The Associated Press

LOUISVILLE - Fire and police departments are leery of a federal proposal to eliminate warning signs on trucks and trains alerting first-responders to the presence of toxic or poison chemicals.

The federal Homeland Security and Transportation departments posted a notice in the federal registry saying the signs, sometimes a skull and bones symbol for poisons or a number corresponding to a specific toxic chemical, may be removed, citing a fear of terrorism.

The notice announces the start of an effort to assess and secure transportation of extremely toxic chemicals, and seeks comment from industry and the public.

Lake Dreamland Fire Chief John Wilkinson said fire departments use the signs to protect themselves and decide whether to evacuate residents or tell them to stay indoors and close their doors and windows.

"I'd be against it," said Wilkinson, whose district includes chemical companies in west Louisville.

A federal study in 2003 recommended that the placards remain. It concluded potential terrorists could find "many useful alternative sources of information" to identify hazardous material shipments for theft or destruction. But the White House asked Homeland Security and the Transportation Department to take another look at the matter, said Joe Dalcambre, a Transportation spokesman .

The railroad industry, which moves about 10 million tons of chemicals deemed toxic, has been encouraging the government to find an alternative to the placards, said Tom White, spokesman for the American Association of Railroads.

"Do you want terrorists to have that information?" he asked.

The federal agencies are seeking comments on several proposals besides eliminating the signs, including limiting the time some chemicals could be parked in rail yards and requiring federal approval of rail company security plans, Dalcambre said.

Public safety will be the driving factor in the final decision, Dalcambre said.

The reaction in Louisville, a rail hub with a concentration of chemical plants, has been strong before anything has been decided.

Firefighters and police officers don't want the placards eliminated, but if they are, they'd want an alternative that doesn't put them, or the community, in jeopardy, said Brad Learn, assistant director of the Louisville Metro Emergency Management Agency.

"If they want to remove them, I hope they think long and hard," said Richard Dotson, president of the River City Fraternal Order of Police, which represents 1,100 active officers.

There are other sources for the information, Dotson acknowledged. Train engineers, for instance, carry records identifying the contents of each car, as do company headquarters. The engineer could be more than a mile away, however, if a leaking car were near the end of a train, Dotson said.