Steve Lynch: “together with Mr. Holt of New Jersey and Mr. Castle of Delaware, this amendment seeks to increase the amount…”

“together with Mr. Holt of New Jersey and Mr. Castle of Delaware, this amendment seeks to increase the amount appropriated by H.R. 5441 for rail and transportation security grants from $150 million to $200 million. The $50 million added to the rail security grants is to be offset by a novel idea today, which is to decrease by $50 million the amount appropriated for the Office of the Under Secretary for Management. Mr. Chairman, we are grossly underfunding rail security in this country at a time when it should be a major priority. There is an old saying that states that Congress is always fighting the last war. If you look at the area of transportation security, we have spent $22 billion on aviation security, 97 percent of the transportation money, and only 3 percent of transportation security money on rail. So 97 percent, $22 billion, on aviation, and about half a billion dollars on rail security. This flies in the face of experience. As you look around the world today, the pattern of terrorist activity has been markedly against rail systems. If you go back to 1995, the Tokyo rail system was attacked by sarin gas. The Algerian rebels attacked the Paris subways. Going further, the Chechnyan rebels attacking the Moscow subways, the attacks in Madrid against their commuter rail system, many, many attacks on bus systems in Israel and, most recently, the London attacks against their subway system.…”