But What If It’s Not A Mistake And The Horrible Truth Is That The Empire State Building And Brooklyn Bridge Are Actually Just Really Lame?

New York City is miffed that Homeland won’t fund overtime pay for the police:

Representative Peter T. King, Republican of New York, who is chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, said the allocation formula was flawed.

“This is indefensible,” Mr. King said. “It’s a knife in the back to New York, and I’m going to do everything I can to make them very sorry they made this decision.”

He said senior department officials who had briefed him about the grants made clear that they were unimpressed with the city’s plan.

For example, New York spends a large share of its grant money to cover overtime costs for police officers who are guarding high-risk targets, like bridges or the subways, a recurring expense.

New York, in the coming year, also intended to spend about $80 million in grants to install a security camera system in the Wall Street area, allowing the police to monitor details as small as license plates, an approach similar to the so-called Ring of Steel in London, said Paul J. Browne, the deputy police commissioner.

But the emphasis on spending on recurring costs — like overtime — was cited as a factor in the relatively low rating the city’s application received, one federal official said.

Then there was the national monument/icon issue:

The risk-assessment scorecard used to distribute federal homeland security funds lists New York without a single national monument or “icon” — stunning mistakes that critics yesterday blasted as bewildering.

The single-page document, released yesterday by officials critical of the feds, also reports that the city — home to many of the nation’s largest financial institutions — has only four “assets” in the banking and finance sector.

“It’s outrageous that these bean counters don’t think the Statue of Liberty, Empire State Building and Brooklyn Bridge are national monuments or icons,” said Jordan Barowitz, a spokesman for Mayor Bloomberg.

“It looks like they came to a conclusion first then filled it in,” fumed Sen. Chuck Schumer, referring to the 40 percent cut for the city in the latest allocation.

“To say that there are no national monuments in this city that are vulnerable to an attack is . . . an insult to every New Yorker.”