WHEREAS, law enforcement’s mission entails the unique requirement to prevent, detect, and deter terrorism, in addition to response preparedness; and

WHEREAS, 650,000 law enforcement officers at the state, local, and tribal level are the core component of the nation’s terrorist prevention efforts; and

WHEREAS, the Congress of the United State recognized this unique prevention role of law enforcement with the creation of the Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention Program (LETPP) within the Department of Homeland Security’s Grant Program funding for 2004, 2005 and 2006; and

WHEREAS, Representative Christopher Cox, former Chair of the House Committee on Homeland Security, recognized law enforcement’s unique prevention role when he commented in a February 2005 television interview that “preventing terrorism equates to intelligence” (e.g., information sharing); and

WHEREAS, according to past practice by domestic and foreign terrorists, the planning and gathering of resources for a terrorist act will most likely occur within the counties, cities, villages, and townships outside of metropolitan areas designated by the Urban Area Security Initiatives (UASI); and

WHEREAS, LETPP funding for 2006 was $400 million, a $13.7 million increase from 2005; and

WHEREAS, the national shared mission of preventing terrorism requires the recognition that there exists unique local issues, situations, and forces that dictate the need to permit state and local law enforcement and homeland security planning agencies the flexibility to allow for degrees of variation in the use of all homeland security funding; now, therefore be it

RESOLVED that the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) urges Congress to sustain the LETPP program in 2007 at least at the 2006 level of $400 million, and respectfully requests that there be minimum restrictions placed on the use of these funds.