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COAST GUARD MISSION BALANCE 

(113–2) 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

COAST GUARD AND MARITIME TRANSPORTATION 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON 

TRANSPORTATION AND 

INFRASTRUCTURE 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

FEBRUARY 26, 2013 

Printed for the use of the 

Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure 

( 

Available online at: http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/browse/ 

committee.action?chamber=house&committee=transportation 

(II) 

COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE 

BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania, Chairman 

DON YOUNG, Alaska 

THOMAS E. PETRI, Wisconsin 

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina 

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee, 

Vice Chair 

JOHN L. MICA, Florida 

FRANK A. LOBIONDO, New Jersey 

GARY G. MILLER, California 

SAM GRAVES, Missouri 

SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West Virginia 

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan 

DUNCAN HUNTER, California 

ERIC A. ‘‘RICK’’ CRAWFORD, Arkansas 

LOU BARLETTA, Pennsylvania 

BLAKE FARENTHOLD, Texas 

LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana 

BOB GIBBS, Ohio 

PATRICK MEEHAN, Pennsylvania 

RICHARD L. HANNA, New York 

DANIEL WEBSTER, Florida 

STEVE SOUTHERLAND, II, Florida 

JEFF DENHAM, California 

REID J. RIBBLE, Wisconsin 

THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky 

STEVE DAINES, Montana 

TOM RICE, South Carolina 

MARKWAYNE MULLIN, Oklahoma 

ROGER WILLIAMS, Texas 

TREY RADEL, Florida 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania 

RODNEY DAVIS, Illinois 

VACANCY 

NICK J. RAHALL, II, West Virginia 

PETER A. DEFAZIO, Oregon 

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of 

Columbia 

JERROLD NADLER, New York 

CORRINE BROWN, Florida 

EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas 

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland 

RICK LARSEN, Washington 

MICHAEL E. CAPUANO, Massachusetts 

TIMOTHY H. BISHOP, New York 

MICHAEL H. MICHAUD, Maine 

GRACE F. NAPOLITANO, California 

DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois 

TIMOTHY J. WALZ, Minnesota 

STEVE COHEN, Tennessee 

ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey 

DONNA F. EDWARDS, Maryland 

JOHN GARAMENDI, California 

ANDRE ́ CARSON, Indiana 

JANICE HAHN, California 

RICHARD M. NOLAN, Minnesota 

ANN KIRKPATRICK, Arizona 

DINA TITUS, Nevada 

SEAN PATRICK MALONEY, New York 

ELIZABETH H. ESTY, Connecticut 

LOIS FRANKEL, Florida 

CHERI BUSTOS, Illinois 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON COAST GUARD AND MARITIME TRANSPORTATION

DUNCAN HUNTER, California, Chairman 

DON YOUNG, Alaska 

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina 

FRANK A. LOBIONDO, New Jersey 

PATRICK MEEHAN, Pennsylvania 

STEVE SOUTHERLAND, II, Florida, 

Vice Chair 

TOM RICE, South Carolina 

TREY RADEL, Florida 

VACANCY 

BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania (Ex Officio) 

JOHN GARAMENDI, California 

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland 

CORRINE BROWN, Florida 

RICK LARSEN, Washington 

TIMOTHY H. BISHOP, New York 

JANICE HAHN, California 

LOIS FRANKEL, Florida 

NICK J. RAHALL, II, West Virginia 

(Ex Officio) 

(III) 

CONTENTS Page 

Summary of Subject Matter .................................................................................... iv 

TESTIMONY 

Vice Admiral Peter V. Neffenger, Deputy Commandant for Operations, U.S. 

Coast Guard .......................................................................................................... 3 

PREPARED STATEMENTS AND ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS FOR THE 

RECORD SUBMITTED BY WITNESSES 

Vice Admiral Peter V. Neffenger: 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 29 

Answers to questions from the following Representatives: 

Hon. John Garamendi, of California ........................................................ 33 

Hon. Rick Larsen, of Washington ............................................................ 43 

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD 

U.S. Coast Guard’s inserts for the record: 

Student diversity at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy .................................... 19 

Status of the U.S. Coast Guard’s business case analysis of the cost 

of reactivating the Polar Sea icebreaker ..................................................... 20 

U.S. Coast Guard’s fiscal year 2013 Response Boat-Medium acquisition 

plans ............................................................................................................... 21 

U.S. Coast Guard’s budgetary reductions under sequestration .................... 24 

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(1) 

COAST GUARD MISSION BALANCE 

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2013 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON COAST GUARD AND

MARITIME TRANSPORTATION, 

COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE, 

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:03 a.m. in Room 

2165, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Duncan Hunter (Chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Mr. HUNTER. The subcommittee will come to order. The subcommittee is meeting this morning to review how the Coast Guard 

allocates its assets and personnel to carry out each of its 11 statutory missions, as well as the challenges the Service faces in performing its missions and measuring its performance. 

This is my first hearing as chairman of the subcommittee, and 

Congressman Garamendi’s first hearing as the subcommittee’s 

ranking member. And I look forward to working with him and with 

the Coast Guard and the 113th Congress. Very honored to have 

this subcommittee, worked really hard to get it. I would like to 

thank the staff, too, for all the work they have already put in, and 

just giving me information up to this point. 

Under section 2 of title 14 of—the Coast Guard is responsible for 

a wide range of missions, from search and rescue, icebreaking, and 

marine environmental protection, to port security and drug interdiction. The Coast Guard uses a strategic planning process which 

determines mission priorities based on risk, and helps guide the 

Service in allocating resources among its statutory missions. 

I know Admiral Neffenger is very familiar with this process from 

his prior job as director of strategic management and doctrine, and 

I look forward to hearing from him on how that process works. 

As the Nation’s primary maritime response organization, the 

Coast Guard often must surge assets and personnel to respond to 

a hurricane, oil spill, or other national or international emergencies. In 2005, the Service surged hundreds of assets, including 

40 percent of its helicopter fleet and over 5,000 personnel to the 

gulf coast to respond to Hurricane Katrina, saving over 32,000 

lives. 

In April 2010, the Service moved over 150 assets and 7,500 personnel to the gulf coast to lead response efforts to the Deepwater 

Horizon oil spill. The Coast Guard is also tasked with preventing 

maritime accidents, keeping our borders secure, and protecting our 

ports and waterways. 

2 

In fiscal year 2011, the Service conducted over 19,000 safety, security, and environmental inspections of U.S.- and foreign-flagged 

vessels, and interdicted over 2,400 undocumented migrants and 93 

metric tons of illegal drugs. That is why this subcommittee wants 

to ensure the Service retains its core competencies and acquires the 

assets needed for its response missions and day-to-day prevention 

work. 

One of the best ways to gauge the Coast Guard’s capability to 

carry out its missions is to review mission performance data. In 

2011, the Service used 23 different performance measures to track 

its success in meeting its missions goals. The Service stated that 

it met or exceeded 14 of 23 of its performance measures. 

In December 2012 the DHS inspector general released its annual 

review of Coast Guard mission performance objectives for fiscal 

year 2011. The report indicated the Coast Guard’s total number of 

mission resource hours, the number of flight hours for aircraft and 

underway hours for boats and cutters had fallen by 12 percent over 

the last 5 fiscal years. The inspector general largely attributed the 

reduction in patrol hours to the fact that the Coast Guard’s fleets 

of aircraft and vessels are no longer reliable, having surpassed 

their service lives and become increasingly prone to failures. 

A Representative of southern California, I am particularly concerned about the Service’s ability to secure our borders against illegal drugs and migrants, and maintain its defense readiness. As the 

new chairman of the subcommittee, I look forward to working 

closely with the Coast Guard and my colleagues to get new assets 

operating as quickly as possible, and to find other ways to improve 

readiness and enhance mission performance in a cost-effective 

manner. 

I thank Admiral Neffenger for appearing today and I look forward to his testimony. With that I yield to Ranking Member 

Garamendi. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. Congratulations on the chairmanship of this committee, a very important 

one in my mind, and certainly for all of the Nation. 

I want to also—as fellow Californians, we both realize that very 

few Federal agencies are as important as the United States Coast 

Guard. We also recognize that our maritime economy contributes 

almost $649 billion annually to the U.S. gross domestic product, 

and more than 13 million jobs, and remains a key resource for the 

prosperity of all of the American economy, not least of which are 

the rice producers and farmers in my district that rely upon the exports. And the Coast Guard has a lot to do with that. 

In the congressional district that I represent we have the beginning of San Francisco Bay, and one of the most busy of all the service sectors for the Coast Guard’s search and rescue. Sector San 

Francisco also maintains critical aids to navigation that link the 

ports and the communities: Sacramento, San Joaquin Ports, the 

Stockton Port, the Delta, and of course, the Bay, itself. This vital 

activity helps to ensure safe and reliable maritime transportation. 

And I do like Coast Guard Station Rio Vista, right on the Sacramento River. Also, we have the Port of Oakland, the Nation’s 

fourth busiest container port, and the Concord Naval Weapons Station, one of five designated strategic sea ports in California. 

3 

As we export to the world, I hope this committee will also look 

into ways the Coast Guard can increase its commitment to American manufacturing. The Coast Guard creates jobs by protecting 

our waterways and our ports. They can also create jobs by implementing a stronger Buy America policy, using our limited taxpayer 

dollars to make sure that we buy goods and equipment that the 

Coast Guard needs from companies that manufacture here in the 

United States. 

It is no understatement to say the Coast Guard is indispensable. 

It is hard to actually imagine the smooth functioning of the maritime transportation system without a ready and able Coast Guard. 

Yet, here we are, Mr. Chairman, virtually days away from seeing 

indiscriminate cuts imposed by the sequestration, cuts that are 

clearly going to reduce the Coast Guard’s mission, perhaps by as 

much as 20 percent. And no one seems really able—at least here 

in Congress—to find a solution to this very serious problem. 

I want to commend you, Mr. Chairman, for scheduling this morning’s hearing on how the Coast Guard can maintain a balance 

across its 11 statutory missions. All of those missions are important. Not one of them should be subject to the arbitrary cuts that 

are coming down. However, they will be in just 4 days. Whether 

it is catastrophic oil spills, illegal narcotics, as you said, Mr. Chairman, the interdiction of illegal entry and human trafficking, all of 

those things are important. But all of those things are going to be 

impacted. 

So, what are we going to do? Well, we are going to hear from Admiral Neffenger. And then I hope we get about dealing with this 

sequestration in a balanced and sensible way, so that the Coast 

Guard can go about protecting our citizens and protecting our maritime economy. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank the ranking member. I look forward to 

working with you over the next term. 

Our witness today is Coast Guard VADM Peter Neffenger, Deputy Commandant for Operations. Admiral, you are recognized for 

your statement. 

TESTIMONY OF VICE ADMIRAL PETER NEFFENGER, DEPUTY 

COMMANDANT FOR OPERATIONS, UNITED STATES COAST 

GUARD 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning 

and good morning to you, Mr. Chairman and distinguished members of this subcommittee. I thank you for the opportunity to testify 

today on U.S. Coast Guard mission balance and allocation of operational resources. I have a written statement for the record, and 

will make brief opening comments. 

As you know, the primary mission of the United States Coast 

Guard is to ensure the safety, the security, and the stewardship of 

United States waters. Our oceans, our coasts, rivers, and great 

lakes are the lifeblood of the United States economy, with some 95 

percent of all trade traveling by water. Our waters also provide a 

foundation for research, recreation, and advances in technology. 

The Coast Guard’s service objective is to balance missions such 

that limited resources are applied to highest risks and threats. The 

models we use are adaptive, with success predicated upon our comVerDate Aug 31 2005 11:55 Jan 06, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00013 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\HEARINGS\113\CG\2-26-1~1\79555.TXT JEAN
4 

plementary suite of authorities, capabilities, competencies, and 

partnerships. 

We are at all times an arms service, a Federal law enforcement 

agency, and a member of the intelligence community. This is a 

unique construct in the Nation and in the world. It allows us to 

govern the maritime environment and to contend with a challenging array of maritime risks to people, cargo, conveyances, our 

ports, and our waters. Our adaptability ensures that we address 

existing risks, as well as those that evolve over time. 

In the Arctic, for example, there is a new ocean opening. Summer 

sea ice has diminished, and the region is becoming increasingly accessible to new and expanding activities. Resource extraction, cargo 

transhipment and adventure tourism are but three areas in which 

we are seeing increased activity. And these require maritime governance, and the Coast Guard has responsibility for this in U.S. 

waters. 

In the drug transit zones of the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific, we are attacking illicit networks with layered defenses of our 

own. It takes a network to defeat these networks, and we are working strategically and operationally with Federal, State, and international partners to address threats long before they reach our 

physical borders. 

The Coast Guard exercises its authorities through a core strategic framework: prevent and respond. We strive at all times to 

prevent bad things from happening: loss of life at sea, vessel casualties, smuggling of people and drugs, and the like. 

Our marine safety program, for example, establishes and enforces standards for construction, along with standards for safe and 

secure operation or commercial vessels and the ports in which they 

operate. This includes a credentialing of mariners. We seek to prevent casualties at sea, and ensure the security of ships operating 

in our waters through oversight, engagement, and investigation. 

However, we have to always be ready to respond when necessary. 

And, as we sit here, there are air crews, boat crews, strike teams, 

and others ready to respond to search and rescue cases, homeland 

security incidents, and other missions such as environmental response, all on a moment’s notice. 

I would also like to emphasize the value that partnerships bring 

to this prevent-and-respond strategy. We leverage Federal, State, 

local, tribal, international, and other partnerships to improve our 

operational effectiveness through depth, reach, and capacity that 

others bring to our toolbox. 

During my time in command of the Great Lakes region, the operations there, we partnered very closely and regularly with Canada 

on search and rescue and other missions. Depending upon location 

and nature of distress, these operations often involved U.S. Coast 

Guard ships and helicopters, operating together with their Canadian counterparts. It takes a team approach to meet the missions 

that we have, and partnerships are critical to their success. 

Coast Guard sectors administer our authorities, capabilities, and 

partnerships on the frontlines in our ports, along our coasts, and 

in our inland waterways. As commander of Sector Los AngelesLong Beach from 2003 to 2006, I applied this prevent-respond 

5 

strategy every day to our missions. I focused my finite resources 

against my highest risks. 

With the support of the administration and the Congress, the 

Coast Guard has made important strides towards improving our 

capability. We’ve acquired new National Security Cutters, Response Boats-Medium, Fast Response Cutters, Ocean Sentry Maritime Patrol Aircraft, and the Rescue 21 communications distress 

system, along with system upgrades to existing assets. These acquisitions enhance the Coast Guard’s ability to operate in offshore, 

coastal, and inland waters with improved speed, more capable sensors, and better coverage, all underpinned by greater reliability and 

safety. 

But our missions are conducted by Coast Guard men and women 

who are heroic and courageous in the face of sometimes unimaginable situations of extreme weather, unforgiving threats, and limited time to react. So I would like to close with a story about one 

of our people. 

During the early morning hours of December 2, 2012, in the waters off southern California, SCPO Terrell Horne was leading a 

small boarding party to investigate a vessel suspected of smuggling 

drugs. SCPO Horne and his crew had just launched from an 87- 

foot patrol boat. It was dark, and they didn’t know what they 

might encounter as they approached. 

They saw a panga-type large, open boat with a number of highhorsepower outboards. They came alongside. The suspect vessel 

suddenly increased speed, maneuvered directly at our small boat 

and its boarding team, and rammed it. SCPO Horne saw what was 

happening, moved forward to pull one of his crew out of harm’s 

way. He was thrown from the boat, injured severely, and did not 

survive. He leaves behind a wife and children, but will always be 

remembered as a hero in our ranks. 

Now, that case is personal for me. His small boat was deployed 

from the 87-foot patrol boat USCGC Halibut, which was under my 

command, while serving as sector commander in Los Angeles and 

Long Beach. I know firsthand that night operations are exceptionally challenging. With limited visibility, rolling seas, and complex 

threats, our crews must be confident, proficient, and agile. And we 

need to provide them with the best equipment we can. The risks 

they face are real, and they deserve our best efforts. So, as the 

Deputy Commandant for Operations, I think about that every day. 

I thank you for the opportunity to testify today. I thank you for 

your interest in the Coast Guard, and your continued support. And 

I look forward to your questions. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank you, Admiral, for your testimony. Before we 

get started asking questions here, I would like to recognize an honored guest, the chairman of the full committee, Mr. Shuster. 

Mr. SHUSTER. Well, thank you, Mr. Hunter, Chairman Hunter. 

I appreciate you recognizing me. I will be brief. Thank you and 

Congressman Garamendi for holding this important oversight hearing. That is one of the most important roles we have as Congress, 

is to make sure we have aggressive oversight. 

And I appreciate your being here today, Admiral, and your testimony. And I guess you are in a unique position, as being the 

former director of strategic management. You planned this, now 

6 

you are operations, you are actually implementing it. So you get to 

grade yourself on how you are doing. 

But it is extremely important, what you are doing, tracing the 

history back to the Coast Guard, back to 1789 and that first—those 

lighthouses we built. And, in fact, the first earmark, the first congressionally directed funding was a lighthouse up in what is now 

Maine but was Massachusetts. So we would like to figure out how 

we can get back to Congress directing more of those funds to important projects. 

But again, what you do in preventing accidents, making sure the 

system works efficiently, is extremely important to the commerce 

of the United States. And we want to make sure that we are supportive of you, but we also want to make sure that the Coast Guard 

is doing the right thing when they are allocating resources and 

having a balanced mission out there. And since 9/11 I know you 

have grown significantly, especially in your security that you provide at our ports, and then the waters of the United States. 

So again, I look forward to working with you, and I appreciate 

the fact that Chairman Hunter and the Ranking Member 

Garamendi are having this hearing today. So thank you very much. 

I yield back. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank the chairman. OK, so let’s get started. We 

are going to recognize Members for questions, starting with myself. 

And to touch on what the chairman just said, over the last decade 

the Coast Guard, post 9/11, has greatly expanded its mission, mostly in the security arena. You have added additional responsibilities, 

because you have had to respond and be able to respond to emergent threats. 

So the question is, how has that changed you? And has it taken 

away from your other missions? Because your budget has gone up 

as well, but your needs in ships and in recapitalization has also 

gone up as well. So your missions have gone up, your budget has 

gone up. But has the budget been commensurate with the amount 

of stuff you have had to do, and that you have had piled on you, 

as well as the recapitalization of your ship fleet? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think that you 

are right, that our mission set has expanded considerably over the 

past decade. And—but so has the, I think, the ability of the Coast 

Guard to both understand how to approach that mission set and 

to structure itself accordingly for that. 

I mentioned that we have a primary mission to ensure the safety, 

the security, and the stewardship of U.S. waters. And by stewardship, I mean both the environmental piece as well as the management of the waters, the maritime transportation system itself, because that is under our responsibility, as well. And in looking at 

that overarching mission, and all of those submissions that we 

have, search and rescue, maritime law enforcement, drug interdiction and the like, all of that plays into that overarching mission. 

So I think my point in that is it allows us to look holistically at 

our missions. I know that there is a designation in statute that determines Homeland versus non-Homeland missions. But, from our 

perspective, all of our missions are tied to that overarching fundamental purpose for safety, security, and stewardship. 

7 

To do that, we have had to do some reorganization. As you know, 

prior to 9/11 we had a different organizational construct for our 

shore forces, for example. We had marine safety offices, which were 

fundamentally responsible for commercial vessel oversight, oversight of the activities of facilities that receive those vessels. We had 

what we called group offices, which were fundamentally responsible for operating our small boats and our patrol boats in pursuit 

of law enforcement—near-coastal law enforcement missions, as well 

as search-and-rescue missions. And then we had our—of course, 

our offshore patrol forces in the form of our large cutters and our 

aircraft. 

Since the 9/11, since the formation of the Department of Homeland Security, we have reorganized those forces into sectors. And 

our sector commands now really incorporate all of our authorities 

under a single operational commander. So, as sector commander for 

the Ports of Los Angeles—actually, for southern California—my 

area of responsibility was for the Monterey County line in the 

north down to the San Diego County line, so about 300 miles of 

coast, and it had a commensurate offshore piece to it, as well. My 

task every day was to look across this broad suite of authorities 

that we have that really give us the ability to address any threat, 

risk, or hazard in the maritime environment, and apply my resources effectively, whether that was a search and rescue mission 

or an oil spill or a potential terrorist attack. 

So, I think that the way I would—so the general answer to that 

is that we have changed dramatically. We have had to—we have 

increased the number of resources we apply to it. I will tell you, 

as a former operational commander, you can never have enough resources to do the things you do. We have a very large operating 

area, and we will likely always have limited resources. But we are 

also well aware of the fiscal constraints that we all face. 

Mr. HUNTER. So let me get more specific, then. Because you have 

heard the saying—I think it was Sun Tzu—if you plan for everything, then you plan for nothing. Right? So you can’t prioritize everything the same. So if you have 11 statutory missions, with the 

entrance of Homeland Security 10 years ago or 12 years now as 

being one of the primary missions of the Coast Guard, and your integral role in Homeland Security, what have you had to give up? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. I guess I would say it is not so much that 

we have given up missions, but we have had to prioritize the work 

that we do. Clearly, search and rescue will always be a top priority 

for us. Someone is in distress on the water, we will do everything 

we can to find that individual or individuals and rescue them. 

Security of this Nation is a top priority, always will be, and we 

need to do whatever we can to ensure that our harbors, our ports, 

our waterways are secure, that we understand the potential 

threats that might face us, and so forth, and that we construct appropriate strategies to combat those threats and to reduce risk in 

our ports. 

The—but I will tell you that there are things that sometimes 

have to be changed with respect to how we operate. The good news 

is that we can leverage a lot of partnerships to help us. So, for example, in our oversight responsibilities for commercial vessel inspection and commercial vessel certification. We have worked with 

8 

classification societies such as ABS and others to conduct some of 

these inspections and oversight responsibilities on our behalf, while 

still conducting the periodic oversight of those agencies that do that 

for us. We have also looked to leverage capability in our ports and 

waterways that local agencies bring to the table for us, and they 

can conduct operations and patrols for us, as well. 

What we have done strategically is to look at the range of missions that we face, the relative priorities of those missions with respect to safety of life, security of this Nation, and then we have 

looked to see who else out there can assist us in operating. So we 

are much better at interoperating with others now than we ever 

were before. We have much more established partnerships. We 

work together in much more seamless ways in our waters. 

Mr. HUNTER. Let me ask you this, Admiral, then I am going to 

pass it on to Mr. Garamendi. You talked about search and rescue 

being your number one priority, as it is, right? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. 

Mr. HUNTER. Life and vessel out there on the water. Coast 

Guard reported that in fiscal year 2011 it did not meet its two 

search-and-rescue mission performance goals. The Coast Guard 

only saved 77 percent of individuals in imminent danger, and not 

the goal of 100 percent. Obviously, it is 100 percent. And the Service was only on the scene of a distress call within 2 hours 93 percent of the time, instead of the goal of 100 percent. 

So, with this in mind, and that being your number one priority, 

are your performance goals that you currently use realistic? And do 

they accurately reflect mission performance? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Well, those—as you know, sir, those performance goals are really designed to measure the outcome, or the 

ability of us to make a difference to the American public, not just 

the measure of our activity. 

The goal we set for rescuing people in distress is admittedly a 

large goal. We would like to rescue every single person in distress 

on the water. That is where the 100 percent come from. I think it 

would be unrealistic and unfair to the American public to suggest 

that we were striving for anything else. But we can’t rescue everyone in distress. There are times when people will die. There are 

times when people will be lost at sea and we won’t be able to find 

them. It doesn’t mean that we look to save every single one of 

them. We don’t look to see whether there is—— 

Mr. HUNTER. Admiral, I understand that. And if I could, a 77 is 

a C+. So my question isn’t that—not that the Coast Guard is not 

trying to do its job. Is the—are your metrics realistic metrics? Because if you are getting a C+ at your number one priority and the 

thing that you put most of your energy and resources into, you are 

still passing. But are the metrics correct? Because you could probably measure your performance in other ways that would reflect 

differently and probably up your score a little bit, I would guess. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. And there was a time when we set 

a lower standard. But let me explain. Maybe it is useful to take a 

moment to talk about how these metrics are used. 

There is really two ways in which you can measure performance. 

You can look at individual cases to determine did—for example, 

let’s say we have a rescue at sea and it wasn’t successful. The first 

9 

thing you ask, is there something that the Coast Guard did that 

made it not successful? So there is an individual outcome measure. 

Did we do the things that we should have done? Did we act in accordance with our—with known tactics, techniques, and procedures? And did we do so in a way that resulted in a successful 

prosecution of the case? That is an important measure, and those 

are measures that we take. Those aren’t captured here. 

This measure is really designed to ask, are our strategies with 

respect to—our operational strategies with respect to how we approach our missions, are they adequate for the missions that we 

are conducting? So when we say that we only met 70 percent of our 

goal, 77 percent of our goal to save lives in distress, it doesn’t necessarily mean that we failed at saving lives in distress. As I said, 

sometimes there is just no way you are going to save somebody. By 

the time you are notified, they are already gone. Or they are lost 

at sea in a way that makes it impossible to find them. 

But what it does tell someone like me to do is to look at whether 

or not there are systems we can put in place that would have obviated the need for that person to get lost in the first place. Rescue 

21 is such a system. That system has allowed us to know more 

about where people are than ever before. Automatic identification 

system. 

So I don’t know if that helps to explain it, but the 77 percent 

number is really a target for me, and a series of questions that I 

need to ask about the overarching strategy. And it doesn’t really 

tell me whether our people are performing adequately. That I 

measure on a case-by-case basis. It tells me whether I am performing adequately in providing my operational forces with the 

strategies and the policies and/or the prevention activities in advance of a case that they might need. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank you, Admiral. I have taken enough time. Mr. 

Garamendi is recognized. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Well, let’s see. 

March 1st is coming, and sequestration along with it. It is my understanding that the Coast Guard is going to be significantly affected by sequestration. Some $340 million will be reduced from 

your 2013 budget. That is below the 2012 budget level. This is 

about a 5-percent cut, as I understand it, but it does result, presumably, in a 21-percent reduction in operations, except for training and for readiness for search and rescue. 

In light of these pending cuts, what are your plans to be able to 

preserve the ability of the Coast Guard to meet the highest priority 

mission requirements? And also, considering the cascading impact 

that these reductions will have on the Coast Guard’s readiness and 

capabilities, how will the Coast Guard revise its performance measures to reflect the reality of sequestration? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Well, sequestration—any time you take a 

cut of any magnitude this far into the fiscal year, it is challenging. 

As you know, most of our expenses are in our people and in the 

operating hours, the cost it is to operate our vessels and aircraft. 

So there are some challenges associated with absorbing that level 

of reduction. I will—and I know that the—our Secretary has recently testified to the Senate Appropriations Committee on the 

10 

overarching impacts of those cuts and some of the high-level effects 

that that will have. 

We are still in the process of determining what some of the very 

detailed cuts are, should the sequestration order be issued this 

week. But our goal is to ensure that we have our frontline forces 

at all times ready to respond to emergency, whether that is a 

search-and-rescue case, or any other contingency that may happen, 

a natural or a man-made disaster. And, of course, any terrorist 

events. 

We are also ensuring that we have frontline forces in place in 

those areas of risks that we know are of ongoing concern, whether 

that is the transit zones in the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific, 

or migrant interdiction. 

The—with respect to our performance targets, we don’t intend to 

reduce our performance targets, we simply intend to report whether or not—you know, what the impact this may or may not have 

had upon our ability to meet those targets. So I think that that will 

be a more realistic way—certainly more useful for me to determine, 

because our performance targets are set to some extent—well, they 

are set with respect to the risks and the threats, keeping in mind 

the available assets to apply to those. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. Well, it then appears that there—is there going 

to be a 20-percent—21-percent reduction in the operations of the 

cutters, other boats, as well as the aircraft? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. There will be a reduction to our operations 

budget. I know that the Secretary testified that it could be as much 

as 25 percent. What we are trying to do is determine whether a sequestration order would allow us to alter somewhat the types of 

cuts that we make. 

I will tell you that we are—again, we are committed to—I am 

committed to ensuring that we have frontline resources at all times 

ready to respond. But there will be an impact to our ability to operate with a reduction. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. Will those impacts be in the search-and-rescue 

area, or in the prevention area? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. We will not reduce our ability to respond 

to search-and-rescue cases or to contingencies and emergencies. We 

at all times have to be ready to meet the Nation’s demand in that 

respect. 

We will look across our other activities to determine whether we 

can postpone, alter, or otherwise delay the other types of activities 

we will do. We will look at things like maintenance, deferring 

maintenance on our vessels, and doing other temporary measures 

to extend our budget through the rest of the fiscal year. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. Thank you very much. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank the ranking member. And Mr. LoBiondo is 

now recognized. 

Mr. LOBIONDO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Admiral, thank you. A little bit different to be sitting here after 

a number of years, but it feels good. Chairman Hunter, congratulations. 

Admiral, I would like to consider myself one of the biggest cheerleaders of the Coast Guard and partner with the Coast Guard. But 

also when questions come up, sometimes tough questions—and in 

11 

this budget environment, and that is—we are talking about priorities and a lot of things of how we should handle it. 

I have been made aware that over the last couple of years the 

Coast Guard has been, on a fairly regular basis, sending Government employees to Paris, France, to attend weeklong meetings involving representatives from five small countries to discuss the regulation of marine pilotage. 

I also understand that the Coast Guard has been a driving force 

in organizing these gatherings, and is largely responsible for ensuring these small gatherings continue to be held regularly. 

I would hope that you would tell me my information is wrong, 

and this is not the case. But if it is, I am really confused as to why 

the Coast Guard is so invested in this issue when the law is clear. 

With the limited exception of the Great Lakes, pilotage in the 

United States is regulated by State and local authorities. And I 

just can’t understand why the Coast Guard is spending these vitally scarce funds to regularly send Government employees to Paris 

for a week at a time to meet with a handful of small countries on 

an issue that is not the primary responsibility of the Coast Guard. 

Can you help me out here? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. I think I can, and I think I can 

put you in a more comfortable place, with respect to the issue you 

bring up. 

I will start by saying we have sent one individual to France for 

a 31⁄2-day meeting once each in the past year. So it has been one 

individual from the United States Coast Guard. It has been out of 

our Great Lakes pilotage authority office. As you know, the Coast 

Guard is a pilotage authority itself. We regulate pilotage on the 

Great Lakes. We set their work hours, we set the rates, and we do 

so in concert with Canada, because it is a jointly used waterway. 

We have also been subject to a number of recommendations over 

the years from the National Transportation Safety Board with respect to pilotage, both our own regulation of pilotage as well as our 

oversight of pilotage authorities in the form of our licensing and so 

forth of Federal pilots. And some of those regulations have suggested that there is a need for greater information sharing among 

pilotage authorities for best practice—learning best practices. 

So, the purpose of attending this conference—and it is not one 

that the Coast Guard organizes, although we participate in it—the 

purpose of attending it is to—really, to share best practices with 

other pilotage authorities. It is an international body. It is the only 

body of its type in the world in which you can have those kinds of 

interactions. It is very similar to the kinds of work we do through 

the International Maritime Organization, the International Association of Lighthouse Authorities, and the like. 

So, I would put it in the category of understanding best practices, 

understanding what standards exist elsewhere in the world. And to 

your point on overseas travel, we are absolutely aware of the responsibility we have to husband our taxpayer dollars carefully. As 

I said, it is one individual that has attended this. 

It is likely not going to happen this year, particularly if we are 

under a sequestration order, because we have cut back on all of our 

travel. But I believe that it is a reasonable use of that time, and 

we get good information out of that. And it helps us to be better 

12 

at our pilotage on the Great Lakes. So I hope that is responsive to 

your question, sir. 

Mr. LOBIONDO. Well, it helps. 

But I have to tell you that I am concerned that with such limited 

Coast Guard oversight, shall we say, of pilots just to being the 

Great Lakes, and you being stretched so thin in so many areas, 

that is just something that I can’t connect the dots with in my 

head. I mean we all want to get best practices, but it is not like 

you are dealing with the whole United States of America. We are 

only dealing with the Great Lakes here. And I know that we want 

to be the best that we can be, but I don’t—to my recollection, there 

haven’t been any real problems. So I would hope you would take 

a close look at this. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. We will. 

Mr. LOBIONDO. Thank you. Yield back, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank the former chairman of this committee. And 

I would like to recognize Ms. Hahn for 5 minutes. 

Ms. HAHN. Thank you. And thank you, Chairman Hunter, Ranking Member Garamendi, for convening this hearing focusing on our 

Coast Guard mission balance and capabilities. I really want to 

thank my friend, VADM Peter Neffenger, who has been my friend 

since he was captain of the port in Los Angeles during the time 

that I was on the city council in Los Angeles. Thanks for being here 

today and for providing your testimony. 

Statutory mission of the Coast Guard play a critical role in protecting our Nation. From drug interdiction to defense readiness to 

port security, Coast Guard is our best asset to counter the many 

threats that we face on the domestic and international waters. 

Same time, our Coast Guard is facing emerging threats that require modern and innovative strategies in order to remain effective. 

For instance, as you talked about, the rising use of panga boats 

not only risk pouring tons of illegal drugs and weapons into our 

country, but also threaten the safety of our Coast Guardsmen, as 

you talked about. The tragic loss of SCPO Horne, I attended his 

memorial service and was very moved and very saddened at the 

family that he leaves behind. I think the only silver lining to that 

tragic event was maybe for a brief moment Americans began to understand what the Coast Guard actually does, and the risk that 

they take personally every time they go out to protect our waters. 

You know, since 9/11 we have focused in this country on our Nation’s ports of entry in beefing up the security. Most of the attention, in my opinion, has gone to focusing on our airports and less 

on our Nation’s seaports. I represent the largest port in the country, the Port of Los Angeles. And I still think we have vulnerable 

entryways into this country through our ports. 

Without giving away any secrets to those who would do us harm, 

are you able to tell this subcommittee what you think is some of 

our biggest vulnerabilities that currently exist in our ports and 

maritime security? And should Congress be focusing more on these 

gaps in security? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Thank you, Congresswoman. And thank 

you for your thoughts about SCPO Horne. I know it meant a lot 

to his family to have you out there. 

13 

With respect to our ports, as you know, much of that, with respect to vulnerabilities, is in the classified realm. And I am always 

happy to come back to the committee and brief you in a classified 

setting as to the specifics with respect to that. But let me speak 

in very high levels. 

The very thing that makes our ports so powerful in their—in the 

economic engine that they provide to this country is their openness. 

And that openness is the very thing that argues against security 

and safety. So it is—there is a balance there, with respect to our 

ports. You can’t lock them down in the same way that you can lock 

down an airport and expect to move the kinds of volumes that we 

move through there. 

During the time that I was in Los Angeles and Long Beach, I 

think there was a combined total of about 13,000 actual containers 

a day coming into the port, not to mention those that were being 

moved around, and the like. That is a lot of containers. And if you 

tried to lock that all down, it would be challenging. 

So, how do you determine, you know, what is the—how to protect 

a port? Well, it starts by looking—getting—really, gathering experts together to think about the ways in which a port has to operate. That may sound like a fairly straightforward question, but it 

is a challenging question to answer, if you think about what makes 

a port efficient, and then you look at the ways in which that efficiency can be damaged or is vulnerable. 

And so, we spent a fair amount of time—this is a continuous 

process—where we look at the vulnerabilities in a port. And 

vulnerabilities can be to any type of thing that you might think 

about, whether it is a small boat type attack or some other type 

of incident. And again, I am talking in the intentional category 

here of somebody trying to do damage. And you look at how those 

vulnerabilities rank in terms of the consequence that there might 

be to the port if something were to happen. 

So, some things could happen that would have very little impact 

on the operation of the port. There may be a psychological effect, 

but it wouldn’t put the port out of business. Some things could happen that could put the port out of business for some extended period of time. So that, by definition, starts to force a rank order of 

those vulnerabilities, and it creates some priorities for us. 

And then we try to determine what the potential threats are, you 

know, who—what might an adversary try to do? And so, ultimately 

you come up with an equation that leads to a risk that you might 

have in the port. And that equation starts with: What do I think 

the threat might be? What are the vulnerabilities that those 

threats might try to exploit? And what is the consequence of that 

happening? 

Now, the threat is the independent variable. We don’t really 

know what might happen. And we know that there is intent, and 

we have seen examples of what people can do around the world, 

but we don’t necessarily have any specific threat information. So 

we game that out. And we game that out against our 

vulnerabilities, and we game it out against the things that we do 

to try to protect the ports. And in doing we determine to go back 

to Mr.—Chairman Hunter’s question about our measures, we set 

measures that try—that use our existing tactics and techniques 

14 

and procedures and strategies, and then we take those scenarios 

and we game them against those. And sometimes we find in our 

scenarios that we fail, and then we have to change our tactics and 

techniques. 

So, what I would say is that we know a lot more about the security of our ports, about the vulnerability of our ports, about how 

those vulnerabilities can lead to unpleasant and difficult consequences for us to deal with. We know less about actual threats, 

a lot about intent. And we can game out a number of potential scenarios. 

And we have done a great deal to coordinate amongst all the various agencies responsible for security and safety in our ports. 

I think that is a high-level view of it. What I would be happy to 

do is do some more detailed briefings in a closed setting for some 

specifics that we have discovered in particular ports, as well. 

Ms. HAHN. Thank you. I know my time is up but, Chairman 

Hunter, I would love it if you would consider reconvening this in 

a classified setting so we could hear more specifics about the 

threats to our Nation’s ports. I think this subcommittee would be 

the perfect place to hear those facts. 

Mr. HUNTER. Sounds like a great recommendation to me. We will 

take it up. 

Mr. Southerland is recognized. 

Mr. SOUTHERLAND. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And, Admiral, 

thank you for appearing before us today. I am new to the committee, so I may ask you some questions that may seem pretty 

basic to you, but just to give me some education. 

I understand that the topic of sequestration seems to be on 

everybody’s lips, and we are hearing—you know, I have heard you 

mention today that cuts up to 20 percent, perhaps, give or take. Of 

those—of the percentage of those cuts, I mean, how much of those 

cuts will be done at the administrative level, as opposed to, you 

know, right there where the operations are taking place? How 

much upstream in offices will those cuts be administered to? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Well, our plan is to move as much upstream as possible. The last place that I will go for cuts is our 

frontline operations. And so I think I already mentioned in response to Mr. LoBiondo’s question that we are—we will cut our 

nonoperational travel almost completely. There is very little other 

travel that we do. 

There are certain things that you still have to do, but we are cutting administrative overhead to the extent possible, we are reducing nonessential operational activities, and that would—when I say 

nonessential, it doesn’t mean that you don’t have to do them eventually—— 

Mr. SOUTHERLAND. I get it. 

Admiral NEFFENGER [continuing]. But nonessential from the 

standpoint of deferring maintenance, deferring activities that 

would inspect vessels, deferring other types of activities. 

Mr. SOUTHERLAND. So it sounds like you are very unique, compared to some of the rhetoric we have been hearing as far as food 

inspectors and the like, because that is the frontline. It seems to 

me that if you equate your philosophy, it is a stark contrast to 

15 

some of the things that we are hearing coming from other departments. 

So, if you, in fact, implement the cuts in a commonsense approach as you just outlined, first of all, I want to commend you. It 

is refreshing. Because we are hearing just the opposite of that in 

other departments if we go into sequestration. 

And I want to say this as a small business owner and I had not— 

you and I just met. You know, I had not had a background in political service or elected office before. Our family had small businesses. I just want everyone to know that across America today 

small businesses take 15 to 20 percent cuts every year as standard 

operating procedure over the last 4 to 5 years. And so I have to say 

that we find a way to make it happen. We don’t have any choice. 

And so, you know, I know these are difficult to do. 

I am pleased by your presentation and the way that you seem— 

the reasonable way that you seem to go after things. But I think 

to make cuts farther away is important. 

I wanted to ask you another question. The Service reports that 

funding dictated by—or, excuse me, dedicated by mission on an annual basis, and the DHS inspector general annually reviews the 

number of patrol and flight hours dedicated to each mission. The 

IG reported that the total number of patrol and flight hours have 

decreased by nearly 12 percent over the last 5 fiscal years. What 

are the main reasons for this? And what is the Service doing to reverse this trend? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. The primary reason for that reduction is 

the age of our assets and the increasing unreliability of those assets. So as our cutters and aircraft have aged, they suffer increasing casualties. Clearly these are not expected. And those casualties 

tend to be more and more consequential in their nature. 

So, instead of just the—a small part failing, now you have an entire system failing on a vessel. With the average age of our cutter 

fleet—some are above—some are between 40 and 50 years—it is 

not possible to keep them running at the same efficiency that they 

were once before. And, as I mentioned before, when you have to 

defer maintenance in order to meet certain fiscal targets, then that 

only compounds the problem. So, that is the primary reason. 

What have we done to address that? Well, we have been working 

for some time now with the assistance of the Congress and the support of the administration to recapitalize the major assets of the 

Coast Guard: our cutters, our aircraft, our small boats, and the 

like. I will tell you that we are thankful for the amount of recapitalization that we have had so far. And we are bringing on board 

quite a new—a number of new assets from our small boat fleet, all 

the way up into our major cutter fleet. 

We recognize the challenges of doing this in constrained fiscal 

environments, but we know that if we don’t recapitalize, we will 

continue to have more and more of these casualties, and continue 

to fail to meet the operational hour targets that we have. 

Mr. SOUTHERLAND. Admiral, thank you. I see my time has expired. And I just appreciate your service and that of the Coast 

Guard, especially in my area, living on the Gulf of Mexico. I appreciate it, and I yield back. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank the gentleman. Ms. Frankel is recognized. 

16 

Ms. FRANKEL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for this opportunity. 

And thank you, Vice Admiral, for your service and your colleagues. 

Just to let you know, my father was in the Coast Guard. And I still 

actually have one of his uniforms hanging at home. 

So, I didn’t have the exact—I don’t want to withdraw a compliment from you—I didn’t have the exact interpretation of your 

testimony to mean that the sequestration would not hinder your 

operations. But thank you for your efficiencies. 

I represent an area that has two ports, and—which is—and they 

are huge economic drivers. I represent part of south Florida. And 

I would like to know, in your opinion, whether the sequestration 

will—or how it would impact our ports. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Well, again, we are well aware of the vulnerability of our ports. We are also well aware of the need to keep 

them in operation. Fortunately, we have a lot of partners in ports 

these days. We work very closely with them. Everyone is constrained these days, and that is true, and we understand that other 

Federal partners, as well as State partners, are suffering from 

some of the same fiscal constraints that we do, as well. 

But the upside is that over the past 10 years we have put a lot 

of systems in place, a lot of understanding in place, to allow us, in 

a limited fiscal environment, when you have to ultimately reduce 

some of your nonemergency operational capabilities, it lets us know 

where to focus the remaining capabilities that we have to most effect. 

There is always going to be concern when you reduce operational 

budgets this far into a fiscal year. And it poses challenges with respect to how you then allocate the hours that you can afford to operate. But our goal is to make sure we allocate those to our most 

pressing risks and concerns, and that includes our ports, Congresswoman. 

Ms. FRANKEL. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

Mr. HUNTER. There are no more questions on our side, so we will 

go to Mr. Cummings. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much. It is good to see you 

again. 

You know, I was listening to the questions of the gentleman at 

the end. And I want to go back. You know, I don’t—I am trying 

not to get caught up in this sequester thing, but it is a little bit 

more major than I think he described it. 

Having been a chairman of this committee, I know that we have 

already had deferred maintenance. Am I right? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir, you are. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. And how many vessels—I remember when we 

had the Haiti earthquake and we were trying to get to Haiti, and 

we had vessels breaking down. Can you describe that to the gentleman? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. We did have a number of casualties on the 

vessels that we deployed to the Haiti earthquake response. Yes, sir. 

And it put two of those vessels out of commission for—— 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Put two vessels—out of about how many? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. For a period of time. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Out of how many? 

17 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Out of—I don’t have the—I don’t recall the 

exact number—— 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Just make a reasonable guess. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. We had roughly—I think we had three vessels that immediately responded, and two of those suffered engineering casualties during that response. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. And so we have been deferring maintenance 

quite a while, haven’t we? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. We have deferred maintenance. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. And with regard to Deepwater, how are we doing 

with Deepwater? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. The acquisition program? 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Acquisition program. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Actually, I think that we have really done 

quite well in the last few years. As you know, that was originally 

a program that was run by a lead systems integrator, not the Coast 

Guard. Since 2007 we have re-assumed the lead on that acquisition 

program. We no longer call it the Deepwater acquisition program. 

It is really just an acquisition program to replace our major capital 

assets. And—— 

Mr. CUMMINGS. So—I talk about Deepwater all the time in 

speeches. So I guess when I tell people to go to Google, they won’t 

get an update on Deepwater, huh? What do you call it? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. What they will see is they will probably get 

a link to our acquisition programs now, across the board. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. No, I am very proud of the work that we all did, 

this committee did, working with the Coast Guard to make that 

program more efficient and effective. 

As you well know, nearly 10 years ago the Coast Guard was required to bring towing vessels under inspection by the Coast Guard 

and Maritime Transportation Act of 2004. The Coast Guard issued 

a notice of proposed rulemaking in 2011, but has not yet issued a 

final rule. I have asked a number of witnesses in many different 

hearings when a final rule would be issued, and I will continue my 

effort to obtain today, by which towing vessels will begin to be inspected, by asking you the same question. When do you think the 

final rule will be issued? And will towing vessels finally come 

under inspection? 

And I want to incorporate in my question does—I mean I—one 

of the things that we have heard in the past is there is a backlog, 

and sometimes there were personnel problems. Is it reasonable to 

assume that under sequestration that this—it will be even put further on the back burner? If it is still on the back burner. It may 

not be there. But we can’t seem to get a final rule, and I am just 

wondering. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. No, we will not put it on the back burner. 

The good news is that the—over the past few years the Congress 

has been very generous in providing new people for our marine 

safety oversight program, in particular the regulatory component of 

that. As you know, that is a very labor-intensive operation, requires a fair amount of analysis and review in order to meet the 

various requirements that exist before you put potential new regulations on the street that may—that affect an entire industry. 

18 

So, we don’t intend to do that. That—and it doesn’t suffer from 

a backlog. That rulemaking, as you know, sir, is one that involves 

an awful lot of details and affects a large industry that has never 

been inspected before. We have been working very closely with the 

American Waterways Operators, in particular—that is a representative of that towing vessel industry—as well as individual owners 

and operators to ensure that we get the right mix of inspection, 

oversight, and applicability. That makes that a complicated process, by definition. 

So, I recognize your—and appreciate your concern with respect 

to the timing—— 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Let me ask you this before my time runs out. 

If—assuming we get the rule, say, within the next year or so, will 

we have the inspectors, the trained marine inspectors, to inspect? 

As you probably know, in the past we have had a problem with 

people who are even qualified to inspect. And I just wondered. Do 

you—how—what do you foresee for that? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. As you know, as a result of your 

oversight, the oversight of this committee and the assistance of the 

appropriations committees, we have been able to significantly increase the number of inspectors and inspection-related personnel in 

the Coast Guard. So we thank you for that. That has been—and 

that is done under what we call our Marine Safety Enhancement 

Plan, which I think you are familiar with, sir. 

And so, over the past number of years we have added a significant number of new—over 500 new individuals to the marine safety program in that inspections/regulatory world. Some of those individuals are towing vessel inspectors. Not all of those people are 

yet on board, for obvious reasons. We don’t have all those regulations in place yet, and so you want to make sure that you cycle 

them in. But we have created a towing vessel center of expertise, 

we have put people into that towing vessel that have expertise. 

And we developed a plan for going from apprentice to master in the 

inspection trade. 

So I think we are on a good stead. We are concerned about potential, you know, budget impacts in the near future. We don’t intend 

to go after any of those new billets that we have coming on board, 

and we are doing our best to continue to meet the requirements—— 

Mr. CUMMINGS. I see I am out of time. But how are we doing 

with diversity? You know, we made tremendous strides with regard 

to diversity in the Academy. How are we doing there? 

[The Coast Guard submitted the following information for the 

record regarding diversity at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy:] 

19 


Insert offset folio 8 here 79555.008
20 

Mr. HUNTER. The gentleman is out of time. If you wouldn’t mind 

taking this for the record—— 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Yes, but with your permission I just had one 

question. 

Mr. HUNTER. If Mr. Larsen would like to yield to you, he is welcome to. I would like to recognize Mr. Larsen for 5 minutes. 

Mr. LARSEN. Admiral, thanks for coming this morning, and a 

couple of questions. We put together the bill last year and had a 

lot of information there on capital building, acquisition, and procurement. Two things in particular I was working on I want to just 

ask some questions about. 

As you know, one of the Coast Guard’s missions is to provide 

icebreaking services, and including in the Arctic. And so, I wonder 

if the Coast Guard—can you answer if the Coast Guard has looked 

at the impact of these across-the-board spending cuts on the 

timeline for the Coast Guard to design and build new icebreakers 

that are needed in the Arctic? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. We have. We don’t—as you know, the 

President’s budget, the fiscal year 2013 budget, included $8 million 

for survey and design for a new icebreaker. And although that 

budget has not yet been agreed to, what we have done is move forward with preliminary survey and design work. This is work that 

we can do that doesn’t require an appropriated budget to do. This 

is, you know, getting together with those people that we know have 

requirements in the Arctic and determining what initial requirements would be. 

Assuming that the budget request is funded as requested, I don’t 

see it affecting our ability to move forward with a procurement— 

ultimate procurement of a new icebreaker, sir. 

Mr. LARSEN. All right. Well, section 222 of the act that we passed 

requires the Coast Guard as well to complete a business case analysis of the cost of reactivating the Polar Sea icebreaker and options 

to maintain her capabilities. Can you update the committee on how 

the Coast Guard is progressing with that report? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. I know that that report is underway. I 

don’t have the exact date for when that is due, sir. I can—I will 

get that for you, what the projected date is. But I know that we 

are conducting that business case analysis now, to determine what 

the ultimate disposition should be for the—— 

Mr. LARSEN. The sooner that you can at least get back to the 

committee—— 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. 

Mr. LARSEN [continuing]. With an approximate date, that would 

be fine. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. 

[The Coast Guard submitted the following information for the 

record:] 

The CGC Polar Sea Business Case Analysis is underway 

and it is anticipated that the final report will be submitted 

to the committee by September 2013, in accordance with 

the 2012 Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Act, 

Public Law 112–213. 

21 

Mr. LARSEN. If you could. Then on Response Boat-Medium you 

mentioned in your testimony the importance of RBMs as one of the 

new assets. Section 220 of the Act requires the Coast Guard to 

maintain a program of record of 180 boats, unless the Commandant 

submits to this committee documentation justifying a smaller acquisition level. 

Does the Coast Guard plan on completing the program of record 

of 180 for RBM? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. As you know, that is an exceptionally capable vessel. And as we field that vessel and put it into operation, 

we are discovering that it has even greater capability than we had 

planned to receive. So that may allow us to change the program of 

record. 

I will determine where we are with respect to the report to the 

committee, but I think that as we look at that, our general belief 

is that we may not have to go to the full 180-boat buy in order to 

meet our operational requirements. That would provide us with 

some flexibility, with respect to our other acquisitions. But allow 

me to get you a specific answer. 

Mr. LARSEN. Well, please just do that, because the 2012 Act said 

that you will maintain the program of record of 180. That is what 

we said. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. And I know we owe you a discussion before we change that. 

[The Coast Guard submitted the following information for the 

record:] 

The Coast Guard’s FY2013 President’s Budget states ‘‘...in 

FY2013 the Coast Guard will reduce the scope of the RB– 

M acquisition, leveraging FY2012 funding to procure 40 

RB–Ms over FY2012–2013 and close out the project at a 

total of 166 boats’’ (page CG–AC&I–4). 

Mr. LARSEN. Yes, all right. Great. And with that, Mr. Cummings, 

I would yield the remainder of my time to Mr. Cummings. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Well, thank the gentleman. Tell me about how 

we are doing with the Academy. We made great strides a few years 

ago, and they worked with the Navy, and I was very proud of what 

the Coast Guard did. And I just wanted to know whether we are 

continuing that. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. Actually, we have made significant 

strides. I can get you specific numbers for the record, because I 

don’t have them off the top of my head. But this is, I know for a 

fact, the most diverse class the Academy has ever seen. And it is 

also a class with the greatest number of women cadets ever, this 

entering class this past year. And so we thank you for your attention to that and your ongoing concerns in that. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. You know, back—you know, there was a time 

when a lot of arguments were made and they were very insulting 

to me, personally, and I am sure to many people. And when folks 

said that if you made your class more diverse, the standards would 

be going down. That would be class—you know, the SATs would be 

lower, and all that. That has not been the case, has it? 

22 

Admiral NEFFENGER. No, sir. We have not lowered the standards 

for—— 

Mr. CUMMINGS. And I am talking about your classes still have 

high SATs, very high SATs—— 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very—and I really appreciate it, Mr. 

Larsen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank the gentleman. We are going to go through 

another round of questions, and I would like to recognize Mr. 

Southerland again. 

Mr. SOUTHERLAND. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I was not familiar, I wasn’t serving on this committee when you shared the story 

about SCPO Horne. I am curious. It just prompted a question regarding operations. 

When dangerous missions like that, obviously, are being performed, how do you determine what vessels you board? And just— 

and I know this is probably an elementary question, but I am asking. When you go out in the dark of night on the open water, I 

mean, what is the determining factor in boarding a boat? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Well, in this case—so I will speak to this 

specific case, and then general. In this case, this was an intelligence-cued boarding. So there was intelligence that a vessel of 

this type—and when I say panga-type vessel for—just for the benefit of those who may not know what that is, this is an open-style 

boat. In this case, this boat was some 40 feet in length. And these 

are open, and they are really designed to move quickly through the 

water with a load of drugs or a load of—or smuggling people. They 

are just a big open boat with high-horsepower outboards on the 

back, anywhere from one to three outboards, sometimes four outboards. And they typically run up in the dark of night along the 

coast of California, coming up from Central America. 

And so this one, particular one, was we had some intelligence 

that there was a vessel of this type out there. We generally knew 

where to find that vessel. And it resulted in that boarding. And so 

this was a boarding that we suspected this was a bad agent, a bad 

actor, we go prepared to deal with what may be an unsettled situation, in that case. 

In other cases, when we are just out patrolling, we may come 

across—in some senses, everything is intelligence-cued, because we 

know that there are areas where we have greater risk of people 

smuggling drugs and migrants. And so we concentrate our forces 

in those areas. But sometimes it is a concentration of forces that 

then discover activity, not necessarily a specific target to that vessel. And in that case, we may have to go investigate the vessel. So 

you may not know that you have got an actual bad actor, but you 

may want to go take a look at this bad actor. And that may come 

from cuing from aircraft or cuing from human intel on the ground, 

sir. 

Mr. SOUTHERLAND. If the—but as far as—I mean, obviously, if 

you have longliners, boats that are operating, they are businesses 

in open water. And I understand you do inspections of those vessels, and I understand that. The process by which you do that, 

though, is it a—I mean is that a forewarned process, or do they 

23 

know, or does a boat just—you know, do you come up beside them? 

I mean how does that—— 

Admiral NEFFENGER. You know, it depends on the type of activity we are talking about. So fisheries—— 

Mr. SOUTHERLAND. A longliner. I mean—— 

Admiral NEFFENGER. I mean, fisheries, that is a kind of a unique 

situation. We are responsible for enforcing U.S. fisheries laws in 

U.S. waters, as well as we have certain international treaty obligations to ensure that what is called illegal, unreported, or unregulated fishing doesn’t go without notice. 

And so these, a longliner or a—high-seas driftnet fishing is a 

good example. People who are putting these—essentially these killing machines out into the water that can be 50, 60 miles in length, 

and they just indiscriminately pick up marine life, that is illegal 

by definition around the world. 

And so, there are planned inspections, where a vessel knows they 

are going to get inspected, they can expect to be inspected, and 

then there are the routine—or essentially the routine inspections. 

And then there are the unplanned, or nonroutine spot checks, if 

you will. So it could be either. Most times you gain compliance 

through voluntary measures and through regular periodic inspections. And then you do spot checks, just the way any law enforcement agency would do, to ensure that you don’t have a bad actor 

out there. 

Mr. SOUTHERLAND. Thank you very much, and that was just 

from my personal knowledge of how you operate. 

My colleague on the other side alluded to my not understanding 

the seriousness of sequestration and the decommissioning of ships. 

As a small business owner, a three-generation small business that 

my grandfather started, I see decommissioned small businesses all 

over America going out of business. And when a small business run 

by a family, when they have employees that depend on a paycheck, 

when they are put out of business—for a lot of reasons, but clearly 

because of the cost of doing business, and it is estimated that a 

small business with 20 employees has regulatory costs of over 

$10,000 per employee—it gets a little bit difficult to hear some of 

the things that I have heard. 

So, I just want to make it very clear. I understand a lot about 

decommissioning, and in my world, the decommissioning of small 

businesses, because of the cuts and the pressures of having to operate in the current environment, as it relates to sequestration and 

the 2-percent cut. 

So, with that, thank you, Admiral, and I yield back. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank the gentleman. Mr. Garamendi is recognized 

for 5 minutes. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. Thank you, Admiral. I don’t believe you run a 

small business. You run a critical part of the U.S. Government’s effort to maintain commerce and safety. It is not a small business. 

Early on it was described that you might be able to deal with sequestration by dealing with certain administrative and travel cuts. 

Is that the only reduction that you will be facing? Or will you be 

facing reductions in operations such as maintenance, and port inspections, inspections of cruise ships, and the like? 

24 

Admiral NEFFENGER. You know, sir, we are a pretty lean organization to begin with. So there is not a lot of places to go for administrative overhead. We try to ensure that we have as little overhead 

as possible in our organization, and we put our activities to frontline operations. 

So, any cut to operational dollars is obviously going to be a cut 

to certain types of operations. Our goal is to ensure that the most 

important and most critical frontline operations are not affected. So 

we don’t intend to pull any aircraft or vessels offline. We don’t intend to fail to meet our responsibilities for rescuing people in distress and for responding to emergencies. 

But there will be—there will obviously have to be some impacts 

to our other operations. And those impacts are in the form of 

things like additional deferred maintenance, perhaps additional deferred what we might consider nonessential training. And when I 

say ‘‘nonessential training,’’ I mean training that doesn’t directly go 

towards maintaining proficiency in aircraft, cutters, and boats, and 

other such things. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. I would appreciate you delivering to the committee a detailed accounting of changes in operations, maintenance, 

administrative overhead, and other activities as a result of sequestration. Also, sequestration, together with the continuing resolution, has the unfortunate effect—or, depending on where you are 

coming from, the fortunate effect—of changing your baseline to a 

lower level. And I would like to have an accounting, an estimation, 

of what that means, going forward. I suspect it will have some significant impact. 

[The Coast Guard submitted the following information for the 

record:] 

The following table summarizes the Coast Guard’s budgetary reductions under sequestration: 

Account USCG 

Baseline* Sequestered Amount 

Operating Expenses (includes OCO) ............ $3,576 – $195 

Environmental Compliance & Restoration ... $14 – $1 

Reserve Training .......................................... $36 – $2 

Research, Development, Testing & Evaluation ........................................................... $26 – $1 

Acquisition, Construction & Improvement** $1,681 – $85 

Maritime Oil Spill Program .......................... $101 – $5 

Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund ........................ $45 [Included in other totals] 

Boat Safety ................................................... $116 – $6 

Total .................................................... $5,595 – $295 

* Data reflects the Office of Management and Budget’s Report to the Congress on 

the Joint Committee Sequestration for FY2013 provided to Congress on 3/1/2013, and 

are based on FY2012 enacted funding levels (excluding exempt funding). 

25 

** Reflects FY2013 AC&I Hurricane Sandy Disaster Supplemental funding ($274M) 

and associated reduction. 

Under sequestration, reductions will require the Coast 

Guard to curtail air and surface operations by approximately 25 percent below planned levels, affecting maritime 

safety and security across almost all mission areas. This 

means reducing hours related to drug and migrant interdiction, fisheries and other law enforcement, aids to navigation maintenance and other activities involved in the 

safe flow of commerce along U.S. waterways. To meet the 

budgetary reductions imposed by sequestration, the Coast 

Guard will also reduce administrative/overhead functions 

and travel, defer lower priority planned asset maintenance, and postpone job/technical training activities. The 

Coast Guard’s objective under sequestration is to preserve 

the ability to meet the highest priority mission activities, 

including search and rescue, critical security operations, 

and emergency response. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. One final—that is the final question. Thank 

you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. HUNTER. I thank the gentleman. I would like to weigh in 

here and ask. You say you are going to take a 21-percent cut because of sequestration, and most of that is going to go towards 

operational capability? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Well, we haven’t put a specific number on 

it. I know that the Secretary has testified that it could be as much 

as 25 percent. As I said before, we are really still knocking around 

the specific details as we get closer to the potential for sequestration—— 

Mr. HUNTER. But I understand you are not going to do any civilian furloughs, is that right? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. We hope not to furlough any of our civilian 

workforce. 

Mr. HUNTER. But in exchange you would cut operational capability, right? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Well, no. As I said, we are trying not to cut 

any frontline operational capability, as well. 

The challenge is that simply furloughing individuals does not 

necessarily provide us with the operational capability we need. It 

is the way in which the monies are distributed in our budget—— 

Mr. HUNTER. Well, I think Admiral Papp has already told me if 

you have sequestration—I think you have three ships in South 

America. Is that true? How many ships have you got down in 

South America, running—— 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Well, we—— 

Mr. HUNTER [continuing]. Drug interdiction? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Well, we—it depends on the time of year. 

I would prefer not, in open session, to talk about specifically what 

our lay down is. 

Mr. HUNTER. OK. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. But we have—we have had to—we will adjust that. That adjusts on a regular basis, as it is. I suspect that 

we will have to adjust our present—— 

26 

Mr. HUNTER. But I understand that is going to be impacted by 

sequestration. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. It is—— 

Mr. HUNTER. And that is an operational capability. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. That is an operational. Yes, sir. 

Mr. HUNTER. OK. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, sir. 

Mr. HUNTER. Ms. Hahn? 

Ms. HAHN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Actually, I had two more, 

but we talked a lot about the panga boat threat. I am glad we are 

talking about it in this committee. I will give kudos to my colleague, Dana Rohrabacher, who invited the chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security, Mike McCaul, to, 2 weeks ago, go to 

the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles to learn some of the 

issues that we have in security. But they got a personal demonstration of one of the panga boats and what it means. 

That incident happened right off the coast of Rancho Palos 

Verdes, right where I live. And I think this is a growing threat, 

particularly on the west coast. They are smuggling people, they are 

smuggling drugs, they are smuggling potential weapons. And the 

threat of terrorism, I think, is very clear. So I hope you continue 

to give us an update on what the Coast Guard is doing to handle 

that. 

But while I have you here, one of the things I was thinking about 

when you were talking about the mission of the Coast Guard was, 

of course, one of your number one priorities, is to rescue those who 

are in distress upon our waters. And there was no more visible 

symbol of 4,000 people in distress on our ocean than the Carnival 

Cruise Line a couple of weeks ago. The whole country, the whole 

world, was watching that as it was unfolding daily. Certainly it 

was about folks who have chosen to recreate on our waterways. But 

for someone, again, who represents ports—and I have started this 

bipartisan port caucus—the cruise industry in Long Beach and Los 

Angeles is very key to our economy and our jobs. I think that incident set back the cruise industry probably a decade. 

I know there is probably an investigation going on on what went 

wrong, what we can do to prevent it in the future. Maybe you can 

give us just a little bit of what your—what we have learned, what 

we can do to prevent that, how the Coast Guard works with the 

cruise ship industry. I was—you know, just watching it on TV—I 

didn’t understand why we couldn’t—I know the Coast Guard, I 

think, came alongside and helped to provide supplies. Was there 

talk about actually rescuing those people, getting them off the 

ship? 

I also was dismayed at the tug and the line that was used to tow 

that cruise ship. Did we not have in our arsenal, with the Navy or 

the Coast Guard, some more industrial-strength tow line or tug? Is 

that all we have to tow a vessel of that size? That was distressing 

to me, that we didn’t deploy some giant Navy tug or some other 

Coast Guard vessel to pull that ship to where it went. That was— 

it felt a little like we were, you know, using, you know, a breakable 

tow line to tow these people. 

And again, I felt these people were in distress. Thank God no one 

perished. But this was clearly people in distress on the water, and 

27 

it didn’t look like we did all we could do to actually get those people to—either off the ship or to shore quicker. What do you think? 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Well, let’s see if I can tackle some of those. 

Let me start with your last point, with respect to the towing. I will 

tell you there is no—there is nothing in the Federal Government 

that has the capability to tow that a large commercial towing vessel does. So you are always better off going to a large commercial 

towing vessel. This is a big ship, though. There is a lot of mass 

there. So it is not surprising that you could occasionally part a tow 

line. That happens sometimes. The good news is is they were able 

to get it back in tow and to carry it in. 

With respect to taking people off the vessel, I—you know, we always start from the assumption that the ship itself is the best lifeboat. So if you don’t have to remove people, even if they are uncomfortable, even if they are dealing with unpleasant, perhaps even 

unsanitary at times situation, they are still safer on board the vessel than they would be attempting to take them off that vessel at 

sea. If you think about an at-sea transfer, it can be challenging. As 

someone who has done a couple at-sea transfers myself, as they 

move me from one ship to another, it is—it can be a challenging 

evolution. And when you think about doing that with, you know, 

up to 4,000 people, many of whom are not sailors, are not familiar 

with operations at sea, that can be challenging. 

So, I think you rightfully note that the good news is is that there 

was nobody killed, nobody injured, and only one person that I think 

that was removed for medical reasons, but unrelated to the accident. 

As to how the investigation proceeds, as you know that is a Bahamian-flag vessel. So the Bahamas does have the authority to 

conduct—and the responsibility to conduct—an investigation. We 

also have responsibility to conduct an investigation. And, in fact, 

there are a number of Coast Guard investigators, along with National Transportation Safety Board investigators on board that vessel in Mobile, conducting the investigation. 

So we will conduct our own investigation in concert with the Bahamians, as well as we have the option to do our own independent 

report. And we are looking at exactly what happened. We may 

have some specific reason it happened. You know, the—I think 

there was a speculation that there was a hole in a fuel line. But 

as to how that hole got there, and what the procedures were, and 

all of the chain of events leading up to that, that is yet to be determined. But we are going to be very interested in that. 

And we are going to be interested to see whether we learn something about the construction of cruise ships that we may need to 

change, or that we may need to alter in—as we look to construct 

new vessels and/or look at existing vessels in operation. All of that 

may come out of that investigation. 

But we are very interested in how these ships operate. We work 

very closely through the International Maritime Organization to 

set appropriate international standards for safety of life at sea, and 

that includes the way in which vessels are constructed, their ability 

to withstand casualties at sea, their ability to withstand fires, their 

ability to protect the people who are on board that vessel. 

28 

And so, while exceedingly unpleasant for those folks on board— 

and I would not want to have been one of those passengers over 

that 4- or 5-day period that it took to get them back to Mobile— 

I am happy that they were able to survive that with minimal longterm effect. And again, we will be interested in seeing what the investigation reveals, and what our investigators discover in the 

process of that investigation. 

Ms. HAHN. Thank you. I appreciate that. But that is a little disconcerting, that that is our best form of towing that we have, currently, on the open seas. Because, as you said, that was a big vessel, but we do big vessels in this country. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Well, and—— 

Ms. HAHN. If we were to have another incident or major disaster 

and a large vessel became incapacitated, that is a little bit distressing, that that is our best mode of towing. 

Admiral NEFFENGER. Yes, ma’am. And the investigation will look 

at that aspect, as well. So there may be some recommendations 

that come out of that, as well. 

Ms. HAHN. I would hope so. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank the gentlelady for her question, and we do 

look forward and trust the NTSB and the Coast Guard to conduct 

a good investigation of what happened. 

One final thing here. I would leave you with this, Admiral. The 

Coast Guard budget just about doubled over the last decade. About 

a quarter of a billion dollars was lost—and I wasn’t on this committee, I got elected in 2008, but about a quarter of a billion dollars 

was lost because of acquisition and procurement boondoggling with 

Deepwater. You got that on track now. 

I would give you the same words that I give my DOD friends. 

I served in the Marine Corps three tours overseas: two in Iraq and 

one in Afghanistan. Never floated, flew over every time, unfortunately, so I didn’t get the marine part of the Marine Corps. But I 

would do everything that you can, and I would advise the Coast 

Guard to do everything that they can to keep operational capability 

where it is now, especially your homeland security missions and 

your search-and-rescue missions. I think, you know, that is what 

you are there to do. 

And I know it is easy to try to make us—get us worried and get 

the American people worried and say, ‘‘This is what is going to 

happen under sequester, and the sky is going to fall,’’ but I think 

when you have a budget double in the last decade, and a lot of your 

resources went to nothing a while back—but that has all been 

straightened out now—I think it is incumbent upon the Coast 

Guard to make sure that they do what the American public expects 

of them, even with—if you lose $200 or $300 million out of this 

year’s budget with sequester going forward, I think it is—you are 

going to have to be prepared, always be prepared, and just make 

it work. 

So, with that, thank you for your time, thank you for your service to your Nation. And with that, the hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 11:25 a.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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