Posted on 11/10/2004 6:51:52 PM PST by mhking
WASHINGTON — The federal government will lower the terror alert status for financial institutions in New York, New Jersey and Washington, The Associated Press learned Wednesday.
The reduction from orange to yellow, the midpoint on the government's five-level terror warning system, comes three months after the alert was raised amid concerns the institutions could be al-Qaida targets. Yellow is "elevated," while orange is considered a "high" threat of attack.
Two officials at the Homeland Security Department and aides to three members of Congress told the AP the alert level would be lowered. They all spoke on condition of anonymity because they did not want to pre-empt an announcement by James Loy, the department's deputy secretary.
Homeland Security set the threat level at orange for areas surrounding financial institutions. They included the Citigroup Center building and the New York Stock Exchange in New York; the International Monetary Fund and World Bank buildings in Washington; and Prudential Financial Inc.'s headquarters in northern New Jersey.
The rest of the nation remained at yellow, the current threat level.
The increase in the threat level for financial institutions came after officials said they had intelligence indicating al-Qaida had conducted surveillance of the buildings.
Counterterror officials later acknowledged that much of the intelligence was at least several years old. However, they defended their decision to raise the alert because of al-Qaida's record of extensive planning and plotting.
Government officials were particularly worried about the possibility of an al-Qaida attack using a car or truck bomb, but did not rule out other possibilities.
When the nation is at heightened alert, state and local homeland security officials, along with relevant members of the private sector, take added precautions such as adding patrols at ports and increasing undercover officers monitoring potentially attractive targets.
The announcement signals to local authorities that they can scale back some of the extra security personnel assigned to specific sites mentioned in the warning.
New York officials have chosen to keep the city at orange since the Sept. 11 attacks, even though the rest of the country has been at yellow most of the time.
New York City Police Department spokesman Paul Browne said Wednesday's announcement by Homeland Security would not change the city's status.
"We remain on orange alert as we have since 9/11," he said.
Just damn.
If you want on the list, FReepmail me. This IS a high-volume PING list...
There terrorists know that Dubya's back in business! With an unequivocal mandate!
I figured this wouldn't happen until after the inauguration....
Prairie
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