Remarks of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to the United States Conference of Mayors 74th Winter Meeting
January 25, 2006

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Thank you. Thank you very, very much. I am so pleased to be here and I greatly appreciate the introduction by my friend, Beverly O'Neill, and it is a typical day in Washington. I am well aware of how busy your schedules are and I'll have to leave immediately after being with you for just a short period of time, but I wanted to come today to thank you. Because, as Beverly was saying, I have worked with many of you individually. Certainly, I know we have a number of mayors of New York here – I've seen two already since I walked in – but I've also worked with the conference and I really want to commend the work of the conference here in Washington because your representatives keep us well informed and really make the case for the cities and the needs of cities. And that's especially important right now because as we look into the future, not very far off, we know we face a lot of challenges and we also can see the shrinking of resources and support from the federal government. So in many respects, you are being asked to continue to do even more with much less, and that poses additional burdens on you as mayors, and on the cities that you govern.

I want to go back to the subject I have addressed you on two times before, and that is Homeland Security. And by Homeland Security, I mean not only security against the threat of terrorism, but security against the realities of natural disasters and disease. Because when we talk about homeland security today, we have to take into account what happened along the gulf coast just a few months ago. We also have to be prepared for the potential of a pandemic flu that could overwhelm the healthcare capacity of our cities. But let's start with homeland security as has traditionally been defined over the last 4 years and 4 months since September 11th. That day did mark a turning point in our nation's history. We were attacked on our own soil. And we had to ask difficult questions. How do we defeat this enemy? How do we take this fight against terrorism to them? How do we build alliances so that we can be successful with our efforts to make our world and particularly our homes safe?

What was clear that day – and has been every day since – is that the threat posed by decentralized terrorists who have access to all the tools of modern life, who can take advantage of globalized transportation and communications requires a mobilization of our country's might, muscle, resources, and ingenuity.

We have done this numerous times in our past. We may not need victory gardens in this war… but we need a framework for victory. We have to understand clearly the various level of responsibility that is required from all levels of government and also from the private sector and the not-for-profit sector. This has to be a coordinated strategy.

We don't need to ration, thankfully, like our parents and grandparents did, but we do need rational policies that take into account the best available evidence and best practices where resources need to be allocated based on the reality of the threats that we face.

It is also clear to me, at least, that the leader in this effort must be the federal government. Terrorism, just like wars in the past is a national threat; and defending ourselves at home demands the fullest federal response. Yet, I have to regretfully report to you that at the federal level, the sense of urgency that marked the days and months following the 9/11 attacks has largely given way to politics as usual.

We owe a great debt of gratitude to the 9/11 commission. The bipartisan leadership provided by former governor Tom Kean, former congressman Lee Hamilton was an example of how we must cross party lines to look at our challenges honestly, speak about them candidly, and come up with recommendations.

But just this December, Tom Kean, said that, when it comes to protecting America, "It's not a priority for the government right now." I have to ask you, what is a greater priority? If we are not doing the first and foremost job of protecting our people, what kind of government do we have?

I'm really preaching to the choir, because you at the local level confront both the constraints of tight budgets and the difficulty of dealing with the federal government that, by action and inaction, has neglected and worsened domestic preparedness of many parts of our country. The First Response Coalition, for example, issued a report in March of 2005 that revealed what we all know. That first responders will be under funded by over $100 billion by 2008.

The way I look at it, the problem is three fold: States and cities have greater and greater obligations for preparation, safety equipment, and training, but with limited federal support. Across the board federal budget cuts are leaving states and cities struggling to make up the difference. And bottle necks in the bureaucracy mean that needed funds don't always end up where they are required.

We have a resource problem because we are not delivering the necessary resources to hire, and train, and equip the men and women on the front lines. We have even seen budget cuts that are reducing the number of police on the streets cutting back on grants to firefighters. We know so well the cutbacks in the COPS program that put 11,927 cops on the streets in New York State alone and supported advances in technology and improvements in law enforcement.

Second, we have misplaced priorities in Washington. Funds that states and cities rely on are slashed. And when you ask where the money is going because we are in a huge deficit position now, we know that the money is going to tax-cuts. And no matter what one thinks about cutting taxes, which I think all of agree whenever is possible we need to do it, it is hard to square with the challenges we face at this time of terrorist threat. Community Development Block Grants for example, have served cities since 1974; they have been slashed $777 million. Head Start has been slashed, eliminating spots for 25,000 children. School improvement funds have been slashed $452 million. Medicaid has been slashed, foster care, you name it. There's hardly a program that is part of the social safety net that hasn't been slashed – which then pits your law enforcement and preparedness responsibilities against the human needs of the people you represent and serve.

Third, cities are forced to navigate a maze of bureaucracy – a maze with too many dead ends – in order to access homeland security funds. In January of 2004, when I addressed you, we discussed this problem. We have not made nearly enough progress.

In 2004, only 24 percent of the cities according to statistics gathered by the US Conference had received money from the 2003 budget by the time you were asked. And we know, still, it's a very difficult process to navigate in order to get the money you think you need in order to feel you are serving your public.

And a House Select Homeland Security Committee report showed that $5.2 billion out of $6.3 billion in Homeland Security terrorism preparedness grants had yet to be awarded. So basically it is sitting in the federal treasury. It's not going to police, firefighters, emergency workers, or cities.

That means costs are being shifting onto all of you. And we are confronting you with very difficult choices, which will only get harder because of our growing deficit position. Five years ago, this month, we had a budget surplus; we had a balanced budget. Now our national debt is at $8.1 trillion and climbing. We borrow 60 billion dollars a month. And where do we borrow it from? We borrow it from China and South Korea and Saudi Arabia and Japan.

And often times, people ask me as I travel around my state. Why can't we do more to get tougher with the Chinese or deal with the challenges of the Middle East? In part, we are dependent on them. We are a debtor. If we were a company or a household, we would have already filed for bankruptcy. But because the federal government, unlike cities and states, can print money, we can go merrily on our way. And therefore, the burdens are being pushed further and further down the ladder to local government.

Next week President Bush will deliver the State of the Union, but I think I can guess what the message will be. Across the board, from homeland security to Social Security, from health care to a healthy economy, the message can be summed up in three words:

"On your own."

We are shifting costs and we are shifting risks onto individuals, and families, and local government. Mayors, you are on your own to protect your cities.

Senior citizens who were promised real prescription drug benefits are on their own to figure out how to access the complicated and confusing program.

3.5 million children who will be affected by cuts to Medicaid are on their own.

And now we learn that, if we look forward, the President's going to be proposing some healthcare proposals that will shift costs and risks even more on the backs of individuals, many of whom will not be able to carry it. It is troubling to me that when we look at this shifting of costs, again the buck stops with state and local government. You know that many uninsured people show up in the emergency rooms in the hospitals in your cities.

Maryland recently sought to address this cost-shifting, requiring that companies like Wal-Mart put 8 percent of their payroll costs into employee health benefits… or contribute to state-sponsored insurance for the working poor. Similar steps have been taken in New York City and elsewhere in New York. Because cities and states are saying, we can't keep holding the bag here. Everybody has got to be part of the solution because we are all part of the problem that we confront.

In order to begin to reverse some of the decisions that have been made that I believe are not in our long-term best interest, we have to stop shirking our responsibilities and we have to begin to base decisions on evidence, not ideology. We have to look at the facts. That means we need to distribute homeland security funding based on threats. We need to make sure you have the resources you need, just as the 9/11 Commission recommended, and we need to do so by overcoming politics and pork-barrel decision making. We need to make sure we do that we do that in a way that takes into account the differences in our country. The infrastructure that different parts of our nation have that need to carefully be evaluated and protected. I still believe in direct funding to cities. I don't think we should have to have you run through the hoops, to go through all kinds of layers, and cities above a certain size should not have to wait on your state capitals to distribute homeland security funding. You ought to be getting that money directly.

I'm also deeply concerned, that all these years later, we still don't in most of the country, have interoperable communications systems. That was one of the key recommendations that I and others made after 9/11. It was certainly recommended by the 9/11 Commission. Firefighters ought to be able to talk with police officers and emergency responders in New Jersey ought to be able to talk to emergency workers in New York. We've made some progress – setting a hard transition date from analog to digital broadcasts will free up much-needed spectrum for emergency communications. And one of the few bright spots in the Budget Reconciliation bill was the $1 billion set aside for interoperability.

But we need leadership. This needs to be an urgent, national priority.

In its major report on the current state of interoperability, the Congressional Research Service has stated that, after FEMA was absorbed by DHS it was effectively stripped of responsibilities for planning for emergency communications and the decision was made at the executive level. However, according to public information, very little has been done and it appears, very little will be done.

This is no longer acceptable because we saw the effects in a natural disaster along the gulf coast. We saw what happens when a terrible hurricane – could have been an earthquake, could have been a disastrous flood, could have been a tornado – we saw what happens when a natural disaster overwhelms the capacity even to communicate at a local level. Where was the help that was required? Unfortunately the response to Katrina demonstrated all the pitfalls within our emergency response system. I still believe we should have a Katrina Commission to get to the bottom of what went wrong. Because until we know what went wrong, we cannot fix and make better our preparation for the future. And now of course we have look to pandemic bird flu or some other disease that can sweep through our country. Do we have the surge capacity? Who will make the decisions? What about the difficult issuer of quarantine? These should be at the highest levels of federal concern working with the cities, which will be on the front lines of any kind of disaster, so we can get it right. I hope as we move forward, we take to heart the challenge we were given by the 9/11 Commission.

Again in his remarks last December, Tom Kean, described our lack of preparedness, the failure to have interoperability communications, and basically said, and I quote: "God help us if we have another attack and we haven't done some of these things."

Well President Kennedy said, "Here on earth, God's work must truly be our own." It isn't fair, it isn't right, to be blaming cities that are overwhelmed as they were along the Gulf Coast. The cities need help, not blame, in order to be prepared for the future.

There is a lot to be done and I always appreciate the invitation to come and address you at this conference, because this is really where the responsibility stops. The buck doesn't stop, because it's not getting to you. But the responsibility stops on your doorstep, and I'd like to see you get a few more bucks and lot more leadership so that you can feel confident that you are doing everything you possibly can.

In speaking with mayors around my own state, a number of them have said, ‘We don't know if we would ever be the target of a terrorist threat, but we want to feel as though we are prepared. And we certainly know that there but for the grace of God, there's a natural disaster or some kind of pandemic disease, so we need to be prepared no matter what.'

Previous generations of Americans made the investments that prepared us for the future. Back in 1947, there was a smallpox scare in New York City and the NYC public health department vaccinated 6 million people in a week.

We have to have the same sense of organization and commitment and same partnership, and we also need to call on our friends in the private sector because there's a lot infrastructure that isn't in the public domain. Whether its chemical plants or other factories that are very important to the economy but also may have chemicals or other processes that could be dangerous, we need to have that partnership and it needs to be modeled at the federal level.

This is not a Democratic issue nor is it a Republican issue. It is an American issue, and the mayors know better than anyone that if we are going to keep our country safe and protect our homeland and our people, we have got to do a better job than what we are doing today.

Thank you very much.