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DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY’S

PROPOSED FISCAL YEAR 2005 BUDGET

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SELECT COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND 

SECURITY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

FEBRUARY 12, 2004

Serial No. 108–36

Printed for the use of the Select Committee on Homeland Security

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/house
SELECT COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY

CHRISTOPHER COX, California, Chairman 

JENNIFER DUNN, Washington 

C.W. BILL YOUNG, Florida 

DON YOUNG, Alaska 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., Wisconsin 

W.J. (BILLY) TAUZIN, Louisiana 

DAVID DREIER, California 

DUNCAN HUNTER, California 

HAROLD ROGERS, Kentucky 

SHERWOOD BOEHLERT, New York 

LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas 

CURT WELDON, Pennsylvania 

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut 

PORTER J. GOSS, Florida 

DAVE CAMP, Michigan 

LINCOLN DIAZ–BALART, Florida 

BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia 

ERNEST J. ISTOOK, JR., Oklahoma 

PETER T. KING, New York 

JOHN LINDER, Georgia 

JOHN B. SHADEGG, Arizona 

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana 

MAC THORNBERRY, Texas 

JIM GIBBONS, Nevada 

KAY GRANGER, Texas 

PETE SESSIONS, Texas 

JOHN E. SWEENEY, New York 

JIM TURNER, Texas, Ranking Member 

BENNIE G. THOMPSON, Mississippi 

LORETTA SANCHEZ, California 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

NORMAN D. DICKS, Washington 

BARNEY FRANK, Massachusetts 

JANE HARMAN, California 

BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland 

LOUISE MCINTOSH SLAUGHTER, New York 

PETER A. DEFAZIO, Oregon 

NITA M. LOWEY, New York 

ROBERT E. ANDREWS, New Jersey 

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of 

Columbia 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

KAREN MCCARTHY, Missouri 

SHEILA JACKSON-LEE, Texas 

BILL PASCRELL, JR., North Carolina 

DONNA M. CHRISTENSEN, U.S. Virgin Islands 

BOB ETHERIDGE, North Carolina 

KEN LUCAS, Kentucky 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

KENDRICK B. MEEK, Florida

JOHN GANNON, Chief of Staff 

STEPHEN DEVINE, Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel 

THOMAS DILENGE, Chief Counsel and Policy Director 

DAVID H. SCHANZER, Democrat Staff Director 

MARK T. MAGEE, Democrat Deputy Staff Director 

MICHAEL S. TWINCHEK, Chief Clerk

(II) 
(III)

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

STATEMENTS

The Honorable Christopher Cox, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of California, and Chairman, Select Committee on Homeland Security ......................................................................................................................... 1

The Honorable Jim Turner, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Texas, Ranking Member, Select Committee on Homeland Security ........... 3

The Honorable Robert E. Andrews, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of New Jersey ............................................................................................. 52

The Honorable Dave Camp, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Michigan ........................................................................................................... 36

The Honorable Peter A. DeFazio, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Oregon ..................................................................................................... 50

The Honorable Lincoln Diaz-Balart, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Florida ..................................................................................................... 40

The Honorable Norman D. Dicks, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Washington ............................................................................................. 30

The Honorable Bob Etheridge, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of North Carolina ................................................................................................. 60

The Honorable Barney Frank, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Massachusetts .................................................................................................. 34

The Honorable Jane Harman, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of California .......................................................................................................... 38

The Honorable Duncan Hunter, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of California .......................................................................................................... 48

The Honorable James R. Langevin, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Rhode Island ........................................................................................... 62

The Honorable John Linder, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Georgia 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 7

The Honorable Sheila Jackson-Lee, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Texas 

The Honorable Edward J. Markey, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Massachusetts ........................................................................................ 42

The Honorable Kendrick B. Meek, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Florida ..................................................................................................... 64

The Honorable Eleanor Holmes Norton, a Delegate in Congress From the 

District of Columbia ............................................................................................. 54

The Honorable Loretta Sanchez, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of California ................................................................................................ 25

The Honorable Christopher Shays, a Representative in Congress From the 

State Connecticut ................................................................................................. 32

The Honorable Louise McIntosh Slaughter, a Representative in Congress 

From the State of ................................................................................................. 46

The Honorable John E. Sweeney, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of New York 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 28

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 7 

The Honorable Mac Thornberry, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Texas ....................................................................................................... 44

The Honorable Curt Weldon, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Pennsylvania .................................................................................................... 22
Page

IV

WITNESS 

The Honorable Tom Ridge, Secretary, Department of Homeland Security 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 11

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 13

Response to questions from the Honorable Kendrick B. Meek ........................ 65 

APPENDIX 

MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD

Questions from the Honorable Diaz-Balart ........................................................... 68

Questions from the Honorable Jim Gibbons ......................................................... 72

Questions from the Honorable Ernest J. Istook, Jr. ............................................. 69

Questions from the Honorable Jim Langevin ....................................................... 67 

Questions from the Honorable Bill Pascrell, Jr. ................................................... 76

Questions from the Honorable John Sweeney ....................................................... 74

Questions from the Minority Staff of the Committee ........................................... 79
(1)

DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY’S 

PROPOSED FISCAL YEAR 2005 BUDGET 

Thursday, February 12, 2004

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SELECT COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY, Washington, DC. 

The committee met, pursuant to call, at 9:30 a.m., in Room 2200, 

Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher Cox [chairman of 

the committee] presiding. 

Present: Representatives Cox, Hunter, Boehlert, Weldon, Shays, 

Camp, Diaz-Balart, Istook, King, Linder, Shadegg, Souder, Thornberry, Gibbons, Granger, Sessions, Sweeney, Turner, Sanchez, Markey, Dicks, Frank, Harman, Cardin, Slaughter, DeFazio, Andrews, 

Norton, Lofgren, Jackson-Lee, Pascrell, Etheridge, Langevin, and 

Meek. 

Chairman COX. A quorum being present, the Select Committee 

on Homeland Security will come to order. It feels as if we have 

more than a quorum in these very intimate quarters. We have a 

big Department and a small room this morning. 

The committee is meeting today to hear testimony on the proposed Department of Homeland security budget for fiscal year 

2005, and we are privileged to have with us today the Secretary 

of the Department of Homeland Security, the Honorable Tom 

Ridge. 

In order for us to utilize the time we have with our witness more 

fully and ensure adequate time for questioning, I ask unanimous 

consent that oral opening statements be limited to the Chairman 

and the Ranking Member and that all questioning proceed under 

the 5-minute rule. Without objection, so ordered. 

If other members have statements, they can be included in the 

hearing record under unanimous consent. Again, without objection, 

so ordered. 

Today this committee begins what will be a deliberate and 

thoughtful process to review the President’s proposed budget for 

the Department of Homeland Security for fiscal year 2005. Our objective on behalf of the American people is to evaluate the progress 

that has been made in the Department’s first year and to assess 

the Department’s plans and challenges for the near future. 

Much has been achieved in the past year under the leadership 

of President Bush and Secretary Ridge. We are all demonstrably 

safer than we were a year ago but we all recognize that we have 

much more to do. We can look back on tangible progress in securing our ports, borders, and other critical infrastructure. We have 

improved the flow of threat-based information to our first respond-
2

ers. We have materially improved their capability both to prevent 

and respond to a terrorist attack. 

As we meet this morning, more scheduled commercial flights 

have been canceled, this time a British Airways flight to Washington, D.C., reflecting how intelligence information is being put to 

use to protect Americans. Now, at the 1-year anniversary of the 

Department, the time has come for us to develop and implement 

a more fully considered national strategy for homeland security 

that will govern our spending and permit the measurement of our 

progress. To that end, we need concrete goals to make the country 

safer. The Secretary, the Department, and this committee are all 

committed to this path. 

The Department will soon inaugurate its first comprehensive 

strategic plan. Strategic planning deters ill-advised binge spending. 

And this committee will pursue a fiscally responsible legislative 

agenda focused on making the Department more effective. This will 

include our threat-based first responder grant bill which has already passed unanimously in the Emergency Preparedness and Response Subcommittee. It will include a metrics bill to monitor the 

Department’s progress in meeting strategic goals and also a DHS 

authorization bill. In cooperation with the other committees of jurisdiction, we will continue to work to identify the right priorities 

to secure America against terrorism. 

I am pleased to welcome Secretary Ridge back to this committee. 

I know that I speak for every member of this committee today, Mr. 

Secretary, when I say you have one of the hardest jobs, if not the 

hardest job, in Washington, D.C. and you do it very well. We admire your dedication to your country and your devotion to protecting the security of your fellow citizens, and we thank you for 

the tremendous and undeniable progress the Department is making in enhancing our Homeland Security, the safety of the American people, our territory, and the institutions and activities that 

mark and lend distinction to our way of life. 

Let me also say that I am very pleased with many aspects of the 

President’s homeland security budget proposal. That demonstrates 

this Nation’s unwavering commitment to defending American lives 

and territory against further terrorist attacks. It also begins to 

take some necessary steps towards strategic resource allocation, towards the creation of a long-term sustainable homeland security 

budget. 

After September 11th there was an understandable rush to provide whatever funding is necessary, that was called homeland security. And as the President has so often stated, this war on terrorism is a long-term war, and simply spending more each year is 

not a strategy. Instead we need to get smarter about how and 

where we spend our homeland security dollars. 

This budget starts to do that. It invests in new technologies that 

will allow us to screen people and cargo entering the United States 

more effectively and at lower cost. It funds biosurveillance and 

other prevention-oriented systems. The President’s budget seems to 

be asking the right questions and coming up with sound answers. 

This is particularly true in the area of terrorism preparedness 

grants. States, local governments, and our first-responder communities need this help. 
3

It is well known that Mr. Turner and I have been advocating for 

some time a shift away from grant making based on ancient-legacy 

political formulas unrelated to the post-9/11 mission. The committee’s first responders bill, H.R. 3266, would prioritize and distribute 

terrorism preparedness grants to our first responders based on actual risk of terrorist attack, making sure that our limited resources 

get to the areas that need them most and that they get there faster. 

The President’s budget proposal clearly embraces this strategy. It 

would double the funding for grants distributed on the basis of risk 

to $1.4 billion, while cutting back significantly the grants that are 

awarded based on political formulas without regard to risks. This 

may not be universally popular but it is definitely smart and necessary. 

The committee also looks forward to working closely with Secretary Ridge and the Department as you move to develop and then 

implement a comprehensive strategic plan to integrate the Department’s 22 legacy agencies and two major start-up directorates. This 

is exactly what was envisioned by the Congress when we passed 

the Homeland Security Act. Nowhere is this more important than 

in the Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate, which, unlike the other directorates in the Department, has 

had to be built from scratch. Significant progress has been made 

in building this function but the Department still has a long way 

to go in this area. Standing up IAIP will be a critical element in 

the Department’s strategic planning and this committee’s legislative program this year. But on this 1-year anniversary, Mr. Secretary, we should be proud of what we have been able to accomplish so far, united for good in a global war on terror. 

We have worked very constructively across the aisle and at both 

ends of Pennsylvania Avenue. There is no doubt in my mind that 

this continued strong leadership and our concerted action have prevented other potential terrorist attacks on America. We need to 

strengthen that spirit of collaboration in the year ahead as we implement more strategic and measurable programs to protect the 

American people from the scourge of terrorism. They expect and 

deserve no less. 

I want to thank you in advance, Mr. Secretary, for your testimony today and I now recognize the Ranking Member, Mr. Turner, 

for his opening statement. 

Mr. TURNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and welcome, Mr. Secretary. We appreciate very much your presence here today with us. 

Without a doubt, you have a daunting set of responsibilities, and 

I know I speak for everyone on this committee in saying how grateful we are for your dedication to addressing the great challenges 

that we face in homeland security. 

You have assembled a very skilled leadership team and we have 

begun to develop good working relationships with many of them. 

They are working hard to try to bring the Department up to speed, 

and we appreciate all of their efforts as well. 

And we had a chance to hear from Admiral Loy last week, certainly a distinguished American, who I know is dedicated to the 

task of serving as your deputy. And we look forward to working 
4

with all of the under secretaries that you have assembled in appearing before us in the coming weeks to follow your testimony. 

And, Mr. Secretary, I also want to praise the people who work 

in the Department. I think so often we fail to compliment the frontline workers, those customs and immigration inspectors, the 

screeners that work tirelessly at our airports, the intelligence analysts, the Coast Guard, and many others who are out there as the 

front line, protecting us in the war on terror. They work at their 

post every day, too. It is not glamorous work on many occasions, 

and sometimes dangerous. But they are very necessary, and we 

want you to know and we want them to know that they are very 

much appreciated in their efforts to protect America. 

We are here today, a few weeks shy of the 1-year anniversary of 

the date that the 22 agencies merged to form the Department of 

Homeland Security. As the budget that was submitted by the 

President last week reflects, the Department is maturing. The organizational structures are becoming clearer. The Department has 

performance goals and programs dedicated to achieving those goals. 

Many of the initiatives launched over the past year are beginning 

to take root. They are laying a foundation for greater security in 

this country, and we appreciate the leadership that you have provided in achieving the progress so far. 

The question clearly that we all must ask is not whether we are 

safer than we were before September 11th, because most certainly 

we are; the key question is whether we are as safe as we need to 

be. And unfortunately, I think we all understand that we are not 

as safe as we need to be. America continues to face serious security 

gaps. It really doesn’t matter whether you would look at our ports 

or our land borders or our bioterrorism preparedness or our chemical plants. Up and down the line, there are substantial security 

gaps that remain and that are open to exploitation by terrorists. 

Let me mention just a few examples. Two-and-a-half years after 

September 11th, we still do not have a functional comprehensive 

terrorist watch list. This means that people are boarding our 

planes or entering our borders without being checked against—or 

entering without being checked against a government list that contains all of our terrorist—our known terrorists. I know the FBI is 

working hard to solve this problem, but they have a ways to go. 

I notice that Director Mueller stated a few weeks ago that the task 

would be completed by March. I think you made a comment earlier 

this week that you thought the job would be completed by the end 

of the summer. We all know it should have been done 2 years ago. 

But this is a very critical task that must be completed. 

The ricin attack in the Senate last week reminds us that bioterrorism is still a significant and dangerous threat. Yet it is clear we 

are not as prepared as we need to be on bioterrorism. 

Last year the administration set out to vaccinate 500,000 emergency workers, and they were going to follow that by the vaccination of 10 million citizens to increase our ability to respond to a 

smallpox attack. To date, only 39,000 emergency workers have 

been vaccinated across our Nation. And it is even more disturbing 

when you analyze where those vaccinated emergency workers live. 

In the State of Nevada, only 17 people have been vaccinated under 

this program. And in Chicago, only 71. And in New York City, pop-
5

ulation 8 million, only 342 people have been vaccinated under this 

program. That is a total in New York of only 1 vaccinated emergency worker for every 30,000 people. And we all know the goal is 

to be able to vaccinate the entire population in the event of an attack within 10 years. Clearly we have failed to carry out this very 

critical vaccination effort. 

We also know that we have 20 million cargo containers coming 

in this country to our seaports and land borders and then travel 

by truck and rail right through our communities. But we do not 

screen all of these cargo containers for radiological materials. We 

all know the threat of a dirty bomb or of a nuclear weapon is a 

very real one. The installation of radiation portals, as they are 

called, would allow us to screen 100 percent of the cargo containers 

that enter our country without slowing commerce. 

Last year Congress provided funding to install portals at every 

major seaport, but the job is not yet done. Only one seaport in this 

country has the technology fully installed. In fact, they did it on 

their own, and that is right down the road here. Not a single port 

of entry on our southern border has any radiation portals and not 

a single rail hub has them either. So we have a long way to go to 

ensure that radiological devices or dirty bombs are not going to 

enter this country through commerce. 

We also know that our communities all across America still lack 

the equipment, the training and the personnel they need to respond to acts of terrorism. While we know that large resource increases have gone to our Nation’s first responders, we still lack a 

national goal of what more needs to be done. As you know, some 

outside experts have estimated it may take something approximating $100 billion to ensure that all of our citizens are fully protected. And yet when we look at our budget that was submitted by 

the President the other day, total spending for first responders is 

18 percent below the amount provided last year. 

Mr. Secretary, it is without any disparagement of your efforts or 

of your honorable intent that, in my opinion, we are not moving 

fast enough, we are not being strong enough in closing the security 

gaps that we all know still exist. The budget increase that the Department is receiving this year is important and necessary but we 

really need to put that figure in perspective. 

You know, despite common perceptions, we have really not restructured our national budget to adequately protect the homeland. 

Since September 11th, we have increased discretionary spending on 

the agencies that now make up your Department by about $12 billion. During that same period, our defense budget went up $135 

billion. The budget increase for this year in homeland security is 

about the cost of 1 month of the occupation in Iraq. Another way 

to look at it is that we could run the entire Department of Homeland Security for 3 years with just the estimating error that was 

recently made public by the administration on the Medicare prescription drug bill that we passed last year. 

The limitations that are imposed on your efforts to secure the 

homeland is a direct function of the choices that the administration 

makes in submitting the budget to the Congress. If we wanted to 

take faster and stronger action to close the security gaps we face, 

we know we could. It is simply a matter of priorities. And, Mr. Sec-
6

retary, history has shown that if the President of the United States 

requests support in the name of homeland security, this Congress 

never fails to respond. 

Many of us are very concerned that our homeland security efforts 

lack the sense of urgency that we all had after September 11th of 

2001. There are a couple of examples that I think illustrate the 

lack of urgency that we now need to restore. A key component of 

a robust and effective homeland security strategy is a comprehensive threat and vulnerability assessment to help set priorities and 

ensure that scarce resources are directed to where they are needed 

most. The Washington Post has an editorial on this very subject in 

today’s issue. Clearly, we have not completed this task, and as we 

all know, representatives in your Department in charge of this national threat and vulnerability assessment have told us that it may 

take 5 years. We believe that is unacceptable. 

Another example is, by law, the Department of Health and 

Human Services was supposed to develop with you a coordinated 

strategy to prepare for and respond to bioterror attack. It is now 

8 months past the promised date of that coordinated strategy. 

Another example is the lack of information sharing that continues to exist between the Federal Government and local law enforcement officials, which has been identified as a cause, a key 

cause of the 9/11 attacks. While new organizations have been 

formed to address this problem, every major study that I have 

seen—including a recent Markle Foundation report which I would 

urge you to take a look at—they have all found that the Federal 

Government is not taking the steps necessary to create a decentralized coordination information network. State and local officials bitterly complain to us on a daily basis that they are not getting the 

information they need from the Federal Government, and we certainly don’t have in place a comprehensive, decentralized coordination and information network whereby they can provide us with information that they daily collect. 

In summary, Mr. Secretary, if we ask is progress being made, 

most certainly, it is; and I commend you for that. Are we safer 

today than we were before September 11th? Yes, we are. But it is 

also clear to me that we are not as safe as we need to be. Again, 

it is solely a matter of priorities. 

Mr. Secretary, the American people don’t hear the daily threat 

reports that you hear and that the Chairman and other Members 

of this Congress routinely hear, and I suspect that if they did, the 

American people would be demanding that we move faster and be 

stronger in protecting against the threats we face. 

It is our responsibility to recapture the sense of urgency that we 

all had after September 11th, to recapture that focus, recapture 

that sense of purpose that every American felt on September 11th. 

I hope that through the efforts that you are making, and the work 

of this committee, that we can move to be stronger and to move 

faster in protecting our country. 

Thank you again, Mr. Secretary, for being with us today. 

Chairman COX. Thank you, Mr. Turner. 

[The information follows:]
7

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JOHN LINDER A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF GEORGIA

A few weeks ago, I was asked by a group of Georgia citizens to support a transfer 

of money from defense and homeland security programs to programs that advanced 

a more domestic agenda in this country. My response to this request was simple: 

If I were to support such a transfer, I would be negligent in my responsibility to 

uphold the single greatest responsibility of the Federal government ? to protect the 

people of this great nation. 

Often times, I have quoted the words of John Jay, America’s first Chief Justice 

to the U.S. Supreme Court, who once wrote that providing for the safety of the people seems to be the first item to which a wise and free people find it necessary to 

direct their attention. These words, canonized by The Federalist Papers, are the 

grounds upon which I base many of my decisions here in the U.S. House of Representatives. These words are, in my opinion, the best example of what great men 

like Washington, Hamilton, and Madison intended for this government when they 

affixed their signatures upon the Constitution. 

It is because of our responsibility that we are called here today. I am pleased that 

this Committee is now giving us the opportunity to discuss how we, in the 108th 

Congress, are able to recognize the words and meanings of the Founders, and 

refocus this government’s attention on providing for the safety and security of the 

American people. 

President Bush has consistently demonstrated his own intention to uphold the objectives of the Founders. Immediately after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, we made a commitment to take defensive measures and to defeat terrorism 

by stopping it and eliminating it where it grows. We have since focused on making 

America safer from terrorists and the nation-states that support them. By proposing 

a $3.6 billion increase over the fiscal year 2004 levels for the U.S. Department of 

Homeland Security in his fiscal year 2005 budget proposal, he continues to show the 

American people that he remains committed to protecting the citizenry of the 

United States. I applaud and support him in this effort. 

As Members of Congress we should ask: how can the American people possibly 

hope to enjoy any of the freedoms and liberties given to them, or look to continue 

their advancements in medicine, science, education, or health care when they are 

forced to live with the fear of foreign threats or terrorist attacks? I am hopeful that 

my colleagues will join me in reviewing how the Legislative and Executive Branches 

can work together to find the best answers that both ensure this is not the case 

and recognize that this government is upholding its 200-year old constitutional responsibility.

PREPARED STATEMENT FOR THE RECORD OF THE HONORABLE JOHN E. SWEENY, A

REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEW YORK

Welcome, Mr. Secretary. This Committee is pleased to hear your thoughts today 

on the Department’s fiscal budget 2005 budget. Under your direction, the Department of Homeland Security has moved from a proposal toward becoming a functioning organization. 

I want to commend you and the Administration for the increase in funding for 

first responder grants, and for high threat urban area grants specifically. In fact, 

I strongly believe all DHS first responder grants should go out on the basis of 

threat, vulnerability and consequences. 

Nothing pleases me more than carrying out the monumental task of securing our 

homeland in an apolitical fashion. Threat-based first responder funding is a good 

start toward achieving this goal. 

The Department is also making significant strides in information analysis. The 

Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection directorate is working hard to 

bring many divergent groups together to better evaluate and effectively communicate threats against our great country. 

Understanding the Department is still in its infant stages, I retain some concerns. 

After nearly one year, I hope to see DHS begin to place a heavier emphasis of importance on productivity and responsiveness. 

There remains a need to see progress in the area of linking programs across the 

Department. Interoperability is not just a necessary term the military uses to have 

the Services better able to communicate with each other, but it is a term that needs 

to be included in the culture of the hard working employees of the Department of 

Homeland Security. Once every one is talking to each other within the Department, 

the Department will then be more able to communicate with the public and the U.S. 

Congress. 
8

I look forward to your testimony today and continuing to work together to ensure 

our nation remains safe and secure.

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE SHEILA JACKSON-LEE, A REPRESENTATIVE

IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS

Good morning Chairman Cox, Ranking Member Turner, and my colleagues on the 

Full Committee. Thank you for organizing today’s hearing, and thank you to Secretary Tom Ridge for your preparation and time today. In many ways, today’s hearing is probably one of the most important that we will have all year. As we know, 

the President’s Fiscal Year 2005 budget was composed, largely, based on the specific 

recommendations of our witness today. The prioritization of homeland security 

needs for the entire nation was reflected directly in the money allocations, and in 

the case of Houston, Texas, as is the case with many of my colleagues’ districts, the 

money received from the federal government will dramatically change from the 

budget of fiscal year 2003. 

Funding of Local First Responders 

The President’s fiscal year 2005 budget request for grants to our state and local 

first responders, and related homeland security efforts, represents close to an $800 

million (18 percent) decrease from amounts appropriated by Congress for fiscal 

year 2004. The request proposes to consolidate grants previously administered by other DHS components (e.g., port security grants overseen by the 

Transportation Security Administration) to the Office of Domestic Preparedness (ODP). Furthermore, with respect to our first responder funding 

mechanisms, it reduces grants for the first responder law enforcement 

community by over $700 million (53 percent). The total reduction of grants 

made to local and state first responders and related homeland security programs for 

fiscal year 2005 is $1.5 billion. 

The House Select Committee on Homeland Security, and the leadership of Ranking Member Jim Turner, helped the Houston area make tremendous strides in their 

homeland security preparations in past funding periods-in particular, it secured 

funds for our first responders in fiscal year 2003. 

On April 8, 2003, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced that approximately $100 million from the fiscal year 2003 funding would be dedicated 

to large urban areas. Of that $100 million, $29.5 million was made available to 

Texas from the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Domestic Preparedness. Plus, an additional $8.63 million was provided to the City of Houston as part 

of the Urban Area Security Initiative. 

The Members of the Houston delegation have also worked tirelessly to secure additional funds through the appropriations process for local organizations that are 

part of the Homeland Security battle. For example, I have requested funds be appropriated for: • The Harris County Hazardous Materials Team and Fire Department • Houston area Immigration Enforcement Efforts • The City of Houston for collaborative efforts to build community health centers 

• The Mental Health and Mental Retardation Authority of Harris County • Millennium Super Neighborhoods Southeast • Port Security 

My appropriations requests on behalf of local organizations fighting the war on terrorism and protecting our homeland totaled over $18 million. The requests were 

designed to help our first responders and also improve the resources available to 

help the victims of terrorist attacks. An objective was to build new and improve existing local medical and counseling facilities. Included in my requests also were 

funds to help mental health organizations provide trauma relief to the victims of 

terrorist attacks. 

On December 31, 2003, I met with personnel from the Houston Police Department, School District Police Department, Fire Department, Mental Health Mental 

Retardation of Harris County, Office of Emergency Management, Health Department, Airport System, and the Houston chapter of the American Red Cross; members of the local branches of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Drug 

Enforcement Agency (DEA); and the local academic and church communities to discuss the viability of Houston’s threat assessment systems with respect to homeland 

security. 

Among the issues that we discussed today were whether the funding levels, equipment availability, depth of personnel, and degree of interoperability between local, 

state, and federal systems are adequate to facilitate timely emergency response. 

Overall, some of the responses given were that intelligence-sharing has generally 
9

improved; however, other important aspects clearly require immediate attention. 

Monies that were promised back in 2001 by the federal government have not been 

received; more hospital beds and medical equipment are needed; and the first responder staff and equipment levels must be increased. 

Border Security and the US-VISIT Program 

The United States Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology program’s 

(US–VISIT) first phase is deployed at 115 airports and 14 seaports. US VISIT was 

designed to expedite the arrival and departure of legitimate travelers, while making 

it more difficult for those intending to do us harm to enter our nation. 

The budget for fiscal year 2005 provides $340 million in 2005, an increase of 

$12 million over the fiscal year 2004 funding to continue expansion of the US 

VISIT system. 

Appropriations 

In fiscal year 2003, the Department of Justice requested $380 million for US–

VISIT—$362 million in new funding and $18 million in fiscal year 2003 base resources. 

Relative to the Consolidated Appropriations Resolution, 2003, the conference report recommended $362 million for the program and related information technology 

(IT) infrastructure upgrades. According to DHS officials, the $18 million in base resources was to come from a user fee account. However, according to these officials, 

given the decrease in user fee receipts since September 11, 2001, it is unclear 

whether the $18 million will be available for the US–VISIT program. 

DHS submitted its fiscal year 2003 expenditure plan for $375 million on June 5, 

2003, to its House and Senate Appropriations Subcommittees on Homeland Security. 

Criticisms of the Program 

In his testimony, Secretary Ridge indicates that ‘‘over $1 billion will be used to 

support [US–VISIT].’’ Unfortunately, the testimony fails to adequately address how 

the budgetary plan will address the following criticisms: 

• That US–VISIT will not be effective for border security 

• That it will impede U.S.-Mexican trade 

• That it will discourage legitimate international travel and hinder South Texas 

retail. 

• That it essentially amounts to an anti-immigration policy under the guise of 

homeland security. 

• Harm to efficiency—Without a way to separate travelers, lines during highvolume times will be staggering, regardless of how fast the machines may operate. 

— Of the estimated 400 million people whom US–VISIT would process annually, 360 million would go through land ports of entry—five times more 

than go through airports and seaports. And unlike air and sea travelers, 

most land travelers do not file itineraries, carry passport information or go 

through personal screening. 

— Legitimate travelers—truckers who haul goods to warehouses just north 

of the border; people who live in Mexico and work in Texas retail shops or 

factories; Mexicans who own property in the United States—could be stuck 

in processing lines. 

• hat US–VISIT targets the wrong people: Mexican and Texas businesses and 

people who have created an interdependent relationship. 

• As identified by a GAO Report issued in September 2003, there are 10 risk 

factors associated with US-VISIT: 

• Mission is critical. The missed entry of one person who poses a threat 

to the United States could have severe consequences. 

• Scope is large and complex. Controlling the pre-entry, entry, status, 

and exit of millions of travelers is a large and complex process. 

• Milestones are challenging. Progress and current status of the program makes satisfying legislatively mandated milestones difficult. 

• Potential cost is significant. DHS has estimated that the program will 

cost $7.2 billion through fiscal year 2014, and this estimate does not include 

all costs and may underestimate some others. 

• Existing systems have known problems. The program is to initially 

rely on existing systems with known problems that could limit US-VISIT 

performance. 

• Governance structure is not established. The program is not currently governed by an accountable body that reflects its government wide 

scope and that can make and enforce decisions and commit resources for 

all program stakeholders. 
10

• Program management capability is not implemented. The program 

office is not yet adequately staffed, roles and responsibilities are not yet 

clearly defined, and acquisition management processes are not yet established. 

• Operational context is unsettled. Operational issues have not been 

decided, such as which rules and standards will govern implementation of 

biometrics technology. 

• Near-term facilities solutions pose challenges. Interim facility planning for high-volume land ports of entry (POEs) must satisfy demanding as 

well as yet to-be defined requirements. 

• Mission value of first increment is currently unknown. The benefits versus costs of the first increment are not yet known. 

Aviation Security 

Today, it was reported that a British Airways flight from London Heathrow to 

Dulles Airport, flight #223, has been delayed. According to the report, this flight has 

been delayed or canceled eight previous times this year because of U.S. security 

alerts. Furthermore, more Americans were in the air over the Christmas holiday 

than at any time since September 11, 2001, yet the security of our airports has not 

clearly made any significant improvements. After more than two years of federal security operations, it is not clear that Americans are getting the security they deserve for the enormous sums they have spent. 

Spending on aviation security since September 11, 2001 has totaled $14.5 billion. 

Since September 11, we have spent $18 securing our skies for every $1 spent securing ports, trucks, buses, mass transit, and pipelines combined. Numerous media accounts tell of passengers bringing knives and guns on flights without realizing it, 

and not getting caught. In the recent situation regarding Nathaniel Heatwole, it 

was discovered that he told the TSA that he was going to put box cutters and other 

potentially dangerous items on airplanes, but it still took a routine maintenance 

check a month later to find them. 

Recent government alerts indicate that Al-Qa‘eda continues to plan terrorist attacks using aircraft. A major security step was taken without spending a lot of 

money: fortifying cockpit doors so hijackers cannot take over the controls. The security yield from the roughly $4 billion spent on screening bags and passengers is less 

clear. While the Administration reports that its personnel have intercepted more 

than 1,500 firearms and more than 54,000 box cutters since February 2002, disturbing reports draw attention to how many similar items have not been caught. 

If the procedures aren’t being followed, the $4 billion we’re spending on air security every year is wasted. Roughly half the passenger planes flying today carry 

cargo. Despite a legal requirement to screen all cargo shipped on planes, hardly any 

of these materials are screened for explosives or anything else. Planes that carry 

only cargo are also dangerously unsecured. Many do not have hardened cockpit 

doors, and the pilots are not yet allowed to carry firearms. 

Another problem was created by the Administration’s inexplicable policy of allowing airport employees to enter secure areas of the airport without being screened 

in the same way passengers and pilots are. Congress has given the Administration 

substantial resources to do the job—more than any other aspect of homeland security. They must move faster to strengthen our front line defense against the terrorists threatening the safety of our skies and our communities. 

Overall, $890 million is provided for aviation security, a nearly 20 percent 

increase, including funds to improve integration of explosive detection system 

(EDS) equipment into individual airports’ baggage processing to increase security effectiveness and promote greater efficiency. In addition, the Federal Air Marshals 

will receive supplementary training and have opportunities to rotate into land-based 

agent assignments, further refining their law enforcement skills. 

Between fiscal year 2003 and fiscal year 2005, the FAMS budget will grow from 

$466 million, to $613 million, an increase of 32 percent. Because aviation continues 

to be an attractive terrorist target, we must continue to strengthen our aviation security system. The 2005 Budget provides: 

• $5.3 billion for TSA, an increase of $890 million over resources appropriated in fiscal year 2004. These funds will be used to continue to improve 

the quality and efficiency of screening operations through additional screener 

training, stronger management controls of screener performance, and technology automation. 

• The funding includes $400 million to continue deploying more efficient baggage screening solutions at our nation’s busiest airports. 

• $85 million for air cargo security in TSA’s budget, to continue the research and deployment of screening technology started in FY 2004. 
11

• $61 million in S&T’s budget, to accelerate development of more effective 

technologies to counter the threat of portable anti-aircraft missiles. 

In Houston, the 11,000-acre Bush Intercontinental Airport facility-the largest in 

the City, plans to institute a program to increase security capabilities called ‘‘Airport Rangers.’’ Under this program, Rangers will patrol the perimeter of the facility 

and utilize the advantage that it has over vehicles in monitoring airport traffic. It 

is unclear whether the 2005 proposed budget will fund this type of hybrid service 

of aviation and first responder security.

Chairman COX. Welcome again Mr. Secretary. Thank you for providing your testimony to the committee, and we offer you such time 

as you may need to summarize it for the committee. 

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE TOM RIDGE, SECRETARY, 

DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY 

Secretary RIDGE. Very good. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Congressman Turner, members of the committee. First of all, I would 

like to thank both of you for your public recognition of the quality 

of service and the commitment of 180,000 coworkers. All of us affiliated with their work, members of this committee, know how 

hard they work, and I am grateful for that public acknowledgment 

of that. Part of our job as leaders and managers is also to equip 

them. And they are highly motivated. One of the challenges in the 

years ahead is to give them the continuous training and the technological assistance that they need to do their job. They are doing 

a great job, and I thank you for recognizing it. 

I am grateful for the opportunity to appear before you today and 

to present the President’s budget and priorities for the Department 

of Homeland Security in the coming year. Before the tragic events 

of 9/11, no single government entity had homeland security as a 

primary charge. With the creation of the Department, that charge 

is now ours; 22 agencies, 180,000 employees brought together to 

pursue a single mission. That mission has been outlined and well 

recognized by this committee: To secure our Nation and citizens 

from the threats of terrorism and natural disaster is one that does 

not change or lessen in importance with the passage of time. 

As we prepare to celebrate our 1-year anniversary as a Department, it is the steadfast support of this Congress and the resources 

you have provided that have made it possible for us to not only 

carry out a vigorous and ambitious slate of security initiatives, but 

also to say with confidence that Americans indeed are safer, and 

also to recognize in the same breath we still have more work to do. 

In a short time, we have strengthened airline security, increased 

vigilance at our ports and borders, forged unprecedented partnerships across the private sector and State and local governments, 

improved information sharing, launched robust efforts to engage 

citizens in preparedness efforts and distributed funds and resources for our dedicated first responders. Of course, as I said, 

there is still more we can do and there is still more we must do. 

The President’s budget request for the Department in fiscal year 

2005 includes $40.2 billion in new resources. When you take the 

total amount for BioShield, it is a 10 percent increase. If you take 

the BioShield dollars out of there and consider the fee increases 

and the discretionary increase, it is a 6 percent increase. If you 

take the fees out, it is still nearly a 4-1/2 percent increase. This increase in funding will provide the resources we need to expand and 
12

improve existing projects and programs as well as build new barriers to terrorists who wish to do us harm. 

Let me touch briefly on a couple of areas where a specific increase in our resources will help us continue to make progress at 

our borders, in our skies, on our waterways and throughout the 

Nation. 

To further strengthen our borders and port security, the budget includes $411 million increase for our Customs and Border Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and Coast Guard. 

This funding will support such innovative initiatives as the recently launched US–VISIT program which is now operational at 

115 airports and 14 seaports across the country to help ensure that 

our borders remain open to legitimate travel but closed to terrorists. The program has been very successful, utilizing biometric 

technology to process more than 1 million legitimate passengers 

since the program began. And since that time, we have matched 

more than 100 potential entrants against criminal watch lists. 

With additional funding of $340 million, we will continue to expand 

US–VISIT to include land borders and additional seaports. 

However, we realize that potential enemies will not always ar- rive at a customs checkpoint. That is why we have more than $64 

million to enhance monitoring efforts along the border in between 

our ports. We have also requested an increase of $186 million to better enforce our immigration laws. We are also pushing our perimeter of 

security outward, making sure that our borders are the last line of 

defense, not the first. The Container Security Initiative, for example, focuses on prescreening cargo before it even reaches our ports, 

and this budget includes $25 million in additional funding to enhance our presence at existing ports and to begin the final phase 

of CSI, especially in high-risk areas around the world. 

Also the Coast Guard’s budget will increase by 9 percent, which 

includes continued funding for the continuation of the Integrated 

Deepwater System and important new resources of more than $100 

million to implement the Maritime Transportation Safety Act. 

One of the greatest concerns of Congress to the American public 

since September 11th, of course, has been aviation security, and 

thus it continues to be an area of high priority for our budget, and 

we have requested a 20 percent increase this year. The Transportation Security Administration will receive an additional $892 million to continue to improve the quality and efficiency of the screening process. Also, considerable funds will be available to continue 

the research and deployment of air cargo screening technology, as 

well as accelerate the development of technologies to counter the 

threat of portable anti-aircraft missiles. We have seen the havoc 

possible when aircraft are used as weapons. 

We have yet to experience the full impact of a bioterror attack, 

and may we never have to do so. But we must be prepared. And 

it is in that spirit that Secretary Tommy Thompson and I announced a $274 million Biosurveillance Program Initiative designed 

to protect the Nation against bioterrorism and to strengthen the 

public health infrastructure. The initiative will enhance ongoing 

surveillance programs for human health, hospitals, vaccines, food 

supply, State and local preparedness, and environmental moni-
13

toring and integrate them into one comprehensive surveillance system. 

In addition, one of our prime responsibilities is to gather intelligence and share information with the private sector and State 

and local officials as we work to secure the vast critical infrastructure upon which our economy as well as our way of life depends. 

That is why Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection 

will receive an $864 million increase in funding that will enable us 

to carry out this important task. 

And finally, as I have said many times in the past, for the homeland to be secure, the hometown must be secure. That is why we 

continue to funnel resources to our State and local partners, as 

well as to ensure that those who serve on the front lines of this 

war, our firefighters, police, and medical personnel have the tools 

they need. And with that in mind, the total first responder funding 

in this budget adds another $3.5 billion to the more than $8 billion 

we have made available since March 1st of last year. 

These are just some of our budget priorities over the coming 

year, priorities that reflect the vast nature of our mission. Whether 

safeguarding America from terrorist attacks or providing aid in the 

face of natural disasters, our charge never changes, and our course 

must never alter. 

To protect the people we serve is the greatest call of any government through the work of many. From the men and women of Congress of the United States who allocate the resources to those who 

serve as Governors and mayors, who work to fill gaps in their 

States and their cities’ security, to those individual citizens who 

make preparedness kits, that call is being answered and embraced 

by an entire Nation. It is that singleness and dedication of purpose 

that fuels our work in homeland security. We are grateful for the 

continued support of the Congress of the United States and of this 

committee in that effort. We thank you very much. 

Chairman COX. Thank you very much Mr. Secretary. 

[The statement of Secretary Ridge follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE TOM RIDGE, SECRETARY, DEPARTMENT OF

HOMELAND SECURITY

Introduction: 

Mr. Chairman, Congressman Turner, and Members of the Committee: 

I am honored and pleased to appear before the Committee to present President 

Bush’s fiscal year 2005 budget for the Department of Homeland Security. Before beginning to outline our fiscal year 2005 budget request, I want to thank you for the 

strong support you showed for the Department in the fiscal year 2004 budget and 

for the fact that that appropriation was passed in time for it to be signed by the 

President on October 1, 2003—the first day of the fiscal year. The $40.2 billion request represents a ten percent increase in resources available 

to the Department over the comparable fiscal year 2004 budget and reflects the Administration’s strong and continued commitment to the security of our homeland. 

The fiscal year 2005 budget is a $3.6 billion increase over fiscal year 2004, and it 

includes increased funding for new and expanded programs in border and port security, transportation security, immigration enforcement and services, biodefense, incident preparedness and response, and the implementation of a new human resources 

system that will reward outstanding performance. The budget also continues our 

momentum toward integrating intelligence, operations and systems in a way that 

increases our nation’s security. 

The Department of Homeland Security has made great organizational strides during the first year of operations. Nearly 180,000 employees and a budget of $31.2 billion were brought under DHS less than a year ago. The Department established a 

headquarters operation and successfully began operations on March 1, 2003—bring-
14

ing together the legacy agencies and programs that now make up DHS. Customs, 

border and immigration activities have been reformulated into new agencies that 

will increase the effectiveness of our dedicated employees. DHS continues to create 

new ways to share information and intelligence within the Department and between 

levels of governments, and horizontally across agencies and jurisdictions. Already, 

over 350 different management processes have been consolidated to 130, and DHS 

has begun consolidating 2,500 support contracts into roughly 600. 

While DHS invested considerable time to make the many organizational improvements that will improve our effectiveness, much was also accomplished programmatically. The fiscal year 2003 Performance and Accountability Report provides a 

comprehensive discussion of our accomplishments of the past year. We believe that 

in the twelve months since the creation of the Department, we have made substantial progress. Through the hard work of our dedicated and talented employees, 

America is more secure and better prepared than we were one year ago. 

We have achieved many results since our creation, including: • improving the collection, analysis and sharing of critical intelligence with key 

federal, state and local entities; 

• allocating or awarding over $8 billion to state and local first responders to 

help them prevent and prepare to respond to acts of terrorism and other potential disasters; 

• strengthening border security through the ‘‘One face at the border’’ initiative, 

which will cross-train officers to perform three formerly separate inspections—

immigration, customs and agriculture. This will allow us to target our resources 

toward higher risk travelers; 

• instituting innovative new systems like US•VISIT to identify and track foreign visitors and students and to screen for possible terrorist or criminal involvement; 

• safeguarding air travel from the terrorist threat by hardening cockpit doors, 

instituting 100 percent checked baggage screening; and training more than 

50,000 federal passenger and baggage screeners; 

• increasing safeguards on maritime transportation and port infrastructure; • expanding research and development in the defense of our homeland, through 

the creation of programs such as the Homeland Security Advanced Research 

Projects Agency (HSARPA) which has already engaged hundreds of private companies and universities in developing new cutting-edge technologies; 

• launching an ambitious, collaborative effort involving input from employees 

at all levels, unions, academia, and outside experts to design a modern human 

resources system that is mission-centered, fair, effective and flexible; 

• initiating a five-year budget and planning process and commencing the development of an integrated business and financial management system (Project 

eMerge 2) to consolidate the 50 different budget execution systems, 43 different 

general ledgers, and 30 different procurement systems inherited by DHS; and 

• successfully transferring more than $50 billion in assets, $36 billion in liabilities and more than 180,000 employees to the Department.

Fiscal Year 2005 Budget Request 

The Fiscal Year 2005 budget for the Department of Homeland Security builds 

upon the significant investments to date to our safeguard against terrorism, while 

also sustaining the many important departmental activities not directly related to 

our fight against terrorism. The President’s budget clearly demonstrates the continuing priority placed on the Department of Homeland Security in providing total 

resources for fiscal year 2005 of $40.2 billion. This is an increase of 10 percent above 

the comparable fiscal year 2004 resource level, $9 billion (29 percent) over the 2003 

level and $20.4 billion (103 percent) over the 2001 level.

Strengthening Border and Port Security 

Securing our border and transportation systems continues to be an enormous 

challenge. Ports-of-entry into the United States stretch across 7,500 miles of land 

border between the United States and Mexico and Canada, 95,000 miles of shoreline 

and navigable rivers, and an exclusive economic zone of 3.4 million square miles. 

Each year more than 500 million people, 130 million motor vehicles, 2.5 million railcars, and 5.7 million cargo containers must be processed at the border. Conditions 

and venues vary considerably, from air and sea ports-of-entry in metropolitan New 

York City with dozens of employees to a two-person land entry point in North Dakota. 

During fiscal year 2005, we will continue to strengthen our border and port security. Our budget seeks over $400 million in new funding to maintain and enhance 

border and port security activities, including the expansion of pre-screening cargo 

containers in high-risk areas and the detection of individuals attempting to illegally 
15

enter the United States. Our budget also includes an 8 percent increase for the 

Coast Guard to upgrade port security efforts, implement the Maritime Transportation Security Act, and enhance other activities. 

Specifically, our budget includes an increase of $25 million for U.S. Customs and 

Border Protection’s Container Security Initiative (CSI) which focuses on pre-screening cargo before it reaches our shores. We are also seeking an increase of $15.2 million for Customs Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C–TPAT). C–TPAT focuses 

on partnerships all along the entire supply chain, from the factory floor, to foreign 

vendors, to land borders and seaports. To date, nearly 3,000 importers, 600 carriers, 

and 1,000 brokers and freight forwarders are participating in C–TPAT, surpassing 

the Department’s original goal of participation of the top 1,000 importers. In order 

to further protect the homeland against radiological threats, the budget seeks $50 

million for next generation radiation detection monitors. 

As well as continuing development for secure trade programs, the President’s 

budget also seeks an increase of $20.6 million to support improvements for the National Targeting Center and multiple targeting systems that focus on people and/

or goods. These systems use information from diverse sources to provide automated 

risk assessments for arriving international air passengers, shipments of goods to our 

country, and land border passenger traffic. 

The United States Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology (US–

VISIT) program’s goals are to enhance the security of our citizens and our visitors; 

facilitate legitimate travel and trade across our borders; ensure the integrity of our 

immigration system; and respect the privacy of our welcomed visitors. US–VISIT 

represents a major milestone in our efforts to reform our borders. DHS deployed the 

first increment of US–VISIT on time, on budget, and has met the mandates established by Congress as well as including biometrics ahead of schedule. The budget 

seeks a total of $340 million in fiscal year 2005, an increase of $12 million over the 

fiscal year 2004 level. Through fiscal year 2005, over $1 billion will be used to support this initiative. 

Our budget also seeks an increase of $64.2 million to enhance land-based detection and monitoring of movement between the ports, and $10 million to plan, procure, deploy and operate unmanned aerial vehicles. In addition, the budget request 

for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) includes an increase of $28 

million to increase the flight hours of P–3 aircraft. The P–3 has already proven itself 

to be a key asset in the battle against terrorism as demonstrated in the days immediately following the September 11, 2001 attacks when P–3s flew airspace security 

missions over Atlanta and Miami. 

The Coast Guard funding increase includes over $100 million to implement the 

Maritime Transportation Security Act, to support the Coast Guard’s ability to develop, review and approve vessel and port security plans, ensure that foreign vessels 

meet security standards, improve underwater detection capabilities, and increase intelligence capacity. The budget also maintains the Coast Guard’s ongoing Integrated 

Deepwater System initiative, funding the program at $678 million, an increase of 

$10 million over the fiscal year 2004 funding level.

Enhancing Biodefense 

The President’s fiscal year 2005 budget reflects $2.5 billion for Project BioShield 

that will be available in fiscal year 2005 to encourage the development and pre-purchase of necessary medical countermeasures against weapons of mass destruction. 

Project BioShield allows the Federal Government to pre-purchase critically needed 

vaccines and medications for biodefense as soon as experts agree that they are safe 

and effective enough to be added to the Strategic National Stockpile. The Administration is moving forward in purchasing the most important countermeasures and 

high on the list are next-generation vaccines for both smallpox and anthrax. 

The Department’s efforts to improve biosurveillance will involve the Information 

Analysis and Infrastructure Protection (IAIP) and Science and Technology (S&T) directorates. In S&T, the budget requests $65 million increase to enhance current environmental monitoring activities, bringing the total fiscal year 2005 investment in 

this area to $118 million. One key component of this initiative will be an expansion 

and deployment of the next generation of technologies related to the BioWatch Program, a biosurveillance warning system. In IAIP, $11 million increase is included 

to integrate, in real-time, biosurveillance data collected from sensors throughout the 

country and fuse this data with information from health and agricultural surveillance and other terrorist-threat information from the law enforcement and intelligence communities. 

The National Disaster Medical System (NDMS) is responsible for managing and 

coordinating the Federal medical response to major emergencies and federally declared disasters. For 2005, FEMA’s budget includes $20 million for planning and ex-
16

ercises associated with medical surge capabilities. In addition, the budget transfers 

funding ($400 million) for the Strategic National Stockpile to the Department of 

Health and Human Services to better align the program with that agency’s medical 

expertise. 

Improving Aviation Security 

We have made great strides to improve the safety of the aviation system from acts 

of terrorism. For example, we have made significant investments in baggage screening technology—over $2 billion to purchase and install Explosive Detection System 

machines (EDS) and Explosive Trace Detection machines (ETD) to the nation’s airports from fiscal year 2003 to fiscal year 2005; hardened cockpit doors; deployed 

45,000 federal passenger and baggage screeners at the Nation’s airports; and 

trained pilots to be Federal Flight Deck Officers. The President’s fiscal year 2005 

budget seeks to enhance our efforts in this regard and would provide an increase 

of $892 million, a 20 percent increase over the comparable fiscal year 2004 level, 

for the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). Additional funding for TSA 

supports aviation security, including efforts to maintain and improve screener performance through the deployment of technology. 

The Department implemented a substantially improved air cargo security and 

screening program last year, and the President’s budget sustains funding to continue program deployment and screening technology research. In addition, the fiscal 

year 2005 budget seeks a total of $61 million to accelerate development of more effective technologies to counter the threat of portable anti-aircraft missiles. 

Enhancing Immigration Security and Enforcement 

Comprehensive immigration security and enforcement extends beyond efforts at 

and between the ports-of-entry into the United States. It extends overseas, to keep 

unwelcome persons from reaching our ports, and to removing persons now illegally 

residing in the United States. The Administration is committed to stronger workplace enforcement in support of the President’s temporary worker proposal announced January 7, 2004. The requested increases include $186 million for U.S. Immigration and Customs 

Enforcement (ICE)—whose appropriated budget overall increases by about 10 percent—to fund improvements in immigration enforcement both domestically and 

overseas, including more than doubling of current worksite enforcement efforts and 

approximately $100 million increase for the detention and removal of illegal aliens. 

Detention and Removal of illegal aliens present in the United States is critical to 

the enforcement of our immigration laws and the requested funding will expand ongoing fugitive apprehension efforts, the removal from the United States of jailed illegal aliens, and additional detention and removal capacity. Our proposal for ICE also includes an increase $78 million for immigration enforcement. As part of the President’s proposed new temporary worker program to 

match willing foreign workers with willing U.S. employers, enforcement of immigration laws against companies that break the law and hire illegal workers will increase. The Fiscal Year 2005 President’s Budget includes an additional $23 million 

for enhanced worksite enforcement. This more than doubles existing funds devoted 

to worksite enforcement and allows ICE to hire more Special Agents devoted to this 

effort. With these resources, ICE will be able to facilitate the implementation of the 

President’s temporary worker program initiative by establishing a traditional worksite enforcement program that offers credible deterrence to the hiring of unauthorized workers. Without such a deterrent, employers will have no incentive to maintain a legal workforce. 

Our budget also seeks $14 million to support our international enforcement efforts 

related to immigration, including enabling ICE to provide visa security by working 

cooperatively with U.S. consular offices to review visa applications. 

We are a welcoming nation, and the hard work and strength of our immigrants 

have made our Nation prosperous. Within the Department, the U.S. Citizenship and 

Immigration Service (CIS) has improved the administration of immigration benefits 

to the more than seven million annual applicants. For fiscal year 2005, the President’s budget seeks an additional $60 million, for a total of $140 million, to achieve 

a six-month processing for all immigration applications by 2006, while maintaining 

security. 

Increasing Preparedness and Response Capability 

Though the primary mission is to protect the Nation from terrorism, the Department’s responsibilities are diverse. The ships that interdict threats to our homeland 

are also used to help mariners when they are in distress and protect our marine 

resources from polluters and illegal fishing. While we must be prepared to respond 

to terrorist attacks, we are more often called upon to respond to natural disasters 

To support the Department’s efforts to respond, the President’s Budget includes 

an increase of $10 million, for a total of $35 million in fiscal year 2005, for the 
17

Homeland Security Operations Center (HSOC). Pursuant to the Initial National Response Plan, the HSOC integrates and provides overall steady state threat monitoring and situational awareness and domestic incident management on a 24/7 

basis. The HSOC maintains and provides situational awareness on homeland security matters for the Secretary of Homeland Security, the White House Homeland Security Council and the federal community. In addition, the HSOC provides the Department’s critical interface to all federal, state, local & private sector entities to 

deter, detect, respond and recover from threats and incidents. 

The National Incident Management System (NIMS) is designed to ensure that all 

levels of government work more efficiently and effectively together to prepare for, 

respond to, and recover from domestic emergencies and disasters, regardless of 

cause. For fiscal year 2005, the Department requests $7 million to ensure that the 

major NIMS concepts involving incident command, coordination, communication, information management, resource management, etc., are incorporated into and reflected in FEMA’s national disaster operational capability. This funding will provide 

for plan development, training, exercises and resource typing at the Federal, State, 

and local levels 

Supporting State and Local First Responders 

The Department has initiated consolidation of the two principal offices responsible 

for administering the grants awarding process for emergency responders and State/

local coordination, the Office of State and Local Government Coordination and the 

Office of Domestic Preparedness. This consolidation provides an opportunity to tie 

all DHS terrorism preparedness programs together into a cohesive overall national 

preparedness program designed to support implementation of State Homeland Security Strategies. 

The fiscal year 2005 budget continues to support the Nation’s first responders and seeks a total of $3.6 billion to support first-responder terrorism preparedness grants 

with better targeting to high-threat areas facing the greatest risk and vulnerability. 

For fiscal year 2005, funding for the Urban Area Security Initiative (UASI) doubles 

from $727 million to $1.45 billion. Since March 1, 2003, DHS awarded or allotted 

over $8 billion to support state and local preparedness. Between fiscal year 2001 

and the fiscal 2005 budget request, over $14 billion in assistance will be made available for programs now under DHS. Our request for fiscal year 2005 is slightly higher than funding sought for these programs in fiscal year 2004. 

Investing in Human Capital and Building Departmental Infrastructure 

Our employees are our single greatest asset and we are committed to investing 

in the development and motivation of our workforce. To support our efforts in creating a model personnel system, the President’s fiscal year 2005 budget seeks 

$133.5 million for the implementation of a new DHS human resources system that 

is mission-centered, fair, and flexible by rewarding top performers. The fiscal year 

2005 budget specifically provides additional resources that will be used for training 

supervisory personnel to administer a performance-based pay system and to create 

the information technology framework for the new system. Our new system will ensure that DHS can manage and deploy its resources to best address homeland security threats and support information technology tools for workforce management. 

We also seek additional funds to invest in the Department’s core infrastructure. 

Our budget request seeks a total of $56 million, an increase of $17 million to support a new resource management system. This funding will support the design, development, and implementation for a single Department-wide financial management 

system. It will provide decision-makers with critical business information, e.g., 

budget, accounting, procurement, grants, assets, travel, in near ‘‘real-time’’ and 

eliminate stovepipes within existing systems and processes. 

An increase of $45.1 million is also sought to continue expanding the DHS presence at the Nebraska Avenue Complex (NAC). These resources will enable DHS to 

perform tenant improvements to the facility and relocate U.S. Navy operations, pursuant to congressional authorization, from the NAC to leased facilities. 

Conclusion: 

We have a dedicated and skilled team in DHS who understand that what they 

are doing is important. We have the support of our partners in government and the 

public and private sectors. I thank the Congress for its support, which has been critical to bringing us to this point. 

Our homeland is safer than it was a year ago, but we live in dangerous times 

and cannot count on times to change. That is why the Department of Homeland Security was created, and why we are moving forward. I am grateful to be here today 

to talk about the work we are doing to make America a safer home for us, for our 

children and generations to come. 

Thank you for inviting me to appear before me today, and I look forward to answering your questions.
18

Chairman COX. I recognize myself for questions. 

Mr. Turner alluded in his opening statement to an editorial in 

the Washington Post this morning that caught my attention and, 

I am sure, yours as well. The subject was the President’s budget 

for homeland security. The Post editorial argues that, quote, ‘‘Without a better analysis of likely threats and targets, it is impossible 

to say whether the amounts allocated are grossly inadequate or 

wastefully large.’’ 

That is certainly true. And even more important than knowing 

whether we are spending the right amount is that we put ourselves 

in a position to get the best possible analysis of potential terrorist 

threats and targets based on current information from all types of 

sources. We need to know where we should be acting and what we 

should be doing to make America safer, and spending needs to follow needs. 

So my first question I am going to put to you and then ask you 

to respond is, What is your strategy, what is the Department’s 

strategy for bringing the Department’s Information Analysis Division to full strength and for bringing its analytic products to stateof-the-art so that the IAIP Directorate can, in the words of the 

Homeland Security Act, quote, ‘‘identify and assess the nature and 

scope of terrorist threats to the homeland, and understand such 

threats in light of actual and potential vulnerabilities of the homeland’’? 

My second question concerns the inspection of containers, of 

cargo containers coming into the United States. The Brookings Institution put out a report that I know that you have seen and that 

the Department has read, the committee has read it: ‘‘Protecting 

the American Homeland.’’ The Brookings report cautions against 

inspecting everything, what they call the ‘‘brute force’’ approach. 

And let me just quote briefly from the report. It observes that 

there are 21.4 million import shipments in the United States. That 

was as of 2001, their most recent year. Quote: Inspecting all of 

them, instead of the current small percentage, could push Customs’ 

$2.4 billion annual budget well over the $50 billion mark. Using 

such a brute-force approach, the broader cost to the economy would 

be substantially larger. 

According to one estimate, the cost of slowing the delivery of imported goods by 1 day, because of additional security checks, could 

amount to $7 billion per year. 

They put forward an alternative suggestion to develop a database 

for real-time tracking of containers headed toward the United 

States and to complete much of the inspecting before goods even 

reach American shores or land borders. Customs agents could then 

focus their limited resources on monitoring and inspecting shipments that did not undergo such offshore procedures. With this approach, Brookings concludes, the Department of Homeland Security 

would not have to expend its—or, pardon me, expand its capabilities tenfold or more; it could selectively target those shipments of 

goods that pose the greatest risk for inspection at home, and rely 

on good port security and monitoring at overseas ports where U.Sbound cargo is loaded for most protection, as well as on continuous 

tracking of cargo and transit using GPS receivers and transmitters. 
19

This sounds to me to be very much like the Container Security 

Initiative, and I want to find out whether in your view Brookings’ 

suggestions are good and accurate; whether, you know, since they 

have written your report as you developed CSI, whether you are 

moving more closely to the brute-force approach or whether more 

closely to a refined approach. 

Secretary RIDGE. Mr. Chairman, with regard to your first question, it was alluded to in Congressman Turner’s introductory remarks as well, when he talked about the need for an integrated 

threat and vulnerability assessment tool. Clearly, it is a high priority for Congress because it is part of the enabling legislation, and 

it is that strategic product that you have funded, and we are asking for a generous level of funding this time to assist us in that 

effort. 

I was looking at the dollars associated with the start-up of that particular unit within our Department and it was $185 million. We 

were just getting started. It has gone up to $834 million in the 

2004 budget. So you have given us the resources. We are in the 

process of hiring the people. We have developed information-sharing advisory counsels with the 13 different sectors of our economy. 

We have asked our colleagues—and really they are our partners, 

Governors, to build strategic plans to address the security needs of 

the individual States. Part of those strategic plans is to have the 

States either through—with their management people, their State 

police, begin developing their own list of critical infrastructure that 

they deem critical infrastructure. 

I had a good conversation with Governor Romney yesterday up 

in Massachusetts. Part of the plan that they submitted to us was 

a basic outline of how they went about that process. 

So you have given us the resources to build the Department. It 

is clearly a strategic tool that we will use at the Federal level but 

can be even more effectively used at the State and local level. The 

Governors and their homeland security advisers are in the process 

of developing their own independent list that we can match. 

We are working with the private sector, from the telecommunications and energy and chemical and financial services industry 

and the like to take a look at it. So I think we are well on our way 

to getting the kind of threat and vulnerability assessment tool that 

was referred to in the Washington Post article today. 

It will continue to take a great deal of work. And one of the interesting components of that process is we will get a good threat 

and vulnerability assessment tool. We will map it against the 

vulnerabilities, and then the next piece of that puzzle, since 85 percent of the critical infrastructure is owned by the private sector, is 

to make the business case so that these companies pay for their 

own security. We are digging pretty deep into the taxpayers’ pocket 

to help secure America. They have a fiduciary responsibility to do 

so. But we have a lot of business leaders that will help us make 

that business case. But before we can do that, we do need that 

threat and vulnerability assessment tool. You have given us the resources. We are hiring the people and it is an ongoing work. 

Secondly, with regard to the Container Security Initiative, the 

magnitude of international commerce combined with just-in-time 

manufacturing at our borders, combined with the impact of delays 
20

in the supply chain that would be associated with literally inspecting, individually, 22 million containers, suggests to us that we have 

to be smarter than that. And we are in the risk management business. And I daresay there will never be a day we are going to open 

all 22 million containers and check out the contents. So the smart 

approach—using people, data and technology—begins when we now 

get 24 hours in advance the manifest as to what is in the container. And the Coast Guard and legacy customs, over the past 

years and years, have built up a database, based on a commercial 

database and some information the government has and a rulebased system that we have developed, very sophisticated system, 

has a lot of pieces to it that we actually put a value on that manifest and we grade it, and depending on the grade, then we take additional precautionary measures, and we begin that process before 

they load the shipping container on board. 

Right now as we speak, we have citizens and members of the 

homeland security staff in 16 ports around the world. By the end 

of the year, with the money you have given us in the 04 budget, 

we will have it up to 24. And we want to expand that with the 

2005 budget, so we do that right now. From air, land, and sea containers, we physically inspect, either through the nonintrusive 

technology—and we have various kinds of technology at various 

places—or physically open and inspect about 15 percent of that 

cargo. And of course, when a ship is in transit, we now not only 

have the manifest in front of us, but we have an opportunity to 

take a look at the crew list, where the ship has been, and we will 

be able to monitor and track where that ship has been. 

As the Brookings Institute has pointed out, they had to make 

sure they don’t make any unscheduled stops that aren’t reflected 

on their itinerary. So again, in the process of managing the rest, 

we understand—22 million containers—we understand the vulnerability associated with it. 

You have given us a lot of people. We have placed a lot of technology, and we start that whole process overseas. And I think that 

is the best and most effective way to deal with managing potential 

risk associated with a huge reliance on international commerce to 

keep our economy going, to keep our communities going, to keep 

people employed. 

Chairman COX. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. I am very encouraged 

that we are using technology, targeted, and intelligence to take a 

smarter approach to this. I saw a remarkable similarity between 

what Brookings was recommending and what you were doing, and 

it seems to me that since they have written that report, you have 

taken it even much further. 

Mr. Turner. 

Mr. TURNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Secretary, I think we all understand, you know, you can’t 

open every cargo container; 20 million of them a year come in this 

country. But it does seem to me that we should have already made 

the investment, which I understand is not in the theme of the total 

budget, that large an investment, to install these radiation portals 

so that all of these containers as they come in can be run through 

these portals. And I understand that if we provide enough of them 

at our ports, it would not unduly delay the movement of commerce. 
21

And so I would ask you, one, why is it we haven’t made those 

purchases in light of the fact that I think it is a cost-effective purchase? And secondly, when we talk about this trusted shipper program, I guess it is called CT PAT, I was looking at some numbers 

on that and we have 5,300 companies that have been approved for 

that program as trusted, but only 141 of the 5,300 have actually 

been asked to provide to the Department their security practices to 

ensure that they meet certain minimum standards. 

So it is disturbing to me that we say that we have this redundant system in place and one of those checks is to be sure we know 

who the shipper is, and yet we must have compiled a list of 5,300 

and said you all are all okay. But I am not sure I understand the 

basis for that decision if we haven’t asked but 141 of them to give 

us the security standards that they operate under to ensure that 

somebody doesn’t put something bad in those containers. I know 

the threats we are worried most about are the catastrophic threats, 

and I do believe that moving faster to deploy these radiation portals would be a wise investment. 

But I would welcome your comments on those two points. 

Secretary RIDGE. Thank you, Congressman. As of December of 

2003, Customs and Border Patrol had deployed nearly 10,000 personal radiation detectors, over 300 radiation isotope identifier devices, and in excess of 140 radiation portal monitors. There is an 

additional 57 of these radiation portal monitors scheduled for deployment by—well, by the end of this month, I believe. We will be 

purchasing more during the course of the year and deploying them, 

and the budget requests in 2005 asks for additional. 

So again, just like in many other areas, we continue in a very, 

I think, very constructive and a very appropriate way to build up 

our capacity at our borders to deal with the potential radiological 

threat. 

With regard to the Customs Trade Partnership Against Terrorism, there is a preliminary inspection and a commitment from 

those 5,000 companies to apply security standards. I am not quite 

sure, and I am going to ask for the opportunity to get back to you 

to clarify that huge gap, because I don’t believe that is accurate. 

These are companies that have committed themselves to certain security protocols. We still reserve the right to pull those trucks 

aside, trust them to do it, but we want to verify it occasionally with 

random inspection. And again, whether it is 141 or 1,041, we have 

got the commitment from the companies. We are sending out inspection teams to see the kind of security procedures they have employed. We have asked them, and we are conducting background 

checks on the drivers of the vehicles coming across our borders. We 

get their manifest information in advance so we can check that as 

well. 

So again, there is a gap between necessarily those that we have 

physically inspected to see if they are complying with the security 

protocols that we have—they have agreed to deploy and that will 

obviously take time because it is labor intensive. But I do think it 

is a little bit higher than 141 and—but I will have to get back to 

you and either say, Congressman, you are absolutely right we have 

to accelerate it, or there is another figure in between. 
22

Mr. TURNER. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. And I do hope you will 

take a look at the issue of the radiation portals. I know in your 

budget there are insufficient funds for radiation portals on the 

southern border. And if you look at the cost of those, I think a 

strong case can be made that an investment now in those would 

be a wise investment. 

I think my time has expired and so I will yield back. Thank you, 

Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman COX. The Chair will now recognize other members for 

questions they may have. And so that there is no confusion, let me 

be clear that I plan to recognize members in order of their committee seniority, beginning with members who were present at or 

before the conclusion of opening statements. Those arriving after 

that time will be recognized in order of their appearance. That 

means that we begin with Mr. Shays. Oh, I am sorry. I have a list 

here that says Shays, Weldon. But I am happy to do it Weldon, 

Shays. 

Mr. Weldon. 

Mr. WELDON. Thank you Chris. And thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

First of all, let me say I would ask unanimous consent that we, 

in support of our Chairman, demand that the House Administration make a more suitable hearing room available for this very important committee. There are a number of hearing rooms in this—

on Capitol Hill that are far more worthy of the importance of this 

Chairman and the Ranking Member in this issue than this room. 

And this has nothing do with Secretary Ridge, but it is an embarrassment that we have to be crammed in here. And Mr. Chairman 

it is an embarrassment to you personally because of your outstanding leadership. And so I would join, hopefully with my colleague on both sides, in demanding that a more appropriate room 

be made available. I walked around the room today and there are 

other—the halls, and I see other rooms that are not even being 

used today. And it is not the fault of this committee. It is House 

Administration that assigns hearing rooms, but—. 

Chairman COX. Without objection, so ordered. We will have a 

larger room. 

Mr. WELDON. Let me get on to—. 

Secretary RIDGE. So let it be written, so let be done. 

Mr. WELDON. To my good friend and colleague and my former 

Governor who is a dear friend, and I thank him for the great work 

he has done. We had a meeting the first week you were in office—

do you remember, Mr. Secretary—and I told you some of my concerns, and you addressed many of them when you were The governor in our State on first responder issues. And you have come 

through, I think with amazing success, in responding to those concerns of intelligence sharing, data fusion, for the analysis of emerging threats. The interoperability issue you have taken on as a challenge nationwide and it is being recognized by the first responders 

all over the country. The JRISE program that is underway, which 

now allows vertical sharing of intelligence information with local, 

State, county, and Federal agencies is an outstanding success and 

a model that I have seen in reality all across the country, from 

California to the east coast. You deserve credit for all of those. 
23

I am a little concerned that the funding for some of our first responder programs, the Assistance to Firefighter Grant Program, or 

FIRE Act, is at a lower level, but I think we will deal with that 

in the Congress. It is a very popular program, as you know. And 

also the lack of funding request for the SAFER program, which was 

a bipartisan initiative in the last Congress modeled after the COPS 

first program. I think you will see the Congress also deal with that 

in the appropriation process. 

But I want to get at an issue that I think is not your concern 

but—it is your concern, but not your fault. It is the bureaucrats 

that sometimes work within the FEMA and other agencies below 

you. They have this mind-set that Washington knows all and that 

all the solutions for our local problems come from the top down. 

The fact is that, as you know, Mr. Secretary, we have 32,000 fire 

and EMS departments in the country. They have been in existence 

longer than America has been a Nation. 250 years. They respond 

to every incident and disaster we have had, and they have done so 

extremely well. Before there was a FEMA, before there was a National Guard, before there was a Department of Homeland Security, these men and women have responded to incidents in our refineries, in our ports, HazMat explosions, levies; you name it, they 

have been there. Many of them weren’t terrorist incidents. Some 

were, like the Murrah Building bombing and the World Trade Center. But many of them were incidents that just occur as a part of 

the risk associated with our quality of life. 

And what frustrates me is that this Congress, back as far as 

2000, said we have got to give these first responders the tools they 

need, because they best understand what their threats are locally. 

You go to any local fire chief, he or she knows what their threats 

are in that town. They know it is the potential for an explosion at 

a refinery or at a port. And instead of trying to come from the top 

down and shape what they have been doing for 200 years, we ought 

to be listening to them and work from the bottom up. 

And why I say that is in the new request coming in, we limit the 

amount, the types of money that can go out for first responders, to 

only four subsections. We no longer allow them to do the other 

kinds of things that were the original intent of the Congress. And 

the Congress has its ears tuned in with the fire departments and 

the emergency med. We take EMS out of that in the proposal put 

forward by the Department. 

And I would just ask you to revisit that, with the understanding 

that Congress is always in tune from the bottom up. 

Now, that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t have that overarching 

threat assessment that comes in from terrorism. But it doesn’t 

mean in support of that we should undermine the ability of our 

local first responders to have the best tools to deal with what they 

know to be the threats locally, based on their years of experience. 

I would ask you to look at that as a key issue. We don’t know 

it at all in Washington. And in fact, the first—in fact, in one case, 

the USFA used to hold annual meetings of all the fire services to 

go over the purpose for grant uses. DHS is bypassing that process 

now and determining on their own what the priority should be. I 

think that is wrong. 
24

You have got a great U.S. Fire Administrator, Dave Paulison, 

who is a great guy and was chief of the Metro Dade, handled the 

Hurricane Andrew with tremendous success. We ought to be listening to people like Dave. He understands. And I know you are a big 

supporter of his and he is a big admirer of yours as well. 

One final thing. And here is your chance. Two things. Tech 

transfer. We have got to do a better job of transferring military 

technology for first responders. We haven’t done that well. I have 

a bill that is bipartisan that would do that. I would ask you to look 

at that for consideration in this session. 

Finally, here is your chance. We tell you what you are doing 

wrong, and I am going to give you a chance to hit us over the head. 

And here is what I am going to say to you. And we talk a good 

game, Mr. Secretary, but the fact is when we created your agency, 

you have to report to 88 committees and subcommittees of the 

House and the Senate, and when you look at the members of those 

88 committees and subcommittees, that is 505 members of the 

House and Senate that you report to. In anyone’s estimation, that 

is an absolute joke. It is a farce. It is impossible, I would say—and 

you can comment on your own—for you to have to report to that 

many people. One of our top priorities is to make this committee 

a full standing committee with a full authorization over the funding that goes to your agency. The appropriators in the House have 

done that, and Hal Rogers is a very capable chairman. 

What is your opinion? Should we do the same thing? What would 

it do to you? How would it impact your ability to respond to us if 

we had not just the select committee, but one permanent committee overseeing all the areas of funding? And should we do that 

in the next session of Congress? Would it help you? 

Secretary RIDGE. I think you thought you were doing me a favor 

by asking me that question. 

First of all, having sat on that side of the table for 12 years, I 

appreciate the importance of not only oversight, but you have the 

power of the purse, and so I think rigorous oversight is an important part, particularly the type of partnership we have developed 

with this committee and a few others, and I think it goes without 

saying that a streamlined process of oversight and accountability, 

in my judgment, would do both the executive branch and the legislative branch a world of good. 

Last year, we testified, myself, the deputy, under secretaries, I 

think in excess of 120 times. 

I mean, and maybe we would testify that many times if there 

was some form of consolidation. Oversight, that is your responsibility, but that is 24 to 48 hours of preparation before you testify. 

We have right now before us 420 GAO requests, a couple thousand very appropriate letters from Congress, and so if there 

was•gain the kind of rigorous oversight is essential, the kind of 

partnership we are building I think is critical to the success of the 

Department, but I will leave it to the wisdom and the consensus 

that the leaders of this body. I am sure they can arrive at the best 

way to partner with us, but I am not going to sugar coat it. 

On the points of access and the points of oversight, I think, both 

the executive and the legislative branch, can do better than that. 

Mr. WELDON. Thank you. 
25

Secretary RIDGE. I thank you. 

Congresswoman Pelosi, we will see what they think about my 

suggestion to reconfigure. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentlelady from California, Miss Sanchez. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, thank you, Secretary 

Ridge, for being before us. 

Last time you were before us I told you I did not think America 

was so much safer with what was going on and with so many outstanding issues. I still feel the same way. There are a lot of things 

we need to handle and there are a lot of questions that I have for 

you. 

I am going to try to concentrate on actual questions that my law 

enforcement fire fighters and first responders submitted to me to 

ask you, because, obviously, I have been asking your under secretaries and your assistants and others other questions. 

I would like to say first that this whole issue of an infrastructure 

vulnerability risk analysis is very, very important, in particular 

since I am the ranking member of this subcommittee on that and 

it is a little disconcerting that when we first asked the question a 

year ago your under secretary at the time said it would take 180 

days to put that together but would not give us a start date for 

that. 

180 days later he came before us and of course nothing was done, 

and so I guess one question I would have and I will let you go 

through the questions and I will let you answer. This one is going 

to be easy. 

What is the time line? 

I really want to know a time line, because I have been waiting 

almost a year now and really have seen no movement on that, and 

it is important for us because there are limited resources to be 

spent on homeland security, and we cannot make a good policy decision without having the weighted facts of what we need to invest 

in. That would be the first question. 

The second, you know, I used to say your Department was pretty 

chaotic because most of the time I did not even know who to reach 

for whatever. Now, I think it has actually gotten a little better. 

Now, it is a little confused or maybe very confused. I think one 

of the things I think that I see is—. 

Secretary RIDGE. Yes. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. I want to understand the attrition rate that has 

gone on from when we merged these 22 departments or pieces of 

departments and who are the contract workers you are really using 

versus the real people who came over from those agencies, and I 

say confused because somebody asked me who actually works for 

the BICE. 

Is there anything happening at his place, and he mentioned his 

place of employment being INS. Is there anything happening, and 

he knows there is a change coming, but he really does not understand what is going on, so I guess this feeling that, you know, 

change can only happen if people are invested from the very 

ground floor up, and that just plays into the whole issue of I think 

there is a lot of confusion still going on within the entire department. 
26

I also want to get a handle from you on this whole issue of the 

immigration issue that the President has put forward and what 

you believe, because I actually think it could be a very good thing 

for us to understand and to have a way in which we give an incentive to people who are here without documents that we are never 

going to have the funds to find and try to figure out what they are 

doing, if we give them an incentive to figure out who they are and 

then we can spend the limited resources that we do have on those 

people who would be meaning to do us harm. So I would like to 

get your comments on how you feel about the issues of immigration, since it somewhat falls under your jurisdiction now, and then 

back to the first responders. 

I guess it comes down to this. You know, they all want to know 

where is the money. They still haven’t seen it. 

Last week, this committee had a hearing on the orange alert 

level, and Admiral Loy, your Deputy Secretary, told this committee 

that we expect to pay the bills; we, meaning your department. He 

said that local law enforcement had to tell DHS by February 23 

what extra costs they incurred during the holiday orange alert between December 21 and January 9. 

This is the first time last week, this announcement, that a lot of 

my folks had heard the Department was intending to put up funds 

for what they have gone through, and my office followed up after 

this hearing. 

They talked to our California Office of Homeland Security and 

they found something really important that there is no money 

there, so we expect to pay the bills. That was the statement from 

your second in command, but there is no resources for it. So can 

you tell me where is that money going to come from or are you 

going to put forward a supplemental? 

I also do not see anything in the budget to look at the next orange alert, because, you know, the City of Anaheim, we have 

Disneyland and a lot of other venues there. We spend $30,000 

every day that you put us on orange alert, above and beyond what 

we normally do, and so I would just say what is happening, where 

is the money? 

You just have the Urban Area Security Initiative, where Anaheim and Santa Ana were to be granted 10,000,000, 50,000,000. 

Again, no money. Nothing has come forward. 

We are just trying to understand. Help us with this process. 

How are we going to get the money to the local agencies? 

Secretary RIDGE. Okay. Thank you, Congresswoman. 

I am not sure from chaotic to confused is progress or not. I do 

not think we are chaotic and I certainly do not think we are confused about our mission, but clearly as we set up the Department, 

as it relates to the second question that you have asked, there is 

a combination of people we brought in to headquarters that were 

previously working for some of the agencies that were in other departments, and that process itself would probably work its way out 

through the balance of this year. 

I, for one, favor fewer contractors and more FTEs, use contractors when you need them for specific projects but currently embedding a whole bunch of them is not the way. We need them now and 
27

we will need them in the future but not to the degree we need 

them now. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. Mr. Secretary, that might be a question for someone to put together. 

Secretary RIDGE. Sure. 

Chairman COX. If the gentlelady will yield. The gentlelady’s time 

has expired. 

I want to make sure the Secretary has ample time to answer the 

questions that she put and I would remind members that the Secretary is with us for an extended period but has to leave at 12:15. 

I have counted the members in the room, and if we stick to something like the 5-minute rule, every member will have the opportunity to ask questions, but try and give some chance for the Secretary within your 5 minutes to answer those questions or it will 

not work. 

Mr. Secretary. 

Secretary RIDGE. First question was the threat and vulnerability 

assessment. The President has assigned a Homeland Security Presidential Directive, requiring us to develop preliminary tools for that 

purpose. We should have that done in the next 60 to 90 years. 

We have begun looking at different sectors of the economy in 

coming up with vulnerability tools, but there is a broader strategic 

overview in the direction the President has given us and you 

should be advised that that is going to be completed in the next 

couple of months. So I will tell you the next 60 to 90 years, and 

if it is any different I will get back to you, but that is the timetable 

we have right now. 

We will get back to you with regard to the full-time equivalents 

and the contractors. 

The President has stated very clearly some principles around 

which he hopes the Congress will take on the very important task 

of dealing with the reality that we have 8 to 10 million people in 

this country illegally. The reality is that just about every one of 

them came over to this country to live a dream, not to be a part 

of a terrorist act or a terrorist organization. The reality is that if 

we can come up with a lawful, rational, systematic way of validating their presence, not necessarily making them citizens, and 

one could argue that a lot of these people would just as soon 

come—a lot of these immigrants would just as soon come to this 

country, work and go back to their own country, so validating their 

presence is far different than putting them in the front of the line 

or even in the front of the citizenship line. We just have to accept 

that they are here and that they make an economic contribution to 

citizens all over this country, accept the reality that they did break 

the law and we do need to come up with a process in order to validate their presence, but come up with a better process of dealing 

with that immigration in the future. And so I think the President 

has laid out some principles and our department and immigration 

and citizenship services will look forward to the opportunity to 

work with Congress to develop that program. 

I will tell you at the outset that a key to the successful limitation 

of that program will be the kind of commitment Congress is willing 

to make to the resources necessary to enforce it. You know, we 

have asked for some additional dollars in this budget. We are going 
28

to nearly triple the teams we have going out to the workplaces and 

going out after absconders, and the need for a more robust enforcement procedure to make whatever we come up with work, but I 

think the President, very appropriately, has laid out principles that 

we can build a good policy around. 

Finally, first responders: Show me the money. That is what they 

are all saying. 

Congress had told us to get the money ready to distribute within 

45 days. We were ready to distribute every penny. We had a very 

good conversation, frankly, about 3 weeks ago with California’s 

homeland security adviser and your new Governor, because, as you 

well know, there is about $700 million I think from California sitting on the shelf from 2003–2004 that needs to be distributed to 

the first responders. 

The logjam I believe, Congresswoman, is there is no single distribution mechanism between the States and the local communities. It varies from State to State. 

Again, I am going to refer back. There are a couple that have a 

better system of distribution. Some distribute it regionally, some 

have it embedded in their program and some do not. We are going 

to take it on to sit down with the National Governors’ Association, 

the Conference of Mayors, see if we can come up with one process 

that everybody is comfortable with so that when you appropriate 

the money to us and tell us to get it out the door, we can get it 

out the door with the kind of speed and efficiency that you want 

us to. So again the Federal Government is ready to cut the checks. 

The logjam is between the State and the locals and we have to 

partner with them for a better way to come up with a way to distribute it. 

Chairman COX. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 

The Chair would ask unanimous consent that the gentleman 

from New York, Mr. Sweeney, be permitted to question out of order 

since he is already late for his plane to Iraq. 

Mr. SWEENEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman COX. Without objection. 

Mr. SWEENEY. And I appreciate the opportunity and I will be 

very brief, Mr. Secretary. It is a tight room. I feel so close, I am 

not sure I should be asking questions or answering them. 

Secretary RIDGE. You are welcome to join me if you want. 

Mr. SWEENEY. You are doing a fine job on your own. 

In my statement that I will submit for the record, I want to reiterate my thanks for your successes this past year. There are a couple of things that have already been touched on that I have some 

interest and concern about, and I will follow up on some of these 

because I am fortunate enough that I will be seeing you in Approps 

as well at some point. 

I was pleased to see in the President’s budget that the distribution language, the formula language, referring to the PATRIOT 

Act, was deleted. I thought that was a move in the right direction. 

As you know, this committee, as part of its underlying legislation 

that I believe we will be moving quickly on here, will establish a 

funding formulation, I think, that will help your distribution problems. 
29

Based on a formula that focuses on threat, vulnerability and consequences, and we will have some debate over whether there ought 

to be a reasonable minimum allocation to the States or not, I know 

you have said in the past that you support that. 

My concern is this: In the last week, since the distribution of the 

budget, we are hearing rumblings from various sources that your 

folks at ODP want to reinsert that language back in. 

Where do you stand on that issue? 

Secretary RIDGE. Folks of ODP stand where I stand and that is 

the President’s initiative to number one, shift a lot of the money 

that historically that was just given out by formula into the Urban 

Area Security Initiative, where we do focus not just on population 

and density but threat to our protection. 

I do believe that States large and small have to build up some 

minimal capacity, if nothing else, for mutual aid within their 

own—in their own jurisdictions. But I also think that there is 

something else that we ought to look at, based on the documents 

that are given to us by the States. 

Our threat and vulnerability assessment tools can be used for 

some of the allocation. The allocation should not be just according 

to a formula. 

Mr. SWEENEY. You do believe, I believe you said this before, that 

the current formulation is broken, is inept. 

Secretary RIDGE. I accept the notion that every State deserves 

some amount of money. I think it is, frankly, higher than it should 

be, but I also think as we look at States, large and small, they may 

very well—I certainly know there are some communities out there 

that do not qualify for any of these grants because they do not 

quite fit the fairly rigid requirements, and it is conceivable there 

may be small States out there who may receive more than a formula would give them based on what their critical infrastructure 

might be. So I think the States should be building up a minimal 

capacity, but the extent that we are sending all that money out by 

formula, that ought to be changed and there ought to be other factors requested by the President that we could include in our distribution, particularly of critical infrastructure and threat. 

Mr. SWEENEY. I think we agree. Not to disregard the threat that 

each American faces anywhere, but the notion that certain places 

would receive substantially larger per capita allocations when they 

are not considered to be on the A list of threats and targets is a 

little too much to believe in. 

Another question I have is that I know the Science and Technology Directorate faces a number of challenges allocating resources to the national labs, based on peer review and competition, 

developing teams, drawing on the best individual talent in the 

country, and integrating the work. 

It is a pretty substantial task they face and they have to do it 

in realtime and as comprehensively as they can. There is an understanding that in working with those folks, they tend to develop two 

lists in terms of who they are going to deal with and work with 

in national labs, an intramural list and an extramural list, meaning those in and those out, and I am wondering what you think 

about that and what the purpose is. 
30

Secretary RIDGE. Well, first of all, the national labs have a 60-

year history working with the Federal Government, the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, and that is Sandia, 

Los Alamos, and Livermore, there are four or five of them that 

would be integral to some of the research that we have ongoing 

now that would help us set priorities, but also because they are 

working so close with us internally, frankly being at a competitive 

advantage if they also had the opportunity to compete for some of 

the dollars that are going to be distributed by the Homeland Security Advanced Research Projects Agency, so again trying to avoid 

that kind of conflicts. 

There are some of those labs that we are going to say will be 

unique to us internally and help with some of the basic research 

we are doing, help set the strategic direction of the Department 

and the research we need, not just within the Department but taking a look at the broader research needs of the country. They will 

be adequately compensated and very much an integral part of that 

process. 

Those laboratories that are not working with us internally will 

be the ones that will be competing for literally hundreds of millions 

of dollars under the Homeland Security Advance Research Project 

Agency. That is a distinction that we are trying to make because 

basically one would have some insider knowledge, and you could 

conceivably—we are just trying to delineate basic functions from 

basic labs. Some of those will help us internally. Those that aren’t 

going to be involved in that capacity will be the ones that have access to other dollars. 

Mr. SWEENEY. I will follow up and I thank you for your time. 

Chairman COX. Thank you. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentleman from the State of Washington, Mr. Dicks, is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. DICKS. It is good to see our colleague, Tom Ridge, here again. 

Just keep working hard. We are making some progress. 

I just met with Tim Lowenberg from the State of Washington. I 

know you know Tim. 

Secretary RIDGE. Right. 

Mr. DICKS. He gave me a copy of the Washington Statewide 

Homeland Security Strategic Plan. Now, I do not know if other 

States are doing this, but I think this is an outstanding document 

and I think every State should do one of these plans. I do not 

know, under existing law are the other States required to have a 

plan like this? 

Secretary RIDGE. Yes, sir. We in the middle of last year said to 

the States now that we have a department and we knew we were 

going to try to integrate the grant programs into a one-stop shop, 

we had a national strategy, we wanted the States and Territories 

to have a strategy, so they were all due January1 of this year. 

Mr. DICKS. Have they all come in? 

Secretary RIDGE. Last time I checked there may have been one 

or two that haven’t made it. We’re going through the review. We 

sent a few back for some modifications. 

Mr. DICKS. Under the Urban Area Security Initiative, where we 

are giving all this money to the big cities, in our State Seattle is 

getting a much larger share of the money than the entire rest of 
31

the State of Washington I think we ought to allow the funding to 

be done via the strategic plan, and what is happening here is the 

State now will get a lot less money for the whole rest of the State 

outside Seattle. 

We have got problems with Hanford, with nuclear waste, we 

have got other bases, other ports. I think there has got to be a way, 

Mr. Secretary, to fund these plans and let them at the local level 

allocate the money to the highest priorities in the State. By putting 

all the money into the big cities, we are not going to be getting 

there. I would like to hear your comment on that. 

Secretary RIDGE. Well, first of all, we want to direct dollars to 

the individual States through the plan, number one. That is why 

we asked them for it and that will be a dynamic document. 

Mr. DICKS. But most of the money is going to the cities, not much 

to the States. 

Secretary RIDGE. Again, it is our primary task, not exclusive 

task, but the primary task has tried to manage the risk of a catastrophic incident, where you have a catastrophic loss of life or catastrophic economic incident and more often than not, just because 

of numbers and critical infrastructure being combined in urban 

areas, that is where potentially the greatest threat is, not necessarily where the only threat is. 

One of the challenges we have with that, Congressman, is to convince these metropolitan areas that there are a lot of surrounding 

counties that provide for their mutual aid, that provide support if 

something happens. 

I had an occasion to visit a community called Port Huron, which 

is outside of Detroit, Michigan. They have an incredible amount of 

infrastructure there and yet they somehow did not get any money 

that went to Detroit. So we are going to take a look at that initiative to make sure that those adjacent communities participate in 

the funding. 

Mr. DICKS. That is the problem we are having and I would ask 

you to look at that. 

Secretary RIDGE. I will. 

Mr. DICKS. One other point: The President’s budget proposal also 

significantly impacted the Emergency Management Performance 

Grant Program. Only 25 percent of grant funds will be available to 

support State and local emergency management personnel salaries. 

At present, up to 100 percent of these grant funds can be used 

for personnel salaries if required. Lowenberg tells me this will have 

a devastating effect in the State of Washington in terms of the 

funding of these people by this cut. I hope Congress will reject this. 

A March 2002 survey by the National Emergency Management 

Association found that an additional 5,212 local management emergency positions are needed, with 3,960 or 76 percent of these positions being full-time directors needed to manage the program, so by 

cutting the funding for salaries from 100 percent to 25 percent we 

are going to devastate this program. I cannot believe that is our 

intent. 

Secretary RIDGE. Well, I think, Congressman, the funding level 

is higher than it has ever been. Let’s have a shared responsibility 

for employing that individual, individuals, and using the balance of 
32

the money for training exercises and planning. You may disagree 

with that interpretation. I think it contains the largest amount. 

Mr. DICKS. Why change it from 100 percent of availability of 

these funds to 25 percent? I think that is going to hurt the program 

and these people are going to have to lay people off. We need to 

hire people, not lay people off in this emergency management response area, so I hope you will take a look at that. 

Secretary RIDGE. I will, Congressman. 

Mr. DICKS. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman from Connecticut, Mr.Shays. 

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Secretary, it would be hard for you to know that I am a big 

fan of yours in the Department since I have been getting in some 

disagreements with the Department, but in this room you have 

Mac Thornberry and Jim Gibbons and Jane Harman, who were responsible in creating your office. Ellen Tauscher is the only other 

one. It came through my subcommittee, and my committee still has 

jurisdiction over your department as it relates to programs, not authorization and not money. 

I want to know why we have not developed an antitoxin to botulinum. We do not now have a capability to deal with that and it 

kills you, and I just would like it to show up in your radar screen 

as something I would like your department to be moving a little 

more quickly with. 

The other thing is as it relates to standards. You basically are 

under the impression that the States are providing you what they 

need for vulnerability assessments, and my understanding, I think 

it is the committee’s as well, is that is these are not coming in, the 

States are just giving you a wish list, and you cannot operate on 

a wish list. 

I believe urban areas, the bigger cities, need—I mean, it is crazy 

for a city like New York to be ignored and have Kent, Connecticut 

get something, and I honestly believe that when you force yourself 

to have set up a higher standard level in the States we are going 

to see money spent in better ways. 

As it relates to the whole issue of the warning system, I just 

want to express a concern and have you comment, and if I have 

time to respond, I would like to as well. 

We basically are at yellow alert, which means significant alert. 

Forget the colors. It is low, guarded, significant, high, and severe, 

and I feel like significant has come to mean guarded; in other 

words, we are all guarded, but—and even if we are at significant, 

when you go up from significant to high, to orange, you are basically saying to me and others we have got one hell of a serious potential for an attack. 

Secretary RIDGE. Right. 

Mr. SHAYS. And I need to know if you could just explain to me 

how Americans should just go on about their normal behavior. I 

want to know why the public should not be responding and maybe 

not do something they ought to do. 

Let me just give you a case in point. I would not recommend 

when we go to high alert, when we think there is maybe a terrorist 

threat of a plane being hijacked from Europe, I would not rec-
33

ommend that a group of students go and then come back during 

that high alert. 

Why would you and why would your department say just do 

what you normally do? 

Secretary RIDGE. First of all, Congressman, there is no doubt in 

my department, certainly no doubt from my personal perspective, 

that you are not a supporter of the Department, its mission, and 

men and women who work there. 

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. 

Secretary RIDGE. We have a difference of opinion as to how tools 

are used effectively or not effectively, very appropriate question to 

suggest that, but there is no doubt about that in anybody’s mind. 

First of all, in regard to the dollars that are being expended to 

deal with the botulism, the antidote, we have presently expended 

as a countermeasure a budget authority of over $200 million and 

we are looking for in 2005, looking for an outlay of at least 150 million. We have already shifted some money into that, and I would 

have to go back to the NIH and CDC to give you more specific dollar figures, but there are dollars invested in research precisely in 

that area. 

Your comment about wish list, Congressman, I think, is a good 

one. Understandably, if you do not have try to come up with some 

standard definition of critical infrastructure, a lot of people in their 

communities take great pride and think certain venues are absolutely critical to their way of life, to the security of their community 

or the economic needs of the community. But we need to develop 

a pretty good list, working with the States, and develop the kinds 

of things, a standard list, to frame the issue, so that they can go 

out and help us identify those, the destruction of which would result in the catastrophic loss of human life or catastrophic economic 

loss. So we need to pare the wish list down to needs, and we will 

address the needs so we can deal with the wishes. 

And then finally the question, with regard to the warning system. When we initiated the warning system, Congressman, before 

we had the Department, it was really an alert system based on the 

assessment of the threat. It is not just unique to the Secretary of 

the Department, but when the decision to raise the threat level or 

the decision to reduce it is made, it is after considerable work and 

research over a long period of time and then a final discussion 

among Secretaries of State and Defense and the Attorney General, 

the CIA Director, the FBI Director, the Secretary of Transportation. So there is not a unilateral recommendation. 

I make the recommendation to the President. If there is a consensus, it is whether or not we take it up, and the reason we say, 

Congressman, that people should go about being Americans and 

doing what they planned on doing even before we raised it is because we are now in the position to issue that warning and understand completely that it does two things: One, it is an alert system 

and we tell the American public it is a consensus among some of 

your leaders who have researched, analyzed and discussed the 

threat information that we are tomorrow and in the foreseeable future at a higher level of risk to a potential attack. That is what 

we want Americans to know. We want to equip them with informa-
34

tion. We cannot tell them the specifics, but we want them to know 

that. 

It is also a signal to security and law enforcement professionals 

that at this point in time they need to add additional preventative 

or security measures at specific sites in their States, specific sites 

in the private sector, and, Congressman, as we develop the threat 

and vulnerability assessment tools, as we identify those critical 

pieces of infrastructure and make permanent the kinds of security 

measures that should exist there on a permanent basis, I think the 

threshold, to raise it from yellow to orange, will be a higher threshold, because it is one thing to be worried about the threat when you 

haven’t taken any precautionary measures. It is another thing to 

have the same level of threat but take a look at the potential target 

and say the police, the security professionals, the fire departments, 

the law enforcement community all around, State and local, have 

done additional things to enhance security. 

So again, it is a blunt instrument, Congressman, and I know 

that. I also know we are getting better and better at refining and 

pinpointing based on intelligence we receive now, additional security measures that will enable us in the future to be targeted and 

almost surgical in sharing that information, and we do not have to 

raise the national threat level. 

Mr. SHAYS. I know the time has run out, and thank you. My committee will be following up on what this committee has done in 

hearings. I would just ask your cooperation. 

Secretary RIDGE. Sure. 

Mr. SHAYS. We would really like to sort it out and help you. 

Secretary RIDGE. Thank you. 

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr. Frank. 

Mr. FRANK. Mr. Secretary, you have two levels, two parts of your 

job, and I want to talk about another important part. Protecting 

against the threats is very important, and we did on September 

11th encounter a real challenge to our law enforcement. 

We are a free society and the rule in a free society has been pretty much the bad guys get the first shot; that is, we do not have 

a system of restriction and prevention. We hope that deterrence 

would be the way to work. 

We have people killing themselves to kill other people and obviously that requires a change in which you do law enforcement. It 

means some restriction on freedom of movement, on privacy. Part 

of your job is to protect, but obviously another important part of 

the job, I know you fully well understand it, is to protect as much 

of the freedom that we cherish. So this is the balance that we have 

to draw. 

I believe that in fact since September 11 we have done better 

than some people expected; that is, if I look back, World War I, 

World War II and Korea and Vietnam, I think we have seen on the 

whole in the country less impingement on our freedom than we 

have seen in some previous eras. I am very pleased, for instance, 

that freedom of expression has on the whole not been jeopardized 

the way it has been in some of those early eras. 
35

What I want to talk about is a few examples of the other hard 

part of your job; namely, to help us protect the liberty that is so 

precious to us within the context of security, and it is particularly 

the case with immigration. I mean, I think—and I was pleased my 

colleague Miss Sanchez asked you about the President’s plan, because there was a recognition there that on the whole a great contribution has been made to the country and that we do not want 

to start to pull the plug. 

I want to talk about two examples of that. One, I have to tell you 

I am going to give you some copies of this. In December or November all my colleagues from Massachusetts and I received the kind 

of frankly annoying letter from your Congressional affairs office 

that I know used to make you as irritated as it made us back when 

you were getting them and we were serving together on the Banking Committee. We asked about Liberia. It has been a place where 

terrible things have happened. The world community very late responded, and there has been some improvement. We have temporary protected status for the Liberians. Your office did and your 

department did extend that until October of 2004, and we appreciate that, but we wrote because the cutoff date had been October 

of 2002, and, sadly, the international community did not get itself 

together in time and there were people who came to this country 

driven by the same terror that had driven earlier people, and we 

wrote and asked, all of us from Massachusetts, for an extension beyond October of 02 for the cutoff date. 

We got back a letter that said, oh, by the way, we have taken 

care of this. We have extended till October of 2004, but that was 

not the issue. That was to the people already covered, so we have 

this group of people who came after October 2002. It may well be 

that a cutoff date should be imposed, and things may have gotten 

better in Liberia, but we believe there are people who came here 

at a time when there was still terror. Our government acknowledged that and I will ask you to look at that. 

Secretary RIDGE. I will. 

Mr. FRANK. The other one is a question of students. One has to 

be very careful to preserve the flow of foreign students. Part of this 

is a cultural battle. 

I am proud of this country. I do not think there is anything we 

can do better to diminish irrational and unbalanced anti–Americanism than to bring people over here and let them see our flaws 

and our willingness to deal with our flaws and to improve them, 

and part of the problem is a tendency to say: Oh, these countries, 

we are particularly going to restrict from these countries where we 

have the worst problems and it gets particularly hard to bring in 

some of these people. They ought to be vetted. There ought to be 

security checks. We have the SEVIS program that you are familiar 

with, and the only reason frankly of bringing over foreign students 

is that it is one of the few ways we have of keeping down the costs 

for American students, because they bring money with them. On 

the whole they contribute more per capita at the universities they 

are studying at than the American students, and there is also a 

third reason: American students learn from them. No matter what 

university, including the one you and I attended, the students edu-
36

cate each other more than the faculty does, and that is a big part 

of it. 

So we have a couple of bureaucratic obstacles with the SEVIS 

program, and it deals in part with the fact that State and Immigration are together. One is just the way they pay. You have to, if you 

are applying under the SEVIS program, you have to pay either by 

a check drawn on a U.S. bank or on a credit card through the 

Internet. That is just bureaucratic and hard for some of these students who do not have access. 

What we would like, and maybe you can advocate to your boss 

and to your colleague, the Secretary of State, and see if he could 

get his people to do this, we do not see why when they apply for 

the visa they could not pay at the same time. Right now they have 

to make a payment in advance and then go apply for the visa. In 

some parts of the world they do not have access to American banks 

and the Internet, so making it easier for them to pay the fee would 

be very significant, and I am also going to leave you with that and 

I do not expect off the top answers, Chairman, so—. 

Secretary RIDGE. Well, if I might, I will personally look into and 

get back to you with regard to the response concerning Liberia. 

Secondly, I will tell you that I think from the administration of 

the SEVIS program in 2002 to 2003, we made dramatic and steady 

improvements. 

Mr. FRANK. Yes, you did. I appreciate it. 

Secretary RIDGE. But we are not done yet and frankly the practical suggestions you made publicly make a lot of sense to me and 

I will work on it. I could not agree with you more the reasons that 

we ought to make it easier for those students to get into this country. 

You hit it. That is one of the best long-term antidotes to deal 

with the problem around which we have had to build a huge department, and the notion they come in and see us, what we do 

right, what we do wrong, and our ability to digest it, debate it or 

take corrective action is just precisely the kind of system they need 

to see and part of the long-term solution to the problems you and 

I are combating right now. 

Mr. FRANK. Could I just take 10 seconds? 

I want to take credit for a bit of modesty. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman wants to ask unanimous consent? 

Mr. FRANK. When I said that students at university do a better 

job of educating each other than the faculty, I want you to know 

that when Mr. Ridge and I were at the same university part of the 

time I was a junior faculty member, he was a student. So that is 

a very self-denying comment that I made. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman from Michigan, the chairman of 

the Subcommittee on Infrastructure and Border Security, Mr. 

Camp. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Secretary, and 

thank you for your visit to Michigan and to Port Huron and the 

Blue Water Bridge. I thank you for that. I want to congratulate on 

the successful roll out of the first phase of the US–VISIT program 

at air and seaports, and clearly it is a major border management 

system. The current budget proposal requests a $12 million increase for that program, and we are approaching this deadline for 
37

implementation by December1 at the 50 largest ports of entry, and 

I wonder if you could tell me how this program will continue to be 

implemented, how funding will be allocated, without disrupting the 

necessary travel associated with this. 

Secretary RIDGE. Congressman, the literal interpretation; I 

mean, you can take a look at the enabling legislation and the directive given to the executive branch with regard to the entry-exit system, and I think we have all concluded by now that literally stopping every single pedestrian, clearing everybody out of every bus, 

emptying the back seats of the cars coming across Canada and 

Mexican borders is certainly inconsistent with our collective responsibility to enhance security but improve the flow of legitimate 

goods in commerce. So right now we are looking at a system that 

has many parts to it. We are going to prescreen pedestrians and 

commercial vehicles and passengers. That will take care of some of 

the flow. We are going to do some random checks. We are also 

going to try to employ some radio frequency technology to monitor 

people coming back and forth in vehicles across the border. 

There are still many of the details that need to be worked out, 

but I think in my discussions, private discussions with Members of 

Congress, they understand that a literal interpretation, that would 

have enormous personal and economic impact on communities and 

families. So we are going to provide the best balance we can between security and commerce, given the directive of the legislature. 

Mr. CAMP. Well, thank you. There has been a great deal of discussion on this regional structure for custom and commerce potentially, and obviously the worry is that there will be different policies for different ports or points of entry, and I understand the Department is moving ahead with plans for regions. 

Does the budget reflect that as a priority and, if that is true, 

what protections do we have to ensure we will have uniformity in 

terms of policy around the country? 

Secretary RIDGE. There should not be the regionalization of any 

policy, any regulation, any law, that is inconsistent with Congressional intent, that is inconsistent with how any executive branch 

should be operating. 

I know that people in the trade community several years ago legitimately had a complaint that Customs was interpreting some of 

the programs differently depending on the port of entry, and I assure you we will do everything we can to make sure it is standardized consistent across the board. Nothing else will be acceptable. 

Mr. CAMP. And, lastly, we are all concerned about maximizing 

our resources, to get the most out of every tax dollar that is spent, 

and one proposal along the lines the Department had was the ‘‘One 

Face at the Border’’ program to cross-train both Customs and Border Protection, to streamline the whole port of entry process. I 

want to commend you and Commissioner Bonner for this program 

and the progress you have made, but I wonder if you could give me 

an update on this program and when we might see the new management and payroll system the Department is developing in this 

regard. 

Secretary RIDGE. There are two pieces of that. Congress gave 

us—is giving us additional new dollars to build additional capacities, but there is a legitimate expectation of Congress, it begins 
38

through the President and Administration and Congress, to do a 

better job with the people and resources you already have, and one 

of the ways we needed to move and move quickly as of day one of 

the Department was understand we needed one face at the border, 

not two or three faces. 

Historically, if you came into this country, an airport, you would 

run into an immigration officer in one uniform and a customs officer in another uniform and conceivably another officer from the Department of Agriculture or elsewhere. We decided day one that you 

have three chains of command. You do not necessarily have the 

kind of collaborative relationship you might want; I mean, personally you might but institutionally you might not. So we decided 

from day one, from this day forward, there will be one face at the 

border. 

The customs and INS, there is no reason to believe somebody 

cannot do both, and so we have done basically the Customs and 

Border Patrol. The new classes, the recruits are trained to do all 

these tasks, and gives us a surge capacity at the airports. Many 

times you will see 10, 12, 15 aisles, and there is not too much traffic and you have a few inspectors, and now suddenly you have got 

several international flights arrive at the same time, we can open 

up more aisles and we can take care of more people. 

Frankly, I think it is better for morale. My view of most employees is they want to do a good job. I do not know there are too many 

people in America that are going to get up and go to work anywhere in America that are not going to try to do their best during 

the course of a day. I also think men and women if they were empowered with more knowledge or more technology to help them do 

their job better they will probably respond to that as well. So again 

if we give them more training and more technology, and we did 

this with US–VISIT, and these are folks that work with old INS 

and old Customs and for a long time they were waiting for more 

technology to help with the entry-exit system. Well, suddenly we 

have given them US–VISIT and consolidated in one unit and they 

are doing a phenomenal job. We have turned back a hundred people at the ports already and they feel good about their mission but 

they feel even better equipped to get it done. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. 

Thank you Mr. Secretary. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman COX. The gentlelady from California, the ranking 

member on the Committee on Intelligence, Ms. Harman, is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Good morning, Mr. Secretary. 

Secretary RIDGE. Good morning. 

Ms. HARMAN. As Mr. Shays has said, I consider myself one of the 

founding mothers of your department; in fact, I was in a small but 

hardy bipartisan band of brothers and sisters here who thought we 

needed a department soon after 9/11. I also remember saying when 

you were an assistant to the President that you needed a real job. 

Now, you have one. 

Secretary RIDGE. Thank you for your personal advocacy on that. 

Ms. HARMAN. I thought you would say that. 
39

The goal of the new department, as you are well aware, is not 

just to rearrange the deck chairs. It was to create one deck, one 

national integrated homeland security policy, and that is why so 

many of us are so impatient to see the final threat and vulnerability assessment. It not only will drive money to where it needs 

to go, but it will drive strategy. 

Secretary RIDGE. Right. 

Ms. HARMAN. Which was the whole point in the first place. 

I think you are making progress, I know it is hard. I think it is 

useful to have the States make their own suggestions to feed this 

national integrated strategy, but we have got to bring this project 

to a close as soon as possible. The Washington Post editorial is 

right in my opinion. 

I also want to thank you for your early visit to Los Angeles. I 

know you have made more than one. I was with you, maybe others 

were too, during your visit to LAX and the Terrorism Early Warning Group, which is an interagency facility, stood up in 1996, to our 

ports, et cetera. 

We have many high value targets in southern California, unfortunately, and our chairman, Miss Sanchez, and I and others are on 

this committee in part because we are very worried about protecting them against terrorist attack. 

I just want to ask you about two areas that I do not believe have 

been covered. I have been listening carefully. One is multiyear 

funding, grant funding for port security. 

Let me say that TSA has done quite well. There is still some 

bumps in the road, but you now have an Acting Director, David 

Stone, who was the Acting Director at LAX, who is terrific. 

You also have a Director at LAX, Anna Hinojosa, who I met with 

you, who just showed me the US–VISIT program, who is terrific. 

TSA can issue letters of intent on a multi-year basis for airport 

improvement projects, but it cannot do this for port improvement 

projects. We have all been discussing how dangerous ports are. The 

ports of L.A. and Long Beach move 40 percent of the container traffic in and out of the United States and they need to fund multiyear improvement projects. 

My question to you is do you support LOIs for port improvement 

and will you support legislation that has already been introduced, 

H.R. 3712, by Congresswoman Millender-McDonald, to require that 

there be letters of intent for ports improvement projects? 

Secretary RIDGE. Congresswoman, I first thank you for your 

strong support of the Department and the Secretary. 

There have been many issues we agreed upon, but I think we 

probably part company on this one. I think the taxpayers invest a 

great deal in ports and in port security. The Coast Guard’s budget 

is up 9 percent. We have put Customs and Border Patrol people 

there and we have already expended about $550 million for port 

grants, but I will tell you, based on my experience as Governor, we 

had a couple ports in Pennsylvania. There is Federal money in 

those ports, State money in those ports, local money in the ports. 

There are publicly supported employees in the ports. 

I think we ought to have a public discussion and get away from 

the aviation model and to say this is an intermediate stop in a supply chain that supports the private sector, and I know the private 
40

sector contributes a little bit to the security at these ports, but I 

think there is a responsibility, at least a shared responsibility, for 

some of these companies who use State or local property, where 

there are Federal resources applied, where Federal resources are 

overseas helping to secure their shipments, securing the ports. I 

think we need to have a discussion as to whether or not there is 

a role for those companies who use these intermodal facilities. 

Ms. HARMAN. Mr. Secretary, I do not mean to cut you off, but my 

time is going to expire. I would love to have that conversation. 

Secretary RIDGE. We need to have it publicly. 

Ms. HARMAN. The same is true about airports. 

I want to also ask you about interoperable communications, 

which is obviously critical to fix the problems we had on 9/11. My 

understanding is in your current budget you zero out funding for 

interoperability communications. You answered a question from 

Senator Lieberman the other day, saying that first responder agencies could use other grant categories for interoperable equipment 

purchases. 

I find this very disturbing, given the priority that this issue 

needs and just want to ask you 

Secretary RIDGE. Sure. 

Ms. HARMAN. —in my last 5 seconds to respond to why this category was zeroed out in your current budget. 

Secretary RIDGE. Well, first of all, there are some dollars that 

will continue. This is a multi —there are several departments, including Homeland Security, that are contributing to the interoperability study and taking a look at it vis-a-vis the government. Our 

department is in the near future beginning to set communication 

standards, interoperability standards. My sense is from an initial 

reading of this, some of these State reports, that their number one 

priority is communication and we want those to address that need, 

and there is in the pipeline now several billion dollars for the 

States and locals to drive down, to buy their communication equipment, and I think it is certainly an eligible cost, and I guess the 

decision is that you have $8 million appropriated since March 1st 

of last year. The Congress is going to give us another $3.5 or whatever sum. There will be several billion dollars more and the States 

and locals can draw down on that massive amount of money to improve their communications. 

Ms. HARMAN. Well, my time is up, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, Mr. Secretary. We need to solve this problem obviously, and dedicated spectrum is another part of the answer. 

Secretary RIDGE. Right. 

Ms. HARMAN. And we are working on that as well. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman COX. Gentlelady’s time has expired. 

The gentleman from Florida, the chairman of the Subcommittee 

on Rules, Mr. Diaz-Balart. 

Mr. DIAZ-BALART. Thank you for appearing before us today. I 

think it is appropriate to commend you for your leadership on the 

immigration issue. I recall even before the President made his bold 

and courageous immigration proposal that you spoke in a similar 

fashion as you did today in south Florida on that issue, and you 

deserve commendation for your courage and leadership. 
41

I would like to ask two questions, if I may, and then if I have 

time simply flag a third issue. 

On July! of last year, this select committee, Mr. Secretary, held 

a hearing on the Terrorist Threat Integration Center, TTIC. During 

that hearing I raised a question regarding the Cuban spy networks 

that have operated here in the United States, including Ana Belen 

Montes, a senior analyst for the Defense Intelligence Agency, who 

was arrested after she was caught spying for the Cuban regime. 

During the hearing I asked for an assessment and whether Ana 

Belen Montes was able to gather and pass on information even beyond those that are Cuban related. During the hearing, Larry Medford, then Assistant Director For Counterterrorism for the FBI, 

said that the information could not be addressed in an open format, 

that they would be happy to provide in a follow-up closed briefing. 

It has been 7 months and this committee has been denied a 

briefing from the FBI, DOJ or from anyone else. I know, Mr. Secretary, that you do not have oversight over the FBI, and I would 

doubt that this issue has been brought to your personal attention. 

Nonetheless, since your department plays an active role in the coordination of domestic and foreign intelligence, I would like to request that in the next 30 days DHS organize a briefing on this 

matter. 

Would you be willing, Mr. Secretary, to work with this committee 

to ensure a briefing on the potential risks to U.S. security in or 

emanating from Cuba within the next 30 years? 

That is question number one. 

Secretary RIDGE. To the extent that our department plays a role, 

and you are right we have analysts in TTIC in coordination with 

the intelligence community, you made a formal request, but I cannot respond on behalf of the other departments. I will bring it up 

with them and formally communicate. I would like to think we 

could do it and I think that is the mindset that we ought to bring 

toward the task you have given us. 

Mr. DIAZ-BALART. Thank you. 

Secretary RIDGE. Put it that way. 

Mr. DIAZ-BALART. Thank you. I appreciate your support on that. 

Secretary RIDGE. You know Larry Medford is no longer with us. 

Mr. DIAZ-BALART. I am aware of that and the services exist. 

Thank you for what you said with regard to your department and 

your department’s support on this. 

Number two, I applaud your commitment to reduce the current 

immigration application backlog, both for citizenship and residency, 

and I think Mr. Aguirre is doing a wonderful job, and he deserves 

commendation. 

However, the CIS still faces a serious application backlog issue. 

Dealing with the immigration backlog in my district takes up the 

overwhelming majority of case workers. 

I would like to ask you: How will, to the best of your knowledge 

how will the money be spent to achieve this goal in 6months, because there is a concern that the focus is on creating a system for 

applications received after 2006, rather than clearling the current 

backlog, so if you could address that. 

Secretary RIDGE. Right. 
42

First of all, there are two approaches that we are taking simultaneously. One, Eduardo Aguirre has begun a process of creating online applications for people. We are 6 months behind in just about 

every form of application, but there are two forms. One I think 

deals with reemployment application and one other form are a substantial part of the backlog. 

We began to put these online, so hopefully people can apply for 

the extension or apply for the next document and get approval online rather than going to the office. That will relieve some of the 

workload. 

Secondly, Congress, when they created the Homeland Security 

Department, also created the Office of Ombudsman to oversee the 

immigration process and to help oversee the backlog, and the ombudsman has been working with Eduardo. 

We are close to agreeing on a couple of pilot programs that will 

facilitate the process. We think it significantly will reduce the time 

from application to either approval or rejection, so, one, we are 

going to move some technology in. We hope it will facilitate the 

process, but also we want to experiment this year in a couple of 

our larger communities with some process changes. It does not 

grab any headlines, but, you know, people have to go back many, 

many times in some of these applications to get a final decision. We 

want to compress the number of times they have to go to the office 

in order to get approval. 

So we will be—we are working and we will be announcing those 

pilot programs in the future. 

Mr. DIAZ-BALART. Mr. Chairman, do I have 10 seconds to flag an 

issue? 

As part of this hearing and part of this record, I will be including 

a question for in-line explosive detection system machines at Miami 

International Airport. This is a very important issue for Miami 

International Airport and my constituents. I would ask you give 

that a high level of scrutiny. 

Secretary RIDGE. All right. 

Mr. DIAZ-BALART. Thank you. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr. Markey, 

is recognized for 5 minutes. Welcome back. 

Mr. MARKEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, very much. 

The City of Everett in Massachusetts is home to the only urban 

site of a liquefied natural gas facility in the United States, and 

when it went to orange alert in December it was reimbursed; that 

is, the City of Everett, for additional police and fire protection 

which was required during that period of time. 

Mr. MARKEY. Now, we have approximately one shipment per 

week of LNG coming in from overseas into Everett, a city of 40,000 

people. And, de facto, it is on Orange Alert full time, but yet the 

city of Everett receives no reimbursement for their police and fire, 

which puts a tremendous strain on Everett as it does on other 

smaller communities that have de facto Orange Alert facilities in 

their community. 

Do you think it makes sense, Mr. Secretary, that these communities should be eligible for reimbursement, even when there is no 

national Orange Alert because of the incredible burden which is 

placed upon these smaller communities to protect against the tar-
43

gets that have been identified by your agency as being at the top 

of the terrorist target list? 

Secretary RIDGE. Congressman, I think—I don’t know if you were 

here when I had a previous discussion with one of your colleagues. 

This is precisely the kind of situation where you have a community 

adjacent to a metropolitan area that gets substantial dollars, that 

benefits because of the infrastructure right across the river, and 

yet the people responsible for protecting the infrastructure across 

the river that generates a lot of the energy to support the metropolitan area don’t benefit from that Urban Area Security Initiative 

grant. 

So one of the reforms that we want to undertake this year is to 

broaden the application of the urban area initiative grants so that 

smaller counties and communities that basically the support the 

metropolitan area qualify for some of these dollars. 

Mr. MARKEY. So you are saying that a community like Everett—

see, the problem is that when the ship pulls away it is in Everett 

now, not in Boston. And so in addition to what happens when it 

is being unloaded, you also have this daily pressure on Everett to 

deal with it that Boston doesn’t have to shoulder because the facility is in that community. So you are saying that Everett itself 

would be able to qualify for

Secretary RIDGE. No, not in and of itself. Because it is a critical 

piece of infrastructure right across the river. I mean I have been 

there, I know what extraordinary measures not only the locals 

take, but the Coast Guard takes and other Federal agencies when 

the ship is in port and leaving port. But I do think that because 

it is a significant part of that regional infrastructure, that there 

ought to be some way that they qualify for some of those dollars 

from the urban area security initiative. 

Mr. MARKEY. So you are going to make that recommendation. 

Secretary RIDGE. Yes, because we have run into a couple of situations, Congressman, around the country where the cities got the 

big dollars, and yet the support that the cities have and get from 

adjacent counties haven’t benefited from any kind of distribution. 

And we would like to remedy that because the surrounding counties are very supportive of the major metropolitan areas. So we are 

going to look at changing the regs as it relates to that distribution. 

Mr. MARKEY. The city of Everett actually made a request to your 

Department, and the request—and the answer that came back to 

the city of Everett was, At this time we cannot make an exception 

to our list of critical infrastructure. 

Secretary RIDGE. Congressman, would you be kind enough to get 

a little closer to the microphone? 

Mr. MARKEY. Yeah, sure. The city of Everett actually received an 

e-mail back from your Department that said to them, At this time 

we cannot make an exception to our list of critical infrastructure 

and these facilities would not be eligible for funding. You are saying that is going to change? 

Secretary RIDGE. Well, because we just got the State plans, the 

50 States and the territories have given us their security plans. We 

have asked them to help us identify from their perspective what 

are the critical pieces of infrastructure. I realize it is not a specific 
44

answer, but we are looking for a way to solve that problem because 

it is not just unique to Everett. 

Mr. MARKEY. All right. One quick question. Last May you told 

me, in response to my questions at this hearing, that the technology for screening cargo exists, but deciding to use it is a funding 

question. Do you continue to feel that way, that the technology is 

available to screen cargo, but that it is a funding question and the 

agency has decided not to screen all cargo that goes on to passenger planes? 

Secretary RIDGE. I don’t—if you said I said it Senator, it is a 

matter of—excuse me, Congressman—it is a matter of the record. 

I don’t believe we are convinced within our S&T unit that we have 

the technology unique enough to help us deal with air cargo security, but we have invested—the Science and Technology unit has 

invested considerable dollars in looking for technology that could be 

applied to air cargo security. We have the known shipper program, 

as you know, but we need the technology to layer in the defense. 

Mr. MARKEY. The TSA has put out a request, an RFP to companies for commercial off-the-shelf technology to screen cargo. I mean, 

your Department has in place now a program to purchase this 

equipment. So my question is, Is it a funding question as a result, 

as to whether or not you are going to screen all cargo? 

Secretary RIDGE. And the answer is, Congressman, as soon as 

the RFPs are responded to the TSA and the S&T laboratories can 

confirm that they will do the job that we want them to do, then 

we come back to answer the question with regard to funding and 

whether or not—. 

Mr. MARKEY. Would you then screen all cargo on commercial 

planes if the technology is available? 

Chairman COX. The Secretary may answer the question. The 

gentleman’s time has expired. 

Secretary RIDGE. We are going to layer in defenses, and the 

known shipper is just part of it. OOG teams are part of that. 

Mr. MARKEY. I appreciate that. I am talking about screening. 

Secretary RIDGE. And I think that there will be places and choke 

points where we get most of this cargo in. If we have that technology, we will want to deploy it. I don’t know, I am not personally 

familiar with the technology. I don’t know what the RFP said and 

when that report is due back to us. I do know that by April of this 

year, pursuant to the appropriations bill last year, we are supposed 

to come back to the Congress and give you a report as relates to 

air cargo security. And I presume that you want us to comment on 

the technology component as well. So we will be back and revisiting 

the issue with you. If it is required, we ought to deploy it. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. The gentleman from Texas, the chairman of the Subcommittee on 

Cybersecurity, Science, and Research and Development, Mr. Thornberry, is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. THORNBERRY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Secretary, you know better than anyone that one of the primary reasons the Department was created was to take 22 separate 

agencies and to integrate them into one seamless unit. Obviously, 

you cannot go in and flip a switch and make that happen overnight. But management consultants, folks in the private sector, 
45

who have done large-scale integrations like this all say that you 

need to bite the bullet and get it done quickly, because the longer 

agencies can keep on doing their own thing, the more calcification 

that happens. Culturally and every other way it becomes much 

more difficult. From folks in the field to the people on the commissions that recommended your agency be created, there is concern 

that maybe we haven’t moved as fast as we should have in the first 

year to do that. And lots of examples, from procurement to IT to 

one personnel system to having CFOs in various organizations. 

I guess I would like to get a feel from you as to what degree of 

urgency you feel you need to bring in the second year of the Department to force this together into literally one seamless unit, not 

just make people work together, but to have one organization with 

everything from business operations, personnel systems, down the 

line. 

Secretary RIDGE. Congressman, from the day the legislation was 

signed to create the Department to the day we were supposed to 

operate was about 90 days. And I daresay that we are dealing, 

under the umbrella of the Department, with a couple of start-ups, 

a few mergers, an acquisition, and a little divestiture. And I also 

say that if that is done in the private sector, you normally have a 

couple of years to get ready to do it. I mean when all these big companies have merged, they have literally had to go for—while they 

are going through antitrust review and everything else, they had 

a heck of a lot more time to prepare for the integration of the system. There is a sense of urgency to do that within our Department 

because the integration of these enabling management systems will 

save us money and make us far more efficient. And I want to assure you that in less than a year, we have reduced the number of 

financial management systems, payroll systems—and we started 

with 22 payroll systems. By the end of this year, we are going to 

have one. We know we have to have eight or nine different procurement regimens. We now have one regulation that goes throughout 

the Department. But we are going to merge all those procurement 

systems. We have—we are working our way toward one human resource system. Those regulations should be out in a couple of 

weeks and we will begin implementing them over the next couple 

of years. 

So I would assure you that we have the same sense of urgency 

that your friends in the private sector have discussed with you in 

their conversations. It will make us more agile, far more efficient, 

and much more effective in doing what you have tasked us to do, 

and that is secure the homeland. And I will be happy—when we 

get to that first-year review on March 1st, we are going to lay that 

out for you to see, and I think you will be gratified by how much 

integration has gone on. 

There is still more to do. And again, part of it is—I didn’t have 

my complete leadership team in place for the first 4 or 5 months 

because there is a confirmation process. But the pace has accelerated, and we will keep the pressure on so we can reduce the systems to one Department-wide system as quickly as we can. 

Mr. THORNBERRY. Well, I appreciate that. Let me ask you about 

one other issue and that is how you measure and how we measure 

how we are making progress. The Chairman mentioned at the be-
46

ginning that we are looking at a metrics bill. I know it is something that you are considering. I am a little concerned, when I hear 

some of the questions you have already been asked, that there is 

some suggestion that the Department or anybody is going to put 

together one magic piece of paper that is going to tell us all our 

vulnerabilities and threats, and if we just fund that all our problems go away. Obviously that is not the case. It is important to get 

a sense of what our vulnerabilities are. The threat is going to 

change all the time, particularly in reaction to the things we do. 

But do you have a sense of ways to measure how much and 

whether we are making progress? Because a lot of the problem 

with your Department is it is what doesn’t happen that determines 

our success. And so that is part of the challenge, I think, on both 

sides of the table we face. 

Secretary RIDGE. Well, Congressman, there are—we certainly 

have internal performance measures. I mean, our strategic outline 

for the consolidation of the departments has been reduced to a couple of hundred pages of fine print, and where there are dates and 

there are names next to each date and those people responsible for 

getting that piece of the integration done, and we monitor that 

very, very carefully. 

Externally, some of the work we do is visible. How quickly we 

get the grants out, that is measurable. Now that we have State 

strategies and we have an ability to work with the States, I think 

in a more confidential way, we will determine what the critical infrastructure pieces are and can quietly and privately share what 

measures have been done to secure those critical pieces of infrastructure. 

So, yes, I agree with the Chairman’s and the committee’s notion. 

We have—should have some kind of performance matrix. I think 

we just have to be careful in what areas it is a public performance 

matrix. Obviously there is accountability of this committee across 

the board, both public and private. We just in the years ahead have 

to work those out. 

Chairman COX. The gentlelady from New York, Ms. Slaughter, is 

recognized for 5 minutes. 

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And, Mr. Secretary, 

it is very nice to see you this morning, my neighbor from Pennsylvania, and we are glad to have you here. I don’t think anything I 

have heard lately, though, makes my blood run colder than the fact 

that the 50 States are doing their own assessment. And I want to 

tell you, I bet you will find out that every State is going to be a 

hotbed of intrigue and terrorism and that you are going to have to 

spend a lot of money there. I have experience. After 9/11, the Congress voted $20 billion to help New York rebuild its infrastructure 

and try to get back on its feet. And then I am sure you know the 

story. Our Governor then asked for 54 billion more for many 

things, including a rail line from Albany to Schenectady, and there 

was such major embarrassment in the whole delegation that they 

finally withdrew that. 

I had no idea we were waiting to get that vulnerability assessment to wait for those 50 States and come up with that they need. 

I think you are probably going to—after you get it, you will have 

to go back to the drawing board an awful lot. I am concerned about 
47

it. But at the same time, that places in the middle of States that 

are—small populations and probably less threat are getting some 

money. 

I represent the Niagara Falls area which represents one of the 

largest power sources on the earth, a large leftover from the Manhattan Project, still a number of chemical plants. One of the most 

busy—probably the busiest border, other than Detroit, going across. 

And we can’t get much money. Frankly, the money that has been 

given out has gone to grants pretty much to Albany. Albany gives 

some to New York City, most of it to New York City, some to Albany and a little bit to Buffalo. This has got to change. And I 

would like your assurance that we could get something more reasonable, that the people who really need the money are going to get 

it. But I really want you to take another thought on that business 

of having 50 States do it. 

Secretary RIDGE. Congresswoman, I assure you that the identification by the States of critical infrastructure is not the final answer. We have already begun the process of taking a look at what 

States have put forth as critical pieces of infrastructure, and, in the 

instances with which I am familiar, they are inflated lists. I mean, 

it is more of a wish list rather than a need list. 

Ms. SLAUGHTER. I would bet on it. 

Secretary RIDGE. Congressman Shays mentioned that. And our 

job is to work with the States and in just about every instance with 

which I am familiar we have significantly reduced the list. 

Ms. SLAUGHTER. But shouldn’t we have been able within a month 

to know what is in the States, the 50 States that could have been 

vulnerable? 

Secretary RIDGE. Oh, I would tell you that as a former Governor, 

my emergency management community had a pretty good idea of 

what the critical resources and sites were, power plants, transmission grids, nuclear facilities, chemical facilities. I mean, I think 

any Governor and any emergency management director in every 

State has a pretty good idea right now, even before 9/11. I think 

post–9/11, given the threat environment—these are lists that are 

easily accessible—I think it is a matter of really setting priorities 

within those lists, and that will be part of the responsibility of the 

Office of State and Local Government Coordination and Preparedness, because not all these sites have to be secured at the same 

level. We have to set priorities within them. 

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Well now, talking about the Nexus program, 

too, which is terribly important, again, for those of us on the border 

States, you are not planning to institute that all over the country, 

are you? That would be an enormous expense. 

Secretary RIDGE. Nexus? 

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Yes, to allow people to come across borders, who 

come across every day, to have some identity to give them quick 

access. 

Secretary RIDGE. Well, we have on several areas along the U.S.–

Canadian border implemented the Nexus program and it is where 

people register, vetted on both sides, and it expedites traffic. 

Ms. SLAUGHTER. It is going very slowly, however. Traffic tie-ups 

are still very difficult, sometimes 5 and 6 hours between U.S.-Canadian border. 
48

Secretary RIDGE. Well, part of that, Congresswoman, is we work 

with particularly our friends at the Canadian border to take a look 

at whatever additional infrastructure needs we have, and down the 

road, both governments, national governments, are going to have 

to determine whether they want to build additional infrastructure 

there. Right now our priority is we take a look at the different 

ports of entry to see what alterations we can make within the existing highway system to reward people who sign up for the Nexus 

program with immediate entry into the United States or into Canada. We have several of those lanes now and there will be more 

in the future. 

Ms. SLAUGHTER. But it is going slowly. But I know that the 

President has requested 340 million for the US VISIT program, 

and in May you are going to be awarding that as a prime contract; 

is that correct? 

Secretary RIDGE. Well, the next phase, you are talking about 05, 

the next phase of the US VISIT program is at the land borders, 

and I frankly can’t tell you when the—I believe the RFP might be 

out. I can’t tell you when the contract will be awarded. I will get 

back to you on that. 

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Well, is it true that when people come into the 

United States and have their fingerprints taken, that we have 

nothing to do—we have no way to check those fingerprints? 

Secretary RIDGE. They are checked against a database. We have 

already kept out about 100 people. 

Ms. SLAUGHTER. But we don’t have the strict watch list do we, 

that we need? Aren’t we behind on that? 

Secretary RIDGE. Two different sources of information for us, 

Congresswoman. The integration of the watch list is happening as 

we speak. And we have in the Terrorist Screening Center, we have 

all those databases and people going over those lists. As a matter 

of fact, some of the first inquiries came from State and local police. 

So that is a name-based identification system. But the fingerprint 

scans give us, we think, almost a failproof means of matching identities with a huge, basically, a criminal database that we have accumulated literally over the years if not decades. And based on 

that, while we have viewed 1 million people coming across, we have 

kept—we have turned over 100 away, put them on the next flight 

and sent them back where they came from. 

Ms. SLAUGHTER. When I gave you my list of things that I have 

to look out for in my district, I omitted the Lackawanna 7. So we 

probably—I may have to give you a call, Mr. Secretary. 

Secretary RIDGE. All right. 

Ms. SLAUGHTER. See what we can do. In the meantime, the National Journal says this morning they are about to cut your budget 

to pay for the highway bill, so we will have to look out for that as 

well. 

Chairman COX. The gentlelady’s time has expired, although surely we can find funds in the highways bill to add more lanes to get 

some of that stuff moving at the border. 

The gentleman from California, the chairman of the Committee 

on Armed Services, Mr. Hunter, is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thanks to Secretary 

Ridge. Thank you, Mr. Secretary Ridge, for being with us today 
49

and walking us through this budget. You know, you were—you 

were with us in San Diego on the border a couple of months ago 

and watched that enormous truck traffic coming across the border. 

And I recall that we have some 2,200 trucks a day coming across 

at Otay Mesa, and you were there on the bridge at one of the ports 

of entry there and asked the port director or one of the other administrators why all those trucks that were in line, basically waiting to get their paperwork approved, couldn’t at the same time be 

x-rayed by a nonintrusive—one of these nonintrusive machines 

that, for practical purposes, gives you an internal picture of the 

container, just like the x-ray machines that do our carry-on luggage 

at the airport. And his reply to you was, well, they didn’t have the 

$15,000 to pave the road, or something that you didn’t feel was 

really a totally responsive answer. 

And that reminded me of this basic of balancing problem that 

you have in this prioritization problem. I think it is clear that our 

duty, our primary duty as a Federal Government in Homeland Security, is to know two things: what is coming into the country and 

who is coming into the country. And I looked at the billions of dollars that are going to be going out to States and local governments 

to so-called first responders in this budget, and it is my feeling that 

if in fact something comes through the land border or the sea border, maybe coming in on one of these trucks, a weapon of mass destruction or something else that causes a major terrorist event in 

a city or in a community in this country at some point, the very 

same city fathers who put together a laundry list of shiny new fire 

trucks that they wanted to have for their FIRE DEPARTMENT are 

going to blame you and the Department of Homeland Security for 

not doing what they feel is your primary duty, which is to make 

sure that we know what is coming into the country. 

And so my recommendation would be that we would take a new 

look and we rebalance this list and that we fulfill that obligation 

first. It looks to me like it is still going to be a long time before 

we get above 10 to 15 percent of the cargo containers that are coming into the country on a mass basis in a position where they can 

be scrutinized by this x-ray technology, which is developing fairly 

rapidly and is becoming less expensive. So I would hope that you 

would focus on that, and that we would see a shift in the funding 

profile in this budget in future years. 

The other issue that I think is an important one that you could 

be of great assistance on is this. We have built a border fence between what was the biggest smuggling corridor in the Nation, that 

is, the smugglers’ corridor between San Diego, California and Tijuana, Mexico. And through that corridor in the past, most of the 

cocaine that came into the country, and most of the smuggling of 

illegal aliens that came into the country traveled. It is about a 14-

mile corridor from the Pacific Ocean to the coastal hills. We embarked on a program of building a border fence, a triple fence along 

that border, and we funded it and we have been putting dollars in 

in fact from the—under the antidrug program from the defense 

committees for a number of years into that fence. By doing that, 

we eliminated the 300 drug trucks or so a month that were simply 

ramming across the border, because there was no obstacle bringing 

cocaine into our population. We also reduced the smuggling of ille-
50

gal aliens from what was represented as 500,000 arrests per year 

in that San Diego corridor down to about 100,000. So we knocked 

it down by 80 percent because we had the fence. There is one piece 

of fence left that hasn’t been built, and I haven’t been able to get 

it done over the last couple of years, and I think not only to my 

frustration but that of the Border Patrol and people in the U.S. 

Navy who are worried about the security of our Navy base which 

is just north of that border. And that piece of fence is a couple of 

miles just before you get to the Pacific Ocean, and it abuts what 

is known as Border State Park. That area includes the smugglers’ 

canyon. And the reason we haven’t been able to do that is because 

the Coastal Commission doesn’t feel it is aesthetically pleasing to 

have a fence there right on the border at the Pacific Ocean. 

I would hope that you would help us, because we are going to 

have a hearing by the Coastal Commission and a decision in the 

next several days as to whether or not they allow or recommend 

that the fence be permitted to be finished at that location. 

And I would just remind you also, as I just reminded the Secretary of the Navy, that we have one of the biggest NAVAL bases 

in the world, with some very sensitive aspects, just a few miles 

north of that opening to another country where we have no monitoring capability with respect to systems that could be brought into 

the country by vehicle and headed north, and could arrive in just 

a few minutes at our major naval bases just a few miles north of 

that particular area. 

Now, we put in, when we passed the legislation to build the 

fence, Republicans and Democrats put in something that was very 

unusual. We put in a waiver of the Endangered Species Act, because the Endangered Species Act had up to that point been a bar 

to building that fence. And we put in, and President Clinton signed 

the law waiving the Endangered Species Act, if the waiver was requested by the administration. 

And so if this administration requests a waiver, we can move 

ahead immediately with that last section of the fence and we can 

waive the Endangered Species Act requirements. Now, let me tell 

you, what is involved in the Endangered Species Act requirements 

are now a demand from the resources people that the border security—that the Border Patrol pay $12 million for mitigating lands 

before they build that fence. So that is going to suck 12 million 

bucks out of your budget if you don’t invoke the waiver, along with 

obviously causing a major delay. 

I would hope that you could write a letter to the Coastal Commission and, on a basis of security, border security and homeland 

security, do two things: approve that—approve the fence; and secondly, I would hope that you as our leader in this area in administration would, in fact, request that waiver that President Clinton 

signed the legislation providing for. I think that is clearly the intent of Congress. It was passed by a fairly overwhelming vote in 

the House and Senate to allow for that waiver to be invoked. It is 

somewhat surprising that it hasn’t been invoked. I think now is the 

time to do it. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. HUNTER. And thank you. 
51

Secretary RIDGE. Congressman, I will personally look into the enabling language in the statute, talk to the Coastal Commission, 

and communicate back to you. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. 

Secretary RIDGE. You are welcome. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman from Oregon, Mr. DeFazio, is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. DEFAZIO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being here today. You have got an iron constitution to 

sit there so long. I will try and pose quickly three questions or concerns. 

The first goes, like many members, I went out and met with my 

emergency personnel and first responders. The thing I heard from 

the State police, the county sheriffs, the local police, the fire and 

everybody, the number one concern was the lack of interoperable 

communications. I am very concerned to see that that has been in 

its sort of singular form zeroed out of the budget. An 85 million reduction, and apparently merged to be competitive in some other 

programs. And I would ask you to address that briefly. 

Secondly, there are other categories, the FIRE grants, the 

EMPG, all these were principally accessed from smaller cities and 

rural areas as their principal sorts of funding. I am concerned 

about this. I understand about setting priorities, but on the other 

hand these are pretty smart terrorists, and I am worried that we 

create essentially soft targets if we totally ignore—and I am afraid 

we are moving in that direction—the needs of the smaller cities 

and rural areas. I have football games in my district that gather 

25,000 people together on a Saturday. That is a pretty attractive 

target. So there are smaller communities that provide for very 

high, high-risk potential targets for some terrorist activities, and I 

would like to hear your perspective on that. 

And then the third one is something I asked you about last time, 

and again you may not know—I am also in an aviation hearing. I 

may more appropriately ask that down there. But I asked about 

your familiarity with and the problem that we weren’t requiring 

the screening of all the vendors that flow in and out of the airport 

on a daily basis; tens of thousands across the country, while we 

were requiring the screening of pilots, flight attendants, frequent 

travelers and others. And apparently, I don’t believe this problem 

has been comprehensively addressed. So if you could, Mr. Secretary, briefly address those concerns. 

Secretary RIDGE. All right. I will see if I can. 

Mr. DEFAZIO. That is actually a question, not a speech. 

Secretary RIDGE. It is very appropriate. I believe interoperable 

communications is everyone’s highest priority. 

We are in the position of having the responsibility to set standards. We are not going to tell them what equipment to buy, but we 

need to set the standard so that it is interoperable. There is some 

short-term technology on the market today that I understand that 

can assist local communities, but we do need to take a look at a 

long-term solution. We will as part of our strategic plan for this 

year; that is a—one of the highest priorities, we have to get those 

standards out. We have done standards for radiological detection 

equipment. We have done standards for personal protection gear. 
52

We need and are working on standards for interoperability, and not 

only this year but in future years, I think we will continue to support the State and locals and make that as an eligible expenditure. 

I would say we are—and I am going to spend a little bit of time 

with some of my former colleagues, the Governors, when they come 

into town. A couple of concerns I have that they could help address 

because we need to be partners in this. One, we are going to set 

the standards, but the police and the fire in the future are going 

to continue to upgrade their own communications equipment. So it 

is not just—we won’t have—not only access to Federal money but 

there is going to be State and local money to do it as well. So we 

are going to need their leadership to make sure that the State and 

local portion is expanded on a broader-based regional communication system. So we need them to do that. 

We also need them to help us design a distribution system so 

that some of that 20 percent that goes right to the states can be 

allocated from the State capitol to some of these smaller communities if it is the State’s opinion that there is critical infrastructure 

or events that need to be protected. 

The fire grants give us an opportunity to spread about—we have 

asked for half a billion dollars. Last year the Congress appropriated three-quarters of a billion dollars with some of the monies 

out to the smaller communities that you are talking about. We 

have asked for the same amount. The President asked for the same 

amount this year as he asked the year before. I think I have in the 

back of my mind, Congress, Congress will probably add to that 

amount and shift some other priorities within our budget. We accept that. But we know that about 95 percent of the fire grants 

that went out last year were really directed toward use to either 

combat that fire or terrorist attack. I mean, there is no—they have 

got a laundry list that they could choose from, but they have been 

fairly judicious about where they have been spending that money. 

And one of the good things about the fire grant program is that 

there is peer review. Firemen know what firemen need. They know 

their requirements and they respond accordingly so. But at least 

there is some comfort that this is how we are spreading a lot of 

money out around these smaller communities. And I don’t believe 

we have—we are complete with the screening of everybody that has 

access to our airports and our aircraft. We have started with those 

who operate and fly. But, again, transportation worker identification cards, there are still additional screening and vetting responsibilities that TSA has, and we will administer the Federal security 

directives if we are not done doing that yet. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. DEFAZIO. Just one brief point on Disaster Medical Assistance 

Teams. I am concerned that they seem to be getting less support 

from FEMA. They are really essential—Disaster Medical Assistance Teams. They are expressing concerns, since FEMA has been 

moved into Homeland Security, that they are not getting as much 

cooperation and coordination as they used to, and if some of your 

staff could perhaps get back to us. 

Secretary RIDGE. Well, if you would be kind enough to put those 

concerns in writing, and I will try to specifically address them for 

you. 
53

Chairman COX. The gentleman from New Jersey, Mr. Andrews. 

And before you begin, the chairman has been with us, pardon me—

the Secretary has been with us all morning. 

Secretary RIDGE. I try to keep my answers brief. 

Chairman COX. He has told us that he needs to leave at 12:15. 

I think with some cooperation, we can get all of our member questions in. But we do need to stick strictly to this time limit. The gentleman from New Jersey. 

Mr. ANDREWS. Thank you. 

Welcome, Mr. Secretary. It is always an honor to be in public 

service with you. I want to follow up on the questions about interoperability because it is the thing I hear most frequently about 

from law enforcement people. I agree with you; it would be a mistake to throw a lot of money at this problem before we have sorted 

out what the standards ought to be. 

And I also frankly believe that although homeland security is a 

piece of this problem, it is not the whole problem. And although it 

may not be politically correct to say this, I don’t think Federal taxpayers should be paying to solve an interoperability problem that 

deals with local crime and local public safety. I think we should 

pay a share of it but not the whole thing. 

When do you think the standards that your Department is developing would be ready? 

Secretary RIDGE. Well, based upon a preliminary read of some of 

the homeland security strategies that we received on January 1st, 

it seems to be the highest priority, one of the highest priorities for 

every State. It is our highest priority within S&T, and they have 

been working on them for quite some time. And instead of speculating as to when they will be done, I would rather give you a date 

certain, if you let me talk to the folks in our Science and Technology Directorate. 

Mr. ANDREWS. But you think it is eminent. 

Secretary RIDGE. Yes. There is a lot of pressure on them to get 

it done, because that is the highest priority for the first responders. 

Mr. ANDREWS. I have a question about TTIC and the way it is 

working, and maybe I could ask questions through this hypothetical scenario. Let’s assume this morning that TTIC picked up 

credible information that they felt that there was going to be an 

attack that would try to take over a nuclear power plant somewhere and convert that plant into a weapon of mass destruction by 

deliberately causing a meltdown of the core. And let’s assume that 

that was the only level of specificity we had, that they were interested in nuclear power plants. We didn’t know what part of the 

country, we didn’t know when or under what circumstances. 

Would you have been notified, if you were Governor of Pennsylvania again, and given the fact that TMI sits in Harrisburg

Secretary RIDGE. We have several facilities. 

Mr. ANDREWS. Would the TTIC notify the Governor of Pennsylvania of that specific piece of information? Would the TTIC notify 

the head of the Pennsylvania State Police? How far down would 

that specific information go? 

Secretary RIDGE. First of all, there would probably be multiple 

notifications if the threat is deemed that credible—this is a hypo-
54

thetical, and I don’t normally like to answer hypotheticals. But if 

it is that credible that that is the target, is there a date certain? 

Mr. ANDREWS. Well, when I say that, I don’t mean just TMI. I 

mean a nuclear power plant somewhere in America. That is all we 

know. 

Secretary RIDGE. But that has been a fairly—I mean there have 

been concerns raised from time to time about potential attacks on 

nuclear power plants for the past couple of years. I think what you 

are saying is it’s from a very, very credible source, we have no 

doubt that they have got the information, they just don’t know 

when and how? 

Mr. ANDREWS. Where. 

Secretary RIDGE. And where. 

Mr. ANDREWS. Right. 

Secretary RIDGE. I think at that point in time, the homeland security advisers and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission so to the 

companies themselves, and that information would go out. 

Mr. ANDREWS. Would it go out to the

Secretary RIDGE. It would go out privately. 

Mr. ANDREWS. Would it go out to the local law enforcement people? Would the people in Dauphin County, which is where Harrisburg, as you know—would they receive this information? 

Secretary RIDGE. We would probably rely on—again, we are 

very—it would have to be very, very credible for us to rely, to notify 

every small police department around every nuclear power facility. 

But if we deemed this that critical, that poignant, that eminent, 

yes. And we are—but it raises a very good question in how do we 

go about doing that. And we are developing not only a normal 

means of communication, pick up the phone and call; the Nuclear 

Regulatory Commission has their way of doing it. But we are also 

creating an Internet-based system that would be able to exchange 

information with local police departments. 

Mr. ANDREWS. It is a hard problem that I daresay needs to be 

fixed. 

The final point is more parochial. On August 7th of 2001, your 

predecessor at INS made a commitment to create a new service 

center in my area, and it hasn’t happened yet. So I am very interested if I could talk to your staff about how we can expedite that 

for happening. 

Secretary RIDGE. Okay. When was the commitment made, Congressman? 

Mr. ANDREWS. August 7th of 2001. A lot has happened since 

then, obviously. But I would like your office’s attention on trying 

to solve that problem. 

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman is to be commended for yielding 

his time—. 

Mr. ANDREWS. I have great sympathy for my colleague. 

Chairman COX. With 10 seconds remaining. The gentlelady from 

the District of Columbia, Ms. Holmes Norton, is recognized for 5 

minutes. 

Ms. NORTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you, Mr. 

Secretary, for the way you are dealing with a thousand different 

priorities at one time. 
55

Let me ask you first a question that concerns this entire National Capital Region. You may be aware that, alone in the United 

States, general aviation has been closed in the capital of the United 

States, sending a very loud message that we don’t know how to 

protect our own capital. We know how to—we, of course, have 

opened general aviation just a few days later in New York, at Dulles, at BWI. 

The chairman of the Transportation Committee and of the Aviation Committee, Subcommittee, on which I serve had pressed and 

pressed for a very long time. Finally, the FAA reauthorization bill 

made a plan mandatory. The President signed this bill in December, and it says the Secretary of Homeland Security shall develop, 

that is ‘‘shall,’’ and implement a security plan to permit general 

aviation aircraft to land and take off at Ronald Reagan Washington 

National Airport. The chairman of the Aviation Subcommittee, Mr. 

Mica, told me that he intends to hold a hearing at Ronald Reagan 

Airport in order to see how security at the airport and certainly 

general aviation security is proceeding. 

May I ask you what progress you have made in drawing a plan 

mandated by the FAA reauthorization? 

Secretary RIDGE. Let me for one moment check. Since Congress 

directed—within TSA or within—. 

Ms. NORTON. But that is the Secretary of Homeland Security. 

Secretary RIDGE. Well of course, the Secretary, but hopefully he 

has not imputed constructive knowledge of everything that is going 

on within 180,000 employees. We try to stay on top of it, and I 

would just have to get back to you with a specific answer rather 

than a general one. 

Ms. NORTON. Well I would very much ask you to do that Mr. 

Chairman. I am speaking not only for myself. The entire Aviation 

Subcommittee has pressed this very, very hard for 2-1/2 years now. 

Secretary RIDGE. And I am very familiar with the complaints and 

concerns registered not only by my—by Congressmen and -women 

and Senators, but the general aviation community at large. And we 

have had many conversations with them and how those conversations both with Congress and the aviation community, and where 

it is on the drawing board I do not know and I will have to get 

back to you. 

Ms. NORTON. I commend you that the industry has indicated that 

there is nothing it would not do that Homeland Security asked it 

to do, even though it would hurt its operations in order to get general aviation up again at Ronald Reagan National Airport. 

Let me ask you a question concerning a part of your testimony 

at PAGE 4 of 8. You say, the administration is moving forward in 

purchasing the most important countermeasures, and high on the 

list—this is under biodefense—and high on the list are next-generation vaccines for both smallpox and anthrax. You may be aware 

that localities, States, complain that they diverted funds from other 

urgent biodefense measures when the smallpox project was announced by the administration. Actually, the administration’s theory is a very good one. That is, if you vaccinate first responders, 

you can avoid mass vaccination of smallpox of the entire population. It made a lot of sense. The reason for this, as you know, is 

that we are not sure what happened to the smallpox reserves of the 
56

Soviet Union when the Soviet Union collapsed. No one has been 

able to fully account for that, so we are forced now to act as though 

there could be a smallpox occurrence. 

This matter seems to be stalled at least since April. And the 

States proceeded, and looks like they stopped dead. But there 

seems to have been no particular leadership from the administration. I think the Ranking Member read some figures indicating the 

disparity between the number of people vaccinated. I am concerned 

because I represent the District of Columbia, and the District of 

Columbia has many more first responders that it thinks should be 

vaccinated. What is great about this is actually it is a small number relative to the population. Here the District of Columbia says 

3,000 to 4,000, because we would have to contend not only with our 

own 600,000 people, but with, of course, the entire—the 200,000 

Federal workers, the entire Federal establishment. Of course, of 

the 3,000 to 5,000 we should—we said we should vaccinate, we 

have vaccinated 105. 

I understand that the compensation program is no longer the 

problem. That was part of the reason volunteers did not come forward. There are some adverse consequences here. 

There is apparently no—with a 10 percent reduction in the funding available for HHS, no CDC funding. If CDC is to be involved, 

they are going to take that out of their own funding. 

I need to know where we are on the original smallpox initiative 

and whether you think there is funding or how we can get the 

States back up. We have got 39,000 out of what you now say is 

50,000. The problem is that scattered. No one has said, but you 

must have X number in this county of first responders, X number 

in this city, so that you would be covered. So it looks like they have 

scattered all over the place and it looks as if we would not be protected in the event of a smallpox event in our country. 

Chairman COX. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

Secretary RIDGE. Clearly, given the potential catastrophe associated with a smallpox epidemic and hundreds of thousands if not 

millions of people dying because of it, we, one, take note that for 

the first time we have enough vaccine in the national—the Strategic National Stockpile. 

The next step is to convince—because we cannot mandate—convince the public health community and those who would be responsible for vaccination that it is in the broader national public health 

interest to increase the number of men and women who subjected 

themselves to the vaccination, understanding, you are right, there 

are potential side effects, small in number, but potentially very 

devastating to the individual. You have the compensation program, 

hopefully, that will relieve not the fear or the concern, but some 

of the economic consequences if that occurs. And I know Secretary 

Thompson is committed to doing the very best he can to educate 

and promote and advocate that people in the public health community take it upon themselves to identify health professionals who 

would be willing to administer the vaccine. 

We are still as interested in increasing the numbers, but it has 

been fairly—I think it is great that we have got 40, 000. It is not 

evenly distributed around the country, clearly, and I don’t believe 

that Secretary Thompson has diminished his desire and his effort 
57

to convince the public health community they have to help us do 

more. We can’t mandate people to get vaccinated, so we have to 

convince them of the need, and the public health community needs 

to get it done. 

Ms. NORTON. We need to make sure that there is a push to continue to do this because, again, all reports are that once it got 

stalled it never got started up again. Anyway, thank you Mr. Secretary. 

Chairman COX. The gentlelady from Texas, Ms. Jackson-Lee is 

recognized for 5 minutes. 

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. I thank the distinguished Chairman and the 

Ranking Member. 

Let me thank the Secretary for his gracious gift, I guess, to this 

committee in his time. And I hope that you will allow my two colleagues that are following me to complete their questions as well. 

Let me associate myself—now there are three colleagues. Allow me 

to associate myself with Congressman Weldon’s remarks regarding 

the importance of this committee and the fact that we should have 

a standing Homeland Security Committee, because our effort with 

you is collaborative. We are a team, and even though our oversight 

requires us sometime to be constructively critical, we are in fact a 

team. 

Let me acknowledge the fact that I have got a number of 

Houstonians here in the room, the President of the University of 

Houston, Dr. Gogue, is here with me, and board members with 

Chairman Smith, and obviously universities and communities are 

particularly concerned about how we can ensure the security of the 

hometown. 

And so I am going to pose a number of questions if I might, and 

can I also reinvite you back to Texas? I indicated that there are 

a number of sites that you had an opportunity to visit. We would 

like to show you what we have done. But we also want to show 

you, as a city that is enormously vulnerable, being No. 7 on the 

vulnerability list, what some of the needs are that may be reflective of this country. 

I want to cite for you some of the financial issues and problems 

that I think—and let me do that very quickly. There was an $800 

million—the fiscal year budget request to the President requests 

grants for our State and local first responders and related homeland security efforts close to 800 million, or an 18 percent decrease 

from the amounts appropriated by Congress for fiscal year 2004. 

We are giving the Coast Guard $541 million less than the 1.1 billion that they have requested. And we are giving the Bureau of 

Citizenship and Immigration Services—236 million was appropriated in 2004, and it has been slashed by $140 million. Each of 

those are just to suggest to you that we are not going up, we are 

going down. And I believe that we have problems in that area. 

But let me focus on specifically the immigration areas and a 

number of questions along those lines. You yourself said—as was 

cited by my colleagues—just about a year ago, that it is important 

for us to find a pathway of citizenship or at least to document all 

of those who are here. You said there were about 8- to 14 million 

undocumented individuals and, of course, you acknowledge that 

some came in illegally. 
58

My question and concern with the President’s plan is, I don’t 

think it answers the question and the statement that you made in 

Miami a couple of months ago, because it is a flat-earth plan. What 

it does is, yes, it provides documentation. But what it does after 

a 3-year period, it literally drops off the radar screen, because at 

that point they have to reassess whether they will go again, whether they will have a job or not. 

Wouldn’t it be better, Mr. Secretary, if we could work collaboratively for a pathway to citizenship, getting in line, not necessarily 

in front of the others, documenting everybody, knowing that these 

individuals are not going to return to their homeland, know that 

they are contributing taxpaying individuals, of which you said 

yourself, and so that we shouldn’t play these kind of false games 

of a 3-year program? 

Let me also acknowledge the US VISIT program which I deal 

with quite readily. I am on the Border Committee—Subcommittee—here, and also the on Judiciary Committee. I would 

like to know what your estimate is of the cost of making that work. 

There is an extensive backlog on the border between Mexico and 

the United States, a large amount of complaints along those lines. 

I have seen the program work. But I have also seen it not work. 

And I think it is extremely important that we talk about how many 

staffing that we will need and the cost we will need to expedite 

that transition along those borders, but also to be secure. 

You know and I know that you have heard a lot of complaints 

from the airlines on the data collection of all travelers that are 

traveling in the United States. I am particularly concerned about 

domestic travelers and the sense of collecting data on a grandmother visiting her grandchildren. It is an invasion of privacy that 

I don’t think makes Americans more safe. And we can do better 

than this. We can do better than clogging up our computer lines 

and databases with whether or not Mrs. Jones, 68 years old, is 

traveling from Chicago, Illinois to Jackson, Mississippi and maybe 

to Houston, Texas. 

Might I just quickly say as you answer that, this problem of reimbursement to our local communities. I have said it over and over 

again. You are a Governor. I came out of city council. I can assure 

you I love State government, but the bureaucracy is enormous 

when our cities and localities are not being reimbursed as they 

should be or as quickly as they should be. My city alone is still 

waiting for reimbursement. 

Let me finish by saying if you come to Houston, I would like you 

to see our citizen corps, but know that citizen corps needs to be 

neighborhood based. I am continuing to press the agency for that. 

Not big congomlerate-based, county-based or city-based, but we 

need to have citizen corps that are directed through the neighborhoods. 

I hope you will look at that and I hope you will provide this in 

writing and give me your structure for MWBEs so that we can get 

more of our small businesses and minority businesses working locally, and our small—and our other university systems working locally with Homeland Security. 
59

But if you can just focus on the data and the US VISIT and the 

immigration question and reimbursement, I would appreciate it. 

Thank you for your time. 

Chairman COX. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

Secretary RIDGE. Well, let me see if I can cover it all for you, 

Congresswoman. First of all, you should know that we have designed some very—probably some of the most flexible rules for procurement for small businesses. And we have been working with the 

minority business community to do that. And I would be happy to 

share that with you because, again, as we create a model agency, 

we take a look at how things have been done in the past. And we 

decided that we needed more flexibility and greater outreach to the 

minority business community, and I would be happy to share that 

work with you. 

You talked a little bit about the reimbursement dilemma that the 

locals have. This Department, hopefully with the support of Governors nationwide, and mayors, will try to work. It is an intraState 

problem. We are ready to cut the checks, but I think we need to 

be the catalyst to get the Governors to sit down with the mayors 

and come up with a satisfactory plan. 

I would tell you some States already have one. I happened to 

visit Massachusetts and was familiar with their plan. They have 

divided their State into regions. They only honored regional requests for equipment and training exercises. They came out with 

a very specific distribution program, and so there, through their 

homeland security adviser, with the great support of the Governor, 

they have come out with a plan to strategize and to take all those 

dollars and distribute them in the most effective way for those citizens. 

I think we have to take a look at a couple of best practices and 

convince our colleagues to adopt one of them. 

The data collection at the airports, we are hopeful that we can 

convince the Congress and the aviation public that the CAPPS II 

program, the Computer Assisted Passenger Pre-Screening program, 

is something that will add not only additional security but certainly 

improve the convenience at the airports. I, too, have witnessed 

some people being pulled aside for more intense examination and 

review and have questioned myself—certainly as I looked at them, 

I couldn’t see any reason why they would have been pulled aside, 

particularly elderly people. But I do know that we have a job to 

make sure that we ensure the rights of personal privacy are protected. As we scan the database to make some decisions to let people go through, I think it will cut down substantially on secondary 

screening, but we have to make the case before Congress and the 

American public and I think we are prepared to do that. 

You talk about the borders. I think one of the big challenges we 

have at the border, something the country is going to have to wrestle with, is that we have existing infrastructure, but it was not—

most of it was built pre-NAFTA not post-NAFTA. And at the highest level, I think the countries of Canada and Mexico and the 

United States are going to have to take a look at that and plan for 

additional infrastructure. Right now our task as a country is to—

in working with our colleagues with our border agreements—is to 

adjust some of the entry lanes or reassign some of the existing 
60

highways so we can move people and products across quicker. The 

whole immigration debate is one that you can all imagine is going 

to be very, very visible it is going to be very controversial. I think 

the President was basically saying—what I do not understand I 

guess, is the controversy about the notion, is we have 8, 10, 12 million. Let us accept the reality. Let us accept as a country that we 

are unlikely going to deport everybody, even though we know they 

have broken the law. Let us accept the reality that most of them 

have come across, because this is America and are thinking about 

the opportunities they have, not only for themselves, but particularly across the southern border. They sent fifteen to twenty billion 

dollars back. We certainly do need to validate their presence here. 

So the President lays out a group of principles, and it will be our 

department working with Congress to take these principles and at 

least match a willing worker with a willing employee, but that is 

going to take quite a bit of time, between our department, this 

committee and several other committees. 

You should know that the Coast Guard got a 9 percent increase. 

The Immigration and Naturalization Act gave us the authority, for 

basically a fee based system, and we are going to move to that in 

the future. 

I hope I covered it all. 

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Thank you very much. You did. 

Thank you. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman from North Carolina is recognized for 5 minutes, Mr. Etheridge. 

Mr. ETHERIDGE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Secretary, I do not know that anyone has a more difficult, 

complicated job than you do in the Federal Government and it is 

an important one. 

Let me see if I can ask questions that have not already been 

asked. We go to the area of first responders. I remember my first 

responders always remind me, when they dial 911, they ask us to 

help coordinate and do other things. 

As you know, agriculture is about a $1 trillion industry in this 

country, and it is one-sixth of the American Gross National Product, and it provides employment for one in eight Americans. The 

administration in 2003 recognizes a significant element of this critical infrastructure in America and contributes greatly to our balance of payments, as you well know, and a lot of the attention in 

dollars have been now shifted in this budget to urban areas from 

rural areas and ultimately from rural States. 

Even if they have significant agricultural operations, that leads 

to my question, because a recent RAND study estimated that foot 

and mouth disease would cost our economy over $30 billion, it 

would cripple the country’s transportation and agricultural sector. 

Even though a lot of that is privately required, it still requires us 

in the Federal sector to protect it, and you have requested complete 

discretion over these State and urban threats. So my question is, 

number one, do you plan to include consideration of these agriculture operations when determining the threat levels and, second, 

if you do not, why not? 

I trust you will. 
61

Let me move to my second question and get you to answer in the 

time allotted. You have stated in the question and we covered it 

in several others already, as relates to Federal funds, getting in the 

hands of first responders. 

In many of our States, North Carolina being mine, is not immune to it, have really been devastated by the economic situations 

in our State more than others because of tremendous job loss. My 

understanding is to get the reimbursement, even though they have 

submitted the plan—and incidentally North Carolina has committed about 91 percent of the funds, but to get the funds back is 

really on a committed basis and they have to—it is a reimbursement model, as you well know. 

In some cases they do not have the money to spend, even though 

they make the commitment, and my suggestion would be I hope 

you will consider that. It would be a way to clean up this pipeline, 

because if you are going to make them spend the funds it makes 

sense if you have funds at the local level, but for some large expenditures they absolutely do not have the resources to get it done 

in some cases, and that is why we got this tremendous backlog. I 

hope you will look at that. 

And, finally, as relates to a question that was raised earlier 

today, and I hope you will elaborate on it a little more, the National Emergency Managers Association. The President of the association happens to live in my Congressional district, Dwayne West, 

who is an outstanding person, does a tremendous job across this 

country. He has contacted our office and indicated that currently 

if only 25 percent of the EM, emergency management, performance 

grant funds are allowed to be used, we will finally cross this country. Currently they are able, as you well know, to use 100 percent. 

We can find that a lot of folks in a lot of these rural areas that 

have high vulnerability threats will do a competent job. I hope you 

will look into that, and I would certainly appreciate it. 

Secretary RIDGE. Congressman, very good. As you know, one of 

the responsibilities of the Department of Homeland Security was to 

work in collaboration with other Cabinet members to deal with 

their particular niche as relates to potential terrorist attack. We 

work in coordination with Secretary Thompson because HHS is the 

primary lead on bioterrorism. There are many things we do together. The same situation applies with regard to agriterrorism. 

Now, from our perspective within the Department there are a 

couple primary missions. As you know, we inherited as part of the 

enabling legislation the Plum Island facility. It was in need of substantial repair and we are in the process of doing it now, and we 

have asked for additional money because that is critical to the agriculture industry in the country. 

Secondly, you should know that we are going out, this year, and 

create a couple of additional academic centers of excellence, and, if 

my recollection is correct, two of the new ones are going to be related to agroterrorism. So that will be the part we will be playing 

and hopefully again we will find multiple universities making applications so we can bring capacities around the country to deal 

with the potential agroterror to benefit the entire Nation. 

Thirdly, you should know that I believe the President has asked 

for several hundreds of million dollars in the Department of Agri-
62

culture’s budget for an initiative to support the agricultural community. So we have a role, sometimes it is primary, with regard 

to Plum Island, creating the academic centers of excellence that 

will support USDA and us, and certainly where we interface with 

that initiative in the Department of Agriculture, we are anxious to 

work with them. 

The question of reimbursement is, I think, frankly an interesting 

one because I have heard that complaint before. One of the challenges, and we really have to be mindful of this, if we are going 

to invest these dollars we want to get a security return for the investment, and I am not going to suggest that if we sent the check 

out that it would not go for anything other than security matters. 

We certainly would feel much more comfortable if we knew it was 

going to needs that were identified in the State plan. The plans 

were to be built from the bottom up, but I am not saying under certain circumstances or for certain kinds of acquisitions we should 

not look at a—we should abandon the reimbursement model and 

look for the State to send the check down. I am open to anything 

that improves the process, facilitates the process and builds more 

security. 

If we could be assured of those three things, we ought to do it, 

and finally, I think the budget reflects a higher number for the 

emergency management professionals, less of it to go to personnel 

costs, more of it to go to training and exercises. I believe that it 

is a shared responsibility to hire and maintain those individuals; 

that is, our share and the State and local to reimburse in part, reimburse up to 25 percent and the rest to go for training and planning exercises. 

Mr. ETHERIDGE. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentleman from Rhode Island is recognized for 5 minutes, 

Mr. Langevin. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I certainly admire your endurance and perseverance for appearing here this morning and every time you come here, although we 

come from different perspectives, we certainly share the same goal, 

to protect the Nation to the greatest degree possible. 

Chairman COX. Would the gentleman yield for just a moment? 

I have just been alerted that we may need to change our procedure slightly. To make sure that both you and Mr. Meek get your 

questions asked, which I think is even more important that they 

get answered in realtime, if you would not mind sharing your time 

and put the questions both to the Secretary. Then, Mr. Secretary, 

if you have to take them in writing, we are going to leave the 

record open for 30 years for written responses, but I want to make 

sure that since you have both been here that you get your questions asked, and I do not want to use up any more of your time 

with an explanation. So please proceed. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Secretary, I would like to follow up on the allocation of funding to high threat urban areas under the Urban Areas Security Initiative. While I am certainly pleased the Department is making efforts to direct funds to those cities and regions that most need it, 
63

I share concern with many of my colleagues that it remains unclear 

exactly what assessment these UASI designations are based on. 

I am concerned with my State of Rhode Island being denied 

funding and ensuring that an adequate minimal level of funding is 

preserved for all States. In addition, I am concerned about a category of communities that is being left out of the UASI program 

and that has specific needs that aren’t necessarily being taken into 

account by the State homeland security funding formula. 

As an example, Providence, Rhode Island is a major city, a State 

capital, contains a port, bridges, an interstate highway, sports 

arena, convention center, as well as an LNG facility at its port, and 

its homeland security apparatus is critical not only to the city but 

to the entire State. 

Providence has not previously been recognized under the UASI 

program, and there is no indication that this will change. I am sure 

that there are many cities across the country in a similar situation, 

particularly State capitals, that have serious vulnerabilities and 

could be attractive terrorist targets. They must therefore find ways 

to meet the high costs associated with these targets and their citizens. 

However, they are not considered high threat areas by DHS and, 

with the drastic cuts in funding going to non-UASI localities, they 

could find it impossible to achieve an adequate level of protection 

preparedness. 

So, Mr. Secretary, could you speak to the special needs of these 

communities and are there any plans to create some sort of subcategory of higher risk areas in order to recognize these cities and 

these circumstances or is there any intent to expand eligibility for 

UASI funds to incorporate cities like Providence? 

Second, the administration has defended the funding shift toward the Urban Area Security Initiative and away from the State 

Homeland Security Grant Program by arguing that the distribution 

of Federal funds should be based more closely on threat and risk. 

Now, while I believe that a certain minimum level of funding 

must flow to every State, even in small States like my own, I do 

agree that threat and risk assessments are critical to making the 

best use of the resources. 

However, I would appreciate if you could help me understand exactly what these funding decisions are based upon. I know you 

spoke earlier, several times actually, about a comprehensive nationwide threat and vulnerability analysis that is under way but it 

is far from complete and yet the budget proposes a major shift in 

funds, based apparently on the results of such analysis. 

Secretary RIDGE. Sure. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. So can you discuss that and can you update me 

on your department’s threat and vulnerability assessment. I believe 

that IAIP is the directorate with primary responsibility for this 

analysis, so does IAIP have the resources and staff levels required 

to carry out this task expeditiously and are your analysts receiving 

the complete and timely information they need from TTIC and the 

rest of the Intelligence Community. And finally, you have—I have 

noticed in your statement that you are asking for $45 million for 

infrastructure improvements at the DHS facility where you are 

now located and also would be used to help relocate the Navy. I 
64

really would like to know what assessment was made to determine 

whether that was the best location for the DHS headquarters. 

I want to be on record, Mr. Secretary, in saying that I believe 

it is a mistake to locate DHS headquarters within Washington, 

D.C. We all know that Washington, like New York, is a prime terrorist target. We have the capital here, the White House, the Pentagon is very close by. If there were an attack on Washington 

which took out the city—and let’s face it, it is a very real possibility 

at some point in the future as technology becomes more sophisticated and easier to acquire—it is a mistake to have DHS located 

here. I think we would be much smarter to spend the funds locating the facility at a more remote site, perhaps somewhere in Virginia or Maryland, but not so close to Washington, D.C. 

So if you could take those. 

Chairman COX. Pursuant to the previous order of the Chair, the 

gentleman from Florida is recognized for his questions. 

Mr. Secretary, we are very, very concerned about your schedule. 

We know you are trying to be as gracious as possible, but we have 

had several notices from your staff that you are long since supposed to be gone. 

Secretary RIDGE. Thank you. 

Mr. MEEK. Mr. Secretary, I am going to forego some of the questions that I had, but on budget questions I will give it to you in 

writing. Hopefully, we will get a response. 

I want to thank you on a recent project we worked on as relates 

to children and immigrations, but I want a case in point. As you 

know, I am from south Florida. We have talked about south Florida 

being very unique to protecting the homeland and I think it is very, 

very important that you pay very close attention to what is happening right now as we speak in Haiti and as we may well have 

in the coming days if the violence continues. 

I have had a meeting with members of the Department of State, 

and I think it is important that the Department of Homeland Security is very much aware of the resources that are going to have to 

be given if we play a defensive strategy of waiting for things to get 

worse and the kind of exodus we are going to see out of Haiti that 

I think will jeopardize protection of the homeland. 

As you know, many of the 9/11 terrorists came from south Florida. I do not believe that they are a number or a great—any evidence to show that they are Haitian terrorists, but the resources 

of the Coast Guard and others and the Navy that it will take to 

stop an exodus will give light to other countries that have a higher 

question of Al-Qa‘eda presence there, to be able to allow someone 

to be able to slip through and hurt our homeland, and at the same 

time we have had discussions with south Florida. We do not have 

the infrastructure to be able to house a high concentration of refugees. 

I would ask you if you would please work with Miss Condoleezza 

Rice and also with Secretary Powell in making sure that we work 

with CARICOM, the Caribbean countries, in putting a civilian police force with the Canadians and the French there on the ground 

to bring about some sort of peace, to save lives of Haitians, but also 

to make sure we maintain the protection of our homeland and also 
65

as relates to stopping the courier of drugs into the U.S., not being 

able to send those resources from Guantanamo. 

There are other questions, but today I want to make sure that 

I share that information with you because I believe with all those 

resources on an issue that we can play offense on will take away 

from other countries that are in the Caribbean that has a very high 

question of Al–Qa‘eda presence and could very well slip through 

what we have now, that the Coast Guard is preventing those individuals from getting into the country. 

Secretary RIDGE. I want to assure you we have been aware and 

monitoring that situation for quite some time and working in collaboration with State. We are aware. We are watching it very carefully and understand the concerns that you addressed. 

Mr. MEEK. Thank you, Mr. Secretary Ridge. 

Secretary RIDGE. And I appreciate the courtesy both that the 

Congressmen have extended to me and I look forward to responding to their letters first. 

[The information follows:]

QUESTIONS FROM THE HONORABLE KENDRICK B. MEEK

1. Secretary Ridge, I would like to discuss with you Project SeaHawk, a highly 

successful program being coordinated at the Port of Charleston, S.C., by a Joint 

Agency Task Force consisting of DHS, the Coast Guard, the FBI and Justice Department law enforcement personnel. Project SeaHawk includes a critical threat assessment system that conducts a risk profile of all vessels that enter a port. 

I strongly believe that since Florida is particularly vulnerable to threats, the Port 

of Miami and other Florida ports could benefit from this program. As you know, the 

Port of Miami is the largest passenger port and one of the busiest cargo ports in 

the world. I, along with other Members of the Florida delegation, sent your Department a letter requesting that you consider implementing a vessel profiling system 

that would improve maritime safety, as well as protect the large volume of cargo 

and the millions of passengers that move through our ports.

Knowing that DHS is centralizing intelligence at the highest level to ensure security, is the Department planning to expand this program to the 

Port of Miami or to other Florida ports? In order to continue the process of 

planning to protect our homeland, I highly recommend and encourage that the Department does expand this program into Florida. 

Answer: The Coast Guard, and its partners-federal, Federal, State, and local 

agencies, foreign governments, international organizations, and other stakeholdershave a fundamental need for comprehensive information, intelligence, and knowledge about all entities and their respective activities within the U.S. Maritime Domain. This comprehensive information, intelligence, and knowledge base is Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA). The CG is well qualified to help lead the effort to 

integrate and coordinate a national MDA capability. This capability collects and 

analyzes all available sources of maritime and related information and intelligence, 

and leverages them into a common operational picture to enable the Coast Guard, 

DHS, IAIP and other members of the law enforcement and defense communities to 

see, understand, and act first in safeguarding our Nation. 

The Charleston Harbor Operations Center (CHOC) was an initiative funded 

through the Department of Justice and coordinated via very strong interagency 

partnerships. At its core, the goal was to improve the sharing and coordination of 

information; i.e. enhance MDA. The Coast Guard is expanding on lessons learned 

from CHOC and has already deployed similar capability in Miami, San Diego, Boston, New York, and Hampton Roads. While the levels of capability vary among each 

port at this time, the Coast Guard is continuing to work to deploy a Common Operating Picture (COP) among all our coastal command and control centers in a way 

that the information is comprehensive, can be shared across agencies, and most importantly is actionable by field commanders. 

In Miami in particular, the Coast Guard has partnered with DHS Science and 

Technology Directorate (S&T) to build a prototype integrated maritime surveillance 

system (Project Hawkeye) covering Port Everglades, Miami, and Key West, Florida 

and develop the Department’s enterprise Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA) archi-
66

tecture. Thanks to funding made available through S&T, the Coast Guard has been 

able to deploy this initial capability in Miami and lay the groundwork for future expansions. Project Hawkeye is an ongoing program that will enhance Integrated Maritime Command Centers by combining existing facilities, upgrading equipment to 

detect, track, and identify vessel traffic around ports, harbors, approaches, and 

costal zones, and providing robust MDA through integration of information in a 

Common Operational Picture.

2. Given the serious nature of the current engine reliability and power 

problems on the HH–65, what is the status of the HH–65 Reengining Program? Can reengining the HH–65 in a timely manner impact the HITRON 

Mission aircraft? 

I ask these questions because wouldn’t reengined HH–65s be able to provide significant support for the security of the Port of Miami? 

Answer: To address urgent HH–65 safety and reliability issues, the Commandant 

made the decision on January 14, 2004 to re-engine the HH–65. This includes both 

the engine and engine control systems. The Coast Guard issued letter delivery task 

order (DTO) to Integrated Deepwater Systems (ICGS) on January 15, 2004 directing 

them to take immediate action to re-engine the HH–65 to ensure unrestricted safe 

and reliable operations. This DTO includes sufficient funding to carry out development and initiate the production phase of the product. Since that time, the CG and 

ICGS have negotiated a project cost. The manufacture and delivery of critical parts 

has driven the schedule. The CG, ICGS and its subcontractors continue to negotiate 

with its subcontractors to accelerate the delivery of engines and parts. 

The First HH–65 has been re-engined, and has completed initial test flights. It 

is scheduled to return to service in mid-September 2004. The second HH–65 is undergoing re-engining at this time. 

The goal of the re-engining effort is to expeditiously address safety and reliability 

issues. The Coast Guard’s long-term desire is that all Coast Guard helicopters be 

capable of use of force projection.

Chairman COX. Mr. Secretary, we appreciate your valued and informative testimony. We appreciate your willingness to respond to 

these additional questions in writing. We look forward to working 

with you this year. 

The committee stands adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:46 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] 
(67)

A P P E N D I X 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD

RESPONSES BY HONORABLE TOM RIDGE TO QUESTIONS FOR THE RECORD SUBMITTED

BY THE HONORABLE JIM LANGEVIN

1. Mr. Secretary, I would like to follow up on the allocation of funding to high 

threat urban areas under the Urban Areas Security Initiative. While I am certainly 

pleased the Department is making efforts to direct funds to those cities and regions 

that most need it, I share concern with many of my colleagues that it remains unclear exactly what assessment these UASI designations are based on. I am concerned with my State of Rhode Island being denied funding and ensuring that an 

adequate minimal level of funding is preserved for all States. In addition, I am concerned about a category of communities that is being left out of the UASI program 

and that has specific needs that aren’t necessarily being taken into account by the 

State homeland security funding formula. As an example, Providence, Rhode Island 

is a major city, a State capital, contains a port, bridges, an interstate highway, 

sports arena, convention center, as well as an LNG facility at its port, since homeland security apparatus is critical not only to the city but to the entire State. Providence has not previously been recognized under the UASI program, and there is no 

indication that this will change. I am sure that there are many cities across the 

country in a similar situation, particularly State capitals, that have serious 

vulnerabilities and could be attractive terrorist targets. It must therefore find ways 

to meet the high costs associated with these targets and their citizens. However, 

they are not considered high threat areas by DHS and, with the drastic cuts in 

funding going to USAI localities, they could find it impossible to achieve an adequate level of protection preparedness. So, Mr. Secretary, could you speak to 

the special needs of these communities and are there any plans to create 

some sort of subcategory of higher risk areas in order to recognize these 

cities and these circumstances or is there any intent to expand eligibility 

for USAI funds to incorporate cities like Providence?

Answer: ODP is the Federal government’s lead agency responsible for preparing 

the National against terrorism by assisting States, local and tribal jurisdictions, and 

regional authorities to reduce vulnerabilities against, prevent, respond to, and recover from terrorist acts. ODP’s funding goes well beyond focusing on high-density, 

high threat urban areas. ODP provides funds to every State and territory through 

the State Homeland Security Grant Program (SHSGP) using a State and territory 

minimum formula. In fiscal year 2003, ODP provided more than $2 billion to states 

and territories under this program. In fiscal year 2004, ODP will distribute more 

than $2.2 billion under this program. Under this program, the States are required 

to obligate or pass-through at least 80 percent of their allocated amount to units 

of local government. These funds also can be used by the States and territories to 

support a wide range of activities to enhance and augment their security measures, 

including the purchase of specialized equipment, training and exercise support, and 

preparedness planning. States base their funding distribution decisions on homeland security strategies that are a requirement of receiving ODP funds. 

I strongly recommend that your constituents work directly with Rhode Island’s 

State Administering Agency (SAA) to determine what resources, if any, are available to them to enhance security across the state. The SAA for Rhode Island is 

Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency and the point-of-contact is John E. 

Aucott who can be reached by telephone at (401) 462–7127 or by email at 

john.aucott@ri.ngb.army.mil.

2. Second, the administration has defended the funding shift toward the Urban 

Area Security Initiative and away from the State Homeland Security Grant Program by arguing that the distribution of Federal funds should be based more closely 

on threat and risk. Now, while I believe that a certain minimum level of funding 
68

must flow to everybody’s State, even in small States like my own, I do agree that 

threat and risk assessments are critical to making the best use of the resources. 

However, I would appreciate if you could help me understand exactly what these 

funding decisions are based upon. I know you spoke earlier, several times actually, 

about a comprehensive nationwide threat building analysis that is under way but 

it is far from complete and yet the budget proposes a major shift on funds, based 

apparently on the results of such analysis.

Answer: The UASI grant formula is based on information about threat provided 

by the intelligence community, the placement of critical infrastructure, and population densities. The Administration feels that this formula correctly targets the cities that should receive the UASI grants.

3. Can you update me on the progress of your Department’s threat and 

vulnerability assessment? Does IA/IP have the resources and staff levels required to carry out this task expeditiously? Are your analysts receiving the 

complete and timely information they need from TTIC and the rest of the 

intelligence community?

Answer: The Office of Information Analysis (IA) currently has all the information 

it needs to assess threats to the nation. This involves the independent analysis of 

all information received from other members of the Intelligence Community, the 

Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC), and other DHS component entities. As 

IA matures, staffing levels will increase and processes will be refined to enable IA 

to expeditiously carry out its mission. Similarly, the Office of Infrastructure Protection (IP) is currently assessing the vulnerabilities of critical infrastructures and key 

assets. 

QUESTIONS FROM THE HONORABLE LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART

Congress imposed a December 31, 2003 deadline for permanent installation of 

Electronic Explosive Detection (EDS) equipment in-line with baggage systems at the 

nation’s airports. I understand the dollars needed for airports seeking in-line EDS 

equipment exceeds the budget for installation of the EDS. TSA has said that the 

in-line deployment of EDS is the most effective baggage screening method for Miami 

International Airport (MIA), in my district.

However, MIA has had difficulty obtaining approval for design and funding for 

their in-line EDS equipment. 

MIA is a Category X airport. More than 29.6 million passengers passed through 

MIA in 2003. MIA is the third busiest airport for international passengers in the 

United States. Over ninety airlines operate out of MIA, more than any American 

airport. MIA has 1,416 total international flights a week, the most of any airport 

in the U.S. Of that, it has 565 flights to and from Latin America per week, more 

than all American airports combined. 

MIA is jobsite for nearly 37,000 employees working for nearly 400 employers. 

There are 237,421 direct and indirect jobs associated with MIA. Overall, the airport 

has $18.5 billion revenue impact for South Florida. 

As MIA continues to await TSA design approval, the Airport has had to put their 

contractors on hold and I have been informed that the hold order is costing them 

over $175,000 a day.

1. Can you explain how TSA prioritizes its grants to airports? What policy 

criteria are used to allocate these dollars?

Answer: DHS and TSA will continue to apply prioritization factors when determining which airports will be covered by funding allocated. In fiscal year 2004, $721 

million was made available for the installation of electronic screening technology for 

explosives detection, covering both lobby and in-line solutions. This figure included 

$250 million in the Department’s fiscal year 2004 appropriation and an additional 

$471 million in carryover from fiscal years 2002 and 2003. Fiscal year 2004 funding 

also included $158 million for equipment purchases. The Administration’s fiscal year 

2005 budget request for explosives detection calls for $400 million, including $250 

million for the Aviation Security Capital Fund, for the installation and purchase of 

electronic screening technology for explosives detection at airports working towards 

in-line solutions as well as airports requiring additional stand-alone solutions to 

support increased throughput needs. 

TSA purchases and installs in-line EDS equipment through a variety of funding 

mechanisms, including Congressionally authorized Letters of Intent (LOIs) as well 

as Other Transaction Agreements (OTAs). For facility modifications needed to accommodate the installation of EDS equipment, the Federal Aviation Administration 

has provided funding through its Airport Improvement Program (AIP) in fiscal year 
69

2002 and fiscal year 2003. The funding mechanism initiated with an airport for installation of EDS technology is selected based upon the particular security circumstances and needs of each project. 

Existing Letters of Intent (LOI) were awarded primarily on the basis of whether 

or not 100% electronic screening had been achieved at the airport. DHS and TSA 

are in the process of defining and quantifying new prioritization factors so that we 

can establish a list of candidate airports going forward should additional LOIs be 

deemed appropriate. 

MIA has been working with TSA on two mutually agreeable Memorandums of 

Agreement and Letters of Intent (MOA/LOI)s—one for the Central Terminal and 

one for the South and North Terminal Development Programs—and a design concept for the in-line baggage screening operation. The purpose of the MOA/LOI is to 

define the parties’ agreement with respect to funding amounts and schedules for 

performance of work for the replacement of baggage conveyor systems or reconfiguration of baggage areas to install in-line EDS equipment within MIA’s North, 

South and Central Terminals. MIA has agreed to initially fund the project with the 

intent that TSA will reimburse at least 90 percent of the total project costs as provided for in the FAA Reauthorization (Public Law 108–176). The current cost estimates included in the MOA/LOI that are pending TSA’s approval are:

Total Cost Federal Share at 90%

Central Terminal .............................................. $57,444,000 $51,699,600

South & North Terminal .................................. 177,206,846 159,486,161 Total ........................................................ 234,650,846 211,185,761

To date, TSA has approved MOA/LOIs for in-line baggage screening at eight 

major U.S. airports.I understand that TSA stated that it intends to sign only a 

handful of additional LOIs, leaving a significant number of airports across the country without a long-term EDS solution. MIA’s request is currently in the next phase 

of airports to be approved. However, I have been told that TSA has informed MIA 

that OMB will not authorize TSA to issue any further LOI’s due to insufficient funding. 

TSA provides a monthly report to Congress detailing all the airports where TSA 

is not in compliance with the 100 percent electronic screening of all checked baggage. I have been told that, during a January 8 phone call between MIA Airport 

Director Gittens and TSA Acting Administrator Stone, Mr. Stone said he had only 

recently been informed that MIA is not in compliance with the requirement to 

screen 100 percent of checked baggage electronically. Admiral Stone further stated 

that MIA had not been included in the monthly report to Congress of non-compliant 

airports. I have been told that the report was also used to determine which airports 

received priority for LOIs for in-line EDS installation. 

If the allegations are true and TSA had reported accurately, MIA, one of the busiest airports in the nation, would have most likely been given priority and had their 

MOA/LOI approved in the 1st round. The safety and security of the American public 

is my primary concern.

2. Can you look into these serious allegations and report back to this 

Committee? 

Answer: TSA’s top priority is security, and consequently, TSA will continue to 

focus its available funds for the purchase and installation of explosives detections 

systems (EDS) at those airports that require additional work in order to achieve and 

maintain compliance with the 100 percent electronic screening of checked baggage 

mandate. Miami International Airport (MIA) has achieved compliance with the 

mandate to conduct 100 percent electronic screening. Because of ongoing changes to 

passenger loads, terminal modifications and airport expansion projects, MIA warrants—and receives—monitoring by the TSA to ensure that we maintain that level 

of compliance. As TSA continues to balance the many competing priorities for available funds, we are continually reviewing our priorities to maximize the utilization 

of the funds available. 

QUESTIONS FROM THE HONORABLE ERNEST J. ISTOOK, JR. 

1. The December 17, 2003 Homeland Security Presidential Directive requires the 

federal government to, ‘‘identify, prioritize and coordinate the protection of the critical infrastructure and its key resources (including telecommunications) in order to 

prevent, deter and mitigate the effects of deliberate efforts to destroy, incapacitate, 

or exploit them.’’ While commercial communications networks should be considered 

when implementing this directive, I am more interested in hearing from you the ef-
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forts the Department is taking in regards to the protection of the private internal 

communications systems owned and operated by the utilities themselves. How 

should we ensure that the needs and protection of these private networks 

are addressed? 

Answer: The National Communications System (NCS) has in place existing robust processes and capabilities that support the identification and coordination of 

protection of critical infrastructure, especially the public telecommunications assets. 

The NCS’s Network Design and Analysis Capability (NDAC) applies both public and 

industry proprietary data to analyze and assess the vulnerabilities of the public networks. The NDAC is capable of using general and specific threat scenarios to identify specific assets at risk and determine mitigations strategies. The NCS also conducts ongoing vulnerability analyses of specific segments of the infrastructures. The 

results of some of these analyses have been applied by the Protective Security Division (PSD) in initiating detailed security analyses of key infrastructure components 

such as cable head landings and telecom hotels. As this process matures, the scope 

of these efforts will be expanded. The NCS also participates with the FCC Network 

Reliability and Interoperability Council (NRIC), which in its last session developed 

over 400 best practices for physical and cyber security for all platforms of the telecommunications infrastructure. These best practices will continue to be reviewed 

and updated during the NRIC VII session over the next two years and will apply 

to private networks as well. 

Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition Systems are a core component of many 

of the electric utilities internal networks. The NCS is developing a capability to 

model the interaction and dependency between SCADA and telecommunications systems. This capability will enable detailed analyses of SCADA communications 

vulnerabilities. The NDAC has amassed a set of data, tools, and models that characterize various aspects of these communications systems. The Idaho National Environmental and Engineering Laboratory’s (INEEL) National SCADA test bed provides the ability to test variants of SCADA equipment, software, protocols, and configurations and to assess and model their communications vulnerabilities. The NCS 

and INEEL collaboration, using real SCADA systems and their communications 

interfaces, will enable calibration of the NCS? SCADA communications dependency 

and vulnerability models. 

The NCS is leveraging INEEL’s expertise to achieve the following goals: • Develop detailed test plans (including specific tests to be performed) that will 

be used to evaluate SCADA network vulnerabilities and dependencies; 

• Develop prototype SCADA communications models; • Test and validate models; • Develop technology/procedures to mitigate vulnerabilities; 

In the longer term the NCS will: • Evaluate performance of mitigation approaches using models, and 

• Develop recommended best practices for mitigation of SCADA communications vulnerabilities. 

This combination of tools for examining vulnerabilities of common communications systems will contribute to meeting the protective needs of these private networks.

2. Is there a process or network within DHS that enables a cross-coordination of emergency response and communications capabilities that includes critical infrastructure as well as the traditional public safety community? 

Answer: The SAFECOM (Wireless Public SAFEty Interoperable COMmunications) program resides within the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS’s) 

Science and Technology Directorate and serves as the umbrella program within the 

federal government to help local, tribal, state and federal public safety agencies improve public safety response through more effective and efficient interoperable wireless communications. SAFECOM developed two mechanisms to ensure the coordination of DHS efforts related to communications and interoperability. The first is the 

Federal Interagency Coordination Council (FICC), comprised of those offices whose 

mission is to support communications as they relate to public safety and critical infrastructure protection. The second is the SAFECOM program’s Advisory Council, 

which provides a venue for federal programs and national organizations representing public safety and critical infrastructure protection sectors to contribute to 

the SAFECOM strategy and to collaboratively share information to protect the 

homeland.

3. The nation’s electric, gas and water utilities and natural gas pipelines are 

among the longest-term users of private radio spectrum and have been reclassified 

as public safety radio services by Congress. Given this designation and their vital 
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role during emergency response situations, I would be interested in learning whether representatives of the utility industries have been or will be included during discussions of a nationwide interoperable communications network for emergency responders. 

Answer: As a public safety practitioner driven program, SAFECOM is dedicated 

to addressing the needs of all public safety organizations. The program began to include public safety by reaching out to those first responders involved in local emergencies on a daily basis. SAFECOM further coordinated its activities with representatives from local and state governments, to ensure that the responsible decision 

makers were also included. SAFECOM has since developed relationships with the 

national associations representing these practitioner and decision making communities, as well as other, broader public safety disciplines, which have provided the 

program the opportunity to gather input from a wide range of stakeholders as it 

outlined and developed its strategy. While initial relationships with representatives 

from the electric, gas, water, and natural gas pipelines industries have been established at conferences and other venues, SAFECOM will now begin to incorporate 

them more formally into the program, such as their representation on the 

SAFECOM Advisory Committee.

4. To what extent does HSARPA work with the DARPA at the Department 

of Defense to identify technologies which DoD is already working on that 

might be beneficial to our Homeland Security efforts? My concern here is 

making sure that we are making the most of taxpayers dollars and not trying to 

reinvent the wheel. 

Answer: HSARPA works very closely with DARPA to identify areas of joint interest, to avoid duplication of effort, and to identify and quantify opportunities for cooperation. The Director of DARPA and the Director of HSARPA correspond quite 

frequently. The Deputy Director and several HSARPA Program Managers served at 

DARPA in the past and maintain professional relationships with their former colleagues; this increases the information flow and serves to identify potential conflicts 

and opportunities for cooperation. Formal cooperative efforts are documented by 

Memoranda of Agreement that specify the role of each organization. Several areas 

of DARPA effort have progressed to the stage at which they would be of interest 

to HSARPA. Discussions are underway exploring transfering the technology or the 

program to HSARPA management. Those areas in which HSARPA has issued solicitations have been discussed with DARPA representatives to ensure that HSARPA 

is not ‘‘reinventing the wheel.’’

5.Undersecretary Hutchinson recently reported to the department’s Advisory 

Committee on Commercial Operations (COAC) that DHS is near to finalizing its 

plans for a regional structure. He stated that 7 to 10 regional offices would be created around the country with a director leading each. As you know, we in Congress 

and those in the trade community have expressed serious concern about how the 

department will ensure that customs commercial operations continue to be administered in a uniform and consistent way under such a regional structure.

Can you share with us what specific mechanisms DHS will employ in 

order to maintain consistent national policies and procedures with respect 

to customs operations in different regional offices? 

Answer: Success in accomplishing DHS’ missions requires developing a coordinated effort among federal, state, local, tribal, public and private sector entities on 

all aspects of homeland security; integrating the activities of the department across 

mission areas; and the efficient and effective delivery of DHS services within each 

mission area. To achieve this mandate, DHS is exploring a regional concept of operations that ensures that these three functions are achieved at the regional and especially local level among federal, state, tribal and private sector entities. 

While our goal in implementing a regional structure will be to build better operational capabilities for the Department, national policies and doctrine will continue 

to be issued from DHS headquarters to ensure that programs are consistently applied nationwide. 

The Department recognizes that with global trade and product tracking, America 

needs uniform and consistent customs processes in every port and the unimpeded 

flow of legitimate commerce is vital to our nation’s security. The partnerships established between business and government have been fundamental to improving these 

processes. These efforts in turn have contributed to the growth in America’s global 

economic strength. The Secretary is committed to continuing this partnership to increase our collective security.
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6. Will the public be given the opportunity to review and comment on the 

department’s proposal for the regional structure and its potential impact 

on commercial operations? 

Answer: The initial regional concept of operations recommendations are being reviewed within the Department and its component agencies. The assessment of the 

infrastructure, operations, personnel and assets of component offices throughout the 

nation has required extensive analysis and data collection. In addition, the Department is conducting an analysis on any potential operational considerations with regard to implementing a regional structure. 

Upon approval of these initial recommendations, the Department will ensure that 

our external Stakeholder constituents will have the opportunity to review and comment on the impact this regional structure will have on their particular operations 

and programs. Although work is underway to determine the best way to move forward on a DHS regional structure, the many variables of this complex issue will 

be discussed prior to the final implementation of the regional concept.

7. Please provide for me and the Committee a summary of the C–TPAT program 

in terms of how many violators the program has identified as well as what disciplinary actions have been taken against those violators. 

Answer: Companies seeking C–TPAT certification must apply to CBP by first 

signing and submitting the appropriate C–TPAT Agreement. Companies are then 

required to conduct comprehensive internal/external security self-assessments of 

their supply chains and report back to CBP, via their Profile Questionnaire submission, a summary of their findings including any identified weaknesses. 

CBP then reviews the profile questionnaire, initiates the vetting process, and either accepts or rejects the applicant’s submission. 

After CBP certifies a company for C–TPAT, the company then qualifies for the 

Validation process. The validation process is a physical review (foreign and domestic) by CBP and the C–TPAT participant to ensure that the supply chain security 

measures contained in the C–TPAT participant’s security profile have been implemented and are being followed. 

There is currently an 18 percent outright rejection rate for insufficient profile 

questionnaire submissions. In addition to these 1,000 plus initial rejections, over 90 

companies have been denied C–TPAT benefits, or have had their benefits suspended, due to violations identified during our vetting or validation process. These 

violations include but are not limited to the following: 

• Previous criminal records or violations. 

• Significant violations involving narcotics. 

• Failure to implement adequate security measures and procedures. 

• Misrepresentation of information submitted to CBP. 

QUESTIONS FROM THE HONORABLE JIM GIBBONS

1. Las Vegas McCarran Airport is the second busiest domestic Origin and Destination airport in the nation and processes more passengers through its checkpoints than any airport except LAX. McCarran is of vital importance in sustaining 

the largely visitor-dependent Las Vegas economy. However, the recent return of extremely long passenger screening lines is a major cause of frustration for the Las 

Vegas air traveler. If the situation does not improve, many of our visitors may be 

discouraged from returning to Las Vegas. I’m sure there are similar situations in 

other parts of the country. 

These long lines also cause masses of people to congregate outside of the checkpoints presenting the additional security risk of shifting the would-be target from 

the airplane to the airport terminals themselves. 

I don’t want my comments to be a reflection on the hard work of the TSA employees at McCarran. I firmly believe that this situation can be addressed with a few 

tweaks in TSA policy. For instance, Federal Security Directors at airports should 

be given the maximum flexibility to address the airport’s needs.

Has the department looked at giving Federal Security Directors at the individual airports expanded authority to manage the security screening 

process? 

Answer: TSA has in fact given Federal Security Directors (FSD) increased flexibility and authority to manage the security screening process. Initiatives are underway to allow our FSDs to have the flexibility they need to perform their security 

functions more effectively and efficiently by giving them more direct authority. TSA, 

in turn, will continue to hold FSDs accountable for meeting Federal security standards and for managing effectively. TSA is committed to strike the right balance between effective agency-wide management and local FSD authority. 
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McCarran International Airport (LAS) is a prime example of the benefits gained 

by this practice. LAS formerly faced long passenger wait times that often exceeded 

one hour, having peaked during heavy convention attendance in February 2004. In 

contrast, the wait times at LAS for the months of April, May, June, and July have 

rarely exceeded 30 minutes. Average wait times for the airport are well within a 

10 minute average.

Examples of flexibility provided to LAS include: 

A. Overtime. LAS was provided considerable autonomy in using overtime to 

support operational requirements during peak travel times—such as holidays 

and conventions. The flexible use of overtime as a management tool to support 

high volumes of passengers associated with large functions allowed the FSD to 

ensure that screener staffing could meet the airport’s changing needs. 

B. Enhanced checkpoint screening procedures. LAS had latitude to innovate changes at the checkpoint in order to screen passengers with the greatest 

efficiency. In coordination with the Administrator, LAS piloted programs including 1) Incorporating front loaders; 2) Developing more efficient bin returns; 3) 

Enhanced use of x-ray procedures; and 4) Expansion of the number of checkpoint lanes. 

C. Flexible deployment of resources. The LAS FSD was able to redeploy 

equipment and personnel as needed to meet screening requirements. LAS was 

thus able to manage available resources to adjust quickly for natural or unexpected fluctuations in airport requirements. This flexibility enabled the FHS to 

continue to meet TSA’s security mandate despite sometimes dramatically 

changing circumstances. 

Much of this success is due to the combined effort and teamwork of TSA and other 

parties with operational responsibilities at LAS. For example, the Las Vegas Department of Aviation officials were quick to provide assistance by providing lane 

monitors to assist passengers with queuing and divesting in front of the checkpoints. TSA officials made several decisions involving operations in keeping with the 

increased flexibility of the FSDs. These decisions proved so beneficial that they were 

implemented at many other airports in the United States. In addition, the FSDs and 

their staffs have worked especially hard with airline stakeholders to manage flight 

loads and expand checkpoints to keep pace with the rapid passenger traffic growth 

experienced at LAS. An increase of three lanes in 2003 has been followed by an additional seven lane expansion that will open in late August 2004. This new seven 

lane expansion is an effort to prepare for the pending growth of the D concourse 

by 10 gates in late 2004.

2. The Department of Homeland Security needed to get off to a running start. 

Consequently, DHS now has a wide variety of well-qualified men and women—including yourself—who have taken the reins and implemented programs and strategies to protect the American homeland. 

Many of these highly qualified people have military and other federal backgrounds. All of these people will draw upon these experiences to build DHS’ capabilities.

What are you and your management team doing to ensure that DHS develops efficient processes so that you can avoid adopting the some of the 

inefficiencies that the Department of Defense and other agencies have developed over the years? 

Answer: We have worked to ensure a consistent understanding of the mission, 

vision and values of the Department—stressing the importance of leadership and 

the responsibility of all levels of leadership to managing the change to DHS while 

maintaining the vigilance we need to secure our homeland. We have adopted the 

dictum ‘‘One mission, one team, one fight’’ to keep us focused on this end. We have 

seen the opportunity of the new Department as an opportunity to change past practices, to merge like programs and functions creating even stronger and more effective organization; for example, the ‘‘one face at the border’’ initiative in CBP. Or, 

to propose changes to the organizational structure such as the combination of the 

Office of Domestic Preparedness with the Office of State and Local Government. We 

continue to look for opportunities to streamline our activities, as we have in developing the National Incident Management System, which is the Nation’s first standardized management plan that creates a unified structure for Federal, state, and 

local lines of government for incident response. 

We are blending 22 distinct agencies and bureaus, each with its employees, mission, and culture, into a single, unified Department whose mission is to secure the 

homeland. Simultaneous with that harmonization and integration effort, we are devising new processes and infrastructure to stand up the Departmental offices. We 
74

need to transform multiple legacy business practices, and their legacy infrastructure, into harmonized or single business practices across the enterprise. We have 

the opportunity to build the 21st century department and that will be accomplished 

by business transformations. There are multiple, enterprise wide transformations 

that must take place and be overseen, integrated and optimized by the Department’s leadership. Examples of enterprise wide transformations include eMerge2 

(Electronically Managing Enterprise Resources for Government Effectiveness and 

Efficiency); Max HR (the unitary human capital management system) and, the 

Homeland Secure Data Network (HSDN) (classified secure communications backbone for not only the DHS enterprise but also secure communications with all federal, state, local and tribal Homeland Security stakeholders). DHS will be a cohesive, capable and service-oriented organization whose cross-cutting functions will be 

optimized so that we may protect our nation against threats and effectively respond 

to disasters. 

At this time, there are many change programs and projects underway; programs 

such as eMerge2 , Max HR and HSDN and projects such as TriBureau, the realignment of the legacy Customs and INS support services base with the new mission 

elements of CIS, ICE and CBP. These programs and major projects are being executed with varying degrees of impact, risk, and applied management disciplines. We 

are constantly considering options to, unify, streamline, and improve our entire organization. We are aggressively solving immediate and real business gaps while at 

the same time, defining and implementing new business operations. As a result, we 

require a formalized and systematic approach for defining, chartering, supporting, 

synchronizing, and measuring change programs. 

One example of this type of process improvement is the management of moving 

the Department off of services provided by former owning cabinet Departments to 

DHS provided services in fiscal year 2004. This was a relatively massive project involving cataloguing all the service requirements across the enterprise, developing 

fiscal year 2004 service delivery plans and contracting back under Memorandums 

Agreement (MOUs) for only those services that the new DHS infrastructure could 

not support. This included harmonizing business process across the enterprise as 

much as possible to drive down the number of different processes being used by the 

components. 

QUESTIONS FROM THE HONORABLE JOHN SWEENEY

1. I am concerned about granting security clearances not only to state and local 

officials but to the private sector as they own and operate 85 percent of our infrastructure. I understand the Homeland Security Act has sufficient authorization language to allow DHS to grant clearances to first responders. Do you agree with this? 

I would like to see your actual plan on number of clearances you intend to grant 

and time schedules. 

Answer: Both the Homeland Security Act and Executive Order 12968 ‘‘Access to 

Classified Information,’’ dated August 4, 1995, allow for the investigation of and 

granting of access to individuals who act for or on behalf of an agency as determined 

by the appropriate agency head. Therefore, if it is determined that officials in the 

private sector have a ‘‘need-to-know’’ and require access to classified information, 

DHS has a process in place to investigate and grant access to those individuals. If 

it is determined that particular first responders have a ‘‘need-to-know,’’ they will be 

investigated and granted access in accordance with E.O. 12968. 

The Office of Security would not be in a position of determining the number of 

clearances necessary or establishing a time schedule. The Office of Security would 

only handle the processing and the briefing of those individuals identified by the 

appropriate office/directorate.

2. Do you have explicit authorization to grant security clearances to relevant individuals in the private sector where they have a legitimate need 

to know? 

Answer: See response to question 1 above.

3. Do you support or oppose making the Commandant of the U.S. Coast 

Guard a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff when issues pertaining to the 

Coast Guard are under discussion? 

Answer: It is not necessary that the Commandant be a member of the JCS. The 

Commandant has an open invitation from the Chairman to participate in JCS discussions that the Commandant feels involve specific Coast Guard equities or those 

of a general nature involving all military services. The Commandant exercises that 

open invitation regularly, but with discretion, participating only in discussions of 

topics with Coast Guard equities involved (average of one time per month). Coast 
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Guard Assistant Commandant for Operations (G–O) and Director of Operations Policy (G–OP) attend similar meetings (at the OPSDEPS level) on a more frequent 

basis (average of 2–4 times per month). 

The Commandant also routinely participates in Combatant Commanders conferences and related DOD senior leadership venues as a military service chief. As 

a member of the Joint Planning and Execution Community, the Coast Guard participates in a variety of Joint planning and policy forums, including: 

• Joint Strategy Reviews (including rewrites of National Military Strategy and 

periodic risk assessments); 

• Quadrennial Defense Reviews; 

• War on Terrorism assessments and strategy development; and Regional Combatant Commander Operations Plans development and force flow conferences. 

In addition, the Coast Guard HQ maintains a Joint Action Coordination Office 

(JACO–CG) for daily coordination of CG inputs to a variety of Joint Staff initiatives. 

The JACO–CG responded to 348 Joint Staff Action Packages (JSAPs) in 2003; 48 

to date in 2004 (avg.—28 JSAPs per month)

4. Describe DHS efforts—and note significant, real accomplishments—of 

how the Coast Guard and the Navy have created a synergy among their 

staffs to improve the capability, interoperability, and affordability of their 

platforms so that our nation is well served across the full breadth of this 

widened national security spectrum? 

Answer: The Coast Guard and the Navy have historically maintained a strong 

relationship. However, given recent increased efforts in cooperation over the past 

several years, especially with regards to our shared National Fleet Policy, the interservice relationship is considered the strongest it has ever been. The two Services 

have strengthened their service liaisons, entered into formal agreements for shipbuilding coordination efforts, and are collaborating on weapons and sensors system 

development—all in the spirit of improving interoperability and developing complementary capabilities. Recently most manifest in Coast Guard deployments for 

Operations IRAQI FREEDOM & ENDURING FREEDOM and for stability and security operations in Haiti, Coast Guard forces seamlessly integrated into joint operations on day one. In both cases, DOD specifically asked for Coast Guard capabilities to meet Combatant Commander requirements. 

A National Fleet Policy Statement, first signed in September 1998 and updated 

most recently in July 2002, commits the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) and U.S. Navy 

(Navy) to ‘‘shared purpose and common effort.’’ Today, the National Fleet policy is 

embodied in initiatives such as Deepwater recapitalization, the prospective DOD–

DHS Command & Control Memorandum of Agreement for Homeland Defense/

Homeland Security, the USN–USCG partnership to expand Maritime Domain 

Awareness (MDA) and our close relationship with US Northern Command. Each of 

these endeavors builds upon our synergistic relationship to ensure that National 

Fleet assets provide the broadest mix of capabilities to meet the full spectrum of 

national security requirements. 

The USCG and Navy continue to work together, continually improving their staff 

alignment and cooperation as they re-capitalize their fleets. There are two Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs) established between the USCG Deepwater Program and the Navy’s Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) program. One MOU is requirements focused and the other is acquisition focused. As both programs continue their 

development, the USCG and Navy leadership are engaged in coordinating their efforts where it makes good business sense and is legally permissible. The Deepwater 

Program Executive Officer (PEO) is working closely with the Navy’s LCS program. 

The PEO meets regularly with the Navy, monitoring programmatic and technical 

progress and looking to maximize opportunities for commonality and interoperability. 

Specific examples of how the Coast Guard and the Navy have created a synergy 

among their staffs to improve the capability, interoperability, and affordability of 

their platforms include: 

• With funding support from the Navy, the Coast Guard is developing the MK 

3 / 57mm Gun System for Deepwater cutters. The gun is also a candidate system 

for LCS and DDX (next generation surface combatant ship). The Navy remains 

aware of USCG gun and ammunition qualification efforts and will benefit from the 

USCG’s advance work if the gun is included in the weapons systems of other naval 

warships. 

• The Navy is supporting the USCG’s procurement of Navy Type combat systems 

equipment for the National Security Cutter (NSC). By placing Navy Type systems 

on the NSC, the Navy and USCG can integrate logistics, maintenance and training 
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for years to come. Additionally, common systems will facilitate future naval operational planning and execution across a broad spectrum of future Deepwater assets. 

• The CG Deepwater PEO is finalizing a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with 

Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) in March 2004 to maximize effectiveness 

across naval and maritime missions. Under the agreement, the organizations will 

exchange information to identify areas of mutual interest and support. 

• Cooperation between various USCG and USN commands in the development of 

a prototype Integrated Anti-diver/swimmer System capable of providing MSSTs with 

an underwater detection and defense capability.

5. Does the Coast Guard have an Unfunded Priority List (UPL) like it’s 

Department of Defense sister services? If not, why not? 

Answer: The Coast Guard does not maintain an Unfunded Priority List (UPL) 

like the Department of Defense services. The President’s fiscal year 2005 budget 

provides the necessary resources for the Coast Guard to meet its missions. The 

Deepwater project is replacing technically obsolete and high cost maintenance ships 

and aircraft, which are becoming more unreliable every day. The Deepwater project 

is the Coast Guard’s top funding priority to recapitalize these critically needed platforms. An UPL is not necessary because the Department of Homeland Security will 

submit a Future Year Homeland Security Plan with the President’s Budget each 

year, which includes outyear requirements. 

QUESTIONS FROM THE HONORABLE BILL PASCRELL, JR. 

1. Every year it’s the same thing: the Administration proposes big cuts to the successful FIRE Grant program. This time out you’ve proposed a cut of one-third—from 

$750 million down to $500 million. In fact, in this budget, all grants to our first 

responders suffer an $800 million decrease from amounts appropriated by Congress 

last year. Is there less threat today? Is this why you’ve dramatically reduced the 

federal help to our men and women on the frontlines? 

Answer: The Administration and the Department recognize the importance of the 

support provided through the Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program (AFGP), 

particularly with respect to rural and volunteer fire departments, as well as to 

urban and suburban departments. For many of these departments, these funds are 

critical to their operations. The fiscal year 2005 request includes $500 million for 

the AFGP, which is the first time the Administration had requested funding for this 

program separately from the rest of the larger first responders program. The fiscal 

year 2004 appropriations act for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) transferred the administration of the AFGP to the Office for Domestic Preparedness 

(ODP) from FEMA. ODP is committed to working with the fire service to ensure 

the continued success of this program. By the end of fiscal year 2004, the Department expects that more than $2 billion will have been distributed to over 15,000 

fire departments since the beginning of this initiative. 

In addition to the support provided to the fire service through AFGP, this community is also eligible to receive funds and assistance through ODP’s Homeland Security Grant Program (HSGP) and Urban Areas Security Initiative (UASI). The request would provide more than $1 billion for continuation of HSGP and over $1.4 

billion for continuation of UASI. As in past years, the fire service is eligible to receive support—including equipment acquisition funds and training and exercise support—under both of these programs. With the funds dedicated to AFGP, along with 

funds for continuation of HSGP and UASI, the Administration and Department are 

confident that the needs of the emergency response community will be met.

2. Everyone who has any level of contact with the firefighter community knows 

that there are basic, critical needs out there. We knew that before 9/11. For example, we know that 45 percent of firefighters lack standard portable radios, and 

57,000 firefighters lack critical personal protective clothing. These are basic needs 

that have gone unmet. Why are you proposing to shift the focus of this program 

away from basic, unmet critical needs to terrorism preparedness? 

Answer: While we agree that fire departments have basic needs, a Federal grant 

program cannot replace the role of local governments and communities supporting 

the majority of those needs. As the Administration continues to support the Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program to address the highest priority needs, we have 

emphasized that Federal assistance to responders should provide for the procurement of those specialized items that are not just dual-use items, but rather specific 

to terrorism preparedness. The changes proposed for 2005 support the first responder community’s capability and capacity to address chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear or explosive threats. By doing so, we support basic fire department 
77

needs and are also addressing the nation’s priority to fight terrorism in the homeland.

3. In preparing this budget, did you actually consult with any real-life 

firefighters? With all due respect, I don’t know any firefighter out there 

who thinks that cutting funding to the FIRE Act and changing its mission 

is an appropriate thing to do. Where are you gathering your intelligence 

to make these inexplicable decisions? 

Answer: As discussed in our previous reply, we do not see the 2005 proposal as 

a change in mission but more as providing increased visibility for those fire departments in need of terrorism-specific preparedness and training, or dual-use equipment for departments in high-risk areas. We implement these measures based on 

discussions with fire departments and firefighters from all types and sizes of fire 

departments. The fiscal year 2005 request includes $500 million for continuation of the Fire Act 

Grant program, the same funding level as in the President’s Fiscal Year 2004 request , and representing a solid commitment to continue to support the critical 

needs of the nation’s fire service, who’s views and expertise are well-represented by 

the U.S. Fire Administration. Even though the fiscal year 2004 appropriations act 

for the Department of Homeland Security transferred the administration of the Fire 

Act Grant Program to ODP from FEMA, the Department is committed to cooperation between ODP and the U.S. Fire Administration to ensure the ongoing success 

of this program. By the end of fiscal year 2004, the Department expects that more 

than $2 billion will have been distributed to over 15,000 fire departments since the 

beginning of this initiative. 

Further, the AFGP is not the only means of providing assistance to fire departments. , Fire departments are eligible to receive funds and assistance through 

ODP’s Homeland Security Grant Program (HSGP) and Urban Areas Security Initiative (UASI). The fiscal year 2005 request would provide more than $1 billion for continuation of HSGP and $1.2 billion for continuation of UASI. The funds proposed 

for the Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program, along with funds for continuation 

of HSGP and UASI, leave the Administration and Department confident that the 

needs of the emergency response community will be met.

4. The leading cause of firefighter death in America is a heart attack that occurs 

either at the scene of emergencies or soon after returning from emergency scenes. 

In my district, Bloomfield, NJ Firefighter Daniel McGrath could tell you a thing or 

two about the need for cardiac fitness. When Mr. McGrath went to his physical 

mandated by the program funded by the 2002 FIRE grant, it was discovered that 

he needed immediate heart surgery—no one had any idea he was in danger prior 

to that physical. He had successful bypass and valve replacement surgery and is 

back on the job today. With all this in mind, why would the President’s 2005 

proposed budget eliminate funding for programs to enhance the level of 

cardiac fitness among firefighters? 

Answer: The goal of the President’s Fiscal Year 2005 budget is to focus the Assistance to Firefighter Grant Program on the basic training and equipment needed 

to be prepared for all hazard and terrorism responses to protect the American public. During the past four years, those departments that had a need for wellness and 

fitness projects had ample opportunity to seek funding for those activities. Many did 

and now have exercise equipment and training that will last them for many years 

to come. Medical exams, immunizations, and personal fitness have long been local 

responsibilities, and indeed the vast majority of such costs are borne annually by 

local government. Inclusion of these items in the first four years of the AFG Program was intended to provide a jump start to local fire departments who had never 

undertaken such activities but not to permanently subsidize these operating costs.

5. Another leading cause of firefighter death occurs from firefighters getting lost 

inside burning buildings and other crews not being able to find and rescue them. 

Why would the budget eliminate funding for programs to train rapid intervention teams to improve their capability to rescue firefighters who are 

trapped or lost at fires? 

Answer: Contrary to any misunderstanding that may exist, the Assistance to 

Firefighters Grant Program support for the development of RIT capability will continue, but rather than cited as a separate activity, it will be integrated into the eligible equipment and training activities supported by the program.

6. The nation’s leading reports on the fire safety of America, ‘‘America Burning’’ 

and ‘‘America At Risk. . .America Burning Revisited’’ specifically cited prevention 

and education as crucial strategies in reducing loss of life and property from unwanted fires. The recent review of the Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program by 
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the Department of Homeland Security’s Inspector General suggests a greater emphasis should be placed on fire prevention and education. American fire departments value prevention efforts as part of a multi-faceted system for keeping people 

in communities safe. Why would the President’s proposed 2005 budget eliminate funding for such a critical component of this nation’s fire and life 

safety infrastructure? 

Answer: The Administration’s proposal does not eliminate the statutory funding 

set aside of 5 percent for Special Fire Prevention and Safety projects, which will 

continue to be made available to fire departments and other nationally recognized 

agencies with a proven record of success in such efforts. Within the broader program, applicants have continually chosen to select fire operations, firefighter safety 

and firefighting vehicles for assistance over fire prevention activities by an overwhelming majority. We believe this demonstrates that the fire service overall believes that investment at this point in time is best made in the equipment and 

training areas. In addition, direct and effective fire prevention activity is centered 

on the adoption and enforcement of fire and building codes, which remain a state 

and local responsibility in the United States.

7. Even the best-trained and equipped fire department cannot reach emergency 

scenes instantaneously, meaning that serious efforts at reducing fire deaths, medical 

emergencies, and property loss must focus on preventing these incidents from happening in the first place. According to the ‘‘State of Home Safety In America’’ report, 

our nation suffers nearly 20,000 deaths and almost 20 million medical visits each 

year from preventable injuries. Fires and burns are the third leading cause of unintentional home injury death, following slips and falls and poisonings. Injury in 

America is at epidemic proportions. A key focus area for the United States Fire Administration Programs is prevention and public education. Why is the President’s 

2005 budget proposal so out of alignment with the goals of the federal 

agency responsible for focusing on the nation’s fire safety? 

Answer: There is a reasonable distinction between the program activities pursued by a national agency such as the U.S. Fire Administration, and the activities 

funded in a national grant program aimed at local responders. Activities of the 

United States Fire Administration (USFA) will continue to focus efforts on injury 

prevention, especially to the young and the old as part of the USFA’s five-year strategic goals. Support for special education, and training courses and targeted marketing efforts related to USFA safety and injury reduction initiatives continued as 

does the mandatory Community Risk Reduction Course at the National Fire Academy which trains senior fire service managers on how to reduce injuries from all 

hazards in their communities. Even with the changes proposed by the Administration, the 5 percent set aside for Special Fire Prevention and Safety projects has preserved for fiscal year 2005. Furthermore, the AFG Program, which has only been 

existence since 2001, is not the sole source of Federal support to injury prevention 

activities, Other public health agencies continue to address injury prevention as 

part of their mission.

8. The Budget’s Program Assessment Rating Tool declared that the Fire Grant 

Program ‘‘is unfocussed and has not demonstrated its impact on public safety.’’ The 

fact is that this program has positively impacted public safety by providing nearly 

$2 billion for infrared cameras, hazmat detection devices, improved breathing 

apparatuses, advanced training and fitness programs, fire engines, and interoperable communication systems. This is the basic equipment our fire departments need 

to effectively respond to all hazards. How was your assessment reached? 

Answer: The analysis was conducted by the Office of Management and Budget 

in coordination with the Department, FEMA, and the U.S. Fire Administration. This 

analysis included all program information and data available at the time. As of that 

point, the program still lacked clear goals for the objectives laid out in the Fire Act, 

‘‘protecting the health and safety of the public and firefighting personnel;’’ and 

lacked strategy for measuring progress towards these goals. The analysis raised concerns about the wide array of funding uses and the broad dispersal of funds among 

a large number departments. Both factors may limit the program’s ability to focus 

resources on those activities benefiting the maximum number of firefighters and the 

general public. In the absence of a program evaluation strategy, grantees were not 

required demonstrate measurable improvements in their capabilities as a result of 

these grants. As this Administration has a commitment to results, not simply the 

purchase of equipment, there should be osome means of knowing whether the activities funded by the program actually contribute to the safety of the American public. 

Over the last year, the Administration has taken a number of actions to address 

these issues while also supporting continued funding: goals have been clarified, a 

program evaluation process has established, funding uses have been narrowed, and 
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the Administration has sought to increase the grant size for larger cities. In time, 

these improvements should contribute to a measurable track record for the AFG 

Program’s performance. 

QUESTIONS FROM THE MINORITY STAFF OF THE COMMITTEE

1. A comprehensive staffing strategy is needed to identify vulnerabilities along our 

borders and to provide resources according to the greatest need. However, to the 

Committee’s knowledge, there is no comprehensive border staffing strategy: • created, or being developed, by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) 

or any of its components; 

• after the 9/11 attacks; • that includes both the northern and southern land borders; and • that identifies how our limited resources—border inspectors, Border Patrol 

agents, and technology to support these groups—will be assigned. 

To the contrary, several staffing initiatives have been announced or implemented 

(such as the ‘‘Action Plan for Cooperation and Border Safety’’ recently announced 

by Secretary Ridge and his Mexican counterpart, Secretary of Government Santiago 

Creel) without any evidence that a vulnerability assessment of our land borders was 

conducted or is even being planned. Despite the fact that more than two years 

have passed since the 9/11 attacks, there is no indication that DHS has 

made any effort to establish a comprehensive staffing strategy—for example, updating existing staffing strategies such as Customs? Resource Allocation Model (RAM) to reflect post-9/11 security concerns. The Committee is concerned 

that DHS does not seem to have a comprehensive policy in place to guide the placement of border resources—such as unmanned aerial vehicles, sensors, or camera arrays—or implementation of staffing initiatives such as the ‘‘One Face at the Border.’’

What, if any, steps has DHS taken to assess staffing and technology needs along 

the border since its creation last year? Has any DHS component made an attempt 

to conduct these assessments after the 9/11 attacks? How many other land border 

staffing initiatives does DHS plan to implement without an overall staffing strategy 

in place? Does DHS have plans to conduct a vulnerability assessment of our land 

borders, and if so, what is the timeframe for those assessments? 

Answer: The creation of CBP on March 1, 2003, and the resulting merger of customs, immigration, border patrol, and agriculture functions into CBP has resulted 

in the need to evaluate any future agency-wide use of an allocation model for projecting staffing needs. Integrated workload distribution and assumptions are still 

being assessed in the newly configured CBP. Among the questions to be considered 

in future staffing models are how the workforce will be aligned and how workload 

and work process data from the various incoming agencies will be collected and 

used. As we have continued to assess data and information from incoming agencies, 

we have determined that it exists in many different formats. These different formats 

must still be integrated and/or expanded to meet the needs of the new agency and 

be captured in CBP automated systems to feed into any allocation model. 

In the meantime, we have used different data sources to assist in allocating resources. Using this approach, it is clear to us that there is no available scientific 

assessment to be able to know and project all threats associated with our borders 

both between the ports-of-entry or at the ports-of-entry. We have, however, attempted to project our needs based on known threats and workload and performance 

data that are presently available. 

Between the ports of entry, we have recognized and determined, based on intelligence, a known vulnerability at the northern border and have re-deployed temporary and permanent staffing and resources to address this threat. We have also 

determined based on apprehensions and intelligence the need to re-deploy existing 

personnel and resources to address an identified threat along the Southwest Border 

and will deploy border patrol resources to address this threat. 

At the ports of entry, we have undergone a major initiative to integrate three 

inspectional workforces, which has been the primary focus of our merger. Since 

‘‘One Face at the Border’’ is still in its infancy we are not in a position to prepare 

a comprehensive staffing strategy. We are presently implementing a major crosstraining effort over the next 1–2 years. As officers become fully trained, we will be 

in a better position to determine the number that would be appropriate at all ports 

of entry and geographic locations and will introduce the use of intelligence, risk assessments and data to assist in designing staffing allocations. 

To this end, CBP will continue to use other decision support tools such as threat 

assessments, existing and anticipated workload, targeting results, and statistics to 

assist in preparing analyses to support the allocation and deployment of staffing, 

technology and resource deployment. 
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The Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) is under development and has 

deployed initial capabilities. The ACE is the information technology foundation for 

CBP business processes and will significantly enhance information collection and 

analysis pertaining to potential terrorist threats and movement of trade. As the centerpiece of CBP Modernization, deployment of ACE capabilities and resulting of 

business process enhancements will be a significant consideration in planning resource allocation and staffing.

2. The ‘‘One Face at the Border’’ initiative was announced in September, 2003 and 

streamlines the inspections process at our ports-of-entry. As part of that announcement, DHS indicated it would offer Agriculture Specialists the opportunity to transfer to Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Officer positions. However, to the Committee’s knowledge, CBP has announced no procedures or timeframes for these 

transfers of Agriculture Specialists, nor has it announced a plan to back-fill the Agriculture Specialist positions of those who choose to accept the new CBP Officer positions. 

First, please provide the Committee with any written documents concerning the 

most recent plan available for transferring Agriculture Specialists to CBP Officer positions, including but not limited to: application timeframes, method of selection (and 

any applicable factors, such as geography, seniority) of Agriculture Specialists to become CBP Officers, and types and length of notice Agriculture Specialists will receive 

in advance of application process. Second, please provide the Committee with information on: how many Agriculture Specialists will be allowed to transfer, how this 

number was reached, and whether there is any appeals process for Agriculture Specialists who are denied a transfer to CBP Officer positions. Finally, please provide 

the name of the individual who is responsible for making all decisions regarding implementation of the ‘‘One Face at the Border’’ initiative. 

Answer: DHS and CBP are committed to offering Agriculture Specialists the opportunity for reassignment to the position of CBP Officer. On July 25, 2004 the legacy Customs and Immigration Inspectors were converted to CBP Officers in the 

1895 series and into one overtime system—COPRA. We still plan to offer Agriculture Specialists the opportunity to become CBP Officers, however, we must ensure that we do not create vulnerabilities in the ports as a result, which makes the 

timing of this opportunity critical. Filling current vacancies in the ports and training the new employees is our number one priority.

3. To the Committee’s knowledge, there are no studies or metrics that confirm 

how much states and localities have improved their preparedness for acts of terrorism. In addition, a December 31, 2003, report from the DHS Inspector General 

found that, ‘‘DHS program managers have yet to develop meaningful performance 

measures necessary to determine whether the grant programs have actually enhanced state and local capabilities to respond to terrorist attacks and natural disasters.’’ Therefore, what is the basis for the overall reduction in grant funds 

to be distributed by the Office of Domestic Preparedness? 

Answer: The Department firmly supports the need to develop national preparedness standards. As part of this effort, ODP is continuing its efforts to develop preparedness standards and to establish clear methods for assessing State and local 

preparedness levels and progress. On December 17, 2003, the President issued 

Homeland Security Presidential Directive (HSPD)–8. Through HSPD–8, the President tasked Secretary Ridge, in coordination with other Federal departments and 

State and local jurisdictions, to develop national preparedness goals, improve delivery of federal preparedness assistance to State and local jurisdictions, and strengthen the preparedness capabilities of Federal, State, territorial, tribal, and local governments. 

Earlier this year, the Secretary delegated to ODP the lead for the implementation 

of HSPD–8. This designation by the Secretary is consistent with ODP’s mission, as 

provided under the provisions of the Homeland Security Act, to be the primary Federal agency responsible for the preparedness of the United States for acts of terrorism. 

The standards that will result from HSPD–8 implementation build on an existing 

body of standards and guidelines developed by ODP and other Federal agencies to 

guide and inform State and local preparedness efforts. Since its inception ODP has 

worked with Federal agencies and State and local jurisdictions to develop and disseminate information to State and local agencies to assist them in making more informed preparedness decisions, including capability assessments, preparedness planning and strategies, and choices relating to training, equipment, and exercises.

4. The FIRE Grant program was created by Congress in order to meet basic, critical needs of the firefighting community—including fire engines, portable radios, 
81

protective clothing, and breathing apparatus—which a December 2002 study by the 

U.S. Fire Administration and the National Fire Protection Association found to be 

significant. Once again, not only is the Administration proposing to reduce funding 

for this program from $750 million to $500 million, but you are also proposing to 

shift the focus of this program to terrorism preparedness. How does the Administration expect the fire community to prepare for and respond to terrorism 

when it is abundantly clear that many fire departments lack the training 

and equipment to respond to even the most basic emergency situations? 

Answer: The Administration and the Department recognize the importance of the 

support provided through the AFGP particularly with respect to rural and volunteer 

fire departments, as well as to urban and suburban departments. For many of these 

departments, these funds are critical to their operations. The fiscal year 2005 request includes $500 million for the AFGP, which is the first time the Administration 

had requested funding for this program separately from the rest of the larger first 

responders program. The fiscal year 2004 appropriations act for DHS transferred 

the administration of the AFGP to ODP from FEMA. ODP is committed to working 

with the fire service to ensure the continued success of this program. By the end 

of fiscal year 2004, the Department expects that more than $2 billion will have been 

distributed to over 15,000 fire departments since the beginning of this initiative. 

In addition to the support provided to the fire service through the AFGP, this 

community is also eligible to receive funds and assistance through ODP’s HSPG and 

UASI. The request would provide more than $1 billion for continuation of HSGP and 

over $1.4 billion for continuation of UASI. As in past years, the fire service is eligible to receive support—including equipment acquisition funds and training and exercise support—under both of these programs. With the funds dedicated to AFGP, 

along with funds for continuation of HSGP and UASI, the Administration and Department are confident that the needs of the emergency response community will 

be met.

5. Although the President’s request increases the amount of discretionary grant 

funds to be distributed based on threats and vulnerabilities under the Urban Area 

Security Initiative, you have yet to provide Congressional appropriators and authorizers with a detailed explanation of the intelligence information that you are using 

to determine which cities receive these grants, despite the fact that we have requested this information. In addition, it still is not at all clear how the Department 

intends to measure progress in building our preparedness capabilities nationwide. 

a. When can we expect the Department to provide this Committee with 

detailed information that supports your selection of specific cities to 

receive funds under the Urban Area Security Initiative? 

Answer: DHS officials and staff have provided a number of briefings on how the 

UASI funds were allocated. The methodology was fully consistent with appropriations legislation requiring an allocation that took ‘‘into consideration credible threat, 

presence of critical infrastructure, population, vulnerability. . .’’ Yet as our methodology relies on information provided from other Federal agencies, we must be sensitive to their requirements for handling this information, including concerns about 

the specific formula. DHS is willing to provide additional briefings at the Committee’s request. 

b. What is your progress to date in building the terrorism preparedness 

capabilities of states and localities, how are you measuring this 

progress, and what is your timeline for building a ‘‘baseline’’ level of 

preparedness capabilities nationwide? 

Answer: The Department of Homeland Security firmly believes that it is essential to provide states and localities the support they need to enhance their security 

against terrorist attacks, and to provide them the resources to identify 

vulnerabilities and needs. To this end, the Department, through ODP, administered 

the State Homeland Security Assessment and Strategy Process (SHSAS). This process allowed states and local jurisdictions to update their needs and vulnerabilities 

assessment to reflect post-September 11, 2001, realities, as well as to identify 

progress on the priorities outlined their initial homeland security strategies, which 

were initially conducted in 1999. The SHSAS process allows states to make prudent 

and informed decisions on how best to allocate and distribute funds they receive 

from ODP and DHS to enhance their security. 

In addition, ODP is continuing its efforts to develop preparedness standards and 

to establish clear methods for assessing State and local preparedness levels and 

progress. On December 17, 2003, the President issued ‘‘Homeland Security Presidential Directive (HSPD)–8.’’ Through HSPD–8, the President tasked Secretary 

Ridge, in coordination with other Federal departments and State and local jurisdictions, to develop national preparedness goals, improve delivery of federal prepared-
82

ness assistance to State and local jurisdictions, and strengthen the preparedness capabilities of Federal, State, territorial, tribal, and local governments. 

Earlier this year, the Secretary delegated to ODP the lead for the implementation 

of HSPD–8. This designation by the Secretary is consistent with ODP’s mission, as 

provided under the provisions of the Homeland Security Act, to be the primary federal agency responsible for the preparedness of the United States for acts of terrorism. HSPD–8 is consistent with the broader goals and objectives established in 

the President’s National Strategy for Homeland Security issued in July, 2002, which 

discussed the creation of a fully-integrated national emergency response capability. 

Inherent to the successful implementation of HSPD–8 is the development of clear 

and measurable standards for State and local preparedness capabilities. 

The standards that will result from HSPD–8 implementation build on an existing 

body of standards and guidelines developed by ODP and other Federal agencies to 

guide and inform State and local preparedness efforts. Since its inception ODP has 

worked with Federal agencies and State and local jurisdictions to develop and disseminate information to State and local agencies to assist them in making more informed preparedness decisions, including capability assessments, preparedness planning and strategies, and choices relating to training, equipment, and exercises. 

c. A recent Presidential Directive (HSPD–8) required you to develop a national 

domestic all-hazards preparedness goal. How do you intend to develop this 

goal, how will state and local governments be involved in the development of this goal, and when do you expect to be completed with this 

goal? How will this goal be integrated into both your current grant programs, and your future budget requests? 

Answer: HSPD–8 requires the creation of an all-hazards preparedness goal, 

mechanisms to improve delivery of federal preparedness assistance to States and localities, and an outline to strengthen preparedness for our nation. To this end, ODP 

has developed 4 initiatives to implement HSPD–8: (1) create a National Preparedness System, (2) balance the Federal portfolio of preparedness investment, (3) establish a National Training and Exercise Program, and (4) develop a National Preparedness Assessment and Reporting System. To execute these strategies, a Senior 

Steering Committee has been put together to oversee the implementation and guide 

the interagency Integrated Concept Teams (ICTs). The ICTs must develop comprehensive and executable program implementation plans. Since preparedness is capability based, the National Preparedness Goal will be determined by analyzing existing scenarios, defining baseline capabilities, establishing metrics, and issuing national guidance. This will help DHS establish preparedness requirements and scorecards that indicate gaps, deficiencies and excesses in the nation’s preparedness. It 

will also help generate tools and processes to assist in the prioritizing the allocation 

of resources. 

State and local stakeholders have been closely involved in the planning and development related to HSPD–8. State, territorial, tribal, and local participation in the 

Integrated Concept Teams (ICTs) and Senior Steering Committee for HSPD–8 Implementation was carefully selected to balance stakeholder views. Participation includes 4 members per ICT and 7 on the Senior Steering Committee, to keep the 

groups to a manageable size. DHS is funding travel for these representatives to 

make participation easier: 

Further, DHS is committed to the nation-wide review of key drafts in the process—through a secure website, targeted conferences for some activities, and other 

means. The intent is to obtain broad review before final drafts are submitted to the 

Senior Steering Committee and DHS Leadership. 

Additionally, an initial version of a homeland security universal task list (UTL) 

is being reviewed by the preparedness community, including over 50 national associations representing State and local stakeholder groups and ICT members. The 

UTL will define the tasks that must be performed at the federal, state, and local 

levels to prevent, respond to and recover from the incidents described in the 15 Illustrative Planning Scenarios (IPS) developed by the Homeland Security Council. 

The IPS will define the range of threats and hazards for incidents of national significance. 

MAJOR MILESTONES

• March 26, 2004—Secretary Ridge approves concept for HSPD–8 Implementation. 

• July 31, 2004—Establish Universal List of Mission Essential Tasks for the 

Homeland Security Community. Submit a multi-year Exercise plan to the President. 

• September 1, 2004—Submit to DHS a Program Implementation Plan and Requirements. 
83

• September 15, 2004—Submit National Preparedness Goal to the President. • October 1, 2004—First Annual Report on the Use of Funds for Preparedness Assistance Programs to the Secretary. • December 31, 2004—Complete Federal Response Capabilities Inventory. • March 15, 2005—Quantifiable Performance Measurement for Planning, Equipment, Training, and Exercises for Federal Preparedness. • September 1, 2005—Full implementation of Process to Develop and Adopt First 

Responder Equipment Standards and R&D Needs, National Training Program, and 

National Lessons Learned / Best Practices System. • September 15, 2005—First Annual Report to the President. • September 30, 2005—Full Implementation of a Closely Coordinate Interagency 

Grant Process. 

State and local stakeholders have been closely involved in the planning and development related to HSPD–8. State, territorial, tribal, and local participation in the 

Integrated Concept Teams (ICTs) and Senior Steering Committee for HSPD–8 Implementation was carefully selected to balance stakeholder views. Participation includes 4 members per ICT and 7 on the Senior Steering Committee, to keep the 

groups to a manageable size. DHS is funding travel for these representatives to 

make participation easier:

Balanced Investments Integrated Concept Team 

Errol Etting, Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) 

W. R. Zwerschke, International Association of Emergency Managers (IAEM) 

Michael Fraser, National Association of City & County Health Officials 

(NACCHO) 

Training and Exercises Integrated Concept Team 

Captain John P. Salle, International Association of Chiefs of Police 

Robert Cumberland, National Volunteer Fire Council 

Thomas J. Fargione, National Emergency Management Association (NEMA) 

Mark H. McCain, American Public Works Association (APWA)

Assessment and Reporting Integrated Concept Team 

Chief John M. Buckman, International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC) 

Tim Stephens, Association of State and Territories Health Officials (ASTHO) 

Mike Brown, National Sheriff’s Association (NSA) 

Emily B. DeMers, The Council of State Governments

Senior Steering Committee 

Governor Dirk Kempthorne, Boise, ID 

Mayor Anthony Williams, Washington, DC 

Commissioner Karen Miller, President, National Association of Counties 

Chief William Phillips, Aroostook Band of Micmacs, Presque Isle, ME 

Dale Shipley, Director, Ohio Emergency Management Agency 

Chief Michael Freeman, Los Angeles County Fire Department

DHS is committed to the nation-wide review of key drafts in the process—through 

an online electronic program management office (ePMO), targeted conferences for 

some activities, and other means. The intent is to obtain broad review before final 

drafts are submitted to the Senior Steering Committee and DHS Leadership. 

Additionally, the initial version of the universal task list (UTL) is being reviewed 

by the preparedness community, including over 50 national associations representing State and local stakeholder groups and ICT members. The UTL will define the tasks that must be performed at the federal, state, and local levels to prevent, respond to and recover from the incidents described in the 15 Illustrative 

Planning Scenarios (IPS) developed by the Homeland Security Council. The IPS will 

define the range of threats and hazards for incidents of national significance.

6. Deputy Secretary Loy recently testified to this Committee that achieving interoperable communications was ‘‘one of the Secretary’s top four or five priorities for 

the Department.’’ Although interoperable communications systems remain a critical 

need for the first responder community, the President’s Budget requests no funds 

for grants—a reduction of $85 million from fiscal year 2004 that was appropriated 

by Congress—to enhance state and local interoperability. 

a. How does the Department intend to address this ‘‘priority’’ issue when 

you have requested no grant funds for this purpose? 

Answer: The Department is working to improve interoperable wireless communications in a number of ways. 

SAFECOM, a program within the Science and Technology Directorate, hosted a 

strategic planning meeting in December 2003 with representatives of the state and 

local public safety and government communities. This group helped SAFECOM plan 

specific efforts to promote public safety communications and interoperability with 
84

the funding available for fiscal year 2004. The following are initiatives SAFECOM 

will pursue, leveraging resources from other federal programs where possible to 

maximize resources available to all levels of government in support of improved 

public safety communications and interoperability. 

Research, develop, test & evaluate (RDT&E) existing & emerging technologies for improved public safety communications and interoperability.

Public safety is in need of equipment that has been tested and has been proven to 

meet their operational requirements. To accomplish this, SAFECOM is developing 

a Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) to be released in the Spring of CY 2004 to 

select and fund critical field tests for the cutting edge technologies necessary to improve public safety communications and interoperability. In addition, SAFECOM 

provides funding to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to 

perform laboratory testing of interim technologies that can assist public safety in 

developing short term solutions for interoperable communications. 

Developing a process to advance standards necessary to improve public 

safety communications and interoperability. To accomplish this, SAFECOM 

will identify, test, and, where necessary, develop standards in coordination with the 

public safety community and ongoing standards activities. These activities will be 

performed in conjunction with NIST. 

Creating a one-stop shop for public safety communications and interoperability. A national public safety wireless communications portal will be developed to provide planning and management applications, collaborative tools, and relevant and timely wireless information to the public safety community. The first step 

in delivering this one-stop-shop will be to build a prototype combining a limited 

number of existing applications, tools, and sites. A toll-free telephone number will 

be established to provide technical assistance and other information to the practitioner community. 

ntegrating coordinated grant guidance across all grant making agencies.

Coordinated grant guidance provides criteria to avert the creation of public safety 

communications systems stovepipes at the local and state levels. To integrate grant 

guidance, we will work with the Federal Interagency Coordination Council (FICC) 

to ensure that federal money is spent to promote a consistent vision of interoperability. 

Creating a baseline of public safety communications and interoperability 

across the country. A mechanism will be established to assess the current state 

of interoperability across the nation. This will be the basis for measuring future improvements made through local, state, and federal public safety communications initiatives. To accomplish this, we will define the optimal metrics, assess previous 

studies into the state of interoperability, conduct a gap analysis, and launch and 

support a project team to conduct the baseline assessment. 

Completing the comprehensive Public Safety Statement of Requirements(SoR). The SoR defines the functional requirements for public safety practitioners to communicate and share information when it is needed, where it is needed, 

and when authorized. To accomplish this, we will complete Version 1.0 of the SoR 

in partnership with public safety. This document is expected to be available by the 

end of March 2004. 

Providing technical assistance for public safety communications and 

interoperability. Technical assistance, which includes support for planning, development, implementation and assessment of public safety communications systems, 

is a stated need of the public safety community. To provide this, we will develop 

a coordinated, consistent approach for the entire lifecycle of a communications system in partnership with FICC. 

SAFECOM and the public safety community assembled believe that this set of initiatives will move the country towards improved public safety communications and 

interoperability. 

b. Your own Project SAFECOM officials have noted that no standard, guidance, 

or national strategy exists on interoperability. Justice Department officials informed 

GAO that they are working with SAFECOM to develop a statement of requirements 

for interoperability—not interoperability standards, but requirements for such 

standards—that should be ready for release by May 1, 2004. First, will these requirements be ready by May 1st of this year, and second, how long after 

the requirements are ready can we expect standards to be issued? 

Answer: The Statement of Requirements is now in draft form and will be finalized and released before May 1, 2004. After its completion, SAFECOM will perform 

a standards gap analysis against the SoR to continue the promotion and adoption 

of standards developed by the user community and existing standards-defining organizations. This is an ongoing task as technology changes and improves. Standards 

must evolve with technology to ensure the backwards compatibility of new equip-
85

ment with legacy systems. Such an approach helps maximize the current investments that public safety has made. 

To ensure that appropriate standards are promulgated and adopted SAFECOM is 

partnering with the National Institute of Standards and Technology Office of Law 

Enforcement Standards and the Department of Justice’s Advanced Generation 

Interoperability Law Enforcement (AGILE) program to continue to support current 

standards efforts, as well as to continue the testing and evaluation of new technologies and equipment. In addition, SAFECOM is funding a Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) to field test new technologies that may be applied to the public 

safety environment and working with its federal partners to promote the adoption 

of currently available standards when applicable through coordinate grant guidance. 

An example of this is the fiscal year 2003 SAFECOM guidance used in the Office 

of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) grant solicitation.

7. Before the Department of Homeland Security was established, U.S. Customs 

had responsibility for investigating unfair trade practices. Since Customs investigations were moved to ICE a year ago, what activities has ICE undertaken to investigate unfair trade practices—especially dumping cases? Specifically, what resources have been requested in the Fiscal Year 2005 budget to pursue these 

cases, including FTEs and total funds requested, and is there a strategy 

plan for ICE that reflects how ICE will continue to pursue non–DHS mission investigations? If so, what is it? 

Answer: In August 2003, in order to combat potential fraud and facilitate legitimate trade, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) published its Trade Strategy 

Document. This strategy was developed under the guidance of the CBP Modernization Board and with the direction of the Trade Strategy Board. ICE is a full member 

of the CBP Modernization Board and is represented by the Director of the Office 

of Investigations (OI). The ICE representative on the CBP Trade Strategy Board is 

the Chief of the Commercial Fraud Investigations Unit within OI. ICE’s partnership 

within CBP’s Trade Strategy Board is a highlight of the ICE/CBP shared trade enforcement mission. ICE is the principal provider of investigative services to CBP. 

As such, ICE is committed to the success of the CBP Trade Strategy Board. 

ICE’s trade enforcement program and commercial fraud investigations mission is 

to detect, deter, investigate, penalize, and dismantle organizations that employ 

fraudulent, predatory, and unfair trade practices that threaten U.S, economic stability, market competitiveness, and public health and safety. To detect and/or deter 

the circumvention of anti-dumping duties on imports into the U.S., ICE is actively 

working with CBP on targeting initiatives on such commodities as catfish, crawfish, 

shrimp, garlic, steel, and honey, to name a few. In addition, ICE and CBP have met 

on several occasions with representatives of domestic industry who are being injured 

by the illegal practices of other importers. 

ICE currently has numerous investigations open nationwide involving the evasion 

of anti-dumping duties, especially on commodities from China. In the last year, ICE 

has made significant progress in the investigation and convictions of importers who 

evade or attempt to evade payment of anti-dumping duties. Included in these ‘‘milestones’’ are increased cooperation with the Department of Commerce (DOC) and the 

ability to obtain proprietary documents from DOC. 

During the past year, ICE has made significant civil and criminal cases. One such 

case is a civil settlement of $5.25 million in penalties against the Bank of China 

for its role in conspiring with, and financing, Nature’s Farm, et al, in a scheme to 

evade the payment of anti-dumping duties on Chilean mushrooms imported from 

China. Also, in the Central District of California, a jury convicted Young Sen LIN 

for Conspiracy to Evade Payment of Anti-dumping Duties, a violation of 18 USC 

371. LIN defrauded the government of approximately $3 million in anti-dumping 

duties on imported crawfish tail meat. 

ICE has provided increased training to special agents and federal prosecutors, including steel training seminars hosted by the Steel Industry. During fiscal year 

2004, seminars were held in eight cities throughout the U.S. and Puerto Rico. 

Funding to support anti-dumping investigative efforts, as well as investigations 

of other unfair trade practices, is contained within the base budget of the Office of 

Investigations. There is no additional funding requested in the fiscal year 2005 

President’s Budget supporting the investigation of unfair trade practices.

8. Several strategic industries in the United States are being weakened by what 

seems to be this Administration’s benign neglect of aggressive Chinese trade into 

our country. For example, a company in Congresswoman Slaughter’s district (FMC) 

makes a chemical crucial to the information economy. In fact, it is the only U.S. 

producer of this chemical which is necessary to etch circuit boards. This company 
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has alleged unfair trade practices, but this Administration has, so far, failed to pursue this case against the Chinese. Beyond the lost American jobs, what is the 

Department’s position concerning the potential security threat posed if 

critical U.S. industries, which provide equipment for our war on terror or 

military, are weakened or lost overseas, such as steel? What actions, if any, 

is DHS taking to prevent this from happening? 

Answer: DHS is responsible for border security and that includes the enforcement of our trade laws. The Administration has shown its willingness to pursue 

policies to help vital sectors of the economy. When it is necessary to take measures 

to create a fair and level playing field, it is DHS that enforces these measures at 

the border. We will continue to vigorously enforce our trade laws, while at the same 

time allowing legitimate commerce to move freely and thereby strengthen our economic growth. We are pursuing the development of the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) which will become the foundation of a 21st century trade data system providing enhanced support for cargo processing and enforcement operations. 

The increasing availability of early and accurate trade information is allowing DHS 

to identify risks earlier so that we can respond sooner to protect the homeland.

9. Has DHS communicated with those responsible for administering our 

trade policy? How frequently does that occur? 

Answer: DHS is actively engaged in trade policy development. The Assistant Secretary for Border and Transportation Security (BTS) Policy and Planning is a member of the Trade Policy Review Group (TPRG). The TPRG is a senior group lead by 

the United States Trade Representative with participants from the Department of 

State, the Treasury Department, the Department of Commerce, the Department of 

Justice and many other federal agencies. Through this and subordinate groups, the 

Department of Homeland Security communicates our interests during the development of trade policy. Border and Transportation Security staff participate on a 

weekly basis in working level trade discussions through the Trade Policy Staff Committee (TPSC) of the TPRGa.

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