President Bush constantly invokes 9/11, but when it comes to doing the things needed to make sure something like that doesn’t happen again, he fails miserably. To drastically cut homeland security funding to a city where terrorists slaughtered nearly 3,000 innocent Americans is unconscionable. It’s the same shortsightedness we’ve seen from this administration again and again-whether it’s Iraq, Hurricane Katrina, or the Medicare prescription drug plan fiasco.

According to the Department of Homeland Security, New York City’s urban area grant will be slashed to $124.5 million this year from $207.6 million last year-a 40 percent drop. Buffalo, which shares a border with a foreign country, will have its border control funding cut by 48.5 percent. And Washington, D.C.-the other city attacked by terrorists on 9/11-will also see a 40 percent cut in its homeland security funding.

Only the Bush administration would consider the Brooklyn Bridge as merely a mode of transportation and not recognize it as a very real potential target for acts of terrorism.

Assemblywoman Millman is urging the Bush administration to properly fund New York’s homeland security. If the President doesn’t do more to protect our country’s most important cities, then we are inviting another tragedy.

The Department of Homeland Security said New York City’s decrease in funding was because the area had no "national monuments or icons." Assemblywoman Millman asks, "If the Statue of Liberty and the Empire State Building are not ‘national monuments,’ what are?"

This is another example of the incompetence of the Bush Administration. The White House needs to tell the residents of New York City-who have already suffered two terrorist attacks-why it cut tens of millions of dollars in crucial homeland security funding.

This latest setback means the per- capita share of non-urban area homeland security funds for the rest of New York State will fall from the current $4.07 to $2.93 per-person. Meanwhile, states with little or no high-profile targets are cashing in on federal anti-terrorism aid.