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Department of Homeland Security
Washington, DC 20528 / www.oig.dhs.gov

February 26, 2018
MEMORANDUM FOR:

The Honorable William B. Long
Administrator
Federal Emergency Management Agency

FROM:John V. Kelly
Acting Inspector General

SUBJECT:

Management Alert – Inadequate FEMA Progressin Addressing Open Recommendations from our2015 Report, “FEMA Faces Challenges inManaging Information Technology” (OIG-16-10)

In November 2015, we reported that the Federal Emergency Management
Agency’s (FEMA) information technology (IT) management approach did
not adequately address technology planning, governance, and system
support challenges to effectively support its mission. We issued fiverecommendations to the FEMA Chief Information Officer (CIO) aimed at
improving the agency’s management of IT.1 Specifically, we recommended
the CIO finalize key planning documents related to IT modernization;
execute against those planning documents; fully implement an IT
governance board; improve integration and functionality of existing
systems; and implement agency-wide acquisition, development, andoperation and maintenance standards.
Since the publication of our report, FEMA has provided six complianceupdates on its steps to address our five report recommendations.
However, we have closed only recommendation 3 based on FEMA’s
implementation of an IT governance board charter. Congressional
interest, as well as our analysis of the compliance updates, indicated aneed for further review to determine the adequacy of FEMA's efforts toresolve our open recommendations.
As such, we began a formal verification review in December 2017. TheFEMA CIO assured us at our entrance conference that he had includedin the Deputy CIO’s fiscal year 2018 performance plan a requirement tocomplete corrective actions to address our November 2015 report
recommendations. However, CIO Office officials we subsequently
1 FEMA Faces Challenges in Managing Information Technology, OIG-16-10, November 20, 2015

OFFICE OF INSPECTOR GENERAL
Department of Homeland Security

interviewed said that, given competing priorities, the CIO had removed
the funding and staff resources they needed to effectively address thereport recommendations.
We subsequently found during our January and February 2018 fieldworkthat FEMA has made limited progress in improving its IT management.
Many of the issues we reported based on our prior audits in 2005, 2011,
and 2015 remain unchanged, with adverse impact on day-to-day
operations and mission readiness. Especially disconcerting, our recent
work revealed that the justification that FEMA provided to support ourclosing recommendation 3 was misleading, as governance board
procedures had not truly met the intent of the recommendation.
Given these deficiencies, we are suspending our verification review andwill initiate a more comprehensive audit of FEMA’s IT management
approach. We expect that this new audit will assist FEMA in resolving its
longstanding IT issues, which can hamper disaster response efforts.
Having reliable and efficient IT systems and infrastructure is critical tosupport increased disaster relief efforts in the wake of the 2017
hurricane season. Per FEMA’s Disaster Relief Fund Monthly Report, as ofDecember 31, 2017, the Congress had appropriated over $24 billion forsuch efforts.
Please call me with any questions, or your staff may contact
Sondra F. McCauley, Assistant Inspector General for Information
Technology Audits, at (202) 254-4041.

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22,*Additional Information and Copies
To view this and any of our other reports, please visit our website at:www.oig.dhs.gov.
For further information or questions, please contact Office of Inspector General
Public Affairs at: DHS-OIG.OfficePublicAffairs@oig.dhs.gov.
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OIG Hotline
To report fraud, waste, or abuse, visit our website at www.oig.dhs.gov and clickon the red "Hotline" tab. If you cannot access our website, call our hotline at(800) 323-8603, fax our hotline at (202) 254-4297, or write to us at:
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Washington, DC 20528-0305