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ACCESS DELAYED: FIXING THE SECURITY

CLEARANCE PROCESS — PART II

HEARING

BEFORE THE

OVERSIGHT OF GOVERNMENT MANAGEMENT, 

THE FEDERAL WORKFORCE AND THE DISTRICT 

OF COLUMBIA SUBCOMMITTEE

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON 

HOMELAND SECURITY AND 

GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

NOVEMBER 9, 2005

Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security 

and Governmental Affairs

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine, Chairman 

TED STEVENS, Alaska 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio 

NORM COLEMAN, Minnesota 

TOM COBURN, Oklahoma 

LINCOLN D. CHAFEE, Rhode Island 

ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah 

PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico 

JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia 

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut 

CARL LEVIN, Michigan 

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

MARK DAYTON, Minnesota 

FRANK LAUTENBERG, New Jersey 

MARK PRYOR, Arkansas

MICHAEL D. BOPP, Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

JOYCE A. RECHTSCHAFFEN, Minority Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

TRINA DRIESSNACK TYRER, Chief Clerk 

OVERSIGHT OF GOVERNMENT MANAGEMENT, THE FEDERAL 

WORKFORCE AND THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA SUBCOMMITTEE 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio, Chairman 

TED STEVENS, Alaska 

NORM COLEMAN, Minnesota 

TOM COBURN, Oklahoma 

LINCOLN D. CHAFEE, Rhode Island 

ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah 

PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico 

JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia 

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii 

CARL LEVIN, Michigan 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

MARK DAYTON, Minnesota 

FRANK LAUTENBERG, New Jersey 

MARK PRYOR, Arkansas

ANDREW RICHARDSON, Staff Director 

RICHARD J. KESSLER, Minority Staff Director 

NANCI E. LANGLEY, Minority Deputy Staff Director 

TARA BAIRD, Chief Clerk 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

Opening statements: Page 

Senator Voinovich ............................................................................................. 1

Senator Akaka .................................................................................................. 10

WITNESSES 

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2005

Linda M. Springer, Director, U.S. Office of Personnel Management, accompanied by Kathy Dillaman, Associate Director, Federal Investigative Services Division, U.S. Office of Personnel Management ........................................ 3

Clay Johnson, III, Deputy Director for Management, U.S. Office of Management and Budget .................................................................................................. 5

Derek B. Stewart, Director, Defense Capabilities and Management, U.S. Government Accountability Office ............................................................................. 7

ALPHABETICAL LIST OF WITNESSES

Johnson, Clay, III: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 5

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 30

Springer, Linda M.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 3

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 23

Stewart, Derek B.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 7

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 34

APPENDIX 

Questions and responses for the Record from: 

Ms. Springer ..................................................................................................... 49

Mr. Johnson ...................................................................................................... 55

Mr. Stewart ....................................................................................................... 57

‘‘Plan for Improving the Personnel Security Clearance Process,’’ November 

2005 ....................................................................................................................... 64

(1)

ACCESS DELAYED: FIXING THE SECURITY 

CLEARANCE PROCESS — PART II 

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2005

U.S. SENATE, OVERSIGHT OF GOVERNMENT MANAGEMENT, THE FEDERAL WORKFORCE, AND THE

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA SUBCOMMITTEE, OF THE COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY

AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS, Washington, DC. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 3:04 p.m., in room 

342, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. George V. Voinovich, 

Chairman of the Subcommittee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Voinovich and Akaka. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR VOINOVICH 

Senator VOINOVICH. The meeting will please come to order. Good 

afternoon and thank you for coming. 

Today, our Subcommittee will hold its second hearing on the 

Federal Government’s security clearance process. Today’s hearing 

on this issue is titled, ‘‘Access Delayed: Fixing the Security Clearance Process—Part II.’’

I know that this issue must seem mundane to most people, and 

I doubt that it resonates with the general public. However, a broken security clearance process has serious consequences for the 

Federal Government and the Nation. Highly-skilled employees may 

sit idly by for months, waiting for their security clearances to be 

finalized, while important national security work is not being done. 

I have no doubt that many people are dissuaded by the long process and seek opportunities elsewhere, thus denying the government 

of many hard working and smart people. 

Finally, I understand that government employees who already 

hold security clearances may nevertheless face lengthy reinvestigations while seeking jobs in other agencies that require clearances. 

I can only imagine how frustrating this must be. 

Let there be no doubt that a broken security clearance process 

has a negative impact on those seeking to serve, and on the overall 

safety of our Nation. 

Today’s hearing will examine two critical components of reforming the security clearance process. First, we are going to review Executive Order 13381, issued by President Bush, and the steps that 

the Office of Management and Budget is taking to implement the 

policy. Second, we will examine the Office of Personnel Management’s strategic plan to address the longstanding backlog of secuVerDate 0ct 09 2002 13:37 Sep 20, 2006 Jkt 024930 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\24930.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
2

rity clearance investigations, which was released on Monday 

evening. 

On June 27, 2005, one day prior to our first Subcommittee hearing on security clearances, the President issued the Executive 

Order in compliance with Title III of the Intelligence Reform and 

Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004. The underlying policy goal of 

this Executive Order was to establish uniform, centralized, efficient, effective, timely, and reciprocal means of determining eligibility for the access to classified information. 

I look forward to Mr. Johnson’s testimony this afternoon, as he 

is the Administration’s point person for implementing the Executive Order. It has been almost 41⁄2 months since the Executive 

Order was issued and I am anxious to learn what steps you have 

taken to ensure it is implemented in a consistent manner throughout the Federal Government. 

Additionally, we discussed the transfer of investigative functions 

from the Department of Defense to OPM and what impact that 

shift will have on the government’s ability to investigate and adjudicate security clearances in a thorough and expeditious manner. 

At the hearing, Kathy Dillaman, OPM’s Deputy Associate Director 

of the Center for Investigative Services, said the agency would provide their plan to improve the security clearance process to Congress by the end of October. Even though the submission was a 

week late, I commend OMB and OPM for working together on the 

strategic plan. After our discussions here today, I hope that we will 

all have a clearer understanding of the strategies, measures, and 

benchmarks the Executive Branch will use to track the success of 

the security program. 

Central to the successful implementation of the strategic plan is 

the leadership from the Federal agencies in charge of the security 

clearance process. To this end, I was pleased to learn that OPM Director Springer recently promoted Ms. Dillaman to an Associate Director for the newly-designated Federal Investigative Service Division within OPM. By elevating Ms. Dillaman to that position, OPM 

is sending a strong message that they are serious about enhancing 

their security clearance investigative procedures. 

In addition, I understand that Mr. Johnson has been personally 

involved in the drafting of the strategic plan. Mr. Johnson, thank 

you for your efforts and for ensuring that the plan was developed 

in a collaborative manner with input from all agency stakeholders. 

That is terrific. 

We all share a common goal of fixing a process that has serious 

implications on the ability of the Federal Government’s national security workforce to get the job done. Qualified civilian and contract 

employees are waiting too long for security clearances. It is both 

unreasonable and unacceptable for civilian employees to wait an 

average of 274 days for a background investigation to be completed. 

Even worse, as noted by GAO, it was taking DOD an average of 

375 days to process clearances for private sector contracting positions back in 2003. 

However, the processing time for security clearances is only part 

of the problem. According to the OPM strategic plan, there are approximately 232,000 security clearances pending approval. When 

one considers the sheer size of the backlog coupled with the time 

3

1The prepared statement of Ms. Springer appears in the Appendix on page 23. 

it takes to conduct an investigation, it is apparent that immediate 

improvements must be made to the security clearance process to 

get the workload down to more acceptable levels. 

Fortunately, when examining the OPM strategic plan, it is evident that bold goals have been outlined for improving the timeliness of the investigation, which in turn should help minimize the 

backlog. For example, OPM intends to complete 80 percent of their 

investigations within 90 days by the end of calendar year 2006, 

thereby meeting the parameters outlined in the Intelligence Reform Act. An improvement of this magnitude will require a concerted effort from the OPM investigative workforce. 

Therefore, I am interested to hear from Director Springer on 

what steps OPM will take to ensure that they have the workforce 

with the requisite skills to streamline and improve the security 

process. I would also like to know if there is anything specific that 

Congress can do to help in your endeavors. 

Senator Akaka and I will work together with the Administration 

and GAO on this matter. We hope that our collective efforts will 

improve the security clearance process so that it will be removed 

from the GAO high-risk list within a reasonable time frame. Also, 

Mr. Stewart, I am interested in your assessment of the OPM strategic plan to see if you believe it lays the foundation for removing 

this issue from the high-risk list. 

I would like to thank our witnesses for their participation this 

afternoon. I look forward to your testimony. Unfortunately, Senator 

Akaka has a conflict. Though, I hear from his staff he is going to 

try and make time to attend. We have three great witnesses today 

and I want you to know that your entire statements will be entered 

into the record. I now ask that you please stand and be sworn in, 

as is the custom of the Subcommittee. 

Do you swear that the testimony you are about to give is the 

truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you, 

God? 

Ms. SPRINGER. I do. 

Mr. JOHNSON. I do. 

Mr. STEWART. I do. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Our witnesses include Linda Springer, the 

Director of the Office of Personnel Management. Linda, it is great 

to see you. Clay Johnson, I am glad that you are here, and Derek 

Stewart, thank you for coming today. Linda, we will start with you. 

TESTIMONY OF LINDA M. SPRINGER,1 DIRECTOR, U.S. OFFICE 

OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT; ACCOMPANIED BY KATHY 

DILLAMAN, ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR, FEDERAL INVESTIGATIVE SERVICES DIVISION, U.S. OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT 

Ms. SPRINGER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is always good to be 

back to visit with you on these issues. We appreciate the opportunity to testify today about OPM’s efforts to expedite security 

clearance processes and specifically our efforts to reduce the current backlog. 

4

1 ‘‘Plan for Improving the Personnel Security Clearance Process,’’ November 2005 appears in 

the Appendix on page 00. 

As you know, OPM is now responsible for ensuring that, each 

year, approximately 1.4 million Federal employees and contractors 

meet suitability and/or security requirements so that they can 

serve in the Federal Government. By the end of 2006, OPM is required by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Protection Act of 

2004, as you stated, to reduce investigations processing time to 90 

days. We intend to meet that goal by adhering to the strategy laid 

out in the ‘‘Plan for Improving the Personnel Security Clearance 

Process,’’ 1 which was jointly prepared by OPM, the Office of Management and Budget, and major clearance-granting agencies across 

the government. 

Our last update to you was at the June 28, 2005, hearing on this 

issue. Since then, we have worked hard with OMB to complete an 

analysis of our overall process and proposed performance goals and 

milestones that could be measured with data available from OPM’s 

automated processing system. We have also been working with 

OMB and senior representatives from the intelligence community, 

as well as the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security and 

others, to develop an overall ‘‘Plan for Improving the Security 

Clearance Process.’’ We have also worked together to build a consensus about those performance goals and the action items which 

we will be measuring to improve. We assure you that we are meeting our timelines and goals. 

Meanwhile, some specific actions that we have taken are in the 

areas of assisting agencies in improving the forecasting of their 

workload. That has been a challenge for them. We collect quarterly 

data, comparing agencies’ annual workload projections with their 

actual requests, and we are then able to enlighten them, so that 

they can better project their upcoming workload. That will help us 

with our staffing. 

We have also been increasing the amount of staff that are devoted to background investigations. We have reached levels now 

that we think will help us to get through not only our current 

workloads, but also the backlogs. 

We have also implemented an automated process for collecting 

the subjects’ background information electronically, rather than 

through a paper-based format. This new system is used by agency 

employees, who are seeking clearances, to submit their background 

investigation. Since its implementation, that system has been able 

to improve our timelines and our accuracy for investigations. Electronic submissions reduce the amount of time applicants spend 

completing forms, and those forms are more accurate, when done 

through the automated process versus the manual. 

During June of this year, about 370 investigation requests were 

used by the new system. By October, we were up to over 4,200 per 

week, and that success rate in that greater utilization is helping 

us in making a noticeable impact on our timeliness. 

Investigation time has been reduced in all levels of clearance. For 

example, the investigations process related to top secret clearances 

is a particularly important and sensitive program. When OPM was 

delegated this authority in February 2005, there were 72,000 invesVerDate 0ct 09 2002 13:37 Sep 20, 2006 Jkt 024930 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\24930.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
5

1The prepared statement of Mr. Johnson appears in the Appendix on page 30. 

tigations in process. As of October, that number has gone down to 

54,000. So we have a ways to go, but I think we are demonstrating 

that we put a good down payment on making a dent in the backlog. 

In June, OPM reported that its goal was to average 35 days or 

less for the priority initial clearance investigations by October 1 of 

this year. In October, our Federal and contractor field staff completed all required subject and source interviews and advance results to the agencies in an average of 34 days for over 890 priority 

investigations. 

To ensure our processes are successful, OPM continues to measure investigation timeliness, including the overall required to get 

field coverage and information from key third parties at the national, State, and local government agencies. That is a critical dependency for OPM in meeting our 90-day goal under the Act. 

To summarize, OPM is making significant progress. We have 

worked with other agencies and OMB in the development of reasonable goals and targets and we are working to meet them by 

measuring success and making procedural changes. We are using 

greater automation. We are hiring additional people. And we are 

on track to meet the goal of the 90 days within of receipt by the 

end of calendar year 2006. 

Mr. Chairman, that concludes my remarks and I would be glad 

to take your questions. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you very much. Mr. Johnson. 

TESTIMONY OF CLAY JOHNSON, III,1 DEPUTY DIRECTOR FOR 

MANAGEMENT, U.S. OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET 

Mr. JOHNSON. Mr. Chairman, thank you for inviting me up here 

today. 

When OMB was designated the lead agency and I was designated by Director Bolton to be the point person on this, we 

formed what we called a Security Clearance Oversight Committee 

to guide this effort. On that committee, we have Kathy Dillaman, 

representing OPM, and we have the seven largest users of security 

clearances—Defense, State, Homeland Security, Justice, Energy, 

Commerce, and Transportation, seven agencies. We are focusing on 

the non-DNI intelligence world, which is about 10 percent of the 

total. 

We are focusing on the part where all the investigative work is 

done by OPM. When we get that up to full speed, then we will 

bring the other 10 percent in; using the same methodologies and 

the same metrics. So, that is why those seven agencies are the ones 

involved. We also have representatives from the National Archives, 

because they have been working on this issue for years, and we 

have representatives from the National Security Council, because 

they have worked on it. 

We also have a representative from the Director of National Intelligence because we want to make sure that whatever we set up 

for the non-DNI world, that it will be compatible with the way they 

envision running their world. We are going to use the same 

metrics, the same levels of accountability, the same performance 

standard. 

6

So we have met three times, end of August, end of September, 

and then just last Friday. We have had two committees, one headed up by the National Archives person that looked at the whole 

issue of reciprocity, and a representative from every one of those 

seven agencies plus the DNI representative were on that. They 

have done fabulous work to clarify what we have to do to have a 

functional granting of reciprocity with regard to security clearances. 

We had another committee that Ms. Dillaman headed up that 

looked at what are our standards across the board. What our adjudication standards are, what should our delivery of security clearance request forms be to OPM, and what should our investigative 

turn-around time standards be, and so forth? She and representatives from all the agencies have been working on that plan, which 

was delivered Monday night, and which you have seen. 

I am highly confident that we will accomplish the goals that have 

been laid out for the security clearance process in the Intel bill. 

There is lots and lots of clarity. We have a very clear understanding via the Intel bill of what the goals and time frames are, 

what we are supposed to do, and by when. It is very clear what 

each agency has to do to meet its overall goals, what they have to 

do in terms of delivering accurate information to OPM to launch 

the investigative part of it and then what kind of turn-around time 

they have for the adjudication part of it, and it is very clear what 

OPM has to do. These have all been mutually agreed to by these 

seven agencies plus the DNI. 

The agencies have, or soon will have, detailed action plans for 

getting their adjudication turn-around times up to satisfactory levels. I think it is 80 percent within 30 days. Some of them will be 

able to do that very quickly. Some will have to hire many more adjudicators, or train many more adjudicators, so that the action plan 

called for is different for each agency. 

There is a lot of performance information. Attached to the plan 

are some of the metrics that we envisioned using to hold ourselves 

accountable. Everything that moves in this process will be measured, so there is lots and lots of performance information that we 

have to manage ourselves with. There is a very strong commitment 

to do what we say we are going to do. 

One of the things I have been really pleased by is how ‘‘leaning 

forward’’ every representative, from every agency, is. We know this 

system is broke. We know there is no law of physics that needs to 

be violated to unbreak this system. We just need to be very clear 

about what needs to be done and then go do it. There is a very 

strong commitment to hold ourselves accountable. It is not OMB 

holding the rest of the world accountable, but it is really the security clearance world holding itself accountable for having a functional system. 

There is a tremendous can-do attitude. We all know we can and 

will reform this process and we are all—if I do say so myself—I 

think it is a shared sentiment—very proud to be working on it because we know this has been broken for a very long time and our 

group is going to be the one that fixes it. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you. Mr. Stewart. 

7

1The prepared statement of Mr. Stewart appears in the Appendix on page 34. 

TESTIMONY OF DEREK B. STEWART,1 DIRECTOR, DEFENSE 

CAPABILITIES AND MANAGEMENT, U.S. GOVERNMENT 

ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE 

Mr. STEWART. Mr. Chairman, we are pleased to be here today to 

discuss the government’s plan to improve the security clearance 

process and, in particular, we focused on DOD’s personnel security 

program. We want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your continued 

focus on this critical issue. We really do appreciate your attention 

to this matter. 

When I testified before this Subcommittee in June, I made several points, and I would just like to review quickly three of them. 

I told you in June that GAO declared DOD’s security clearance program as high-risk due primarily to three things: Longstanding 

delays in completing investigations, a growing backlog, and no effective method to estimate total workload requirements. 

I also told you that GAO viewed the problems with DOD’s program as a national security matter because DOD has about two 

million clearances and is responsible for the clearances of contract 

personnel in 22 other Federal departments and agencies. 

And the third point I made before this Subcommittee was that 

DOD’s investigative function, when transferred to OPM in February, was not a panacea that would fix all the problems. 

Well, today, Mr. Chairman, I sit before you almost 41⁄2 months 

later and I am pleased to tell you that based on our review of the 

government’s plan, we think that the plan represents an important 

step forward and will address some of the longstanding concerns 

that we raised at the June hearing. 

One very positive feature of the plan is the numerous metrics. 

You just heard Mr. Johnson say, anything that moves, we can 

measure it, and that is true. There are numerous metrics to help 

monitor the timeliness of the clearance process, statistics on how 

long the process takes for investigations, the various types of investigations, the amount of time needed to determine clearance eligibility, and on and on and on. These are all very good metrics that 

will help keep the government on track. We are very pleased to see 

that. 

On the other hand, our review showed that there are a few elements of the plan that are less comprehensive than those found in, 

let us say, a fully-developed plan. To illustrate this point, I will cite 

just three examples. We believe that the plan would benefit from 

more details on the resources required to accomplish the plan’s objectives. 

Mr. Chairman, in June, I remember you said directly to Ms. 

Dillaman, I want to know if you don’t have the resources you need 

to get the job done. So I know that you know that is a critical 

point. 

The second thing that we think the plan would benefit from more 

of is more focus on monitoring and improving the quality of the security clearance process. The primary metric in the plan for measuring the quality of the investigations is the percentage of investigations returned due to incomplete case files. We do not believe 

8

that this metric, which is essentially rework, is by itself a valid indicator of quality. 

And last, the plan requires agencies to improve the accuracy of 

their workload projections to be within 5 percent of their actual demand, but it does not establish interim milestones for achieving 

that, or a target completion date for when that requirement has to 

be met. 

As I noted earlier in my June testimony, DOD’s inability to estimate its workload requirement was a major contributing factor 

that led to GAO’s high-risk designation, because they could not accurately estimate their workload requirements. We cannot emphasize enough that the accurate workload projections will heavily influence the success or failure of the government’s plan. 

In closing, Mr. Chairman, I would repeat that we are encouraged 

by the high level of commitment by Mr. Johnson and his staff at 

OMB in taking a lead to develop this plan. This is a positive step 

in the right direction. And again, Mr. Chairman, we appreciate 

your attention and the Subcommittee’s attention to this critical 

matter. This concludes my prepared remarks. I will be happy to 

take your questions, sir. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you very much. 

The first question that I have is in regards to resources. Ms. 

Springer and Mr. Johnson, in the 2006 and the 2007 budget that 

the Administration is putting together, do they include the funding 

to provide people and resources to get the job done. 

Ms. SPRINGER. We think that the 2007 budget, as well as the 

2006 budget, Mr. Chairman, are set in a way that we can support 

the number of people we need to hire. That includes contractors as 

well as permanent staff. 

One of the challenges that we have is that it takes about a year 

or so for an investigator to become fully productive, up to the level 

that they will ultimately achieve. So the levels of staffing that we 

have budgeted for will allow us to bring on—actually, I don’t want 

to say over-hire, but to bring on enough people to compensate for 

the fact that there is that learning curve. So we are comfortable 

that the amount that is in the budget will allow us to do that. 

Senator VOINOVICH. In terms of retirement, succession, and competency, do you feel that you have this under control? 

Ms. SPRINGER. We think we do, and obviously, as you mentioned, 

I have elevated Ms. Dillaman up to the point of being a direct reporter of mine so I am personally involved in reviewing that. But 

we have anticipated a normal termination and attrition and we understand that the turnover levels of contractors are different than 

for permanent staff, so we have taken all that into account. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Mr. Johnson. 

Mr. JOHNSON. We had the OPM review for the 2007 budget the 

other day and I was asking about this, what resources were needed, and I think it is fee-for-service, agencies requesting clearances 

pay OPM for their services, that is where they get their money. It 

is not an appropriated amount. It is tied directly to the level of 

work they do. So the money is there and the question is managing 

the cost. The big challenge is not where do you get the revenue to 

cover it, but managing the cost so that the productivities and the 

9

retirement and so forth and the competency levels are what we 

need to do to achieve the goals. 

Senator VOINOVICH. The reason I am asking the question is that 

you have many other things that are on your plate. 

Ms. SPRINGER. A few. 

Senator VOINOVICH. One of which is the pay-for-performance programs. I want to make sure that we are not shifting money around. 

I want to be sure that you have the budget and resources to carry 

out this task. I want to make sure you have the wherewithal to get 

the job done. 

Ms. SPRINGER. Right. 

Senator VOINOVICH. In 2004, GAO noted that OPM’s primary 

contract was hiring around 100 investigators a month and at the 

same time was losing around 70 employees. However, during the 

last hearing, Ms. Dillaman indicated that the primary contractor 

turnover was down to 18 percent. Is this still the case? In addition, 

your plan mentions that OPM plans to promote a redistribution of 

staff between the companies currently under contract to better position a broad base of companies to deal with the unanticipated 

workload changes. 

I would be interested in knowing, how are your private contractors doing? 

Ms. SPRINGER. I would like to answer that and then maybe, if I 

could, ask Ms. Dillaman, if that would be all right, if she would——

Senator VOINOVICH. Yes, that would be fine. 

Ms. SPRINGER. One of the things that we are doing with our contractors is to have a better segregation of duties, if you will, so 

that, for example, when we have quality assurance reviews and 

quality control, that we have got a contractor that is independent 

enough of the process to be able to review what another contractor 

is doing. 

So one of the things that we have observed is that we needed a 

better segregation of duties, if you will, to have that right assurance. So bringing on additional contractors was partly to address 

that particular situation, so we get a better assurance over that result. 

As far as the 18 percent turnover rate, I think that is probably 

a typical rate. Actually, it may even be a little low, but I am going 

to ask Ms. Dillaman if she would respond. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Ms. Dillaman, would you stand so I can 

swear you in. 

Do you swear that the testimony you are about to give is the 

truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you, 

God? 

Ms. DILLAMAN. I do. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you. 

Ms. DILLAMAN. And yes, Mr. Chairman, the turnover has stabilized. It is remaining constant. We have redistributed the resources. Today, the five new contracts that OPM has let has about 

1,200 resources of the 6,600 contractors and there will be a continued redistribution of those resources, so we are right on target with 

what we projected in June. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Do you have the people to monitor what the 

contractors are doing? 

10

Ms. DILLAMAN. Absolutely. 

Senator VOINOVICH. That is good. What input did you get from 

the private sector in terms of putting your plan together, Mr. Johnson? 

Mr. JOHNSON. We wanted to make some progress on the plan before we met with them, so we met with them first October 18, with 

representatives from a number of companies. We have another 

meeting Monday afternoon to talk to them, and we have laid out 

for them the kind of plan we were developing, our thinking about 

reciprocity, the kind of performance measures we were developing, 

and got their initial response. We will do the same thing, but with 

the real plan, on Monday. The feedback they have given us is they 

have let us know loud and clear, which we knew already, that this 

is very important for them. 

We understand we need to create a mechanism whereby they can 

communicate to us if it is not working from their standpoint but 

have a mechanism that doesn’t require them to go to the hand that 

is feeding them to complain about how their security clearance 

process isn’t working. So we are going to set that up so they can 

go to a third party to let us know whether it is working or not——

Senator VOINOVICH. So in other words, if they have a problem, 

under the plan, they could come to you and say——

Mr. JOHNSON. Right. 

Senator VOINOVICH [continuing]. This isn’t working the way we 

want it to. So you did get their input on how they thought the process could be improved? 

Mr. JOHNSON. Well, again, they have asked for feedback mechanisms and they asked to be kept informed and they encourage us 

to do it sooner rather than later. I think they were very pleased 

with the seriousness of it and the commitment and the method to 

the madness and on the measures we were going to have, and the 

Intel bill goals are what they are and they understand we are committed to achieving those goals and are highly confident that we 

will be able to do so. 

Senator VOINOVICH. OK. Senator Akaka. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR AKAKA 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Let me welcome the panelists. It is good to see all of you, and 

I regret that I missed your testimony. 

Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank you for your leadership in 

seeking to reduce the number of government programs that are on 

GAO’s high-risk list. What we are doing in this Subcommittee, examining problems and inefficiencies, is really having an effect. 

I was late because I was coming from an Armed Services Readiness Subcommittee hearing where Chairman Ensign and I heard 

testimony from Under Secretary Ken Krieg who also testified at 

this Subcommittee’s hearing on DOD logistics last month. We also 

had DOD Comptroller Tina Jonas, as well as Randolph Hite of 

GAO there. At the SASC hearing, the Secretary spoke of the successful collaboration he has with OMB and GAO in developing 

plans to reduce the number of DOD programs on the high-risk list. 

This ties in with our concern here today. 

11

Mr. Chairman, we are making good progress on the high-risk 

list, and I am pleased that the Administration, at the highest levels, is involved in the process. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you 

for holding this hearing. If I may go to one question, we are coming 

to a vote. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Yes, why don’t you go ahead. 

Senator AKAKA. All right. 

Senator VOINOVICH. We have got some time left. I am going to 

try and see if we can’t run this until about the end, and then we 

will leave and try and cast the second vote, because there are two 

votes, I think, if it is all right with you. 

Senator AKAKA. Mr. Johnson, thank you for your approach to addressing the challenge. I can see that the OPM plan provides certain goals and milestones. Although I did not expect to see details 

on funding the plan, I know that meeting the plan’s metrics will 

require significant funds for programs and other personnel services. Some of my questions for Secretary Kreig were along these 

lines, too. 

My question to you is, do you or Director Springer have any preliminary figures on how much money will be needed to reach the 

goals of the plan, especially in the area of information technology 

needs? 

Ms. SPRINGER. Senator, we don’t have a number to give you right 

now. We could look into it. I can say that for the next year, the 

next budget cycle and the way this is structured, the way our income or our money comes in to fund these things, that we are wellfunded to be able to achieve next year’s goals. But looking longterm, particularly for IT, we would have to get back to you on that. 

We will do that. 

Mr. JOHNSON. But the money that funds their security clearance 

activities comes from the fees that are paid by the agencies that 

are seeking the clearances. So if there is a lot of volume, there is 

a lot of money. It varies with the amount of work. 

Senator AKAKA. Director Springer, I commend the plan’s efforts 

to monitor how quickly agencies are supplying the required records 

to complete the clearance investigation. I know that investigators 

are sometimes hindered in their work because of problems obtaining State and local records. However, I know my own State of Hawaii has what is called the Criminal Justice Information System 

that allows all Islands to hook into a single reporting system, 

which, in turn, can be used by Federal law enforcement, as well. 

Can you describe the State and local access problems and share 

with us whether you believe legislative action is needed to facilitate 

such access? 

Ms. SPRINGER. I am going to ask Associate Director Dillaman, 

who is responsible for the program, to answer that, Senator. 

Ms. DILLAMAN. Senator, we have a team dedicated to the research into a number of different State and local record systems to 

see the best way to use technology or access to get the information 

we need. We do, in fact, with our duty station in Hawaii, use your 

centralized criminal history record system. That is true in many 

States. 

At the State level, we are looking at Bureau of Vital Statistics 

records, possibly National Guard records, other records at that 

12

level, and quite frankly, 50 States have 50 different ways of keeping their records. So the liaison has to be State-specific to identify 

how the records are kept, what the most efficient way to get access 

to those records would be, and we have to monitor the timeliness 

for each State. 

There are 26,000 local law enforcement agencies and it is the 

same exact issue with each and every one of them. So doing adequate research to determine whether or not a State record system 

suffices in lieu of doing local checks, or, in fact, the reporting system within a State is such that it doesn’t, that we have to go to 

each and every local law enforcement agency where we know the 

individual has activity. And so that is a dedicated team effort on 

our part. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you. Director Springer, the plan’s staffing 

distribution charts project the total staff level of 9,000 by October 

1, 2006, with a mix of 1,800 Federal employees and 7,200 contract 

staff. Projected staff levels 3 years later, October 1, 2009, would 

still be at 9,000, but with 500 fewer Federal workers. Can you explain why the mix of Federal employees to contract workers will 

change? 

Ms. DILLAMAN. Well, the primary reason for the change is going 

to be related to normal decrement, normal termination, retirements, for example, that we expect will occur and then rebalancing 

will just happen as we have to go to contractors to some degree to 

compensate for that. 

Let me just say that I have spent a fair amount of time out in 

the field at field offices, at several of our field offices, visiting with 

the staff, legacy DSS staff, OPM staff, contractors, just about every 

type, every level, supervisors down to investigators, just about 

every level, hundreds of people who are working on this effort, and 

over the past few weeks, I have had a chance to go out and visit 

them. And what I can tell you, because I open up the microphone 

and say, just ask me any questions you want to, the questions 

range from, ‘‘We would like to have an ice machine in our office,’’ 

to ‘‘Can you get us a certain type of technology?’’

But I can tell you that the questions that we are getting don’t 

indicate a level of dissatisfaction or a lack of support, but rather 

a real sense of commitment and can we get even some better tools 

and understanding of the objectives. I am not getting questions 

about the requirements that we are putting on the ability to meet 

the goals. 

So I think that whether it is the contractor community or whether it is an employee, a legacy employee or an OPM employee, that 

everyone is committed and working together very well. That mix 

will just evolve as we have changes in retirement, normal changes 

that we project over these next couple of years. 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you. My time has expired. 

Senator VOINOVICH. I need to recess this hearing to go and vote. 

I have additional questions, and I am sure Senator Akaka has 

some as well. I apologize to you, but that is the way things are 

around this place.When I was governor and mayor, I controlled the 

schedule. Thank you. [Laughter.] 

[Recess.] 

13

Senator VOINOVICH. The Subcommittee will come to order and reconvene. I apologize for the delay. I hope you had a chance to talk 

back and forth. 

Mr. Stewart, in your statement, you raised a couple of questions 

in regard to the plan that you observed. Overall, you thought it 

was a good, comprehensive plan but you did raise a couple of issues 

with the plan. I would be interested in the response to those questions that you raised, either by Ms. Springer or by Mr. Johnson. 

Mr. STEWART. The couple I mentioned——

Senator VOINOVICH. If you could repeat them again. I want to 

give them a chance to respond to the fact that you raised these 

issues. 

Mr. STEWART. Yes. There are a couple of issues. One centers on 

quality, and Mr. Chairman, I want you to know that I didn’t mention it, but Mr. Johnson and the OMB staff and the GAO staff have 

been meeting. We had a meeting right after the hearing in June. 

Mr. Johnson invited us over in July and then we met again in October. We have been talking and we have made this comment to 

OMB, so this is not a surprise. 

When we were briefed on the plan, the one concern we had was 

around quality. There are a lot of metrics, as I noted, in the plan, 

really good metrics to measure things, but we are concerned about 

the quality of the process. We know that the government has hired 

a lot of new investigators and will continue to hire new investigators. It is important to make sure that everybody is trained and on 

the same page, familiar with the government standards, etc., and 

the plan mentions that there is a training program. 

But beyond that, we don’t see a mechanism in the plan, a metric, 

I guess, for measuring quality beyond the metric of rework or the 

percentage of investigations that are returned because they are incomplete. 

Senator VOINOVICH. So it is the quality of the work that is done 

which reflects the quality of the people that do the job. Your concern is: Is OPM going to have the training necessary for their employees to be able to do a quality job? 

Mr. STEWART. I couldn’t have said it any better, sir, and I would 

just add to that in addition to the training, will there be something 

other than rework that OMB or OPM will be looking at to make 

sure that quality is built into the process? 

Senator VOINOVICH. Ms. Springer. 

Ms. SPRINGER. Yes. Thank you for restating that question. With 

respect to training, I will say a few things. Let me make a couple 

of comments about training and quality control, if you will, and 

then maybe I will ask Ms. Dillaman if she wants to supplement. 

There is an OPM team that is dedicated to training new agents. 

The first year, in particular, as I earlier mentioned, is where that 

steepest learning curve is. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Can I ask you something? 

Ms. SPRINGER. Yes. 

Senator VOINOVICH. How much of this work is going to be done 

in OPM and how much of it is sent out to contractors? 

Ms. SPRINGER. Do you mean the training work itself? 

Senator VOINOVICH. You are going to farm out some of this work, 

correct? 

14

Ms. SPRINGER. The investigative work. 

Senator VOINOVICH. So the contractors are going to do the investigation work. OPM is not in the business of doing the investigative 

work. Do you have people that do investigative work? 

Ms. SPRINGER. Yes, we do. 

Senator VOINOVICH. About what percentageof the workload will 

they be doing versus the private sector group? 

Ms. SPRINGER. It is about a one-quarter/three-quarter split, 

three-quarter contractor, one-quarter OPM. 

Senator VOINOVICH. OK. What is the reason for the one-third 

that are in-house? Does the work that they are doing require highly-trained people? 

Ms. SPRINGER. Yes. 

Senator VOINOVICH. The other work that you are farming out 

may not require that level of training? 

Ms. SPRINGER. I am not sure it is so much that we had to supplement quickly and with flexibility the existing staff that we had and 

that we inherited, and the fastest way to do that was with contractors. I don’t think that there is one particular type of work being 

done solely by contractors and another type that is done solely——

Senator VOINOVICH. So you do not distinguish the work that is 

being sent out or kept in-house on the level of investigation that 

has to be done? 

Ms. DILLAMAN. Sir, if I may address that, when we inherited the 

Federal agents from the Defense Security Service, both groups, the 

Federal and the contractor group, were dedicated to all levels of 

background investigations. Now, the long-range plan is to segregate the work so that, for example, the Federal agents are clearing the contractors and the contractors aren’t clearing themselves 

and that the Federal agents would serve as a backbone, where the 

more sensitive investigations, higher-priority investigations, or 

those investigations that may contain up-front known issues would 

be handled by the Federal team. But for the remaining Federal capacity, they would be working side-by-side with the contractors 

doing the same work. 

Senator VOINOVICH. I would like to get an idea of what the cost 

is for the in-house employees versus the contractors. Additionally, 

I would also like to see the level of the quality of the work. 

I suspect that you pay more for the people that are in-house, but 

the issue then becomes do you get a better quality worker? My understanding is that a lot of the in-house employees are part-time 

workers. Down the road, I would really like to get a feel for just 

how this is working out and what the trade-offs are. Of the third 

that are doing it in-house, how many of them are going to be 

around for a while and how many of them would be close to retirement. 

I would like to know, what is your succession plan? What is your 

long-range plan? 

Ms. SPRINGER. We can get that for you. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Mr. Stewart, your concern is the training of 

the people that are in-house, as well as the training of the contractors. Specifically, the supervision of the work that is being farmed 

out to make sure that the quality of the work that is being done 

is what it should be. 

15

Mr. STEWART. Yes, sir. And in fact, in our 1999 report, which is 

a little old now, we made this recommendation 6 or 7 years ago. 

We thought to ensure quality that there should be some periodic 

sampling of case files to see how well the investigators had satisfied the standards. We actually did that, Mr. Chairman, and it was 

tedious. With a team of six or seven people, the job took a year and 

a couple of months. But, we went through actual case files and 

sampled to see how well things were done. It is that type of quality 

assurance that we were looking for in the plan that we didn’t see. 

Senator VOINOVICH. It makes sense to me that if you are going 

to farm out three-quarters of your work to the private sector, that 

you have a process in place to monitor the performance of the private sector, to periodically ascertain the quality of the work that 

is being done. Ms. Springer, are you going to implement this review 

process? 

Ms. SPRINGER. We have some of that now, and if you would like 

to describe just briefly what we are——

Ms. DILLAMAN. Certainly. And by no means, the returns from 

agencies, that is not the only metric of quality. In our structure, 

we have built a very robust quality assurance program for the contractors. I have a branch dedicated to contract management and 

quality oversight. 

Every investigation conducted by a contractor goes through a review process. The terms of the contracts require the companies 

themselves to have a quality assurance program that we review. 

Over and above that, I have a dedicated Federal team that does 

sampling of the contractor-conducted cases, both to confirm that 

the contractor has a good quality assurance program. Rigid metrics 

are kept down to the agent level on those. 

Parallel with that, I have the same quality assurance program 

with the Federal agents that conduct investigations. So there are 

multiple tiers of quality review with performance statistics at the 

company and individual level. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Mr. Stewart, I would like you to sit down 

with Ms. Dillaman——

Mr. STEWART. Yes. 

Senator VOINOVICH [continuing]. And talk about this and maybe 

get back to me in the next couple of weeks. I would like to know 

whether or not what OPM has in place is what you have in mind. 

Mr. STEWART. We appreciate Ms. Dillaman’s contribution here. I 

was not aware of that entire structure. I am aware that the contractors have their own quality assurance program. That concerns 

us a little bit, because that means that they get to judge themselves, and that has been an issue for a while and we have made 

a couple of recommendations back 7 or 8 years on that point, long 

before Ms. Springer and Mr. Johnson’s time on this issue. I think 

Ms. Dillaman had been around then, I am not sure. But we will 

get together and get more details. 

In fact, Mr. Chairman, at your request, we have underway an engagement looking at the processing of top secret clearances. So we 

are going to get into some of these issues as we proceed with that 

work and we are going to report back to you formally in a report 

on what we find. 

Senator VOINOVICH. OK. Thank you. 

16

Mr. STEWART. The other issue, the other concern that we had 

was on the projection of workload requirements. Mr. Chairman, if 

there is one thing that really concerns us, it is the workload requirement. You may recall when I was here in June, I testified that 

DOD had not done a good job of estimating its workload requirements and I gave you a few statistics, and I will repeat those. In 

fiscal year 2001, DOD over-estimated its workload by 150,000 

cases. In 2002, it under-estimated its workload by 135,000 cases. 

And in 2003, it under-estimated its workload by 100,000 cases. 

We have talked to contractors recently, Mr. Chairman, and the 

contractors tell us that their biggest concern in conducting this 

work is that they don’t know what the workload requirements are. 

They don’t know what is coming at them. They don’t know how to 

prepare for what is down the road. One contractor told us it cost 

them almost $80,000 to hire, train, and develop an investigator. 

They told us that they were trying to change the paradigm of hiring retired Federal workers and part-time staff, and they were actually active on campus, recruiting people with degrees in criminal 

justice and trying to build a younger, more committed workforce. 

That is expensive. They want to do it. They are committed to that. 

But they don’t know what the requirements are. 

So we think it is critical that the agencies do a good job of—not 

a good job, but an accurate job of projecting their workloads. The 

plan speaks to that. Our concern is that there are no interim milestones. There are no target completion dates for when the agencies 

are supposed to do this, and we know from experience with DOD, 

if you don’t force a certain date, it is not going to happen. It hasn’t 

happened in 20 years and it probably won’t happen until their feet 

are really held to the fire. 

Senator VOINOVICH. So you are saying that the customers of 

OPM need to do a better job of projecting their caseload. Additionally, the plan needs more milestones to ensure that this problem 

can be fixed. 

Mr. STEWART. Absolutely, sir. I mean, if I am OPM, I say to 

DOD, you know generally what your workload is. What initiatives 

do you have in place? With contract employees, of the two million 

security clearances that DOD is responsible for, about a third of 

those are for industry personnel, contractors, almost 700,000. When 

a government contracting officer lets a contract, that contracting officer knows, or has a pretty good feel for, which jobs are going to 

require clearances. There should be some way that DOD can roll 

that up and say, these are how many contracts we are going to let. 

This is how many people we need to clear——

Senator VOINOVICH. So that really gets back to OMB making 

sure that the agencies that are the customers of OPM come up 

with accurate numbers. It makes sense to guarantee the contractors that they will have X-number of work for 2 or 3 years. In turn 

they will hire a better quality of individual and train them. 

We have a 5- or 6-year highway fund. Before we went to ISTEA 

and T–21, Congress would appropriate money annually. The contractors around the country never knew whether the money was 

coming or wasn’t coming, so they weren’t able to plan their workforce, the equipment they would need, and so forth. This new system has really put them in a position where they can do a better 

17

job of managing their workforce and their capital investment. In 

my opinion, we are getting a much better turnaround. We are getting more in return from the money that we are spending. So it 

would be interesting to see if something like that could be done. 

For my next question, there are five reports that OPM has laid 

out, clearance granting, agency reporting, and agencies with delegated investigative authority require OPM to obtain performance 

information from other Federal agencies. What steps are you taking to work with the Federal community to make sure you receive 

the information in a timely manner, and also, how will you verify 

the authenticity of the performance information? 

Ms. SPRINGER. Well, one factor there—I will just start off and 

maybe Mr. Johnson will want to comment—is that OMB now approves delegations related to—for these investigative agencies. In 

order for them to get their continued delegation, it is going to be 

predicated on their ability to provide accurate data and timely data 

to OPM for us to be doing this kind of tracking of how they are 

doing. So there is a little bit of leverage that we have with respect 

to that. The agencies are going to want to give us timely and accurate information. 

I don’t know if you want to comment further on that. 

Mr. JOHNSON. On the information, there are different kinds of information that we need that we track. How long it took for somebody to—once they handed a form to a prospective employee—from 

that date to when they submitted it accurately to OPM. There is 

a date on the form. They know when they get it. So that is automatic. That comes with it. 

The error rate, they get it—so Ms. Dillaman determines the level 

of errors. So we don’t have a problem in getting that information. 

I think we do require them to report to us when they complete 

the adjudication, so there is a requirement that they are obligated 

to report to them, and we don’t get that information automatically. 

We are relying on them to report that to us and report it accurately 

to us. 

We have not talked about how we build a quality control process 

into that to make sure that they are reporting that information accurately. Right now, we need to set up a system where it will be 

what it is, and then the next level of sophistication is to make sure 

there is quality control to make sure it is accurate. 

A lot of the information comes to us automatically. It is really 

the adjudication completion date that is the one thing that we rely 

on them to report accurately to us. 

Senator VOINOVICH. In other words, the investigation is done. 

You do it for the agencies. They look at the investigation and they 

do the adjudication on whether or not the individual is qualified to 

come to work for the agency? 

Ms. DILLAMAN. Exactly, and the clearance will be reported in the 

central clearance record system, so that, too, gives us an indicator 

of when the action actually took place. 

Senator VOINOVICH. For example, if you are hiring somebody for 

the State Department, when do they go on the payroll, after the 

adjudication is done? 

Mr. JOHNSON. Well, Ms. Dillaman and I were just talking about 

this during the break. Some agencies grant interim clearances, and 

18

so we are talking about getting information from agencies and understanding who uses interim clearances, who does not. That will 

have a bearing on whether Ms. Dillaman should be rushing the 

non-interim clearance people their information, because they can’t 

go to work until they are granted the full clearance. So we need 

to understand that better. 

But the short answer to your question is, it depends on the agency. It depends on whether they grant the interim clearance——

Senator VOINOVICH. It seems to me you are going to have to figure out a priority system. I think we are losing very qualified individuals because it takes too long to get their clearance. 

Mr. JOHNSON. You have a priority-setting clearance, I mean process, don’t you? 

Ms. SPRINGER. Yes. We actually charge for a quicker turnaround. There is a protocol where if you pay a premium for special 

cases, where there is something that needs to get through really 

fast. I am not as familiar with it, but there is some way if there 

is a particularly urgent situation. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Well, if you start getting into the nitty-gritty 

of it, it is more complicated than you think. But, the priorities are 

important, particularly, when we are going to be competing for 

qualified individuals. We have asked GAO to do a report on the 

need for scientists and engineers in various departments throughout the Federal Government. Anything that stands in the way of 

bringing these people on board puts the Federal Government in a 

non-competitive position. 

Mr. Johnson, reciprocity is a vital component of the National Intelligence Reform Act and the President’s Executive Order. In order 

to address the issue, you established the reciprocity working group. 

Can you discuss the structure of this working group, including the 

mission of the group and the Federal agencies that belong to it? In 

addition, what, if any, enforcement authorities does the working 

group have to ensure that agencies are abiding by the reciprocity 

standards of the Intelligence Reform Act and the Executive Order? 

I hired somebody to come in and work in my office that had certain clearances from the State Department and it took a while for 

her to—when she came on board with me, it was the same kind 

of clearance and it took a while before all that information got sent 

over. If it wasn’t for the fact that I think she pulled some strings, 

because she knew some people over there and was able to jumpstart the thing, it would have been quite some time before the 

clearances went through. 

So how are you going to deal with that, because that is a problem. Some of these agencies, as you know from the testimony we 

had, are kind of——

Mr. JOHNSON. Protective of their——

Senator VOINOVICH. You have got it. Yes. How are you going to 

work on that? 

Mr. JOHNSON. The committee we formed is not an enforcement 

committee. They were to define what the reciprocity issues are and 

what has to be done, what they recommend doing to address those 

issues. So they have laid out what the exceptions for reciprocity 

should be, and their proposal is that it is when the current clearance that someone has is an interim clearance, or is the result of 

19

a waiver, that has been granted or it is a clearance—or the new 

clearance calls for a polygraph and the old one didn’t—that would 

allow additional work to be done. The new clearance prohibits foreign-born family members, whereas the old clearance may not 

have. Or if somebody has an exception, if they want to seek other 

than those, they have to come and get Josh Bolton’s or my approval. 

So it is very specific about when additional investigative work is 

allowed. If none of those situations occurs, you accept without further investigative work and without further adjudication the clearance that the person has if it is for the same level. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Is there a secure website where agencies can 

view a person’s clearance status? 

Ms. DILLAMAN. There is a database, sir, that will be in place December 15, that OPM is sponsoring, where all the clearances will 

be residing in one central record system. Each agency will have access to to confirm the person’s current clearance status with this 

system. 

Senator VOINOVICH. And then the point is that there are some 

indicators in place that say when an agency could require, as Mr. 

Johnson has said, more information and when it wouldn’t be satisfactory in terms of whatever it is they wanted? 

Ms. DILLAMAN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. JOHNSON. So if they come to Ms. Dillaman for more investigative work, she can say, well, this person—this is an improper 

request, so there is a recordation there, possibly. Then that is one 

piece of feedback that they are not granting reciprocity. Another 

one is where the contractor or the employee believes they have a 

clearance and they are not being granted reciprocity or it is not 

being recognized by the new employer. We are going to create a 

mechanism where they can communicate that to us, as well, so we 

will have some data gathering about where reciprocity is not being 

granted. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Will you get reports regarding the agencies’ 

request for information to determine whether some of these agencies are getting a little bit fastidious? 

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes. You asked about enforcement, I mean, how 

do we—what bad things can we do to agencies that don’t recognize 

other people, or clearances granted by other agencies. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Yes. 

Mr. JOHNSON. What I mentioned in my opening remarks, I think 

is relevant here. The attitude and the ‘‘can-do’’ mindset of the agencies involved is really great. Everybody understands that we can 

better train all our adjudicators. We can do the work more consistently and faster and they are going to do their part. Just in general, I don’t think we have a problem getting people’s attention. It 

is not the Bush Administration, just in general. If you are real 

clear, about which agencies are not granting reciprocity and what 

individuals are above the standard or below the standard for reciprocity, then some appropriate, important person calls some other 

appropriate person and says, you have got to honor reciprocity. 

So there has been an Executive Order since 1997 that says there 

shall be reciprocity. Nobody has held an agency accountable for 

abiding by that Executive Order. You need performance measures 

20

and then you need a mechanism to hold agencies accountable for 

complying with the rules. 

Senator VOINOVICH. It is important to make sure that we have 

buy in from the top. The message needs to be that we want to get 

the job done, we want to make sure that we are thorough, but we 

don’t want to put ourselves in a position where we are slowing the 

process down. 

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes. That is why it has been important to have 

the representative from the DNI there who agrees with all the 

things that have been decided about reciprocity and they are fully 

prepared to abide by those rules. 

So one of the things we have talked about also is the concern 

about how consistent or inconsistent the quality of adjudication 

might be. Some agencies have said, well, I am not personally satisfied with the quality of the training my adjudicators get. And someone would say, well, mine are great, and medium, so we were talking about how we bring more consistency to the quality of adjudication, not the investigative work, but the adjudication, so there is 

an effort underway to look at how we could standardize the training. DOD has most of the adjudicators in the Federal Government, 

so one thought is maybe we should make that a good training program. Maybe we use their training program as the sort of benchmark for how to train all adjudicators. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Mr. Johnson, I would like you to know that 

I am excited about what you are doing. I really believe that if you 

carry out what you have planned, then I think that we can get this 

off the high-risk list. The only question I have is why does the Executive Order expire on July 1, 2006? 

Mr. JOHNSON. Let me talk about that. The thought was, we will 

revisit, then, who ought to be the prime mover. Right now, there 

is some thought that the DNI ought to be the person that is ensuring that the security clearance process works. In July or June of 

this past year, the DNI was trying to get office supplies and so 

forth, so they were not prepared to do that, so they said, let us 

make it OMB, because we are prepared to do it and we know how 

to do it, so let us do that and then we will review the bidding this 

next year. I don’t know whether the decision will be that we continue to be the oversight or whether it comes to DNI. But, we know 

the thing will not be where we want it to be by June, but we will 

pick somebody else. We will renew the Executive Order and go 

from there. 

Senator VOINOVICH. I would feel a lot more comfortable if you 

stayed with it. 

Mr. JOHNSON. Thank you, although, sir, the three times we have 

met, the oversight committee, we have a little vote for who the 

most valuable member of the meeting is. I have never won that 

award. [Laughter.] 

But Ms. Dillaman has won it each time, so if there is a treasure 

in this group, it is Ms. Dillaman. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Well, you had better be concerned about 

Negroponte stealing her. [Laughter.] 

Ms. SPRINGER. It is not going to happen. [Laughter.] 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you very much, and again, I apologize 

to all of you for having to leave and vote. I am thrilled about where 

21

we are with this process. Mr. Stewart, I encourage GAO to continue working with OMB and OPM. Again, I want you to know, if 

there is anything I can do or this Subcommittee can do to help 

make this possible, let me know. I want to do it. Thank you. 

The meeting is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 4:32 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 

(23)

A P P E N D I X 


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Æ


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