Title: Feds, industry need to share port security costs, DHS says
Source: Aviation Week's Homeland Security & Defense
Date: December 15, 2004
Author: John M. Doyle johnm_doyle@AviationNow.com

Paying for port security has to be a "shared burden" between the federal government and the private sector, according to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official in charge of protecting transportation.

"There has to be a balance there. It's not simply a federal government responsibility," DHS Under Secretary Asa Hutchinson said Dec. 10 at a Council of Foreign Relations (CFR) border security seminar in Washington.

"I believe our responsibility is to provide leadership and investing in technologies, pilot projects, putting seed money out there to enhance port security," said Hutchinson, head of the DHS Border and Transportation Security directorate.

The Coast Guard has estimated it will cost more than $7 billion over the next 10 years to bring the nation's port facilities up to standards required by the Maritime Transportation Security Act. The fiscal 2005 DHS appropriations legislation provided only $150 million in port security grants.

Maritime interests have formed several groups to lobby Congress and the White House for more money.

But Hutchinson noted that much of the money in port security grants is going to the private sector.

"You have to recognize that that's not simply the port authority property. That may very well include the Exxon facility ...[or] the Mobil facility. It will include the chemical plants that are all privately owned," he said.