Wednesday, March 29, 2006

OVERHAULED HOMELAND SECURITY FUNDING ALARMS AREAS AT RISK

By Diane M. Grassi

Since 2003, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has provided funding for states and urban areas across the country, under its Homeland Security Grant Program, in an effort to improve emergency preparedness, at the local level, in the event of a terrorist attack. Such funding has been available through two types of programs known as the State Homeland Security Grant Program (SHSGP) and the Urban Area Security Initiative (UASI). Both types of funds have consisted of myriad formulas and application requirements which have caused disputes between members of the United States Congress as well as between state governors regarding the amount of allocations doled out, both in the past and presently.

In 2006, when it was thought that the program could not get any more confusing and unfair to certain states and urban areas, the DHS has topped itself yet again. Many lawmakers have been left dumbfounded, since they have so little information and criteria available in the decisions that the DHS has made for Fiscal Year 2006, which began October 1, 2005. In addition, the decisions for FY 2006 will have a direct impact on any forthcoming funding beyond FY 2007, for those urban areas which have been deleted from the eligible list for 2006.

If the aforementioned has left you confused, you are not alone. It is important to note that the two distinctly separate funding programs, although Homeland Security Grant Programs, are more apt now to become supplements to each other, as the amount of funding has been cut for not only 2006 distributions but projected to be further reduced in 2007 as well. The UASI grants for 2006 allot $765 million to 35 urban or metropolitan areas, comprised of various counties, cities and towns in their immediate vicinities. In 2005 there included 50 urban areas and thus the initial outcries this year.

The 2006 eligible urban areas list has left off some major urban regions which were included in 2005 and since the program’s inception in 2003, leaving lawmakers and law enforcement with lots of questions. Among the big question marks are San Diego, CA, Las Vegas, NV and Phoenix, AZ, prompting federal, state and local officials to demand answers from the DHS.

The Homeland Security Appropriations Act, originated in 2002, established the SHSGP, which in the past allocated one-half of its funds to be equally divided between all 50 U.S. states including U.S. territories and possessions, with the remaining funds distributed to states based upon population. The system in place in 2006, however, guarantees a minimum amount to each state, but requires each to apply and qualify the need for additional risk-driven funding. Thus, it is incumbent upon each state to essentially prove its case to the DHS for additional allocations. For FY 2006, each state is guaranteed a baseline minimum distribution of $7.13 million in the SHSGP, reserved to concentrate on law enforcement training and preparedness. And since UASI grants are now pared down from 50 to 35, state grants loom even more important, as each year since 2004 the amount of funding for both programs has de-escalated.

In its effort to temper the criticism of pork-barrel rewards for certain states and urban areas least expected to be hit by a terrorist attack, the DHS has reframed its criteria in order for states and urban areas to either qualify for additional funding or in the case of the UASI, for any funding at all. With respect to San Diego, for example, which was eliminated from eligibility for 2006 UASI grants, when questions were asked by state and local lawmakers and officials, it became clear that the formula will not be disclosed because it is classified information, according the Secretary of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff. In its zeal to remove all doubt that it is not being unfair in its analysis and that politics has not played a part in its decisions, the DHS states that the formula used for risk assessment was derived scientifically by computer calibrations and algorithms, yet so confusing that the DHS cannot even begin to explain them.

It is primarily the confusing new rules, which remain unexplained by the DHS, which has upset officials from both federal and state levels of government all over the country, with quite vocal protests coming from California and Nevada. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Senator Diane Feinstein of California along with Governor Kenny Guinn and Senator Harry Reid of Nevada have all been outspoken on the issue and have demanded more answers.

San Diego’s federal contingent of representatives, which includes Congressman Duncan Hunter, Congressman Darrell Issa, Congresswoman Susan Davis and Congressman Bob Filner, met in February with Homeland Security officials. But frustration was clearly expressed by Representative Filner. Most objectionable was the perceived disregard by the DHS that the county of 3 million residents, sits on an international border, is an international port, houses the largest marine base in the U.S. along with being a major naval base. As well as being a choice tourist destination, it would seem that these factors would be qualifiers for UASI funding for San Diego.

Filner recalls, “San Diego’s military bases and ships could be sitting ducks for a terrorist and aren’t factored into Chertoff’s “disciplined” analysis. I asked whether anyone has the [same] concentration of nuclear things that are a perfect target for terrorists,” he said. “Does any other city have three nuclear carriers in their harbor, a dozen or more nuclear submarines and a nuclear power plant? They said, “We don’t have those figures, but all of those military assets are “invisible to us,” in the DHS’ risk calculations,” according to Filner.

Rep. Susan Davis’ account was similar to Filner’s. “The DHS have certain principles they use when evaluating communities, such as transportation systems and populations, but that they haven’t really figured in [defense] facilities. What was so darned frustrating was that we expected them to come in with a rationale, but they basically said the [defense] facilities don’t quite factor into their assessment. It did seem very strange to us,” Davis said.

California Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, believes that military installations are not necessarily immune from terrorist attack. And the Mayor of San Diego, Jerry Sanders, points out the vulnerability of the U.S.- Mexican border, especially with recent discovery of sophisticated underground tunnels, in which drugs, contraband and potential terrorists can be funneled into the U.S.

Nevada officials were allowed access to a classified meeting with Secretary Chertoff on March 9, 2006, including Congressman Jim Gibbons, Congressman Jon Porter, along with two top police administrators one of whom was the Las Vegas Metro Police Homeland Security Deputy Chief, Mike McClary. “When their calculations were done, there were areas where there was no data available,” according to McClary. “It’s a mystery how 10’s of millions of hotel guests were left out of the equation,” he said. According to Frank Siracusa, Nevada Emergency Management Director, “Different officials at Homeland Security often give contradictory recommendations or simply refuse to answer the questions.”

On any given weekend throughout the year, there are upwards of 300,000 hotel occupants on the Las Vegas Strip, many of whom are part of the more than 44 million tourists that arrived at Las Vegas McCarran International Airport in 2005, and growing each year. Why such data was not part of the equation in the assessment for Las Vegas could not be explained by the DHS, but it did offer to provide Las Vegas with another review. Whether or not the security of Hoover Dam was also overlooked in the DHS analysis remains a mystery as well. Las Vegas officials were not given a time frame in which they would get any future official communication from the DHS.

The UASI program is now focused primarily on enhancing the capabilities of local government to prevent, protect against, respond to and recover from any number of catastrophic events. But planning for law enforcement training programs and equipment purchases for localities such as San Diego and Las Vegas will now have to rely solely on “Sustainment” risk funds or “Tier 2” eligible funding, versus “High risk” or “Tier 1” funding.

This means that localities may receive the balance of funding only for those projects which remain incomplete from 2005. Should the DHS find that its oversight of not including tourists in its eligibility analysis of Las Vegas was not an error, thus finding it only eligible for Tier 2 funding in 2006, Las Vegas will have to reapply from scratch in 2007. And if any urban area has two consecutive years of either denied funding or Tier 2 funding, it then remains permanently ineligible for any future UASI funding. Meanwhile, urban areas newly added to the eligible list for UASI funding in 2006 include Orlando and Ft. Lauderdale, FL and Columbus, OH.

And finally, given all of their formulas and 37 capabilities requirements of “investment justification” in order for states and urban areas to be considered for funding from the DHS, it has yet to come up with such a measure of accountability, once funding has been dispersed, in order to realize the effectiveness of its funding. For without follow-up analysis, the DHS, the Congress, and state and local governments and law enforcement will have no clear indicators as to whether their law enforcement programs and preparedness purchases has been money well spent through the funding programs.

And without transparency between the federal and state levels of government, requiring necessary input from local government, the DHS will remain hamstrung in its own red tape, thus weakening the original intent of its grant programs. In order to expedite emergency response preparedness to those areas most likely at risk in the event of catastrophe, without such commitment to accountability the DHS spending programs will serve to create a false sense of security, and ultimately put the U.S. at far greater risk.

Thursday, March 23, 2006

MLB's SORIANO HUNG OUT TO DRY BY NATIONALS

By Diane M. Grassi

How often does it happen that a present Major League Baseball All-Star player gets treated with so little respect that he is told after his trade to another team that he will have to give up his starting position or else? After all, baseball has come a long way since free agency, forming its players’ association, gaining arbitration for its players, and providing them access to high-powered agents nearly guaranteeing them a shot at multi-million dollar contracts.

But this latest faux pas on the part of Major League Baseball ownership concerns 2nd baseman Alfonso Soriano, formerly of the Texas Rangers and the New York Yankees, who has spent the entirety of his major league career playing 2nd base. He has been known, however, for his offense over the past five years which included his first three years, 2001- 2003, with the New York Yankees and his last two years, 2004 and 2005, with the Texas Rangers.

Yet, before all of the so-called expert pundits and baseballs’ fans have at it with their generalizations about the latest supposed “spoiled professional athlete who should grow up,” it would be wise to examine exactly which athlete they are attacking and the circumstances involved. Unfortunately, it is athletes such as the NFL’s Terrell Owens who have now given all professional athletes a bad name.

The dilemma which has become the talk of the day and should play itself out by week’s end, or around March 24, 2006, involves the controversial trade of Soriano from the Texas Rangers to the Washington Nationals on December 7, 2005, which became official on December 13, 2005. The Washington Nationals’ General Manager, Jim Bowden, was looking to get some pop in the Nats’ lineup and offered to trade outfielder, Brad Wilkerson, outfielder Termel Sledge and minor league pitching prospect, Armando Galarraga to the Rangers.

Prior to the trade, in all fairness to Bowden, he claims that before the Nationals signed off on the deal, he requested the Rangers’ permission to speak to Soriano first, to specifically ask him if he would agree to change his 2nd base position to leftfield. The Rangers said no, supposedly pending players’ physicals, and precisely because they knew of Soriano’s history of not wanting to change positions in the past and did not want to kill the deal. According to Bowden, “We took it [to mean that] if we talked to the player [the Rangers felt] that the player would say no [to changing positions] and the deal would be killed.” Soriano was never consulted about being traded either for that matter.

When Soriano originally signed his first Major League Baseball contract, with the New York Yankees in 2001, he was a shortstop, which he considered his natural position. Obviously, with shortstop, Derek Jeter, at that position, the Yankees were forced to find another position for him as he showed so much promise with his bat. When he filled in briefly at shortstop for a few weeks during Spring Training in the 2001 season when Jeter was nursing an injury, he proved to the Yankees that they had to have him in the lineup everyday. And when Jeter returned that spring, Soriano was moved to left field, albeit for a total of only five games. Soriano was expected to start the season there, but when 2nd baseman, Chuck Knoblauch, developed a mental block with the inability to throw to 1st base, the Yankees switched the two players’ positions. Since that time, Soriano has never played any other position but 2nd base and has never played a regular season major league game in the outfield.

But upon arriving in Texas in 2004, when Soriano was traded by the Yankees for Alex Rodriguez, Rangers’ manager, Buck Showalter, had another rising star in Michael Young, also a 2nd baseman, who needed to be added to the lineup. Unlike Bowden’s approach, however, Showalter felt out the situation with Soriano changing positions. “We just talked about trying to make some plans and asked him how he felt about it. It wasn’t something we were trying to cram down his throat.” And Michael Young helped resolve the situation by volunteering to move to shortstop, as Soriano was adamant about not moving from 2nd base.

Given Soriano’s known history of relishing his position at 2nd base in spite of steeped criticism of his defense, it makes Jim Bowden’s deal for him seem ill fated from the onset, as it was well known throughout MLB of Soriano’s reticence to change positions. And in the case of Soriano, Yogi Berra’s philosophy could not hold more true as “Baseball is 90% mental, the other 50% is physical.” Given Soriano’s being so upset with the situation is enough to distract his offense, let alone learning a whole knew position as the season progresses.

But one would think that given his stellar offensive skills and his good attitude would have earned him some brownie points to not have been put in this position in the first place. A four-time All-Star from 2002-2005 and the MVP of the 2004 All-Star Game, Soriano has earned his notoriety and the $10 million he will earn this year, due to his record-high arbitration case. Although considered a defensive liability, Soriano’s offensive stats are more than impressive. They include his breakout season in 2002 when he had 209 hits, 128 runs scored, 39 home runs, 102 RBI, 41 stolen bases, 51 doubles, a .332 batting average and 198 hits. In 2003, Soriano followed up with very comparable stats with a .338 batting average, 35 stolen bases, 38 home runs, 114 runs scored, 198 hits and 91 RBI.

In 2004 when he was with his new team, the Rangers, his offense dipped slightly but he finished with a respectable .324 batting average with 91 RBI and 170 hits. And in 2005, his batting average dropped off markedly to .268 but he still scored 102 runs, had 171 hits, 43 doubles, 36 home runs, 30 stolen bases and 104 RBI. Only time will tell how the grand expanse of RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C. and adjusting to the National League will impact his offensive skills.

Following the no-show of Soriano for the Nationals’ Spring Training game against the Los Angeles Dodgers on March 20th, when he was written in the lineup by manager, Frank Robinson, to play leftfield, he will have another opportunity to redeem himself by showing up for the March 22nd game which the Nationals have against the St. Louis Cardinals in another pre-season matchup. It has been promised that the lineup card will remain the same according to Robinson.

Should Soriano maintain his refusal to play leftfield and thus refuse to play, according to Bowden, the Nationals will petition MLB’s Commissioner’s Office to place Soriano on the rarely used “disqualified list.” This additionally presents Commissioner Selig with a new twist to the problem, in that MLB officially still owns the Nationals, as Selig has failed as of yet to get a deal done for new ownership. Becoming “disqualified” translates into Soriano losing his salary for 2006, losing any credit for 2006 service time and his chance to become a free agent at the end of the season would also be lost as he would remain the property of the Nationals.

Since Soriano chose to participate in the March 2006 World Baseball Classic (WBC) for the Dominican Republic team, should he decide to play leftfield, he now has less than two weeks in which to learn a non-infield position he has never officially played. Bowden claims that during Soriano’s time away during the WBC he tried to work a deal to trade Soriano if the right offer came along. “We obviously will field offers, but we’re not going to give the player away, Bowden said on March 20th. “If we can make a deal that makes sense, we would have. At this point we have not been given a trade proposal that makes any sense for the Nationals, he said.

Besides putting his manager, Frank Robinson, in an uncomfortable position, and giving Soriano an ultimatum of playing leftfield after the trade was completed, leaves the actions of Bowden questionable. Combined with the fact that the Nationals already had an All-Star 2nd baseman in Jose Vidro, and Bowden’s admission that he had heard of Soriano’s prior insistence on playing 2nd base prior to the deal with the Rangers, could put his own job in jeopardy when new ownership is finally decided. After all, the deal for Soriano was misguided at best and Bowden’s theory that he alone could convince Soriano to change positions was foolhardy. It begs the question, excuses aside, which Soriano himself asked of Bowden, “Why didn’t you try to talk to me before you made the trade?”

Sunday, March 19, 2006

INSOURCING FOREIGN STUDENTS & ENGINEERS TOP U.S. PRIORITY

By Diane M. Grassi

Effective on July 1, 2006, it will be more difficult for U.S. students to both become eligible for and borrow federally subsidized student loans, due to legislation signed by President Bush in February 2006. Known as the Budget-Deficit Reduction Bill, it wipes out $12 billion from the federal student loan program. The interest rates will climb to a fixed rate of 6.8 % for a student applying for a federal loan, referred to as the Stafford Loan program, with a capped rate of 8.5% for parents applying on behalf of their child, known as PLUS loans, also subject to additional variable rates. Many parents are considering home equity loans as an alternative, which provide far lower borrowing interest rates.

But with college tuition rates rising each year sometimes more than double the rate of inflation, it is becoming more and more impossible for the middle class to afford a college education. With the federal loan limit for years now remaining at $20,000.00 per school year, it requires many to apply for private bank loans in addition to the federal loan. Many students take as many as seven years to complete an undergraduate degree as they must work full-time at low-paying jobs, in order to afford tuition and living expenses, thus delaying their ascendance into the permanent work force.

According to the Department of Education, as many as 400,000 U.S. students each year forego a higher education entirely, dissuaded by tuition costs and fear of the inability to repay college loans. In the last several years, due to declining interest rates, students were able to consolidate their student loans in order to lower the rates on previous accruing loans. With the new legislation, the fixed rate will preclude them from doing so in the future, regardless of a decline again in interest rates.

The higher education dilemma in the U.S. is rather complex and multi-faceted, however, and universities have already begun to look to other resources in order to fill their coffers by going abroad. That brings us to the present immigration bill making its way through the U.S. Senate which is a far more liberal version than the U.S. House of Representatives’ bill which passed at the end of 2005. Buried in the text of the Senate bill is a restructuring of the student visa process, which was largely slowed down after September 11, 2001 and eventually put under the auspices of the Department of Homeland Security by 2003.

In April 2005, President Bush met with King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz of Saudi Arabia at his Crawford, TX ranch. At such time, they made an agreement to encourage more Saudi students to receive their undergraduate educations in the U.S. Presently, there are approximately 5,000 Saudi Arabian students studying in U.S. colleges and universities and 15,000 applications in the pipeline, although confirming the exact figures is one momentous task, if not impossible to find.

The deal which King Abdullah proposed to President Bush was to allow 5,000 students per year the opportunity to study in the U.S., with all tuition costs footed by the Saudi Arabian government. The scholarship program, which was not publicly announced by either the White House or the Saudi Embassy, was an attempt for the Saudi government to fast-track the student visa program to which the administration has now agreed.

Of importance, and publicly disclosed and lauded by Maura Harty, the State Department’s Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs, when attending the U.S. University Presidents Summit on International Education, - a two-day forum to promote international education and hosted by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in January 2006 - is that the system to expedite the student visa application process has been a top priority since 9/11. She remarked that 500 new consular positions have been added since 9/11; negotiations extended reciprocity agreements reducing the number of times a student must renew or reapply for a visa; directing all U.S. embassies and consulates to put student and exchange visitors at the head of the line when scheduling visa interviews.

Also of note, is that during the 2004-2005 school year, there were 565,039 foreign students enrolled in institutions of higher learning in the U.S., meaning, there now are that many fewer slots for American students when applying to college. But Harty adds, “We do not want to lose a single foreign student and we don’t want them to miss the beginning of school, so the State Department has made processing of student and exchange visitor visas a priority at every post.”

And alarmingly so in a post-9/11 world, Harty states that “Some 97.5% visa applications are processed within two days, and that the screening process for the 2.5% visa applicants subject to special screening requirements for security reasons has been streamlined, typically taking one week to two weeks.” If true, Americans can only dream that other government services flowed so quickly and efficiently for them. In contrast, U.S. students applying for federal loans must wait months to find out the status of their applications and whether or not they will be able to afford the next school year’s tuition.

But at the heart of the proposed expansion of the student visa program is another issue embedded in the Senate’s immigration bill which would raise considerably the amount of H1-B visas allowed, which are allotted to foreign workers to work in U.S. industry on a supposed temporary basis. Beginning in Fiscal Year 2006, the amount of such visas were limited to 65,000 but an additional 20,000 were eventually added, at the 11th hour, for foreigners who graduated from U.S. graduate and Ph.D. programs. In the new bill, measures call for doubling the number of skilled worker temporary visas to 115,000 per year with an option of raising the cap 20% more each subsequent year.

And in a new visa category known as the F-4 visa, students pursuing advanced degrees in science, technology, engineering, or mathematics would be granted permanent U.S. residence if they find a job in their field. They would only be required to pay a fee of $1,000.00. The rallying cries from such notables as Microsoft Chairman, Bill Gates, and Sun Microsystems CEO, Scott McNealy, have made it clear that they desperately need the government to increase the number of H1-B visas. But telling, as Microsoft’s Manager for Federal Affairs, Marland Buckner, states, “It’s in the best interests of Microsoft and we believe in the best interest of national competitiveness from an innovation standpoint, to bring as many smart people to the U.S. as possible.” Bill Gates wants no restrictions at all on H1-B visas.

But according to Ron Hira, Vice President of IEEE-USA, an organization representing 225,000 electrical and computer engineers, says, “Many U.S. companies don’t even bother to recruit Americans because they can find foreigners willing to work longer hours for less pay.” But with business and science leaders focusing almost exclusively on loosening laws in order to acquire foreign talent, they are seemingly turning their backs on educating Americans first, necessary to maintain a thriving, innovative economy for Americans.

Much like all other sectors of our government as well as commercial industry, both lawmakers and CEO’s myopically concentrate on the bottom line, while the U.S. educational system is being systematically abandoned and essentially dismantled. By not providing future livelihoods for future generations of Americans all in the name of globalism, the U.S. may find itself incurably behind, not only in terms of innovation but in terms of a basic standard of living. How can we expect our students to compete with such an agenda if they are no longer the top priority?

Sunday, March 12, 2006

BANKRUPTING MEDICAL COSTS SYMPTOM OF AILING SYSTEM

By Diane M. Grassi


On March 5, 2006, CBS television news magazine, 60 Minutes, featured a report titled, “Hospitals: Is the Price Right?” The piece concentrated on the soaring costs of hospital care, specifically for uninsured Americans and the exponentially higher charges they are billed, which can be up to four times more than the same services directly billed to health insurance companies. The information was valid and fairly detailed regarding such costs, largely based upon information provided by patient advocate and community activist, K.B. Forbes, known for his Spanish language radio talk show out of Los Angeles, CA and also known as former press secretary for Conservative, Pat Buchanan. Forbes is the Executive Director of the Council for United Latinos, his small organization in East Los Angeles, where he has been taking on major hospitals across the United States regarding their unfair billing practices since 2000.

But 60 Minutes’ coverage of the topic seems all the more remarkable, as it was presented as being a recent phenomenon. These crises amongst middle class families are not news and have been present for years. It is an issue, however, which continues to get worse and worse as U.S. healthcare costs have continued to rise approximately 15% each year since the late 1990’s. In addition, is the lack of uniformity between insurance providers and types of coverage offered, which remains a constant problem. More importantly, the lack of a comprehensive presentation by 60 Minutes on the contributing factors for how these families and thousands of others like them are made vulnerable by the present healthcare systems in place, was not accomplished by CBS, but remains important to understand.

Without devoting more time and explanation, 60 Minutes did those under-educated on the topic a disservice. No employed adult, retiree, or disabled American is immune from recognizing the impact of spiraling and out of control costs for hospital care, outpatient care and pharmaceutical expenses. Even if an employer is still picking up most of the charges, more and more employers are requiring employees to pay higher deductibles and larger co-pays. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Health Research Educational Trust, premiums for employed individuals in 2005 averaged $10,880.00 annually for family coverage or $907.00 per month and $4,024.00 or $335.00 per month for individual coverage.

However, why costs are so high is a composite of several factors. However, many CEO’s and policy makers at the state and federal levels continue to remain silent in constructively addressing such. Massive layoffs in both the manufacturing and white-collar work forces in lieu of cheaper and benefit-free labor offshore, powerful lobbyists in both the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries having their way with the U.S. Congress, and the non-stop flow of illegal aliens through U.S. borders and ports of entry, collectively have eroded a once healthy healthcare system.

The U.S. is the only industrialized nation in the world which has based the majority of its healthcare coverage on employer provided plans. The U.S. middle class, as it grew in the post-war 1940’s, was able to rely at that time and until the end of the 20th century, on healthcare costs being absorbed by its employers. It was a way for industry to retain good workers while making a commitment to preventative healthcare, thus ensuring a healthier workforce. However, in what seems a relatively short time, the destabilization of healthcare affordability has seen the most damage manifested within the last five years.

Missing from the 60 Minutes presentation, for example, is that the referenced 5,000 hospitals across the U.S. have had to bear the brunt of 50% of unpaid costs for emergency room medical care. While some illegal aliens are on Medicaid, those who are indigent are entitled to free care under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA) of 1985. Hospitals are thus obligated to treat the uninsured without an obligation of reimbursement from the state or the federal government. Estimates of free emergency care to illegal aliens is between 25% and 40% of said indigent care. And while federal legislation was signed into law in May of 2005 allowing states to apply for grants for some federal reimbursement, it does not begin to approach, for example, the $500 million the state of California alone spent on non-reimbursed costs in 2005. It is only eligible for a maximum of a total $70 million reimbursement.

But EMTALA was perceived as a safety net for the indigent and infirm, long before the U.S. had an open border policy and long before hospitals would ever conceive of offsetting their shortfalls upon the backs of working and middle class Americans who have fallen on bad times, through no fault of their own. 60 Minutes also failed to expand upon why middle class Americans can find themselves near bankruptcy. Yes, the piece was about the fact that a working man was asked to pay a $250,000.00 bill for the same services which would total only $50,000.00 had it been billed through an insurance provider. But that is only part of the story.

There are major corporations laying off workers and giving them the choice of either severance pay or healthcare benefits, but not both. There are more and more corporations which employ a combination of independent contractors, temporary hires and outsourced personnel in order to avoid providing healthcare benefits. There are those laid off individuals­ who lose their medical insurance once they are laid off and because they have pre-existing conditions, defined as anything from a broken arm to diabetes depending on the insurer, can no longer get insurance. There are spouses of laid off personnel who have insurance but are not accepted into their spouses plan for the same reason. And there are those individuals with medical insurance who can have deductibles as high as $2,000 with coverage for only 50-80% of the total bill.

Even without the hospital costs quadrupled, paying off thousands of dollars of a large balance due can be insurmountable, even for a family with an average income of $50,000.00. The little publicized fact is that families declaring bankruptcy as the result of medical debt, at some point were insured. But it only takes an unexpected illness or catastrophic accident to set back those working families, sending them into financial crisis. As illness results in loss of income or disability, thus leading to loss of coverage, the bills can spiral out of control from there. And in the event of a job loss, at non-profit hospitals which do offer “charity care,” it is rarely offered to patients with assets such as a home. The hospitals merely turn over the bills to collection agencies which can and do put liens on patients’ property.

Yes, we have been hearing since Bill Clinton ran for president the first time around that 45 million Americans do not have health insurance. But given the quickening of the global economy, an average of 3 million illegal aliens crossing the border each year, and medical care costs escalating by double digits annually, accompanied by less and less accommodating insurance plans, it would be hard to believe that that figure has remained stagnant since 1992. It suggests that 45 million is the total without a tally of illegal aliens receiving free medical care. That way, it does not require an acknowledgement by the federal government that the illegal population is a contributing factor to the problem.

While the federal government welcomes a global economy, lawmakers still do not welcome the chore of dealing with a fractured healthcare system which in the not too distant future threatens to provide only for the poorest and those in the top income brackets. But preventative health may soon become a thing of the past for the middle class, forcing many between the middle class and working class to fall through the cracks. The lesson here is that there needs to be an honest discussion not only about healthcare costs, but accessibility to healthcare for those who are willing to maintain their health. For without it, there will be no tax base in which to keep America’s hospitals and healthcare providers afloat. And in order to have an honest discussion both the media and government must acknowledge how subsidies are being spent and finally admit that there are too many deserving Americans who are being left behind.

Wednesday, March 01, 2006

UNDERFUNDED FEDERAL MANDATES BELIE PORT SECURITY

By Diane M. Grassi

As the story unfolds, it is perhaps important to gain some perspective on the underlying facts and historical context of the United Arab Emirates based Dubai Ports World (DPW) since its takeover of London based Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co. (P&O), before political allegiances and commercial interests totally obscure the main issues at hand. In addition, the capacity of the United States Coast Guard to employ national security processes at U.S. ports of entry has come under much scrutiny, not only since said proposed deal was unveiled to the American people, but as far back as September 11, 2001.

The DPW Company was formed as recently as September 28, 2005. As the result of a merger between Dubai Ports Authority and Dubai Ports International (DPI), two Dubai state-owned facilities, it believed it had a legitimate shot at overtaking P&0. In January 2005, DPI acquired CSX World Terminals. Of note is that U.S. Secretary of Treasury, John Snow, was the CEO of CSX Terminals until January 31, 2003 and was sworn in on February 3, 2003. Secretary Snow has said he has since divested all interest in CSX worth some $72 million, although he continues to receive deferred compensation from CSX reportedly between $5 million to $25 million according to Senator Christopher Dodd (D-CT).

The Committee on Foreign Investments in the U.S. (CFIUS), headed by Secretary Snow, approved the United Arab Emirates taking over port operations of six major U.S. ports in addition to 29 terminal operations on January 16, 2006, having completed an assessment report on December 5, 2005. Among the ports to be included in the deal are Corpus Christi, TX and Beaumont, TX which receive heavy U.S. military equipment shipments including helicopters. U.S. troops also sail on U.S. ships from these two ports. The deal was finalized by DPW’s shareholders on February 13, 2006 after $6.5 billion of the $6.85 billion purchase price was successfully financed by Barclay’s Capital, the investment arm of Barclay’s Bank and Deutsche Bank AG.

CFIUS supposedly went through a 30-day investigatory process in approving the deal, and now acknowledged by Secretary Snow that actually underlings of twelve different U.S. agencies including the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Defense were responsible for vetting the deal, thereby ruling out national security concerns. However, although we have been given assurances by Secretary of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff, that the U.S. Coast Guard was involved in the vetting process it is now clearer that they were only peripherally involved in the final assessment.

According to White House spokesman, Scott McClellan, “The intelligence community did assessments to make sure that there was no national security threat.” But intelligence officials now claim that the Community Acquisition Risk Centre known as CARC, overseen by the Office of Intelligence chief, John Negroponte, whose agency was just formed in October 2005, had been asked to begin work on the DPW acquisition as late as November 2005. But CARC’s first director, William Dawson, was only appointed in January 2006. CARC has little to do with counterterrorism activities but is mandated to assess security risks posed by companies doing business with the intelligence community. Thus, all agencies apparently were told that the security issues were vetted and complete when it was CARC which made the security vulnerability assessment.

Prior to CARC’s investigation and vetting of the DPW deal, the U.S. Coast Guard filed an assessment report in December 2005 with CFIUS on port security concerning the DPW deal, which came to light on February 27, 2006 before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, chaired by Senator Susan Collins (R-ME). Senator Collins remarked, “This report suggests there were significant and troubling intelligence gaps.” She was referring to the language included in the report that stated that questions were raised by the Coast Guard that foreign influence, employees and operations made it impossible to assess the threat level by a state-owned Dubai company’s purchase of a firm to manage terminal operations of six U.S. seaports. However, according to testimony by Treasury Secretary Snow in the same hearing, the U.S. Coast Guard report was given to CFIUS after December 5, 2005 when the CFIUS assessment process had already been completed. Therefore, the U.S. Coast Guard’s report was not part of CFIUS’ final determination.

The mixed messages continue and will become unwieldy as time passes, particularly as politics entwines itself into the process. And there is no shortage of discrepancies as concerns the operations of the U.S. Coast Guard with respect to security operations. And testimony of Admiral Thomas H. Gilmour, Assistant Coast Guard Commandant for Marine Safety, Security and Environmental Protection, tried to rebuff any of Senator Collins’ doubts, stating that she was taking that part of the report out of context and that the report, “concludes that DP World’s acquisition of P&O, in and of itself, does not pose a significant threat to U.S. assets in ports.”

The U.S. Coast Guard continues to struggle to ensure security of U.S. ports due to a lack of necessary funding and aged equipment, nonetheless. Although Homeland Security Secretary, Michael Chertoff, has tried to assure the American people that his agency would still see that the U.S. Coast Guard and U.S. Customs and Border Protection oversee port security, they have only been able to do a marginal job, in spite of mandates since September 11, 2001. The U.S. largely remains vulnerable from inadequate security at points of origin, where manifests are the sole system used for checks and balances of cargo containers.

And there has been disingenuousness concerning the hierarchy of how the various agencies work in concert at U.S. ports. After 9/11, both the U.S. Congress and the White House enacted myriad regulations and legislation to provide better port security, namely the 2002 Maritime Transportation Safety Act, to standardize individual vessel and port security plans and gave the U.S. Coast Guard more duties. But most of the mandates either remain under-funded, yet to be realized, or both. More obvious and perhaps more simple to implement funding for is a plan to standardize security badges to maritime workers, now only required to show a state driver’s license as identification. A new security badge program is finally slated to begin in April 2006. The Coast Guards’ fleet is in need of replacement as most of its vessels are more than 50 years old.

But far more complicated is oversight of foreign-based containers and manifests. And the security of both foreign and domestic ports falls under the auspices of a conglomerate of agencies which includes U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the U.S. Coast Guard, terminal and vessel operators, state and local port authorities, as well as state and local law enforcement.

The regulatory requirements which went into effect in 2003 with the Maritime Transportation Safety Act requires port or terminal operators be responsible for security for its own facilities or the area within the port where cargo is loaded, unloaded or transferred, according the Department of Homeland Security. In addition, port operators are to conduct their own assessments of its assets with the federal government or U.S. Customs and Border Protection providing an overall role. Port operators and owners must mitigate their own security vulnerabilities, not the U.S. Coast Guard or U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The U.S. Coast Guard approves those security plans and is only responsible for overseeing that specific security plans are maintained.

For further clarity, as ships initially dock at U.S. ports, the U.S. Coast Guard has jurisdiction of said ships. After the ship docks, U.S. Customs and Border Protection oversee unloading operations. Thereafter, the ship’s cargo becomes the responsibility of the port operator.

According to Stephen Flynn, a former U.S. Coast Guard commander and now a Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, “When Customs says it screens 100% of the cargo, that simply means it scrutinizes the paper work of cargo manifests and of ships headed for the U.S., looking for things that might raise a red flag.” Presently, approximately only 5% of those containers, which raise red flags, are singled out for assessment such as whether a seal is broken, or a container comes from an unfamiliar company or shipper. Use of large gamma x-ray machines can then be used which can expose changes in the density of its contents. Rarely is a container searched by hand, due to the time consumption, which could take up to five hours.

“They’re making their best guess about what they think is a high risk material ….but they assume that the other 95% has come from trusted shippers, known shippers, name brand companies that are not involved with terrorism,” says Flynn. And although the White House keeps insisting otherwise, protection for most of all port facilities are the responsibility of the port operators and left up to gate guards and night watchman, for example, when incomplete inspections are left for the next day, while ships sit at their respective docks, uninspected, if at all.

Unregulated directly by the federal government, port operators administer the contents of the cargo once it is unloaded and its manifests are checked. And manifests, processed by U.S. Customs and Border Protection still remain on an honor system from ports abroad. But ports consist of far more than a dock, and can include warehouses, factories, refineries, bridges and various types of infrastructure. The port operator is responsible for lighting, fencing, locks and background checks of its employees as well as its entire various infrastructure.

Once U.S. Customs and Border Protection receives the manifests in the U.S., should agents see a red-flag they then contact the operator of the port of origin and are reliant upon that country’s security agent to do some kind of inspection or investigation. At best, it is a flawed system without the manpower or funding for more technology to better inspect containers arriving on U.S. shores.

But without mitigating obvious risks in ports of origin in parts of the world where terrorists are known to have access to harm Americans, appears fool hardy. It would seem then, regardless of what transpires as the result of congressional hearings and a more thorough investigation now granted for the DPW deal, that the U.S. government and its elected representatives must become more familiar with available resources and systems in place at U.S. port operations, in need of direct funding. For whatever arrives on U.S. docks will ultimately travel on myriad trains, trucks and aircraft throughout communities of America. In a post 9/11 world, we can no longer afford to unnecessarily take risks with strategic U.S. assets when we know we can do a far better job.