WASHINGTON The Obama Administration has proposed eliminating the Intercity Bus Security Grant Program that has resulted in nearly $72 million in federal taxpayer money going to private bus operators during the past seven years.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security also proposed ending funding for Highway Watch, a security program aimed at making truckers and bus operators roadway watchdogs.

In calling for the elimination of the bus security grant program, the Homeland Security Department said "the awards are not based on risk assessment, and the homeland security investments in intercity bus security should be evaluated in the context of the risks faced and relative benefits to be gained."

The program was started in the wake of 9/11, during the early days of the Department of Homeland Security Department and the Transportation Security Administration.

Roughly $10 million was awarded annually, starting in fiscal 2002, with upwards of 40 percent of the money every year going to Greyhound Lines.

Each time new grants were announced, the federal bureaucrats in charge of the program fiddled with the rules. In recent years, 55 percent of the money has been earmarked for companies operating more than 250 buses and the remaining 45 percent has gone to smaller operators.

In fiscal 2008, a new wrinkle was added: operators had to come up with a 25 percent match to secure a grant. Other rules changes over the years included requirements that applicants have a formal and functioning security plan, and their coaches had to do most of their traveling inside areas bureaucrats considered high risk.

One year, the rules effectively kept tour-and-charter operators from applying for the money, outraging many in the industry.

Winning a grant was never a cakewalk and generally required the services of an experienced grant writer. Grants could range from a few thousand dollars to hundreds of thousands for big operators, like Academy Express of Hoboken, N.J., or Peter Pan Lines of Springfield, Mass., or several million in the case of Greyhound.

Many operators that applied for and won grants used the money to buy GPS and other communications devices for their coaches because such systems were considered security enhancements by homeland security officials. For the grant winning operators, it was a no- or low-cost method of upgrading their fleet operations.

The Highway Watch program, which was operated for four years by the American Trucking Associations for the Department of Homeland Security, had generally come to be considered a boondoggle by many.

It was yanked out of the ATA last year and awarded to a Virginia firm.