Police group: Rethink anti-terrorism money

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Oct. 2 (UPI) -- Washington should cut the billions of dollars it gives to police to fight terrorism and put it instead toward fighting rising U.S. crime, a police group says.

"The simple truth is that average Americans are much more likely to find themselves victims of crime than of terrorist attack," the International Association of Chiefs of Police says in a report that calls on the next president to shift money back to crime fighting.

The police group says 99,000 people have been killed in the United States since Sept. 11, 2001, and 1.4 million are victims of violent crime each year.

The U.S. Conference of Mayors, joining IACP, says money spent on local policing has dropped 81 percent since Sept. 11, 2001, while 34 Americans, on the average, are gunned down daily.

"If al-Qaida were responsible for 34 deaths a day in the United States, the nation would do whatever was necessary to stop the deaths," the conference says in an open letter to the next U.S. president.

Washington has given $22.7 billion to local governments for "emergency preparedness" since 2003. Much of it is spent on equipment stored in warehouses, IACP says.

U.S. Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Laura Keehner told USA Today police might need more money but "we reject the view that enough has been done on homeland security."