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44–570 2008

GAO INSIGHTS INTO 

SECURITY CLEARANCE REFORM 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY 

MANAGEMENT 

OF THE

PERMANENT SELECT 

COMMITTEE 

ON INTELLIGENCE 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

Hearing held in Washington, DC, July 30, 2008 

( 

Printed for the use of the Committee 


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PERMANENT SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE 

SILVESTRE REYES, Texas, Chairman 

LEONARD L. BOSWELL, Iowa 

ROBERT E. (BUD) CRAMER, Alabama 

ANNA G. ESHOO, California 

RUSH D. HOLT, New Jersey 

C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland 

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts 

MIKE THOMPSON, California 

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

PATRICK J. MURPHY, Pennsylvania 

ADAM B. SCHIFF, California 

PETER HOEKSTRA, Michigan 

TERRY EVERETT, Alabama 

ELTON GALLEGLY, California 

HEATHER WILSON, New Mexico 

MAC THORNBERRY, Texas 

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York 

TODD TIAHRT, Kansas 

MIKE ROGERS, Michigan 

DARRELL E. ISSA, California 

NANCY PELOSI, California, Speaker, Ex Officio Member 

JOHN A. BOEHNER, Ohio, Minority Leader, Ex Officio Member 

MICHAEL DELANEY, Staff Director 


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GAO INSIGHTS INTO SECURITY CLEARANCE 

REFORM 

WEDNESDAY, JULY 30, 2008 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, PERMANENT SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE, SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY MANAGEMENT, Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 3:07 p.m., in room 

2212, Rayburn House Office Building, the Hon. Anna G. Eshoo 

(chairwoman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Present: Representatives Eshoo, Holt, and Issa. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Good afternoon, everyone. I hope you are all 

well. The first thing I would like to do is to thank you for your patience in waiting for us to begin the hearing. 

My name is Anna Eshoo. I chair the Intelligence Community 

Management Subcommittee; and just as I was en route to be here 

a few minutes before 2:30, the bells went off. Perhaps it is better 

that they did then and won’t interrupt our hearing. 

I know the Ranking Member will be here. He has a very important vote over at the Judiciary Committee. So I will start out with 

an opening statement; and, again, thank you to everyone that is 

here. 

This is our second hearing on security clearance reform. We all 

know that the clearance system serves two main functions. It 

should clear trustworthy people into the community so that they 

can serve without undue delay, and it is supposed to keep out those 

who pose security threats. 

In recent years, the security system has been plagued by delays 

in clearing people into the community quickly, on a timely basis. 

These challenges have been amply documented by the GAO. I know 

no one has done the work that the GAO has done on this issue. 

It is highly instructive to all of us not only on this subcommittee 

but the full committee, and we salute the GAO for the work that 

they have done. 

In response to these concerns, Congress enacted the Intelligence 

Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, which had some 

very specific language for reform which directed improvements in 

timelines and in quality. The administration has made strides, 

though belated, in addressing the delays, but it has not been as aggressive in addressing other reforms until recently. And as my 

mother used to say, nothing like waiting for the last minute. But 

let’s see what we can get done. 

At our last hearing, we heard testimony from the GAO and the 

administration on their most recent reform efforts which were just 


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beginning. In the beginning of 2005, in compliance with the Intelligence Reform Act, the President issued an Executive Order that 

authorized OMB to reform the clearance process. Earlier this year, 

a joint DOD–ODNI reform team published an initial report on their 

vision of clearance reform. 

Now these are all steps, but what it says to me is that we 

haven’t even begun. I know that there are things that have to be 

done in preparation, but we still haven’t gotten there. It is still 

what I consider to be mostly a Cold War system. 

Now, most recently, on June 30, the President signed another 

Executive Order dividing responsibilities for clearance reform 

among the ODNI, OPM and OMB. Given the flurry of clearance reform activity by the administration and the constantly shifting division of labor, I think it is critical that Congress keep a watchful 

eye on the program and ensure that progress in this area is actually made. 

There are a lot of people in a lot of functions that are dependent 

upon a 21st century looking, forward-leaning security clearance 

program. Members of the subcommittee remain concerned that the 

administration has not developed metrics to evaluate the quality of 

the process and has been inconsistent in interpreting congressional 

intent on reciprocity between the agencies, the consolidation of the 

process or uniformity of the process across agencies. 

We need to get this right. And I will say it again. We need to 

get this right. I spent 2 years chairing this little subcommittee; and 

I really thought, if someone had asked me 2 years ago where we 

would be on this, I would have said we would have been at least 

maybe 60, 65 percent on the road to progress and the implementation was taking place. We are still in the planning stages of this 

thing. So we need to get this right. 

What is at stake with clearance reform I think is the success of 

the Intelligence Community. Both the public and the private sectors both rely on it. 

This is a function that has to be engaged in by our government. 

People can’t go to Macy’s or Neiman Marcus to get these clearances, to buy them or to process them. They have to come to us. 

Every intelligence community employee, whether they are working 

for the government or for a contractor, has to hold a clearance from 

top to bottom. Whether one is the director of an agency, an entry 

level translator, an aerospace engineer or an IT consultant, you 

need a clearance. 

A malfunctioning clearance system keeps the right people out 

and lets the wrong people in, and it jeopardizes the security of our 

country. We have to ensure that we bring in the linguistic and the 

cultural talent that we need. 

I am kind of a broken record on that along with several of my 

colleagues on the full committee. We have to ensure that intelligence professionals can transfer and collaborate between intelligence agencies. In other words, they have to fit into different settings; and reform has to fit the mission needs. To that end, we may 

need to re-evaluate some of the assumptions of the reform legislation and consider whether a different approach is necessary. 

To assist us in our oversight, this committee asked the GAO to 

evaluate certain reform efforts, including the GAO’s first assessVerDate Aug 31 2005 21:29 Nov 24, 2008 Jkt 044570 PO 00000 Frm 00004 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 E:\HR\OC\A570.XXX A570

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ment of the Intelligence Community’s security clearance process. 

We made a formal request for an assessment of the ongoing joint 

DNI–DOD reform pilot effort relative to best practice standards 

that GAO has used in the past. We also asked for a review of the 

criteria that the administration is using to assess the effectiveness 

of its efforts, and the GAO is here today to share their initial findings. 

Our witness today is Ms. Brenda Farrell, the Director of Military 

and Civilian Personnel and Medical Readiness, Defense Capabilities and Management. She has had years of valuable experience 

and can provide this committee with a historical perspective on the 

challenges we face in our efforts to deal with the problems. 

I hope that you will address a few key questions today; and they 

are: 

Does the administration’s reform plan offer solutions to the clearance problems GAO has identified in past assessments? And if anyone hasn’t taken the time, I would recommend that you pour 

through all the work that GAO has done on this. I mean, these are 

volumes of really superb work. 

Is the reform plan an improvement over the current system? I 

mean, is it going to take us to where we want to land? Or is it one 

layer over another of planning activities without the kind of direction or directive that it needs to be? 

And has the administration developed adequate metrics to assess 

the quality of its system? Planning is wonderful. Ideas are always 

important. But if you can’t measure these things to see if you are 

producing the outcomes that the initial process and planning was 

for. If not, then you are really, in my view, back to square one. 

So we have also asked for an initial evaluation of the new Executive order on clearance reforms signed by the President at the end 

of June, and I look forward to that evaluation and especially your 

testimony. 

So with that, since our Ranking Member is not here—I will recognize him as soon as he comes in. As I said, he had a vote, a very 

important vote at the Judiciary Committee. And then he said he 

would be over here to join us as well as some of the other members 

of the subcommittee. 

I want to welcome you again, Ms. Farrell, and thank you for the 

very important, superb, professional work that you do. So, with 

that, I will ask you to make your statement. 

Ms. FARRELL. Thank you so much. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. It looks like it is just the two of us with an 

audience, right? It is kind of a luxury though, isn’t it? 

STATEMENT OF BRENDA S. FARRELL, DIRECTOR, DEFENSE 

CAPABILITIES AND MANAGEMENT 

Ms. FARRELL. Thank you so much for those kinds words, too, 

about GAO. We are proud of the decades of work, that you are obviously very familiar with, on personnel security clearances. But, if 

I may, I will briefly summarize my written statement; and then, 

hopefully, the others will join us. 

Again, thank you for the opportunity to be here today to discuss 

GAO’s preliminary observations on the Federal Government’s efforts to reform the security clearance process. My remarks today 


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are based on our preliminary review of the Joint Security and Suitability Reform Team’s initial plan and the recently issued Executive Order 13467, our prior work on security clearance processes 

and best practices developed from GAO’s institutional knowledge of 

organizational transformation. 

Next month, we plan to officially begin our detailed review of the 

joint reform efforts as requested by the Chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and you, Madam Chairwoman, in your capacity as Chair of this Subcommittee. 

GAO placed the Department of Defense’s personnel security 

clearance program on our high-risk list in 2005 because of a variety 

of long-standing problems that increase a risk to national security. 

These problems include delays in clearance processing, incomplete 

investigations and the granting of clearances based on incomplete 

data. 

Since then, the government has undertaken a number of clearance reform efforts, including an April 30, 2008, initial plan by the 

Joint Security and Suitability Reform Team. The plan outlines a 

new seven-step process for determining clearance eligibility. 

Another effort was an issuance in June, 2008, of the Executive 

Order 13467 that responds to the initial reform plan by establishing a Performance Accountability Council to implement reform 

efforts. 

The joint reform team’s initial plan in the Executive order reflected the collaborative efforts of several key agencies, including 

the Office of Management and Budget, DOD, the Office of Director 

of National Intelligence, and the Office of Personnel Management. 

In addition, before this subcommittee in February of this year, we 

identified four factors key to reforming the security clearance process. 

My written statement is divided into three parts. First, the recent security efforts as reflected in the joint reform team’s initial 

plan and Executive Order 13467 consist of several positive elements, including responsiveness to the President’s direction with 

an initial plan that identifies near-term actions to follow, input 

from key stakeholders and support and accountability of high-level 

leadership. For example, the initial plan described several nearterm actions that will be taken to transform the security process 

across the Federal Government. These actions include establishing 

an executive branch governance structure to achieve the goals of 

reform and sustain reform momentum through the upcoming administration transition; developing and initiating automated systems for the application, adjudication and record-checking steps; 

and developing information technology strategy to enable improvements government-wide. 

Second, the joint reform team’s plan and the Executive order 

begin to but do not fully address the four factors that GAO identified before this committee as key to reforming the process. These 

factors are having a sound requirements determination in place, 

building quality into every step of the clearance process, heading 

a valid set of metrics for evaluating efficiency and effectiveness, 

and providing Congress with long-term funding requirements of security reform. 


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First, although the plan states that a reformed clearance process 

would begin with a step to validate the need for a clearance, neither the plan nor the Executive order includes discrete actions for 

implementing a sound requirements determination process. 

Second, while the plan provides some information on building 

quality into the clearance process, it provides limited details on 

how the newly automated processes will ensure quality. 

Third, the reform efforts emphasize timeliness but do not discuss 

the use of additional metrics that could be used to evaluate the 

performance of a reform process. 

Finally, neither the plan nor the Executive order contain information about funding requirements, which limits their utility in 

helping decision makers. 

The last part of my written statement addresses how moving forward the reform efforts could benefit from clearly incorporating additional best practices that GAO has identified for agencies to successfully transform their cultures. This is particularly important 

since a central theme of the 9/11 Commission Report was that one 

of the major challenges facing the Intelligence Community is moving from a culture of need to know to a culture of need to share. 

These best practices include, among other things, establishing a 

coherent mission and integrating strategic goals to guide the transformation, focusing on a key set of principles and priorities at the 

outset of the transformation, setting implementation goals and a 

timeline to build momentum and show progress from day one and, 

last, establishing a communication strategy to create shared expectations and report related progress. 

Further, the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 

2004 sets clearance processing timeliness requirements, general 

specifications for an integrated database and reciprocity across government. Using the best practices to meet IRTPA requirements can 

assist the newly formed Performance Accountability Council in the 

development of a coherent mission, guide the transformation and 

focus efforts on key principles and priorities as the Council prepares its December, 2008, report which we understand from OMB 

will detail implementation of the reformed security process. 

In summary, the current reform efforts represent positive steps 

forward. The key to successfully reforming the personnel security 

process is how these reform efforts will be implemented. 

Again, GAO is honored to be before you today, and we look forward to conducting a more detailed review of these reform efforts, 

and in that review we plan to examine all of the considerations 

presented in my written statement as the efforts move forward. 

Thank you, Madam Chair, and I will be pleased to take questions 

whenever you are ready. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Thank you very much, Ms. Farrell. 

[The statement of Ms. Farrell follows:] 


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Chairwoman ESHOO. We have been joined by the Ranking Member of our subcommittee, a very able and respected member of the 

Intelligence Committee and a wonderful partner in the Congress, 

a fellow Californian, Mr. Issa. 

Mr. ISSA. Madam Chair, I would like to ask unanimous consent 

to have my written statement put into the record. And I will be so 

brief we will be in questioning before you know it. 

Obviously, we have such a long series of these kind of hearings, 

open hearings whenever possible, because it is so important that 

we get this right. It is so important that something we have started 

down, that seems to be floundering in this Member’s opinion. And 

particularly you touched on the metrics for speed but maybe not accuracy, budget, uniformity and the other issues. 

So I will save the rest of my speech for my questions. And I 

thank the gentlelady. And let’s move forward because this is a bipartisan issue that we have to get right. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Thank you, and thank you for being here. 

[The statement of Mr. Issa follows:] 


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Chairwoman ESHOO. One can’t help but observe that this has 

gone on for a long time. And before we get into some of the specifics and the details of what is at hand now and how you measure 

it, why do you think it is, while the GAO placed the security clearance on a high-risk list—that should be an attention-getter, a highrisk list in 2005, because of the long-standing problems. What 

would you identify as maybe the top two or top three things that 

have kept this from actually being fixed? 

Is it so complicated that the agencies don’t know how to do it, 

that the overall planning has lacked something? Is it that there is 

not a designated heavy hitter, an effective leader in it? Is it that 

the agencies are proprietary and if they get involved they may have 

to give something up? What do you find to be the reason for this? 

I am curious, given all of the reports. 

Ms. FARRELL. Certainly. Well, I think that the requirements 

were laid out in the IRTPA of 2004, of what the intent was in 

terms of personnel security reform. Leadership was definitely needed. How that was to be achieved was not evident at the beginning. 

By the time we hit 2005, OMB, due to Executive Order 13383, 

stepped up to the plate and provided the leadership in terms of trying to move the agencies forward to a common goal. 

A plan was issued in November of 2005. We testified a couple of 

days after that plan was issued. We said at that time that, although leadership was now evident with OMB, this was a very 

positive thing, we still did not see a plan with details in terms of 

goals, metrics, milestones; and these were the things that were 

needed in order to move a very significant transformation forward. 

Since then, as you have noted, there have been other planning 

efforts. And the good thing that we are seeing, besides leadership 

at this stage, is the collaboration, among other things. You didn’t 

see the collaboration when GAO was looking at these efforts in the 

past. And the collaboration being amongst the key players, the 

DNI, the DOD, OMB, OPM. I think they should be recognized for 

coming together at this stage and having at least a collaborative 

plan that is reflected in the April 30, 2008, plan of this year. 

But, in 2005, we saw what you acknowledged earlier in your 

opening, a lack of clear milestones in how you are going to get 

there; and you need those so that when you are off course you can 

identify why you are off course and make a course correction. That 

is what has been missing. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. I am going to run through some of the directives in the Act and ask you to give us a letter grade on them, 

what you think, where we are on them right now. 

Creation of a single entity for oversight of security clearances. 

Ms. FARRELL. We would probably give them higher marks because we, again—— 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Higher. What is higher? B? 

Ms. FARRELL. Above meets. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. B plus? 

Ms. FARRELL. I don’t give letter grades, but it would be at the 

upper end. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. That sounds like a B plus to me. 

Ms. FARRELL. A few years ago, the Executive order did establish 

OMB as being the single entity responsible for clearance oversight; 


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and that was recognized in 2005. Now there are some questions 

that are arising with the latest Executive order about the new Performance Accountability Council and their role. We do have some 

work that we have to do to understand the roles and responsibilities of that Council and how they act as a single entity in response 

to IRTPA. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Interagency reciprocity of security clearances. 

Ms. FARRELL. That is an unknown. We hear anecdotal stories 

about reciprocity. The extent of the problem hasn’t been clearly defined. If you ask OMB, OPM and others, they will tell you there 

is no issue with reciprocity. Our concern is OPM has oversight of 

what is going on in DOD, but they don’t have oversight of what is 

going on in the Intelligence Community. And, as you know, we 

have ongoing work for this subcommittee to look at the Intelligence 

Committee, not just the timeliness and the quality but the issues 

of reciprocity and is it a problem. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Creation of a single, integrated database for 

security clearances, are we anywhere near that? 

Ms. FARRELL. That doesn’t exist. We have asked questions. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. That is our hope and our prayer. 

Okay. Evaluation of available information technologies. 

Ms. FARRELL. PERSEREC, as you are probably familiar with, 

has been doing research for years about potential technology that 

can be used to streamline the process. So there has been a lot going 

on in that area. We will be looking even closer about where do 

those demonstration projects fit with the long-term goals that are 

laid out in IRTPA. So there is work going on in there. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Reducing the length of security clearance 

processing to 90 days by the end of the year. I think there has been 

progress made on that, in some areas, anyway. 

Ms. FARRELL. The OMB report show that the numbers are going 

in the right direction. It is good to have interim goals to get to your 

long-term goal of 60 days. Whether they will get there or not remains to be seen. When you have reform efforts as major as the 

one that is being planned, they could be put off-course to some extent. But the numbers appear to be moving in the right direction. 

When we looked at the numbers in 2006, there was quite a bit 

of disagreement, as you know, between OMB and GAO about the 

numbers for timeliness. But I will note that in the February, 2008, 

report of OMB, the numbers that they reported for 2006 were the 

same as the numbers that we reported. We are looking very carefully at this point to see what are the current numbers. 

There are concerns still about the starting point for the clearance 

process. We disagree with OMB about—when you measure end-toend processing, where do you start? Do you start with when the applicant submits the application or when the security officer submits 

it? 

Then there is the question of, do you count the time to transfer 

the investigative report to the adjudicators? Does that go with the 

investigator’s time or the adjudicator’s time? 

So there are still some points that we are asking about and looking at in great detail right now to see how accurate are those numVerDate Aug 31 2005 21:29 Nov 24, 2008 Jkt 044570 PO 00000 Frm 00054 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A570.XXX A570

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bers and if they reflect what you are wanting to see as required 

with IRTPA. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Mr. Issa. 

Mr. ISSA. Thank you, Madam Chair. I am going to follow up on 

the same line. 

Although it is pretty easy to tell if you get a security clearance 

in 90 days, pretty easy to tell if the adjudication runs 30 days or 

less, of what real value is that unless all the other important issues 

of accuracy, uniformity, you know, if you will, reciprocity, if those 

aren’t achieved, then in a sense aren’t we simply saying, okay, 

deadline, give them that. It is a little bit like a court that has a 

90-day requirement or that they have to let the felon go. Well, obviously, they are going to get him to trial, but it doesn’t mean they 

are ready for trial. And, by the way, if they let him go, that is not 

good. 

So my question is, did we fundamentally flaw in making 90 days 

and then the final goal of 60 days anything more than the last 

step, rather than the first step in the reform? 

Ms. FARRELL. The reform effort, when it started in 2005, was focused on timeliness; and that was in response to IRTPA. 

Some of the other issues with respect to—with transferring clearances across government fell to the bottom of the list. The target 

was the 60, as you mentioned. Our concern has been exactly what 

you are raising, that you might increase the speed but the quality 

of the investigations has been called into doubt. We are also looking at the adjudication phase for which there are no metrics. So it 

is something though that can be corrected with the reform effort. 

The good news is that, in the April 30 plan, there is an acknowledgement of quality metrics needing be to be put in place, but we 

don’t have any more information than that. As you know, for going 

back to 1999, GAO reported that the only metric that was being 

used was when investigations were returned; and that, by itself, 

was not enough to assess the quality of the investigations, much 

less the other steps in the process. 

So we would like to see quality and quality metrics built into the 

reform process every step of the phase. 

Mr. ISSA. Following up on that, because it is not in the Act, although we have a single point for oversight—and one could say 

that there is a single point for oversight and it is at the dais here, 

you know, in that the committees, in a sense, are the ultimate 

oversight. As we start looking at possible add-on or future followon legislation, since it has been 4 years, and that is about the time 

that we start on something that 6 years later often becomes law, 

would it be, from a management practice—— 

I come from the private sector, even though I have been here 8 

years, I guess. In the private sector, we would say, well, wait a second, you want everyone to trust a common clearance. Well, the 

easiest way to do that is to say, okay, instead of CIA and Defense 

Intelligence and everyone having their own little fiefdoms, we will 

simply have a single entity, although they may be implanted in 

these various intelligence communities, that owns this. And, if you 

will, a little like the Corps of Engineers which not only does the 

Army Corps but also does NASA, probably is responsible for everything except this building. 


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In a sense, do you believe, from your experience and the progress 

we have made and failed to make, that perhaps that was something that Congress should have looked at, was that a uniform security agency—security clearance agency could have, in fact, guaranteed that the examiners, the computer systems, the processes, 

the interface with the FBI and those who—because that may not 

be the FBI as the agency. 

But all of that would be uniform, by definition, if you created one 

career group that, in fact, this is what they did. They got a highlevel clearance. They were then embedded in the appropriate places 

to do their job, because they need to be all over. But, at the end 

of the day, the oversight is pretty easy. We funnel up to one organization that is responsible, and then we have oversight on them. 

And, yes, the CIA says, I need this. But they say it to the same 

entity that Defense Intelligence says and the NRO says and everyone else says so that, if they specified the same level, they get the 

same level. Looking back, is this something that we should have 

anticipated and perhaps done? 

Ms. FARRELL. The Act was clear that a single entity, whether it 

was a department or an agency or an element of the Federal Government, was to be responsible for six—I think it was six aspects 

of the security clearance process. The law gave OMB leeway to proceed with how they saw that this could—— 

Mr. ISSA. My question is the leeway, if you will. 

Ms. FARRELL. And, as I said, to respond to the 2005 Executive 

order, OMB did step up to the plate. They were provided the leadership to be that single entity that would be providing oversight 

and move on from there. 

Now we have this Performance Accountability Council. The DNI 

that is the executive agent for the security clearance process. OPM 

is the executive agent for suitability. OMB though is still Chair of 

the Performance Accountability Council, but we will be questioning 

the Council about how do they see their role in terms of that single 

entity? Does OMB as Chair of the performance accountability rule 

what the executive agents do? Or does the DNI have responsibility 

that is separate from this Performance Accountability Council? 

This is something that we are going to be exploring further. 

But you gave leeway again to OMB to see how they wanted to 

move forward, and that has been a stumbling block in terms of who 

is in charge to keep moving this forward. Right now, it appears to 

be OMB as Chair of that Council. But we need to talk to them 

more to see how they see carrying out their role. 

Mr. ISSA. Well, working with the gentlelady, I think we are 

reaching that point where we are asking did we give too much leeway? 

I will share with you very quickly. I was in another committee 

today where a sergeant had been electrocuted in Iraq, and the 

hearing dealt with a contractor who was sort of the plumber and 

the electrician for the buildings. And it was unclear what their role 

was, what they were supposed to do, not do. And I asked six people 

there, five of whom were former commissioned officers and the 

three commissioned officers behind them, well, didn’t the sergeant 

have a lieutenant that was supposed to care for his health and 


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well-being and didn’t that lieutenant have a captain and didn’t that 

captain have a colonel? 

Well, it turned out, yes, they had a chain of command, all of 

whom were responsible to make sure that the previously reported 

shocks that people were getting in the shower didn’t allow him to 

later be electrocuted because no one should have been in that 

shower from the first time. There was that. 

To a certain extent, I am seeing a correlation here that concerns 

me. If the basics of who is in charge—if we don’t get that right, 

then we are going to have later questions that you are having now. 

Is everyone playing well together in the sandbox? I am hearing 

and I think Ms. Eshoo and I both are hearing at every one of our 

hearings that people aren’t playing as well in the sandbox and the 

usual question of, well, the DNI is an emerging power. Should they 

take the lead? All of this—and the DNI and the FBI are never 

going to play well together in the sandbox because they weren’t 

mandated by Congress to be the same entities. 

So we start seeing that, in fact, we may have had a fundamental 

mistake, which is that whether it is the people behind us on the 

dais needing clearances or contractors needing clearances, that, in 

fact, it wasn’t easy to hand to one group and say, make everyone 

play. Am I hearing that correctly? Because that is the impression 

I am getting here, and it is not the first time I have gotten it. 

Ms. FARRELL. Well, again, maybe one of the reasons why it has 

been taking so long is to get people to play together. But that is 

what we are seeing with the latest efforts with this Performance 

Accountability Council. You have heard OMB and OPM and the 

DNI say, this is the first time they have actually come together and 

tried to have an agreement to move forward. 

But there are questions about who is in charge. And this again 

is something that we need to explore, with how do they see the 

Chair of the Performance Accountability Council or the executive 

agents fitting with this single entity that is described in IRTPA? 

Mr. ISSA. Okay. Madam Chair, I have a markup to go to, but I 

would like to ask, if at all possible, that we look during the September session at asking to have a panel back before us to see 

whether or not, going into the next administration, we have to immediately act. Because it does appear as though—you know, we 

both know there is going to be a lot of new appointments, and we 

can either set the tone or not set the tone to get progress in that 

next administration. So I would hope that we could set a short fuse 

to revisit this to see whether that progress has actually come to 

fruition in as little as, let’s say, July or August and the first part 

of September. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. I think that is an excellent suggestion. I 

wanted to start out with the GAO first and then when we return 

after the August break to do exactly what you said. There is a 

short time frame here. 

And I am delighted that you were here to participate. You are 

an important partner in this. 

Mr. ISSA. And I apologize. Mr. Conyers will not wait. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. He has got to get your vote. Thank you very 

much. 


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I think, in listening to both Mr. Issa’s questions and your responses as well as your opening remarks, Ms. Farrell, that what 

I am reminded of is that nothing has really changed dramatically 

in terms of the structure, a new structure, a new way of doing business, something that is streamlined and timely and all that is attached to that, that in all of this planning there has not been one 

security clearance that these people have approved. 

We have layers and layers of planning—and I am not one to diminish the need for good, solid planning. You have a good plan. 

Then that leads to, I think, that much more of an effective execution and implementation. But it seems to me that we are caught 

in layers here and that there are still questions about who may be 

in charge, if the others are buying in. We are not going to find that 

out until we bring them in and let’s hear what they have to say 

to each other. 

But what I am hearing from you really leads me to a place where 

I am still not satisfied. I am uncomfortable. Tell me this, do you 

think that there is hope for specifics in the reform plan that can 

be executed before the end of this administration? Or is that just 

too much to hope for? 

Ms. FARRELL. Well, the good news is the April 30 plan does have 

some near-term primary goals. And that makes—— 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Do you think they can execute them? I 

mean, these are plans and intentions and more plans that direct 

the stakeholders to execute. 

Ms. FARRELL. It is a plan that requires more planning with action. But it does differ from the 2005 plan that had no near-term 

primary goals. This April plan does have some primary near-term 

goals. 

We don’t see those near-term goals connected with the long-term 

goals of IRTPA. One of the near-term goals, again, was the governance structure, which is the Executive Order 13467 that establishes this Performance Accountability Council. That is an example 

of a near-term goal that they have put in motion. So I think we 

should keep in mind that that plan does differ from previous plans. 

Initially, we were also thinking that we would be seeing some interim plans before the final implementation. Mr. Johnson informed 

us that there would not be any other interim plans. They decided 

it was in the best interest in order to keep moving forward to have 

everything wrapped up by December 2008. And we are told that 

much is under way. That is what we will be asking questions 

about. Do they have pieces of this out there that needs to be consolidated into one plan? And what is behind that? 

But it is important I think to recognize that the difference with 

the April plan is that it does have some near-term actions. Our 

concern still is that—linking that to the long-term goals, of whether it is an integrated database and how you are going to get there, 

who is responsible for it, how are you going to measure your 

progress to get there, we don’t see that. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Do you think that the agencies—which all 

need to have timely security clearances issued—have a sense that 

they have a sense of urgency about it? 

Ms. FARRELL. The Intelligence Community agencies? 


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Chairwoman ESHOO. Yes. Or are they kind of comfortable with 

where they are and how they do it? 

Ms. FARRELL. We hear anecdotal stories all the time, as I think 

you do; and in the course of our work we have had concerns expressed about DHS, FBI, individual cases. This is the first time 

that we have had work where we actually are going in to measure 

the timeliness and see if it is a problem and is quality a problem 

in the Intelligence Community the same way that we have seen 

with the DOD community. So that is work that you requested that 

I am happy to say is under way. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Where do you think this needs to be by the 

end of the year to hand over to a new administration? 

Ms. FARRELL. The Joint Team needs to do what they say they are 

going to deliver in December, which is a very detailed implementation plan with the performance accountability council’s roles even 

more defined in terms of who is in charge. Does that single entity 

meet IRTPA requirements? Does anyone have voting rights? They 

need a very coherent mission with common goals, with milestones 

so that they can hand it off to the next administration. If you don’t 

have a detailed plan with specifics that can be measured, then you 

can’t determine if you are on the right road to transformation. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. This is OMB’s security and suitability process reform initial report April 30, 2008. Under CY 08 they have a 

whole list of bullets, and the second one is to draft and submit an 

Executive Order to ensure fitness reciprocity and reinvestigation of 

individuals in public trust positions. Can you tell us about where 

that is? Do you know? Can you comment on this one? 

Ms. FARRELL. Well, to our knowledge—again, we have just started this work—the only action that has been fulfilled in that plan 

is that of the Executive Order, establishing the governance structure which is one of their near-term goals. 

For these other issues, those require action to be taken. It is possible, I guess, that they have taken that. The Executive order is 

about a month old at this point, which may move them a little bit 

further in terms of the accountability. But we have not seen the 

specifics. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Have you seen the full Executive Order and 

what it contains? 

Ms. FARRELL. The Executive order, yes. But we haven’t seen the 

specifics of any details behind that plan, other than the—— 

Chairwoman ESHOO. On the one I just asked about. 

Ms. FARRELL. There is the appendix that accompanies that plan. 

It is more about hindsight of projects that they have completed, 

rather than where they are going. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. I just have this overwhelming sensibility 

that we are driving with an emergency brake on. You know? We 

are moving, but none of this seems to have a sense of urgency relative to reforming the whole system. 

I don’t know if we didn’t give them clear enough direction in 

IRTPA or if the GAO sees a further need for legislative direction 

from the Congress, from the Intelligence Committee to get this 

going. I mean, I think that that is an important consideration as 

well. 


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I am not suggesting just because we had language to direct 

something that it was perfect and absolutely clear. And if it needs 

to be more directive and have more clarity and have some time 

frames around it and some specifics, then maybe if you have any 

suggestions or views in that area—— 

Ms. FARRELL. I would want to see what is going to be in their 

December 2008 plan. We are told that—when we shared the message of our statement with Mr. Johnson last week, we were told 

that everything we were discussing would be reflected down the 

road, that it was in motion, it was evolving. 

We also had a discussion about how the focus has been on timeliness. It has not been on these other issues that we have been discussing today with the database and reciprocity and the other 

issues. You can see that when you look at the February OMB 2007 

report and the February OMB 2008 report. The focus is on timeliness. And, with timeliness, they had interim steps of how they 

were trying to get to the 60 days to issue a clearance. And that is 

good that they had those interim steps for timeliness, but you don’t 

see interim steps to develop an integrated database that the agencies could use—— 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Well, it seems to me that the administration has made progress, in addressing timeliness—and I salute 

their having achieved a better time frame for some of these security clearances. But that is only one part of it. And the other pieces, 

in my view, are tougher to do. They are tougher to do. 

And so I think the ball is being bounced and passed along 

through these various committees and executive orders and reviews 

and structure and plans, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera; and we are 

not doing ourselves any favor by this. 

Has the administration indicated to you that they are planning 

to reform the suitability guidelines, you know, what I had asked 

about earlier? 

Ms. FARRELL. We have been told that part of the reform effort 

is to look at suitability guidelines, look at the clearance guidelines 

in terms of investigations and adjudications and see how the two 

sets can work better together. As you know now, they are rather 

isolated and there are questions about duplication. We are told that 

guidelines are part of the reform effort. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Well, the Intelligence Reform Act stated 

that there should be a single entity. I mean, to me that is very 

clear. And I don’t think the Congress’ intent here when we referred 

to a single entity is a single planning group. I don’t think that is 

what it is about. I have respect for planning, but I don’t think that 

that is what the intention of the Congress was. And, yes, one has 

to take place in order to achieve the other. 

Do you think that equal attention is being paid to adjudications 

and investigations? 

Ms. FARRELL. In the past, you know, we have raised the issue 

of quality throughout the process; and the answer was no. Again, 

we are looking at that again right now. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Is there any way for that to be measured 

now in the present system? 

Ms. FARRELL. Yes, we believe it is. We believe that you can have 

metrics in the present system from the beginning to the end. 


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Chairwoman ESHOO. But there aren’t, though. 

Ms. FARRELL. Currently, there is only, as we have discussed before, one metric; and we are not even sure that that metric is being 

used right now for the investigative phase, that being the number 

of investigations that are returned by the adjudicators to the investigators. Several years ago we know that that was the metric that 

was being used, but it has fallen out of reports recently. We are 

not sure that any metrics are being used for the current system. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Has the administration established a 

timeline or any specific objectives that have to be achieved to create a single adjudicative entity, do you know? 

Ms. FARRELL. Not to our—again, the timelines are what are 

missing from this April 30 plan, that we are told that there will 

be more specifics in the December plan. 

The Performance Accountability Council had their first meeting 

last Tuesday. We were over at OMB, and they were meeting that 

afternoon. They were going to be discussing how to form subcommittees to carry out some of these actions. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. There we go. It is getting really hot. It is 

heating up. We are going to do subcommittees! We have to have 

a sense of humor about some things I guess. 

Ms. FARRELL. There were discussions about bringing other stakeholders in, other Federal agencies, the Commerce Department, VA, 

others that might have a need to be players. But, again, it was 

their first meeting. It appeared that they would be meeting about 

once a month, maybe more often after August. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Why is this so hard to do? 

Ms. FARRELL. Why is this so hard? 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Why do you think return is so hard to do? 

Ms. FARRELL. It is a complicated issue that has been around for 

decades. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Let me just dissect that word ‘‘complicated’’. 

Security clearances are not something that is brand new. We have 

been doing them for a long, long time. These reviews of the process 

are a service that has been rendered, whether it is inside of an 

agency or another agency, and they help the agency that needs to 

have clearances done. It is not something that we have never done 

before and have to maybe go to some liaison service to find out 

about on the other side of the world. It is something that we have 

been doing. 

We know that there are processes that can help. Because technology—and I understand this coming from my district, which is 

where all the innovation and so much takes place—can certainly 

speed things up. It can advance. It can enhance. It can do a lot of 

things. 

We know that agencies, especially within the Intelligence Community, have a need to hold things close to the vest rather than 

share. And I don’t know how much of a problem that is, if they just 

don’t want to let go of controlling their process and they want to 

have this within their own agency. But it seems to me that this old 

system has been in place, and served us well for a long time. And 

it certainly reflects the time that it served us well, during the Cold 

War. It seems to me that if there is anything that we have duplicated from that, taken from that Cold War system is this system; 


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but times have changed yet we don’t seem to have an urgency to 

change the system. So I am wondering if there needs to be clearer, 

stronger directive legislative language to change the process. 

But I agree with you. I think we have to wait until December to 

see progress. I am not exceptionally hopeful about what is going to 

happen until December. And this isn’t aspersions against any of 

the people that are working on this. It just seems to me that they 

are complicating it more with their subcommittees. 

Are you as frustrated as I am about this? 

Ms. FARRELL. Yes, we are. Yes, we are. 

When I first started at GAO early in the 1980s, we were looking 

at personnel security clearances. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. And there is a long, long history on it. 

Ms. FARRELL. And here we are many, many years later; and we 

are still looking at these same issues. It now has management attention, though. It goes back to what we were talking about. There 

was management attention in 2005. The problem is sustaining it. 

And management attention by itself won’t get you transformation. 

As you know, there are a number of other best practices that you 

have to put in play. 

And now, as we have been discussing, the Performance Accountability Council raises another set of questions. It looks like this 

could be a good thing in terms of assigning roles and responsibilities for certain areas. We haven’t seen that before. But how does 

that really play out when we talk about—— 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Why don’t we have one entity that actually 

is responsible for doing the things that we are describing? I mean, 

it seems to me that you need to establish the entity—and then the 

person that is in charge and goes forward to do these things. 

I don’t understand why it is being done this way. Because right 

now we are being planned and subcommitteed to death on this 

thing. 

My guess in December is, is that there will be some kind of report on the plan and the subcommittees to a new administration. 

And then by the time they start up and they review everything 

that the GAO has said and tried to get the agencies to do, et 

cetera, et cetera, plus review all of this, that it will be well into 

2009. 

And I am not saying this to be disrespectful. I just think that 

there just isn’t any ‘‘umph’’ to this thing. There isn’t anyone that 

has a sense of urgency—you know, ‘‘fire, fire, house on fire,’’ saying 

we have got to get this thing done. 

I think it is being done the wrong way. I think you have somebody in charge. Then they say, all right, come on in, here is the 

plan. Here is how we are going to measure it. These are the assignments for people. This is the equipment that we need to buy in 

order to enhance the system that we have. This is the request we 

need to make of the Congress. These are some of the snags that 

need to be cleaned up legislatively. 

Otherwise, I will be gone from the Congress. You will be retired 

from the GAO. Maybe that will make some of the people in these 

security clearance subcommittee happy, but reform won’t be 

achieved. 


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Anyway, I will yield time to I think one of the most brilliant 

Members of the Congress and the House Intelligence Committee 

and this subcommittee, Mr. Holt from New Jersey. 

Mr. HOLT. Thank you for the compliment. But, more important, 

thank you for holding this hearing; and thank you, Ms. Farrell, for 

coming. 

How many people in the U.S. Government have security clearances? 

Ms. FARRELL. The volume of security clearances is unknown to 

us at this time, due to past data reliability problems that we have 

identified with DOD’s JPAS system and others. We can use the 

number of investigations that OPM tells us they do, which is only 

one portion of the community that you are interested in, the Intelligence Community. I can’t tell you that number because there is 

not a reliable number out there that I can present to you. 

Mr. HOLT. Well, that is what I thought you would say. I don’t 

really need to know the answer. I just wanted it on the record that 

nobody knows the answer. I believe it is true. 

Do you also believe it is true that nobody knows the answer? 

Ms. FARRELL. We, based on our past work with DOD’s program, 

would say that is correct. Again, we are just starting our work with 

the Intelligence Community; and we are trying to get a reliable 

number. I will be back to report that or my colleague, Ms. Davi 

D’Agostino, will. 

Mr. HOLT. Why do you suppose that the requirement of the Intelligence Reform Act on the intelligence part that there be a comprehensive database has not been fulfilled? Why do you think that 

provision has not been? 

Ms. FARRELL. There are multiple databases among the agencies. 

I think there are over 20 in various stages. One issue for them is 

going to be integrating those databases, deciding to use legacy or 

go with something brand new. That is a business transformation 

effort, and that will require an information technology strategy 

that they have acknowledged in the plan, but we haven’t seen anything that will move them forward to developing that database. 

Mr. HOLT. Thank you. 

In April of this year, the Office of Management and Budget sent 

the President a report on security and suitability reform; and OMB 

stated it is now ready to adopt and pursue implementation of a 

process to reform the system that will include six concepts: to improve the relevancy of information collected, which makes sense because a lot of the investigation that goes into this seems to me to 

be irrelevant to the whole purpose of the investigation. 

Ms. FARRELL. Yes. 

Mr. HOLT. Second, to increase the use of automation to speed the 

process. Third, to focus field investigations on specific kinds of information, rather than fishing expeditions. Four, to make decisions 

based on modern analytic assessments of risk, rather than a riskavoidance model. Five, to reduce duplication of data. And, six, to 

use continuous evaluation, rather than periodic investigations. 

Did GAO—did you evaluate the methodology that the administration used to develop these concepts and do you have any idea 

how they decided to move away from periodic reinvestigation to 


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continuous evaluation? I’m not saying that is a bad move. I just 

wonder how they came up with these. 

Ms. FARRELL. These concepts are familiar to us. If you look at 

the history of personnel security clearances, whether it is the old 

process or the new process, I think you can make some kind of relationship. We don’t know the methodology that they used to come 

up with those, but they seem to be logical. 

As far as the continuous evaluation, research has been done by 

DOD for years in this area of what technology can be applied to 

streamline the process and improve quality. So the continuous 

evaluation is a concept that has been discussed for some time. We 

know concepts that have been around. We don’t know specifics on 

how to make them materialize. 

Mr. HOLT. Thank you. 

On reciprocity, do you think the administration—and forgive me, 

Madam Chair, if I am repeating ground that already has been 

plowed here. Does the administration security reform effort move 

toward reciprocity, transferability—and I am not sure that we will 

ever see an Intelligence Community, one badge, as has been suggested, but are we moving toward at least transferability, reciprocity, whatever name you want to use? 

Ms. FARRELL. We don’t see that movement in the plan. IRPTA 

clearly lays that out as a goal. But, again, that is where we would 

like to see a coherent mission with clear goals and steps of how the 

Council or whoever the single entity is in charge is going to get 

there. But you cannot tell what the movement is to reciprocity by 

looking at the plan or at the Executive order. 

Mr. HOLT. Is it your job to evaluate the idea of a one badge or 

of a community-wide reciprocity or just to look at the process for 

getting there or not? Are you going to offer a judgment on the wisdom of such a clearance and clearance system? 

Ms. FARRELL. We are going to look at that process in terms of 

what is the goal, just what you are raising. Is it one badge? Or 

what do you mean by reciprocity? First, that needs to be defined 

in the plan, what is that, and then what steps are going to be 

taken. We are not going to be specific in terms of this is exactly 

what you should do. 

Mr. HOLT. More to the point, I am wondering if you think it is 

in your purview to make a judgment about the wisdom of doing 

that. 

Ms. FARRELL. We make judgment based on criteria; and, in this 

case, the law is what we would be using as criteria or other best 

practices or something that very clearly lays out what it should be. 

GAO would not come in and offer this is exactly how it should be 

unless it is in the law and this is how it meets the intent of the 

law. 

Mr. HOLT. It is the law, I think, that all the investigations and 

determinations shall be transferable, accepted by any agency. I 

guess you are not in a position to judge whether that will work well 

once we get there. Right now, all you can ask is whether there is 

a plan and activity to get there. 

Ms. FARRELL. Right now, we have several efforts that are under 

way. Besides looking at the reform efforts, we are looking at timeliness, quality, and reciprocity within the Intelligence Community. 


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So that is part of what we are addressing for this subcommittee in 

terms of is it a problem or isn’t it a problem. 

Mr. HOLT. Well, this is enlightening. I will have to catch up on 

your testimony earlier today. 

I thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. I thank you, Mr. Holt, for being here and 

the questions you asked. 

We are planning when we return, when Congress returns after 

the August break, to have a hearing with the stakeholders—the 

planners, the major stakeholders. We will review with them where 

they are in their goals, when and how they plan to execute, really 

the questions and some of the points that were raised today. 

But we wanted to start with you. Because if there is anyone who 

has been the very important thorn in the ointment, so to speak, it 

has been the GAO. And not just one report but reports over decades on this very issue. So we are very grateful to you for the work 

that you have done, that the agency has done. 

I think today has been enlightening, both for myself, the ranking 

member, and for Mr. Holt as well as the staff, the minority staff 

and the majority staff. This is not a partisan issue. There is no reason for it to be. In fact, I think we keep developing more consensus 

about this as we move through it. 

What is disturbing to me is when we don’t know exactly how 

many security clearances are out there. The question comes up that 

can be raised is how do we protect those who have them if we don’t 

know how many and who they are. I guess we know who they are, 

but why don’t we know how many there are. 

That raises the question, do we really know who they are? There 

is a whole new group that have been issued security clearances, 

and that is all these contractors. What happens when they leave 

and their contract runs out or is cut off, like some of those that 

have not respected the public dime or the taxpayer that provides 

it. It is a big concern of mine. And so I think, beyond the planning 

and as important as all of these things are really very, very serious 

issues. 

Mr. HOLT. Madam Chairman, if I may add a comment along 

those lines. The proliferation of clearances and classified material 

just cheapens the process and makes it less and less reliable because it is less and less meaningful. 

Thank you. 

Chairwoman ESHOO. Thank you. I think on that note we will 

close the hearing. And again, Ms. Farrell, thank you again for your 

service to our country. And for everyone who is here and attended 

the hearing today, I thank you for being here and I hope it was 

as instructive and enlightening for you as it was for the rest of us. 

Thank you. 

[Whereupon, at 4:12 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

Æ 


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