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BUILDING A PARTNERSHIP STRATEGY: 

IMPROVING INFORMATION SHARING WITH 

STATE AND LOCAL LAW ENFORCEMENT AND 

THE PRIVATE SECTOR 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE, 

INFORMATION SHARING, AND 

TERRORISM RISK ASSESSMENT 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

MAY 25, 2007 

Serial No. 110–42 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/index.html 


Congress.#13
COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY 

BENNIE G. THOMPSON, Mississippi, Chairman 

LORETTA SANCHEZ, California, 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

NORMAN D. DICKS, Washington 

JANE HARMAN, California 

PETER A. DEFAZIO, Oregon 

NITA M. LOWEY, New York 

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of 

Columbia 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

DONNA M. CHRISTENSEN, U.S. Virgin 

Islands 

BOB ETHERIDGE, North Carolina 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

HENRY CUELLAR, Texas 

CHRISTOPHER P. CARNEY, Pennsylvania 

YVETTE D. CLARKE, New York 

AL GREEN, Texas 

ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado 

PETER T. KING, New York 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas 

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut 

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana 

TOM DAVIS, Virginia 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

MIKE ROGERS, Alabama 

BOBBY JINDAL, Louisiana 

DAVID G. REICHERT, Washington 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania 

GINNY BROWN-WAITE, Florida 

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee 

GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida 

DAVID DAVIS, Tennessee 

JESSICA HERRERA-FLANIGAN, Staff Director & General Counsel 

ROSALINE COHEN, Chief Counsel 

MICHAEL TWINCHEK, Chief Clerk 

ROBERT O’CONNOR, Minority Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE, INFORMATION SHARING, AND 

TERRORISM RISK ASSESSMENT 

JANE HARMAN, California, Chair 

NORMAN D. DICKS, Washington 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

CHRISTOPHER P. CARNEY, Pennsylvania 

ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado 

BENNIE G. THOMPSON, Mississippi (Ex 

Officio) 

DAVID G. REICHERT, Washington 

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut 

CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania 

PETER T. KING, New York (Ex Officio) 

THOMAS M. FINAN, Director and Counsel 

BRANDON DECLET, Counsel 

NATALIE NIXON, Deputy Chief Clerk 

DERON MCELROY, Minority Senior Professional Staff Member 

(II) 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

STATEMENTS 

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

of California, and Chair, Subcommittee on Intelligence, Information 

Sharing, and Terrorism Risk Assessment .......................................................... 1 

The Honorable David G. Reichert, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Washington, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Intelligence, 

Information Sharing, and Terrorism Risk Assessment .................................... 1 

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

State of Washington ............................................................................................. 29 

WITNESSES

PANEL I 

Chief John R. Batiste, Washington State Patrol: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 23 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 24 

Chief R. Gil Kerlikowske, Seattle Police Department: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 13 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 15 

Major General Timothy J. Lowenberg, Washington Military Department: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 7 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 9 

Mr. John McKay, Former U.S. Attorney: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 18 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 20 

PANEL II 

Mr. Richard E. Hovel, Aviation Security Advisor, The Boeing Company: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 33 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 35 

Mr. Matt Morrison, Executive Director, Pacific North West Economic Region: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 36 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 38 

Mr. Steve L. Stein, Senior Program Manager, Pacific Northwest National 

Laboratory: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 48 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 50 

Mr. Richard H. Stevenson, President and COO Clise Properties, Inc.: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 51 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 53 

(1) 

BUILDING A PARTNERSHIP STRATEGY: 

IMPROVING INFORMATION SHARING WITH 

STATE AND LOCAL LAW ENFORCEMENT 

AND THE PRIVATE SECTOR 

Friday, May 25, 2007 

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE, INFORMATION SHARING, 

AND TERRORISM RISK ASSESSMENT, 

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 1:06 p.m., at Bellevue 

City Council Chambers, 450 110th Avenue NE, Bellevue, Washington, Hon. Jane Harman presiding. 

Members present: Representatives Harman, Dicks and Reichert. 

Ms. HARMAN. The subcommittee will come to order. 

The subcommittee is meeting today to receive testimony on improving information sharing with state and local—law enforcement 

and the private sector, and before we begin I would like to yield 

to our ranking member, Dave Reichert, for a matter of personal 

business. 

Mr. REICHERT. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

I just want to take a moment. I think we would, all of us here, 

as community members, be remiss if we didn’t just take a moment 

to recognize the passing of our good friend Norm Maleng, so if we 

could just—I’m not going to make a long speech. We all know how 

much he meant to each and every one of us in this room, how much 

he meant to all of us in this community, but if we could just take 

a moment, Madam Chair, a moment of silence in honor of Norm’s 

service and also maybe a personal and private prayer for their family and for their peace and strength. 

Thank you. 

[Moment of silence.] 

Mr. REICHERT. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you. 

Thank you both for inviting me to this beautiful city and this 

beautiful location on a sunny day. 

I have been to Seattle many times, never in sunshine, so I think 

having this hearing is a good omen. 

Less than a week ago, 11 time zones away, I was in Baghdad 

and Ramadi, Iraq. It’s a tough place to visit. I’m sure some of you 

have been there. 

2 

One thing I came away with is that al-Qa’ida is very real in Iraq, 

but I also know from other travels that al-Qa’ida is real and growing around the world. 

This is just one of the major threats that could come our way. 

I also know that about 150 miles from here at the Canadian border in 2000 a man named Ahmed Rasam was apprehended due to 

the good work of a customs agent. 

Ahmed Rasam was driving a car with a trunk full of fertilizer, 

and the bomb, that he was going to put together, was intended to 

blow up at Los Angeles International Airport. 

That gets my attention since my congressional district surrounds 

Los Angeles International Airport, and LAX is the airport target in 

America that has been identified several times by al-Qa’ida as a 

place that it would like to hit. 

So it brings home to us how real are threats against us. 

I’m just talking about terrorism threats. There are also—obviously most of us who come from California know about the natural 

threats. 

Some say the four seasons of California are fire, floods, earthquakes, and riots, but nonetheless, all of us understand vividly how 

dangerous our world is. 

This hearing explores the failure of the federal government to 

share critical terrorism-related information with those who need it 

most, and they’re sitting right in front of us, our first responders 

in state and local law enforcement and their private sector partners. 

Just last fall our staff concluded a random survey of police and 

sheriff’s officers across the country to find out what was really 

going on with information sharing. 

One sheriff in North Dakota when asked why we weren’t making 

faster progress had a stunning answer. ‘‘I hate to say it,’’ he said, 

‘‘but 9/11 memories are fading. We simply haven’t bled enough to 

get where we need to be.’’ 

Well, I think we shouldn’t have to wait for more Americans to 

be hurt or killed before we get it right. 

This subcommittee, on a bipartisan basis, has been focusing on 

ways to fix how the federal government shares information not only 

horizontally with its federal partners but vertically with those of 

you on the front lines. 

No one has a monopoly on how to do information sharing, and 

Washington DC definitely doesn’t have all the answers. 

I think the greatest hope and most measurable progress is to be 

found at the state and local levels, and that is why, at the invitation of two capable members sitting to my right and left, we are 

here in Washington state. 

Slowly but surely cities like Seattle, Bellevue, Los Angeles, and 

others are making real progress in standing up intelligence fusion 

centers and relaying to the federal government their information 

needs. 

In the view of this subcommittee, we need to make state, local, 

and tribal sector information needs the driver of federal information sharing efforts not the other way around. 

3 

You’re the ones who need to identify the information you need, 

and then that needs to go up the chain, and the federal government, your client, needs to respond to you. 

That was the message in the Homeland Security Committee’s 

law enforcement assistance and partnership or LEAP strategy last 

fall, which some of you are going to address in your testimony. 

Law enforcement officers know that to prevent and disrupt a potential attack, they must be full participants in the intelligence 

cycle, and as some of you pointed out in your testimony, that’s the 

goal, preventing and disrupting not responding. 

I am particularly interested in hearing from our witnesses about 

two ideas in the LEAP strategy, first the creation of a national center for intelligence-led policing. In my view creating such a center 

makes good sense and will allow locals to learn about the intelligence process as well as the protection of privacy, civil rights, and 

civil liberties of the people they serve. 

Second, the deployment of state and local law enforcement officers to the national counterterrorism center, the NCTC, to work 

side by side with intelligence analysts. 

You may know, and I’m sure the witnesses know, that Congress 

has passed, in both Houses, a so-called 9/11 bill to implement those 

recommendations of the 9/11 commission that we have not yet enacted into law. 

The Senate and House bills are different, and so a preconference 

is going out to try to reach agreement and then pass a final version 

of the bill, which would go to the President. 

The 9/11 bill is—at least the House version of it, and we’re being 

effective in persuading the Senate to agree to this, would require 

the NCTC to include state, local, and tribal law enforcement officers. We’ve come to that point of view since it’s not happening voluntarily, so we’re thinking we’re going to put a requirement in the 

law if it doesn’t happen before that law is enacted. 

The third point I want to make, final point, is that the private 

sector owns or controls at least 85 percent of this country’s critical 

infrastructure. 

Our second panel will include private sector witnesses. 

The private sector too needs information that will help inform decisions about how to protect against terrorism. 

The newly created national infrastructure advisory council is a 

positive step forward in addressing private sector concerns about 

securing facilities. However, the council’s recommendations don’t 

appear to be gaining much traction on Capitol Hill. 

Local law enforcement agencies like the Seattle police department, on the other hand, have begun to share information with the 

private sector very successfully, another example of leadership at 

the local level. 

As I mentioned, I was pleased to be invited, but I’m also pleased 

to join my colleagues, Ranking Member Sheriff Dave Reichert and 

committee member, Appropriations Committee cardinal, Norm 

Dicks. 

I’m in between a sheriff and a cardinal. It’s quite a religious experience. 

I’m very pleased also to have read about the progress that Washington state is making. 

4 

You may not know that 35 years ago, when we were each 5 years 

old, Norm and I worked together in the United States Senate. He 

worked for Senator Magnuson, and I worked for California Senator 

John Tunney. 

We worked there together, although we are from the same political party, at a time when toxic partisanship was not in Washington. It was a better time, but the good news is that Dave and 

I work together very well, and this subcommittee works on a bipartisan basis. 

I haven’t—our legislative projects and our hearings have been totally bipartisan, and as far as I’m concerned, that’s the way you get 

the job done, so I’m very pleased to be here with Norm and Dave, 

the cardinal and the sheriff—maybe a play could be written—and 

at this point would like to recognize two people in our audience and 

introduce our first panel. 

First the mayor of Bellevue—I think he’s still here—Grant 

Degginger is here, and the Interim Police Chief Linda Pillo is here. 

If you want to get the job done right, put a woman in charge, 

right? 

So let me tell you that I’m very excited about our witnesses 

today, and we’ll introduce the first panel, and then you will each 

testify or summarize your testimony in five minutes. 

Ms. HARMAN. Yes, I forgot about Dave Reichert giving his— 

thank you. Everyone has been pulling at me, and I couldn’t figure 

out what I had said wrong about the mayor. 

Let me first yield to the ranking member for an opening statement. 

Mr. REICHERT. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

The hesitancy is that she knows once I get the microphone, I continue to talk and talk and talk. 

I’ve learned that’s what you do in DC is that you grab the microphone and never stop, right, Norm? 

Mr. DICKS. Five minute rule in the House. 

Mr. REICHERT. So for those of you—and they really go by the 

five-minute rule. 

For those of you who haven’t experienced a federal hearing before—I know that the panel has—it’s quite an experience back in 

Washington DC, and it’s kind of a formal experience, but usually 

the members of the committee, we get to pontificate for a while, 

and then we get to hear the witnesses and their testimony, and we 

get to ask questions. 

Part of the reason we do that is we want to learn as much as 

we can, and we go back and build good legislation, and, as Jane 

said, we really have been a committee that has worked well together. 

We are a committee that is really focused on protecting this 

country and protecting our citizens and protecting our community 

and doing away with that bipartisanship—or that partisanship 

that you see back in Washington DC, so you’ll see this committee 

really focused on that. 

Again, thank you, Madam Chair, and welcome to Washington 

state, and Norm and I are, of course, good friends, and thanks for 

coming up from the south end today, Norm, and welcome to the 8th 

District. 

5 

I’m just going to read a prepared statement very quickly. 

I would like to welcome, again, the Chairwoman here for this 

hearing, glad that you were able to make it and thank you for coming to Seattle. 

We are all here because we agree that having information flow 

to and from our first responders is paramount in preventing a future terrorist attack. 

However, information sharing is a two-way street. It needs to 

happen in a partnership based on trust and mutual understanding. 

That is the purpose of this hearing today, to better understand 

how information—information sharing, how those needs are being 

met and how these relationships can be improved. 

Unlike many other major cities across the nation, Seattle is located in close proximity to an international border. 

It’s home to a number of internationally recognized businesses 

and combined with the Port of Tacoma has the third largest port 

as well as the largest ferry system in the nation. 

Our region is not new to the threat of terrorism. 

Ahmed Rasam is a reminder to us of that threat posed by the 

border, and the challenges we will face in the upcoming 2010 Vancouver Olympics is real. 

Collaboration between federal, state, and local entities is key. 

It is clear that in Seattle information sharing has improved dramatically since September 11th, and I was fortunate to be a part 

of those efforts in the beginning and working with everyone represented today on this panel as their partner in law enforcement 

here. 

I know from past experience that increased collaboration between 

the federal government and local law enforcement needs to improve 

more though. We have a lot more work to do. 

The private sector as well should be involved. They should be 

helping us to create a better understanding of potential threats to 

the Seattle area, and though—and through those partnerships 

being developed at the Washington joint analytical center, the 

WAJAC, and FBI, information is flowing directly to those first preventers capable of increasing our level of protection, but it is also 

clear there is room for improvement. 

One of the issues I hear about time and time again is ensuring 

that the federal funding can be used for analysts in fusion centers, 

and I know that that’s something the chief will touch on today. 

The Department of Homeland Security recently allowed state 

and local entities to use grant funding for analysts, but we are 

looking to strengthen this law. 

While the feds have focused their efforts on improving the security in the nation’s most critical infrastructures, it is also essential 

that the federal government focus on forging new partnerships and 

improving information sharing, whether these networks be human 

or cyber. 

It is essential that these partnerships and networks include the 

private sector, especially since private sector owns and operates 85 

percent of U.S. critical infrastructure. 

Part of the difficulty of the information sharing with the private 

sector is that the private sector companies are often reluctant to 

6 

share information with the federal government. They fear exposure 

to lawsuits and the loss of competitive advantage. 

Given the track record from the Department of Homeland Security protecting information, they are rightly worried. 

That is why as part the Department of Homeland Security Authorization Act that passed the House earlier this month, I included a provision to study incentives for the private sector for information sharing. 

If a company takes a risk in sharing sensitive data, it is essential 

that potential benefits outweigh possible costs. 

Having some sort of incentives in place could help increase the 

flow of critical information. 

I would like to thank all of our witnesses for being here today 

and for participating in these two panels, and with that, Madam 

Chair, I yield. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, very much Congressman Reichert. 

Ms. HARMAN. Congressman Dicks had the opportunity in his 

home state to make an opening comment but has chosen to waive, 

and so I know we’ll hear from him shortly. 

Mr. DICKS. I would like to hear from the witnesses. 

Ms. HARMAN. There you go. 

Our first witness, Major General Timothy Lowenberg is the Adjutant General of Washington state where he guides the preparation 

of Washington Army and Air National Guard citizen soldiers and 

airmen to respond in times of state and national emergency. 

Major General Lowenberg is responsible for formulating, developing, and coordinating all policies, plans, and programs affecting 

the Army National Guard. 

He also serves as chair of the national governors association, 

homeland security advisors council, and is extremely well known 

nationally, and it is a pleasure to have you as our witness, sir. 

Our second witness, Gil Kerlikowske, is the chief of police for the 

City of Seattle, a position he has held since August of 2000. 

During his 35 years in law enforcement, the chief has served in 

many distinguished capacities, including as the deputy director of 

the community-oriented policing services, COPS, at the Department of Justice, the police commissioner in Buffalo, New York, and 

as a patrol officer in St. Petersburg, Florida, and I do know that 

you’re close friends of the chief and the sheriff in Los Angeles. 

Again, it’s a pleasure to see you. 

Our third witness, David McKay— 

Mr. DICKS. John McKay. 

Ms. HARMAN. John McKay, thank you. 

I’m sorry, I had it down wrong in this transcript. 

John McKay was, until recently, the U.S. Attorney for western 

Washington. He was nominated by President Bush to serve as U.S. 

Attorney on September 19, 2001, and the United States Senate 

confirmed his nomination several weeks later. 

From 1989 to 1990 Mr. McKay served as a White House fellow 

where he worked as special assistant to the director of the federal 

Bureau of Investigation in Washington. 

I know you also, as I recall, were president of the legal services 

corporation in Washington in the late 1990s, a very important asVerDate Nov 24 2008 07:58 Jul 07, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00010 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 H:\DOCS\110-HRGS\110-42\48917.TXT HSEC PsN: DIANE
7 

signment, I believe, and you are presently visiting professor at the 

Seattle University school of law. 

Our fourth witness, John Batiste, is the chief of Washington 

state patrol, the largest public safety and law enforcement agency 

in the state. 

Chief Batiste oversees the day-to-day management of the agency’s six bureaus: Field operations bureau, fire protection bureau, forensic laboratory services bureau, investigative services, management services, and technical services. 

Without objection, each of your full statements will be inserted 

in the record, and I would ask you each to summarize your statement in five minutes, and I can’t see, but is there a timer—over 

there, so for those—why don’t you focus it toward the people who 

are testifying first, and we’re starting with Major General 

Lowenberg. 

STATEMENT OF MAJOR GENERAL TIMOTHY J. LOWENBERG, 

WASHINGTON MILITARY DEPARTMENT 

General LOWENBERG. Thank you, Madam Chair and members of 

the committee. It’s a pleasure to be a member of this distinguished 

panel with my friends and colleagues with whom I’ve worked so 

long and so well. 

As noted, I am testifying today as a state official but also as 

chair of the national governors association of homeland security advisors council. 

In fact, I had a national teleconference at 11:00 local to review 

my testimony with my colleagues from all of the states, and I also 

appear today as chair of homeland defense and homeland security 

for the adjutant generals association of the United States. 

Let me begin by stating an obvious but critical ground truth acknowledged by the chairwoman, and that is that we are a nation 

at war, a nation whose communities for the first time in our nation’s history are part of the global battle space, and the intent of 

our adversaries is very clear. 

The ‘‘Blind Sheik’’ when he was sentenced for a life term of imprisonment for the 1993 bombings of the World Trade Tower said, 

and I quote, ‘‘God will make America disappear from the surface 

of the earth as He has made the Soviet Union disappear.’’ 

With a lot of great leadership and unity of effort, we have done 

a number of things to make us safer today than we were when we 

were attacked in 2001, but we are far from safe. 

The 9/11 commission did a laudable job of addressing the spectrum of threats related to al-Qa’ida and what they referred to as 

ideological movements, but I believe it’s also important that we address the spectrum of home-grown terrorism, to that I would add 

specifically the growing phenomenon of prison radicalization in 

U.S. prisons, principally in our state prison systems, and these and 

other domestic threats can only be dealt with by leveraging the 

vastly superior numbers and ‘‘boots on the ground’’ contacts or our 

local law enforcement and officials in the private sector as well. 

The homeland security advisory council released a report in December of 2004 that went well beyond the 9/11 commission’s reports in focusing on the criticality of incorporating these state, tribal, and local intelligence-gathering, intelligence-fusion, and inforVerDate Nov 24 2008 07:58 Jul 07, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00011 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 H:\DOCS\110-HRGS\110-42\48917.TXT HSEC PsN: DIANE
8 

mation sharing capabilities, and focused on the need for a truly national as opposed to a federal system of intelligence and information sharing. 

The LEAP strategy mentioned by the chairwoman I think goes 

a long way, provides an excellent road map for a true enterprise 

strategy that would enhance and improve our nation’s domestic security. 

I know that Chief Kerlikowske is going to comment on the national center for intelligence-led policing and some of the other 

specification provisions, so I’m not going to spend my limited time 

doing that, other than to acknowledge that the kinds of activities 

that support or many times presage domestic terrorist events can 

best be discerned, interdicted, and prevented when there is a seamless local, tribal, state, and federal intelligence network. 

The ground truth is that state intelligence centers have been established almost solely as a result of the initiative and the perseverance of local jurisdictions and states. 

There’s been tremendous pushback from the very inception. 

We were told initially that it wasn’t part of the national strategy 

when then Governor Mitt Romney led the Homeland Security’s advisory council’s effort on intelligence and information sharing and 

released their report. 

It took us more than a year to get that report through the advisory council, simply to acknowledge the efficacy of state and local 

intelligence fusion centers. 

Once we got that in the fiscal year 2005 grant guidance, we were 

told that we could hire up to two contract planners to assist the 

state efforts, but we weren’t given the guidelines to enable us to 

do what we really needed to do, and that was begin to develop a 

cadre of analysts. 

Beginning in fiscal year 2006 we’ve been authorized to hire analysts but only with grant money limited to the two-year program 

cycle of the grant, and so as we look at how we fund these efforts 

at the state and local level, we are restricted to part-time contract 

employees. 

It does not allow us to build a cadre of professional analysts so 

necessary for national security. 

By the way, Madam Chair, you mentioned the NCTC, and we 

need state and local representation on the NCTC, the national 

counterterrorism center, that goes beyond one or two fellowship 

status prisons. 

What we really need is a regime in which state and local analysts rotate through the NCTC and federal analysts rotate into the 

field, so that over a period of time we begin to develop 

crosspollination personal and professional relationships where fusion center analysts at the various echelons truly have a keen appreciation and understanding of the requirements at the other 

echelons. 

What jeopardizes the operations of state and local intelligence fusion centers in Washington and every other state is the lack of predictable and sustainable federal funding. 

We believe, and when I say ‘‘we,’’ the Homeland Security advisors for the several states and territories, believes that a multiyear 

POM cycle for Homeland Security budgeting, much like we do for 

9 

the Department of Defense budgeting, is long overdue and would 

help lay the groundwork for strategic and long-term homeland security planning at all levels of government. 

We also believe fervently that the restrictions of DHS information bulletin 235, which limit funding support for its contract intelligence analysts to the two-year performance period, is really not 

driven by any Congressional authorization or appropriation language and is policy that is off the mark. 

If it’s not revised, it should be revised by Congress. 

Finally, a national as opposed to a federal intelligence center 

communications architecture needs to be developed and funded, 

tying together intelligence centers within the states, within intrastate and interstate regions and nationally. 

Targeted support from Congress that would allow us to develop 

this information-operations-sharing database and information system will go a long way to making our country more secure. 

Thank you, Madam Chair, for the opportunity to appear before 

you, and I look forward to your questioning. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, General, and I will just point out to 

you that the legislative fix we have in mind in the 9/11 bill for the 

NCTC is exactly what you described, so hopefully we will get that 

very soon. 

General LOWENBERG. That will be very welcome. 

[The statement of General Lowenberg follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF MAJOR GENERAL TIMOTHY LOWENBERG

Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and distinguished members of the Committee. For 

the record, I am Major General Tim Lowenberg, Adjutant General of the State of 

Washington. I am also Chair of the National Governors Association (NGA) Homeland Security Advisors Council and Chair of Homeland Defense and Homeland Security for the Adjutants General Association of the United States (AGAUS). In addition to my Army and Air National Guard command responsibilities, state law designates the Adjutant General as the state’s senior emergency management official 

and vests in me the responsibility to ‘‘administer the comprehensive emergency 

management program of the state of Washington (RCW 38.52.005). 

I wish to emphasize that although I am a federally recognized and U.S. Senateconfirmed Air Force general officer, I appear before you today solely in my capacity 

as a state official. 

We are a Nation at War! 

We are a nation at war! That is the ‘‘ground truth’’ that must drive all of our data 

collection, information sharing and intelligence fusion and risk assessment actions. 

We have been under attack since al-Qa’ida operatives prevailed in a decade-long 

battle against one of the world’s two acknowledged ‘‘Super Powers’’ in Afghanistan. 

Having watched the Soviet Union implode and literally cease to exist within two (2) 

years of the conclusion of that bloody conflict in 1989, al-Qa’ida began systematically 

attacking United States interests at home and abroad. The ongoing conflict has already lasted longer than America’s involvement in World War II—with no end in 

sight. More than three thousand U.S. residents perished in the September 11, 2001 

attack. Today, all American communities, large and small, are part of a new and 

frighteningly lethal 21st Century global battle space. 

Our adversaries’ intentions—and commitment—are manifestly clear. At his sentencing for masterminding the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Towers, Sheik 

Omar Abdul Rahman (the ‘‘Blind Sheik’’) declared: ‘‘God will make America disappear from the surface of the earth, as He has made the Soviet Union disappear!’’ 

We Are Safer Today—But Not Safe 

As the Governor’s Homeland Security Advisor and Chair of the NGA Homeland 

Security Advisors Council, I am often asked if we are safer today than we were on 

10 

September 11, 200l. In other words, are we safer today than when we were last attacked? 

The principal studies and statutory materials I rely upon in responding to this 

question include the 9/11 Commission Report; the Homeland Security Act of 2002; 

the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004; the December 2004 

Homeland Security Advisory Council Intelligence and Information Sharing Initiative 

chaired by then-Governor Mitt Romney; and the 2006 Law Enforcement Assistance 

and Partnership Strategy. The 9/11 Commission Report reminds us that ‘‘Since 9/ 

11, the United States and its allies have killed or captured a majority of al-Qa’ida’s 

leadership; toppled the Taliban, which gave al-Qa’ida sanctuary in Afghanistan; and 

severely damaged the organization. Yet terrorist attacks continue. Even as we have 

thwarted attacks, nearly everyone expects they will come. How can this be? The 

problem is that al-Qa’ida represents an ideological movement, not a finite group of 

people. It initiates and inspires, even if it no longer directs. —Because of the offensive actions against al-Qa’ida since 9/11, and defensive actions to improve homeland 

security, we believe we are safer today. But we are not safe.’’ 

I concur with this analysis. To the obvious threats posed by al-Qa’ida’s ‘‘ideological 

movement’’, I would add the dangers of home-grown terrorism to include the growing and disturbing phenomenon of U.S. prison radicalization. These domestic 

threats can only be dealt with by leveraging the vastly superior numbers and ‘‘boots 

on the ground’’ contacts of state and local law enforcement officials. 

To improve domestic security, the 9/11 Commission stressed the importance of 

unity of effort within the intelligence and information sharing community and urged, 

among many recommendations, targeted intelligence initiatives to create (1) a national counter-terrorism center to unify strategic intelligence and operational planning; (2) a national intelligence director to unify the intelligence community; (3) increased congressional oversight; and (4) establishment of a specialized and integrated national security unit within the FBI. 

Subsequent to the 9/11 Commission report, the Homeland Security Advisory 

Council released a report in December 2004 that focused specifically on the nation’s 

intelligence and information sharing requirements and went even further in recommending: • Effective prevention efforts must be information-driven and risk-based. • Federal, state, tribal and local authorities must work together with the private sector to assess threat, vulnerability, risk and consequence. 

• State, tribal, local and private entities are now ‘‘consumers’’ of accurate, timely and actionable intelligence. 

• The federal government needs to develop a reliable and organized conduit for 

providing information to state, tribes, and localities. 

• The federal government should emphasize providing current and actionable 

unclassified information. 

• The collectors of intelligence; state, tribal and local entities are now 

partners with the federal intelligence community. * 

• The federal government should take steps to ensure domestic intelligence/information activities are carried out in a consistent fashion. 

• State, tribal and local governments need to collect, analyze, disseminate and use intelligence and information as part of their day-to-day operations. * 

• DHS should gather and share best practices. 

• Statewide intelligence/information fusion centers should be an important part of national intelligence/information sharing efforts. * 

• Each state should establish an information center that serves as a 24/ 

7 ‘‘all-source,’’ multi-disciplinary, information fusion center. * 

* (emphasis added) 

Two years after release of the Homeland Security Advisory Council report, the 

House Committee on Homeland Security proffered additional and more precisely focused recommendations in its Law Enforcement Assistance and Partnership (LEAP) 

Strategy. I applaud the House Committee’s analysis and concur with many of the 

LEAP Strategy recommendations including establishing a national center for intelligence-led policing; establishing a law-enforcement presence overseas; creating intelligence fusion centers at or near our borders; supporting grant programs to assist 

local law enforcement education and teaming; enhancing vertical information sharing between levels of law enforcement; assuring timely accessible security clearances 

for law enforcement; and continual surveying efforts to provide feedback on intelligence system effectiveness. If authorized and funded, these initiatives would enhance unity of effort and fundamentally improve our nation’s domestic security. 

To date, however, most of the attention and funding for these and other initiatives 

have been focused at the federal level. While continuously improving federal interVerDate Nov 24 2008 07:58 Jul 07, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00014 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\DOCS\110-HRGS\110-42\48917.TXT HSEC PsN: DIANE
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agency operations, we must also be mindful that terrorist attacks and criminal activities that support terrorist activities occur in local communities and local citizens 

are the primary victims. Unless and until the federal government also supports and 

funds a national strategy of state and local counter-terrorism capacity building, 

homeland security will continue to be an illusive goal. 

Federal-Centric First Steps 

In 2003 the Terrorism Threat Integration Center (TTIC) was formed to provide 

a comprehensive assessment of potential terrorist threats to U.S. interests. The 

TTIC included the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI’s Counterterrorism 

Division, the Central Intelligence Agency’s Counterterrorist Center, the Department 

of Defense and other U.S. Government agencies. The Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 renamed the TTIC the National Counterterrorism 

Center (NCTC) and placed it under the control of the United States Director of National Intelligence (DNI). The NCTC vision statement calls for it to serve as the nation’s center of excellence for counterterrorism and to eliminate the threat of terrorism through integrated, dedicated and disciplined strategic operational planning 

and counterterrorism intelligence. One of its stated objectives is to operate as a 

partnership of organizations including: the Central Intelligence Agency; the Department of Justice/Federal Bureau of Investigation; the Departments of State, Defense, 

and Homeland Security; and other entities that provide unique expertise such as the 

Departments of Energy, Treasury, Agriculture, Transportation, and Health and 

Human Services; the Nuclear Regulatory Commission; and the US Capitol Hill Police. 

While this vision, purpose, and strategy are prudent and highly important, I mention the creation of the TTIC and NCTC as an illustration of the federal-centric nature of many of our initial homeland security initiatives. Without diminishing the 

importance of these and other federal government actions, they must be part of a 

larger enterprise strategy of federal-state-tribal-local capacity building, especially in 

the areas of intelligence fusion and information sharing. As DHS moves forward 

with efforts to create uniform information sharing guidelines, it is imperative that 

they have a better understanding of state operations and how state, tribal and local 

operations can enhance our overall national intelligence system. State intelligence 

fusion centers have had to be built almost exclusively through state and local perseverance, not as a result of any federal encouragement or federally-supported national strategy. Even after release of the Homeland Security Advisory Council’s Intelligence and Information Sharing Initiative report touting the national security 

benefits of state-tribal-local intelligence fusion centers, financial support from DHS 

and OMB was not forthcoming. Only after a substantial number of states established such centers and others were clearly in the process of doing the same did 

DHS and OMB belatedly begin providing limited funding support for these state 

and local operations. 

With American communities at the heart of the new 21st Century battle space, 

we cannot afford to ‘‘manage’’ the consequences of future terrorist attacks. We must 

be able to detect, deter, intercept and prevent such attacks from occurring. That can 

only be done through the systematic gathering, assessment, distillation and dissemination of actionable intelligence. The LEAP report accurately notes that intelligence 

analysis has heretofore been the near-exclusive domain of the federal government 

and that we have been slow to recognize that local, state, and tribal law enforcement professionals, if properly resourced, are our nation’s true ‘‘eyes and ears’’ and 

can substantially enhance our nation’s security. 

When planes were flown into buildings on September 11, 2001 it was the brave 

men and women of local police and fire departments who heroically responded. That 

same sense of urgency and commitment exists today in our state, tribal and local 

intelligence fusion centers. 

—Enhancing State and Local Intelligence Fusion Capacity— 

Creating a ‘‘National’’ Intelligence System that Makes our Nation Safer! 

Capitalizing on an All-Crimes Approach 

To develop a broader intelligence sharing system, additional information, that is 

to say information other than that which has a clear nexus to terrorism, must be 

considered. To that end, the LEAP report observed: 

Everyday, police and sheriffs’ officers collect millions of pieces of information during the course of their work—the kind of information that, if properly analyzed and 

12 

integrated, can form the basis of highly informative law enforcement intelligence reports. That is what ‘‘intelligence-led policing’’ or ILP is all about. 

Another proponent of ILP, Michael Downing, Commander of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Counter-Terrorism/Criminal Intelligence Bureau, has opined: 

The success and understanding of community based policing philosophies and 

community based government practice [has] set the stage for local, state, and federal law enforcement partners to construct the building blocks for shared and fused 

intelligence that will prevent, deter, disrupt, and interdict planned terrorist acts targeting America. This intelligence model of policing should be robust enough to incorporate an ‘‘all-crimes, all-hazards’’ approach, resisting terrorism as well as crime 

and disorder. 

The state of Washington has firmly embraced an all-crimes approach to the collection, analysis and dissemination of intelligence information. The State’s fusion center, known as the Washington Joint Analytical Center or WAJAC, regularly dispenses actionable intelligence and Be-On-the-Look Out (BOLO) information related 

to terrorism as well as a variety of topics including missing children, stalking suspects, counter-drug and narcotics interdiction missions, auto-theft rings, and organized gangs. 

This kind of information can only become fully actionable when state, tribal and 

local fusion centers are linked together by consistent communications architecture 

within states and throughout the nation. A national—as opposed to a federal—intelligence center information operations (IO) strategy would facilitate the horizontal 

and vertical sharing of ‘‘real time’’ classified and law enforcement sensitive information. 

We should also leverage the skills and capabilities of trained and experienced analysts and subject matter experts from our state prison systems and from non-law 

enforcement disciplines such as the Army and Air National Guard and Public 

Health. 

The Need for Predictable and Sustainable Federal Funding 

Above all else, however, what jeopardizes the operations of state and local intelligence fusion centers in Washington and all other states is the lack of predictable 

and sustainable funding. Current federal grant guidelines (Information Bulletin— 

IB235) authorize funding support for intelligence analysts for only the 2 year performance period of the fiscal year 2006 UASI and LETPP programs. 

Fiscal Year 2006 Grant Guidance (pages 33–34, 83, 89): 

‘‘Furthermore, costs associated with hiring new intelligence analysts are allowable 

only for the period of performance of the fiscal year 2006 UASI and LETPP programs. Upon close-out of the fiscal year 2006 grants, States and Urban Areas shall 

be responsible for supporting the sustainment costs for those intelligence analysts.’’ 

Fiscal year 2007 HSGP Grant Guidance (pages 26 and B–1): 

‘‘Costs associated with hiring new intelligence analysts are allowable for only two 

years, after which States and Urban Areas shall be responsible for supporting the 

sustainment costs for those intelligence analysts.’’ 

Although there are no references to intelligence analysts in the congressional appropriation bills, the Department of Homeland Security, as a matter of discretion 

and policy, has issued IB235 which tracks both grant guidelines and applies the two 

year limitation to both years’ funding. These limitations, coupled with the overall 

uncertainty and unpredictability of federal grant funding, create continuous staff 

turnover and prevent state and local fusion centers from developing a cadre of experienced career analysts. The federal government wouldn’t think of contracting out 

its Intelligence functions, yet the DHS policy essentially forces state and territorial 

governments to rely upon contract personnel hired for only a 2-year grant performance period. States are predictably unable to recruit and retain skilled personnel 

when federal grant guidelines accommodate only short-term, ‘‘temporary’’ contractor 

assistance. 

Synchronizing State and Federal Information Sharing and Intelligence 

Analysis 

Washington State’s proximity to the Canadian land border, coupled with our proximity to Puget Sound and the Pacific Ocean, provide ample air, land and maritime 

routes of illegal entry for those who would do us harm. These geographic 

vulnerabilities substantially increase the risk of a terrorist attack especially when 

viewed against the backdrop of the world ‘‘stage’’ that will be presented to terrorist 

cells by events such as the 2009 World Police and Fire Games and the 2010 Winter 

Olympics and Paralympics. Many of these events will be held in and near VanVerDate Nov 24 2008 07:58 Jul 07, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00016 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\DOCS\110-HRGS\110-42\48917.TXT HSEC PsN: DIANE
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couver, British Columbia at venues within 35 miles of Washington State communities. If domestic or transnational terrorists were to plot an attack in conjunction 

with these international events, it is likely that pre-operation planning and surveillance will be conducted from within the state of Washington. Given al-Qa’ida’s 

modus operandi, such planning might even be occurring in our region today. 

Developing a closer, more disciplined information sharing relationship between 

local, state, and tribal law enforcement and Customs and Border Patrol (CBP), Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other federal agency colleagues 

would substantially enhance our collective situational awareness. In this regard, I 

concur with the LEAP report’s observation that ‘‘in order to better secure the homeland, the Department [of Homeland Security] must partner more effectively with 

state, local, and tribal law enforcement agencies in our nation’s border communities—the ‘force multipliers’ at our own frontiers.’’ 

David Carter, Professor and Director of Michigan State University’s School of 

Criminal Justice, noted in the LEAP report: 

The borders of the U.S. are replete with small state, local, and tribal law enforcement agencies. Officers in those agencies know the people in their communities and 

the character of life on the border and readily recognize when there are anomalies. 

Yet, they rarely report this information and even more rarely are asked. This is valuable data that may often times help fusion center analysts and the federal Intelligence Community complete the threat puzzle. 

Fortunately, Washington State has benefited from a close relationship with our 

federal border partners. Specifically, Thomas Hardy, Director of Field Operations for 

the Seattle CBP Field Office, and his staff have been invaluable collaborators, particularly as we have worked together on preparing for the 2010 Winter Olympics. 

Washington’s local police agencies have also benefited from a high level of collaboration with our federal agency partners. In the LEAP report, Ferry County (WA) 

Sheriff Peter Warner emphasized: 

We rely on Border Patrol agents in my jurisdiction for information about what’s 

going on at the border, and I know them personally. We frankly need more Border Patrol agents—and more resources to hire additional police and sheriffs’ officers—in order to meet the threat of terrorism at the border. 

I concur with Sheriff Warner and encourage the members of this Committee and 

your fellow members of Congress to appropriate funding for additional human and 

technological resources at the federal and at state and local levels—with special and 

targeted support for state and local intelligence fusion center operations—to help ensure the air, land and maritime routes of access to our country are secure. 

Conclusion 

We are a nation at war. We are confronted by daunting and unprecedented domestic security risks. Our ability to detect, deter, dissuade and prevent future terrorist attacks is directly tied to our ability to analyze all-crimes intelligence in adequately funded and staffed state and local intelligence fusion centers and in collectively sharing that information between and among members of the local-tribalstate-federal intelligence community. A federal-centric intelligence system will not 

allow us to meet the threats now confronting our nation nor will it enable us to effectively respond to or recover from future terrorist attacks. Our homeland will be 

secure only when members of local, tribal, state and federal law enforcement communities and other emergency responders have the information and resources they 

need on a daily basis to make sound decisions about transnational and domestic terrorist threats. 

Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. I look forward to your 

questions. 

Ms. HARMAN. Chief Kerlikowske, please summarize your testimony in five minutes. 

STATEMENT OF R. GIL KERLIKOWSKE, CHIEF, SEATTLE 

POLICE DEPARTMENT 

Chief Kerlikowske. Thank you, Committee Chair Harman and 

Congressman Dicks, Congressman Reichert. Thanks very much for 

inviting me to share observations with you on the very important 

topic of information sharing between the public and private sectors 

as it relates to homeland security. 

I’m going to sketch for you the state of intelligence fusion and 

homeland security from the vantage point of a local police chief, 

14 

and I want to address the following two areas: The nature of the 

current obstacles to the creation of an integrated system of intelligence fusion, including private sector participation; and some proposed solutions for removing those impediments and improving the 

information sharing, in particular some of the promising initiatives 

contained in the LEAP report which myself and my colleagues have 

been very impressed with. 

The essential concept of intelligence fusion, which is in several 

different national guidelines, fusion center guidelines, et cetera, involves the systematic collection, analysis, and dissemination of information through an inclusive process, involving the full engagement of all of the key stakeholders, and without the participation 

of the private sector, which as you mentioned, Madam Chair, holds, 

manages and controls over 85 percent of the critical information infrastructure in the nation, it is hard to contemplate that we are 

going to be able to achieve that objective. 

Realization of such private/public partnership is predicated upon 

though having a system upon which we are going to all participate, 

and this is the dilemma that vexes my colleagues and the major 

city chiefs, that is the organization of the 56 largest police and 

sheriff’s departments in the United States and Canada and where 

I currently serve as vice president. 

We consider increased engagement of participation by the private 

sector in homeland security to be among one of our highest priorities. 

Unfortunately, our individual ability to collect and create intelligence fusion centers has been limited, at best. 

Two of the major impediments: First, we remain tethered to the 

federally centered vision of intelligence information based on the 

Cold War ‘‘bottom up’’ type of system. Security clearances are difficult and time-consuming procedures for obtaining access to equipment, are convoluted and unnecessary, and the sharing of vast categories of information is prohibited unless it is brokered by DOJ 

or DHS. 

Second, the restrictions on the use of funds to support homeland 

security, which the General mentioned and I believe Chief Batiste 

will mention also, the potential solutions are contained in the 

LEAP report. 

One is, of course, what you had mentioned earlier, the proposal 

to establish a center for intelligence-led policing. 

We are doing this, as the sheriff or Congressman Reichert knows, 

across the country and looking at best practices in collaborating 

and working together. 

Having this federally located system and funded system would go 

a long way to that. 

The foreign liaison officer against terrorism program—you have 

great acronyms, by the way, for this. Very well done. 

Ms. HARMAN. Give our staff the credit. 

Chief Kerlikowske. The FLOAT program—what an ability in this 

global issue to be able to have local law enforcement understand 

and obtain knowledge in foreign countries, something that we could 

not, unless you are New York City, afford to do, the proposal to reform and streamline the process for obtaining security clearances. 

15 

In Seattle we have a convergence of the circumstances that have 

created the ideal environment for information sharing, and that is 

some of the things that we can accomplish in the city, and I very 

much appreciate the support that we’ve had from our own local 

members. 

Right after 9/11 we were able to reach out to the Muslim community and through a joint letter signed by, at that time, United 

States Attorney John McKay and myself, we notified every police 

agency in the state of Washington how they could be helpful in reducing fear and increasing cooperation and communication in those 

communities. 

We participated in TOPOFF, the first federally centered exercise 

against terrorism after 9/11. 

Under John McKay’s leadership, the Puget Sound region was the 

first to operationalize Linx, the law enforcement system for data 

coordination, and we have been working very hard at a regional fusion center in conjunction with our state fusion center, WAJAC. 

Our areas of interest converged and create substantial opportunities for expanded collaboration. No one knows the strengths and 

vulnerabilities of these critical facilities better than the locals do. 

What I suggest is that we seek the kind of enduring dependable 

relationship we have in Seattle with leaders like Al Clise and Richard Stevenson of Clise Properties. That is a foundation of trust and 

cooperation and relationships that make sure that we are going to 

protect the critical infrastructure in the private sector to the very 

best of our ability. 

Thank you. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you very much, Chief. 

[The statement of Chief Kerlikowske follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF CHIEF R. GIL KERLIKOWSKE

Committee Chair Harmon, Congressman Dicks and Congressman Reichert, thank 

you for inviting me to share my observations with you on the important topic of information sharing between the public and private sectors as it relates to homeland 

security. 

To address the central question of this hearing—How do we build a partnership 

between the public and private sectors to share information relevant to homeland 

security?—requires an analysis, first, of the status of homeland security intelligence 

efforts and systems to date. This is because we cannot share information and intelligence that we don’t have. Moreover, it would be premature to undertake an expansion of information sharing if the infrastructure of intelligence fusion is inadequate 

or incomplete. 

In the brief time I have today, then, I will attempt to sketch for you the state 

of intelligence fusion in support of homeland security, from the vantage point of a 

local police chief, by addressing the following: • the nature of current obstacles to the creation of integrated systems of intelligence fusion, including private sector participation; and 

• proposed solutions for removing these impediments and improving the information sharing environment, in particular, some of the promising initiatives 

contained in the ‘‘Law Enforcement Assistance and Partnership Strategy’’, or 

LEAP report. 

I will conclude my testimony with some observations aimed at reinforcing the importance of public private partnerships, and why I am optimistic that we will 

achieve success to meet that priority. 

Obstacles to creating integrated intelligence fusion. 

The essential concept of intelligence fusion—as defined by DHS in both National 

Criminal Justice Information Sharing Plan (NCISP) and the NIJ-Global Justice Initiative ‘‘Fusion Center Guidelines’’ document they adopted—involves the systematic 

collection, analysis and dissemination of information through an inclusive process, 

involving the full engagement of all relevant stakeholders. Without the participation 

16 

of the private sector, which holds, manages and controls over 85% of the critical information infrastructure of the nation, it is hard to contemplate achievement of this 

objective. 

Realization of such a private/public sector partnership, however, is predicated 

upon having a system or process within which to participate. This is the dilemma 

which has vexed my colleagues in the Major City Chiefs organization, which comprises the 56 largest metropolitan police agencies in the US and Canada, and where 

I currently serve as vice-president. We consider the increased engagement and participation by the private sector in homeland security to be among our highest priorities. Unfortunately, our individual and collective progress to create intelligence fusion systems or centers that have the capacity to integrate private sector participation has been limited, at best. 

Two major impediments have contributed to this reality: 

First, we remain tethered to the federally centered vision of intelligence information 

management. Developed during the Cold War, this vision remains stubbornly resistant to change. For all the stated commitment to derive intelligence requirements 

and priorities from the ‘‘bottom up’’—which I interpret to mean from the front lines 

of local law enforcement—many decisions still originate from somewhere inside the 

beltway, and specifically within DHS and the FBI. This reality finds confirmation 

in many ways. Security clearances are difficult for many in law enforcement to obtain in a timely fashion. • Procedures for obtaining access, equipment or support are often convoluted, 

tortuous and unnecessary. 

• The sharing of vast categories of information is prohibited unless brokered by 

the FBI, in particular as relates to foreign counter-intelligence. (As a police 

chief of the 19th largest city in the nation, and in possession of a top secret 

clearance, by law I cannot set foot unescorted in the NCTC, let alone have direct access to even the most benign information) 

• And while there are some noteworthy and commendable fusion centers and 

systems around the country (I am thinking here of Los Angeles–Los Angeles 

County, Arizona and Massachusetts, to name a few), the vast majority of intelligence management remains centered in the traditional JTTF–FIG structure, 

almost six years after 9/11. 

Second, the restrictions on the use of funds to support homeland security initiatives 

virtually assure that our progress will be limited. In particular, the UASI prohibitions concerning the hiring of sworn law enforcement personnel contradict an order 

of priority that every chief of police knows by heart: It is people who solve crimes 

and prevent terrorism, not buildings and equipment. 

Potential solutions for improving the information-sharing environment. 

My purpose in making the above observations is not to itemize grievances, but 

rather to join with you in finding solutions. Just as it is fair to say that many of 

us in the local law enforcement community have been frustrated by certain unnecessary, and sometimes mysterious, impediments to our progress relating to homeland 

security, it is equally fair to say that we have come a long way since 9/11, and that 

the nation is, on balance, safer and more prepared than we have been in the past. 

And we are all keenly interested in continuing the progress that we have jointly 

achieved. This brings me to comment on certain of the promising initiatives contained in the LEAP report. Specifically, I wish to lend my voice in support of the 

following initiatives outlined in this laudable, strategic document: 

First, the proposal to establish a ‘‘center’’ for intelligence-led policing. This, to me, 

makes a lot of sense. From my vantage, there does not appear to be sufficient attention paid to creating a unified approach to the overall concept of intelligence-driven 

policing on an all-crimes basis, nor is there sufficient focus upon the strategic or civil 

liberties implications of police deployment based upon actionable information. The 

opportunity to evaluate successful models and develop standards and guidelines on 

a national level would meet a great need. This being said, the concept of a national 

center must be more than just about building another big box, of course, and must 

be designed based upon the concepts I discussed earlier. Fundamentally, the full participation of local law enforcement is critical to the success of such an initiative. Perhaps there would be a place in such a center or system for the private sector, as well. 

Second, the ‘‘Foreign Liaison Officers Against Terrorism (FLOAT) Grant Program’’ 

would go a long way toward expanding both the knowledge base and the preparedness capacity of local, state and tribal law enforcement. In a real sense, a program 

of this kind directly confronts the preclusion of local law enforcement involvement in 

the categories of intelligence that I spoke of earlier. This program would open the 

eyes of local law enforcement to understanding this issue and create a knowledge 

base around terrorism and international crime that is presently lacking. Remember 

that most police agencies have trouble talking to their next-door neighbors, let alone 

17 

communicating across international borders. This is an extremely worthwhile component of LEAP. 

Third, the proposal to establish and fund a ‘‘Vertical Intelligence Terrorism Analysis Link (VITAL)’’ is directly on point to confront the current restrictions on local 

law enforcement access to relevant foreign intelligence data. This proposal strikes an 

appropriate middle ground between the integration of local law enforcement in foreign counterintelligence missions—which, except in extreme cases, I do not advocate— 

and allowing appropriate access to information that links to threats directed at the 

communities we police. Like the FLOAT program, this proposal is based upon a mature recognition that for 99% of the populous, their homeland is not inside the beltway, but is instead the city, town or unincorporated county where they reside; and 

their homeland defenders are the local police officers and sheriff’s deputies who live 

and work in those same cities and towns. 

Fourth, the proposal to reform and streamline the process of obtaining security 

clearances will find few—if any—detractors among law enforcement executives. Both 

the goal of the initiative and recognition of the priority of this need are long overdue. 

There are many other laudable proposals described in the LEAP strategy document, including the need to strengthen border intelligence capacity through the creation of a specific focus on US border intelligence fusion, and I do not want my failure to mention them to suggest a lack of support. 

In my time remaining, though, I want to return to the issue of creating greater 

opportunities for public-private information sharing. 

As I stated earlier, the need to understand the challenges that inhere in our commitment to create systems of intelligence fusion is a prerequisite to any meaningful 

discussion of public-private information sharing. I have spent some time describing 

both the limitations and promising alternatives to the current picture of intelligence 

fusion confronting local law enforcement, for the reason that meaningful partnerships are founded upon meaningful systems that provide timely and relevant information. In other words, we must build a strong house if we intend to invite our private sector partners to share floor space. With that, I turn how to the issue of creating greater opportunities for public-private information sharing. 

When I consider the current status of intelligence sharing between local law enforcement and the private sector, I must first observe that the quality and frequency 

of the exchange of information remains more a matter of personal relationships and 

individual initiatives than a well-organized, reliable system of intelligence fusion 

that includes private sector representatives as full partners. As happens frequently 

in this profession, whom we know and have worked with in the past defines the 

boundaries of engagement, particularly as concerns sensitive or classified information. And while public-private partnerships remain a priority in the design and implementation of intelligence fusion, there remain few examples of the kind of fullyintegrated, systematic collaboration with the private sector that state and local public safety leaders acknowledge as a vital component of comprehensive intelligence 

management. The need for this cooperation is evidenced in the Pulitzer Prize winning book, Looming Tower. 

This is not to suggest that the model of personal, relationship-based engagement 

and collaboration cannot meet our objectives for intelligence sharing in the short 

term. At the local level, relationships between police and community have been a 

force multiplier, and have been shown in many cases to prevent or reduce crime. 

In a real sense, it is precisely these relationships which make a system of publicprivate collaboration even possible. 

In Seattle, for example, we have a convergence of both circumstances and initiatives that create an ideal environment for information sharing. Our business, minority and neighborhood communities have a long and proud tradition of civic participation and contribution. Almost twenty years ago, the Seattle Police Department established a structure of precinct level advisory councils, which were so successful 

that they were expanded to include specific councils representing communities of 

color, sexual minorities, private security companies and human service providers. 

Some examples of how this information environment has been of value in the context of homeland security are, as follows: 

• Immediately after 9/11, our outreach to the local Muslim community addressed practical fears and concerns, and at the same time showed the world 

that humanity has many diverse faces and beliefs. 

• The City elected to participate in TOPOFF 2, the first national terrorism exercise after 9/11, which created new partnerships and brought many diverse 

people and interests together in a real time exercise to test our preparedness. 

• We were able to create a Seattle Police Foundation, comprised of many of the 

city’s most important and civic-minded business and community leaders. 

18 

• Under the leadership and commendable commitment of US Attorney John 

McKay, the Puget Sound region was the first to operationalize the ‘‘LinX’’ (Law 

Enforcement Information Exchange) data coordination system. 

• And we are in the process of designing and implementing a regional fusion 

center which seeks to integrate, to the greatest extent possible, private sector 

participation. 

The City of Seattle and the Puget Sound region—like many communities across 

the nation—has the capacity to transform our time-tested, profound personal relationships within the private sector into a system and structure of regular information sharing. So in thinking about the potential for public-private intelligence sharing, I believe it is not so much a matter of will as a matter of structure and design, 

and of overcoming impediments that frustrate our shared commitment to collaborate. The real key to this transformation, however, consists of law enforcement consciously and purposefully broadening its engagement with the private sector, much 

in the same way we have asked DHS to expand the scope of their engagement and 

partnership with local law enforcement. 

One area where our interests converge and create substantial opportunities for expanded collaboration is in the analysis of critical infrastructure. No one knows the 

strengths and vulnerabilities of the critical facilities we seek to protect better than 

their owners and staff. Another is in the area of integrated communications, to include the possibility of interoperability. 

What I suggest we seek is the kind of enduring, dependable relationship we in 

Seattle have with leaders like Al Clise and Richard Stevenson of Clise Properties. 

You will hear testimony today from Richard about how our longstanding professional friendship has been the basis for sharing information about critical infrastructure strengths and vulnerabilities, and has enhanced the capabilities of both 

the Seattle Police Department and Clise Properties to prevent, detect and respond 

to threats to those private sector holdings. For obvious reasons, neither Richard nor 

the Seattle Police Department will disclose any details about this instance of collaboration. The point is that these types of candid, inclusive partnerships are eminently possible. They are founded upon trust, confidence, and mutual respect. They 

can, and should be, the rule, rather than the exception. 

While much work remains, not the least of which involves further development 

of the infrastructure of intelligence fusion at the local, state and tribal level, it is 

clear that the potential for public and private sector collaboration and information 

sharing is significant. We’ve seen it in Seattle. It is possible in every community 

in this nation. And it is on this note of optimism that I will close and take any questions you may have. 

Ms. HARMAN. Mr. McKay. 

STATEMENT OF JOHN McKAY, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY 

Mr. MCKAY. Chair, thank you very much. I appreciate the opportunity to be here as a former United States attorney and a lowly 

law professor at Seattle University Law School. I thank you very 

much. 

I apologize for being late. I don’t know if Madam Chair is aware 

that we lost a real leader last night, Norm Maleng, and Norm was 

a close friend of mine and I know of many others here, and we will 

miss him tremendously, a national leader in deterrent sentencing 

and programs constructed toward violence against women, many 

other tremendous services over his 30 years as the elected prosecutor here, and I will miss him terribly. 

I wanted to talk for a moment about the role of the federal government in building regional law enforcement sharing systems, and 

I think we need to distinguish for a moment between fusion centers, which are important because they bring persons together, and 

bringing the data together, the records together that contain information of crimes. 

I think that most law enforcement recognize that while intelligence is incredibly valuable in the war on terror, it may be more 

important to know what each other knows about crime in our reVerDate Nov 24 2008 07:58 Jul 07, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00022 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\DOCS\110-HRGS\110-42\48917.TXT HSEC PsN: DIANE
19 

gion, and amazingly we today, in most places in the United States, 

do not routinely share law enforcement records with each other. 

In a world in which we can go online and Google information 

from all over the world, law enforcement is not capable today, in 

most places, of finding out what federal agencies, state agencies, 

and local agencies know about individuals who have been arrested 

or convicted of crimes; in particular, relating to investigative 

records which contain full text information about crimes that have 

occurred and which could be the basis for criminal conspiracies or 

even terrorist conspiracies. 

Madam Chair, we do not do a good job of creating those regional 

systems. 

The individuals on this panel are among some of the very best 

leaders in law enforcement in the United States, I believe, in creating the governance behind the first Linx system which was operational here in the state of Washington and to include the gentleman to your right, Congressman Reichert, our sheriff here in 

King County who along with the individuals on this panel with me, 

including General Lowenberg, have been tremendously helpful in 

creating the governance necessary to establish a system in which 

federal, state, and local records reside. 

It sounds easy. The public thinks we have it. We do not have this 

capability, other than a very few places around the United States. 

I’ve set some of those out in my prepared remarks and won’t repeat them here. 

I do believe that the federal government has an incredibly important role, and it begins with acknowledging what the Chair has 

said and what Congressman Reichert has said, and that is that 

local knowledge about crime and local data concerning past crimes 

and current investigations are in many ways more important than 

information that the federal government brings to the table. 

Yet, it is not possible among the more than 200 law enforcement 

agencies in the state of Washington, for example, to ask each of 

them to create a piece of a system that will result in that Google 

capability that we really do seek. 

That means the federal government has to assist in funding. It 

has to assist in providing the forum for the government structure 

that will bring those many different police organizations together, 

all with different civilian supervision at the local, state, and federal 

level. 

That’s what the Linx system is, and I’m not here to sell Linx. 

Linx is owned by the government. It’s owned by the Department 

of Defense. 

Some have really maliciously said that Linx is somehow a proprietary system. It isn’t. 

The key elements of Linx are the ability to search databases that 

are under the control and supervised by civilian authorities over 

law enforcement, and I’m very proud of what has been created 

here. 

I’m also terribly disappointed in the Department of Justice in not 

pursuing the pilot programs that Linx has so successfully launched 

in a number of places around the country, and I would ask really 

this subcommittee to consider this question. 

20 

I don’t believe that anyone in the federal government is responsible for building these systems. We propose an interdepartmental 

partnership with the United States attorneys between Homeland 

Security, the Department of Defense, and the Department of Justice. 

We believe we had an arrangement to do that. It has not occurred, and I believe that is why when you peel aside the rhetoric 

and all the nice words, very little law enforcement information 

sharing is occurring among state, federal, and local partners. 

Partnership is the key. We built trust here. We know it can be 

done, and I’m certainly looking forward to taking any questions 

that you may have. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you very much. 

[The statement of Mr. McKay follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF JOHN MCKAY

Good afternoon Madam Chair and members of the Homeland Security Subcommittee on Intelligence, Information Sharing and Terrorism Risk Assessment. I 

am John McKay, the former United States Attorney for the Western District of 

Washington. I am currently Visiting Professor of Law, Seattle University School of 

Law. I am pleased to appear before you to present information regarding ‘‘Building 

a Partnership Strategy: Improving Information Sharing with Local and State Law 

Enforcement and the Private Sector’’. 

It has been my distinct pleasure to serve the citizens of the State of Washington 

and the Department of Justice as the United States Attorney for the Western District of Washington from 2001 to 2007, when I resigned along with a number of my 

colleagues from around the country. I was honored to serve with professional men 

and women in the United States Attorney’s Office in Seattle and Tacoma, and with 

the many extraordinary professional law enforcement personnel from the various 

local, county, state, tribal and federal law enforcement agencies throughout the 

State of Washington and around the United States. 

One of my most rewarding experiences while serving as the U.S. Attorney was 

to help lead the development of an extremely effective law enforcement information 

sharing effort known as the Law Enforcement Information Exchange (LInX). I first 

became involved in the development of a program to enhance information sharing 

among law enforcement agencies following the tragic events of September 11, 2001. 

It soon became apparent after that fateful day that an extraordinary effort would 

be required to improve information sharing among law enforcement agencies at all 

governmental levels if we were to be successful in mitigating another devastating 

terrorist attack on our homeland. As the U.S. Attorney in Seattle, I sought to facilitate the development of an effective information sharing strategy among scores of 

law enforcement agencies to both mitigate another terrorist attack, and effectively 

combat rising organized crime in my district. 

In early 2002, I was invited to attend a pilot program sponsored by the FBI in 

St. Louis, Missouri. This program, knows as the Gateway initiative, was an effort 

by the FBI to demonstrate that local, county, state and federal law enforcement 

agencies could effectively break down the cultural barriers and obstacles to information sharing, and develop a cost effective technology among their disparate information management systems. During the demonstration of this program, I met with 

Executive Assistant Director Dale Watson of the FBI, Director David Brant of the 

U.S. Naval Criminal Investigative Service, and a variety of other U.S. Attorneys to 

discuss a strategy to expand the Gateway initiative outside of the St. Louis area. 

The Puget Sound area of Washington State serves as a vital homeport to the strategic resources of the United States Navy. We have nuclear powered aircraft carriers, ballistic missile submarines and a large civilian and military workforce which 

are strategic assets in the defense of our country in the Pacific, and which have 

played a vital role in our military response in both Afghanistan and Iraq. The U.S. 

Naval Criminal Investigative Service is responsible to provide felony criminal investigative, counterintelligence and counterterrorism support to the Department of the 

Navy, and to the strategic assets in the Western District of Washington. Following 

my positive impression of the FBI Gateway Program, I approached Director Mueller 

and Director Brant to consider a law enforcement information sharing pilot program 

in my district to enhance our law enforcement and counterterrorism strategies. 

21 

The Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) eagerly accepted my request, 

and then Director Brant devoted resources to develop what has come to be known 

as the LInX program. This is more than a technology project; it is in fact a law enforcement and counterterrorism operational capability. The LInX effort in Seattle 

began with the effective organization of senior law enforcement executives, to include Chiefs of Police, Sheriffs and Special Agents-in–Charge from thirteen critical 

agencies. NCIS provided the funding to develop the technology to permit the electronic sharing of law enforcement records, to include criminal incident data, traffic 

summons, computer assisted display (CAD) data, criminal arrest histories and other 

law enforcement records that are legally retained and shareable by and among these 

law enforcement agencies. NCIS also provided resources to assist me in formally organizing the leadership of these law enforcement agencies who actually owned and 

were responsible for the collection of this data. We formed a LInX Board of Governance, which was comprised of this executive level leadership of local, county, state 

and federal agencies. My office provided direct legal oversight of this program to ensure that all federal guidelines, to include the Federal Privacy Act was complied 

with in the development of this program. 

The NCIS simultaneously initiated LInX Programs in other geographical areas vitally important to the Department of the Navy, and sought to enhance their criminal investigative and force protection support to the Navy through the enhancement 

of information sharing with regional law enforcement agencies. NCIS developed 

LInX projects in the Hampton Roads area of Virginia, the Gulf Coast of Texas, Hawaii, Northeast Florida and Southeast Georgia, the National Capital Region of 

Washington, DC and in New Mexico. In each of these regions, the local United 

States Attorney was personally involved in the oversight and participation of the 

LInX project. From 2003–2006 we expanded the Northwest LInX project to include 

more than one hundred fifty (150) agencies throughout the State of Washington, and 

most recently to include the Portland, Oregon Police Bureau, which includes seventeen local and county agencies. I believe in total, the LInX Program, now deployed 

to seven regions throughout the United States, has developed an effective law enforcement information sharing effort with more than 350 agencies. 

Throughout my involvement with the LInX Program, I had the opportunity to 

meet frequently with leaders in Washington, DC, to include the Secretary of the 

Navy, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, the Deputy Attorney General of the United 

States and the Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security. In partnership with the Director of NCIS, I offered that LInX has fostered an extremely harmonious environment among law enforcement leaders in the Northwest, bringing them together to 

plot a strategy for effective information sharing. We successfully overcame those artificial barriers between agencies, which had become a part of the law enforcement 

culture prior to the events of September 11, 2001. More importantly, with the direction of these law enforcement leaders and their operational personnel, NCIS developed a technical solution for the sharing of electronic data that directly led to law 

enforcement successes in my District. I received reports from virtually all agencies 

involved in this effort that their personnel had solved criminal investigations that 

previously would not have been solved, or would have required extensive resources 

to pursue. 

The LInX Program allowed each participating agency’s law enforcement personnel 

to search and retrieve law enforcement records of other jurisdictions within the 

State of Washington. In addition, the Department of Justice joined the LInX Program in Washington, by developing a linkage to the DOJ Regional Data Exchange 

(R–DEX) program, which is an effort to share information between FBI, DEA, AFT, 

USMS and BOP. For the first time in the profession of law enforcement, detectives 

from Seattle to Spokane were able to share criminal files with each other, and they 

were able to query the DOJ criminal investigative components, and determine if any 

of those agencies had a file of interest to the local agencies. 

Unique to the LInX system is the ability to conduct a comprehensive search of 

law enforcement records, retrieve both structure data and full text investigative narratives, to literally connect the dots to a crime. Most important to me from a strategic standpoint, was the ability of LInX to offer insight into crime committed at 

the local level, which could be a precursor to a future terrorist attack, or a terrorist 

support network. These are the dots that could not be connected prior to 9/11. We 

have developed a system, and a regional organizational structure of law enforcement 

leaders, which, if implemented on a national scale, could likely prevent the next terrorist attack on our country. Law enforcement information sharing should have the 

following characteristics: 

• The system should include all the legally shareable data maintained in the 

record systems of each participating agency. Access controls must be included 

to protect sensitive information from widespread or premature dissemination. 

22 

• The system must permit partners full access to the relevant documents. 

• The system must provide a technical analytical capability to ‘‘connect the 

dots’’, by linking all variables associated with a subject and instantly providing 

a composite picture for the investigator. 

• The system must meet the security standards of the federal law enforcement 

agencies. 

I am convinced that the elements of the LInX program, and all of the standards 

that it embodies should be developed by the federal government on a national scale, 

building on the experience here and in the other NICIS funded pilots. 

Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon England proposed to Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty and Deputy Secretary of DHS Michael Jackson, that we develop 

an inter-departmental effort between DoD, DOJ and DHS to implement a LInX effort on a national scale. Secretary England believed that it was more appropriate 

for either DOJ or DHS to lead such an effort, but certainly offered the full support 

of his Department, and of his law enforcement component in NCIS. As then Chairman of the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee on Information Sharing, I respectfully urged the Deputy Attorney General in a letter, co-signed by eighteen of 

my U.S. Attorney colleagues, to further expand LInX throughout the United States, 

under the auspices of each of the U.S. Attorneys who signed this letter. While the 

DOJ supported the efforts of the U.S. Attorney led LInX programs, it declined to 

take a leadership role in the further development of this vital capability. 

Instead the Justice Department has taken three distinct positions that seriously 

compromise law enforcement information sharing in the United States. First, DOJ 

has retreated from its earlier standard that all legally sharable data be included in 

LInX or similar programs, and has substituted a far lesser standard that gives great 

discretion to agencies in what will be shared. Second, DOJ has refused to mandate 

technical and security approaches for information sharing—leaving that to local discretion and thus ensuring that only non-sensitive data will be shared with local law 

enforcement. And third, DOJ has chosen not to assume responsibility for leading, 

directing, supporting, or funding any regional information sharing system, preferring to let local interests and the market place determine the ultimate configuration 

of a national system. In a December, 2006 Memorandum by Deputy Attorney General McNulty, the Department of Justice withdrew from the LInX pilots and halted 

meaningful record sharing with state and local law enforcement. This is a tragic and 

harmful step backwards in local, state and federal law enforcement and cooperative 

counter terrorism efforts and puts our country at greater risk of terrorism attacks. 

In spite of the failure of leadership at the senior level of DOJ, efforts have been 

made by DoD and NCIS to transition the LInX Program, which has been funded 

by DoD through FY’11, to the Department of Homeland Security. Former U.S. Attorney Debra Wong Yang of Los Angeles, working with Chief Bratton, Los Angeles 

Police Department, Sheriff Baca, Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department, and Sheriff 

Carona, Orange County Sheriff’s Department, is attempting to implement a LInX 

project in the Central District of California. USA Yang submitted a formal proposal 

for the development of this program to DOJ, and requested DOJ invest funding, and 

partner with DoD/NCIS to develop LInX, however, her request was denied by the 

DAG. The leadership of the Los Angeles law enforcement agencies subsequently petitioned DHS for funding. 

I am convinced that the standards of senior executive law enforcement leadership, 

a cost efficient technology, and a fervent commitment to share all legally shareable 

law enforcement records is the recipe for successful information sharing among our 

18,000 law enforcement agencies in our country. This is an effort which must be led 

from the most senior ranks of government, and one which must meet the operational needs of our sworn law enforcement officers and analysts who are on the 

front line every day attempting to find the proverbial needle in the haystack that 

might lead them to a terrorist support network, or to quickly capture a serial 

pedophile, random rapist or violent criminal. Neither crime, criminals nor terrorists 

know any borders. In fact, they now know how to exploit our geographical borders 

and bureaucratic jurisdictions to their own advantage. We need a new weapon in 

our fight to preserve our freedoms, and I believe we may have found such a weapon 

in the deployment of the LInX program. 

Thank you for this opportunity to address you and this important subcommittee. 

I look forward to answering any questions you may have for me. 

Ms. HARMAN. Chief Batiste. 

23 

STATEMENT OF JOHN R. BATISTE, CHIEF, WASHINGTON 

STATE PATROL 

Chief Batiste. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members of 

this distinguished committee. 

Thank you for allowing me to be here to have this opportunity 

to showcase the Washington Joint Analytical Center. 

In 2002 local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies in 

Washington joined together to develop a new system of intelligence 

sharing. 

The key components of this system are the WAJAC, a centralized 

fusion center serving as a single point of intelligence collection, and 

the regional intelligence groups located throughout the state providing a link to a line of level personnel—to line level personnel 

and homeland security partners; the goal, of course, investigating 

crimes and preventing acts of terrorism. 

The true success of the fusion center can be measured by the 

long-term partnership developed since the inception of the statewide integrated intelligence plan. 

Situated in the same—on the same floor and in the same work 

area as the FBI’s intelligence work group, the WAJAC employees 

share information real-time without the hindrance of communications barriers that have existed for decades and have only recently 

been breached. 

For this, we can thank the tremendous efforts of the Seattle field 

office, the FBI, the United States attorney’s office under the leadership of John McKay, and many other federal and local law enforcement leaders. 

Within our fusion center, the King County sheriff’s office, Bellevue police department, and the Washington state patrol detectives 

work hand in hand with numerous federal agencies in collection, 

analysis, and dissemination of intelligence information. 

A prime example of the trust developed between our agencies is 

demonstrated in the authority established within the WAJAC by 

the supervision of WSP sergeant—Washington State Patrol sergeant who has the ability to assign tasks to the field intelligence 

personnel owned by the FBI, and the field intelligence group supervisor having the same authority to task members of the WAJAC. 

In 2006 the WAJAC reviewed and disseminated over 2,000 intelligence information reports, developed 323 leads to support criminal or terrorist case investigation and provide assistance to homeland security partners on 500 separate occasions. 

These numbers alone don’t tell the story with regards to the exceptional work being done in this partnership. 

Every day investigators and analysts from many different jurisdictions throughout this state are communicating with each other 

at a frequency never realized before and are sharing critical information by way of the WAJAC. 

One of the primary information collection programs that has substantially served our intelligence—served our information sharing 

efforts is the Navy’s law enforcement information exchange or the 

Linx system. 

The WAJAC and the marine analysts use this tool on a regular 

basis to assist them in locating persons of interest, establishing 

identities, and connecting the dots on criminal investigation. 

24 

This tool has been invaluable throughout the state and has been 

an instrumental tool in solving a number of criminal cases. 

It’s imperative with regards to information sharing environment 

that support for Linx that we hope will continue well into the future. 

Because Linx contains information only on closed criminal investigation, there still exists a need for a true intelligence database. 

At present, this state does not have the necessary resources to 

store and electronically share critical intelligence with all agencies. 

Many agencies continue to rely on e-mails, fax, and telephone 

conversations. 

The western state information network or WSIN is one of six federally funded regional information sharing system centers. 

WSIN is a force multiplied as it provides the network intelligence 

databases and also safety information services that law enforcement requires. 

WSIN serves the five western states, including the state of 

Washington. I, in fact, sit on the policy board. 

At our state’s request, WSIN expanded its mission several years 

ago to include gangs and more recently all crimes including terrorism. 

Washington has taken the lead in providing access to major 

crime units, such as homicides, burglary, and intelligence units and 

police agencies, but more needs to be done. 

This is a proven concept and it should be fully funded rather 

than using federal dollars to develop additional similar intelligence 

systems. 

Even though we’ve had great successes in establishing partnerships and sharing information, Madam Chair and members of this 

committee, we still face significant hurdles. 

We need the ability to sustain these valuable programs. 

Dedicated and adequate funding for WAJAC, RIGs, and WSIN is 

the greatest of concerns to myself and our stakeholders. 

The three local law enforcement agencies and the National 

Guard who have assigned investigators to the WAJAC have done 

so on their own operational—by using their budget resources. 

Additionally, all 19 contracted analysts both in the WAJAC and 

the RIGs are funded through the law enforcement terrorism prevention program. 

In conclusion, we simply need your help. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, Chief. We are all here to help. 

[The statement of Chief Batiste follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF CHIEF JOHN R. BASISTE

Good afternoon Mr. Chairman and distinguished members of the committee. 

Thank you for allowing me this opportunity to showcase the Washington Joint Analytical Center (WAJAC) and our state’s efforts in sharing critical criminal intelligence information. 

In 2002, local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies in Washington joined 

together to develop a new system of intelligence sharing. The key components of this 

system are the WAJAC, a centralized fusion center serving as a single point of intelligence collection, and regional intelligence groups located throughout the state providing a link to line level personnel and homeland security partners. The goal: investigating crime to prevent acts of terrorism. 

The true success of the fusion center can be measured by the long-term partnerships developed since the inception of the Statewide Integrated Intelligence Plan. 

Situated on the same floor and in the same work area as the FBI’s Field IntelVerDate Nov 24 2008 07:58 Jul 07, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00028 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\DOCS\110-HRGS\110-42\48917.TXT HSEC PsN: DIANE
25 

ligence Group, WAJAC employees share information real-time without the hindrance of communications barriers that have existed for decades and have only recently been breached. For this, we can thank the tremendous efforts of the Seattle 

Field Office of the FBI, the United States Attorney’s Office and many other federal 

and local law enforcement leaders. Within our fusion center, King County Sheriff, 

Bellevue Police and WSP detectives work hand-in-hand with numerous federal 

agencies in the collection, analysis and dissemination of intelligence information 

A prime example of the trust developed between our agencies is demonstrated by 

the authority of the WAJAC supervisor (a WSP Sergeant) to assign tasks to any of 

the FIG personnel and the FIG supervisor having the same tasking authority over 

WAJAC. 

In 2006, WAJAC reviewed and disseminated over 2,000 Intelligence Information 

Reports, developed 323 leads to support criminal or terrorism case investigations 

and provided assistance to homeland security partners on 500 separate occasions. 

These numbers alone don’t tell the story of the exceptional work being done through 

this partnership. Every day investigators and analysts from many different jurisdictions throughout the state are communicating with each other at a frequency never 

realized before and are sharing critical intelligence information with the WAJAC. 

One of the primary information collection programs that has substantially served 

our intelligence sharing efforts is the Navy’s Law Enforcement Information Exchange or LINX system. WAJAC and RIG analysts use this tool on a regular basis 

to assist them in locating persons of interest, in establishing identities and connecting the dots on criminal investigations. This tool has been invaluable throughout the state and has been instrumental in solving a number of criminal cases. It 

is imperative to our information sharing environment that support for LINX continues well into the future. 

Because LINX contains information only on closed criminal investigations, there 

still exists a need for a true intelligence database. At present, this state does not 

have a method to store and electronically share critical intelligence with multiple 

agencies. We continue to relay on e-mails, fax and telephone conversations. Currently, WAJAC and other stakeholders are evaluating a statewide intelligence database to supplement our current programs. In the near future, we will be requesting 

Department of Homeland Security grant funding to purchase and maintain a viable 

database for information sharing purposes. 

Even though we have had great successes in establishing partnerships and sharing information, we still face a significant hurdle in our ability to sustain this program. Dedicate funding for WAJAC and the RIGs is of the greatest concern to all 

stakeholders. The three local law enforcement agencies and National Guard who 

have assigned investigators to the WAJAC have done so out of their own operational 

budgets and have received no monetary compensation to backfill these talented specialists. Additionally, all nineteen contracted analysts both in the WAJAC and in 

the RIGs are funded through the Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention Program 

Grant; funding we expect to diminish over time. Over the last three years, a significant portion of LETPP money granted to Washington State has been dedicated to 

funding the work completed by these contractors. 

Successful programs designed to counter criminal activity and terrorism require 

a human element. Software programs, databases and computers alone do not fight 

terrorism, people do, and without the talented investigators and analysts of the 

WAJAC, it would be near impossible to prevent or disrupt any act of terrorism. We 

must have an established funding source to sustain the WAJAC into the future. 

Another significant challenge we must overcome is our difficulty in staffing regional intelligence groups in all nine emergency management regions of the state. 

Within the rural areas of Washington, many law enforcement agencies do not have 

the resources available to provide full-time or in many cases even part-time investigative support for the intelligence process. Even though we have assigned grantfunded analysts to each region, without investigative support we are only meeting 

half of our commitment to this program. The solution to the problem may not be 

a simple one and with hope we will be able to further develop our RIGs to a point 

where they have the ability to deliver a viable service their region and the state. 

When the WASPC Intelligence Subcommittee began laying the foundation for 

WAJAC and the Statewide Integrated Intelligence Plan they came to the same realization that no one of is as strong as all of us and no single entity can make this 

program work alone. We have combined our limited resources, worked collaboratively and have made a strong partnership against the terror groups who threaten 

the citizens of this state. 

Thank you. 

26 

Ms. HARMAN. I would just—let me advise our members that each 

of you will have five minutes for questions, and I’ll recognize myself first for five minute. 

In my five minutes, let me observe that if Charlie Allen, the head 

of the intelligence division of the Homeland Security Department, 

or Michael Allen the deputy director—or Michael Chertoff, the director of the Homeland Security Department were here, I think 

they would have the same reaction I have, which is this is exactly 

how a region, a local—a state and a region should organize itself. 

You have the right ideas for how the work should get done. 

The problems you’re having are with federal funding and connection between the federal government and you, and those are things 

that we need to fix, and I certainly intend to talk further to Charlie 

Allen and to Michael Jackson and to Michael Chertoff about this. 

These are things that must be fixed, and if they won’t be fixed 

voluntarily, they have to be fixed with legislation, as in the case 

of participation in the NCTC. 

Let me just ask a few questions, and if you could keep your answers brief, we can ask more questions. 

General Lowenberg, you mentioned the problem with prison 

radicalization. That is not the direct subject of this hearing, but it 

is directly relevant to terrorist activity. 

This committee held a field hearing in Torrance, California in my 

district where a prison radicalized cell has been arrested and is 

awaiting trial. 

What are the problems here and, briefly, what are you doing to 

make sure that you are aware of them and can prevent and disrupt 

them from becoming life— 

General LOWENBERG. Madam Chair, I am well aware from having worked with the intelligence director from the California state 

prison system three weeks ago in Monterey, California, that California probably has the best assessment of the prison radicalization 

threat. 

We have brought our state Department of Corrections into the 

WAJAC. Our secretary of corrections, Harold Clark, is part of the 

evidence group that met this last week, and so we’re doing everything we can, quite frankly, to catch up with California and New 

York state who are frankly on the leading edge nationally in dealing with this very disturbing phenomenon. 

Ms. HARMAN. Of course I don’t mind that comment ‘‘catching up 

with California.’’ That’s good. 

Chief Kerlikowske, you gave me an insight about the fact that 

the federal center system of information—intelligence sharing is 

based on a Cold War model. 

When we did intelligence reform in 2004, a bill I was very involved with, that was our rant against the organization of our intelligence community. 

You said it was a 1947 business model and no one can possibly 

operate in a 1947 business model, so we changed it. 

I am very aware that there are problems with clearances at the 

local level and that the FBI and DHS clearances are treated differently. 

Could you just give us a short bit of information on the record 

about the problem getting security clearances? 

27 

Chief Kerlikowske. I think one of the suggestions that was made 

by the major city chief’s intelligence subcommittee in Charlotte was 

to allow, at one level, some of the background work that is now either done by federal agents or is, in fact, contracted out to retired 

federal agents. Why not go ahead and let some of these large local 

agencies do some of the basic background and preliminary work, 

which is so labor intensive and so time consuming? 

That actually was not particularly well received by DHS. 

We think it makes sense because we’re trusted with protecting 

our communities, and we hire these officers. Why in heaven’s name 

shouldn’t we be trusted to doing the preliminary background data 

and information that could be helpful to getting—to moving that 

clearance further and faster? 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you. I think that’s an excellent suggestion. 

Finally for Mr. McKay and Chief Batiste. Mr. McKay, thank you 

for your courageous comments about the Linx system and its reception at DOJ. 

Surely you know there’s a rumor alive in Washington that your 

advocacy for that system may have cost you your job, and I know 

how well regarded you are. I would just like to say that if that is 

true, that is extremely unfortunate. 

This subcommittee has looked at systems like HSNet and LEO 

and HSIN. I won’t go into what they all are because my time is 

running out, but I would just like to know from both of you, do you 

think that Linx is a better system? 

Obviously it matters—it is of critical importance how we move 

data and trying to get to some common system. 

Do you think that Linx is the best? 

Mr. MCKAY. Well, I do. I think that the elements which I’ve set 

out in my prepared remarks are important. 

What’s critical, Madam Chair, I think, is this: The federal government cannot command the transfer of law enforcement records 

to it. 

I’m not sure, and I would issue a challenge to members of Congress, it’s like telling a judge they can’t do something, but truly 

trust and cooperation is required because principals of federalism 

would say that those 18,000 law enforcement agencies around the 

country cannot be ordered to transfer their records to the federal 

government. 

What has to happen, I think what we’ve demonstrated in Linx, 

is that where we own it together—federal, state, and local—and are 

responsible for its administration and its security and to make sure 

that it’s not misused and people’s rights are protected, that is a cooperative governance structure that is not offered in any other system, and if there’s one aspect of a system that is critically important, it is the full text records being shared, in essence, voluntarily 

by each participating agency because they know that if they had 

access to each other’s data, they could make us safer. 

That is the difference. 

The structures exist in other places, but you will see upon analysis that they are not sharing all of their records the way we are 

here. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you. My time is expired, but I want to give 

Chief Batiste the time to answer that question. 

28 

Chief Batiste. Madam Chair, I think I can say with confidence 

in support of all my colleagues across the state and region, we truly 

support what John is remarking with regards to the Linx system 

being a system that serves us well. 

It does allow for independence with regards to pushing our information forward, as an agency, for viewing capabilities, yet I maintain control of that information. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, Chief. Thank you all. 

I now recognize our ranking member Sheriff Reichert for five 

minutes of questions. 

Mr. REICHERT. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

You’ve all mentioned relationships, and that was key when we 

started to talk about Linx, and I remember when John showed up 

on the scene and gathered everybody together. I think everybody 

in this panel would agree that it was a breath of fresh air, John 

was, and his energy behind Linx, and the sharing of information 

was welcomed. 

I think it brought us all together, so first of all, I would like to 

say, ‘‘Thank you’’ to John and agree with Madam Chair’s comments 

on your courage that you show, and I appreciate all the efforts that 

each and every one of you put forth to make this community a 

safer place. 

Sometimes I do miss wearing the uniform. I just thought I would 

share that with everybody. 

Technology is the other thing that we touched on, and the Chair 

asked about the Linx and whether or not it’s a great system. 

John and I had many conversations about when the sheriff officers were going to get involved in this project, and we didn’t jump 

until second year, and that trust had to be there. 

The third thing, money. 

So we have relationship, technology, money. All of these things 

have to come together to build a program, to build a community, 

to build this effort around Linx, and so now we’ve had the relationships are built, we’ve had some technology, the RAIN system here 

in Seattle, Linx and other systems that have come together from 

some of the other agencies, and granted the money has been lacking, but hopefully we’ll be able to work together on acquiring more 

funds for this effort. 

What is the status of Linx right now here in our region? 

Mr. MCKAY. Linx in this region continues to operate very 

robustly. My understanding is that of the 150 of the something 

over 200 police agencies—I believe that’s about right—about 200 

agencies now have signed the agreements. 

I believe that about 70 agencies have data flowing, and that’s 

simply a function of having the funds to move that forward. 

Of those 70, that consists of the largest agencies, including King 

County sheriff’s office, Seattle police department, Washington state 

patrol, and others, so actually, in terms of data, huge amounts of 

data are flowing in the Linx system today. 

Nationally, Linx is, I believe, up and running in five areas with 

seven on the boards, up to nine to include the Washington capital 

region and Los Angeles, and that is principally—all of that is principally being funded by the Naval criminal investigative service 

who should get, in my mind, a huge amount of credit here. 

29 

The technology is simple. It’s not the technology. 

The money is important, but it’s not the money. 

What is important is the agreement by agencies to actually put 

their data out there and share it with each other. 

Frankly, it’s the federal government—it’s the law enforcement 

agencies and the federal government that need a good stick taken 

to them to get that done, not a carrot, a stick, and they need to 

put their data in there and share it, just as the Washington state 

patrol, the King County sheriff’s office, Seattle police department 

are sharing all of their investigative records with the FBI and 

other federal agencies. 

Mr. REICHERT. Another question for you, John. In this reluctance 

to share information, you say overclassification plays a part in 

that. 

Is there a role that that plays? 

Mr. MCKAY. I think not so much overclassification. For one 

thing, the Linx system is not—it’s certified to the secret level, but 

classified data does not reside there, and mostly that would be contributed by the FBI, but, quite understood, classified data. 

I think the question is whether sensitive—what agencies deem to 

be sensitive information is being screened out mostly by federal 

partners not the state and local agencies. 

Chief, among these, being DEA, and, frankly, the security system 

that we built into Linx could take care of all of that, and I think 

it’s a question of individual agencies relying on old days of silos 

and turf and saying, ‘‘Our stuff is too important to share with local 

police officers.’’ 

That is the wrong—that’s the pre-9/11 attitude, and I can’t believe that we allow it to continue to exist, and unfortunately the 

deputy attorney general of the United States issued a memorandum in December of 2006 going right back to that standard and 

letting federal agencies screen their data out of the Linx systems. 

Mr. REICHERT. Thank you. 

One quick question, Chief Kerlikowske. You mentioned being focused on the community, private sector. 

Have you seen a difficulty reaching out to the private sector, including them in this—reluctance on their part to become involved? 

Chief Kerlikowske. You know, I haven’t seen any reluctance on 

their part because I think, as you did in King County, you have relationships established with the private sector, particularly those 

that contain the key infrastructure that we all know that if something happens, things are not going to work well, commerce and 

banking and on and on, and that’s based upon the trust, but we 

also, of course, follow the Los Angeles art angel model and the Acam model of looking at these infrastructures and working with 

them, but they have to be assured that liability, and you had mentioned that earlier, is not going to attach, and they have to be assured that we are going to be as protective of that critical information on how that facility can be better protected to make sure that 

it is, in a proprietary way, not released. 

Ms. HARMAN. The Chair now recognizes the cardinal from Washington, Mr. Dicks, for five minutes. 

Mr. DICKS. Thank you Jane for bringing the hearing here. 

30 

Our same group went down to Los Angeles and saw a fusion center down there, so we’re trying to get a picture of what’s going on 

around the country, and I want to commend all of you in working 

together as effectively as you do in trying to overcome some of the 

impediments from the federal side. 

Now, on this question—I think we could change this two-year 

limit. I mean, that’s a policy matter on these analysts—funding the 

analysts. 

I mean, if Congress stepped in and legislated and said, ‘‘The 

funding that we provide is available for analysts for fusion centers 

beyond two years,’’ I mean, I don’t see any problem doing that, and 

that’s what you would like us to do. 

Is that not right? 

General LOWENBERG. The key, Congressman Dicks, is whether 

the grant money can be used to fund a state FTE as opposed to 

a contractor. 

We recognize that Congress authorizes and appropriates for 

grant program cycles for two or three years, with each fiscal year 

appropriation cycle, but being told what we can expend the money 

for is a limitation. 

As we dealt with Secretary Ridge and now Secretary Chertoff, 

the mantra has always been, ‘‘We would if we could, but we can’t,’’ 

and our question has been, ‘‘Why can’t you,’’ and it’s always been, 

‘‘Because OMB and the White House will not allow us to expend 

the money, as a matter of policy, for anything other than contract 

analysts or contact planners,’’ and so we’re left with these temporary hires, and frankly these information sharing centers and fusion centers then end up being a training ground, if you will, for 

analysts who just leave at the first opportunity to work for a federal agency where there’s some relative job security, sense of stability and future employment. 

Mr. DICKS. John, I want to commend you on this Linx system. 

I remember we talked about this when we were having a little 

difficulty early on, and I think—how did the Navy wind up—the 

Naval criminal investigative—how did they wind up being kind of 

the lead on this? 

Mr. MCKAY. That’s a good question. It was envisioned by the 

FBI, and I was asked by Dale Watson, who then was the executive 

assistant director of the FBI, to lead the effort regionally among 

Washington, Oregon, and Idaho, and then the FBI disappeared 

after their project gateway in St. Louis crashed for different reasons, which we avoided out here in Washington state. 

I went to Dave Brant, who was the NCIS director, and he agreed 

to run it as a pilot project in Puget Sound mainly because of the 

naval bases in our district, so that’s how it came to be NCIS, but 

we felt all along that it should move away from the Department 

of Defense and be taken over by Homeland Security and Justice. 

Mr. DICKS. I was impressed to see that Gordon England, who is 

a very outstanding—and who was the deputy at Homeland Security 

was all for this and was urging the Department of Justice and the 

Department of Homeland Security to go forward on this, and yet 

we’ve had all this resistance from the Department of Justice. 

31 

I just want to commend you for what you did here, and I’m glad 

that Linx is still operational here in the state of Washington and 

that you all are working together on this. 

I think that’s outstanding. 

I think our committee ought to try to work on this to try to convince—at least maybe we can go through Homeland Security, that 

this ought to be a national model, which it was on the road to 

being until McNolty (phonetic) said, ‘‘We can’t go any further’’ in 

December; is that right? 

Mr. MCKAY. That’s correct, and there was an important meeting 

between Michael Jackson, Gordon England, and Paul McNolty in 

which the outlines of an interdepartmental partnership, which is, 

I think, how this should be run, and again, as I said in my opening 

remarks here, you cannot find any organization in the government 

responsible for building the trust systems that we have here, and 

so if I’m sitting in your chair, I’m thinking, ‘‘Well, how is it done?’’ 

I don’t think it can be assigned alone to Homeland Security because the justice agencies have most of the federal law enforcement 

data through the FBI and its five agencies. 

I don’t think the Department of Defense should own this system 

for reasons that deal with civil liberties and the trust of the American people, not that we don’t trust DOD, it’s just that the data 

there is being kept on American citizens and should be overseen by 

civilians in the course, and I think all of us understood that when 

we built the system here, so the pathway to an interdepartmental 

partnership was there. It has not gone forward, and that’s above 

my pay grade as to why that’s happened. 

Mr. DICKS. Now, I want to make sure I understand this. 

Are we getting the information on people who have been convicted of federal crimes in our area? 

Mr. MCKAY. Some. 

Mr. DICKS. In this system. 

Mr. MCKAY. Some but not all. 

Mr. DICKS. They screen out some of these—you have all the local 

records, right. 

Mr. MCKAY. You bet, Congressman Dicks. 

What’s happened is the local agencies are contributing all of 

their data into Linx essentially, not internal matters but—administrative matters, but they’re investigative records, and the partnership deal that the federal government offered, and I know because 

I was offering it, was, and we will give you the FBI’s 302s, investigative records, the DEA 6s and the federal records, which will 

help you solve crime in your regions and all of us to attack potential terrorism, and that promise has now been stopped by the federal government, and it is unfathomable to me why that has occurred, other than that no one is in charge. 

Mr. DICKS. All right. Well, we’ll go to work on it. Thank you very 

much. I appreciate all of your testimony. 

Mr. REICHERT. Chair, allow me just one comment. 

I just wanted to note that last Congress we presented a bill 

that—the language allowed for the full payment of analysts, and 

that bill is still in the hopper, so it’s not a new problem, but we’ve 

also—I want to acknowledge your observation that as we’ve talked 

with members of Homeland Security and the secretary himself, 

32 

there’s been a huge reluctance, as you all know, in financing local 

FTEs. 

I think that’s solely being overcome. There’s a lot of work yet to 

do on that, and I think if we can go to rule change—some sort of 

a policy change route, as the General has suggested, and Norm, 

that would be the route to go, but we still have legislation out 

there too that would push— 

General LOWENBERG. Congressman Reichert, if I could just respond, we very much appreciate the leadership shown in the 109th 

Congress, but the state’s homeland security advisor has presented 

this issue and others to Secretary Chertoff, Secretary Jackson, and 

we have talked to Charlie Allen. All of that took place on April 

17th in Washington DC. We still have not seen any policy shift 

from the agency. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you. This was an excellent panel, and this 

subcommittee will follow up. These are live issues. 

They are very troubling. 

Our perspective, as I said in my opening remarks, is to start at 

the local level, find out what you need and what participation 

would be useful, and then view the federal government as your customer, not the other way around. 

Future terrorist acts in America will, to some extent anyway, 

happen in our neighborhoods, and you’re the folks who understand 

those neighborhoods, so I want to thank you for four pieces of excellent testimony. 

This was a superb panel. We all learned a lot. You’re excused. 

Ms. HARMAN. Welcome to all of you. I will introduce you all at 

once, and we will start our testimony, our five-minute summaries, 

with Mr. Hovel, and all of you will turn the little clock around so 

that everybody observes the time limits. 

Our first witness, Richard Hovel, is the senior aviation and 

homeland security advisor to the Boeing Company, a small concern 

that I’m also very familiar with. You have large facilities in my district in Los Angeles. Thank you for what you do. 

Prior to his tenure with Boeing, Mr. Hovel served as the federal 

security manager for the FAA, aviation security operations division 

at Seatac. 

Mr. Hovel began his law enforcement career with the Albuquerque police department, after which he worked for the Idaho 

state police as a state trooper and supervisor and criminal investigator. 

Our second witness, Matt Morrison, is the executive director of 

the Pacific northwest economic region, PNWER, a public private 

partnership established in 1991 by statute in the states of Alaska, 

Washington, Idaho, Montana, and Oregon, and the western Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, and the Yukon territory. 

For those who don’t live here, this is an extremely impressive 

idea. 

As the director of PNWER, he communicates with the state and 

provincial legislatures and coordinates with the working groups of 

PNWER in the area of homeland security. 

33 

Our third witness, Steve Stein is the northwest regional coordinator for the homeland security market sector for the Pacific 

Northwest national laboratory. 

Mr. Stein recently completed a large project supporting the Department of Homeland Security that was focused on the assessment of the Seattle urban area’s preparedness to prevent and respond to major disasters and the insertion of new technologies that 

would improve the region’s level of preparedness. 

Finally, our fourth witness, Richard Stevenson, is the president 

and chief operating officer for Clise Properties. 

Your firm was mentioned in earlier testimony, as you know. 

Mr. Stevenson has worked in the real estate and property management field for 20 years. He currently serves on the board of directors for the downtown emergency services center and the Seattle 

association. 

Without objection, your full statements will be inserted in the 

record. 

I now ask each of you, starting with Mr. Hovel, to summarize for 

five minutes, and the timer will be turned on, and it it’s right next 

to Mr. Stein. 

STATEMENT OF RICHARD E. HOVEL, AVIATION SECURITY 

ADVISOR, THE BOEING COMPANY 

Mr. HOVEL. Madam Chair, honorable members of Congress, it’s 

very much appreciated allowing this opportunity to talk with you 

about this vital matter. 

Since the tragic events of September 11th, 2001, and consistent 

with HSPD 5, the national response plan, the national infrastructure and protection plan, and the national intelligence strategy, 

there have been increasing strides made to integrate the private 

sector within the public sector information sharing framework 

throughout all levels of government. 

As has been mentioned, in excess of 85 percent of this nation’s 

critical infrastructure residing within the private sector, one can 

hardly expect the public sector law enforcement and intelligence 

entities to sufficiently insulate industry from risks associated with 

what once was primarily a criminal enterprise. 

Understanding and responding to the many interdependencies 

between the various elements of the critical infrastructure may be 

more appropriately and effectively addressed by private sector ownership but with support from public sector agencies. 

This is based upon a sound proactive understanding of the far 

reaching damage that a successful attack on critical infrastructure 

could have, and is somewhat contrary to the largely reactive nature 

of traditional law enforcement. 

Because of this, information that has developed regionally may 

have significant impact nationally. 

This was evidenced very recently by the thwarted terror plot at 

Fort Dix New Jersey. 

To be effective in this arena, industry must have real-time access 

to information through fusion center capabilities in order to analyze that which may have a local or broader impact. 

34 

Conversely, federal, state, local law enforcement and intelligence 

entities must have access to very mature intelligence capabilities 

in the private sector. 

The private sector has the ability to effectively acquire, interpret, 

analyze, and disseminate intelligence information which may originate from private sector sources. 

Indeed, many companies are authorized to receive, store, and 

communicate classified information by employees already holding 

clearances. 

Public/private sharing of intelligence information, as we’ve all 

said, is a function of trust, and as we well know, all trust is local, 

which provides the very foundation of the fusion center concept. 

Capitalizing on the already significant relationships that exist 

between the public and private sectors here in the northwest and 

to mitigate the ever-changing risk, Boeing is in the process of assigning an analyst to the Seattle FBI fusion center. 

Fortunately the government has put in place a mechanism which 

enables private industry to enter into such collaboration, namely 

the Federal Safety Act. 

Boeing is currently working with the Department of Homeland 

Security in an effort to submit an application for protection under 

that act. 

Hopefully this will be the first of many, many similar efforts 

across the nation that will establish a collaborative partnership between public sector and industry and protect our critical infrastructure more effectively and expeditiously. 

A communication hub, around which the fusion concept could be 

built would use the collaborative efforts of both the private and 

public sectors, working in conjunction with the Pacific Northwest 

economic region center for regional disaster resilience have formed 

the community-focused northwest warning and response network, 

otherwise known as NWWARN. 

While the genesis of this was based upon the emergency response 

network model implemented in the southwest, NWWARN is a 

much more robust, all hazards, all threats communication tool. 

This network provides multidirectional communications between 

the FBI and both public and private interests across the five northwestern-most states of Alaska, Montana, Idaho, Washington, and 

Oregon. 

Additionally, we are in formative stages of establishing a virtual 

regional information fusion center pilot project. 

It would provide two-way information sharing on a multilayered, 

secure, and very resilient system with analysis produced by a team 

of core resident, local, and state experts with virtual analysts from 

different sectors and disciplines. 

It would be using a largely virtual database to enable integration, assessment, and secure tailored dissemination of information 

provided to key stakeholders. 

The analysis would be used for organizational and collective decision making in crafting public information. 

The virtual capability will interconnect state, local, private sector, now defense, and other stakeholder capabilities while avoiding 

duplication of effort, proliferation of analytical products, and competition for hard-to-find analytical staff resources. 

35 

It will be—it will enable federal authorities to have a single focal 

point to efficiently and securely provide intelligence and other sensitive information to a wide range of customers. 

This pilot would provide a model which could be customized by 

states and localities across the nation. 

The overarching purpose of these collective efforts is to better 

identify infrastructure interdependencies and preparedness gaps. 

They focus emphasis on identifying asset criticality, managing 

disasters, and furthering the trust factor between key stakeholders 

while moving law enforcement and intelligence communities beyond the ‘‘need to share’’ philosophy toward a ‘‘responsibility to provide’’ model. 

I thank you very much for the opportunity again, for the time 

and effort and the support you all are providing in this hearing. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, Mr. Hovel. 

[The statement of Mr. Hovel follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF RICHARD E. HOVEL

Since the tragic events of September 11, 2001, and consistent with HSPD–5, the 

National Response Plan, National Infrastructure Protection Plan and the 

National Intelligence Strategy, there have been increasing strides made to integrate the private sector within the public sector information sharing framework 

throughout all levels of government. 

With approximately 87 percent of this nation’s critical infrastructure residing 

within the private sector, one can hardly expect public sector law enforcement and 

intelligence entities to sufficiently insulate industry from risk associated with what 

was once [primarily] ‘‘criminal enterprise’’. Understanding and responding to the 

many inter-dependencies between the various elements of the critical infrastructure 

may be more appropriately and effectively addressed by private sector ownership, 

with support from public sector agencies. This is based upon a sound pro-active understanding of the far-reaching damage that a successful attack on critical infrastructure could have—and is somewhat contrary to the largely reactive nature of 

traditional law enforcement. 

Because of this, information that is developed regionally may have significant impact nationally. This was evidenced by the recently thwarted terror plot at Fort Dix. 

To be effective in this arena, industry must have real-time access to information 

through Fusion Center capabilities, in order to analyze that which may have a local 

or broader impact. Conversely, federal, state and local government, law enforcement 

and intelligence entities must have access to mature intelligence capabilities in the 

private sector. 

The private sector has the ability to effectively acquire, interpret, analyze and disseminate intelligence information—which may originate from private sector sources. 

In deed, many companies are authorized to receive, store and communicate classified information by employees already holding clearances. Public/private sharing of 

intelligence information is a function of ‘‘trust’’ and as we well know, ‘‘all trust is 

local’’ which provides the very foundation for the Fusion Center concept. 

Capitalizing on the already significant relationships that exist between the public 

and private sectors in the Northwest and to mitigate ever-changing risk, Boeing is 

in the process of assigning an analyst to the Seattle FBI Fusion Center. Fortunately, the federal government has put in place a mechanism which enables private 

industry to enter into such collaboration, namely, the federal SAFETY Act (‘‘Support 

Anti-terrorism by Fostering Effective Technologies Act of 2002.’’) Boeing is currently 

working with the Department of Homeland Security in an effort to submit an application for protection under the SAFETY Act. Hopefully, this will be the first of 

many similar efforts across the nation that will establish a collaborative partnership 

between the public sector and industry, and protect our critical infrastructure more 

effectively and expeditiously. 

A communication hub, around which the fusion concept could be built would use 

the collaborative efforts of both the private and public sectors, working in conjunction with the Pacific NW Economic Region (PNWER) Center for Regional Disaster 

Resilience have formed the community-focused Northwest Warning and Response 

Network (NW WARN). While the genesis of this was based upon the Emergency Response Network (ERN) model implemented in the Southwest, NW WARN is a much 

36 

more robust ‘‘all hazards—all threats’’ communication tool. This network provides 

multi-directional communications between the FBI and both public and private interests across the five Northwestern-most States of Alaska, Montana, Idaho, Washington and Oregon. 

Additionally, we are in the formative stages of establishing a virtual Regional Information Fusion Center Pilot Project (RIFCPP) that would provide two-way information sharing based on a multi-layered secure and resilient system with analysis 

produced by a team of core resident local and state experts with virtual analysts 

from different sectors and disciplines. They would be using a largely virtual database to enable integration, assessment, and secure, tailored dissemination of information provided to key stakeholders. 

This analysis would be used for organizational and collective decision-making and 

crafting public information. This virtual capability will interconnect state, local, private sector, defense and other stakeholder capabilities while avoiding duplication of 

effort, proliferation of analytical products, and competition for hard-to-find analytical staff resources. It will also enable federal authorities to have a single focal point 

to efficiently and securely provide intelligence and other sensitive information to a 

wide range of customers. This pilot would provide a model which could be customized by states and localities across the nation. 

The overarching purpose of these collective efforts is to better identify infrastructure interdependencies and preparedness gaps. They focus emphasis on identifying 

asset criticality, managing disasters and furthering the ‘‘trust-factor’’ between key 

stakeholders while moving the law enforcement and intelligence communities beyond the ‘‘need to share’’ philosophy toward a ‘‘responsibility to provide’’ 

model. 

Thank you for your time and support in finding solutions to take advantage of 

both public and private sector capabilities. 

Ms. HARMAN. Mr. Morrison. 

STATEMENT OF MATT MORRISON, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 

PACIFIC NORTHWEST ECONOMIC REGION 

Mr. MORRISON. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

I’m very happy to be here. 

I think the title of this hearing is—exactly cuts to the centerpiece 

of what we need in this country in order to be better prepared for 

both manmade and natural hazards. 

I would say that our work has been largely with the critical infrastructures and trying to understand regional disaster resilience, 

and the information sharing piece is a vital cornerstone of regional 

resilience. 

As yet, my experience at DHS has not focused in any meaningful 

way on cross sector challenges to the all-important task of building 

regional resilience. 

We have sector stove-pipes in all of our information sharing. 

What I call the resilience tautology is: Resilient assets and infrastructures require resilient regions; resiliency requires understanding which assets are critical in any specific scenario; understanding criticality depends upon understanding the interdependencies between and among our critical infrastructures; interdependencies remain undiscovered in stove-piped sector specific 

planning; and understanding interdependencies require cross sector 

information sharing; and cross sector and public/private information sharing requires creation of an environment of trust where 

stakeholders feel safe to share their vulnerabilities with each and 

other and with first responders and government. 

Comprehensive planning for resiliency cannot be done without 

having all the key stakeholders together sharing in a trusted environment. 

That’s what we’re missing. 

37 

This process cannot be done by government or the private sector 

alone but only in a trusted partnership. 

So our work—I mean, it’s been amazing. 

The HSIN you mentioned. You know, we—before there was a 

Homeland Security Department we met with the office—the White 

House Office of Homeland Security. 

They came out and endorsed that we could be a pilot at HSIN 

CI, it was called. 

We built 200 vetted professionals throughout the private sector, 

throughout the region. They promised us many times that Canada 

could be a part of it, but that never happened, but last month they 

just wrote a letter to everyone and said, ‘‘Sorry. We’re closing it 

down.’’ 

This was shocking to me. 

I mean, when really it’s—the real asset here is trust, and you 

build that with stakeholders, key stakeholders, so it’s been an unbelievable experience in trying to just develop an opportunity for 

us to share critical information between the silos, and here we have 

a real great test bed. 

I mean, the—we get it out here. We’ve really done the work. 

We’ve had all these exercises. We’ve looked at earthquakes to cyber 

terrorism to pandemic flu and had all 17 infrastructure sectors 

from the whole region working together. 

It’s wonderful, and what we lack is this—there’s such a control— 

DHS just wants to control everything, and they wouldn’t let us 

share with each other, which is really the ultimate goal of having 

resilience, and it’s not a technology issue. 

I think it was mentioned very nicely on the first panel that we 

can do this if we’ll just be allowed to do it, and so of course since 

they shut down what we were working on with NWWARN, we still 

have the board and all the people, and we’re building a local model, 

but it would behoove the government to be listening to the traffic 

between the utilities and the water systems and law enforcement 

because we all need to know this information, so we set up a thing 

with gatekeepers and—you know, we’ve worked out the requirements for the last four years. 

I guess I want to say that I do think it is the responsibility of 

the federal government to find a way to incentivise and fund and 

to—the startup and technical support to develop regional public/ 

private partnerships in communities and states addressing regional 

resiliency, public/private information sharing, and critical infrastructure security. 

I think this could be done by a competitive programming providing even as little as $250,000 seed money for interested states 

and regions to develop something like what we’ve done here, which 

is so doable. 

I would like to suggest that you use this region as a test bed to 

work with regional stakeholders to develop solutions for critical 

challenges that we all face. 

I’m happy to say that with the support of the committee, there 

has been support from the department of the Navy, from DTRA, 

the defense threat reduction agency—is working on a project here 

because of the stakeholder collaboration, and I think that there’s 

great opportunities. 

38 

I would say that federal support for technical assistance and encouragement is essential to spearhead, develop, and initially sustain cross sector collaboration to identify needs and cost effective 

solutions, activities and pilot projects to meet homeland security 

and disaster resilience challenge. 

The area of information sharing is absolutely vital to move forward with the support for developing a regional information fusion 

center that incorporates these critical infrastructure private sector 

opportunities, both analytical capabilities, that we see it as a virtual center that would allow this kind of communication. 

In my formal remarks there is a more detailed explanation of a 

pilot that we feel could be a great model for the nation. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Morrison. 

[The statement of Mr. Morrison follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF MATT MORRISON

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee, 

I commend you for the title of today’s Seattle Field Hearing: ‘‘Building a 

Partnership Strategy: Improving Information Sharing with State & Local 

Law Enforcement and the Private Sector’’. 

This is exactly the right topic to be addressing as it cuts to the centerpiece of how 

this nation needs to be and can be better prepared to face the wide range of natural 

and man-made hazards with a comprehensive system of systems approach to preparedness and the mitigation of vulnerabilities in our communities. 

Since 9–11 there has been a great deal of focus on physical protection, and infrastructure sector specific plans. As we all saw this week, Secretary Chertoff announced the Sector Reports under the National Infrastructure Protection Plan have 

finally been released. 

While it has been a positive step to increase the security of our infrastructures to terrorist attacks, as we saw with Hurricane Katrina, there is 

a pressing need to focus on cross-sector cooperation, coordination and information sharing to achieve regional disaster resilience. As yet, DHS has 

not focused in any meaningful way on cross-sector challenges to the all- important task of building regional resilience. Infrastructures and essential 

service providers in a region are tightly interdependent and subject to cascading failures that can incapacitate entire communities. What this means 

is that a utility or other service provider may have the best security possible and still have its operations or business practices damaged or disrupted. 

Resilient regions are able to bounce back from any kind of disaster with 

limited impacts on public health and safety, the economy, and national security. If we want to have ‘Resilience’ from either a natural hazards or a terrorist 

attack we must be able to understand the vulnerabilities caused by regional interdependencies, what assets and facilities are truly critical, and determine cost-effective ways based on risk to prevent or mitigate these vulnerabilities. The only way 

to gain this understanding is through cross-sector partnerships that foster local 

trust among all the key stakeholders that have roles or vested interests in providing 

critical products and services or which have emergency preparedness and management responsibilities. This is a large number of organizations—all levels of government, private sector, non-profits, academic and research organizations and community institutions. 

What I have just described is what we call the ‘Resilience Tautology’. To 

state it simply, 

• Resilient assets and infrastructures require resilient regions 

• Resiliency requires understanding which assets are critical in any specific scenario 

• Understanding criticality depends upon understanding the interdependencies 

between and among critical infrastructures (85% of which are privately owned). 

Criticality is dynamic and changes during an incident, often in unanticipated 

ways 

• Interdependencies remain undiscovered in stove-piped sector specific planning 

• Understanding interdependencies require cross sector information sharing 

39 

• Cross sector and public/private information sharing requires the creation of 

an environment of trust where stakeholders feel ‘safe’ to share their 

vulnerabilities with each other and with first responders and government 

To emphasize, comprehensive planning for resiliency cannot be done without having all the key stakeholders together—sharing in a trusted environment—which 

provides a value added resource to each and all of them. Regional Resilience requires that procedures and protocols for information sharing be worked out in advance of any incident, and that stakeholders work together to mitigate 

vulnerabilities and address shortfalls in a consistent framework within a public private partnership. This process cannot be done by the government or the private sector alone, but only in a trusted partnership with all key stakeholders in a community. 

PNWER’s Long Role in Fostering Regional Infrastructure Security and Disaster Resilience 

PNWER has been working since the September 1, 2001 attacks to develop ways 

and avenues for information sharing among the public and private sectors and other 

stakeholders through outreach, developing and conducting workshops, exercises, 

interdependency forums, pilot projects and leading/facilitating Partnership activities, including regular meetings. 

PNWER is unique in that it has a statutory mandate from five states: Alaska, 

Washington, Idaho, Oregon, and Montana, as well as the western Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, and the Yukon. PNWER’s board is made up of 

elected state and provincial legislators, the Governors and Premiers of all jurisdictions, and Industry leaders in the major industries in the bi-national region. Our 

focus is the economy of the region, and the safety and quality of life for all citizens. 

After September 11, our governing board was very concerned about the safety of our 

communities, as well as safeguarding against the potential threats to our economy. 

In consultation with all Governors and Premiers, it was agreed that the one area 

that was not being fully addressed was the interface between private infrastructures 

and government. It was this gap that PNWER’s Center for Disaster Resilience was 

launched to address. 

Throughout the winter of 2002, the Pacific Northwest Partnership for Regional Infrastructure Security created by PNWER began preparation for the first multi-sector, multi-jurisdiction, cross border exercise focused on critical infrastructure interdependencies called Blue Cascades. This unprecedented exercise was the first in a 

series and was held outside of Portland, OR in June 2002 and was attended by more 

than 200 representatives from all eight jurisdictions in the PNWER region. The exercise was based on a terrorist attack on some of the Bonneville Power Administration’s important assets, bringing down much of the northwest power grid for weeks 

to months. The exercise focused on cascading impacts involving all critical infrastructure sectors, as well as law enforcement. It was eye-opening to all participants 

After Blue Cascades I, We continued to have quarterly meetings of the Partnership, and held an Action Planning meeting to address shortfalls identified in the exercise. This process led to a regional Action Plan comprised of a number of recommended initiatives, some of which have been accomplished and some which are 

ongoing. The most notable finding from the exercise was the high priority all stakeholders placed on the need for a regional information sharing mechanism for all key 

stakeholders. We took this identified need to the then Whitehouse Office of Homeland Security—CIO Steve Cooper, and Col. Bob Stephan. In the spring of 2003 we 

hosted a meeting with the Seattle FBI to establish a pilot for the northwest which 

became the NorthWest Warning, Alert, and Response Network (NW WARN.GOV). 

NW WARN developed a public—private board of key stakeholders, and a gatekeeper community of over 100 key leaders in all 17 infrastructures. We petitioned 

to become a pilot project in a new program DHS was launching based on the Dallas, 

TX Emergency Response Network (ERN), which was a largely law enforcement-focused model out of the Dallas FBI. After much delay, DHS agreed to let us be part 

of the new pilot, which became known as HSIN-Critical Infrastructure or HSIN–CI. 

Over the past four years, we have worked to build the membership of this information sharing system to over 2,000 vetted key stakeholders in our region. We developed a handbook, detailed requirements for information sharing among sectors, 

but never received the support we needed from DHS for implementation. Instead, 

Last month, DHS discontinued the program and sent a letter to all 2000 professionals to announce the cancellation. Our NW WARN Board nonetheless has continued to meet, and we are determined to build the functionality into the system that 

we have always wanted to be able to share critical information among sectors and 

with law enforcement and emergency management. 

Blue Cascades II—focus on Cyber Systems 

40 

Key stakeholders elected to develop a second regional interdependencies exercise 

with PNWER’s help the following year. Blue Cascades II was again a grassroots effort to address an issue that the first exercise had left out—cyber vulnerabilities 

and the gap between physical and cyber preparedness. A Scenario Design Team, 

made up of over 30 organizations, labored over six months developing the scenario, 

which brought out the importance of cyber systems and information security. 

The process of bringing private sector key individuals, who live and breathe the 

vulnerabilities of their systems, together with law enforcement and emergency management was incredible. ,e had every participant sign a non-disclosure agreement 

to participate in the exercise. For many first responders, it was the first time they 

realized just how the communications systems they relied upon could be compromised by a cyber attack that could leave them essentially ‘in the dark’ and unable to communicate. 

The exercise led our state Homeland Security Director to state that were it not 

for the exercise, he would not have known about what he considered one of the top 

five vulnerabilities in the state—pointing out that both DOD and DHS had missed 

listing this particular issue on their state-wide assessment, but was brought out by 

the process of stakeholder information sharing during the exercise. 

Blue Cascades III—focus on Earthquake Preparedness 

Following Katrina, stakeholders met to discuss what was the Northwest’s 

‘Katrina’. All agreed that it was the 9 point subduction zone earthquake 

that is anticipated to hit off the coast from British Columbia to California 

sometime in the next 50 years or so. (The last one was on Jan. 26, 1700, and 

records show that it has happened on average every 300 years). This exercise 

was led again by PNWER with critical infrastructure stakeholders who wanted to 

address the long term recovery and reconstitution issues after an extreme disaster. 

It was a two day exercise involving over 350 participants. 

Lessons Learned for Information Sharing. While previous Blue Cascades exercises 

demonstrated the need for interoperable communications, in BLUE CASCADES III 

at issue was the impact of the loss of telecommunications and critical IT systems 

and how these systems and particular emergency communications could be made 

more resilient (able to withstand a subduction zone quake and expeditiously recover 

with minimal damage). Some participants pointed to mitigation measures, including 

building more systems redundancy and developing alternative, mobile, and easily 

deployable wireless-based communications. There was need for ‘‘situational awareness’’—knowledge of what was happening throughout the region—as the disaster 

unfolded, to enable optimal decision-making on response (e.g., dispatching personnel 

and other resources where needed, prioritizing service restoration, determining 

evacuations routes and sheltering locations, etc.). Private sector and other non-government organizations emphasized the need for their inclusion in regional preparedness planning, not just with the state or provinces, but with municipalities. One 

water systems representative stated that he would like to hear from government 

less of ‘‘I got you covered—don’t worry’’ and have more cooperation. An energy official noted that ‘‘cooperation is a two-way street and public and private sector representatives must be willing to meet and participate in the many infrastructure and 

planning initiatives currently underway, and not just at the exercises that come 

along every now and again.’’ A telecommunications representative reflected sentiments of other participants that companies are reluctant to share information directly with government. Through participating in ‘‘lots of exercises’’, however, they 

can determine what information they need and what needs to be shared. As one 

participant put it, ‘‘Trust relationships are paramount in creating an environment 

where it is felt that information can be shared safely, and in confidence.’’ A power 

company official cited the need to know what the critical loads are for the other sectors and that without this knowledge it would be difficult to establish restoration 

priorities. Non-electric sectors wanted to learn more about how power is capable of 

being restored and work with utilities to make modifications to their systems so restoration of power to critical infrastructure can be accomplished quicker. 

The Blue Cascades III scenario of an earthquake—an unexpected act of nature— 

precluded the need for participants to address alert and warning in the Puget Sound 

Region through NWWARN. A major issue, however, was the tsunami warning system. Participants questioned whether the many thousands of individuals along the 

coast from British Columbia to San Francisco would have ample warning time to 

reach higher ground, or even receive a warning given the widespread regional power 

outage and telecommunications failures generated by the earthquake. On response 

or recovery/restoration issues, it was unclear in the exercise how decisions would be 

made on trade-offs that needed to be made within a short time frame. An example 

was the issue of whether to use scarce water for putting out the fires from gas leaks 

41 

and pipe ruptures or to save it for human consumption. Moreover, organizations had 

no way to gain information on what resources were available. For example, Cingular 

noted that it has ‘‘loaner’’ cell phones, portable cell phone sites, and cellular phones 

that plug into laptop computers to create internet connectivity. The federal government was said to be working on a process to channel private sector assistance to 

government authorities in a crisis. 

There was much discussion in Blue Cascades III on priorities regarding service 

restoration in an environment when there would be great demand and competition 

for being towards the top of the prioritization list. Some participants pointed out 

that states, localities, and utilities had already established priority lists, and these 

should be followed. Other participants, such as the Postal Service, expressed concern that they were far down on the list and would not gain services for ‘‘some period of time’’. Still others noted that priority restoration should be flexible depending 

on need. At the same time, most participants appeared to understand that in a 

major disaster priority lists would likely ‘‘go out the window’’, and that infrastructure interdependencies should play a role in which services were restored and in 

what sequence. As one participant put it, ‘‘priorities are different depending upon 

where you sit.’’ In addition, there was also some discussion related to what is most 

critical. Participants questioned whether is it the water supply system, hospital, 

transportation, food and agriculture operation, or life safety such as emergency services. As an electric power representative observed, ‘‘understanding what ‘‘critical 

load’’ is will help establish restoration priorities.’’ 

Blue Cascades IV—Pandemic Preparedness and Critical Infrastructures 

Blue Cascade IV held in January of this year focused on impacts on critical infrastructures and essential service providers from a Pandemic Influenza attack. We included the excellent experience of the Ontario Emergency Management director who 

had handled the SARS epidemic in Canada, and looked again at the interdependencies of our critical infrastructures and how there might be cascading impacts due 

to workforce shortages. It was evident that more needs to be communicated to private sector critical infrastructures, and that HHS and DHS need to be better coordinated for incident management in a Pandemic. 

We were fortunate to have the HHS Director of Critical Infrastructure Protection, 

Dr. Tom Sizemore for a planning session for the exercise and have the Regional Director for HHS participate in the event.. 

Again, it was clear that information sharing among critical infrastructures, government, and public health agencies was absolutely vital, and not being well addressed. Our region has some of the leading private sector businesses who have 

done landmark work in Pandemic preparedness and were willing to share their efforts with their peers. Boeing, Microsoft, Washington Mutual, Puget Sound Energy, 

Starbucks, Bonneville Power Administration are some of the leading companies in 

this area in the world. We are in the process of developing an Action Plan based 

on the lessons learned from the most recent exercises that can become part of a regional pandemic preparedness strategy. 

Recommendations: 

The following are based on PNWER’s long experience of working with 

stakeholders to develop and implement regional disaster preparedness initiatives. 

The Federal Government should fund the start up and provide technical 

support to develop regional public/private partnerships in communities 

and states addressing regional resiliency, public/private information sharing, and critical infrastructure security. This could be done by a competitive program providing up to $250K to allow seed money for interested 

states and regions to move forward and develop an ongoing process to 

build trust and develop awareness among key stakeholders of public and 

private infrastructures on vulnerabilities and mitigation measures associated with regional interdependencies. 

The eight jurisdiction PNWER region is demonstrably ahead of the nation in 

building cross-sector trust among regional stakeholders to foster disaster resilience. 

DHS, the Department of Defense, and other federal agencies can use the PNWER 

region as a test-bed to work with regional stakeholders to develop solutions for the 

critical challenges that face the nation today—including developing a model regional 

public/private sector, all-hazards information fusion center and the protocols and 

procedures to allow virtual information sharing among all critical infrastructures, 

law enforcement, emergency management, and other key stakeholders. PNWER 

commends certain federal agencies, DHS/ Science and Technology Directorate, the 

Defense Threat Reduction Agency, and the U.S. Department of Energy for willingness to provide modest support for a few significant projects focusing on interVerDate Nov 24 2008 07:58 Jul 07, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00045 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\DOCS\110-HRGS\110-42\48917.TXT HSEC PsN: DIANE
42 

dependencies challenges. Much more of this type of support needs to be provided 

to undertake many of the recommended solutions to preparedness shortfalls identified in the respective Blue Cascades exercises that are enumerated into the Blue 

Cascades Integrated Action Plan. 

Summary 

To summarize, in addressing disaster resilience, our focus must be not just inside 

organizations or on sectors but outside the fence, cross-sector, grass roots to national 

level, focus on all threats (including aging and deteriorating infrastructures), and 

all-hazards and regional in scope. We must reminder always that all disasters are 

local and that all trust is local. 

We have to also keep in mind the ‘‘Resilience Tautology’’—that resilient assets 

and infrastructures require resilient regions; regional resilience requires an understanding of infrastructure interdependencies and associated vulnerabilities, consequences of disruptions under specific scenarios, and risk-based mitigation; and 

that regional risk assessment and management requires collaboration and information-sharing among key stakeholders, which includes regional DOD assets. 

Lastly, federal support—funds and technical assistance and encouragement—is 

essential to spearhead, develop, and initially sustain cross-sector collaboration to 

identify needs and cost-effective solutions—activities and pilot projects—to meet 

homeland security and disaster resilience challenges. In the area of information 

sharing, it is important to move forward with support for developing a regional information fusion center that incorporates the private sector that can be a model for 

the nation. Following is a description of this essential pilot project for which 

PNWER has been tasked to set up and facilitate a Task Force to develop. 

————— 

Attachment 1 

Northwest Warning, Alert and Response Network 

2007 

NWWARN Regional 

Governnance Board* 

Gennie Thomspon 

NWARN President 

Brandon Hardenbrook 

Pacific Northwest Economic 

Region; NWWARN Vice 

President 

Hal Cchlomann 

Washington Association of 

Sewer and Water Districts; 

NWWARN Secretary 

Marty Prewett 

FBI, Seattle 

NWWARN Regional Manager 

Joe Huden 

City of Everett 

Mary Robinson, 

Puget Sound Energy 

Director 

King County OEM 

Bryant Harrison 

FEMA Region X 

Dick Hoval 

Boeing 

Bill Cooper 

Microsoft 

Scott Heinz 

WA Military Department 

Kevin Zeller 

WA State Patrol 

43 

Rod Hilden 

Port of Seattle 

Paul Schieck 

Seattle Mariners 

Paul McIntyre 

Alerwood Sewer & Water 

* Partial List 

———————— 

TO: MAJOR GENERAL LOWENBERG, WA ADJUTANT GENERAL 

FROM: NWWARN REGIONAL GOVERNANCE BOARD 

1SUBJECT: NORTHWEST WARNING, ALERT AND RESPONSE NETWORK 

DATE: MAY 15, 2007 

Dear General Lowenberg, 

Our officers wanted to update you on all the changes occurring with NWWARN 

and appreciate the continued interest and support of you and your staff. These 

changes have been very challenging and will ultimately all be very beneficial. 

NWWARN was designed and developed locally about five years ago with the assistance of the FBI, Pacific Northwest Economic Region (PNWER), and regional private/public critical infrastructure leaders. Along with similar information sharing 

networks in other geographic regions, we all became the pilot for DHS’ goal of creating a national private/public information sharing network. We were collectively 

known as the Homeland Security Information Network—Critical Infrastructure 

(HSIN–CI). 

This DHS goal was met in 2006 and a GAO analysis of all the DHS HSIN programs stated that HSIN–CI was the only successful program due in large part to 

its extensive membership of local decision makers across all private and public critical infrastructures. However, DHS then switched to a new technology source that 

could not support the system. This resulted in the loss of our national and regional 

websites. 

We understand the need to be regionally owned, controlled and managed to ensure our continued existence and to better address our region’s issues and needs, 

such as the 2010 Olympics security, PNWER and the Pacific Northwest Emergency 

Management Agreement (PNEMA). We will be independent but continue our close 

relationships with L/S/F government agencies, jurisdictions, and all private and 

public infrastructures. 

Our challenge has been to select a new technology vendor to rebuild our system/ 

network, and to obtain initial and ongoing funding. This is underway and we expect 

to have our website restored within 90 days, followed by acceptance of new members 

and full restoration of our services. 

The benefits to all of us will be our incorporating new features and functions, and 

expanding our membership to include all of our interdependent NW states and provinces. These will be Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, Montana, and Washington, plus Alberta, 

British Columbia and the Yukon. 

In closing General, we again want to thank you for your support, the support of 

your staff, and the support of the Washington State Military Department and Emergency Management Division. We have worked closely with the Washington State 

Committee on Homeland Security’s Critical Infrastructure Protection Subcommittee 

and recognize that NWWARN is important to the success of protecting our state’s 

critical infrastructure. We have proven our worth to the state and region, and once 

we have our funding issues settled, we will be able to solidify our standing and expand. 

Respectfully, 

Gennie Thompson, 

NWWARN President 

————— 

Attachment 2 

Pacific NorthWest 

Economic Region 

Pacific Northwest Center for Regional Disaster Resilience 

The Pacific Northwest Center for Regional Disaster Resilience (RDR Center) 

serves public and private sector organizations and other key stakeholders to identify 

44 

preparedness gaps and implement cost-effective prevention and mitigation measures 

to address them. The RDR Center is an integral element of the Pacific NorthWest 

Economic Region (PNWER), a statutory, public/private partnership chartered in 

1991 by the Northwest states of Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington 

and the Western Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, and the Yukon 

Territory. As the implementation manager of PNWER’s Homeland Security Program, the RDR Center’s mission is to improve the ability of the Pacific Northwest 

to protect its critical infrastructures and to withstand and recover from all-hazards 

disasters. The RDR Center does this through raising awareness of infrastructure 

interdependencies, providing training and education, and developing tools, technologies, and approaches that build on existing capabilities and can be utilized 

across the United States, Canada, and the international community. 

Building on Five years of Progress 

The RDR Center’s mission is continuing and building upon a long legacy of 

PNWER’s work with states, municipalities, and other regions to secure interdependent infrastructures and develop disaster resilience. The first initiative to address regional infrastructure security issues was the creation of The Partnership for 

Regional Infrastructure Security in November, 2001. The Partnership brought key 

private stakeholders representing the critical infrastructures in the eight-jurisdiction PNWER region together with the federal, state and provincial officials responsible for emergency management and public safety. These stakeholders, along with 

elected officials from each state and province, identified opportunities for acting 

proactively to strengthen their infrastructures. 

Since then PNWER has organized with the regional stakeholders three critical infrastructure interdependencies exercises over the past four years and is now developing a fourth (the Blue Cascades Series). Each exercise has been designed by the 

stakeholders, reflected regional concerns, and produced an Action Plan of projects 

and activities to address lessons learned. Blue Cascades I, held in Portland, Oregon 

in June 2002, was conducted under the auspices of the newly created Pacific Northwest Partnership for Regional Infrastructure Security and sponsored by the U.S. Department of the Navy’s Critical Infrastructure Protection Office, FEMA Region 10, 

and the Canadian federal government. The exercise centered on raising awareness 

of interconnections among the region’s critical infrastructures and resulting 

vulnerabilities associated with largely physical attacks and disruptions. Blue Cascades II, held in Seattle in September 2004, was sponsored by King County, the 

U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s National Cyber Security Division, Puget 

Sound Energy, Microsoft, and TransCanada. Blue Cascades II centered on cyber 

events to meet stakeholder needs to learn more about cyber threats, disruptions, 

and impacts. Blue Cascades III, held in Bellevue in March 2006, was supported by 

the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Navy Region NW, King County, Microsoft, CH2M HILL, Cingular Wireless, Puget Sound Energy, BPA and CTC. Blue 

Cascades III focused on the response, recovery and restoration after a M9 

subduction zone earthquake. Blue Cascades IV, which focuses on the impact of infrastructure interdependencies on pandemic preparedness, is now under development and scheduled in January, 2007. 

As a result of these regional initiatives, PNWER has undertaken pilot projects 

with DHS, the Department of Energy and other federal entities, including development of a regional alert and warning system (NW WARN), a regional energy vulnerability assessment, and an interdependencies identification tool for stakeholder use. 

RDR Center Today 

The RDR Center is building on this extensive foundation of activities 

through: 

• Creating and fostering cross-sector partnerships focused on infrastructure security and disaster resilience; 

• Developing and conducting regional infrastructure interdependencies initiatives focused on various threat scenarios that include regional cross-sector/cross 

discipline workshops and exercises to better understand threats, vulnerabilities, 

and develop strategies for action to address them; 

• Developing requirements for stakeholder-validated projects and activities to 

address readiness gaps and improve regional resilience; 

• Seeking funding and other resources to support regional pilot projects and 

other activities and to enable state and local agencies to address regional preparedness needs; 

• Overseeing the implementation of priority projects and activities in a cost-effective, timely and ethical manner; 

• Conducting outreach and develop and facilitate seminars, workshops, and targeted exercises to raise awareness and test the level of preparedness. 

45 

• Communicating stakeholder validated regional disaster resilience recommendations to state and provincial governments and policymakers 

• Providing information through a dedicated web portal www.pnwer.org/portal/ 

and other mechanisms about resources on CIP and regional disaster resilience 

issues, lessons learned, best practices; and on upcoming homeland security, 

emergency preparedness, and related events. Tools include: 

• A Document Library that can be searched by infrastructure sector, hazard, threat, and jurisdiction; 

• An Events Calendar with dates and information on conferences, exercises, and other events concerning disaster resilience and critical infrastructure protection; 

• A Stakeholders Forum which allows registered users to interact with 

each other and with a panel of knowledgeable stakeholder representatives. 

Lastly, through its Consortium of multi-disciplinary experts from recognized research institutions and technical assistance providers, the RDR Center provides a 

Center of Excellence with access to expertise, best practices, and lessons learned from CIP and preparedness conferences, workshops, exercises, in addition to other useful resources. 

RDR Center Structure 

As the program implementation focal point for homeland security and disaster resilience for the multi-jurisdiction Pacific NorthWest Economic Region, the RDR Center is a non-profit, public-private collaborative organization. 

Board of Directors. The RDR Center Board of Directors, comprised of state and 

provincial legislators and distinguished independent experts, provides strategic direction and general oversight the Center’s activities. 

RDR Center Director and Administrative Staff. The Director handles operational activities of the Center and ensures effective program execution and quality 

control. The Director determines with PNWER staff budgetary /resource requirements and seeks means to fulfill these requirements. 

Regional Steering Group. The Steering Group is comprised of the chairs of regional and state partnerships/collaborative mechanisms within the PNWER eight 

member jurisdictions. The Steering Group prioritizes and determines what activities 

will be included in the RDR Center’s programmatic activities, reviews progress on 

projects, and provides recommendations. 

Project Requirements and Oversight Work Groups. Cross-sector, multi-disciplinary Work Groups of stakeholder organizations representing interested regions 

are responsible for developing requirements for individual projects and monitoring 

project implementation. 

State/Provincial Council. A Council of state and provincial senior officials 

charged with homeland security and disaster resilience provides guidance to the 

Steering Group and the RDR Center Director on the types of projects that should 

be undertaken to build upon and improve existing capabilities. 

Federal Advisory Group. Comprised of U.S. and Canadian federal agencies 

with homeland security, public safety and emergency management responsibilities, 

the Advisory Group provides advice and as appropriate, technical and policy assistance on program implementation challenges that have national implications. 

RDR Center Technical Assistance Consortium. The Consortium is comprised 

of research and technical service provider organizations that have expertise in the 

broad range of Critical Infrastructure Protection and disaster resilience needs (national laboratories, academic research institutions, contractors/consulting firms). 

Members of the Consortium, based on their capabilities, team to assist state and 

local stakeholders to develop requirements for specific projects and activities and 

provide the technical expertise necessary for program implementation. 

RDR Center Sources of Support 

Overall support for the RDR Center comes from PNWER member State and Provincial dues (which are set by statute), private sector partnership members, as well 

as government programmatic funds and grants; foundations, and other contributions. 

————— 

Attachment 3 

REGIONAL INFORMATION FUSION CENTER 

PILOT PROJECT 

Purpose 

46 

The following paper outlines what is required to build on existing capabilities for 

cross-jurisdiction/public-private collaboration and information-sharing to develop a 

state-wide, holistic regional information sharing and analysis capability to 

meet the following broad security and disaster resilience needs: 

1. Collection, integration, analysis, and dissemination of all-source threat-related information for law enforcement and infrastructure protection; 

2. Understanding regional interdependencies and determining critical infrastructure/key resources (CI/KR) vulnerabilities and risk; 

3. Disaster/incident preparedness and management. 

The pilot project would encompass and leverage various activities supported by 

components of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security that currently are underway to improve regional information sharing and analysis capabilities, including the 

Washington Joint Analytic Center (WAJAC)) and the developing Seattle/King County fusion center; NWWARN, and the Puget Sound Partnership Interdependencies 

template project. The pilot project would also leverage systems and procedures for 

information sharing already developed by DHS, DOD and other entities. 

The end-result would be a state-wide ‘‘virtual’’ Regional Information Fusion Center (information sharing and analysis capability) with protocols/procedures that can 

cost-effectively provide public, private and other key stakeholders with appropriate, 

secure, resilient, two-way interaction at the local, state, and federal (civilian and defense) level. This capability would connect and enhance but not replace mission-specific state and local emergency management, law enforcement, defense, and other 

systems and mechanisms, including EOCs, Special Operations Centers, Law Enforcement Intelligence Operations, Dispatch Centers, etc. 

This pilot project would provide a model which could be customized by states and 

localities across the nation. 

Background 

Since the September 11 attacks more than five years ago, acquiring information 

on threats to infrastructures, vulnerabilities, and impacts has been a top priority 

and essential for determining CI/KR criticality and risk. At the national level, sector-focused Information Sharing and Analysis Centers (ISACs) were established. As 

understanding grew of infrastructure interdependencies and the need for identifying 

asset criticality and managing disasters, regional public-private partnerships 

emerged in some parts of the country. A major objective of these partnerships was 

to facilitate regional information sharing by building trust among key stakeholders 

and cooperatively identifying security and preparedness gaps.??? 

At the same time, in states and municipalities nationwide, law enforcement authorities created information and intelligence sharing and analysis mechanisms to 

focus on threats and crimes. Today there are more than three dozen of these information fusion centers in various stages of development and reflecting the cultural 

and jurisdictional interests of the areas they serve. Their goal is to develop the technologies, procedures, analytic staff and capabilities to integrate and assess relevant 

law enforcement and intelligence information, coordinate security measures, and facilitate two-way flow of timely, accurate, actionable information on all types of hazards. The focus, scope, functions, participation, and organizational structure of these 

centers are evolving as understanding of the requirements increases. A series last 

year of four Information Fusion Center Regional Conferences sponsored by Department of Justice with the U.S. DHS for managers of state and local Centers identified many issues that remain to be resolved. Some of the more important of these 

issues are: 

• Expanding the focus of the Centers to cover all threats, all crimes, and all 

hazards; 

• Inclusion of critical infrastructures and essential service providers and other 

key stakeholders with focus on two-way information-sharing; 

• Creating and maintaining regional situational awareness pre and post incident; and 

• Outreach to communities, including associations serving ethnic and special 

needs groups. 

A priority issue is developing a virtual capability (i.e., procedures, technologies, 

organizational structure, and supporting concept-of-operations) to link information 

fusion centers and other collaborative mechanisms and key stakeholder organizations in a state-wide or broader regional interoperable network to accommodate diverse multi-jurisdiction needs, geographic realities and cultural and infrastructure 

sector interests. This virtual Regional Information Fusion Center would have twoway information sharing based on a multi-layered secure and resilient system with 

analysis produced by a team of core resident local and state experts and virtual analysts from different sectors and disciplines using a largely virtual database to enable 

integration, assessment, and secure, tailored dissemination of information provided 

47 

to key stakeholders. This analysis would be used for organizational and collective 

decision-making and crafting public information. 

This virtual capability will interconnect state, local, private sector and other 

stakeholder capabilities while avoiding of duplication of effort, proliferation of analytical products, and competition for scarce analytical staff resources. It will also enable federal authorities to have a single focal point for effectively and securely providing intelligence and other sensitive information to a wide range of ‘‘customers’’. 

Activities within Washington State that Can Be Leveraged 

Washington State is well ahead of many other regions in the nation with an established information fusion center operated by the State Patrol and situated in the 

FBI Building in Seattle. The WAJAC is in the beginning stages of bringing in private sector analysts. At the local level, King County with surrounding counties have 

been developing regional preparedness plans and working with key stakeholders to 

address vulnerabilities and impacts associated with infrastructure interdependencies. 

A public-private Partnership for Regional Infrastructure Security has been in existence since 2002. There have been four regional interdependencies exercises developed and conducted by the Partnership thus far, each focusing on a different type 

of threat scenario—physical and cyber attacks/disruptions, natural disasters 

(subduction zone earthquake) and an influenza pandemic. These exercises have resulted in recommendations for creation of a Regional Information Sharing and Analysis Center (regional ISAC) to enable key stakeholders to prepare for and manage 

disasters from terrorist attacks, natural disasters or other causes. In addition, Partnership members are currently testing an automated interdependency template developed for them by DHS/S&T/CIP and have created an Information Sharing Working Group to develop secure information sharing procedures for private sector organizations to exchange agreed interdependencies data collected internally with the 

template. 

There is a community-focused alert and warning system, NWWARN, and the City 

of Seattle and King County are looking towards developing an information fusion 

capability to serve local law enforcement needs that would include critical infrastructures and essential service providers. Various proposals and some work are underway on enhancing these existing capabilities. The City of Seattle Police Department and the Pacific Northwest Laboratory have been collaborating on technology 

and procedural requirements for a Seattle/King County regional fusion center. ESRI 

is developing a virtual analysis system for use by fusion centers. There are plans 

to enhance WAJAC’s collection, analysis, and dissemination of information and intelligence to law enforcement and non-law enforcement agencies through developing 

effective Regional Intelligence Groups (RIGS) and creating a Threat Early Warning 

Group (TEW) system. 

Pilot Project Overall Goal 

The goal of the proposed pilot project is to develop a statewide virtual regional 

cross-sector, cross-jurisdiction, secure, and resilient two-way information sharing capability that: 

• Protects proprietary data; 

• Utilizes existing procedures and mechanisms; 

• Focuses on all threats, all crimes, and all-hazards; 

• Identifies vulnerabilities, security and preparedness gaps, and assesses risk; 

• Meets local law enforcement needs; 

• Has a state-wide scope and reaches outside state boundaries and cross-border 

to address regional interdependencies; 

• Supports the alert and warning function of NWWARN and incorporates member organizations as appropriate; 

• Supports Emergency Operations Center Disaster Management Activities; 

• Undertakes outreach and educates community groups; 

• Fosters interoperability and standardization; 

• Provides federal agencies through a single focal point access to state, local, 

and regional key stakeholders. 

Tasks 

The following tasks and subtasks need to be accomplished for a Regional Information Fusion Center Pilot Project. Some are already underway. Most can be addressed simultaneously Specifics on how to accomplish these tasks and subtasks, including a schedule and milestones, will be developed by a Regional Information Fusion Requirements Task Force comprised of representatives of organizations involved in 

the current information sharing and analysis activities noted in the Background Section of this paper and others as appropriate. (Duration of project 

activities is dependent on technical expertise/funding available.) 

48 

Task 1: Requirements Definition (Six-months duration) 

1.1 Identify local, state, and federal jurisdictional issues and needs and 

what memorandums of understanding and other agreements are required; 

1.2 Develop framework for a mechanism to integrate funding streams 

for Fusion Center sustainability; 

1.3 Identify roles and responsibilities and develop decision-making 

process; 

1.4 Determine membership criteria—what critical infrastructures and essential service providers to include and how to develop sector and organizational collaboration arrangements to enable collective information sharing; 

1.5 Identify security and proprietary data protection and control needs 

and develop/leverage appropriate procedures and systems, e.g., PCII; 

1.6 Develop requirements for creating (or leverage an existing) virtual 

information sharing system with access based on multiple levels of security 

that enables stakeholders to provide and receive data virtually (i.e., virtual 

database, analysis and dissemination); 

1.7 Identify what data (information and intelligence) should be collected, which organizations will provide it and how; 

1.8 Determine the security levels for data required and what security safeguards are required; 

1.9 Ascertain data storage needs—what types of data can be stored, and 

how and where stored; 

1.10 Determine information assessment needs—customer base, types of 

analysis required meeting customer requirements, and data and analytic resources necessary; 

1.11 Determine communications and IT security requirements 

1.12 Determine communications and IT resilience needs 

1.13 Determine what analytic tools are needed to identify and assess regional interdependencies and disruption impacts; also for weapons of mass 

destruction (WMD) detection and impacts analysis, including users of these 

tools; 

1.14 Develop requirements for a virtual analytic capability (determine 

qualifications of experts, security requirements, process, and procedures); 

1.15 Determine Pilot Project oversight process and program management; 

1.16 Identify potential sources of funding and how to acquire necessary 

support. 

Task 2. Implementation (multi-year scope—phases and timeframe TBD) 

2.1 Develop a Concept of Operations for the Regional Fusion Center that 

includes decision making and information sharing protocols and secure dissemination procedures; 

2.2 Develop procedures for providing security clearances to Center staff 

and key stakeholder personnel as appropriate; 

2.3 Develop training for Fusion Center personnel and analysts (working 

with DHS/IA); 

2.4 Develop procedures and provide staff training for Community Outreach; 

2.5 Develop Regional Information Fusion Center systems and tools; 

2.5.1 Data collection system; 

2.5.2 Data storage and virtual data system; 

2.5.3 Assessment ‘‘toolset’’; 

Task 3. Issues Investigation, Test, Evaluation and Validation (timeframe TBD) 

3.1 Hold targeted workshops and exercises to further investigate and 

refine implementation issues and priorities; 

3.2 Test and evaluate the Regional Information Fusion Center through 

two to three Blue Cascades regional infrastructure interdependencies 

exercises that have terrorism and regional disaster scenarios. 

3.3 Develop and conduct additional targeted workshops and exercises 

to evaluate specific Regional Fusion Center capabilities. 

Ms. HARMAN. Mr. Stein. 

STATEMENT OF STEVEN L. STEIN, SENIOR PROGRAM 

MANAGER, PACIFIC NORTHWEST NATIONAL LABORATORY 

Mr. STEIN. Thank you Madam Chair, Congressman Reichert, 

Congressman Dicks. 

49 

It is a pleasure to be here representing the Pacific Northwest 

international laboratory. 

I actually find myself probably in the perfect chair because I’m 

in vital agreement with the prior two witnesses. 

The beauty of the position I’m in is that I’m kind of being an observer. I’m not really government. I’m not really private sector. 

My exposure to this issue has been through the regional technology abrasion initiative which is supported by the Department of 

Homeland Security, science and technology side. 

The beauty of that program, in my opinion, is that, as you stated 

earlier, it starts from the ground up. 

The purpose was to meet with the people who live with the problems and talk about the challenges before them, and based on their 

expertise and their wisdom, identify the challenges to them. 

That’s the position I’ve been in for the last four years in this region, and it has truly been an honor and a blessing, and I’ve 

learned a lot in the process. 

One of the things that was keyed up in that process was that 

prevention and preparedness was a key element in this region. 

A lot of money was being put into emergency response, but prevention was one of the pieces that wasn’t as keenly reenforced. 

The law enforcement in the region stepped up and said, ‘‘We 

need to doing something about that,’’ and regionally they decided 

to go ahead and move forward with the regional community intel 

center. 

I’ve had the opportunity to continue to participate in that. 

One of the challenges with a regional intel fusion center or a fusion center at a state level is that partnership between law enforcement, and we’ve all talked about trust, but also that relationship 

with industry. 

The partnership with industry—I really don’t need to talk much 

about that. It’s clearly beneficial. It’s clearly important. The challenge though is who do you bring into the room, what’s that company that you bring into the room, and then what’s their obligation 

and liability. 

What appeared to me through this process is that NWWARN actually is a phenomenal vehicle, wasn’t created for this reason, but 

it provides, as Matt indicated, that trust in network, the vetted 

partnerships, the vetted participation, a secure portal, all of which 

allow connectivity within the infrastructure and between them and 

law enforcement, if this is connected to a fusion center. 

The beauty is that industry doesn’t have to sit inside the fusion 

center. 

All of the things that they would through NWWARN that they 

can do, and that information that can be piped into the fusion center, and literally run the background—you can run information systems over the top of that, you can identify commonalities, you can 

identify correlation, and as you find those needles in the haystack, 

you can then investigate those and, as appropriate, feed back 

through the same channel information that’s relevant to industry 

or that sector so that they can take the necessary action to both 

be prepared and prevent issues in their infrastructure, so everybody is tuned in, everybody’s advised, everybody is aware, without 

50 

having to deal with the political issues, and without struggling 

with the timely issues. 

The intelligence is great if it’s timely. It doesn’t do anybody any 

good if it’s not. 

This process allows that all to occur in real-time. It provides a 

two-way flowing of information. It doesn’t create problems with security. It doesn’t disappear and everybody is vetted in the system. 

The trust is there. 

One of the other things that’s really, really powerful about this, 

in my opinion, is that it is absolutely scale. You can do it in a small 

jurisdiction. You can use the same mechanisms that you would in 

a very large jurisdiction. 

It provides the opportunity for you then to connect fusion centers 

to fusion centers and create a network across the country that is 

truly robust. 

With that, I would like to thank you and would be delighted to 

answer any questions. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, Mr. Stein. 

[The statement of Mr. Stein follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF STEVEN L. STEIN

Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity 

to share some of my views on information sharing between state and local law enforcement and the private sector. 

Introduction 

In 2004 Pacific Northwest National Laboratory was asked by the Department of 

Homeland Security, Science and Technology to lead the Regional Technology Integration Initiative (RTII) for the Seattle Urban Area. In leading this effort I have 

had the pleasure and honor of working with hundreds of professionals in the public 

and private sectors who are committed to public safety and the protection of their 

communities. The first phase of this program was to work with the public safety 

sector and private sector to identify the major technology gaps that if met, would 

significantly improve regional preparedness for major disasters whether natural or 

human induced. One of the key findings of this program was that the Seattle Urban 

Area Emergency Management Planners should direct more resources into prevention. Regional law enforcement used this platform to pursue the development of a 

Regional Fusion Intelligence Center that would focus on intelligence lead, community policing. This effort is being coordinated with the state intelligence fusion center. 

Regional Intelligence Fusion Center 

At its origin the Regional Intelligence Fusion Center was conceived as a partnership. Regional law enforcement recognized that their focus on jurisdictional priorities and boundaries was self limiting. They also recognized that resource limitations resulted in suboptimal intelligence capability. The fundamental question then 

was how do you improve your operations and get the desired results without a significant and sustained increase in resources? The answer is to partner. 

The vision for this partnership is that it will be a multi-jurisdictional and multidisciplinary organization with representatives from state, local, federal and tribal 

partners, all working toward common objectives. At a minimum, it will include the 

regional intelligence groups in Pierce, Kitsap, King, and Snohomish Counties, the 

intelligence operation in the Seattle Police Department, and local industry. Federal 

law enforcement agencies and the Washington State Fusion Intelligence Center are 

also envisioned as partners as is the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Public 

Health, Fire, Utilities, and the private sector. 

Without leadership, an articulation of the challenges that need to be overcome, 

and a critical mass of supporters to articulate and improve the concept, this partnership would never have moved forward. Although there are, and will continue to be 

numerous challenges I would like to focus my remarks on information sharing with 

the public/private sector. 

The Northwest Warning, Alert & Response Network (NWWARN) 

51 

The benefits of information sharing between the public and private sector are well 

recognized. The challenge for any Regional Intelligence Fusion Center is not how 

to build the partnership with the private sector but rather, who should that partnership be with and what kind of information should be shared? The attributes of an 

ideal solution include: • Trusted network of public/private sector representatives by infrastructure element 

• Vetting of participating members so only qualifying individuals are allowed 

to participate 

• Defined roles and responsibilities for private sector members • Secure communication portal for information sharing 

The Northwest Warning, Alert & Response Network (NWWARN) has all these attributes making it a very attractive solution to the challenge of information sharing 

between the public/private sector and law enforcement. The NWWARN was established as a pilot project of the Department of Homeland Security’s Homeland Security Information Network—Critical Infrastructure. NWWARN, a collaborative effort 

between government and private sector partners within Washington State, has as 

its goal, to maximize real-time sharing of situational information and provide immediate distribution of intelligence to those in the field who need to act upon it. Information sharing occurs through a secure web portal and within each infrastructure 

element. Members are vetted by knowledgeable individuals within each infrastructure element, ensuring the formation of trusted network. 

Although initially established to allow infrastructure elements to communicate 

with one another in an emergency, NWWARN became an effective information sharing vehicle for a range of issues. Establishing an information sharing partnership 

between NWWARN and the Regional Fusion Intelligence Center would not change 

the purpose or operation of NWWARN. Rather, it enables regional law enforcement 

to collect and analyze the information NWWARN members provide to each other on 

a daily basis. If law enforcement analysis reveals patterns or suggests heightened 

awareness, law enforcement can use the NWWARN network and secure portal to 

immediately share appropriate information with the potentially affected infrastructure elements. 

Conclusion 

As I mentioned at the beginning, it is a pleasure and an honor to be able to work 

with the law enforcement organizations in the region. The vision for a Regional Intelligence Fusion Center in the Seattle Urban Area is moving toward reality. The 

existence of the NWWARN offers an ideal conduit to enable information sharing between the public/private partners and regional law enforcement. 

Ms. HARMAN. Mr. Stevenson. 

STATEMENT OF RICHARD H. STEVENSON, PRESIDENT AND 

COO, CLISE PROPERTIES, INC. 

Mr. STEVENSON. Thank you, Madam Chair and committee members. 

Good afternoon. I’ll be brief. It’s Friday afternoon. 

My name is Richard Stevenson. I’m president and chief operating 

officer of Clise Properties, Inc., a 120-year old commercial real estate company with approximately 3 million square feet of commercial space, mostly located in the downtown core of Seattle. 

I’m also a past chair of BOMA, building owners and managers 

association of Seattle and King County, current board member of 

the downtown Seattle association, board member of the housing resources group and also the downtown emergency services center. 

I’ve managed commercial property and commercial real estate 

companies in the Seattle area for approximately 27 years. 

Generally speaking, during that time I believe that those of us 

in the industry have formed a very strong relationship with local 

law enforcement and specifically with that of the Seattle police department. 

My first real professional interaction with SPD was in or around 

1991 when businesses located on 1st Avenue near the Pike Place 

52 

Market formed a business improvement area for the purposes of 

managing street issues: Cleaning, pan handling, et cetera. 

The then west precinct commander, Captain Clark Kimerer, 

agreed to a formal interaction between our security patrols and the 

west precinct for the purposes of communicating issues common to 

the business improvement area’s goals and that of Seattle’s downtown west precinct. 

This, at the time, was very bold and innovative thinking. 

Since that time we’ve had a close working relationship with the 

police department as it relates to emergency response, sharing of 

information, and oftentimes on a street level having individual officers have access to the buildings for purposes of surveillance, occasional access to restrooms for bicycle police, and other operational 

issues. 

I’m here today in front of you because it’s my feeling that with 

regard to homeland security, we would prefer to see their efforts 

and resources used to bolster local law enforcement on our behalf 

as opposed to standing alone in potentially duplicate service. 

We would hope that in local law enforcement and homeland security there would be a type of communication between entities needed to provide us with intelligence, financial resources, manpower, 

and technology to provide safety for our downtown commercial office buildings and the vitally of the urban core as a whole. 

What I mean by this is that I believe the local law enforcement, 

including our relationships with ATF, FBI, and others, have provided us a strong and reliable core, and then I think their efforts 

should be furthered buttressed by a federal homeland security 

funding for vital infrastructure improvements that are mutually 

agreed upon by the various parties. 

It would seem to be a mistake for Homeland Security or any 

other governmental agency to go it alone in Seattle when it could 

act as a valuable supporting team member for an existing and 

functional local private relationship. 

The excellent relationship between the downtown business community and the Seattle police department has been the result of 

years of collaboration on the real world challenges. 

We worked together for many years at ground level. Our relationships have been tested and retested over time. 

The key to our success has been a thorough understanding of our 

respective roles and responsibilities. 

The private sector does not want to take on the role of law enforcement. We want to be informed, consulted, and provided timely 

warnings. In return we will lend our support and assistance to law 

enforcement as they perform their duties. 

We have valuable information and insights into the strengths 

and vulnerabilities of the buildings we own and manage, and are 

at the table when public safety and homeland security priorities 

are debated by our elected officials. 

I have every confidence that Chief Kerlikowske and Deputy Chief 

Kimerer will give me the information we need if threats are identified, and I believe that they are confident that Clise Properties and 

our colleagues in the downtown business community will do everything that is in their power to assist the police department. 

53 

This has been a model relationship, and it is only possible at the 

local level because of our frequent and ongoing interaction in the 

course of our daily business. 

Thank you. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you very much. 

[The statement of Mr. Stevenson follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF RICHARD STEVENSON

Good afternoon. My name is Richard Stevenson. I am president and chief operating officer of Clise Properties, Inc., a 120 year old commercial real estate company, 

with approximately 3 million square feet of commercial space, mostly located in the 

downtown core in Seattle. 

I am also a past chair of the Building Owners and Managers Association of Seattle and King County and a current Board member of the Downtown Seattle Association, Housing Resources Group, and the Downtown Emergency Services Center. 

I have managed commercial property and commercial real estate companies in the 

Seattle area for approximately 27 years. Generally speaking, during that time, I believe that those of us in the industry have formed a very strong relationship with 

local law enforcement and specifically with those of the Seattle Police Department. 

My first real professional interaction with SPD was in or around 1991 when businesses located on First Avenue, near Pike Place Market, formed a Business Improvement Area for the purposes of managing street issues, including cleaning, panhandling. The then West Precinct Commander, Capt. Clark Kimerer, agreed to a 

formal interaction between rented security patrols and the West Precinct for the 

purposes of communicating issues common to the business improvement area’s goals 

and that of the Seattle’s downtown West Precinct. This, at the time, was very bold 

and innovative thinking. Since that time, we have had a close working relationship 

with the Police Department as it relates to emergency response, sharing of information, and often times on a street level, having individual officers having access to 

buildings for the purposes of surveillance, occasionally access to restrooms to bicycle 

police, and other operational issues. 

I am here today in front of you because it is my feeling that with regard to Homeland Security, we would prefer to see their efforts and resources used to bolster local 

law enforcement on our behalf as opposed to stand alone and potentially duplicate 

services. We would hope that between local law enforcement and Homeland Security 

there would be the type of communication between entities needed to provide us 

with intelligence, financial resources, manpower, and technology to provide safety 

for our downtown commercial office buildings and the vitality of the urban core as 

a whole. 

What I mean by this is that I believe local law enforcement including their relationships with ATF, FBI and others have provided us a strong and reliable core and 

I think their efforts should be further buttressed by a federal homeland security 

funding for vital infrastructure improvements that are mutually agreed upon by the 

various parties. It would seem to me a mistake for Homeland Security, or any other 

governmental agency to go it alone in Seattle when it could act as valuable support 

and a team member for an existing and functional local public private relationship. 

The excellent relationship between the downtown business community and the Seattle Police Department has been the result of years of collaboration on real world 

challenges. We worked together for many years at ground level, and our relationships have been tested and retested over time. The key to our success has been a 

thorough understanding of our respective roles and responsibilities. The private sector does not want to take on the role of law enforcement. We want to be informed, 

consulted and provided timely warnings. In return, we lend our support and assistance to law enforcement as they perform their duties. We have valuable information 

and insights into the strengths and vulnerabilities of the buildings we own and 

manage, and are at the table when public safety and homeland security priorities 

are debated by our elected officials. I have every confidence that Chief Kerlikowske 

and Deputy Chief Kimerer will give me the information we need if threats are identified, and I believe they are confident that Clise Properties and our colleagues in 

the downtown business community will do everything within their power to cooperate and assist the police department This has been a model relationship, and is only 

possible at the local level because of our frequent and ongoing interaction in the 

course of our daily business. 

Ms. HARMAN. The last two of you finished in less than two minutes. I commend you. You get the gold star. 

54 

As I mentioned, your testimony will be inserted in the record in 

full, and each of us will now ask you five minutes worth of questions. 

I’ll recognize myself first. 

Mr. Hovel, you mentioned the Fort Dix issue when, I think, it 

was six would-be terrorists were apprehended recently in New Jersey and charged with plans for a major attack on Fort Dix. 

As I recall, the first notice to law enforcement came from a—I 

think it was a video store fellow who—or a camera store fellow who 

was asked to do something with a video that these fellows had prepared, and that video obviously contained material that was very 

alarming. 

This obviously illustrates a point you’ve all made, which is that 

the private sector has a lot to contribute here, not just to keeping 

its own facilities safe if it gets the right information but keeping 

the rest of us safe. 

Had that plot not been foiled, obviously there possibly could have 

been a major attack on a U.S. military base. 

I just observe that. 

If you have anything to say about that, please do, but I really 

want to ask a different question. 

Mr. Morrison, your testimony was extremely depressing. 

I have said for years that the dirtiest four-letter word in government is spelled T-U-R-F, turf, and I think that for some reason, 

maybe it’s the water we drink, people instinctively protect power 

and draw perimeters around themselves—it sounds like instinctive 

animal behavior—and block out others. 

What are the best ways to overcome turf instincts? 

Do we have to legislate and force people to be different? Is there 

some management technique? Do we need different people? 

What is it going to take to overcome turf? 

Mr. MORRISON. Madam Chair, that’s a pretty tough question. 

I think that certainly if—in the local and regional sense it’s quite 

possible to do. 

In terms of the dysfunctionality of DHS, I don’t know. 

I mean, I just—anyway, it’s amazing to me. 

In our pandemic, we’re trying to do a comprehensive regional 

pandemic plan and HHS has theirs and DHS has theirs, and 

there’s—I mean, it’s amazing. 

Ms. HARMAN. Is it easier at a local and regional level because 

people know each other, live closer to each other. 

Mr. MORRISON. Definitely. 

Ms. HARMAN. There’s common geography? What are the clues. 

I’m sure there are some people here, of course nobody in this 

room, who are pretty protective of their own power structure and 

block out others, right? 

Mr. MORRISON. Right. 

Ms. HARMAN. No one in this room, certainly not my colleagues. 

It escapes me. I am very frustrated. 

I have been personally involved in the legislation to create the 

Department of Homeland Security, which I agree has enormous organizational issues, and to reform our intelligence community, 

which is still a work in progress, and the instinct is to build bureaucracies and enact procedures that aren’t—that keep data in 

55 

one place and systems that are duplicative and all the things 

you’ve all been testifying to and our first panel has too, but I think 

we need a better approach. 

Legislation by itself doesn’t work. Good people try very hard, and 

that doesn’t work. The problems are identified over and over, and 

that doesn’t work. 

Does anyone else have some ideas? 

Mr. Stein? 

Mr. STEIN. I don’t want to get myself in trouble. 

It’s leadership. 

I mean, there’s lots of things obviously, but my observation in 

this community is the reason it works is because of the leadership. 

The people that were here before at the earlier panel, those gentlemen tell the people that they’re working with what their objectives are, what their goals are, and they walk their talk. 

They re-enforce those behaviors with their peers and with their 

subordinates. 

That leadership translates down. 

Now, at the lower levels, it’s far from perfect, but the message 

is loud and clear, and as a result you get a lot more cooperation 

and collaboration, and I am in that kind of unique position of not 

being in any of the camps, so I kind of see it in a different way. 

This is where I’ll get myself in trouble. In DHS, the question I 

would ask is: Do you have the right leadership in the context of 

people who see that bigger issue, that bigger objective, and are 

really willing to walk the talk to achieve those goals? 

I can’t answer it, but the observations are what you can make. 

Ms. HARMAN. My time has just expired. 

Does anyone else have a comment? 

Okay. Well, I would just agree with you that any of these laws 

and any of these departments, whatever their legal basis is, are in 

my view about 50 percent structure and 50 percent leadership, and 

I do think leadership is critical. 

It was an ancient Chinese philosopher, Lao Tzu, who said the 

more power you give away, the more power you have, and it seems 

to me certainly the people in Washington have never heard of Lao 

Tzu. 

Let me now yield to five minutes for questions to the ranking 

member, Sheriff Reichert. 

Mr. REICHERT. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Well, turf wars—I’ve started in the sheriff’s office in 1972, and 

there have been turf battles since 1972 and still today. 

It’s the human nature, I guess, that we live with, but it does take 

leadership. 

We had a team of leaders sitting before of us earlier and we have 

a team of leaders sitting before us right now, so we know in this 

community we have the makings of great programs, of great systems because we have people here who are interested and who are 

willing to work together. 

So my first question goes to Mr. Hovel and Mr. Stevenson. 

Your two companies, is it unique to your companies, the connection and the involvement and the interaction that you have with 

your local police departments and this interconnection with not just 

addressing local crime but the whole concept of homeland security 

56 

or are you reaching out too to other companies and building that 

platform to make it even stronger? 

Mr. HOVEL. Mr. Congressman, we have done all of those things 

and in the process of reaching out to many other companies. 

Obviously not all of them have the luxury of being able to participate at the level and in the manner that we are, but that being 

said, because we have that capability, we are not going to let the 

opportunity pass either, but there are many ways, as I mentioned 

one of in my prepared remarks, concerning the virtual network, 

that will go a long way to allowing those who really have an interest in participating but otherwise don’t have the means or the logistics to do so to become an integral partner in this entire effort. 

Mr. STEVENSON. You know, it was mentioned earlier—in fact, 

Chief Kerlikowske mentioned that one of the outcomes was the police association, and I think that that is a perfect example of one 

of the things we’ve been able to do locally is have business leaders, 

downtown Seattle association, other groups, get together, work for 

the police foundation, raise money. 

We saw a real need. 

I mean, bicycle policemen in Seattle didn’t have BlackBerrys, and 

so they would stop somebody on the street and couldn’t really figure out what to do with them, other than call a squad car and I 

guess run them downtown, and we got together the money, we got 

the BlackBerrys. 

We had this very close working relationship because it’s very mutually beneficial to us and it’s the right thing to do, and I think 

we do it because we’re stakeholders and we’ve got skin in the 

game, and I think they do it because they’re great people and it’s 

their job and their career and they’re excellent at it, and it seems 

to me that the previous question that Chairwoman Harmon had 

was ‘‘Why doesn’t it work,’’ and I would suggest that maybe not everybody has enough skin in the game. 

Mr. REICHERT. Well, I would think too that not only do you attract other businesses but you are also, in assisting the police department, the sheriff’s office, and other police departments, that 

you have the ability then to reach out to the various diverse communities that exist around your businesses and the employees that 

you have within the businesses and get them involved, and it really 

goes back to, and the chief well knows this concept, of community 

policing. 

It really has had to step up to the next level to have an impact 

on, again, that overarching concept of homeland security. 

Are either of you—I should have ask the chief this. I’m sure he 

is. Is anyone in this panel aware of the Muslim public affairs council? 

So we’re involved in that effort in bringing that community together and reaching out and further educating our community? 

Good, good. I am glad to hear that. I wasn’t quite sure. 

To get back to Matt, it’s good to see you. You too, Steve. 

On the issue of the HSIN critical infrastructure, you testified it’s 

closed down, and by who? 

Mr. MORRISON. By the department. 

They transformed it to— 

Mr. REICHERT. By Homeland Security. 

57 

Mr. MORRISON. HSIN CS, which is critical sectors, which is a 

stove-piped, one direction only communications system, and it 

doesn’t work for what we have in mind. 

Mr. REICHERT. I have no further questions. 

I yield. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Dicks is now recognized for five minutes. 

Mr. DICKS. Let’s stay on that subject again. 

Now, P–N–W–E–R, PNWER, is your big organization, multistate, 

and you’re the leader of that operation, right? 

Mr. MORRISON. I’m just the executive director. The governors— 

Mr. DICKS. Who created NWWARN? 

Mr. MORRISON. That was a joint effort between the Seattle FBI, 

PNWER, and our stakeholder group. 

Mr. DICKS. So it’s separate from your organization— 

Mr. MORRISON. DHS, FBI, and we petitioned to DHS at the time 

to be a— 

Mr. DICKS. And at first they brought you into the fold, right. 

Mr. MORRISON. That’s right. This was 2000— 

Mr. DICKS. And this was based on the Dallas, TX emergency response network, ERN, which was largely a law enforcement focused model out of the Dallas FBI. 

Mr. MORRISON. Right. 

Mr. DICKS. And it was after much delay, isn’t that correct, that 

DHS agreed to let you be part of the new model, which became 

known as HSIN critical infrastructure or HISN CI. 

Did this letter that went out to the 2,000 people that were involved in this operation, did you know they were going to go out 

or did they just all of a sudden everybody gets this letter saying 

this is being disbanded? 

Mr. MORRISON. That’s right. 

Mr. DICKS. Is that how it worked. 

Mr. MORRISON. That’s how it worked. 

Mr. DICKS. Why did they do it? 

Mr. MORRISON. I have no idea. 

Mr. DICKS. Have you talked to any of them. 

Mr. MORRISON. Yeah, I mean, we have. 

It was a turf battle going on between FBI and DHS, even though 

they’re both DHS, but it— 

Mr. DICKS. You know what I would have done? I would have 

called my congressman or your senator or somebody and asked for 

some help. 

Could you do that? Have you asked anybody to help you? 

Mr. MORRISON. Oh, yeah. 

I mean, we have, but maybe not as effectively as we could have. 

Mr. DICKS. I think these—like your Blue Cascade things, I think 

those—I think we should be holding you up as the model for what 

a regional entity ought to be doing. 

I mean, cyber systems, earthquake preparedness, pandemics, 

these are the kinds of things we need to be doing, a possible attack 

on BPA assets—those are the four, aren’t they? 

Mr. MORRISON. Yes. 

Mr. DICKS. I mean, I would think that the federal government 

would think this is what a regional group should be doing. 

58 

I am really taken aback by this, that this—when did this happen? 

When did these 2,000 letters go out? 

Mr. MCKAY. It was March 21. 

Mr. DICKS. I am certainly, as a member of this committee, I’m 

going to bring up the DHS people and get an explanation for this, 

and any information you can give me about the whole thing, I 

would appreciate it because I don’t think this is right, and I certainly want to find out why they did this. 

I think—I think you’re right, the sector idea, the chemical industry, all of these various industry groups, and they’re supposed to 

come up with industry recommendations. That’s been going very tediously as well, by the way. That hasn’t been an example of moving 

out and getting something done, is it? 

I mean, have you— 

Mr. MORRISON. The secretary announced this week that the sector specific plans are now released, six months late, but they are 

out this week. 

Mr. DICKS. Has anybody had a chance to look at them? Are they 

any good. 

Mr. MORRISON. Well— 

Mr. DICKS. See I like—sector specific, I like the idea of a regional 

approach because that way you know—you’ve got all the various 

institutions in that region that are effected, and I would love to 

have some of the information on your Blue Cascade, these four exercises that you did, because I think those are where you really 

learn where the vulnerabilities are and what the problems are, and 

if you could get that to us, I would definitely—I’m sure our committee would like to have that to take a look at. 

Mr. MORRISON. We would love to testify in Washington about 

them, but I think for me it was with General Lowenberg one time 

who said, ‘‘DOD told me all the vulnerabilities in Washington state. 

DHS told—you know, in five days, but something is in the top five 

was on neither list, and I wouldn’t know about it if I wasn’t at the 

blue Cascades exercise.’’ 

Mr. DICKS. Yeah. One of the things that he found out about the 

cyber security issue, right, wasn’t that it. 

Mr. MORRISON. I’m not going to say anything— 

Mr. DICKS. That was the one, I believe. 

You know, when they first came out, when Homeland Security 

first came out with their critical infrastructure in the state of 

Washington, do you know what two businesses were not on the 

list? Boeing and Microsoft. 

I mean, can you imagine having a list—I took one look at this 

list, and I just said, ‘‘I mean, this cannot be true,’’ and it was true. 

I don’t know. They had a number of recreational places and 

things like that, but they didn’t have Boeing and Microsoft on the 

list of critical infrastructure in the state of Washington, and we got 

that straightened out, and—I just—we’ve got to do better, and I appreciate all your testimony today and the work that you’re all 

doing, and we’ll—all of us here on a bipartisan basis, we all work 

together. This is about finding some answers. 

We’re going to help you try to find some answers on these issues. 

Thank you. 

59 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, Mr. Dicks. 

I want to thank the witnesses for your valuable testimony. 

The lively discussion obviously keys off of what you had to tell 

us. Some of it was very depressing. Some of it is inspiring us to 

action. 

You have in these two members people who want to fix these 

problems and are obviously very proud of their home state, as they 

should be. 

I would just mention to Mr. Dicks, and I think he knows this, 

that a lot of the information about critical infrastructure is classified, and there’s a place where I actually think it ought to be classified. 

We don’t need to be telling the bad guys what our major 

vulnerabilities are, but we surely do need to get proper lists that 

reflect the activities of states. 

There was a very foolish list for a long time that had golf 

courses—not that golf courses aren’t important, but I don’t think 

even golfers would claim—well, my husband would claim that 

they’re critical infrastructure, but seriously, I think those lists do 

need to be kept classified, but I think your point is very well taken 

that we have to integrate the list. 

We can’t have more stove-pipes—again, that seems to be our 

tendency to have all these separated reports. 

If I were Michael Chertoff, I would perhaps be inspired, after 

hearing this information, to try to infuse his department with more 

coordination and more of a shared mission than it has. 

Mr. DICKS. Madam Chairman, they’re not helping us very much. 

Ms. HARMAN. And something that we have just decided to do is 

sit down privately with him and go over our top ten list—some of 

those top ten have just come out of this hearing—of things that we 

think he needs to work on, and rather than making it 

confrontational, we’ll just have it be a conversation, and maybe 

that is a key to getting some of this fixed. 

Surely he doesn’t bring all of this turf consciousness to his job. 

It’s in the woodwork and it was in the woodwork of the 22 different 

agencies we thought—we in Congress decided we could put into one 

organization on a quick basis, so that is a problem. 

Mr. Reichert has asked me to thank the mayor of the City of 

Bellevue. 

I think I recognized him at the beginning of the hearing, but I 

would like to thank him again for making this facility available, 

and just say to all of you that you are a model, and Mr. Dicks is 

right that we need to bottle you in some fashion and make sure 

that the good work you’ve done here is encouraged and nurtured 

and spread around the country. 

It does occur to me that places that are well organized, like 

Washington state and the Los Angeles county area, have a lot to 

teach the rest of the country. 

We’re not exactly the same as other parts of the country, but in 

terms of coordination in difficult circumstances, we are a very good 

model, and best practices matter. 

We’re spending a lot of money on this. I’m sure we could spend 

more, but we need to spend it wiser than we do. 

60 

Let me just finally say that something else that was not mentioned today that is critically important to fix is interoperable communications, and I worry a lot that should we have another major 

terrorist incident, and I believe we could have one at any time, we 

might have the same meltdown that we had in New York and 

Washington again in some community or some set of communities 

around the country, so there’s a lot of work to do. 

All three of us care a lot about this, and I would like to ask both 

members if they have any concluding remarks, starting with Mr. 

Reichert. 

Mr. REICHERT. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

I just want to end on a real positive note in honor of our dear 

friend Norm. 

We have talked a lot about turf wars. Norm recognized those. He 

and I talked a lot about those as well as most of you in this room 

had the opportunity to work with Norm, but he had two favorite 

things that he would always share with people, and maybe some 

of you in this room even heard him say these words to you. 

One was if he would come to you and ask you how you were 

doing, and you said, ‘‘You know, I’m doing okay, Norm,’’ he would 

say, ‘‘You know what, we need to move ahead today with a smile 

on our face and an optimistic spirit,’’ so we can do that when it 

comes to these problems. 

The second thing, Norm would come to me and now and then we 

would visit and talk, and I remember one day a really challenging 

issue in the sheriff’s office, and I told him I had this challenge 

ahead of me, and he said, ‘‘You know, Dave, there’s no such thing 

as a challenge, only opportunities,’’ so today we have opportunities, 

and we’ve got a great team. 

We really have some great opportunities to do some great things 

and be true leaders here in our region, so I thank all of you for all 

the hard work that you do to keep our community safe. 

I thank the chairwoman for holding this hearing in our district, 

and I again thank Norm for all of his hard work on behalf of our 

country and our community. 

Thank you. 

Ms. HARMAN. Norm. 

Mr. DICKS. Thank you Jane for coming up and being here today 

with us, and Congressman Reichert and I have been working on 

this. 

Last Congress, the Congressman was chairman, and I told him 

that he got to be chairman in his first term and it only took me 

16 to become chairman, so— 

Ms. HARMAN. Some people are slower than others. 

Mr. DICKS. It took me a long time, but we’re there, but again I 

want to thank all of you and especially General Lowenberg who 

has been right there at the start of this whole thing, and we want 

to try to help you find some solutions to these opportunities, as 

Congressman Reichert said, and I would just say also that Norm 

Maleng was a friend of mine as well, and we were in law school 

about the same time, and he also worked for Senator Magnuson. 

That may not be well remembered, but he was on the staff of the 

Senate commerce committee. 

61 

The senator picked probably one of the outstanding students 

each year—actually it was the faculty that picked—to send back for 

this one-year opportunity to work on the Commerce committee, and 

Norm Maleng was one of those that was selected, and we all admired his career and as the prosecuting attorney in King County 

for so many years, and so many important things that he accomplished, and we’re going to miss him, so thank you. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, and finally let me thank the bipartisan 

staff of the Homeland Security Committee. 

This hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 2:58 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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