Editor's Note: In this column, first responder veteran Roland Sprewell asks an important question: how can first responders be expected to stay on their game in the face of constant funding cuts at the state and local level, and a federal grant process that is beleagured by Washington politics as usual.

News stories regarding the surge in domestic extremist activity, allegedly spawned by passage of the Obama administration’s healthcare reform legislation, recently caught my interest and concern. How can we even begin to prepare for such scenarios in the face of a constant and pernicious erosion of local and regional budgets -- cuts that have led to the furloughing, layoffs and straight out eradication of police and firefighter positions, throughout the nation.

I also have fears about increasingly anemic levels of funding to support first responder programs. It’s easy for bureaucrats to sit back and assume that funding from the federal government, particularly grants from the Department of Homeland Security, will fill the gaps in any cuts made at the local level. But what they fail to remember is the domino effect. As first responder agency’s continue to be subjected to the budget surgeon’s knife, and the more they have to rely on the State Homeland Security Grant Program (SHSGP), Urban Area Security Initiative (UASI), and other DHS provided funds to keep their programs going, the more our local preparedness efforts are stretched thin. These programs are competitive and offer no baseline upon which to build a stable preparedness effort.

And let’s not pretend that agencies don’t get creative when it comes to competing for these so called “threat informed” grants. The term “threat informed” was tucked into the recently released FY 2011 Homeland Security Budget and appears to be bureaucratic language designed to deliberately conceal and obfuscate the method behind DHS’s madness. The reality is that the funds are allocated not because of an actual “risk-based” analysis of threats, but based on some informal promise that the “risks” faced by a state or locality will be taken into consideration when the federal government begins the process of doling out the money.

Of course, none of this would be such a big problem if these grant monies were being used for what they were designed for -- funding first responder initiatives above and beyond what state and local agencies can afford to do themselves. But the reality is that these funds have been used as a convenient political excuse by state and local politicians to cut their own financial responsibilities to the first responders charged with keeping them and their constituents safe. America’s police, firefighters and emergency responders cannot maintain a reasonable level of preparedness in the age of global terrorism given these political and funding realities.

Lastly, the lack of vigilance and apparent apathy about our planning and preparedness efforts is very palpable right now. Not just at the bureaucratic level, but within the local populations we’ve sworn to protect. Mention terrorism, and invariably you will see eyes rolling. We should never let our guard down. That is exactly what the enemy is hoping for. At a time when this country saw at least 19 terrorist attempts against it in 2009 alone, we can’t afford to weaken our ability or our resolve to protect the citizenry. As we continue to see a steep spike in the number of plots against the country, the enemy is not rolling their eyes, but sharpening their skills.

Lets stay on our game!!