[House Hearing, 109 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
THE PRESIDENT'S PROPOSED FY 2007
BUDGET FOR THE DHS: THE OFFICE OF
INTELLIGENCE AND ANALYSIS
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE,
INFORMATION SHARING, AND TERRORISM RISK ASSESSMENT
of the
COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
FEBRUARY 15, 2006
__________
Serial No. 109-63
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security
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Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/
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__________
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COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
Peter T. King, New York, Chairman
Don Young, Alaska Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi
Lamar S. Smith, Texas Loretta Sanchez, California
Curt Weldon, Pennsylvania Edward J. Markey, Massachusetts
Christopher Shays, Connecticut Norman D. Dicks, Washington
John Linder, Georgia Jane Harman, California
Mark E. Souder, Indiana Peter A. DeFazio, Oregon
Tom Davis, Virginia Nita M. Lowey, New York
Daniel E. Lungren, California Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of
Jim Gibbons, Nevada Columbia
Rob Simmons, Connecticut Zoe Lofgren, California
Mike Rogers, Alabama Sheila Jackson-Lee, Texas
Stevan Pearce, New Mexico Bill Pascrell, Jr., New Jersey
Katherine Harris, Florida Donna M. Christensen, U.S. Virgin
Bobby Jindal, Louisiana Islands
Dave G. Reichert, Washington Bob Etheridge, North Carolina
Michael McCaul, Texas James R. Langevin, Rhode Island
Charlie Dent, Pennsylvania Kendrick B. Meek, Florida
Ginny Brown-Waite, Florida
______
SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE, INFORMATION SHARING, AND TERRORISM RISK
ASSESSMENT
Rob Simmons, Connecticut, Chairman
Curt Weldon, Pennsylvania Zoe Lofgren, California
Mark E. Souder, Indiana Loretta Sanchez, California
Daniel E. Lungren, California Jane Harman, California
Jim Gibbons, Nevada Nita M. Lowey, New York
Stevan Pearce, New Mexico Sheila Jackson-Lee, Texas
Bobby Jindal, Louisiana James R. Langevin, Rhode Island
Charlie Dent, Pennsylvania Kendrick B. Meek, Florida
Ginny Brown-Waite, Florida Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi
Peter T. King, New York (Ex (Ex Officio)
Officio)
(II)
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Statements
The Honorable Rob Simmons, a Representative in Congress From the
State of Connecticut, and Chairman, Subcommittee on
Intelligence, Information Sharing, and Terrorism Risk
Assessment..................................................... 1
The Honorable Zoe Lofgren, a Representative in Congress From the
State of California, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on
Intelligence, Information Sharing, and Terrorism Risk
Assessment:
Oral Statement................................................. 2
Prepared Statement............................................. 2
The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Rpresentative in Congress
From the State of Mississippi, and Ranking Member, Committee on
Homeland Security.............................................. 4
The Honorable Jane Harman, a Representative in Congress From the
State of California:
Oral Statement................................................. 12
Prepared Statement............................................. 12
The Honorable Sheila Jackson-Lee, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Texase:
Oral Statement................................................. 15
Prepared Statement............................................. 16
The Honorable Ginny Brown-Waite, a Representative in Congress
from the State of Florida...................................... 15
WITNESSES
Mr. Charlie E. Allen, Chief Intelligence Officer, U.S. Department
of Homeland Security........................................... 4
Accompanied by:
Ms. Mary V. Connell, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Intelligence
and Analysis, U.S. Department of Homeland Security............. 11
THE PRESIDENT'S PROPOSED FY 2007
BUDGET FOR DHS: THE OFFICE OF INTELLIGENCE AND ANALYSIS
----------
Wednesday, February 15, 2006
U.S.House of Representatives,
Committee on Homeland Security,
Subcommittee on Intelligence, Information
Sharing, and Terrorism Risk Assessment,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 3:10 p.m., in
Room 311, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Rob Simmons
[chairman of the subcommittee] presiding.
Present: Representatives Simmons, Brown-Waite, Lofgren,
Thompson, Harman, and Jackson-Lee.
Mr. Simmons. [Presiding.] We meet today in open session
following a classified briefing to receive testimony on the
budget request of the Office of Intelligence and Analysis, or
I&A, for fiscal year 2007 and to discuss the plan of the
department's chief intelligence officer, Mr. Allen, who is here
with us today.
Members are reminded, at least those members who
participated in the closed briefing, not to raise specific
questions on budgetary issues that would fall within the
classified domain.
The Department of Homeland Security's Information Analysis
and Infrastructure Protection Directorate was divided up during
the department's second-stage review last year. The Office of
Information Analysis became the Office of Intelligence and
Analysis and became a direct report to the secretary.
The I&A account funds the chief intelligence officer and is
a part of the larger analysis and operations account. The
Office of Intelligence and Analysis accounts for less than 1
percent of the DHS budget but provides a vital service to the
department and to our nation.
By bringing together the intelligence elements of the
department and fusing that information with information from
state, local, tribal and private-sector partners, I&A plays a
unique role in our nation's intelligence community.
It must continue to strengthen that role and better
integrate those elements into the department and into the
broader intelligence community.
And we are interested to know, Mr. Allen, how your budget
will accomplish this.
I&A must also focus on improving the analysis and sharing
of terrorist threat information and sharing that intelligence
provided to DHS partners is timely, relevant and useful.
The most usable information will come in an unclassified
form, which is often a challenge for the intelligence
community. Not only is it against the culture of the community,
classified information is often difficult to declassify and
share.
And so I would suggest that the department needs to do a
better job working with the Open Source Center, both
contributing to the work of the center and utilizing the
center's product. Open source information by its very nature is
unclassified, although open source intelligence may be lightly
classified, therefore lending itself to rapid dissemination.
And finally, Mr. Allen, we would like to thank you for your
work, for your distinguished career. You have many challenges
ahead of you in building the DHS intelligence strategic
enterprise, and I look forward to continuing to work with you
to help ensure that I&A has the resources and capabilities it
needs to accomplish its vital mission.
And I would yield now to the ranking minority member of the
subcommittee, the gentlelady from California, Ms. Lofgren, for
any opening statement she would like to make.
Ms. Lofgren. As you know, Mr. Chairman, I am losing my
voice, so I will put my whole statement into the record.
I would just note that Mr. Allen has been here a short time
and I think in that short time has made some important strides
forward for the department.
Although I think he is not prepared to comment at this
time, I am mindful of the testimony of Richard Ben-Veniste in
October pointing out that whoever writes the check gets the
most attention.
So at the appropriate time, I look forward to Mr. Allen's
comment about budgetary authority and the like. I know that he
is enmeshed in a information architecture program, which I am
pleased to hear.
I neglected to ask when I met with him earlier whether the
analysis will include what is available in an off-the-shelf
capacity, as compared to a designed-for-specification capacity.
And I do not know if he is prepared to answer that today or
not, so we will find out as time goes by.
I will just say that I think this is an important component
of our efforts to keep our country secure. I have mentioned to
Mr. Allen both in public and in private the need to make sure
that we respect civil liberties of Americans as we move
forward, and I have been constantly reassured by Mr. Allen of
his strong commitment to that. And for that, I am grateful.
And I would yield back.
For the Record
Prepared Statement of the Honorable Zoe Lofgren
Thank you Chairman Simmons, and welcome back Mr. Allen. I am
pleased to see you again. I await your report regarding your progress
in shaping the Office of Intelligence and Analysis, and how the mission
you set for it last fall is coming together.
Today's hearing includes both an open and closed session. Thank you
for answering our questions in the closed session. Your answers have
provided us with information that helps us greatly in understanding
many of the challenges you are facing. I look forward to being able to
ask you many questions in our public sessions about your operations.
I remain concerned that the President's FY 2007 budget may not
provide you with the funding you believe you need to make your office
successful in the fight to defend our nation. I am hopeful that there
are questions that you will be able to answer publicly about how your
budget matches up with your priorities. I also look forward to hearing
about any new initiatives that you have undertaken since last we met.
When you testified last fall, you had been on the job only a few
weeks. You shared with us many of your priorities and what you believed
the mission of the Office of Intelligence and Analysis to be.
At the time, I said I welcomed the Second Stage Review as it
related to the Department's intelligence function because it
represented an opportunity to start anew. This was especially important
because--as we all know--the Administration had stripped the Office of
Information Analysis of its central role in intelligence assessment
shortly after its creation, leaving the Department without a clear
intelligence mission.
Mr. Allen, your testimony last fall convinced me that you had found
a clear and compelling mission for the Department and I was happy to
have someone with your abilities and extensive experience in this
important position.
At the same time, I emphasized with you that the Committee needed
specifics--specifics about your authorities as Chief Intelligence
Office and your roles and responsibilities regarding the various
intelligence units falling under the DHS umbrella. I noted that in
order to drive a common intelligence analysis mission, you needed to
ensure that everyone at the Department was on the same page.
I am pleased to see that just two weeks ago, Secretary Chertoff
took a major step in the right direction by signing a 10-page
Intelligence Integration and Management Directive that spelled out in
specific terms your authorities to integrate and manage the
Department's intelligence programs.
You will be happy to know, Mr. Allen, that in the words of one
intelligence expert, that the directive looks like the work ``of a very
seasoned bureaucratic infighter--someone who knows how to write the
rules to establish and protect the powers of the [Chief Intelligence
Officer] position.'' This expert also noted that while it is ``always a
challenge when a new position is created that is responsible for trying
to bring together diverse pieces of a function spread across a large
agency,'' that this directive at least gives you a fighting change.
I think that time will tell whether or not your having budgetary
authority would enhance your ability to succeed in your position. I am
mindful of the testimony of former 9/11 Commissioner Richard Ben-
Veniste stated during our second panel in October, when he said,
``Whoever writes the check gets the most attention.''
As we discussed in October, Mr. Allen, I am also greatly concerned
that your goal of program integration will never be fully achieved
without some kind of commonality of databases through which information
can be shared internally within the Department.
Those common databases must, of course, include appropriate privacy
safeguards. As we have discussed, civil liberties and privacy
protections can and must be built into the technology. I am pleased to
know that you are committed to supporting the privacy laws of our
nation as they pertain to the information that the Department may
develop, how or if that information is retained and how that
information is to be disposed of when it no longer has any value.
I am curious to know if you believe that there is currently off-
the-shelf -the-Shelf technology that you can use that will meets your
needs. If these technologies do not exist, I know that you will
identify what you need and then be willing to fight to get it. Our
subcommittee wants you to have these necessary these tools and
technologies you need to succeed. I look forward to hearing your candid
assessment of your current capabilities well as your future needs.
In October, you stated that the Department ``obviously'' must do a
better job of building interoperable and interconnected databases, and
that you would have a much better idea in ``six months'' of how those
databases were developing.
We're two months shy of the six-month mark, but I hope you can shed
some light on the work that your office is doing in this area either
during the open or closed session today.
In addition, I look forward to you addressing how the Office of
Intelligence and Analysis is working to overcome the information
sharing challenges tat continue to plague the dialogue between the
Federal government on the one hand and its state, local, and tribal
homeland security partners on the other.
I wonder what impact the vacancy in the Program Manager position of
the Information Sharing Environment is having or what impact you
believe it will have on the work you do.
Mr. Allen, thank you for your commitment to helping to secure our
homeland, I look forward to working with you and hearing your testimony
today.
Mr. Simmons. I thank the gentlelady.
I notice that we are joined by the distinguished ranking
member of the full committee, and I would like to extend to him
the courtesy of making an opening statement.
Mr. Thompson. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And I,
too, will submit a statement for the record.
But I would like to again say to Mr. Allen I appreciate his
outreach that he has done to committee members and the
community at large. It is a very positive step. You have a very
sensitive job to do. It is absolutely one that I could find no
one better to do it than yourself.
There are a couple of things that concern me. I have public
officials who say, from an intelligence standpoint, ``How can
we get information in real-time through a system rather than
seeing it on TV?''
And I think you are aware of one of the statements; the
mayor of Los Angeles indicated concern.
The other situation is, I was a little dismayed by the
departure of Mr. Rusak, a good person. And I hope, for whatever
the reasons, his departure, we will not let it be the problem
for the next person. We absolutely need to make sure we keep
these people and give them the resources necessary to do the
job.
But other than that, the issue on diversity that you have
indicated you will be stepping forward on within the department
is real positive. And I look forward to working with you on
that.
I will yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Simmons. I thank the gentleman for his comments.
The chairman now recognizes Mr. Charlie Allen, chief
intelligence officer of the Department of Homeland Security, to
testify.
And we look forward to hearing this afternoon on a broad
range of issues that you bring to the job, improvements you
have made, and whether or not you feel that the budget that you
have submitted is adequate to accomplish the mission.
Surely, homeland security is one of the most important
things that we can do. Intelligence gives us that early warning
we need to protect our country and our fellow citizens.
And I recognize you, Mr. Allen. We look forward to your
statement.
STATEMENT OF CHARLIE ALLEN, CHIEF INTELLIGENCE OFFICE, U.S.
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
Mr. Allen. Thank you, Chairman Simmons, Ranking Minority
Member Lofgren, and Ranking Member of the full committee
Thompson.
It is a pleasure to be here. I am very grateful that you
are holding this hearing.
The overriding theme that is reflected in our fiscal year
2007 budget is a need for unity and integration of DHS
intelligence. And there is the direction in which I am headed.
I would like to introduce for all concerned my new
leadership team. I have my principal deputy assistant secretary
here, Mr. Jack Tomarchio; my deputy assistant secretary for
intelligence and analysis, Dr. Mary Connell; my deputy
assistant secretary for mission integration, Mr. Tom Faust; my
director of plans and integration, Mr. Jim Chaparro; my chief
of staff, Mr. James Beagles; and my director of finance and
budget, Mr. John Hill.
Four months ago, I identified five priorities that I would
need to address in order to carry out the secretary's vision
for an integrated DHS intelligence enterprise. And I brought
them here to your committee on the 19th of October.
My first priority, I told you, was to improve the quality
of intelligence. We are beginning to broaden the scope of our
intelligence analysis. We continue to focus on terrorist
threats to the homeland, but our analysis must encompass all
aspects of the security of the homeland, including border
security, the phenomenon of radicalization, and critical
infrastructure vulnerabilities.
To support this broader function, my office has established
several cross-division working groups and is developing an
intelligence campaign plan to address border security.
Moreover, we have put new emphasis on reaching out to other
elements of the department. On radicalization, we are working
with the Department of Homeland Security's office of policy, as
well as science and technology and the civil liberties office,
in order to develop a deeper understanding of the roots of the
phenomenon of radicalization.
On chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear issues,
we are partnering with science and technology to leverage the
office's research for its intelligence value.
Another new and significant effort that my office is
pursuing is open source. I view my office as a lynchpin for
providing and managing open source information for the
department. Our plan for acquiring, handling and disseminating
open source information is straightforward, efficient and
effective.
Proven methods of obtaining open source data exists, and we
intend to leverage current activities in the department, as
well as in the open source programs of other agencies,
including the UDNI Open Source Center, as well as the
commercial sector.
The efficient handling of information is critical to DHS
providing our nation the insight, guidance and warning needed
to ensure we are prepared to handle threats to our security and
positioned to respond effectively when required.
We are taking a number of enhancements and new initiative
in this area, including the development of an intelligence
enterprise information architecture that Congresswoman Lofgren
referred to.
Fiscal year 2007 resources will be critical to an
aggressive path that we must have, a system that provides
information to those that need it, when they need it, and will
thusly facilitate a sharing and collaborating information
environment that is critical to our mission.
Our information technology investment we are requesting in
fiscal year 2007 will allow my office to establish an urgently
needed capability for retrieving, handling, using and storing
information.
My second priority is building a unified culture among DHS
intelligence components. Last month, Secretary Chertoff signed
a management directive which formally established me as the
chief intelligence officer of the department and provided me
with the authorities that I need to lead, integrate and manage
DHS intelligence programs.
This management directive also formalizes my chairmanship
of the Homeland Security Intelligence Council, which I
established upon my arrival at DHS to serve as my principal
decisionmaking forum for the intelligence issues, issues of
department-wide significance.
This forum participants include the chiefs of DHS
intelligence elements within the components, as well as key
members of my leadership team. Working with the Homeland
Security Intelligence Council--plans an integration division,
develop comprehensive DHS intelligence enterprise strategic
plan, which articulates our vision, mission goals and
objectives and sets a context for intelligence activities.
And I understand you all have copies of this strategic
plan, which I signed out.
Our strategic plan envisions a purely operational training
and educational system within the next 2 years that will serve
as a vital piece of our efforts to improve intelligence
analysis. A companion to our training plan is our effort to
recruit the best and the brightest from the nation's
universities.
We already have begun implementing our new recruiting plan
and are reaching out to the universities and joining in job
fairs, as I speak.
We have received more than 90 applications for our 2006
summer intern program, a strong indication that the best and
the brightest young Americans across the United States want to
help serve their country and keep it safe.
My office has also been working diligently to build a
workforce at all levels. We finished the last fiscal year with
98 percent of our civil service positions filled. We have
stepped up recruitment and are taking it to new levels with the
development of our recruitment strategy.
Most of the new positions in the fiscal year 2007 budget
proposal are related to integration of the DHS intelligence
enterprise and integration with our state, local and private-
sector partners.
My third priority is providing stronger support to state,
local and private-sector customers. As you know, one of the
initiatives that I have sponsored from the moment I entered is
to be able to share information down to the state and local
levels.
One of our ongoing initiatives in this area is the
placement on intelligence representatives in New York and Los
Angeles. And more broadly, my office is leading a major DHS
effort to plan for and ultimately deploy officers to more than
30 state and local fusion centers throughout the country.
Sharing information with our state and local partners is of
the highest priority for my office. Every product produced by
my office is reviewed with an eye toward sharing that with
state and local authorities.
These products are shared with the state and local
customers via an e-mail distribution and posting system on the
Homeland Security Information Network. We also have a
classified network so that we can share actually classified
information down at the state and local level and out to the 50
homeland security advisers.
My fourth initiative is, of course, taking my place as a
full member at the national intelligence community. As I told
you this morning, I was with Ambassador Negroponte and other
leaders of the community briefing the Defense Subcommittee of
the House Appropriations Committee.
And let me say that Ambassador Negroponte has reached out
to homeland security and to me, and we work as full partners on
counterterrorism issues.
I am also working very closely with Admiral Scott Redd, who
heads the National Counterterrorism Center. We have a very
smooth and close operation.
Our partnership with the FBI continues to be strong. We
reach out daily to the bureau at all levels and work closely on
a broad range of threats.
Finally, our experts are helping the DNI to meet the
objectives of his national intelligence strategy by ensuring
that we have an integrated DHS intelligence enterprise to
address threats broadly to the homeland.
Because of our unique information holdings in the domains
of the border, transportation and maritime security, our strong
and growing relationships with state and local authorities and
the private sector, and as statutory obligations to defend the
homeland against terrorism, intelligence analysis has to be one
of the cornerstones of this integrated capability.
Finally, on my 19 October statement to you, I said I would
work and reach out to the Congress and provide transparency in
all of my actions. I have made repeated trips to the Hill, and
I have met frequently with your staff members. And I intend to
continue to do the same.
I have tried to convey to you my personal sense of urgency
about the mission that we all share: preventing another
catastrophic attack on the United States. The budget that we
have submitted to you for your review reflects the same
urgency.
We need the full president's budget in order to accomplish
our goals. With your strong support, DHS intelligence can do
its part to achieve this goal of protecting the country.
Thank you very much. I request that my classified statement
be retained in your records.
I am ready to answer your questions.
Mr. Simmons. Without objection, so ordered.
And members who attended the classified briefing may, in
fact, have questions that they want to submit for the record,
which will be done.
The classified statement is at the secret level and is not
available to the public, but it is available to members of the
subcommittee and of the committee, and will be held by
committee staff.
Let me ask a general question. First of all, as I recall,
the percentage increase of the overall budget was 18 percent.
And yet the total budget as a component of the total Department
of Homeland Security is only 1 percent, which is a relatively
small figure.
And the challenges that you face in homeland security
intelligence I consider to be substantial. You have to fuse
information. You have to cooperate and coordinate with state,
and local, and tribal actors.
You have mentioned your interest in supporting open source
intelligence, which goes into the issue of data mining. A lot
of these concepts have been discussed for some time.
But now for the first time we have an agency of the U.S.
government that is charged with performing these tasks in an
environment where traditional bureaucracies may or may not be
supportive, the old issue of bureaucratic politics.
How successful do you feel that you have been thus far? And
what is your vision for this year in expending these dollars
and in meeting these non-traditional goals of data mining,
collecting information from open sources, doing analysis for
open sources, working with state, local and tribal entities,
information-sharing, and so and so forth?
Mr. Allen. Chairman Simmons, you have asked a very large
question. Trying to work across traditional bureaucracies,
particularly bureaucracies that existed in other departments or
as independent elements, is going to be extremely challenging,
because the operating components of the Department of Homeland
Security have a great tradition.
They do wonderful work on a daily basis. They have not
necessarily always kept strong intelligence elements within
them.
We are going to--one, I have an agreement that we will
submit--the secretary, when he submits his integrated budget
guidance out to all the components, as well as to all other
elements of homeland security. We will be emphasizing the need
for all elements to strengthen their intelligence capabilities.
There are about nine elements within the operating
components that have intelligence or intelligence-collection
activities. Some are very strong, like the United States Coast
Guard, as you know. Others are less strong.
And for fiscal year 2008 through 2012, I would expect to
see some of those who have less than robust efforts to increase
their capabilities as they make their budget proposals back to
the secretary.
So we are beginning to use my management directive as chief
intelligence officer to begin exchanging some of this
information.
But how we are going to continue to improve analysis: get
more out of our analysts that we have today, deploy officers to
state fusion centers, as well as handle such charges as open
source.
We are also, as you know, as Dr. Connell explained in
closed session, we are going to deploy some analysts out to the
operating components in order to harvest the information they
have collected.
It is going to be a very challenging time, and we are going
to be extremely pressed. But we will live within the budget
that we requested.
Mr. Simmons. How doe we attract people who want to work for
Homeland Security, not people who want to work for the CIA, or
people who want for the Defense Intelligence Agency, or people
who want to work for the FBI.
No disrespect to those entities, but, you know, this is a
new culture, a new challenge, a new mission, a new task. And
these folks have to have some sense that there is a future in
this, that, as they dedicate their time and their talent to the
task of securing the homeland and working in homeland
intelligence, that they will be respected as professionals and
that they will have an opportunity to advance, as opposed to
simply being assigned to homeland security for a couple of
years and then moving on to some other assignment.
How do you address that challenge?
Mr. Allen. That is an extraordinarily difficult challenge,
because, as you know, some of the other more traditional
intelligence agencies are having difficult retaining their
analysts for a sustained period.
Some of the turnover rates in some agencies is very
alarming. Actually, our turnover rate in my own office right
now is very small, and I am very pleased about that.
But we do not have enough entry-level analysts. And for
that reason, we, as you know, as we said in closed session, we
have developed a recruitment strategy to go out and to actually
pursue the best and the brightest out in universities.
We are going to be visiting a number of universities across
the country. We are going to be going to job fairs. We are
advertising in ``Foreign Affairs'' and ``Foreign Policy'' for
people to make homeland security intelligence analysis a
career.
A career, these days, is probably--if you can keep them for
10 to 15 years, you are doing very well. Training is one of the
things that we have lacked.
We have now an extensive plan to do training and improve
not only the quality of our analysts we have today, but we are
going to reach out to CIA University. We are going to reach out
to the National Joint Military Intelligence College.
And we are also going to reach out the Federal Law
Enforcement Training Center, which will be adding some courses
on counterterrorism, which I think is very important.
I think one of the things we can offer to these young
analysts is that we will want some of them to rotate out and be
analysts in ICE, in CBP and TSA, where they can get a broader
appreciation of how intelligence will serve law enforcement in
more operational areas.
I think there is some very exciting prospects for young
analysts to work and to have a varied career, to work with the
operating components, then come back and work for the DHS
central office of intelligence analysis.
That is my vision, and I am going to try to implement it.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you very much.
The Chair now recognizes the distinguished ranking member,
Ms. Lofgren, of California.
Ms. Lofgren. Thank you very much.
We had a chance to ask many of our questions earlier. But I
am just wondering if you could describe for all of us,
including the public, the results of the IAIP being divided up
and the creation of your office, the new responsibilities and
costs that you did not have before this second-stage review,
and how you are covering these new responsibilities.
Mr. Allen. That is a very strong question and a very good
question, because we have to operate on our own. We were
understaffed when we broke apart, which I think was the right
thing for Secretary Chertoff to do, because we did not have the
logistics or the support.
We did not have the SCIF facilities, the facilities that
were secure for handling classified information. We still lack
appropriate facilities for all of our officers. Not all of our
officers have workstations or terminals; they have to sort of
share their terminals, and this makes life very difficult.
But we now have a plan to finish those facilities, to fit
out particularly Building 19. We will probably have to put some
analysts who are working on more strategic intelligence
analysis off in SCIF's place elsewhere, outside the Nebraska
Avenue complex.
And then to begin to build the kind of information
technology that did not exist is a pretty awesome thing.
That was one of the first things Deputy Secretary Jackson
told me the third day I was on the job, is that you do not have
an information system. You do not know your information flows.
Work carefully with the CIO of DHS, but you are going to have
to develop your own information management system, working with
the CIO, and that is where we embarked.
So there was a whole plethora of new problems that we faced
immediately, once we were broken apart. And the challenges are
still there and very steep.
Ms. Lofgren. Now, let me ask you, on the--well, Congressman
Lungren and I call it the hit rack. Everybody else calls it
HITRAC--map these domestic vulnerabilities to terrorist threats
and works and to secure critical infrastructure with that
knowledge.
Now, this sounds exactly like what the IAIP was originally
supposed to do. How is your mission different from that
original mission?
Sometimes I feel like a nag talking about this--but the
lack of progress, or at least the perceived lack of progress,
in the publication of the domestic critical infrastructure
vulnerability assessments is of concern.
And I am wondering, you know, who is doing that now? What
guidance are they getting? And how has that limited, if at all,
your capacity to accomplish your mission?
Mr. Allen. Thank you, Congresswoman. That is a very good
question, because the HITRAC concept, I think, is a brilliant
concept. I think we owe a lot to Tom Faust, who was one of the
pioneers in helping establish the HITRAC concept.
And when we split apart, putting the two apart, does this
create a seam in our ability to analyze and conduct terrorist
threat assessments against our critical infrastructure? There
are 17 sectors out there.
I have Dr. Mary Connell, who is the deputy assistant
secretary for intelligence, here. She manages the HITRAC
program as part of her overall responsibilities, and she will
briefly speak to the HITRAC program and how we are continuing
to sustain it and grow it.
I would appreciate it.
Ms. Connell. We realize how critical HITRAC is--
Mr. Simmons. Dr. Connell, for the record, could you spell
your name, just for the record?
Ms. Connell. It is Connell, C-O-N-N-E-L-L.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you.
Ms. Connell. We realize how critical HITRAC is, because
that is really a unique mission that we perform at the
department.
What I have done is pull it out--it had been a branch and a
division. And since it is a center, I have pulled it out. And
we are treating is as more or less a joint program office. It
is responsible to me and to Bob Stephan in infrastructure
protection.
So it will stand on its own because of what you are talking
about, Congresswoman. We need to do those sector vulnerability
assessments. They are under way, and we are doing those.
And I think we are doing them in a unique way, in that we
have the sector specialists there from I.P. And we have
intelligence analysts from I&A focusing on the threat.
What I am also doing, in addition to the sector
assessments, is I think there is a lot more intel value that we
can get out of HITRAC. And so I have emphasized to the analysts
that we need to focus on what intelligence products we can do,
as well, for the intelligence community and also for state, and
local, and private.
They have also started--
Ms. Lofgren. I am going to try and understand what you mean
by that. Can you explain that?
Ms. Connell. Yes. Right now, the intelligence community
does not do a lot of product on sector security or threats to
sectors. The threats are treated more as networks or people.
And I think a missing component there is look at the
threats to the private sector, and that is something, analysis
we can--
Ms. Lofgren. Oh, I see.
Ms. Connell. Yes. We are also making sure that we give more
product back to the private sector. So we are writing more
unclassified information for them and having more dialogue with
them.
Ms. Lofgren. I know my time is up, but if I could just do
one quick follow-up.
It seemed to me that when we were putting together our
threats to critical infrastructure vulnerability assessment and
list that, as it evolved over time, and it was--the product was
poor. I mean, everyone knew that.
Part of the problem was that, number one, the mission was
mixed. And there was an effort to list everything--well, if you
get solid information that a Safeway store is going to be--
well, you want to know where all the Safeways are. But it is
not one of your critical infrastructure.
And so both items were on the list. And really, the last
time I looked--and it is only been, I think, about 6 weeks, or
maybe it is improved since the last time I was briefed--but
there were big chunks that were just not present and
inexplicably so.
And the putting together of this list was deficient because
it did not include the private sector in any way.
Have you been able to impact that process at all through
the process you are describing?
That does not make any sense to you. I can see by the look
on your face.
Mr. Allen. Well, we are working across all 17 sectors. And
Dr. Connell has 30 officers sitting, and a few of them are
contractors, too, helping work with this. And we are working
our way through a huge series right now.
We are working sector by sector. And as a threat arrives,
we will do this. For example, we are looking at the chemical
sector. We are looking at the energy sector. And we are doing
special analyses.
There is, however, in--Colonel Bob Stephan is under Dr.
Stephan. And I am not sure I can answer it. The list is kept by
him. I will take another look at that, and take it back, and
get your response.
Ms. Lofgren. Well, I appreciate the time. It is just if you
are going to be using that as the map for what needs to be
protected and it is not really yet formulated, my concern is
you will not have what is necessary as the baseline.
Ms. Connell. We are also putting more emphasis on looking
at the sectors themselves and having--
Ms. Lofgren. You are directly, out of your outfit?
Ms. Connell. Yes, having the sector drive the analysis,
rather than vulnerabilities in general or threats in general.
Ms. Lofgren. Maybe what I should do is ask you to come in
and spend 40 minutes with me and go through what you are doing,
so I have?
Mr. Allen. We will do that, and we will do that with
Colonel Bob Stephan's officers, as well.
Ms. Lofgren. Thank you. I appreciate it.
Mr. Allen. Thank you, Congresswoman.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you.
The Chair recognizes the distinguished ranking member of
the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Ms.
Harman from California.
Ms. Harman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I want to apologize to our witness for missing the closed
session, but there was just absolutely no way I could change
another commitment. And I will catch up with the material
either in person or through my work on the House Intelligence
Committee.
I do want to say some things for the public record. First,
I have found the floor statement I made when Charlie Allen
retired from nearly 50 years at the CIA, and I would like to
quote it in part and ask unanimous consent to put it in the
record of this hearing.
For the Record
Prepared Statement of the Honorable Jane Harman
Ms. Harman. I thank the chairman for yielding to me. Charlie Allen
is as close as you can come to a legend in the intelligence community.
Before the intelligence reform bill passed last year, he was one of the
few senior intelligence officers who could get 15 disparate agencies to
function as a community. He did that mainly through sheer force of
personality.
Our Nation collects intelligence through a variety of means, from
spies on the ground to satellites overhead, and everything in between.
In his capacity as the assistant director for collection, Charlie got
the collectors to understand that they were most effective when they
worked together as a team against the hardest targets.
He got them to understand that integrated collection strategies
yielded the best outcomes. Under Charlie's leadership, the collectors
in the intelligence community have scored some truly impressive
victories, and it is unfortunate that these cannot be recounted in
public.
I will just tell you that Charlie's service to the Nation was made
clear to me the day he told the committee that he had been with the CIA
for nearly 50 years. That is an astounding record, and it is certainly
appropriate as we close debate on what I think is one of the best
authorization bills ever, that we recognize Charlie's service to our
Nation.
Congressional Record for June 21, 2005 on page H4850
Mr. Simmons. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Ms. Harman. Here goes. ``Charlie Allen is as close as you
can come to a legend in the intelligence community. Before the
intelligence reform bill passed last year, he was one of the
few senior intelligence officers who could get 15 disparate
agencies to function as a community. He did that mainly through
sheer force of personality.''
While, Mr. Chairman and Madam Ranking Member, we have given
Charlie a few better tools now, so we expect even better
results. And I do not want him to feel any pressure, but I
think he is the best thing that has come into the homeland
world, at least as I see it.
And I want to be absolutely sure, Charlie, that this
committee and the intelligence committees are giving you what
you need to be successful.
When we had our first session with Homeland Security
Secretary Chertoff, he mentioned the intelligence function as
one of the small list of functions he thought absolutely
critical; I agree. And until you showed up, it was on life
support.
So in that vein, I just want to ask you about a couple of
things.
First of all, as I mentioned, you, through force of
personality, built an intelligence community where the
organization chart was lacking. Now you are part of the DNI
structure.
And I would like to know how you function in that structure
and whether there is anything else you need from us to be the
kind of player that the homeland security intel officer must
be?
Mr. Allen. Thank you very much, Congresswoman, for your
comments.
Working within the DNI structure, there are still issues to
be sorted through. One of the things that we are doing is
ensuring that, when we do get threat information, that we
have--discontinuity among the National Counterterrorism Center,
the FBI, and my own office.
We have to make sure that that also stretches down to the
local levels, to the homeland security advisers. And the FBI
must ensure it also stretches down to its joint terrorism task
forces.
There has been issues in the past where this has not worked
as easily as it should. And there are also, as you know, some
ambiguities in the Homeland Security Act and in the
Intelligence Reform Act which add, sometimes, over how
information can flow down to state and local governments.
I think we are working our way through this. Director
Mueller, as you know, has spoken to this and believes that we
serve somewhat separate sets of customers at the state and
local level but that, if we work together, we can do this.
As one of the things that obviously we have to do with the
DNI is to provide him support on homeland security issues. As I
said in my--we are offering some of our positions and people to
the National Counterterrorism Center in order to strengthen
Scott Redd's overall analytic efforts.
I think it is a work in process, but thus far we are being
able to work our way through all bumps in the road.
Ms. Harman. Well, I appreciate that answer. And, again,
through sheer force of personality, you can cut through a lot
of stovepipes.
I do want to cut into one other area before the light goes
red and that is support to state and local intelligence
functions. You mentioned it yourself.
I am aware that you have been out to Los Angeles at least
once and going back soon. I am also aware, as you said, that
you have an officer out there full time, which I appreciate.
Perhaps you want to tell this committee--you may have done
it earlier in a setting in the closed briefing--about this new
JRIC concept and which fusion centers at the local level, and
then the linking up between those fusion centers will give you
an added homeland capability, give not just you, give all of us
an added homeland capability that is so critical.
And just, you know, the last piece of that is, what other
help do you need?
And let me close, because my light is going to go on, just
with my urging to you to treat us as your partners not as your
adversaries. We are here to help, and you add so much
capability to the homeland department, and you have a
collaborative working style. So please call on us for help.
Mr. Allen. Thank you, Congresswoman. I will certainly do
that.
Working and sharing information with the fusion centers--
and California being so large will have four fusion centers,
and we will put officers, I hope, at all four eventually,
certainly starting in Los Angeles, because being able to
collect locally, and provide that information, and have
officers there to immediately be alerted to any threat
information or any type of activity that could cause a
difficulty to the homeland is very vital.
Meanwhile, we can share information down. Already we are
using the officer in Los Angeles. We are on the phone with him.
We are sending him messages, so he can convey to senior members
of the Los Angeles Police Department, as well as the homeland
security adviser up to the governor in Sacramento, threat
information, to be able to filter it, assess it.
That makes a big difference. So from my perspective, this
regional fusion center is going to make a big difference.
I have a principal deputy, Mr. Jack Tomarchio, behind me,
who is spending most of his time on the road meeting with
people. I feel there is enormous eagerness out there to share
information.
And we have to be able to share information at a classified
level, as well as a sensitive but unclassified level, with
state and local government.
And also I am working out with the private sector. And I
find the same professionalism in the private sector. Out in
California, there is just some areas in the private sector that
were--and I must say, they are first-class people.
And we are giving them some additional security clearances,
because they need them and they deserve them. It may break
precedent, but I do not care. We are going to do it.
Ms. Harman. I love that last answer, especially the end of
the last answer.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Simmons. The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from
Florida, Ms. Brown-Waite.
Ms. Brown-Waite. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Allen, I asked some questions before in the closed
session, and you were very forthright. And I appreciate that.
I just have one additional question, and that is--and you
may have answered it; I apologize for coming in late--what
future role do you expect to take in the Coast Guard
intelligence budget?
Mr. Allen. Yes, ma'am.
In the U.S. Coast Guard intelligence budget, we are now in
the process--Mr. Jim Chaparro behind me is working to prepare
guidance, which we will send out through the secretary out to
the operating components that will address intelligence needs
and priorities as we see them.
Part of it will reflect what we believe the secretary needs
to improve in intelligence, with the operating components, as
well as the DNI. Ambassador Negroponte has needs, as well.
So we will provide guidance, and it will go over to
Commandant Collins, and it will go to the head of Jim Sloan,
who is a good, personal friend of mine. And he will have to try
to, as he prepares his fiscal year 2008 through 2012 budgets,
he will have to reflect how Coast Guard resources will have to
be allocated and balanced to support what we see as vital
intelligence needs.
So we are going to give him programmatic and budgetary
guidance. But it will be an interactive process. We will work
directly with Jim Sloan. We will work directly with the
commandant.
Mr. Simmons. The gentlelady from Texas, Ms. Jackson-Lee?
Ms. Jackson-Lee. I thank the chairman very much for this
hearing.
And I am going to take a slightly different approach, Mr.
Allen, from my earlier questions and just focus, as I look at
the mission of the DHS intelligence and information-sharing
activities to provide valuable, actionable intelligence and
intelligence-related information for and among the national
leadership, all components of DHS, our federal partners, state,
local, territorial, tribal, private-sector customers.
We ensure that information is gathered from all relevant
DHS field operations and is fused with information from other
members of the intelligence community.
I might just follow up on Ranking Member Harman's comments
and just ask whether or not we have such centers being placed
in state of the Texas.
You can just answer that. As obviously a member of the
Homeland Security Committee that is from Texas, I am very
concerned about threat vulnerabilities there.
But let me give you a larger question and then tie it in.
From a threat and analysis perspective, the department
organization--or what department organization, in your opinion,
Mr. Allen, is a primary point of contact for, one, the federal
government, two, the intelligence community, three, state,
local and tribal communities, and, four, the private sector,
your office or the Homeland Security Operations Center?
And depending on your answer, I may have a follow-up
question to that.
Prepared Statement of the Honorable Sheila Jackson-Lee
Thank you Mr. Chairman, and my fellow members of the Committee, and
to you, Mr. Allen, for appearing before us today.
I see great potential in the Office of Intelligence and Analysis,
if it can indeed be a team player, a coalition builder, and a prominent
stakeholder in the collection and analysis of domestic homeland
security threats. The President's budget for this year proposes an
increase of 18% for the funding of the Office of Intelligence and
Analysis and the Directorate of Operations combined. As the entity
within the Department of Homeland Security that is responsible for
unique intelligence analysis, unique information distribution, and
stakeholder partnerships, I'm optimistic that your department will be
able to utilize these funds appropriately and successfully.
My district in Houston is till struggling with the aftermath of the
hurricanes last year, and everyday I work to get families the resources
they need to survive, let alone what they may need to rebuild their
life. Again and again, as we review what went wrong, I turn to the
communications mechanism, and how the lack of information and knowledge
prevented our federal government from responding efficiently and
effectively to the disaster at hand, Consistently over the course of
those couple of days, federal agents responded slowly, if at all, and
without meeting the needs of the urgent situation. Just this week, we
learned of over 10,000 wide-bodied mobile homes sitting empty at Hope
Municipal Airport in Arkansas. I hope that your office will contribute
to a streamlined information communications system that can better
prepare us and protect us from homeland security threats.
My district and others affected by the hurricanes are vulnerable,
and I want to support the OIA in any way that I can to ensure that it
protects us from what we may not even expect.
I would like to highlight one important element of the purpose of
your office.You are charged with the task of acting as the primary
Federal government intelligence information provider on homeland
security issues to state, local, territorial, and tribal governments. I
would like to stress to you, and I hope you realize, that you may be
the most crucial stakeholder in emergency response. Information is your
commodity, and your trading partners are precisely the entities and
parts of government that respond first to emergencies, that coordinate
funding, and that work together for regional response. Our states,
local governments, and tribal governments are the closest to our
citizens, and your duty to them must be honored.
I hope that the discussion today will show that progress has been
made in structuring and preparing the OIA. I'm looking forward to your
testimony, Mr. Allen, and thank you again for appearing before this
committee.
Mr. Allen. Thank you very much.
There is a fusion center in Texas, and I believe it is in
Austin.
We are certainly visiting all of the homeland security--all
of the state fusion centers. And certainly, Texas is very much
on our mind, particularly the Houston area and other areas
where we feel that we must do a better job of working closely
with the law enforcement.
As far as my relationships with the operations directorate,
the Office of Intelligence and Analysis works very closely. I
have officers seven by 24 in the Homeland Security Operations
Center that is run by General Broderick.
As far as sharing immediate, alerting information, what
information we would call immediate, tactical warning, and that
is essentially--sensitive and law enforcement, we look to
General Broderick to help manage that when it relates to
threats to the homeland from terrorists.
When it deals with intelligence analysis, being able to
evaluate threats, to be able to provide that down to the state
and local governments or even to the private sector at a
sensitive, but unclassified, level, I believe that my office is
responsible for doing that intelligence analysis.
We are working very closely with General Broderick in
promoting the homeland security information network. I manage
the secret level; he manages the more broader, more robust law
enforcement sharing information.
We both are looking forward to the day when we can build an
even more stronger system called the Homeland Security Data
Network, which will be equivalent to the secret-level Supernet
run by DOD. But it will be for the homeland, and it will be run
under civil authority rather than under military authority.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. And so, as I understand your answer, that
you break it down topically, meaning that you have contact with
the federal government, the intelligence community, state,
local and tribal, private sector on the analysis aspect.
And then, with respect to the other aspects, you put that
in the hands of General Broderick. I guess I did not--you broke
down intelligence analysis. And what would you put in the other
category?
Mr. Allen. It is tactical and, particularly, sensitive law
enforcement information or information relating to natural
disaster acts of nature where damage is done to our country or
infrastructure.
We work primarily with the intelligence community, because
you move immediately into higher classified intelligence
channels. It is a partnership with General Broderick, and we
want to strengthen that partnership.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. And thank you very much.
If I might, Mr. Chairman--and I will be making this request
at every committee level, frankly--and that is that I will be
asking the full committee, now that the task force work has
been done on Hurricane Katrina, I will be asking this committee
to step up to the plate and do its oversight responsibility,
which would require, I believe, the presence of Secretary
Chertoff.
And if I--out jurisdiction, the Subcommittee on
Intelligence and Information Sharing, there is no doubt,
whether or not you wish to engage in the blame game, there have
been a clashing of cultures and a clashing of responsibilities.
Clearly, the singular moment of former FEMA Director Brown
during his hearing was where information went and who gave
information, and he did give information, and the bypassing of
a structure--and I do not fault him--where he felt he could get
no relief whatsoever.
Our committee deals with information sharing. There will be
subsequent committees coming forward that I will be asking the
same questions, the Emergency Preparedness Committee.
And therefore I do not think this is a subcommittee issue;
it is a full committee issue. And, frankly, we failed in
information sharing.
I also would say that--if you would indulge me in
additional minute, I would ask unanimous consent for an
additional minute--
Mr. Simmons. Without objection.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. --I thank the chairman--that this whole
pitting of natural disaster and terrorism--and, of course,
there have been some red lines around that, as to the fact
that, if the levees had been imploded through a terrorist
action, and the word went out that it was a terrorist action,
you would not find the people because there would be so many on
the ground, boots on the ground, that you could not even find
the citizens of New Orleans.
That was not the case. But still, a thousand are dead and
4,000 are missing. And, frankly, I will just add a high degree
of frustration to the extent that I am really sick and tired
that this committee has been hiding from its responsibility of
oversight on Katrina, hiding behind the existence of a task
force, or subcommittee, or whatever it is called.
Let me compliment them for their initial work, but there
have been no accountability in that report.
And so, Mr. Chairman, as you convey it to the chairman of
the full committee, and I will have this banner, if you will,
and commentary on each committee that I am a subcommittee
member of, we need to hold immediate oversight hearings that
has Mr. Chertoff sitting here.
I welcome the former FEMA director under oath and others,
because we have no solutions to those problems.
And as an information sharing, I would commend to you, Mr.
Chairman, that this subcommittee has added responsibility to
determine how we can help each other, how we can help this
nation, by having more effective policies of sharing the right
kind of information timely so that the American people--can
have the protection of the federal government, as they should.
I thank Mr. Allen for his answer to my question. And I am
sure we will have the opportunity to follow up on some of these
aspects.
But I hope you are considering the responsibilities of
information sharing that may not necessarily be on the grounds
of intelligence where it is terrorist-based, but certainly
information sharing is a key element of our mutual
responsibilities.
With that, I see my time. I would yield to any respective
gentleman or lady that wants to comment.
Mr. Simmons. All time having expired, I would like to do a
second round, if that is agreeable to my colleagues.
And what I would like to focus on is the unconventional or
the non-traditional mission of the Department of Homeland
Security.
I mentioned briefly before some of the unconventional
elements. The distinguished lady from Texas has focused on
information sharing.
Traditionally, intelligence officers would share
information in a pipeline, but not across agencies.
Traditionally, if you were a federal-level intelligence
officer, you did not usually share with state, local and
tribal.
So we are dealing with new models, new systems to deal with
new problems, primarily counterterrorism, but perhaps new
models for dealing with natural disasters.
One tool in that toolbox, in my opinion, is open source
intelligence. That is intelligence that is produced as a
product, like other intelligence products, from the acquisition
processing and analysis of open or publicly available
information, or data banks, or sources, whatever they may be.
It occurs to me that, if there is a news story breaking,
that homeland security intelligence and analysis can provide
value added to that breaking news story. And it is very hard
sometimes to beat the news story.
If information is coming from nontraditional sources, it
can perhaps be in the lead form of a tip-off. And that being
the case, open source intelligence is a discipline, like
HUMINT, or SIGINT, or IMINT.
It is a discipline. A discipline needs a home. It is
probably going to be the open source agency, which is FBIS with
a new title. But it occurs to me that your organization more
than many others could benefit from a robust, open source,
analytical capability.
Should you not be requesting more personnel in this field
than you are? Should you not be running them through a vigorous
open source intelligence training program so that you can
capitalize on this new capability?
A week ago, I was over at the NCTC. And I was briefed on
security operations relative to the Olympics. The open source
node was leading the other nodes in providing information.
One person, with language skills and very sophisticated
computer skills, a very capable individual, was leading the
team on that subject. Isn't this the sort of thing that is
going to attract young people into your intelligence
organization?
Mr. Allen. Thank you, Chairman Simmons. Absolutely.
As you may or may not know, I have always been a great
advocate of open source. And my previous job in working with
the DCI for 7 years, I am certain I was the most outspoken
supporter of open source within the broader intelligence
community.
I must say that the leadership of the intelligence
community in the past has not been strong in supporting open
source. And for that reason, finally with the WMD commission
and with the 9/11 commission, the incredible value of open
source is finally being fully recognized.
DNI Ambassador Negroponte has formed the Open Source
Center. FBIS is now called--works for Porter Goss, but it is to
serve in a stronger way the broader interests of the U.S.
government and U.S. intelligence community.
I have the beginnings of an open source strategy. My view
of open source is quite broad. For critical infrastructure
protection, open source, the data are there.
Colonel Bob Stephan over in infrastructure protection uses
open source. And Dr. Connell's officers actually go out and
talk and get documents from people that run mass transit to
understand how mass transit really works so we can understand
how it may be vulnerable or not vulnerable.
Railroads, subways, what have you, to me, it--
Mr. Simmons. If you would just suspend for one second--
Mr. Allen. Yes, sir.
Mr. Simmons. --on that point, this is an activity that is
conducted above-board. It does not create any fears among the
American people that there is a big brother out there. It is
being done openly with these different sectors.
Mr. Allen. It is absolutely above-board. It is absolutely
dealing with factual data. It is not dealing with data relating
to the privacy of individuals at all.
It deals with actual operations of critical sectors out
there, and how they operate, to make sure that we can provide
guidance and advice on how to make them more secure.
And as a result of some work that both Colonel Stephan has
done, our office has done, and we have able to go out and
advise members in the private sector. We always take our
partners with the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
And they say, ``Here is low-hanging fruit. Here are some
things--based on our just simple analysis of open source, here
are some things you can take to make yourself less
vulnerable.''
That is the way actually things ought to be. And one thing
that I also believe is important is that--commercial imagery is
open source. It is there to help our environment. It is there
to help the Department of Interior, to help preserve land,
minerals.
If there are fires, as we had in Oklahoma and Texas, the
kind of remote sensing capabilities that are out there,
commercially available, unclassified, I think that kind of
role--Department of Homeland Security, my office, has a very
major role.
And working with the commercial imagery vendors, I think we
can do a lot more to support that side, as well.
We are in the early stages. I have charged Dr. Connell with
developing the open source strategy, and she has brought in a
world-class consultant to advise her on that.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you.
Ms. Lofgren?
Ms. Lofgren. Just one matter. Thinking about your
recruitment efforts--and it is daunting, really, to get the
number of individuals you want recruited in with great minds--I
am wondering how much support or interface you have had with
the science and technology division?
And thinking about the capacity--we had in the organic act
of creating Homeland Security, 10 university centers that were
to be established. And I believe we only have--I think it is
just two of the 10.
And although we intended that to provide real value, in
terms of research and the like, it was also hoped that it might
be a vehicle to bring people into the system, both in your shop
and other parts.
What impact has the delay in identifying and standing up
these centers had on your recruitment? And what do you think it
will have? Getting all 10 would add some value to you, do you
think?
Mr. Allen. On setting up the 10 university centers, I
think, for Homeland Security, I think that probably had some
inhibiting factors. I do not know that, however, as far as
recruiting it in the long term will make a big difference.
For example, the New York University system is vast. There
are 64 campuses in the state of New York, as I understand it,
and virtually all of those campus now have a curriculum on
homeland security.
Dr. Connell has been working very closely with Dr. Maureen
McCarthy, head of the Office of Research and Development, and
the science and technology director. And I will let her address
how she believes working with S&T of Homeland Security will
help in recruiting.
Ms. Connell. We just started a partnership with S&T's ORD.
So it is very recent.
But they get a tremendous--they have tremendous contacts in
the university community that we could leverage through our
partnership, of bringing Intel to work with S&T on a whole
range of issues.
We have just begun this, but we are focusing on
radicalization as one. And they have contracts with social
scientists, or whatever. So in working with them, that gives us
entree into that university community, that we can leverage.
And we can do that on other issues, as well.
Ms. Lofgren. So you really think that the contracting on a
case-by-case basis might be preferable to these university
centers that we had in mind?
Ms. Connell. I cannot address that--
Ms. Lofgren. Okay, maybe it is not fair to ask you that.
Ms. Connell. I do see value in what we are doing.
Ms. Lofgren. Okay.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Simmons. Ms. Jackson-Lee?
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Again, let me just--I have a question for
Mr. Allen, but let me just, because I think--I do want to
restate a question of inquiry, if might yield to you, Mr.
Chairman.
Will there be any efforts on behalf of this committee, as
it relates to its information sharing, to hold hearings,
specifically as it relates to Katrina and Rita and any other
natural disaster that would require such more pronounced,
competent sharing of information than what has occurred during
the tragedy of Hurricane Katrina?
Mr. Simmons. Yes, I do not have a copy of our schedule for
the coming weeks. Information sharing is clearly an important
responsibility of the Department of Homeland Security. It is a
capability that obviously we are trying to improve.
And I cannot speak for the committee; I can only speak for
the subcommittee. But I would be happy to explore further those
issues.
In fact, I am a great believer in getting out into the
community. What I have tried to do over the last few months is
schedule meetings on-site with the agencies to discuss in
detail how they do their job.
I do not know whether you have been to the Homeland
Security Operations Center recently. I do not know whether you
have been at all. But that is certainly a center of focus for
these types of activities.
And I would be glad to pursue that with you.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Well, I know there were a number of CODELs
planned that were cancelled, so I am not sure which CODEL you
were talking about regarding that visit.
But what I would say is that I think--I appreciate the
chairman's openness, but I think there needs to be, as you
review it, a more pronounced statement that we do hold hearings
on the information sharing, as they have negatively impacted,
as there is clear evidence on citizens that are still being
negatively impacted today, who have been harmed by the lack of
communication or information sharing as it relates to Katrina.
I would also ask, because you are in the majority--you
might get--I would also ask that, since you are the majority, I
would ask that you convey the consternation of at least one
member that we have yet to have credible hearings on Hurricane
Katrina on the backdrop of alleging that we are allowing a
specially appointed committee to do its work.
Its work is finished. And if in your conversations with
majority staff and the chairman of this committee, I believe
that it was imperative that Secretary Chertoff be before this
committee sooner rather than later.
We have a week out. And I feel no need to delay any longer
for his presence before the committee.
So I am not asking you--your task is not to be a messenger.
But certainly, by being in the majority, I would ask--I am
record. And anyone who is able to convey this, because I am
going to tie a string around my finger, and I am going to be
the broken record on this committee, of which I have a great
deal of respect for.
When I say committee, full committee. At every hearing that
I am at, I am going to be asking why we have failed to complete
our responsibility of oversight over the tragedy that is still
occurring with respect to Hurricane Katrina.
And I yield to the gentleman if he wants to respond.
Mr. Simmons. I have never known the gentlelady to fail in
her ability to communicate her message. I certainly hear it.
My understanding is the special committee or the special
task force may be publishing its report shortly. I have not
seen it yet. I do not know exactly--
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Today, I believe.
Mr. Simmons. Is it today? I would be happy to take a look
at it. And if there are issues in the report that we need to
take up at a subcommittee level, I would be happy to do that.
As for sharing with the chairman, I can certainly share the
message. But I suspect you can be very successful at that, too.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. I thank you. I know that you and
Congresswoman Lofgren work very well together. And I want to
thank her for her leadership and would hope that we could work
together on these issues.
Let me quickly say thank you very much--let me just offer
this question.
Mr. Allen, you came before us on October 19th and discussed
terrorist cases of scares involving the New York City subway
system, as well as the Baltimore Harbor system. And I am sure--
I do not believe this was raised.
And I want to follow up. You asked about what must be done
to improve the process for assessing the reliability of
intelligence reports resolving conflicts among agencies looking
at the same intelligence and for sharing real-time information
with local officials.
Well, we have had some local official questions, but I want
to pursue it in the line of the backdrop of what you said on
October 19th.
You mentioned that the department and the FBI could do a
better job of coordinating and aligning their different
missions. And we knew that going into forming DHS, that you
would be looking at lessons learned and that you would be
coming back with your proposals.
I would like to know, and I put the Katrina tragedy in the
backdrop, but I would like to know where you are in this
process and what steps have been taken to improve the situation
that deals with the real-time, if you will, communications and
the other aspects of your work.
Mr. Allen. Congresswoman, I am very happy to report that we
have worked out very strong new procedures. We are working
directly with the National Counterterrorism Center and the DNI,
working with the FBI.
And now that we have begun to deploy people at the state
and local level, the sharing of threat information and the
assessing of that is done jointly by the FBI, by my office, and
by the National Counterterrorism Center, which we view, of
course, as the first among equals in making the final
assessments, because that is its role under the law.
My role, of course, is to ensure that we share that
information rapidly and quickly down to the state and local
levels and that we do it to our homeland security advisers, to
the private sector, to the state fusion centers, that the FBI
sends the same identical information down to the law
enforcement, down to its special agents in charge, and then to
the broader law enforcement community, and that there are no
differences in those assessments.
And that, if we have to go out and talk together down at
the local level, that officers from DHS accompany the FBI, if
they go out and talk, say, to the private sector, because in
the 103 joint terrorist task forces there are DHS officers in
each of those task forces. They are primarily from the
operating components, like ICE and CBP.
But we have worked some standard operating procedures that
should avoid any confusion or mistakes. And I am on the phone,
or my staff, or Dr. Connell's staff are on the phone instantly
if we have what we think is a credible report.
We also are on the phone if we think it does not have
validity but might be misinterpreted at the state and local
levels. We are out there giving them filtered, validated
information.
Unfortunately, in the past, some of the information became
direct, and unfiltered, and unassessed, and it was
misinterpreted, I think, in the case of New York City and
Baltimore.
I think we learned some very strong lessons. I certainly
did. I just arrived. We are doing very well today, I think. It
does not mean we will not make a mistake in the future, but we
are doing much better today.
And there have been a lot of threats that have come in that
we have handled very quietly, and they have all gone away
because they lack credibility or they were fabrications.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Let me congratulate you and thank you for
the progress report. I do not know if any place this new
structure that is not classified is in writing. I would
certainly like to have a copy of it, just to sort of try to
understand it.
And I would just simply say, having listened to sheriffs,
Mr. Chairman, in another hearing that I understand came from
the southern border complaining about not getting real-time
information, I know that we are on the road to progress.
And hopefully we can find solutions that will be effective,
both on the national and local levels. Thank you very much.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you.
Mr. Allen. We will get you the processes in some form of
writing.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. That would be great.
Mr. Allen. You deserve that.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Simmons. I thank my colleagues who are participating
this afternoon.
I thank you, Mr. Allen, for your testimony and for the
testimony of your staff.
I think earlier Ms. Harman expressed the view that we want
to be supportive, we want to be helpful. We also want
accountability.
We want the American people to understand, as best they
can, what is being done to protect their homeland from the
various threats that may occur. And we want to keep talking
about it, because it is something that affects all of us very
directly and very personally.
So we thank you for your testimony in this open session,
and we will take your budget requests under advisement.
Questions for the record will be submitted, and we look
forward to working with you in the future.
Mr. Allen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Simmons. The hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 4:24 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]