KC Loses Urban Security Money

Kansas City is fighting to get back in the money.The federal Urban Security Initiative money, to be precise.

For the second time in five years,Kansas City’s metropolitan area has not made the cut for Urban Area Security Initiative money from the Department of Homeland Security.

The money is used by metropolitan regions to assess the local terror threat and deal with regional disasters.for example,the Kansas City region used some of it’s fund to help the city of joplin, Missouri recover from its 2011 tornado.

Wednesday at a Public Safety Committee meeting, Kansas City Police Captain james Thomas told members of the City Council acts of terror do not only happen on the big cities of the East and west Coasts.

“You can go over to Ft. Riley or to Ft. Hood. We do have incidents,” said Capt. James thomas of the Kansas City Police Dept. He leads a metropolitan unit that Urban Security money pays for. Thomas says with no money, his 9-member unit could lose three analysts who assess are terror threats.

Kansas City’s Emergency Services Director Gene Shepherd agrees. He thinks the cities of the Hartland may get overlooked. The City of St. Louis, however, did received $3 million in Urban Security money this year.

The Homeland Security Department stated making the urban Security money available to US Cities and regions in 2003.
In 2004, the Kansas City region received a record $13.2 million million for the region. In 2014, that amount was down to $1 million.

Twice, in 2011 and 2013, the local region received no money at all.

This year Homeland Security plans to issue grants to 27 regions. Kansas City is ranked 35 on that list.