Ridge Revisits Terrorism Preparedness

The list was specific: Water for three days. Flashlights and a battery-powered radio. Enough duct tape and plastic sheeting to seal a room against the toxic materials that Al Qaeda might try to spread in a terrorist attack.

But four days after telling Americans to assemble emergency supply kits, a move that had people from Washington to New York stripping hardware stores of supplies, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge on Friday was forced to clarify his instructions for how Americans should prepare for potential terrorism.

His new guidance: Buy the duct tape. Just don’t use it without a signal from the government. And wait for further instructions next week.

It was the latest example of the difficulty federal officials are facing in making the public prepared for, but not panicked about, terrorism. It came in a week that saw schools purchase gas masks, businesses review evacuation plans and antiaircraft missile batteries return to key posts around the nation’s capital.

“I want to make something very, very clear at this point: We do not want individuals or families to start sealing their doors or their windows,” Ridge said at a news conference.

He said people should assemble the emergency kits but also watch for a media campaign, scheduled to start Wednesday, that will lay out how to respond to each of the various scenarios that could arise from a terrorist attack, which might include biological, chemical or radioactive materials. Duct tape and plastic, he said, were not appropriate “for every conceivable terrorist attack.”

“What they should do now if they’ve secured their supply kit,” Ridge said, “is they ought to go pick the kids up at school and they ought to go to the soccer games, and they ought to go to work, because they’ve done all we want them to do now.”

The administration’s advice Monday moved thousands of Americans, mostly in the New York-Washington corridor, to stock up on disaster supplies. But it also drew questions from many residents, as well as ridicule from Democrats in Congress.

“Duct tape is not enough,” said Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.). “We need a real plan that makes first responders a first priority and that truly strengthens America’s homeland security.”

He appeared Friday with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) and a group of firefighters at a news conference in which President Bush was urged to spend more money on border control, civil defense equipment and other security measures.

Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.), a Democratic presidential hopeful, said the government still needed to issue “clear and concrete guidance” about how to prepare for terrorism. “Secretary Ridge should go on network television one evening soon and talk us through the realities and possibilities of our current Code Orange threat,” he said, referring to the federal government’s warning that the nation is at “high risk” for terrorism -- the second-highest alert possible.

Others said they had little confidence that duct tape would help them in a terrorist attack.

Chicago college student Ryan Schmidt, 21, fretted that he lived near one of the nation’s tallest buildings. “I live in the shadow of the [John] Hancock [Center], and you think duct tape and plastic is going to save me?” he asked rhetorically. “I can’t explain how stupid that seems.”

“In South Florida, homes are built with concrete, which does not make for a good bond with duct tape,” said Sergio Mariaca, a 34-year-old financial advisor in Boynton Beach, Fla. Even if the tape could seal out toxic materials, “you may suffocate to death. Any way you look at it, you cannot win.”

In Boston, callers to a WRKO radio program have also been skeptical about the emergency preparedness advice.

“I think people were alarmed at first, and the more it sunk in the more it sounded silly to them,” said Doreen Vigue, co-host of the morning “McCarthy and Vigue” program. She said callers tended to trust Bush and support war against Iraq, but they were less certain about Ridge.

“The government didn’t do a lot of homework in telling me to seal myself off in a room, where I might suffocate,” she said.

Several U.S. counter-terrorism officials also expressed dismay over the guidelines released Monday, particularly the recommendation to buy duct tape and plastic sheeting. They said this significantly heightened public unease, making it even harder for FBI agents to do their jobs.

“We have a problem, and we are at war,” one official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity. But the public “should not be absolutely freaking out.”

Schools and businesses on Friday continued efforts to improve security. In Fairfax, Va., near Washington, 360 biohazard masks arrived at the private New School of Northern Virginia, part of a plan to protect staff and students in grades three through 12.

At the Capitol, police warned that people delivering Valentine’s Day flowers would be subject to the standing rule barring couriers from entering the building.

Lawmakers in recent days have been told to keep sensitive documents, medicine and a list of key phone numbers on hand in case an evacuation is announced. Staff members have been trained in how to use “escape hoods” that protect against chemical and biological substances.

The administration released several reports related to homeland security, including one plan to tighten security for computer networks and another to protect “critical infrastructure,” including power plants, water systems and postal and shipping facilities.

Lieberman criticized the Bush administration for proposing to cut taxes while being “too stingy” in spending on homeland security. He said the administration has proposed spending $41.3 billion in the coming fiscal year on homeland security, while cutting more than $100 billion in taxes.

“Its choices favor the wallets of the few over the safety of us all,” Lieberman said in a speech at George Washington University.

He said the federal government should spend at least $16 billion more in fiscal 2004 than Bush’s proposal on homeland security calls for.

Ridge said that Congress had recently approved money that Bush requested to help state and local governments respond to terrorist attacks, but that lawmakers had put some undesirable constraints on a portion of the funding.

Responding to terrorism is a “shared responsibility” for federal, state and local governments, Ridge said.

“I know they need more money. The president recognizes they need more money,” he said. “That’s why in this budget he’s asked for an additional $3.5 billion, which will hopefully be appropriated in a way that we can respond to the specific needs and requests” of state and local authorities.

*

Times staff writers Elizabeth Levin and Josh Meyer in Washington, and researchers Lynn Marshall in Seattle, Anna M. Virtue in Miami and John Beckham in Chicago contributed to this report.