Among major metropolitan areas, only New York City, Houston and San Francisco saw funding increases. Fourteen smaller cities, such as Hartford, Conn., and San Juan, Puerto Rico, are getting grants for the first time.
Maryland will get $18 million, a cut of $2.2 million, or 11 percent. State officials say they were told to expect a 3 percent cut. Several states, including California, New York, Texas and New Jersey, are getting increases, as is the District of Columbia.
The state has fared well in other homeland security grant programs this year, including in May, when lawmakers and federal officials announced that funding for port security had more than tripled to $6.6 million compared with the year before, when it had been cut almost by half.
"On a year-to-year basis, I don't think we're surprised to see these fluctuations," Sen. Benjamin L. Cardin said. "The total money is significant. ... We're fighting for our region to receive greater funds. So we'll continue to fight. But we think part of this is going to be a larger pie to work with."
In many areas, the money has become a vital mechanism for replenishing long-neglected communications equipment and standardizing how local and state agencies respond to an attack or disaster. But this year the department specified that 25 percent of the money for states be spent on preventing attacks by the homemade bombs referred to as "improvised explosive devices."
Another requirement channels 80 percent of the funds for states to local jurisdictions. In some areas, public officials have begun to question whether that money wouldn't be better spent on more police officers or narcotics investigations.
Andrew A. Lauland, homeland security adviser to Gov. Martin O'Malley, said state officials are still working with the Department of Homeland Security to determine how to meet the requirements, some of which "seem somewhat arbitrary," he said.
"I agree that homemade bombs were the most commonly used means of attack in the past, but for that reason it's an area that a lot of states and local jurisdictions have invested heavily in," he said.
As an alternative, he said, the Department of Homeland Security could have set a baseline for what every jurisdiction would need to prevent homemade bomb attacks, and then, once they met that baseline, allow them to apply the funds for other, related purposes.
