Early warning plans to get grant

BY CY RYAN

Wednesday, June 7, 2006 | 8:34 a.m.

CARSON CITY - Setting up an early warning system to prevent terrorist attacks in Nevada is a priority for the more than $20 million in federal homeland security money the state will receive later this year.

Although the $20.5 million grant to the Nevada Homeland Security Commission is a 25 percent reduction from the $27.5 million received last year, Nevada officials took comfort from the fact that their loss was less than that of other states.

"We did pretty good," said Frank Siracusa, director of the state Emergency Planning Division. "New York got cut by 40 percent."

Clark County will receive $7.5 million of the grant, and the Nevada Homeland Security Commission will decide how to spend the rest of the money. Clark County is expected to follow the state's lead in determining how to use the money, officials said.

The statewide priority list is topped by an $8 million plan to establish terrorism early warning groups in Southern and Northern Nevada to gather intelligence information.

"This is a prevention measure," Siracusa said.

The groups would essentially be clearing houses that would gather data from the CIA, the FBI and local law enforcement.

The Las Vegas group would be headed by Metro Police and would include representatives from other law enforcement agencies in Southern Nevada. In Northern Nevada, the Washoe County Sheriff's Department would be the lead agency.

Siracusa stressed that the anti-terrorism groups would not tap phones or engage in eavesdropping.

Metro's early warning group will consist of a full-time team of police officers who will work with federal homeland security analysts and staff from municipal agencies to monitor terrorism threats in the county, Metro Homeland Security Bureau Capt. Kathleen Suey said.

The early warning team will work from a central office, analyzing suspicious activities reported to police, such as people photographing planes or bomb threats, and processing the information to determine whether Las Vegas may be at risk for an attack or crisis, Suey said.

The group's staff will use their information to alert the public and better inform emergency workers, she said.

"It's basically going to be an analytical center where we're looking for what's not right, what's going on, putting all the pieces together," Suey said. "We will look at all the threats and share that information and try to put out a product that we think might alert the public if we feel we have a serious threat."

Metro could have the group up and running within 90 days of receiving the grant money, and operating from a new headquarters within the next two years, Suey said.

Another high statewide priority is establishing a $24 million "interoperable communications" system that would permit all emergency agencies to communicate statewide with each other.

The state already has spent about $15 million putting in a new radio system for the Nevada Highway Patrol. Robert Chisel, assistant director of the state Transportation Department, said the system allows the patrol to talk to Washoe County law enforcement and the Transportation Department. Metro Police, he added, is creating a new radio system that will connect to the Highway Patrol.

Rural Nevada law enforcement agencies, however, are on different radio systems. Although the Highway Patrol maintained its old system to communicate with local police departments in rural areas, the new statewide system would connect all emergency agencies throughout Nevada.

"We would get everyone in Nevada talking on the same system," Siracusa said.

Officials from state and local governments will meet June 21-22 to recommend how the federal money should be spent.

Also high on the list of priorities is development of evacuation and shelter plans, Siracusa said.