Emergency Management Director has suggestions on Homeland Security office

Iowa’s Homeland Security director says there are several principles necessary to run the new federal Homeland Security agency, including an effort to ensure that too many rights aren’t trampled upon.Ellen Gordon, who’s also the state’s Emergency Management director, says it’s important to protect civil liberties and state’s rights when possible in this new era of national security. Critics worry about police-state procedures, like unrestricted wire taps and holding people without charging them with a crime. Gordon is also worried about the future of programs shifted into the new agency. She some are good programs that are important to the state and have been important over the last several years.Gordon says the new agency must quickly establish a national homeland security strategy.A bill to establish a new Homeland Security Agency is under consideration in a U-S Senate Committee. Gordon made her comments this past week during a meeting in Des Moines.