GAO has broad statutory authority under title 31 of the United States Code to audit and evaluate agency financial transactions, programs, and activities. To carry out these audit and evaluation authorities, GAO has a broad statutory right of access to agency records. Using the authority granted under title 31, we perform a range of work to support Congress that, among other things, includes the following: Evaluations of federal programs, policies, operations, and performance: For example, evaluations of transportation security programs related to passenger-screening operations at airports, our work to assess enforcement of immigration laws, and our work on the U.S. Coast Guard’s Deepwater acquisition to replace its aging fleet. Management and financial audits to determine whether public funds are being spent efficiently, effectively, and in accordance with applicable laws: For example, DHS’s appropriations acts for fiscal years 2002 through 2006 have mandated that we review expenditure plans for the U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology (U.S.VISIT) program. Investigations to assess whether illegal or improper activities may have occurred: For example, we investigated the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) Individuals and Households Program to determine the vulnerability of the program to fraud and abuse in the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Constructive engagements in which we work proactively with agencies, when appropriate, to help guide their efforts toward transformation and achieving positive results: For example, we have worked to establish such an arrangement with the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) on its design and implementation of the Secure Flight Program for passenger pre-screening for domestic flights whereby we could review documents on system development as they were being formulated and provide TSA with our preliminary observations for its consideration. Congress mandated TSA certify that the design and implementation of the program would meet 10 specific criteria. Congress also mandated that we review and comment on TSA’s certification. TSA’s certification has not yet occurred. We carry out most of our work in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. Our analysts and financial auditors are responsible for planning, conducting, and reporting their work in a timely manner without internal or external impairments. These standards require that analysts and financial auditors promptly obtain sufficient, competent, and relevant evidence to provide a reasonable basis for any related findings and conclusions. Therefore, prompt access to all records and other information associated with these activities is needed for the effective and efficient performance of our work. Our work involves different collection approaches to meet the evidence requirements of generally accepted government auditing standards. Such evidence falls into four categories: physical (the results of direct inspection or observation); documentary (information created by and for an agency, such as letters, memorandums, contracts, management and accounting records, and other documents in various formats, including electronic databases); testimonial (the results of face-to-face, telephone, or written inquiries, interviews, and questionnaires); and analytical (developed by or for GAO through computations, data comparisons, and other analyses). We have promulgated protocols describing how we will interact with the agencies we audit. We expect that agencies will promptly comply with our requests for all categories of needed information. We also expect that we will receive full and timely access to agency officials who have stewardship over the requested records; to agency employees responsible for the programs, issues, events, operations, and other factors covered by such records; and to contractor personnel supporting such programs, issues, events, and operations. In addition, we expect that we will have timely access to an agency’s facilities and other relevant locations while trying to minimize interruptions to an agency’s operations when conducting work related to requests for information. We provide an appropriate level of security to information obtained during the course of our work. We are statutorily required to maintain the same level of confidentiality of information as is required of the agency from which it is received, and we take very seriously our obligation to safeguard the wide range of sensitive information we routinely receive. For example, we ensure that GAO employees have appropriate security clearances to access information. We also have well-established security policies and procedures. Timely access to information, facilities, and other relevant locations is in the best interests of both GAO and the agencies. We need to efficiently use the time available to complete our work to minimize the impact on the agency being reviewed and to meet the time frames of our congressional clients. Therefore, we expect that an agency’s leadership and internal procedures will recognize the importance of and support prompt responses to our requests for information. When we believe that delays in obtaining requested access significantly impede our work, we contact the agency’s leadership for resolution and notify our congressional clients, as appropriate. Unlike those of many other executive agencies, DHS’s processes for working with us includes extensive coordination among program officials, liaisons, and attorneys at the departmental and component levels and centralized control for all incoming GAO requests for information and outgoing documents. In an April 2004 directive on GAO relations, DHS established a department liaison to manage its relationship with us. In addition, DHS has a GAO coordinator within all of its components and, within the DHS General Counsel Office, an Assistant General Counsel for General Law who provides advice on GAO relations. According to the directive, the department liaison (1) receives and coordinates all GAO notifications of new work, (2) participates in all entrance conferences, and (3) notifies the Assistant General Counsel of new work to obtain participation of counsel. The directive requires the Assistant General Counsel to participate in all entrance meetings to ensure that the scope of any request is clear and finite, and that mutual obligations between DHS and GAO are met. The component coordinator handles all matters involving GAO for the component, generally participates in GAO entrance meetings, and seeks advice of component’s counsel, as appropriate. The following figure illustrates the coordination of information among DHS officials described above when we make a request for information. Typically when we begin an engagement, we send a letter to the department liaison to notify DHS that we are starting a new engagement and we request an entrance meeting to discuss the work. During the course of our review, we provide written requests for meetings and documents to component coordinators using a DHS-prescribed form. The component coordinators then forward our requests to program officials and consult with component counsel, who may consult with the Assistant General Counsel. Figure 1. DHS Process for Working with GAO. In a memo that transmitted the above directive to senior managers in DHS components, the then-Under Secretary for Management emphasized the importance of a positive working relationship between the two agencies. The memo stated that failure to meet or brief GAO staffs in a timely manner, as well as being viewed as nonresponsive to GAO document requests, could result in tense and acrimonious interactions. The Under Secretary also reminded senior officials that prompt and professional discharge of their responsibilities to GAO requests could affect both DHS’s funding and restrictions attached to that funding. In testimony before this committee and the House Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on Homeland Security in February 2007, we stated that DHS has not made its management or operational decisions transparent enough to allow Congress to be sure that the department is effectively, efficiently, and economically using its billions of dollars of annual funding. We also noted that our work for Congress to assess DHS’s operations has been significantly hampered by long delays in obtaining access to program documents and officials. We emphasized that for Congress, GAO, and others to independently assess the department’s efforts, DHS would need to become more transparent and minimize recurring delays in providing access to information on its programs and operations. At most federal agencies and in some cases within DHS, we obtain the information we need directly from program officials, often on the spot or very soon after making the request. For example, our work on the Secure Border Initiative (SBI) has so far met with a very welcome degree of access to both DHS officials and documents. SBI is a comprehensive multiyear program established in November 2005 to secure U.S. borders and reduce illegal immigration. One element of SBI is SBInet, the program within the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) responsible for developing a comprehensive border protection system of tactical infrastructure, rapid response capability, and technology. The fiscal year 2007 Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act required that, before DHS could obligate $950 million of the $1.2 billion appropriated for SBInet, it had to prepare a plan for expending these funds, have it reviewed by GAO, and then submit it to Congress for approval. The plan was to be submitted within 60 days of the act’s passage. CBP officials provided us office space at CBP headquarters, gave us access to all levels of SBInet management, and promptly provided us with all the documentation we requested, much of which was still in draft form and predecisional. DHS met the 60-day requirement when it submitted its plan to the Appropriations Committees on December 4, 2006. We met our responsibilities by being able to review the plan as it developed over the 60-day period, and to provide the results of our review to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees on December 7 and 13, 2006, respectively. In contrast to the access we were afforded in the above example, the process used in most of our interactions with DHS is layered and time- consuming. As discussed earlier, we are asked to submit each request for documents to the component coordinator rather than directly to program officials even if we have already met with these officials. Also as mentioned earlier, the component coordinator often refers our request to component counsel. And the Assistant General Counsel for General Law in DHS’s General Counsel’s office may become involved. The result is that we often wait for months for information that in many cases could be provided immediately.