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U.S. Homeland Security Department Lacks Priorities, Say Outside Experts, Department Watchdog By Joe Fiorill WASHINGTON — The U.S. Homeland Security Department is too disorganized, and its agencies spend too much time competing rather than cooperating with one another, expert witnesses told a Senate committee today (see GSN, Jan. 25). In testimony ahead of confirmation hearings next week on Homeland Security Secretary-designate Michael Chertoff, four outside experts and acting department inspector general Richard Skinner proposed various ways to strengthen the hand of the department’s top managers but generally agreed that clear, enforceable priorities are lacking (see GSN, Jan. 11). Skinner told the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that the department needs “an operational plan that’s developed at the highest level.” “Exactly what do we want to accomplish this year, what do we want to accomplish in five years, with the resources that we have available to ourselves?” Skinner asked. Spending by the department’s grant-making bodies, Skinner said, too often fails to reflect intelligence from its Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate. Port security grants, for example, have been doled out without setting information-based priorities, he said (see GSN, Jan. 3). Skinner cited a need to have Homeland Security’s agencies cooperate more effectively by setting department-wide priorities and then “reaching a consensus among all the elements within the department” on those priorities. Heritage Foundation Senior Fellow James Carafano told the panel that part of the solution to the department’s disorganization must be a “clear division of responsibilities between operators and supporters,” like the one he said exists in the Defense Department between those who fight wars and those who set policy. “Response is clearly an operation function,” he said, offering one example of his proposed division of powers. “Preparedness, on the other hand, you could argue, is a support function.” Homeland Security currently includes among its major elements a single Emergency Preparedness and Response Directorate. Carafano said the homeland security secretary is “absolutely” too weak to reorganize authority within the department to the extent needed. He said the secretary should be granted more power to do so and also suggested creating an undersecretary for policy — a proposal echoed by RAND Corp. Senior Policy Analyst Michael Wermuth, who called for an undersecretary for policy and planning. Wermuth recommended caution on making any major changes at Homeland Security, though. He said the department is still young and has already had its share of “turmoil” in its two years of existence. “Neither Congress nor DHS should rush to judgment about major changes in structure or authority,” Wermuth said. Brookings Institution Visiting Fellow Richard Falkenrath, who until last year was White House homeland security adviser, also opposed making major changes at Homeland Security in the near future. He said the department is about to have a new secretary, that its initial structure has not been given enough time to prove itself and that the secretary already has the power to carry out many organizational changes as he sees fit. “There may well be changes that need to occur, but I think this is exactly the wrong time for a statutorily driven internal reorganization of DHS,” Falkenrath said. Committee members stressed importance of smarter spending at the department, expressing skepticism about the agency’s need for more resources and about the likelihood that any would be forthcoming. Senator Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) said Homeland Security “cannot cover every risk than people dream up.” “If we did, then we would spend more on this than in defense of our nation, and we would give everybody what they want,” he said. “I’m very worried that this process could lead to the funding for Homeland Security being the latest piggy bank, Christmas tree, whatever you wish to call it.” “We cannot be a risk-free America,” Domenici said. “Something has to be at risk, or we just cannot afford a homeland security.”
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