Maryland leaders worry about shift in DHS priorities after elections

DHS secretary Michael Chertoff worries that the nation — and the next president — may let their guard down. “The biggest obstacle my successor will face is, ‘Does the public and does Congress have the will to stick to it?’” said Chertoff. “Or are we going to start to see people cannibalize homeland security because we haven’t been attacked for six years, [and] it doesn’t seem like it is a burning issue any more?” Chertoff raised the concern at a breakfast session with reporters last week, during which he gave a generally optimistic view of how the nation’s terrorism-protection capabilities have improved during the Bush presidency. “We’ve got a lot more to do, but I think we are going to leave for the next administration a pretty well-functioning department that does have a good set of tools that will allow the next managers to come in,” he said.

The Baltimore Sun’s David Nitkin writes that Chertoff’s broad concerns about the future of DHS highlight a looming reality: A change in administrations next year could trigger many shifts that affect Marylanders, with homeland security as an important example. Because of its proximity to the nation’s capital, the Baltimore metro area and Washington suburbs are particularly vulnerable to terrorist activity, Maryland leaders say. They want attention to security increased, not decreased. “The biggest part in all this is the budget commitment,” said state Delegate Brian McHale, a Democrat from Baltimore who is a steamship clerk at the port of Baltimore. “It’s almost infinite, the amount of money we could spend.” Bush’s budget, released last month, calls for increasing DHS’s spending by 6.8 percent, to $50.5 billion. As a heavily populated East Coast city with aging infrastructure, Baltimore and its suburbs have any number of vulnerabilities and can use all available help, as Governor Martin O’Malley, an outspoken advocate for homeland security from his days as mayor, has long noted.

Rail cars carry chemicals through tunnels under the city. High-profile bridges are used by thousands of travelers daily. Nine million tons of cargo come through the port of Baltimore each year. Many of those potential threats are being addressed, Chertoff said. Nearly every cargo container entering ports in Baltimore and elsewhere in the United States is scanned for radiation, he said. Before 9/11, none were. “While I understand containers are a potential vulnerability, there is a little bit of a tendency in the media