.

Congressman King is a friend of law enforcement and a strong advocate of changing the distribution of Department of Homeland Security grants to a formula based on the risk of terrorism. NAPO supports this formula change and has worked with both former Committee Chairman Cox and Ranking Member Bennie Thompson to develop and pass H.R. 1544, the “Faster and Smarter Funding for First Responders Act,” as well as its counterpart in the Senate, S. 21. Congressman King has also made coordination between federal government, local police and firefighters a top priority.

NAPO looks forward to working with Chairman King to ensure that state and local law enforcement are properly supported, trained and equipped to prevent terrorism before it occurs.

HOUSE STRENGTHENS SEX OFFENDER

REGISTRATION REQUIREMENTS

On September 14, 2005, the House passed H.R. 3132, the “Children’s Safety Act of 2005,” legislation that would strengthen federal registration requirements for convicted sex offenders and make failing to comply a federal crime. The bill, sponsored by House Judiciary Chairman F. James Sensenbrenner Jr. (R-WI), would create a national sex offender registry database and require an individual convicted of a sex crime to register before completing a prison term or within five days of being sentenced.

Several amendments were attached to the bill during floor deliberation, including one from Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) that would ban the sale or transfer of firearms to individuals convicted of misdemeanor sex offenses against minors. Representative John Conyers, Jr (D-MI) attached an amendment that would add a separate federal crime charge for those who commit a violent act based on race, color, religion or national origin and broaden the category of hate crimes to include sexual orientation. Sensenbrenner strongly opposed the amendment, which was adopted 223-199, saying that it was a “poison pill” that would eventually kill the bill. However, the hate crimes legislation did not affect the passage of the bill.

Overall, 21 amendments were added to H.R. 3132.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is expected to consider a similar bill, S. 1086, sponsored by Senator Orrin G. Hatch (R-UT).

IMPORTANT LEGISLATION INTRODUCED TO PROTECT THE HEALTH OF FIRST RESPONDERS WHO RESPOND TO NATIONAL DISASTERS

On September 21, 2005, Senators George V. Voinovich (R-OH) and Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY), along with Representatives Carolyn B. Maloney (D-NY) and Christopher Shays (R-CT) introduced legislation (S. 1751 and H.R. 3850) in the House of Representatives and Senate that would provide free medical screenings to first responders, volunteers, and emergency personnel who respond to national disasters like Hurricane Katrina and the September 11 terrorist attacks.

After 9/11, approximately 40,000 first responders answered the call to Ground Zero, many of whom experienced and continue to experience a variety of health problems, including respiratory illness, pneumonia and asthma, as a result of doing their duty. Today, there are nearly 86,000 response, rescue, recovery and law enforcement personnel responding to Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf Coast region. On September 17, 2005, the Joint Taskforce Centers for Disease Control and Prevention & U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released the “Environmental Health Needs and Habitability Assessment.” This report identified 13 environmental health issues in New Orleans, including drinking water, wastewater, solid waste and debris, and sediments and soil contamination from toxic chemicals. One of the report’s central recommendations is to “maintain a central focus on pubic safety and recovery worker health and safety throughout the rebuilding of New Orleans.”

S. 1741, the “Disaster Area Health and Environmental Monitoring Act of 2005,” and its companion bill, H.R. 3850, help make permanent protections authorizing the President to carry out a program for the protection, assessment, monitoring, and study of the health and safety of emergency personnel, volunteers and workers who respond to a disaster and assist in the cleanup, if the President declares that dangerous matter is being released. The program involves informing and protecting responders against possible health impacts, monitoring them over the short and long term, providing medical referrals, and ensuring that any information is used to prevent or protect against future incidents.

HOMELAND SECURITY APPROPRIATIONS BILL

PASSED WITH NEW GRANT FORMULA

On Tuesday, October 18, 2005, the Homeland Security FY 2006 appropriations bill, H.R. 2360, was signed by the President and became Public Law 109-090. The bill is heavily focused on border protection with more than one-third of the funding being appropriated for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection. H.R. 2360 also includes a new distribution formula for Homeland Security grants for first responders.

The formula shift in the Homeland Security appropriations conference report would preserve the current 0.75 percent state minimum for the State Homeland Security grants and the Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention grants, while giving the Homeland Security secretary the flexibility to distribute the remaining funds based on risk rather than population. The Urban Area Security Initiative (UASI) grant program will continue to be distributed on a risk-based only formula.

An analysis by the House Homeland Security staff estimates that under the new formula 21.6 percent of the funding would be allocated based on the state minimums, leaving 78.4 percent to be risk-based. This compares to 16.5 percent for state minimums under H.R. 1544, the “Faster and Smarter Funding for First Responders Act of 2005,” and 39.3 percent for state minimums under S. 21, the “Homeland Security Grant Enhancement Act of 2005.”

All three Homeland Security grant programs will receive a total of $1.7 billion under the fiscal year 2006 appropriations conference report, which is a 28.1 percent cut from fiscal 2005. Of this funding, the House committee staff analysis puts each state’s minimum funding at approximately $7 million, compared with more than $11 million from last fiscal year.

The new distribution formula applies only to fiscal year 2006, but Senators and House members who have been working to change the formula say that negotiations on a permanent alteration will continue, even after H.R. 2360 has been passed. NAPO will continue to work with these members of Congress to ensure that the formula change becomes permanent and that it continues to evolve into a more risk-based formula.

GPO REFORM ACT PROPOSED

Retirees who collect pensions from jobs that were not covered by Social Security would take a much smaller hit from Social Security’s government pension offset (GPO) if legislation proposed by Maryland Democratic Senator Barbara Mikulski becomes law.

GPO reduces Social Security spousal and survivor’s benefits for retirees who collect pensions from jobs that were not covered by Social Security by an amount equal to two-thirds of the pension. Senator Mikulski’s bill, the Government Pension Offset Reform Act (S. 1799), would make GPO equal to the amount by which two-thirds of a retiree’s total monthly income (pension plus Social Security benefit, before the application of the offset) exceeds $1,200, adjusted for inflation.

Senator Mikulski has proposed this legislation in previous Congresses; however, none of those bills have ever made it out of committee. The Government Pension Offset disproportionately and unfairly penalizes those officers and their families who opt out of Social Security coverage because of professional need. The Social Security system is not appropriate for public safety officers who normally retire prior to or around 50 to 55 years of age and often under disability due to the stresses and dangers they face every day. NAPO was pleased to support this legislation in previous Congresses and will continue to support Senator Mikulski’s efforts in the 109^th Congress.