WILSON RING, The Associated Press
BURLINGTON, Vt. (AP) -- “Public safety officials from 10 northeastern states want the Department of Homeland Security to oversee the creation of state intelligence sharing centers to get terrorism-related information to police officers on the street.
In a letter delivered Thursday to Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, the officials proposed that a pilot program to link the states with the Department of Homeland Security be set up as quickly as possible
“America’s 700,000 state and local police officers are our country’s ‘boots on the ground’ in a domestic war on terrorism,” the letter said.
The letter said information that would help officers on the street is not being provided by the joint terrorism task forces in each state.
“This activity cannot and does not take place through the task forces,” the letter said.
“A robust mechanism thus must be put in place that enables the formal, coordinated and routine flow information on a two-way basis,” it said.
The intelligence sharing centers would be set up in each state or on an appropriate regional basis. They would be staffed by people with top-secret security clearances who would work directly with federal, state, and local police and security agencies.
Representatives of the 10 states were in Burlington Friday for a two-day meeting on homeland security issues that included representatives of three Canadian provinces.
The proposal on intelligence sharing was endorsed by representatives of the states as well as representatives of federal law enforcement agencies who also attended, said Vermont Public Safety Commissioner Kerry Sleeper.
The centers are needed because information that could help officers on the street fight terrorism isn’t reaching them, Sleeper said. And those officers are the ones most likely to first detect or respond to terrorist activity, he said.
“Given the size of the country, and the enormity of the task we collectively face, we must utilize our front-line law-enforcement personnel as a prevention network able to interact with each other as well as with appropriate federal authorities,” the letter said.
The centers would enable local officers to use federal databases to learn if suspects had terrorist connections.
Rachael Sunbarger, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, said Friday the department had received the letter.
“We have been working with this group since they contacted us,” she said. “We are currently discussing the particular concept with the individuals.”
The letter was signed by representatives from New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Delaware, Pennsylvania, Maine, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont.
The broader goal of the Burlington meeting was to improve cooperation between law enforcement agencies in the United States and Canada.
The officials from the states and Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick agreed to improve the sharing of information in the fight against terrorism.