US still at risk of terror attack

WASHINGTON, Monday (Reuters) The United States is still unprepared for another inevitable terrorist attack after not doing enough to improve communications for emergency personnel and bolster security at nuclear plants, the heads of the former Sept. 11 Commission said.

Former commission chairman Thomas Kean said preparing for another attack has not been a high enough priority for President George W. Bush and Congress.

"A lot of the things we need to do really to prevent another 9/11 just simply aren't being done by the president or by the Congress," Kean, the former Republican governor of New Jersey, said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

The comments come ahead of the commission's final update, which will be released Monday, grading the status of its post-Sept. 11 security recommendations and in most cases the Bush administration and U.S. lawmakers earned a failing grade, said Kean and Lee Hamilton, the former Democratic representative from Indiana who was the Sept. 11 Commission's vice chairman.

While there has been a little progress in some areas, several major issues remain, Kean and Hamilton said. Among the major shortcomings they cited was setting aside radio airwaves for police, firefighters and other first responders to use in an emergency.

Allocating funds in areas most at risk and setting up a central command system with clear leaders also is floundering, they said.

"We believe that another attack will occur and we had better get to it and protect the American people," Hamilton said. "It's not a question of if."

In the last of a series of updates since the commission's official report was released in August 2004, Hamilton said they plan to highlight "that there is a lack of a sense of urgency" in making reforms. Work by the Department of Homeland Security to evaluate the risk of attack at nuclear power plants and chemical plants was "totally inadequate," Kean said.

"It doesn't set the priorities out," he said. "It just sets basically vague guidelines, what the priorities should be."