Columbia International Affairs Online: Working Papers

CIAO DATE: 04/2011

Houston's Preparedness for Terrorism

Clark Kent Ervin

December 2010

Aspen Institute

Abstract

Mayor Bill White of Houston, one of the fastest growing metropolitan areas in the country, began the roundtable by calling for a public dialogue about what the term, “homeland security,” really means. In White’s view, what we are struggling against is really nothing more than “organized crime with an international political dimension.” Using the term, “terrorism,” to describe what we are fi ghting against romanticizes the problem and unduly magnifi es it. We should not panic over terrorism; we should put and keep the problem in perspective. White emphasized also that countering terrorism is not a job just for government; every American has a role to play. He went on to note that, while there are more “iconic” and, therefore, likely terror targets than the Gulf Coast’s petrochemical industry (of which Houston is the epicenter), such an attack would serve terrorists’ purposes because it could prove to be “devastating” to the U.S. economy, even if the toll in deaths and injuries was relatively small. Stressing the nexus between crime (especially drug-related crime) and terrorism, White worries about Mexico’s becoming a failed state due to the increasing power of narco-traffi ckers and the potential for further violent spillover along the U.S. border. “The security of our Southern border is paramount to national security, and thus it must be treated and funded as such.” Finally, in White’s view, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is less effective now that it is part of the bureaucratic behemoth that is the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).