Port Security

The Baltimore County Police Department will use $860,795 in federal money to purchase tactical response watercraft and dive-and-search equipment to enhance security at the port of Baltimore. The funds will pay for a 25-foot patrol boat with trailer and accessories, a similarly equipped 21-foot boat and two inflatable boats outfitted with diving gear and devices that can disarm explosive devices. The boats and equipment will allow the department to better fulfill its role in the defense of the port area, officials said.

With guns bristling, police officers in full tactical gear sweep across the vast deck of a cargo ship and creep up the stairs to the bridge. Their mission: Take the vessel back from armed intruders. Twice a month, the Natural Resources Police Tactical Response Team practices its craft. Tuesday morning's exercise was aboard the USNS Gilliland, a 956-foot vessel operated by the Navy Military Sealift Command and tied up at the Clinton Street Marine Terminal. "Basically it's a high-rise lying on its side, but it's a lot more complicated," said Sgt. Mel Adam, the squad leader, of the vessel.

Two General Assembly leaders are seeking a review of the state of security at the port of Baltimore, questioning whether state officials have made improvements since The Sun reported a series of lapses in July last year. In a letter this week, Sen. Thomas M. Middleton and Del. Maggie McIntosh ask chief legislative auditor Bruce A. Myers to conduct a performance audit of port security as well as a financial audit of Maryland's use of state and federal homeland security funds. Middleton, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, is a Charles County Democrat.

When career criminals have access to U.S. ports but law-abiding airline passengers must let strangers grope them to board a plane, something smells. Even worse, no one seems to care at a time Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano described in congressional testimony last week as the most dangerous since Sept. 11. Van Smith at the City Paper ran court records of the 918 members of the International Longshoremen's Association Local 333 and found that about one-quarter of union members have been convicted of a crime in Maryland.

One of our government's most-feared terrorism scenarios involves the hiding of components for a nuclear or radiological bomb inside one of the more than 10 million shipping containers that pass through our seaports each year. Unfortunately, the port of Baltimore, one of our nation's busiest seaports, is a potential target and remains vulnerable. Here's why: Six years after 9/11 and despite government approval of some far-reaching efforts to combat this danger, there remain fruitless debates over the costs of a national effort and a tendency to let the best be the enemy of the good.

WASHINGTON -- The federal government will more than triple its grant funding this year for port security in Maryland, providing money for a state-of-the-art video surveillance system and technology to help monitor the thousands of trucks that enter the port of Baltimore each day. Additional money to protect regional transit is also getting a big boost in the annual grants announced yesterday by the Department of Homeland Security. Nationwide, federal spending on what the department calls infrastructure protection is increasing 29 percent to $884 million.

THE SUN'S recent report on security lapses at the port of Baltimore did what investigative journalism is supposed to do - expose problems that spur officials to take corrective action. But at a time when New York Times reporter Judith Miller is in jail for refusing to reveal her confidential sources, and with the public increasingly apprehensive about potential acts of terrorism, this story was published only after an exceptionally high degree of internal scrutiny. The article described dilapidated fences, nonexistent or poorly functioning surveillance systems and new security equipment that was not being used.

WASHINGTON -- President Bush plans to use the port of Baltimore as a backdrop tomorrow for a speech calling on Congress to extend provisions of the USA Patriot Act, the post-9/11 law that grants the government broad powers to fight terrorism. During his morning visit, Bush will highlight stepped-up efforts to secure the nation's ports. He is to be given a demonstration of a new, high-tech container-scanning device in use at the Seagirt Marine Terminal before making remarks to an invited audience at the Dundalk passenger terminal.

The port of Baltimore and Maryland waterways won $4.8 million in grants from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the largest one-time pot of money the state has received in six rounds of funding for maritime security. The money is part of $168 million awarded to 51 ports identified by the U.S. Coast Guard as the nation's most critical seaports after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. It will be used in Maryland for such items as surveillance boats and a new operations center with jurisdiction in the Baltimore port, as well as the Chesapeake Bay and the Potomac River, according to Dennis R. Schrader, director of the Governor's Office of Homeland Security.

Private companies need to "up the ante" in securing the nation's ports from terrorism, the nation's first homeland security chief said yesterday. "The public sector and the private sector have done a pretty good job, but there's more to do," Thomas J. Ridge told the second annual Homeland Port Security Conference, sponsored by the U.S. Naval Institute at the Maryland Port Administration's Cruise Terminal. Local officials echoed that sentiment after the federal government cut security funding for the Helen Delich Bentley Port of Baltimore by more than 60 percent.

Police seek tips in fatal shooting on North Avenue A man suffering from a gunshot wound was found on North Avenue early Saturday morning and died a short time later, police said. Detective Nicole Monroe said police were called to the 2300 block of W. North Ave. about 5:30 a.m. for a report of a shooting and found a man lying in the street. He was taken to Maryland Shock Trauma Center, where he was pronounced dead at 6:15 a.m. Monroe said the man had been tentatively identified, but his name could not be released until his family had been notified.

The Baltimore County Police Department will use $860,795 in federal money to purchase tactical response watercraft and dive-and-search equipment to enhance security at the port of Baltimore. The funds will pay for a 25-foot patrol boat with trailer and accessories, a similarly equipped 21-foot boat and two inflatable boats outfitted with diving gear and devices that can disarm explosive devices. The boats and equipment will allow the department to better fulfill its role in the defense of the port area, officials said.

Maryland will get $6 million of federal stimulus money to go toward port and transit security and firehouse construction, an announcement government officials made Wednesday in Baltimore amid the backdrop of an unspecified terrorism warning issued this week. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said the money earmarked for the state will create jobs through construction projects and is part of a $510 million federal government effort to improve security at some of the country's major ports.

It was a day in late spring 2005 when I first met George Tarburton. The Maryland Transportation Authority police officer showed up without notice in the lobby of The Baltimore Sun. An editor asked me to go downstairs and talk with him. He was a thin, intense man with a lot on his mind. Tarburton, who was assigned to the detail that protects the port of Baltimore, was worried that the security at the marine terminals was riddled with holes that made it vulnerable to attack. He wanted to talk with somebody, anybody who could bring the problem to the attention of the public and the people who make decisions in this state.

The Department of Homeland Security is attempting to bypass a congressional mandate that equipment bought for port security with federal grants be purchased from American companies, according to members of Congress and documents obtained by The Sun. The move, which DHS officials said does not violate Congress' instructions, immediately drew sharp criticism from organized labor groups and "Buy American" sympathizers on Capitol Hill, who in recent years...

Making sure terrorists aren't smuggling some dangerous weapon into the country by way of the port of Baltimore or some similar entry point is a formidable challenge. It's unrealistic to inspect every container on every ship, for instance, so it's vital that authorities be able to determine which ought to be. That's why it's deeply troubling to learn from the Government Accountability Office that the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT) is so fraught with problems. The cooperative government and business initiative is intended to make the vulnerability assessment process easier for U.S. Customs officials by having importers, port authorities and others submit security plans that meet certain minimum criteria.

WASHINGTON -- More than two months after the Dubai Ports World deal drew attention to vulnerabilities at America's seaports, Congress is preparing to take action on legislation aimed at improving port security. A measure that would spend about $800 million per year on security measures could be on President Bush's desk by the end of the summer, supporters said. But partisan disagreements over the best approach - and how much to spend - have added an election-year element to what had been a largely bipartisan effort to close port security gaps.

The Department of Homeland Security is attempting to bypass a congressional mandate that equipment bought for port security with federal grants be purchased from American companies, according to members of Congress and documents obtained by The Sun. The move, which DHS officials said does not violate Congress' instructions, immediately drew sharp criticism from organized labor groups and "Buy American" sympathizers on Capitol Hill, who in recent years...

WASHINGTON -- The federal government will more than triple its grant funding this year for port security in Maryland, providing money for a state-of-the-art video surveillance system and technology to help monitor the thousands of trucks that enter the port of Baltimore each day. Additional money to protect regional transit is also getting a big boost in the annual grants announced yesterday by the Department of Homeland Security. Nationwide, federal spending on what the department calls infrastructure protection is increasing 29 percent to $884 million.

George Tarburton has one word -- actually, a contraction -- for anyone who might feel the urge to blow the whistle on official wrongdoing, government waste or chronic problems in the workplace: Don't. "It's not worth it," Tarburton says. "You'll just get screwed." Tarburton, once a cop with the Maryland Transportation Authority, learned this lesson the hard way. He blew the whistle on lapses in security in the port of Baltimore and lost his job for it. Tarburton was a source for a Sun reporter who, four years after the terrorist attacks of Sept.