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Dear Chairman Price:

On behalf of the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) and its 1,500 member organizations, I write to express my gratitude for your inclusion of $400 million for transit security grants in the Fiscal Year (FY) 2009 Department of Homeland Security Appropriations bill.  As your subcommittee continues to advance this legislation, I encourage you to increase the amount to $750 million, which was authorized for FY 2009 in H.R.1, the 9/11 Commission Recommendation Act of 2007.  That authorized level was based in part on APTA’s 2004 transit security needs survey which noted $6 billion in needs nationwide.  

Safety and security are important priorities for the public transportation industry.    Since September 11, 2001, public transit agencies in the United States have spent billions of dollars for security, emergency preparedness and related technology from their own budgets.  Fighting terrorism is a part of our nation’s homeland security, a federal responsibility.  Terrorist acts in Mumbai, London and Madrid make clear the need to strengthen security on U.S. public transit systems.  We must act to prevent an occurrence of such terrorist attacks in this country.

We appreciate your support in restoring the level of funding to last year’s level, but $750 million in funding, consistent with the authorized level, would go farther in addressing the security needs of our nation’s public transportation authorities.  We look forward to working with you on transit security issues in the coming months and thank you for your leadership.  Please have your staff contact Tom Yedinak of APTA’s Government Affairs Department at (202) 496-4865 or email tyedinak@apta.com if you have any questions about this matter or if we can provide any further information.

Sincerely,

William W. Millar
President

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