The Bush Administration's FY 2005 budget proposal calls for $47.4billion in homeland security funding: approximately 13 percent morethan estimated FY 2004 spending and a significant and appropriategrowth in homeland security expenditures. Most important, theAdministration's funding priorities dovetail well with the criticalmission areas established in the national homeland securitystrategy.
The Bush Administration's National Strategy for Homeland Securityidentified six critical mission areas to focus federal efforts onthe objectives of preventing terrorist attacks, reducing America'svulnerabilities to terrorism, and minimizing the damage andrecovering from attacks that do occur. An analysis of spendingpriorities suggests that most of the proposed major programs fallinto one of the six critical mission areas. It is not clear,however, that in every case the level of resources requested isadequate to meet the critical goals the Administration hasestablished in its strategy or that these efforts are appropriateto address future threats. In particular, while notable progresshas been made in virtually every critical mission area, shortfallsin maritime security top the list of concerns.
In reconciling the Senate and House versions of the FY 2004 DHS appropriations bill, the conferees must ensure that key initiativesare not shortchanged. They also should resist the urge to "overhelp" with unnecessary earmarks that limit the DHS's ability tofocus on the most critical needs or "overload" it with additionaldollars for programs that cannot profitably use them.