Congressional Appropriators Side with Local Stakeholders, First Responders on Homeland Security Grants
Both the House and Senate Committees on Appropriations marked up legislation recently that rejected the National Preparedness Grant Program (NPGP). See National League of Cities article below. Senator Mary Landrieu summed it up in saying that “… major stakeholders wrote to us asking us not to include these reforms.” The Senate is to do mark-up on Tuesday. The Senate draft only funds "the big four grant programs" and is $1.4 Billion so less than the House version. Other grant programs, such as MMRS are not included but would be eligible and would need to apply to states to get funded. The Senate's proposed funding levels are less than the House version. These will be reconciled in Conference Committee at a later date. The Senate bill provides $1.41 billion for state and local grant programs, $369 million above the comparable fiscal year 2012 level. The bill does not include grant reform as proposed in the President’s budget request due to the lack