News Release
Public Safety
Matt Blunt, Governor
Mark James, Director


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


For more information, please contact:
Terri Durdaller
Communication Director
Work:(573) 751-4819
Cell: (573) 301-2023

   
Blunt Announces $8 Million for Regional Homeland Security Committee

JEFFERSON CITY, September 21, 2006-Gov. Matt Blunt announced the nine Regional Homeland Security Oversight Committees will split $8,084,000 earmarked for regionalization from Missouri’s FY06 Homeland Security Grant Funds. The nine regions mirror the Missouri State Highway Patrol regions.

“Our goal is to greatly enhance the collective preparedness of this state ensuring federal funds are directed to areas most at risk while creating solutions that are innovative and regionally driven,” Blunt said. “Preparedness is a shared responsibility.”

Blunt’s Homeland Security Advisory Council chose four core areas for committee leaders to target funds in order to better address regional concerns. The core areas include, agriculture, interoperability, mass care and citizen protection and volunteer and donations management.

Each region received funds based on a formula, which considered the following: Number of Counties in each region, Population totals per the 2000 Census, and the Number of Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources identified by the State in each region.
· Region A: $671,653
· Region B: $959,771
· Region C: $616,274
· Region D: $1,696,274
· Region E: $1,040,357
· Region F: $1,198,425
· Region G: $430,544
· Region H: $892,767
· Region I: $577,933

Missouri has two Urban Area Security Initiative (USAI) cities - St. Louis and Kansas City - which receive separate Homeland Security grants and are not included in the regional Committees. The Kansas City USAI is composed of the Missouri counties of Jackson, Clay, Cass, Platte and Ray and three Kansas counties. The St. Louis City USAI is composed of the Missouri counties of St. Louis, St. Charles, Franklin and Jefferson, and the three Illinois counties.

Each Regional Homeland Security Oversight Committee is made up of leaders from 13 core disciplines, which are tasked with the responsibility of appropriating the funds to best serve their respective region. Designated Regional Planning Commissions (RPCs) will take care of administrative and planning functions for the committee. Those RPCs include Pioneer Trails, Mark Twain Regional Council of Governments, Boonslick, Southeast Missouri Regional Planning & Economic Development Commission, Mid-Mo, SCOCOG, MO-Kan, and Meramec.

For more information about Missouri’s Regionalization of Homeland Security Funds, please refer to http://sema.dps.mo.gov/regionalization/index.htm.


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