BUFFALO — Mayor Byron Brown Tuesday hailed news that the City of Buffalo and the region will receive $5.5 million for the Buffalo Urban Area Security Initiative (UASI) Program. City representatives from the Buffalo Police Department, Buffalo Fire Department and Homeland Security were informed of the 2009 UASI funding in a conference call with DHS staff in Washington, DC.

Buffalo’s 2009 UASI funding represented about $500,000 more than original DHS target level based on "effectiveness analysis" of final application, which was said to be attributable to quality assessments of the Buffalo funding submission.  Any DHS percentage change in funding for a region like Buffalo and its partner communities was capped at 10%, so DHS actually increased the Buffalo UASI’s funding by the maximum allowable in the program.

Within the federal UASI program, the Buffalo Urban Area encompasses the City of Buffalo, the City of Niagara Falls, Erie County and Niagara County.

Since the near defunding of federal UASI monies to the Buffalo Urban Area in 2006, Mayor Brown has met with the former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, his top deputies, worked closely with the region’s federal legislative delegation, testified before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Homeland Security chaired by Congressman Peter King and this past April hosted a meeting at City Hall with U.S. Department of Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Jane Holl Lute during her tour of the Buffalo Niagara region.