If we are to believe Fred Kaplan — and I've yet to see anyone seriously suggest he's wrong about this kind of thing — the whole funding of the Department of Homeland Security has become just a way to shovel your tax money into pork barrel projects that have nothing to do with thwarting terrorist attacks.
This is another one of those "I don't know why there isn't more outrage about this" kind of things. If some Congressguy got up and said we should stop allocating funds to this program, people who are terrified of another 9/11 would accuse him of being soft on terrorism. But they have no problem with that money going to help developers in Kentucky build more shopping malls.