DLC | New Dem Daily | May 4, 2004 Transportation Security: Lots of Pain, Too Little Gain As every traveling American knows, the most visible area of the nation's homeland security effort has been in transportation. One of Congress' first acts after 9/11 was to create the Transportation Security Administration to take over airport security. Billions have been spent already to set up and staff TSA; the Bush administration is asking for $5.3 billion for next year alone. Congress also enacted a Port Security Act in 2003 aimed at preventing terrorists from attacking port facilities or sneaking weapons ashore. But there are growing signs that our transportation system remains very vulnerable, thanks in no small part to negligent supervision and a lack of leadership by an administration that claims to be making America safer every day. TSA is an alarming case in point. Without question, TSA agents are very visible in airports, and travelers have become accustomed to major delays in clearing airport security. But it's not clear all the pain has generated much gain in safety. As a Washington Post editorial noted last week, two new (and classified) reports -- one by the inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security, and another by a private consultant -- have concluded that "there is little difference between the current system and the system that was in place before the TSA existed. The agency has brought long lines at airports and the routine removal of shoes and belts ... but a similar percentage of contraband can still be smuggled through security." A big part of TSA's problem is that it's still using outdated technology, including x-ray scanners that cannot detect explosives, and a passenger screening system that relies on drivers licenses and passports rather than the vastly more reliable biometric technologies (handprint, fingerprint or iris recognition) already being used in other countries (notably Israel) -- and in use at some U.S. airports to screen their own workers. A few weeks after 9/11, the Progressive Policy Institute proposed a crash pilot program to deploy such technologies, which could not only radically improve security but also cut down time spent waiting in lines, especially for frequent travelers. Sen. Joe Lieberman inserted language in the November 2001 airport security legislation authorizing advanced technology tests in at least 20 airports. But the administration waited until just last week to announce it would move forward at its usual leisurely pace on the initiative. (Remember how long it took the administration to get on board with the idea for creating a Department of Homeland Security?) Meanwhile, TSA has been diverting for other uses hundreds of millions of dollars originally appropriated for research, development, and deployment of such technologies as bomb-detecting scanners. The perilous go-slow-and-stay-dumb situation at airports isn't our only transportation security problem. Reporters from a local television station recently tested the security of the Port of Seattle, one of the country's busiest. Riding shotgun with truckers entering "secured" areas of the port, the reporters discovered that security personnel rarely if ever checked drivers' identification documents, and sometimes abandoned security checkpoints altogether. On one occasion, reporters wandered around cargo storage facilities for hours, without once being challenged to show ID or explain their presence. Confronted with these findings, port officials responded quickly -- by placing the reporters on the federal watch list for potential terrorists! While the Seattle case shows that routine supervision, training and discipline are all lacking in the area of port security, even better enforcement of the current regime would still leave holes thanks to the inadequacy of drivers license-based identification systems. Congress has urged the Bush administration to extend biometrics-based identification to all 12 million U.S. transportation workers. But the administration has yet to even issue a Request for Proposals to begin implementing a pilot program for a Transportation Worker Identity Card (TWIC). It's time to demand a sense of urgency, and some results, in exchange for the taxpayer dollars and inconveniences associated with transportation security. But the bigger issue, of course, isn't the financial or personal pain sustained for so little gain in this area: It's the persistent risk that terrorists will exploit this negligence to our genuine peril.