Eye on NY security -- New head of House Homeland Security says transit safety funding should be top priority; vows to team with King

January 30, 2007

By Carol Eisenberg

Newsday Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON - The new Democratic chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee said the federal government must assume greater responsibility for mass transit security, just as it did for air security after terrorists flew planes into buildings five years ago.

Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi said yesterday that his top priorities include getting federal funding to harden train tunnels leading into Penn Station, where several heavily used commuter lines, including the Long Island Rail Road, converge with New York's subways.

"We're spending $9 per passenger on aviation security and only about 2 cents per passenger on rail security," Thompson said yesterday at the Homeland Security Police Institute at George Washington University.

"You can virtually move unfettered into a subway car or a passenger train," he added. "That's really not where we should be. ... Madrid, London and Mumbai are three examples of the potential vulnerabilities in this country. "

Since terrorists detonated bombs on commuter trains in India's financial capital last summer, killing more than 200 people and injuring more than 700, lawmakers have focused attention on transit security. Earlier attacks in London in July 2005 and in Madrid in March 2004 also killed and injured hundreds.

Thompson said that House Democrats would introduce legislation next month requiring that the government mandate vulnerability assessments and better training by public transit authorities to deter and respond to attacks. It would also provide a pot of money to help pay for improved ventilation, fire safety, emergency access and communications.

But would Republicans go along with an enhanced federal role?

Thompson noted he had worked "fabulously" with the committee's senior Republican, Peter King of Seaford, when the Republicans controlled Congress, but added that they had one major issue to resolve now that he was chairman.

"I might need a little help sometimes translating his Long Island brogue into Mississippi-speak, and vice versa, so that we can continue this relationship," he said, seeming to decelerate his already slow-as-molasses Hinds County, Miss., drawl for effect.

King, who has long advocated greater funding for mass transit security, acknowledged that communications between them could be tricky.

"I actually called Bennie the day after the election to congratulate him, and the only way I could reach him was on a cell phone in Mississippi," he recalled. "I talked so fast and he talked so slow that we kept interrupting each other. As part of better interoperability, we need cell phones that can adjust for the King-Thompson clash of dialects. "

Nonetheless, King said he hoped to find common ground with Democrats in creating a "meaningful," but "realistic" role for the federal government.

"We'll never get the same level of security as with aviation because you can't control the egress and ingress," he said. "Nevertheless, we can do a lot more in fortifying tunnels, building escape routes and installing sensor equipment to detect biological and chemical weapons, among other things. "

Thompson said the Democratic package will not mandate technologies, but would encourage transit authorities to experiment with "more boots on the ground," bomb-sniffing dogs and surveillance cameras.

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