[House Hearing, 109 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
A PROGRESS REPORT ON INFORMATION SHARING FOR HOMELAND SECURITY
=======================================================================
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
FIRST SESSION
__________
JULY 20, 2005
__________
Serial No. 109-33
__________
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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COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
Christopher Cox, California, Chairman
Don Young, Alaska Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi
Lamar S. Smith, Texas Loretta Sanchez, California
Curt Weldon, Pennsylvania, Vice Edward J. Markey, Massachusetts
Chairman Norman D. Dicks, Washington
Christopher Shays, Connecticut Jane Harman, California
Peter T. King, New York Peter A. DeFazio, Oregon
John Linder, Georgia Nita M. Lowey, New York
Mark E. Souder, Indiana Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of
Tom Davis, Virginia Columbia
Daniel E. Lungren, California Zoe Lofgren, California
Jim Gibbons, Nevada Sheila Jackson-Lee, Texas
Rob Simmons, Connecticut Bill Pascrell, Jr., New Jersey
Mike Rogers, Alabama Donna M. Christensen, U.S. Virgin
Stevan Pearce, New Mexico Islands
Katherine Harris, Florida Bob Etheridge, North Carolina
Bobby Jindal, Louisiana James R. Langevin, Rhode Island
Dave G. Reichert, Washington Kendrick B. Meek, Florida
Michael McCaul, Texas
Charlie Dent, Pennsylvania
______
SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE, INFORMATION SHARING, AND TERRORISM RISK
ASSESSMENT
Rob Simmons, Connecticut, Chairman
Curt Weldon, Pennsylvania Zoe Lofgren, California
Peter T. King, New York Loretta Sanchez, California
Mark E. Souder, Indiana Jane Harman, California
Daniel E. Lungren, California Nita M. Lowey, New York
Jim Gibbons, Nevada Sheila Jackson-Lee, Texas
Stevan Pearce, New Mexico Bob Etheridge, North Carolina
Bobby Jindal, Louisiana James R. Langevin, Rhode Island
Dave G. Reichert, Washington Kendrick B. Meek, Florida
Charlie Dent, Pennsylvania Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi
Christopher Cox, California (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............................................. 3
The Honorable Christopher Cox, a Representative in Congress From
the State of California, and Chairman, Committee on Homeland
Security....................................................... 4
The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Mississippi, and Ranking Member, Committee on
Homeland Security.............................................. 6
The Honorable Charlie Dent, a Representative in Congress From the
State of Pennsylvania.......................................... 34
The Honorable Bob Etheridge, a Representative in Congress From
the State of North Carolina.................................... 32
The Honorable Peter T. King, a Representative in Congress From
the State of New York.......................................... 30
The Honorable James R. Langevin, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Rhode Island................................. 35
The Honorable Nita M. Lowey, a Representative in Congress From
the State of New York.......................................... 68
The Honorable Daniel E. Lungren, a Representative in Congress
From the State of California................................... 42
The Honorable Sheila Jackson-Lee, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Texas........................................ 39
The Honorable Dave G. Reichert, a Representative in Congress From
the State of Washington........................................ 38
WITNESSES
Panel I
Mr. John Cohen, Senior Homeland Security Policy Advisor,
Executive Office of Public Safety, Commonwealth of
Massachusetts:
Oral Statement................................................. 7
Prepared Statement............................................. 9
Dr. Lee Colwell, Executive Director, Pegas Research Foundation:
Oral Statement................................................. 16
Prepared Statement............................................. 17
Mr. Gary Edwards, Chief Executive Officer, National Native
American, Law Enforcement Association:
Oral Statement................................................. 12
Prepared Statement............................................. 14
Panel II
Brigadier General Matthew Broderick, Director, Homeland Security
Operations Center, Department of Homeland Security:
Oral Statement................................................. 48
Prepared Statement............................................. 50
Mr. Joshua D. Filler, Director, Office of State and Local
Government Coordination, Department of Homeland Security:
Oral Statement................................................. 56
Prepared Statement............................................. 58
A PROGRESS REPORT ON INFORMATION SHARING FOR HOMELAND SECURITY
----------
Wednesday, July 20, 2005
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 10:04 a.m., in
Room 2257, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Rob Simmons
[chairman of the subcommittee] presiding.
Present: Representatives Simmons, Cox, Souder, Lungren,
Jindal, Reichert, Dent, Thompson, Lofgren, Lowey, Jackson-Lee,
Etheridge, and Langevin.
Mr. Simmons. [Presiding.] Good morning. The Committee on
Homeland Security, Subcommittee on Intelligence, Information
Sharing, and Terrorism Risk Assessment will come to order.
The subcommittee is meeting today to hear testimony on the
state of homeland security information sharing between the
Department of Homeland Security and state and local government
entities, and to explore how DHS information-sharing efforts to
date can be enhanced.
In order to examine how DHS information-sharing efforts are
currently working, and perhaps to explore how they can work
better, we are going to hear from two panels: one representing
the state, local and tribal perspective, and the other the
Department of Homeland Security's perspective. The witnesses on
our first panel today are Mr. John Cohen, Senior Homeland
Security Policy Adviser for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts;
Mr. Gary Edwards, Chief Executive Officer of the National
Native American Law Enforcement Association; and Dr. Lee
Colwell, Executive Director of the Pegasus Research Foundation.
I thank you all, gentlemen, for being here today.
The ability to share relevant terrorist-related information
is key to preventing future attacks. In the wake of the
terrible bombings in London on July 7, we are reminded that
prevention is of paramount importance. The department is
working diligently to ensure that structures and policies are
put into place to give our intelligence and law enforcement
entities the tools they need to prevent terrorist attacks. We
have established within the DHS the Information Analysis and
Infrastructure Protection Directorate.
We have created or supported an agreement, a memorandum of
understanding on information sharing requiring all federal law
enforcement, intelligence and homeland security agencies, to
share terrorist-related information. We have established the
Terrorist Threat Integration Center, the Terrorist Screening
Center, and most recently the National Counterterrorism Center,
in order to better coordinate and share information. And so on
and so on and so forth.
The department's Homeland Security Operations Centers
serves as the nation's nerve center for information sharing, as
a point of fusion for homeland security-related terrorist
threat information. There are advisories and bulletins
concerning threats to homeland security, and they manage the
homeland security information network which is deployed to over
260 sites across the country. While the department is working
to increase the federal government's ability to share
information, there are also a variety of efforts underway
across the nation at state, local and tribal levels.
I had the honor and the privilege of serving for over 35
years in the U.S. Army before my retirement a few years ago.
For over 35 of those years, I was in military intelligence. I
also had the experience of serving for 10 years as a CIA
officer for most of those years under cover, actually for all
of those years under cover, and for most of those years
overseas. The culture of the intelligence community in my
experience over those 35 years, the culture of the intelligence
community is not to share. Sharing goes against the culture of
the intelligence community. They want to protect sensitive
sources and methods. They want to keep secrets. So there is a
reluctance to share information. We understand that. Those of
us who have served in the intelligence community understand
that.
So the idea of intelligence information sharing,
intelligence information sharing, is in many respects an
oxymoron. It is kind of like jumbo shrimp, government
efficiency. I could do a few more, but I do not want to offend
anybody. So what we are talking about today is something new
and different, but it is critically important if we are to
prevent another 9/11. It is critically important if we are to
protect our people and to provide for their homeland security.
So that is why we are pleased to offer this hearing today
and to hear from our witnesses.
At this point, I would like to yield to my friend and
colleague, the very distinguished ranking member of the
Intelligence Subcommittee, Ms. Lofgren of California.
Ms. Lofgren. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I will submit my full statement for the record, but I would
like to note that I think this important hearing is timely. We
need to be concerned about the sharing of information within
intelligence agencies, but also perhaps even more importantly
with agencies who are not intelligence agencies, our local and
state police officials.
We have more than 18,000 state and local and tribal law
enforcement agencies across the United States, more than
800,000 law enforcement officers. These officers have intimate
knowledge of the communities they serve, and they develop close
relationships with the citizens they protect. They are in a
unique position to track down terrorist-related information, to
understand and develop prevention information, but they need to
be our partners, our intelligence partners in order to do that
effectively.
I think we need to figure out how to get the police officer
on the street the information that he or she needs to identify
terrorist and to foil their plans. There are multiple efforts
underway at all levels of government to meet the challenge, but
there are some common principles I think that should govern the
work. First, there should be agreement on what law enforcement
needs to know. In my mind, I think they need to know the
threats to specific locations, events, and specific
infrastructure sectors. They need to know methods used by
terrorist to plan, support and carry out attacks, and the
individuals and/or organizations involved in terrorism-related
activity.
Second, there needs to be agreement on why law enforcement
needs to know this information. It needs to know it so it can
guide efforts to prevent terrorist attacks. We do not want to
respond. We want to prevent. And also to develop protective and
continuity measures and emergency response plans. We need to
design training programs and exercises. We need to select
equipment and technology to be acquired for these efforts, and
we need to develop budget and staffing plans in a coordinated
and strategic way.
Finally, there should be agreement that the potential
solution might not come from the top down. To the extent that
state, local and tribal law enforcement agencies have developed
successful methods and means of sharing information,
consideration should be given to adapting these home-grown
sharing approaches regionally and even nationally.
So I am glad to be here today. I look forward to the
witnesses. As I mentioned to the Chairman, I do have to step
out for a meeting with the Democratic Leader at 10:30, but I
will be back shortly after that meeting. Our wonderful ranking
member, who has spent an enormous time on this, certainly is
here. I am grateful to him for his expertise and attention to
this effort.
I yield back. Thank you.
Talking Points for Ranking Member Zoe Lofgren
I am pleased that this Subcommittee is turning its attention once
again to the critical issue of information sharing.
In view of the recent devastating terrorist attacks in London, the
question of how we promote effective information sharing in order to
discover terrorist threats and to avert them could not be more timely.
Like Mr. Thompson, I have long been concerned about how and to what
extent intelligence information is being shared--not only among the
CIA, the FBI, and the Intelligence Community generally, but also (and
perhaps most importantly) with state, local, and tribal law enforcement
authorities.
The Role of Local Law Enforcement
As the September 11th attacks demonstrated, local law enforcement
officers will likely be among the first responders to any future
terrorist attack. Such officers should not be limited, however, to a
merely responsive role. Instead, they can and should play a vital part
in the investigation and prevention of terrorist attacks.
They are in a unique position to do this.
More than 18,000 state, local, and tribal law enforcement agencies
across the United States--comprising more than 800,000 law enforcement
officers--have intimate knowledge of the communities they serve and
accordingly have developed close relationships with the citizens they
protect.
These relationships provide officers with the ability to
effectively track down terrorist-related information.
Officers on their day-to-day patrols interacting with the members
of their communities can--if properly trained in what to look for and
what questions to ask--be valuable sources of information and
intelligence for the national homeland security effort.
In order to make use of this capability, however, it is essential
for federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies to develop an
efficient and comprehensive system for the timely sharing, analysis,
and dissemination of specific and actionable intelligence information.
In other words, we need to figure out how to get the police officer
on the street the information that he or she needs to identify
terrorists and to foil their plans.
The Information Locals Need and Why They Need It
I am aware that multiple efforts are underway at all levels of
government to meet this challenge. While the extent of integration
among these efforts is unclear, I believe several common principles
should govern this work:
First, there should be agreement on what local law enforcement
needs to know. In my mind, it needs to know: (1) the threats to
specific locations, events, and specific infrastructure sectors; (2)
the methods used by terrorists to plan, support, and carry out attacks;
and (3) the individuals and/or organizations involved in terrorism-
related activity.
Second, there should be agreement on why law enforcement needs to
know this information. In my mind, it needs to know it so it can: (1)
guide efforts to prevent terrorist attacks; (2) develop protective and
continuity measures and emergency response plans; (3) design training
programs and exercises; (4) select equipment and technology to be
acquired for these efforts; and (5) develop budget and staffing plans.
Third, there should be agreement that potential solution might not
come from the top down. To the extent state, local and/or tribal law
enforcement agencies have developed successful means and methods of
sharing information, consideration should be given to adapting these
``home grown'' sharing approaches regionally and even nationally.
Conclusion
I am very glad that we have represented here today such a wide
range of voices and expertise on information sharing. I look forward to
your testimony and to hearing your ideas on how to create a workable
information sharing environment.
Mr. Simmons. I thank the distinguished ranking member of
the Intelligence Subcommittee for her observations. I also
thank her for partnering on this hearing here today.
The chair now recognizes the chairman of the full
committee, the distinguished gentleman from California, Mr.
Cox, for any opening statement he might wish to make.
Mr. Cox. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank
you and the ranking member. A progress report on information
sharing on homeland security is a welcome thing. I think it is
an indispensable part of this committee's oversight
responsibilities.
This morning, we begin by hearing from state, local and
tribal government officials. That is unconventional only
because we in Washington have a tendency to focus our attention
on executive branch agencies, on the federal government. A
homeland security enterprise properly conceived calls for a
different approach.
I suppose that state, local and tribal governments are in
theory equal partners, and that is the premise of this hearing.
They are supposed to be equal partners with the federal
government in a joint enterprise. So they must be, if potential
terrorist attacks are to be prevented across this country in
the future.
The federal government, even the Department of Homeland
Security, is not everywhere. State, local and tribal
governments, by contrast, are. It has been well over 2 years
since the attorney general, the director of central
intelligence, and the secretary of homeland security signed
their memorandum of understanding on information sharing,
committing intelligence, law enforcement and homeland security
agencies alike to certain core principles. That MOU called for
specific actions to implement the Homeland Security Act.
It contained the following plain statement: ``Providing all
timely and relevant homeland security-related information to
those who have a need to know it in order to assist them in
meeting their homeland security-related responsibilities is
fundamental to the success of the department and to all other
efforts to ensure the security of the homeland from terrorist
attacks. Delay in providing such information risks frustrating
efforts to meet these critical responsibilities and could
result in preventable attacks against U.S. persons and
interests failing to be preempted, prevented or disrupted.''
We on this committee often stressed that preventing
terrorist attacks must be our overriding priority, and we, like
every commission and blue ribbon panel that has looked into
these matters, understand that the failure promptly to share
all pertinent information was the single preeminent factor in
the government's failure to prevent the 9/11 attacks. It was in
fact 2 years ago almost to the day that, in opening a select
committee hearing on this same topic, I noted that if it is
true that the tragedy of the 9/11 attacks teaches information
and good intelligence is the lifeblood of homeland security,
then it is also true that the information must move and must
circulate. Sadly, that has not always happened.
That was my assessment of the state of affairs in 2003, in
July. Two year later, I think it is fair to expect real
progress, and that is why we are here today. We want to be
reassured that DHS in particular has engaged its nonfederal
government counterparts as equal partners in the homeland
security enterprise. We want to know that there are now
mutually satisfactory mechanisms to enable the two-way
communication, the two-way flow of information, to and from DHS
and its state, local and tribal government partners that this
enterprise contemplates. That, in itself, would be real
progress.
So, Mr. Chairman, I want to focus as we move forward with
this hearing on what I think it would be realistic to expect,
and at the same time, what would be unrealistic to expect. I
think it might be unrealistic to expect state, local and tribal
governments' preventive efforts to be very effective if they
are not routinely informed by the relevant predictive
intelligence that the federal government produces. Nor would
the federal government be serving its nonfederal customers well
if it merely passes on a welter of raw information, or by
speaking to those customers with an inconsistent analytic
voice, a problem this committee addressed squarely in passing
the department's initial authorization act, H.R. 1817,
overwhelmingly just 2 months ago.
So today we look forward to hearing that information
sharing has progressed. We hope to hear how the structural
reforms engendered by the secretary's second-stage review will
further consolidate and enhance that progress. Where, by
contrast, shortcomings emerge, I am confident that this
committee will continue to lead in the effort to ensure that a
failure adequately to share information can never again be
cited as the reason a terrorist attack could succeed.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Simmons. I thank the chairman for his comments.
I agree completely that I suppose our worst nightmare is a
situation where there might be another successful attack in the
homeland, and we learn as part of the process of an after-
action report that there was information available that simply
was not shared with the people that need it. That is our goal,
to avoid that type of a situation from occurring.
The chair now recognizes the distinguished ranking member
of the full committee, the gentleman from Mississippi, Mr.
Thompson, for any comments he would like to make.
Mr. Thompson. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Like my colleagues, I look forward to the testimony of both
panels.
I would like to give a special welcome to Dr. Colwell from
the Pegasus Foundation. He just happens to be from my district
and doing good work.
But nonetheless, Mr. Chairman, this hearing is a very
important hearing. The tragic attacks in London 2 weeks ago
demonstrated to all of us once again that terrorists think
nothing of killing innocent people in their war against open
democratic societies. Terrorists are not only foreign
infiltrators, but homegrown radicals that blend easily into the
various societies that they have come to despise.
What I found so shocking about London, beyond the senseless
carnage, was the fact that neither the British nor our own
intelligence services saw the attacks coming. We at last
addressed information sharing in depth in the 108th Congress,
prior to the issuance of the 9/11 Commission report. In this
report, the commission called for major reforms in the
intelligence community organization of practices, including the
development of a decentralized network for information sharing.
It made clear that improving border security, preparing first-
responders, and security critical infrastructure is not enough.
We will not be safe unless we are effectively sharing
information about terrorists and their plans.
Information sharing, however, means much more than getting
the CIA, the FBI and other members of the federal intelligence
community to talk to each other. It also means improving
information sharing with the law enforcement officer in the
street. This includes reaching out to the law enforcement in
rural and small communities. Ninety-percent of the law
enforcement agencies within the United States serve communities
of less than 25,000 people. Over 75 percent of police
departments across the nation, moreover, serve communities of
less than 10,000 residents. As the 9/11 Commission
demonstrated, it is in these localities that law enforcement
will first encounter the next group of terrorists.
Indeed, it was the local police officers who stopped three
of the 9/11 hijackers for routine traffic violations in the
weeks and months prior to the September 11 attacks. The rest,
the right-wing extremists like Timothy McVeigh and Eric Rudolph
in rural jurisdictions, further highlight the often critical
role that law enforcement in these areas plays in the
apprehension of terrorists.
Rural America is likewise home to much of the nation's
critical infrastructure, including agriculture, food production
facilities, dams, nuclear power plants and portions of electric
grids. For all of these reasons, I am very interested in how
information sharing is working and how it is developing for the
benefit of small and rural communities. While much of our
homeland security attention has been focused on large cities
and urban areas like New York, Washington, Chicago and Los
Angeles, and rightfully so, it is critical that we also ensure
that our small communities and towns are looped into
information-sharing networks.
Mr. Chairman, I look forward to the testimony of our
witnesses, particularly on their views on information sharing
in rural America.
I yield back.
Mr. Simmons. I thank the ranking member for his comments.
Other members of the committee are reminded that opening
statements may be submitted for the record.
Mr. Simmons. Now, I would like to call the first panel: Mr.
John Cohen, senior homeland security policy advisor for the
Commonwealth of Massachusetts; Mr. Gary Edwards, chief
executive officer of the National Native American Law
Enforcement Association; and Dr. Lee Colwell, executive
director for the Pegasus Research Foundation.
Gentleman, if you don't mind testifying in that order, we
have a 5-minute clock that will give you a green light, a
yellow light, and a red light. I think anybody who has been
involved with any form of law enforcement understands that the
yellow light does not mean slow down, it means speed up. And
the red light means stop. We would encourage you to summarize
your testimony because we have copies in our books and can
probably read faster than you can speak. So we encourage that
you summarize, stick to the 5-minute rule so that we will have
an opportunity to ask questions and interact.
That being said, I would ask Mr. Cohen to lead off. Mr.
Cohen?
STATEMENT OF JOHN COHEN, SENIOR HOMELAND SECURITY POLICY
ADVISOR, EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF PUBLIC SAFETY, COMMONWEALTH OF
MASSACHUSETTS
Mr. Cohen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Chairman Cox, members
of the committee. I appreciate the opportunity to appear before
you today.
Recently, the homeland security advisers from a vast
majority of the states came together under the umbrella of the
National Governors Association. There was clear consensus among
that group that at the end of the day this is the most
important issue facing us as we try to better protect our
communities or be prepared to respond should an attack occur,
because again at the end of the day, everything we do as it
relates to homeland security, whether it is response planning,
recovery planning, critical infrastructure protection and
resiliency initiatives, or prevention activities, depends on
accurate and credible information about those who want to
attack us, the targets they intend to attack, and how they wish
to carry out those attacks.
If I had to describe to you, well, since I am here I am
describing to you, where we are today as a nation with regard
to this, I would have to tell you that we have made great
progress over the past 2 years, but we are still not where we
should be or must be if we are going to be effective in
protecting our communities from future attack.
Governor Mitt Romney of Massachusetts has chaired for the
last 1 1/2 years a working group comprised of state and local
officials. My friend, Mr. Edwards, was a participant in that
process, where we looked at the role that state, local, tribal
entities and the private sector should play in supporting our
prevention efforts and most importantly, the role they should
play in efforts to gather, analyze, share and use homeland
security-related intelligence. So much of what I am about to
say to you and much of what was contained in my written
testimony that was submitted are the results of those efforts.
Today, from an information-sharing perspective, we still
depend on a national system that can best be described as a
patchwork of ad-hoc processes, protocols and technical
capabilities that still require state and local officials to
develop strong interpersonal relationships with representatives
from key federal agencies. Particularly in times of critical
threat evaluation or emergency situation, we depend more on
those interpersonal relationships than on a solid, well-
defined, institutionalized infrastructure to support
intelligence and information sharing.
The Department of Homeland Security and the FBI are doing a
much better job at providing state, local and tribal entities
an integrated intelligence product. But at the same time, we
still receive from both those entities large quantities of
nonactionable intelligence and information, which actually
comes to us at times with a caveat that this information has
been deemed noncredible, of course facilitating us to ask the
question, why is it being sent to us in the first place?
Even though the Department of Homeland Security and the
Federal Bureau of Investigation are doing a much better job of
integrating the product that they send out to state and local
entities, we still receive considerable amounts of intelligence
and information from other federal entities who clearly are not
collaborating with the FBI and the Department of Homeland
Security prior to sending that information out, and at times we
receive information that is conflicting or cannot be verified
from some of the key intelligence sources that we rely on to do
our planning.
There still is no national plan that provides clear
guidelines for how state, federal, local and tribal entities
and the private sector should work together to gather, analyze,
disseminate and share homeland security-related intelligence,
recognizing that it is a complex issue because much of this
information is protected by privacy and other types of
guidelines that restrict the inappropriate disclosure of that
information.
There remains an over-emphasis at the federal level on
providing classified information and intelligence to state and
local entities. There is an over-emphasis on trying to create
closer linkages or actually draw state and local entities into
the intelligence community. This is a significant issue because
at the end of the day if I am going to be effective in
protecting our local communities, working with our local,
tribal and private sector entities to be prepared to respond, I
need to share critical intelligence with them. If it is
provided to me in a classified format and I have to share it
with people who do not have appropriate clearances in order to
do my job, I am put in the position of either not doing what I
need to do to be effective, or violating the law.
The emphasis should be on the federal community coming
together and providing unclassified intelligence and
information to state and local authorities. Clearly, there are
times when they will need to share classified information. We
should put the infrastructure in place to do that, but the rule
should be unclassified information.
There is some good news. There is a greater level of
sophistication at the state and local level with regard to
their role in this whole intelligence cycle. You are seeing the
emergence of intelligence fusion centers in most of our major
cities and states. Unfortunately, a lot of money was spent over
the past several years by state and local governments in
establishing these centers without any clear guidelines. The
Homeland Security Advisory Council, working with the Global
Justice Information Sharing Working Group, has developed those
guidelines. We are working with DHS and the FBI and the Justice
Department to send those out.
I just would leave the committee, since my light is red,
with two final thoughts. As everybody pointed out, state and
local entities are important gatherers of intelligence, but
that does not mean that we should act as spies or practice
tradecraft of the intelligence community. We should be focusing
on taking that information which we gather in our day-to-day
crime control and other delivery of emergency and non-emergency
services, and being better able to determine when there is a
linkage with terrorism, as opposed to asking us to carry out
the function of an intelligence agency.
Secondly, I would just re-emphasize that as consumers of
intelligence, we need this intelligence to guide prevention
efforts, but also response, recovery and continuity planning.
It guides everything we do at the state and local level as it
relates to homeland security.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The statement of Mr. Cohen follows:]
Prepared Statement of John D. Cohen
Mr. Chairman, members of the Subcommittee good morning. My name is
John Cohen and I currently serve as the Senior Homeland Security Policy
Advisor to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. In that capacity, I am a
direct advisor to the Governor of Massachusetts Mitt Romney and the
Secretary of the Executive Office of Public Safety Edward Flynn. I
appreciate the opportunity to be here with you today.
The hearing today is entitled ``A Progress Report on Information
Sharing for Homeland Security''--and for state, local and tribal
governments there truly is no more important issue because at the end
of the day, the efficacy of our prevention, response, and recovery
efforts all depend upon the effective collection, analysis, sharing,
and use of timely and accurate intelligence about those who wish to
attack us, the targets they intend to attack and the methods they
intend to use.
Terrorism-related intelligence is not solely utilized by or derived
through the efforts of the Intelligence Community. The attacks of 9/11
and the recent bombings in London taught us that today our enemy may
not always be overseas--he or she may live in our local communities--
and engaged in criminal and/or other suspicious activity as they plan
attacks on targets within the United States and its territories.
Intelligence and/or information regarding possible attacks--possessed
by federal authorities must be provided in a timely manner to state,
tribal, local and key private sector entities to support information-
driven efforts to protect our communities. Furthermore, information
that may forewarn of a future attack may initially come to the
attention of authorities through local crime control activities or by
reports made by the general public.
The Intelligence Community plays a critical role in managing the
flow of terrorism-related intelligence among critical stakeholders.
But, until recently, the manner in which our modern day Intelligence
Community operated and the mindset it operated under for the most part
was established during the Cold War and designed to confront foreign-
based, state-sponsored adversaries. Efforts are underway to restructure
the Intelligence Community so that it can better meet the challenges of
the post 9/11 world. This restructuring must include defining the
appropriate roles for state, tribal, local, and private sector entities
in the collection, analysis, dissemination and use of this intelligence
and information--and how those efforts should be coordinated with those
of the Federal Government. This debate represents an historic
opportunity to enhance existing information sharing between all levels
of government--and--the threat to the nation demands that we proceed
expeditiously. But--we must also proceed thoughtfully and consider all
of the civil liberty and financial implications before asking state,
tribal, local and private sector entities to take on new
responsibilities.
BACKGROUND
In an open society, it is impossible to protect against every
possible type of attack. While all appropriate steps should be taken to
protect and secure our society and we should continue our efforts to
have a robust response effort, the key to protecting America is to
prevent another attack. To be fiscally prudent and operationally
effective, prevention efforts must be intelligence-driven, adaptable,
multifaceted, prioritized, and designed to effectively support efforts
to:
Identify and target for arrest, prosecution,
incarceration, and/or other enforcement actions, such as
deportation, people who have been determined to be supporting,
planning, and/or intending to carry out an attack.
Protect potential targets from being attacked--this
means enhancing the physical security of high-risk targets to
reduce their attractiveness to potential attackers and ensuring
the continuity of critical services to minimize the impact of
an attack at a single or multiple locations.
Disrupt the ability of terrorists to plan and conduct
operations--State, local, and tribal entities can effectively
disrupt the ability of terrorists to operate according to their
plan and force them to change their methods of operation,
thereby exposing them to potential discovery by disrupting
their financial support networks and implementing--in an
unpredictable manner--aggressive protective measures such as
counter-surveillance of potential targets and directed patrol.
The key to prevention is intelligence. We have spent billions in
America since 9/11 on response--it is time now to put equal and greater
attention on the challenge of preventing future attacks. We need to get
our intelligence operations functioning at the level needed for the
threats we now face. While the federal government clearly has primary
responsibility for intelligence, the state and local governments must
play a major role. We are the eyes and ears on the front lines in the
homeland. And while this doesn't mean that state and local authorities
should begin spying on the public, it does mean that in the course of
our day-to-day duties we gather information that may have a nexus with
a terrorist threat and this information needs to be organized, analyzed
and distributed to those who can act on it. Information sharing between
federal, state, local, tribal and private sector entities has improved
since the attacks of 9/11, but it is still not as effective as it
should be--and must be--if we are going to protect our communities from
future attack.
Over the past year, state, tribal and local officials have worked
to better define the role state and locals should play in intelligence
gathering and information sharing. We have also thought about what we
need from the federal government if we are to play our role
successfully. In June 2004, with the concurrence of then DHS Secretary
Tom Ridge, Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney established the Homeland
Security Advisory Council (HSAC) Intelligence and Information Sharing
Working Group (Working Group) to review the roles, responsibilities,
and requirements of state and local government entities as related to
the collection, analysis and dissemination of terrorism-related
intelligence information. The Governor established the Working Group in
recognition that while there seemed to be general agreement at all
levels of government that the sharing of terrorism-related
intelligence/information is vital to our nation's efforts to detect,
prevent, and effectively respond to acts of terrorism here at home, it
is still somewhat unclear what state and local
entities should be doing as a part of a national effort in this
regard.\1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ The Intelligence and Information Sharing Working Group was
comprised of state, tribal, local and private sector officials
representing various disciplines. The Working Group worked closely with
members of the Global Justice Information Sharing Working Group--a
Department of Justice sponsored advisory committee comprised of state
and local law enforcement officials. Representatives from the
Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Justice and the
Federal Bureau of Investigation actively participated in all of the
Working Group's efforts.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In December 2004, the HSAC Intelligence and Information Sharing
Working Group issued a report that included a number of findings and
recommendations intended to better define what state, tribal and local
governments should be doing as part of our nation's efforts to collect,
analyze, disseminate and use terrorism-related intelligence (a summary
of that report is included as an attachment to this testimony). At that
time, the Working Group reported that almost every state is
establishing an ``information fusion center''--a location where
homeland security-related information can be collected and analyzed.
But the Working Group also found that there was no common definition of
fusion nor were there standards to guide the states in doing so. The
Working Group was asked by Secretary Ridge to develop a list of
functional attributes for use as a guide by state, tribal and local
entities as they seek to establish statewide and urban area ``fusion
centers.''
On 4/28/05, the Governor formally presented to the HSAC guidelines
to support establishing a state-based, nationwide fusion capacity--
recognizing that every level of government and the private sector has a
role in the fusion process (a copy of the April report is included as
an attachment to this testimony).
INFORMATION FUSION
The process that has become known as ``information fusion''
represents the organizing principle that supports an effective national
homeland security intelligence capacity. The Working Group defined the
term ``fusion'' as the overarching process of managing the flow of
information and intelligence across levels and sectors of government
and the private sector to support the rapid identification of emerging
terrorism-related threats and other circumstances requiring
intervention by government and private sector authorities. It is a key
part of our nation's homeland security efforts because it supports the
implementation of risk-based, information-driven prevention, response,
and consequence management programs. It means more than the one-time
collection of law enforcement and/or terrorism-related intelligence
information and it goes beyond establishing an intelligence center or
creating a computer network. It is a clearly defined and ongoing
process that involves the blending of information from:
The intelligence and information management systems
used to support the core missions of individual Federal, state,
tribal and local government entities;
The general public; and
Private sector entities.
The Working Group report acknowledges that the way in which
individual jurisdictions and regions implement the fusion process will
vary taking into account their specific needs, capabilities and
resources. The Working Group's report lists a number of factors
critical to an effective intelligence/information fusion process--these
include:
Common terminology used by all stakeholders;
Up-to-date awareness of the global and domestic
threats;
An understanding of the linkages between terrorism and
non-terrorism related information so that we can recognize
``precursors'' or ``indicators'' of an emerging threat;
Intelligence and information requirements that
prioritize and guide planning, collection, analysis,
dissemination and re-evaluation efforts;
Understanding and elimination of impediments to
information collection and sharing;
Extensive and continuous interaction with the private
sector and with the public at-large;
A commitment to ensure aggressive oversight and
accountability so as to protect against the infringement of
constitutional protections and civil liberties.
The Working Group recommended that minimally, each state should
establish and maintain an analytic center to facilitate the fusion
process--Each major urban area (as defined by the UASI program) may
want to establish a similar capacity ensuring that it is interlinked
with the fusion process established by the state. Additionally, there
needs to be some consideration of where these fusion centers link into
the federal system.
Secretary Chertoff--as well as a numerous other federal, state,
local and private sector entities--have been briefed on the efforts and
findings of the Working Group. Information contained in both reports
have been incorporated into the guidelines and other materials being
developed by the Department of Homeland Security that are intended to
support efforts by state, tribal and local governments to enhance their
capacity to prevent, respond to and manage the consequences of a
terrorist attack.
CONCLUSION
The initial report of the HSAC Intelligence and Information Sharing
Working Group outlines the roles state and locals should play in
intelligence gathering and information sharing, and it also outlines
what we need from the federal government if we are to play our role
successfully. This report has been given serious consideration by the
White House and by DHS as they write preparedness standards for state
and local governments, and I hope that the federal government will also
consider the critical role of state and locals in intelligence as they
restructure the federal intelligence environment.
The follow-up report on standards for fusions centers in the states
comes at a time when most states have one or more fusion centers under
development. For this reason, and recognizing that it is ineffective to
demand that the same structure be used in every state or large urban
area, we have focused instead on the process that should take place in
a fusion center--what are the inputs and outputs needed for a state's
fusion operation to be effective.
Equally important is the report's recommendation that the federal
government recognize that states are establishing a fusion process and
that the federal government needs to take this into account as they
restructure the federal environment. We have made clear what we need
from the federal government in order to be effective in our role--and
we will focus in the states on putting together the fusion operations
on the ground that can ensure we have a robust intelligence operation
working at every level throughout our country.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you very much for that testimony.
Congratulations, you finished at the red light. Good going.
Mr. Gary Edwards, we look forward to your testimony, sir.
STATEMENT OF GARY EDWARDS, CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, NATIONAL
NATIVE AMERICAN LAW ENFORCEMENT ASSOCIATION
Mr. Edwards. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Vice Chairman and
distinguished members of the committee. My name is Gary
Edwards. I am the chief executive officer of the National
Native American Law Enforcement Association, also known as
NNALEA.
I am honored and pleased to appear before this committee
and the Subcommittee on Intelligence, Information Sharing and
Terrorism Risk Assessment to discuss the progress of
information sharing for homeland security. Thank you for this
opportunity to address you.
I ask that my written testimony be entered into the record.
Mr. Simmons. Without objection.
Mr. Edwards. NNALEA is a nonprofit public service
organization formed in 1993. Among other things, we provide a
media for the exchange of ideas and new techniques, establish
networks for training collaboration, technical assistance,
information sharing and investigative assistance between
federal, tribal, state and local governments and agencies and
the private sector.
We have conducted 12 national training conferences, and
this year we are going to be conducting our 13th national
training conference on November 15 through 17, 2005, in Las
Vegas, Nevada. We are sure that some of the hot topics will be
homeland security and information sharing. You are all invited
to attend.
In my capacity as the chief executive officer of the
National Native American Law Enforcement Association, I serve
on a number of advisory committees, task forces and working
groups for the Department of Homeland Security and the
Department of Justice. It is my opinion that the progress of
information sharing for homeland security can be best
understood by comparing today's information sharing for
homeland security with that of the past.
Prior to the formation and efforts of the Department of
Homeland Security, information sharing on issues relating to
the security of our homeland was handled in patches, wherein
the federal departments, states, tribes, localities and the
private sector would largely engage in information sharing for
homeland security independently and through limited
coordination. There was not a master weaver, so to speak, to
achieve a seamless fusion of all the patches.
The result was, in the past, although there was some
information sharing, there was no comprehensive plans, no
centralized coordination, no seamless functionality of
information sharing for homeland security. With the formation
of the Department of Homeland Security, the information sharing
to secure our homeland was finally given its much needed master
weaver.
Presently, the Department of Homeland Security has placed a
great focus on information sharing for homeland security.
Secretary Chertoff stated, ``The ability to share information
with our international, state, tribal, local partners, the
private sector, law enforcement and first responders is
absolutely critical to our success.''
The Department of Homeland Security has employed a national
approach engaging national agencies such as the National
Congress of American Indians and the National Native American
Law Enforcement Association, among numerous others, to work
toward achieving information sharing goals such as the
integration among public and private stakeholders of the roles
and responsibilities for the security of our homeland: seamless
functionality for information sharing, establishment of
effective partnerships for information sharing, information
sharing pertaining to prevention, protection, all-hazards
response and recovery, establishment of comprehensive
information sharing, centralized coordination of information
sharing, promotion of greater situational awareness, and the
fusion and sharing of a richer intelligence base.
For example, NNALEA, the National Congress of American
Indians and the Department of Homeland Security are currently
conducting a tribal border security pilot program. The tribal
border security pilot program is cutting edge and provides the
Indian tribes located on or near the international borders of
the United States with the opportunity to advance their
respective tribe's ability to deal with threats or acts of
terrorism, national disasters and other national emergencies,
while also advancing Indian Country and national homeland
security.
In one phase, we used tribal border security pilot program
tools to collect capabilities and information such as emergency
management and public works, law enforcement, border security,
detention facilities, emergency fire response, emergency
medical responders, facilities, critical infrastructure, and
environment and public safety communications and
interoperability. The tribal border security presents this
information to the Department of Homeland Security, which may
use it in assessing the as-is environment of homeland security
on our borders, as well as the homeland security capabilities,
preparedness and assessments for the participation of tribes,
among other uses.
We must thank the 40 tribes for sharing this information
with the Department of Homeland Security. It shows their
vigilance in the protection of our nation.
In the future, as we look to information sharing and
homeland security progress, we must look at integration of
information sharing systems between federal, state, tribal and
local governments and agencies, as well as the private sector.
This integration can be achieved through the following: the
federal government clearly defining what type of intelligence
and information is needed; the removal of barriers like long-
awaited security clearances; the empowerment of local and
tribal law enforcement to collect intelligence; the creation of
a legal structure for intelligence gathering and information
sharing that law enforcement officers feel comfortable in; the
removal of any legal impediments that prevent law enforcement's
ability to gather legitimate information at the state, tribal
and local levels without spying on people, and all the while
protecting the constitutional and human rights of American
citizens; the continued establishment of coordinated
intelligence and information fusion centers; the development of
clear, open interoperable communications and information-
sharing policies that require two-way information sharing
between the federal departments, states, tribes, local entities
and the private sector because top-down information sharing is
an ineffective and inefficient method that creates untimely
critical information sharing; the development of innovative
means to build and maintain a personal relationship across our
great homeland for personal relationships are the time-tested
catalyst for information sharing; and the provision for funding
for much-needed equipment, technology training, accreditation,
certification, personnel pay parity and so forth to allow
governments and agencies of different means to be able to
achieve seamless information sharing for homeland security.
As Winston Churchill once said, ``Give us the tools and we
will finish the job.''
Thank you again for this opportunity to speak, and I will
answer any questions you may have for me.
[The statement of Mr. Edwards follows:]
Prepared Statement of Gary L. Edwards
Introduction
Mr. Chairman, Mr. Vice-Chairman and distinguished members of the
Committee, my name is Gary Edwards and I am the Chief Executive Officer
of the National Native American Law Enforcement Association
(``NNALEA''). I am honored and pleased to appear before the House
Committee on Homeland Security, Subcommittee on Intelligence,
Information Sharing and Terrorism Risk Assessment to discuss the
progress of information sharing for Homeland Security. Thank you for
this opportunity to address you today.
Background on NNALEA
As many of you may be aware, NNALEA is a non-profit public service
organization founded in 1993, which among other things, provides a
media for the exchange of ideas and new techniques, and establishes
networks for training, collaboration, technical assistance, information
sharing and investigative assistance between federal, tribal, state and
local governments and agencies and the private sector. NNALEA has
conducted twelve (12) National Training Conferences across the United
States, and is currently preparing for its thirteenth (13) National
Training Conference to be held on November 15-17, 2005 in Las Vegas,
Nevada. Homeland Security and information sharing will be hot topics at
this upcoming National Training Conference. In my capacity as the CEO
of NNALEA I have served on a number of advisory committees, task forces
and working groups of the Department of Homeland Security and the
Department of Justice.
Information Sharing for Homeland Security_Past
The progress of information sharing for Homeland Security can best
be understood by comparing today's information sharing for Homeland
Security with that of the past. Prior to the formation and efforts of
the Department of Homeland Security, information sharing on issues
relating to the security of our Homeland were handled in ``patches,''
wherein the federal departments, states, tribes, localities, and the
private sector would largely engage in information sharing for homeland
security independently or through limited coordination. There was not a
``Master Weaver,'' so to speak, to achieve a seamless fusion of all of
the ``patches.'' The result was that in the past, although there was
some information sharing, there were no comprehensive plans, no
centralized coordination, and no seamless functionality of information
sharing for Homeland Security as a whole. With the formation of the
Department of Homeland Security, information sharing to secure our
Homeland was finally given its much needed ``Master Weaver.''
Information Sharing for Homeland Security_Present
Presently, the Department of Homeland Security has placed a great
focus on information sharing for Homeland Security. As Secretary
Chertoff recently stated: ``The ability to share information with our
international, state, [tribal] and local partners, the private sector,
law enforcement and first responders is absolutely critical to our
success.'' The Department of Homeland Security has employed a national
approach, engaging national organizations such as the National Congress
of American Indians (NCAI) and NNALEA, among numerous others, to work
towards achieving information sharing goals such as: integration among
public and private stakeholders of the roles and responsibilities for
the security of our homeland; seamless functionality of information
sharing; establishment of effective partnerships for information
sharing; information sharing pertaining to prevention, protection, and
all-hazards response and recovery; establishment of comprehensive
information sharing plans; centralized coordination of information
sharing; promotion of greater situational awareness; and the fusion and
sharing of a richer intelligence base.
For example, NNALEA, NCAI, and a number of other partners with the
support of the United States Department of Homeland Security Office for
Domestic Preparedness are currently performing the Tribal Border
Security Pilot Program ("TBS Pilot Program"). The TBS Pilot Program is
cutting-edge and provides Indian Tribes located on or near our
International Borders with the opportunity to advance their respective
Tribe's ability to deal with threats or acts of terrorism, natural
disasters and other national emergencies, while also advancing Indian
Country and National Homeland Security. In one phase of the TBS Pilot
Program a number of information gathering tools are utilized to collect
information on areas vital to Homeland Security, such as: Emergency
Management and Public Works; Law Enforcement, Border Security and
Detention Facilities; Emergency Fire Responders; Emergency Medical
Responders and Facilities; Critical Infrastructure and Environment; and
Public Safety Communications and Interoperability. It is anticipated
that the Department of Homeland Security may use the information from
the TBS Pilot Program as an aid in assessing the ``as is'' environment
of Homeland Security on our borders, as well as a Homeland Security
capabilities, preparedness and needs assessment of the participating
Tribes, among other uses.
Much recognition and many thanks should be given to the nearly
forty (40) tribes who have graciously shared their information on the
above areas for the TBS Pilot Program. Their participation is a
testament to their vigilance for the security of our Homeland. In
addition, much recognition and many thanks should be given to the
United States Department of Homeland Security for its insightfulness in
recognizing the important role that these border Indian Tribes play in
our Homeland Security.
Information Sharing for Homeland Security_Future
As information sharing for Homeland Security progresses into the
future, the focus should continue to be upon the integration of
information sharing systems between federal, state, tribal, and local
governments and agencies, as well as the private sector. This
integration can be achieved through the following:
the federal government clearly defining what type of
intelligence and information is needed;
the removal of barriers, like long waits for Security
Clearances;
the empowerment of local and tribal law enforcement to
collect intelligence;
the creation of a legal structure for intelligence
gathering and information sharing that law enforcement officers
feel comfortable in;
the removal of any legal impediments that prevent law
enforcements' ability to gather legitimate intelligence at the
state, tribal and local levels, without spying on people and
all the while protecting the Constitutional Rights and Human
Rights of American Citizens;
the continued establishment of coordinated
intelligence and information fusion centers;
the development of clear ``Open Interoperable
Communications Information Sharing Policies'' that require
``two-way'' information sharing between the federal
departments, states, tribes, local entities and the private
sector, because `top-down' information sharing is an
ineffective, inefficient method that creates untimely critical
information sharing;
the development of innovative means to build and
maintain personal relationships across our great Homeland--for
personal relationships are the one time-tested catalyst for
information sharing; and
the provision for funding for much needed equipment,
technology, training, accreditations/certifications, personnel,
pay parity and so forth, to allow governments and agencies of
differing means to be able to achieve seamless information
sharing for Homeland Security.
As Winston Churchill once said: ``Give us the tools and we will
finish the job.''
Conclusion
Thank you again for the opportunity to address you today. I am
happy to answer any questions that any of you may have.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you, Mr. Edwards.
Now, I would like to recognize Dr. Colwell. Again, if you
could summarize your key points in 5 minutes, that would be
most helpful. I have already read your very good statement.
STATEMENT OF LEE COLWELL, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, PEGASUS RESEARCH
FOUNDATION
Mr. Colwell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will be brief.
I request the written statement that I submitted be entered
in the record.
Mr. Simmons. Without objection.
Mr. Colwell. I will summarize, with your permission,
comments made in the written statement.
I want to talk about the functions of a 501(c)(3)
foundation, the Pegasus program, and how it facilitates
information sharing among our local-to-local law enforcement
agencies, that is not without, although the mission is
horizontal, it is not without vertical accessibility, given
certain parameters.
I think that we live in interesting and unprecedented
challenging, changing paradigms involving how law enforcement
does its job. I think that the recognition of a national
imperative that existed long before it was identified has been
good for our country and the noble efforts of this body and the
executive branch are commendable.
I would suggest that when we talk about federal, state and
local, that we raise and, A-N-D, to all caps because local law
enforcement agencies are where all of the day-to-day routine
crimes occur, and that reservoir or body of information
collected through traditional and historical law enforcement
efforts is rich in data that can aid and support law
enforcement at the local level, as well as at the national
level with those agencies of the federal government that have
the first-line responsibility for the strategies involving what
we can do to protect our nation.
I would like to spend a moment describing to you what the
Pegasus program, Local-to-Local, is about. Briefly, Pegasus
facilitates information sharing at the local-to-local level,
the horizontal. This was started by the National Sheriffs'
Association in the year 2000, prior to the tragic events of 9/
11. At that time, and in our view remains to this day, the only
national initiative initiated through this body and funded
through this body that directly involves facilitating and
accessing by local law enforcement information agencies the
information that is generated and created there. There is
nowhere else that this data resides in the form that it is.
There are summaries. There are statistical reports that are
submitted. And there are certain warrants and crimes that rise
on up through the system to the state and the federal level.
Simply stated, the Pegasus program facilitates information
sharing from disparate legacy databases, whatever is there,
without changing it or modifying it in any way, and makes it
accessible to other law enforcement agencies through a
biometric fingerprint authentication process as part of the
protocols for accessing the data system. We use a fingerprint.
It is an Internet-based, secure, biometric fingerprint
performing the following functions: access to legacy databases
that do not meet, for the most part, the global justice XML
standards. It would be a huge cost factor to try to change all
those quickly. It provides a directory of law enforcement
agencies and the personnel, a secure directory. It provides
alert functions. It provides a consular notification function.
When a foreign national is arrested by a local law enforcement
agency, it provides notification to the consulate and the State
Department.
It links databases. It shares information. We have a
governance board of sitting members, former and current
members, sheriffs and chiefs. It does not compete or duplicate
with existing databases or vendors. It works with the existing
software and hardware. It does not extract data. It provides
access. It is not an intelligence system. It is a voluntary
participating process. There is no cost, thanks to the
Congress, to the agencies who are linked up. It employs
multiple vendors who actually perform and make up databases.
We conform to the privacy laws and traditions of each state
and those law enforcement bodies in which they operate. It is a
system for law enforcement.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The statement of Mr. Colwell follows:]
Prepared Statement of Lee Colwell, DPA
Chairman Simmons, Ranking Member Lofgren, and Subcommittee Members:
Thank you for the opportunity to appear before this Committee and
provide you with information and my views about law enforcement and
homeland security information sharing, especially regarding the needs
of local agencies for Local-To-Local (L2L) law enforcement data
communications, not voice (i.e., public safety radio). I speak
especially to the needs of agencies in rural and small-town America.
Thank you also for the work you do to make all our communities and
Nation safer places for all Americans.
My name is Lee Colwell. I am Executive Director of the Pegasus
Research Foundation, located in Little Rock, AR. I am a Former
Associate Director of the FBI, the number two position in the FBI at
the time, a retired university professor, a life member of the NSA and
IACP. My entire professional career has been deeply involved in law
enforcement and public safety at all levels of government.
I am speaking on the need for L2L data communications, especially
in rural areas, on behalf of the Pegasus Program, which includes
Pegasus Technology Consortium members from Colorado, Iowa, Kentucky,
Minnesota, Mississippi, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. I will discuss what
the Pegasus program is, what Pegasus is not, what the program does, the
background on local law enforcement, how Pegasus could assist the
Department of Homeland Security, and a final comment on information
sharing.
I also reflect the views, I believe, of the approximately 700 local
law enforcement agencies from more than 30 states, from Maine to
California and Washington to Florida, and numerous points in between,
which Pegasus currently serves, either by providing an outlet for their
local agency legacy data, or by providing access to that data which is
not available elsewhere, or both. A map showing the location of those
local agencies involved in the Pegasus Program is attached to my
written statement.
What the Pegasus Program Is
The Pegasus program is Congressionally-led. Pegasus is locally
managed as a nationwide initiative for highly-secure nationwide L2L
legacy data exchange of local law enforcement and homeland security
data. As far as we know, the Congressionally initiated Pegasus program
is the only nationwide program with a strategy and plan for nationwide
implementation.
Pegasus is a good example of how Congress provided for previously
unmet local agency needs to solve an essentially Federal problem by
engaging thousands of local front line law enforcement personnel in the
solution. Pegasus was initiated by the National Sheriffs' Association
in 2000 and supported by Congress in 2001 prior to 9/11.
With continued support, Pegasus provides a basic tool that serves
local agency needs for L2L law enforcement data communications. This is
especially critical to those small and rural agencies where the need is
the greatest because they have limited or few financial and information
technology resources and little or no access to local agency data from
other areas.
The Pegasus Program has been working with local agencies to build
local agency consensus on local agency data sharing, namely:
(a) what information do local agencies want to share;
(b) how do they want to share it; and,
(c) who do they want to share it with.
Based on needs assessment work over several years and on-going
policy guidance of local law enforcement, the Pegasus Program has
implemented a technology solution that reflects the ``bottom-up'' needs
of local agency. This program is designed to provide access to specific
and actionable local law enforcement information on a real-time or
near-real-time basis, and the ability to communicate that data without
human intervention.
During the first half of 2005, more than 750 county Sheriff's
Offices and municipal police departments in more than 30 states
participated in the Pegasus Program, either by contributing data,
accessing data, or both. Pegasus is providing authorized secure access
to local law enforcement booking and warrant data that is nowhere else
available, and has taken first steps to provide access to local
incident data nowhere else available. This has been achieved in a
little over a year, with fairly nominal levels of Federal funding, and
is poised to rapidly expand with additional funding.
Built around secure encrypted Internet transport and the Department
of Justice Global Justice XML Data Model and other Federal standards
wherever possible, Pegasus uses commercial off-the-shelf (COTS)
technology. The data is highly-secure, in particular through biometric
fingerprint access authentication. This process is implemented through
formal enrollment procedures and fingerprint-based authentication
technology that is more resistant to ``hacking'' than commonly used
UserID/Password systems. This authentication technology allows system
administrators to ``track the insider'', which is perhaps the greatest
security risk. To do this Pegasus uses COTS fingerprint readers that
are marketed by a dozen different manufacturers and COTS software.
Pegasus is a highly cost-effective vehicle for regional information
sharing projects, especially for local agencies in small towns and
rural areas that do not have the financial and information technology
resources to build technology-intensive data sharing capabilities. A
good example here is the rural law enforcement agencies in Virginia,
West Virginia and Maryland located near Clarke County, Virginia which
work with the Mount Weather Police Department to provide security to
FEMA facilities in the area. These local agencies want and need a
secure information exchange capability of the type that can be provided
both by and to the Mount Weather PD. Pegasus has been working with them
with the view toward providing that capability.
The Pegasus program builds on existing technology deployment which
significantly reduces time to deploy, training, capital and
implementation costs, and maintenance costs. This has the added benefit
of making it fast and cheap to deploy relative to other ``common
software'' and ``common data center'' initiatives.
Your colleagues in the Senate have recently made it clear that
improved information sharing among emergency responders is essential to
a comprehensive homeland security response. Improved information
sharing among emergency responders is also essential to homeland
security preparedness, as well as homeland response.
A classic ``dual-benefit'' system, Pegasus is primarily focused on
local agency needs, starting with local law enforcement, but also can
serve Federal law enforcement and Homeland Security by making local
agency data available for Federal personnel access, not extraction, in
accordance with local agency policies. Pegasus is working with several
federal law enforcement agencies to help them achieve their law
enforcement information exchange mission on terms acceptable to local
law enforcement.
WHAT PEGASUS IS NOT
Pegasus is not a theoretical or ``ivory tower'' standards-setting
body. Pegasus does advance and implement Federal standards like the
Global Justice XML Data Model, which have been adopted by DHS. Most
importantly, Pegasus is actually working in the field to implement
Federal standards, not just discuss them.
Pegasus does not replicate what is in place--where a regional
information sharing system is in place which meets Pegasus security and
other policy requirements, Pegasus works with those system's to provide
a conduit for data to be exchanged in and out of the region.
Pegasus does provide a nationwide, Internet based conduit by which
local agency information in these regional systems can be accessed
nationally, and by which local agency information outside these regions
may be accessed by these regional systems, subject to meeting Pegasus
security standards, in particular biometric access authentication.
Many regional systems do not use biometrics or other strong access
authentication technologies and processes--and we are unable to share
with them because the Pegasus governing policy is to share only with
systems that have biometric fingerprint access authentication
technologies and processes in place.
In this connection, Pegasus is working with local law enforcement
agencies in several locations that have adopted the biometric
fingerprint access authentication technologies and processes. These
include agencies in Hinds, Madison and Rankin Counties, Mississippi;
Jefferson County, Alabama and surrounding counties along Interstate 20;
Marshall County, Iowa and surrounding counties; Linn County, Iowa and
its police departments; Calhoun County, Michigan and surrounding
counties; the Vermont Sheriffs' Association; and, the County Sheriffs
of Colorado. Pegasus provides cost-effective services to these regional
information exchange efforts. A point of discussion is that most local
information sharing systems are being built without strong access
authentication technologies. As a result, Pegasus security policies do
not allow their linkage.
Pegasus is not a data aggregator that owns local agency data, but a
data utility that transports local agency data. Unlike some other
initiatives, Pegasus does not push privacy boundaries or mix law
enforcement and private sector data in powerful data mining
technologies. Pegasus focuses on enabling traditional exchange of law
enforcement data. The Pegasus program emphasis is on information
exchange of traditionally collected law enforcement data and automating
those processes.
WHAT THE PEGASUS PROGRAM DOES
Pegasus' mission is to serve as a nationwide vehicle for local law
enforcement and public safety data in existing legacy systems to be
securely accessed (but not extracted) by authorized law enforcement,
public safety and Homeland Security users at all levels of government,
within policy and security framework approved at the local agency
level.
Pegasus builds local agency consensus and speaks for local-level
agencies nationwide on data integration and data interoperability
issues. It provides a nationwide L2L biometric fingerprint-secured law
enforcement data communications service for agencies located in both
rural and urban areas, ranging from Dawes County, Nebraska, with a
population of 9,060, to Los Angeles County, California, with a
population of over 9,800,000.
Pegasus provides legacy database integration for local law
enforcement agencies nationwide. This system can facilitate law
enforcement agencies at local as well as State and Federal levels to
access but not extract legacy data that local agencies wish to share.
The program also provides a nationwide directory of critical contact
information useful to local agencies; secure messaging and alerting
capabilities that represent a secure alternative to inherently insecure
email; services that automate exchange of information by local law
enforcement, such as consular notifications of foreign nationals who
have been arrested or detained; shared mapping for local agency
location and local critical infrastructure location; and, training on
data interoperability issues.
The Pegasus program governance is through the Pegasus Advisory
Board. Our policy board consists of sitting or recently-retired local
law enforcement officials. The Pegasus Advisory Board addresses
nationwide local-level agency policy on data interoperability issues as
they are developed.
BACKGROUND ON LOCAL AGENCIES AND LOCAL LAW ENFORCEMENT
As you know, under our Federal system of Government, the
overwhelming majority of law enforcement activity is carried out by
local law enforcement--some 14,000 local law enforcement agencies
composed of approximately 3,100 Sheriff's Offices, led by Sheriffs who
are typically the highest constitutionally-elected officials in most
counties, and about 11,000 municipal police departments.
There are some 160 large U.S. cities and counties, served by a few
hundred large local law enforcement agencies--Sheriff's Offices and
Police Departments--that provide law enforcement and public safety
services to the majority of the Nation's population living and working
in a small fraction of the Nation's landmass.
These urban areas and their law enforcement agencies serving them
face many challenges. When compared to non-urban law enforcement these
large urban areas have significant resource advantages; e.g., access to
personnel with cutting edge technology expertise, large tax bases with
significant tax revenues, and the specially-focused Federal programs
such as the Homeland Security Urban Area Security Initiative (UASI),
which focuses on the needs of the largest urban areas.
At the same time, a very significant portion of the Nation's
population and the critical infrastructure serving the entire nation,
including bridges and dams, interstate transportation network,
railroads, shipping, chemical plants, pipelines, nuclear and
conventional power plants and electric transmission facilities, are
located in predominantly rural counties. These rural areas are served
by more than 13,000 local law enforcement agencies--the vast majority
of law enforcement agencies. These small police departments and
Sheriff's Offices typically have 5 or less employees, and are located
in small non-urban communities with a static at best or declining tax
bases: 89.7% of local law enforcement agencies serve populations of
less than 25,000. These municipal police departments and Sheriffs
offices serving rural and small town America are a special focus area
for the Pegasus Program.
The Pegasus Program was conceived of by the Nation's Sheriffs in
the Spring of 2000, to address their need to make their data available
to their local law enforcement partners, in ``local-to-local
communication''. As you know, 90% of the deputy sheriffs work for an
office with a jail and as such, these offices are the primary source of
information about persons arrested and detained for illegal actions,
including criminal aliens. Sheriffs and municipal police departments
work together daily on criminal investigations and other routine law
enforcement matters which require secure L2L data communications
capabilities. This kind of L2L communications is behind the explosive
deployment of regional information sharing projects around the Nation,
many of them ``regional stovepipes'' which do not have L2L
communications capabilities outside their small region.
Rural and small local agencies do not operate in isolation nor are
they immune from the crime in the rest of the Nation. Historically,
every major US terrorist incident has involved major direct contact
with rural law enforcement--ranging from the 9/11 hijackers to the
Unabomber, to the Midwest Pipe Bomber to Timothy McVeigh to Eric Robert
Rudolph, the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games Bomber. Currently, two of our
Nation's more significant law enforcement challenges--methamphetamine
and gang activity--heavily involve urban/rural interaction. Most
methamphetamine production in the Nation takes place in rural America,
where it can be produced without detection before being transported to
both urban and rural areas. Similarly, gang activity, a traditionally-
urban phenomenon, is spreading from urban areas to rural areas
throughout the Nation. Because criminal gangs from Central America, in
particular, are ``franchising'' rural areas, the Nation's local law
enforcement leadership in large urban areas, such as Los Angeles
Sheriff's Department, are seeking ways to work more effectively with
rural law enforcement to control the gang problem, and are looking to
Pegasus and other vehicles to help solve our gang problem.
There is a great deal of misunderstanding about where local law
enforcement data may be found. It is well understood that most law
enforcement activity takes place at the local agency level, and that
most law enforcement data is generated and may be found at the local
agency where it is generated. The twelve million plus reported crimes
by the Uniform Crime Report data are crimes in local jurisdictions.
Many Federal policymakers and agencies also perceive that the National
Crime Information Center (NCIC) or the State agencies generally known
as the ``State Crime Information Centers'' have access to all of this
local law enforcement data: in fact, nothing could be further from the
truth. All narrative criminal offense/incident reports and most
misdemeanor warrants are created and reside exclusively at the
municipal and county level--not at the State level. These records
contain specific and actionable information of great value to law
enforcement at all levels of government, but, in my opinion, the vast
majority of them will never be accessible by local, State or Federal
law enforcement except through L2L data exchange of the kind that
Pegasus is providing.
Enormous quantities of specific and actionable law enforcement
data--highly useful to persons with law enforcement and homeland
defense responsibilities at local, State and Federal levels of
government. These records remain within local agencies and local agency
computer systems, and are never accessed by other agencies. It is
estimated 80-90% of local agency warrants are not reflected in the NCIC
or State Crime Information Centers. These records not in NCIC are
primarily misdemeanor and some felony warrants (most frequently due to
costs to extradite). This data represents a tremendous potential
resource for the Nation's homeland security and other Federal law
enforcement agencies.
There is also a major policy issue regarding Federal access to
local law enforcement data, as opposed to unfettered Federal extraction
of local agency data to reside in Federal databases for manipulation by
Federal agencies. Federal access to local agency data is generally
supported by local law enforcement, but local law enforcement data is
solidly opposed to Federal extraction of their data, which raises
numerous privacy and legal issues. In this connection, 42 USC
Sec. 3789d, ``Prohibition of Federal control over State and local
criminal justice agencies'', provides in relevant part as follows:
``(a) Nothing in this chapter or any other Act shall be construed to
authorize any department, agency, officer, or employee of the United
States to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over any
police force or any other criminal justice agency of any State or any
political subdivision thereof.''
The overwhelming view of local agency officials nationwide is that
Federal extraction of local law enforcement data is a significant start
down the slippery slope to prohibited Federal control over local
police. The overwhelming majority of local law enforcement leaders are
prepared to allow Federal agencies to access their data on local agency
terms, but are not about to start down the slippery slope toward
Federal control over local policing, which is inherent in Federal
extraction of local agency data.
I will now address the ambiguous usages of the term ``information
sharing'', which means different things to different users. Most
Federal information sharing initiatives are driven by Federal needs and
perspectives. For most Federal information sharing initiatives,
``information sharing'' means providing Federal information from one
Federal agency to another Federal agency or pushing Federal data down
to a local or State agency. Sometimes it also means providing the
capability for local agency to push information up to a State or
Federal user.
As important and valid as this Federal view of ``information
sharing'' is, local law enforcement agencies are mostly concerned about
a very different type of L2L ``information sharing'': sharing law
enforcement and public safety information with other agencies--mostly
municipal police departments and Sheriff's Offices--with which they
work on routine criminal investigative matters, some percentage of
which carry Federal law enforcement and Homeland Security implications.
This is the area of ``information sharing'' with which local law
enforcement and Pegasus are most concerned. Except for Pegasus, we are
not aware of any Federal or, for that matter, any non-Federal
initiative which has a strategy and plan for nationwide L2L
``information sharing.''
HOW COULD PEGASUS ASSIST THE DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY IN
ACHIEVING ITS MISSIONS?
We believe there are several opportunities.
(1) One is The Homeland Security Information Network (HSIN), which
serves as a nationwide vehicle for Federal Sensitive But Unclassified
(SBU) data to be securely accessed by emergency responders and critical
infrastructure sector users. This process occurs within policy and
security framework approved by the Federal Government. We believe
Pegasus can help with this mission.
(2) The ICE Detention and Removal Office (DRO) and other DHS units
have information which would be useful for a broad range of law
enforcement personnel to have access to, including persons that DHS or
local officials may not want to have access to HSIN--e.g., DRO data on
alien criminals.
Pegasus and HSIN staffers have discussed working together so that
HSIN recognizes Pegasus-authenticated users. That means that Pegasus
authenticated users will have credentials and permissions recognized by
HSIN. Under this arrangement, Pegasus will bring to HSIN several
thousand users in more than 30 states, many of them from rural counties
and small agencies are added on to the HSIN first-priority areas. We
anticipate that, should HSIN implement strong access authentication
with biometrics for law enforcement personnel, Pegasus will recognize
the HSIN credentials and permissions of HSIN users, as part of the HSIN
Law Enforcement Community.
OTHER INFORMATION SHARING
(3) Pegasus is actively facilitating the sharing of relevant and
timely information between local law enforcement agencies in its L2L
program. Pegasus has also briefed DHS investigative personnel who have
indicated a strong interest in having access to a pilot project which
would provide sophisticated and link analysis to data maintained in
local databases along our southern borders. Pegasus has briefed a
number of Department of Justice federal law enforcement agencies
including the FBI and DEA and proposed providing access to local data
especially jail records. We see relevance to this data with a pilot
project and partnership of federal agencies with Pegasus in providing
link analysis of these records. We have proposed partnerships with a
pilot project utilizing federal prison records with several federal
agencies including the FBI, DEA, ICE and DRO.
(4) Law enforcement officials at the local level are also concerned
about criminal enterprises, including terrorist activity being run from
not only the federal prison population but the 3000+ local jails. To
investigate such criminal enterprises, authorized investigators (both
federal and local) face a daunting and time-consuming process of
assembling jail booking records and detail call records. The Pegasus
Program with its Pegasus Technology Consortium, believe this existing
tool (link analysis) needs to be demonstrated through the pilot
projects we have proposed to the above cited agencies.
Mr. Chairman, thank you and all the committee members for allowing
me to provide my views on L2L information sharing. We look forward to
facilitating a growing dialogue between the Congress and local
agencies, as Congress works to address national law enforcement and
Homeland Security needs and the role and needs of local agencies for
L2L data communications in that larger context.
I will address any questions you may have.
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] 27686.001
National Law Enforcement Data Communications Networks: Functionality and Constituency Analysis (Rev.060402)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Constituency Governance Functionality Legal Regime Mission
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
RISS Federal, State and Authorized by -Provision of a secure law Intelligence Communication and
Local Law Congress; line item enforcement Intranet; databases operate information sharing
Enforcement appropriation; secure e-mail; access to under provisions of among local, state,
oversight at OJP/ intelligence databases at Criminal and federal law
BJA; National Policy local, state, regional, Intelligence enforcement
Group; Six center federal levels; national Systems Regulations agencies
policy boards gang database (28 CFR, Part 23)
-RISSLeads investigative
bulletin board/news group
server for collaborative
law enforcement efforts
-On-line access to
RISSTraining server for
training materials
restricted to law
enforcement;
deconfliction databases;
EPIC clan lab database
-Access to law enforcement
publications; connection
to HIDTAs; utilizations
of XML to facilitate data
exchange
-RISSSearch--a system wide
search engine
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LEO (Law Enforce-ment Online) Federal, State and Joint cooperative -LEO is the only Certified Secure National Secure Data
Local Law agreement between and Accredited (C&A) communications and Communications
Enforcement, FBI and LSU; Internet based system for information Network for
Criminal Justice and authorized by Sensitive But sharing. Presently, information
First Responders Congress, funded Unclassified (SBU) it is not a system sharing, distance
through OJP/BJA and Information by the FBI of record and learning, and
managed by FBI with 37,000 registered contains no communications for
users nationwide databases under local, state, and
-Secure email: LEO is a provisions of federal law
secure Virtual Private Criminal enforcement
Network (VPN) for Intelligence agencies and first
information sharing Systems Regulations responders.
between all levels of law (28 CFR, Part 23)
enforcement, criminal
justice officials and
first responders
-Online training; Online
publications; Multiple
levels of security within
Special Interest Groups
(SIGs); Webpage services;
News Group Services; Real-
time Chat
-Listserv/Broadcast
messaging to members;
Used to disseminate
weekly FBI Intelligence
Bulletin as well as
hosting local and state
intelligence reports
within the Law
Enforcement Sensitive
Communications SIG;
Utilized to support all
criminal investigative
programs as well as
counter-terrorism and
homeland security matters
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NCIC/State CICs Federal, State and DOJ/State CICs Federally-managed National Criminal Justice National Felony
Local Law Crime Information Center System operating Criminal History
Enforcement (NCIC) linked with State- under 28 CFR Part Records Network
managed CICs for 20 and State Laws
accessing Felony Criminal
History Record Databases
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Pegasus Program For Local Law Local Law Enforcement Policy Boards -Creates new databases and Criminal Justice Local Agency
Enforcement Data-bases and (sponsored for composed of Local makes existing databases Databases operating Database Network
Connectivity Sheriffs and Law Enforcement (NSA/ accessible by others, under 28 CFR Part (Non-Felony
Municipal Law Sheriffs and nationwide (including 20 and State Public Criminal History
Enforcement) Municipal Law help desk services for Records Laws; No and other Public
Enforcement), Fire, local agency database Criminal Records)
and EMS Officials, users) for records which Intelligence
subject to OJP/BJA RISS, LEO and NCIC/State Databases under 28
Oversight CICs do not provide CFR Part 23
-Creates optimal Database
Architecture for Local
Records, using XML and
wireless aware protocols
and Federally-encouraged
standards
-Enables local agency
database sharing by
providing broadband
Internet access and
computer equipment
linking local agency
databases for local level
information sharing by
Law Enforcement, Fire,
and EMS with local public
health offices,
hospitals, and public
utility, transportation,
and other private sector
entities with
responsibilities in
Critical Infrastructure
Protection and Homeland
Security
-Provides live training
and education, and
substantive technical
assistance for local
agencies
-Provides a platform for
bringing emergency
priority data
communications to local
agencies and Public Key
Infrastructure (``PKI'')
for secure and
authenticated information
sharing among local
agencies
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mr. Simmons. Thank you very much for that summary.
Now, we will move to questions.
I have a couple of questions for the panel. Let me start by
making a comment, though, and thank Mr. Edwards for his
testimony. Sometimes people ask me why is tribal involved in
these issues. Of course, we have very substantial Indian tribes
that occupy territories on our borders, and that is a pretty
obvious example of where we need to work closely with the
tribes.
I will also say in my district in Eastern Connecticut, we
have the Mashantucket Pequot and the Mohegan Tribes who operate
the two largest casinos in the world, the two largest casinos
in the world. We know from reading the translation of the
Manchester, England, al-Qa'ida manual that places of amusement
are potential targets. So it is very important when you have
anywhere from 60,000 to 100,000 people aggregating in one place
over 1 weekend, it is very important that the people who
operate facilities like that be included in the system. I thank
you for your participation.
I would like to focus a little bit on Mr. Cohen's
testimony. He made reference to the fact that information
sharing is complicated by virtue of the need of people having
clearances and the need to move classified information very,
very carefully. That sometimes inhibits information sharing. I
have been an advocate for many years of open source
intelligence, that is intelligence that is produced from the
acquisition and analysis of information that is openly
available. Of course, the Pegasus system, I think, describes a
mechanism for transferring those openly available data systems
from one organization to another.
One of the advantages of open source acquisition is that
you are not placed in the position of being a spy. You are
simply accessing databases that somebody else has accumulated.
The information that you acquire and the analysis that takes
place, takes place in an open environment where you can share
with others. If people question your analysis, you can show the
factual basis for the analysis.
Are we doing enough in the area of open source intelligence
and does this discipline lend itself to the homeland security
mission? I would be interested in any comments you might have
to make.
Mr. Cohen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I think you make a very valid point. As I stated earlier,
for me to be able to use intelligence that is produced from
information from a variety of sources, I need to be able to
share that information or that intelligence oftentimes with
people who do not have clearances. Sometimes they are law
enforcement officials. Oftentimes they are emergency management
fire officials. They are all important parts of not only our
response planning activities, but they are an important part of
our ability to protect or mitigate the risks to specific
targets.
So we need to have an intelligence sharing environment that
allows us to take that intelligence and share it with as many
people as possible who are involved in our homeland security-
related activities.
Right now, there is sort of a conflict, however. There is a
conflict between some in the federal system, and quite frankly
there is a disconnect by some at the state and local level. At
the state and local level, there are still a great number of
people who believe, if I only had my security clearance, I
would see the magic. I would see the unicorn. The sun would
come through the trees and I would have a full understanding of
those threats which we face.
I think there is an education process that is necessary to
train these state and local folks and tribal folks that the
magic panacea does not lie with a security clearance; that
there is important information, critical information that is
not classified, that can be accumulated through open source-
related activities, and that it is much more important to put
in place an effective process of gathering analysis,
dissemination and use and re-evaluation than necessarily having
a security clearance.
Within the federal side of the house, I think there is
still a debate over whether we should continue the practices of
the Cold War era and try to classify as much as possible, and
then provide clearances to people at the state and local level
and let those people in on the secrets. In contrast, there are
those at the federal level, and DHS has been a real champion of
this in many respects, of saying no, we need to take this
information. We have to put it into an unclassified format. We
have to blend it with other information that is taken from open
source and taken from state and local sources, and we need to
get that finished product to state and locals so it can become
part of their planning efforts.
So I would agree with you. I think the vast majority of
state and local officials would also agree with you, the more
open the better.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you very much.
Any other comments from the panel? You do not have to if
you do not want to.
Mr. Colwell. Mr. Chairman?
Mr. Simmons. Yes, Mr. Colwell.
Mr. Colwell. I would add to the comments and support the
comments made. I would make a couple of observations. I do not
believe that local law enforcement, meaning the county sheriff
and the municipal police department, want every piece of
information. They want those items that are specific and
actionable so that they can tell their officers what they need
to know and what needs to be done. They are not talking about
classified information.
I am aware that there is a major initiative by my former
organization, the FBI, to present information in an
unclassified version at the outset, if it is significant
information and contains specific and actionable information,
then they are trying to do that. They are not there yet, but
the point is the attitude and the willingness and the will to
do it is there. But on the other hand, there is not a demand
for that information because there is a lot of information that
all of us do not need to know. The question is whether I can do
something about it.
Thank you.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you for those comments.
The chair now recognizes the distinguished ranking member
of the full committee, Mr. Thompson, for questions.
Mr. Thompson. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I appreciate the testimony of all the witnesses.
Dr. Colwell, I live in a community of 500 people, just west
of your operation. How would a rural community relate to this
intelligence gathering network? And how would that information
be delivered? And what would be the backbone for a system like
that so that we would make sure that the right information is
getting to a community of that size?
Mr. Colwell. There are a number of communication links
where that can occur and is occurring in varying degrees of
accuracy and success. So permit me, if you will, to just speak
about the Pegasus program. It links databases that are resident
in those small communities and permits them to share
information. Built in with that is a secure system of
notification to communities. The non-law enforcement portion of
those communications that does not involve investigations of
individuals or involve privacy issues could be linked to a
mayor's office even in a small community of 500, where there is
a need to know that.
I think that overall there is an effort being made to
address that. A lot of progress has been made, but there is a
huge amount of work yet to be done. The Pegasus program, with
the information alerts to the law enforcement agency, whether
it is a chief of police or a sheriff, can get information to
those areas, unlike any other. It is economically feasible with
a project like the Pegasus because of the use of the Internet.
Anyone who has a computer can, with pre-authentication and
validation, can subscribe to that or participate in that.
Mr. Thompson. Thank you very much.
Mr. Cohen, you have heard a description of a system like
that. What do we have available to state and local law
enforcement people at this present time?
Mr. Cohen. Congressman, there are a variety of mechanisms
that are out there.
I think one that we are looking at in Massachusetts very
strongly at is the Homeland Security Information Network that
is being provided to us by the Department of Homeland Security.
We are going to put it in every local community, even those in
the rural areas. We are going to accompany its deployment with
a training program for all of our communities so we can tell
people, whether they are rural police officers or firefighters
or someone inspecting the tracks on our transit and rail
infrastructure, what they should be looking for, how they
should report it, how to use the system.
The system will link into our statewide fusion center. It
will provide feedback back to those rural communities that
provide us the information and intelligence. Then it also gives
us a way to communicate with our Joint Terrorism Task Force and
the HSOC.
Mr. Thompson. But at this moment, we do not have a system.
Mr. Cohen. Right. At this moment we depend on a variety of
processes, whether it is telephone calls, faxes, using email
systems. We have a system we call Saturn in Massachusetts, but
it is one-directional. We can send information out. We have to
have people call us back with additional information.
Mr. Thompson. Dr. Colwell, do you want to make a comment?
Mr. Colwell. Yes. In meeting with Homeland Security
officials yesterday, I believe their plans calls for the
creation of 2000 sites in the next 2 years. My understanding is
that it will not go to the specific, you know, the 500-member
community unless there is a compelling reason to put it there
due to critical infrastructure presence or some extenuating
circumstance. The point is, as Mr. Cohen mentioned, they are in
the process of doing that and it just takes a little time.
Mr. Thompson. I think it is important, and that we
encourage the department to move forward because obviously this
is a vulnerability from the standpoint of intelligence.
If I might, I would like to ask Mr. Edwards, to your
information, are Indian tribes plugged into the intelligence
network so that you can receive information on any homeland
security-related activities?
Mr. Edwards. For the most part, no. There are some
departments that are some of the top in the country that are
connected, but they are connected through cross-deputization
and other user agreements. Most of Indian Country, the majority
of the 562 federally recognized tribes, do not have access to
the information, and many times they do not have a way to give
information that they see or hear in their communities.
Mr. Thompson. Thank you.
Mr. King. [Presiding.] Thank you, Mr. Thompson.
Chairman Simmons has left the chair for approximately 10 or
15 minutes, and I will be sitting in his place for that time.
I would like to ask Mr. Cohen the question, then, and
either of the other two gentleman certainly are encouraged to
add anything they want to it. Really, it is a two-part
question.
One is, if you could just give me the chain of command or
exactly what happens when you arrive in the office in the
morning. Who in Washington would be giving you intelligence?
You mentioned Homeland Security, but also you said other
agencies and departments also feed you information. Some of it
is useful and some of it is not. You also, I believe, said that
some of it is conflicting. Some information you get says it is
deemed not to be credible, but it is given to you anyway.
If you could just lay out the process as to who gives you
information, where you look for it, who gives it to you outside
of Homeland Security from the federal government? Does FBI
information come separate or does that go through Homeland
Security?
Then as an add-on to that, I think it flows, you mentioned
a number of problems that still exist as far as the flow of
information. Can you just give a general thematic answer to
that? Are those problems decreasing? Is the system getting
better? Or do you think the problems are locked in place?
Thank you.
Mr. Cohen. Thank you, Congressman. May I answer your second
question first?
Mr. King. Surely, yes.
Mr. Cohen. Because I was getting a red light, and I would
have gone into this in my general testimony.
Things are getting better. The Department of Homeland
Security, the FBI, the Justice Department are working very
closely with us at the state and local level and the tribal
level to begin working through some of these issues.
We had a meeting yesterday, in fact, a combined meeting of
the Homeland Security Advisory Council Working Group on
Intelligence and Information Sharing, with the Global Justice
Information Sharing Working Group. It was attended by folks
from the FBI, from the Justice Department, from DHS, and people
outside of the law enforcement community.
We are thinking through not just how do we share
information and intelligence more effectively between law
enforcement, but also how do we bring in the other disciplines
that are critical, both as consumers and gatherers of
information.
So there is a lot of progress. DHS has been working very
aggressively with us to fix these problems. They recognize that
there are some challenges. Secretary Chertoff really seems to
get it from the perspective the state and locals are a key
partner. So we are at the table. We are working together.
Things are getting better.
From the standpoint of your first question, that is a great
question because my day usually begins with me calling the
Department of Homeland Security, at least most days, just to
see what is going on on a general basis. They are very good
about sending out a morning operation report, which I look at.
There are other reports that come to me from a variety of other
sources such as TSA, FAA, the information sharing advisory
committees for the different industry sectors.
At the same time, I check with our state police to see if
our folks assigned to the JTTF, the Joint Terrorism Task Force,
have anything on the horizon. I then make a call to the U.S.
Attorney's office in Massachusetts to see if they have anything
that they are looking at. If I see anything that causes me the
least bit of concern, I then begin calling around to some of my
colleagues in the FBI, in the Department of Homeland Security,
and other parts of the intelligence community to see if they
have any additional information.
In fact, when we had our situation in January where there
was some concern about potential folks coming cross the
Southwest border, coming to Boston with a potential dirty bomb,
a good part of my morning was calling a variety of folks that I
have developed strong relationships with here in Washington and
in other states around the country at the federal, state and
local level to see what I could find out they knew about the
situation. I usually go through that process, sometimes in an
expedited manner, before I do my briefing for the governor or
for the secretary of public safety.
So the answer to your question is, every morning I am
pinging my sources to see what they are hearing and what is
going on. If I hear something that causes me concern, I then
begin an aggressive effort to talk to pretty much everyone I
can think of to see what they know about the situation that is
concerning me.
Mr. King. Who is responsible for the reverse part of the
process as far as local intelligence going to Washington? Does
that go through you or the local police chiefs on their own?
How is that coordinated?
Mr. Cohen. In Massachusetts, we have now established a
statewide fusion center. They will do part of the process of
what I just described earlier as far as checking each morning
what is going on and put out a report that I would look at,
instead of me making the phone calls. In our state, and this is
being replicated in a number of states, local jurisdictions who
want to report up can report directly to the HSOC through a
variety of channels, the Homeland Security Operations Center.
At the same time, what we are asking them to do is to send it
to us and the JTTF directly.
That is when there is a clear nexus with terrorism. For the
most part, much of the information we are getting from
localities, maybe reports of suspicious circumstances where
they do not know if it is terrorism-related or not, or maybe
just general crime information, because it is through the
analysis of that general crime information, when we blend that
with the intelligence we get from DHS, we are able to identify
patterns and trends that may reflect a threat.
Mr. King. Mr. Edwards or Dr. Colwell, do you have any
comments?
Mr. Colwell. I do. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I think, number one, I support the answers that Mr. Cohen
gave and their accuracy. But I think when good questions,
important questions like that are asked, it is important to put
them in context.
There are 87 joint terrorism task forces in the United
States. That is expected to grow to about 167. There are,
depending on your definition, 53 to 57 major cities in the
United States. So, much of the initiative and effort and
challenge of the federal law enforcement community in a state
is directed at where the population densities are.
When a question like that is asked and answered accurately
and appropriately, it is in that context of what we are talking
about, not out in these many, many 22,000-some odd
municipalities around the country and 3,109 counties that
serve, for the most part, small populations.
Thank you.
Mr. King. The gentleman from North Carolina, Mr. Etheridge?
Mr. Etheridge. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
As you know, we have been talking a lot about the role of
first responders and law enforcement and others, and of course
you just touched on it a little bit, simply because we are a
big country and terrorists do not determine where they are
going to come in except where the soft spots are. It seems to
me that is a soft spot that we have to find a way at a minimum
to help plug.
Let me go back to one of the questions that was asked
earlier, because a 2003 GAO report reports that local officials
said that they did not receive timely and pertinent
information. You have alluded to some of that, that we are
making progress, from the Homeland Security or from the federal
government, for that matter, in general terms overall. I must
say to you, the first responders from my district tell me the
same thing today that they did in this report.
I would like to know from a generic standpoint, Mr. Cohen
and each one of you, if you would touch on it, yes, we are
making progress, but it has been a long time. We have spent a
lot of money. And to get there, it seems to me, number one, you
have to have a plan. And number two, you have to work the plan.
And number three, whether it is terrorism or just out and out
pure crime, we may be looking for terrorists, but we ought to
be looking for the criminals first, because it seems to me that
is where it starts. These are criminals. They are international
criminals. If we get our focus in the wrong place and look for
the big stuff, we are going to miss all of the opportunities to
get the job done.
So I hope you will touch on that, because it seems to me it
does not matter whether it happens in isolated Iowa or North
Carolina, it has the same problem in the long run.
Mr. Cohen. Congressman, you have made some very important
points.
The first point that I would like to talk a little bit
about is the connection between terrorism and crime. In the
state and local community, you are starting to hear about the
all-hazards, all-crime approach to the intelligence process.
That is critically important because terrorist do not come into
this country and hide in a hotel room waiting for the day of
their attack, and then suddenly come out.
They are involved in a whole host of activities, planning
activities and pre-operational activities, many of which are
illegal. They are involved in cigarette smuggling. They are
involved in document fraud. They are involved in money
laundering. They are involved in drug trafficking. They are
involved in weapons trafficking. They are conducting
surveillance activities. They are doing things that rise to the
attention of local officials, either through crime
investigations or reports being made to those state and local
officials.
We should not be putting our state and local officials in
the position of having to figure out when is something
terrorism-related and who should they report it to. We should
be putting place a system that regardless of who they report it
to, it gets to the right place so it can be analyzed and put
into the national analytical mix.
You are right, there has been no plan for prevention and
intelligence sharing up to this point, but we have been working
aggressively, particularly over the last 6 to 9 months with the
Department of Homeland Security, with the White House, with the
Department of Justice, to think through these issues. With the
passage of the Intel Reform Act, the creation of the Project
Managers Office to begin the design of the information sharing
environment, that provides an excellent opportunity to create
the environment that you just talked about as badly needed.
Part of the other reason why we have not made more
progress, I truly believe, is because I do not think
consistently across the board at the federal level there has
really been a true understanding of the value that state and
locals bring. I think for the most part, state and locals were
viewed simply, in the early days after September 11, as folks
who responded after the attack occurred, which required a
certain type of intelligence and information sharing. I think
there is a growing level of sophistication that no, wait a
minute, state and locals and tribal governments are important
from a prevention perspective.
But it goes beyond that. Prevention is more than just
conducting investigations. Prevention includes identifying at-
risk locations, mitigating the risks to those locations. It
means disrupting the environment so they cannot plan and carry
out their operations. That requires a whole host of activities
at the state and local level. While a growing number of
officials are beginning to understand that at the federal
level, not everybody does yet, and that is a problem.
Mr. Etheridge. Before we run out of time, I hope somebody
will touch on this one too. Has a lack of leadership at the
federal level up to this point created an informal network that
has always been out there in law enforcement, that is growing
and allowing for information to be shared?
Mr. Edwards. From the tribal perspective, that is certainly
true, and DHS is leading the way. When you look at the NIMS and
the NRP, anywhere you see federal, state and local, you see
tribal. So we have actually been given a seat at the table, so
therefore when we begin to talk and we begin to exchange
information and see each other at exercises, we are beginning
to establish that personal relationship. So yes, it is.
And when we look at the national preparedness goal and the
critical task list and the universal task list, then we are
beginning to come together with a lot of things that we were
just doing in the regular routine parts of our job that now
have true meaning based on that strategy.
Mr. Colwell. Congressman, the things that have changed in
my view--and I am talking about in the context of primarily
non-urban, small town, rural America, where Interstate highways
go through and trains and hazardous materials and waterways and
water reservoirs, electrical grids and so forth exist--what has
changed there is an understanding that they are part of a
holistic approach to homeland security.
What is needed, and to a certain degree many efforts have
been made to accomplish this, it is just hard to define what
should you be on the lookout for at the local level?
When I say ``local,'' it is different than what Mr. Cohen
says. When I say ``local,'' I mean outside the urban areas
where the majority of our population lives.
It is an integral part of any holistic approach to homeland
security. They are using computers more. Many of them still do
not have computers, and they need the database links which are
being provided. A lot of progress has been made and there is a
lot of work left to be done.
Mr. Cohen. Congressman, can I just make one quick point?
I am not really sure why Mr. Colwell indicated that I am
not referring when I say ``local'' rural communities. I think
once you do the type of intelligence analysis that we are
talking about, blending state, local, federal intelligence
community information, you learn how these organizations
operate. You then see how through those operations local
communities are involved. You then can train those rural police
officers, those rural firefighters what they need to be
prepared for and what they should be looking for.
So when I say ``local,'' I mean urban, I mean rural, I mean
suburban, I mean local.
Mr. King. The gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. Dent?
Mr. Dent. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
My question will be directed to Mr. Cohen.
The Homeland Security Information Network and the Joint
Regional Information Exchange System, the is an issue that has
been created in my state's Homeland Security Office. I was just
curious if you were part of that pilot effort in your State of
Massachusetts?
Mr. Cohen. Yes, Congressman. The commonwealth is working
closely with the Department of Homeland Security to do a
statewide rollout of HSI and how we will be rolling it out as
we will be putting a capacity or providing access to each
locality, rural, suburban, urban, throughout the commonwealth,
and routing that information both on a regional basis and on a
statewide basis.
So as information rolls out and as information comes in or
is put in, it will be routed to other regional entities of
relevance as defined by our planning regions into our state
fusion center and then to DHS and the FBI.
Mr. Dent. Has your experience in that program been useful
and helpful? In my state, there has been some concern. I know
some of the stakeholders, I believe, has disengaged from that
process. Can you just give me your perspective?
Mr. Cohen. HSIN and the JRIES system have gone through some
growing pains. I think the initial deployment of what was
called at that point JRIES, there were some issues. I think it
grew faster than they were prepared for and the technology
could support. I think there was some frustration that came
from that.
As they migrated JRIES over to the Homeland Security
Information Network, to more of a portal-based system or an
Internet-based system, I think that the capacity of the system
has increased. So far, DHS, we have no complaints with how DHS
has worked with us in the deployment of the pilot project. They
have been attentive. They have been responsive to what we have
talked about, and we are looking forward to deploying it.
Mr. Dent. Is your state currently exploring their own
information sharing network, outside of the JRIES and HSIN
system?
Mr. Cohen. Yes. We are looking at integrating our HSIN in
deployment with the deployment of a statewide information
management system that is going to be run out of our fusion
center. And then we are also looking to leverage our Health
Alert Network.
Mr. Dent. Would that be outside the JRIES system?
Mr. Cohen. It is a separate system, but they are all going
to be integrated and fused together.
Mr. Dent. Okay. Thank you.
Does anybody else want to comment on that? Okay.
Thank you. No further questions.
Mr. King. Thank you, Mr. Dent.
The gentleman from Rhode Island, Mr. Langevin?
Mr. Langevin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Gentlemen, I want to thank you for your testimony today.
Similar to the question that Mr. Dent was just asking, I
guess I wanted to start and just go to Mr. Colwell for a
second. I know there are several information sharing systems
out there. There is RISS, which I am very familiar with. I know
there is HSIN.
Mr. Colwell, can you compare and contrast a little bit the
Pegasus system with some of these others? To what degree are we
reinventing the wheel and to what degree do you think it is
possible that we can have just one information sharing system
that everybody can get behind? It seems like there is a lot of
duplication of effort out there.
Mr. Colwell. Congressman, I believe that you referred to
RISS. That is a criminal intelligence network system.
Mr. Langevin. I bring that up because--
Mr. Colwell. And the Pegasus program is--
Mr. Langevin. --it is something we can build onto, which is
what HSIN is.
Mr. Colwell. The links, the communication links could be,
and in many instances are coordinated, consolidated. The FBI
has a LEO system and it is highly specialized and
compartmented. All of them have great attributes, including the
Pegasus program. The Pegasus program just links existing data
and makes no attempt to interpret it or analyze it, so we are
not in the intelligence business.
With the chairman's permission, I could submit for the
record a written comparison of the systems. It would be quite
instructive.
Mr. King. Without objection, so ordered.
Mr. Colwell. I might add that those descriptions on that
comparison that I will submit is about 2 years old and the
narratives in that description were submitted by each of the
entities that are mentioned. They describe themselves. Pegasus
did not describe them. I will submit it for the record.
Mr. Langevin. Would either of you gentlemen like to
comment?
Mr. Cohen. You know, Congressman, this is actually an issue
that the working group that the governor chairs looked at.
There are a variety of systems. You have RISS, RISS-Net,
LEO, Law Enforcement Online. You have the CDC's Health Alert
Network. All of them are used to communicate certain
subcomponents or information that could have a homeland
security relationship.
I think we looked at the issue sort of two ways. One, the
working group came out and said we want a single conduit coming
from the federal government for threat-related information and
intelligence. So if you are going to send to us terrorism-
related or homeland security-related threat intelligence, pick
a conduit, whether it is HSIN, LEO, RISS. Pick one.
On the other hand, we recognized that all of those systems
that you have described or that we have been talking about play
an important role in activities outside of those which are
clearly identified as being terrorism related. So they are
important. They need to be maintained because they support
other activities that we need to be involved in each and every
day.
So therefore, pick one to communicate threat intelligence;
keep the other ones in place because they are valuable tools,
don't make those the mechanism in which you are sharing defined
threat-related intelligence.
Mr. Edwards. I think from the tribal and very rural law
enforcement entities, and most law enforcement departments
across the country, you know, 92 percent are less than 50
people in the department, and I think maybe 80-some percent of
that 92 percent have less than 25. Many times, the problem is
we do not have the equipment, the technology, the training, the
personnel to be able to even access these information systems
that are out there. So that is our first step, is just to get
connectivity.
Mr. Langevin. And on the issue of information sharing, I
know you touched on this in some of your testimony already, but
more specifically if you can expand upon it. In an August 2003
report, the GAO reported that local officials routinely
complained that the homeland security information they received
was not timely.
For example, police chiefs reported that they often
received critical homeland security information at the same
time that the public received it. The chiefs blame the federal
government's historical reluctance to share this type of
information with local officials.
Can you discuss more fully what changes you have seen or
witnessed in this culture, if you will, and what can be done to
undo this historical reluctance to reach out to local
officials? This reluctance clearly would place our first
responders and our citizens at risk.
Mr. Cohen, you can start.
Mr. Cohen. I think there are a couple of issues there,
Congressman. I think one issue, as an outside observer, but
someone looking in, I think there is a pretty unwieldy process
that takes place at the federal level as far as clearing and
vetting intelligence that comes down to the state and local
level. I think at times that process in itself may be part of
the issue.
But I think there is a bigger issue, and the bigger issue
is depending on where that intelligence resides, depending on
what department, there may be separate systems or disclosure
protocols that are in place. Here is an example. If the
information or intelligence that is threat-related comes as a
result of an ongoing JTTF investigation, and the communication
of it to Boston, say, comes from a JTTF office in California to
the JTTF office in Boston, the culture has changed dramatically
as far as the FBI sharing that information with state and
locals, but they share it with state and locals that are
involved in the JTTF and involved in that criminal
investigation or that terrorism investigation.
There is nothing wrong with that. That is really important.
But at the same time they are sharing it with the other law
enforcement entities, there is oftentimes a cultural reluctance
to share it with those who are outside of the investigation.
Now, I have been a law enforcement person for 21 years in
different functions. Even though my current job is not strictly
a law enforcement job, but I may need portions of that
information or intelligence that is maintained by the JTTF to
do some very important threat mitigation and planning
activities.
So part of the issue is is that we have to develop a
process that without compromising intelligence operations or
law enforcement operations, information is shared outside of
the investigative circle so that planning and protection
activities can take place by those who are involved with it.
Mr. Langevin. Does the other gentleman want to comment?
Mr. Colwell. One of the things that is occurring now that
did not exist previously, and I would add that there is a lot
of progress that is not seen and noted that has been made since
the GAO report in 2003. But one of the things that is
occurring, there are some databases that are now accessible
that were not accessible before to make inquiries of
information at the non-urban area.
Mr. Langevin. Thank you very much for your testimony. It is
obviously clear we are making progress, but I still get the
sense that we are in this mode of need to know versus need to
share. We need to be ever-vigilant in changing that culture. So
thank you very much.
Mr. King. Go ahead.
Mr. Colwell. One footnote, Mr. Chairman. A lot of the
technology that existed in the past was there, is being
utilized to a more appropriate level. For example, the Pegasus
program uses a priority software that overrides any other
communication if it is from one law enforcement agency to
another, which is an advance that was not commonly used in the
past.
Mr. Langevin. Thank you.
Mr. King. The gentleman from the state of Washington,
Sheriff Reichert?
Mr. Reichert. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
You said ``Sheriff Reichert.'' I was the sheriff in
Seattle, King County, Washington, for the last 8 years. I
started out in a police car 33 years ago at 21 years old. So
thank you for that honor, Mr. Chairman.
I have a question. It always boils down to me, at least for
the last few years after September 11, and I have had a lot of
experience in dealing with federal agencies, as you might
imagine, over my 33 years. In this post-9/11 world that we live
in, the gathering of information, the analysis of information,
and the sharing of information really are the three key pieces
to this puzzle.
There are a lot of initiatives out there. The integration
initiative that was just recently announced by the Department
of Homeland Security, which $10 million and four cities have
been identified across the nation. Seattle, King County is one
of those chosen to participate.
Promises about local help are--I should say federal dollars
in helping the locals construct a system where we can actually
have first-hand, real-time information on the street for the
people in the police cars, it is not happening. Difficulties
with the U.S. Attorney's office in being a partner. Actually,
the U.S. Attorney's office in Seattle has really stepped
forward. The FBI at first would not participate because they
did not want to share certain information.
So I guess my concern is that there are two--to help us get
to the gathering, analysis and the sharing, local cops need
help in funding personnel. We are supplying people to the
federal task forces, to the joint analytical centers, and to
the Joint Terrorism Task Force out of our own budget.
I think the Department of Homeland Security, I would hope,
would take a close look at funding, and I know it has been
their policy not to, funding bodies to help us in that area.
Can you comment on that, Mr. Cohen, first, and then others?
Mr. Cohen. Congressman, when you mentioned patrol cars,
there is not a day that goes by that I do not wish that I am
back to driving a patrol car. Life was a lot simpler back then.
I think you raise a very intriguing issue because on the
one hand I think there are a lot of folks who will acknowledge
that the frontlines on our homeland security efforts and our
global terrorism efforts are the police officers that work at
the local level, whether it is in a rural community or an urban
community.
At the same time that we are asking them to take on more,
raise their level of sophistication, increase their awareness
about terrorism, they are still required to handle their day-
to-day jobs, handling bank robberies, drug traffickers,
arresting prostitutes, handling burglary reports.
At the same time, most local communities are dealing with
pretty severe budget issues. So we are losing police officers
and firefighters, at the same time relying on them more to
protect our communities from future terrorist attacks.
So yes, I think you raise a very valid issue and it is
something we need to figure out because on the one hand, by
asking them to do more, but on the other hand, as we saw with
London, it is going to be those activities that probably
provide our greatest chance at stopping the next attack. The
next attack may not come from someone coming from abroad. It
may come from someone who was born and raised in this country,
who lived in the local community, and conducted all their
planning activities in that local community or in that region
prior to the attack.
At the same time, I do not know how you balance the fact
that confronting terrorism is now part of what we do on a day-
to-day basis from a state and local perspective. It means that
we need to change the way we do business to take that into
account.
So I think you raise a very valid point. There is
definitely a resource issue from the standpoint of how can we
be losing police officers and firefighters at a time when we
need them more than ever, and at the same time there is how do
we integrate this into their day-to-day business.
Mr. Edwards. I totally agree with what John is saying. I
think one thing that we are really missing is the law
enforcement officers that are on the street, particularly in
the rural areas, being able to gather that information and know
what information to gather, and feel comfortable in the
environment that they are gathering it in, and feel like once
they have put it forward, that they are getting some
information back.
I think that is why you see the popularity of the state
fusion centers, and the coming together there. I do think that
we are making progress. We need not just personnel, but
technical assistance, high-speed hookups. A lot of the local
police departments say, well, it takes me maybe 10 minutes to
download one information report or bulletin because I have a
slow-speed dialup. These are things that we have to address at
the local level and I think we could do that with a reasonable
amount of funding to get people connected first, and then teach
them what we need together, second.
Mr. Reichert. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. King. Thank you, Congressman Reichert.
The gentlelady from Texas, Ms. Jackson-Lee?
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your kindness
and indulgence.
I thank the ranking member and the committee, and I thank
the panelists for their service. Many of us come from local
government and understand the importance of your work.
Let me just, if I might, read a paragraph into the record,
``From Hometown Security to Homeland Security.'' This was
prepared by some good friends of mine, the International
Association of Chiefs of Police. I think it is important
because, Mr. Cohen, I think you have made it eloquently, as I
have been here, and I know that Mr. Edwards and certainly Dr.
Colwell has made it very clear, law enforcement efforts to
combat terrorism did not begin on September 11, 2001.
For decades prior to that fateful day, law enforcement
agencies throughout Europe, Asia, Central and South America,
and the Middle East and the United States were engaged in daily
battles to apprehend terrorists and keep their communities safe
from harm.
Of course, this does not have the United States, but I know
that the work that many in law enforcement were doing certainly
was in tune with potential danger or threats to the United
States within their local communities.
I think it is important to put this on the record. This is
a document prepared by the chiefs of police and seemingly was
provided to us by the Democratic staff.
Mr. King. Without objection, it will be made part of the
record.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. I thank the distinguished chairman.
That is the line of questioning that I would like to
proceed with. Let me give you a little background for that.
Many of us on this committee, and some of us were on the
Select Committee on Homeland Community, kept talking about the
question of sharing of intelligence. I think we can be
reminded, aside from some of the tendencies and the fear after
9/11 to stereotype, to racially profile, to suggest it was a
particular religion or ethnic group. I kept saying, one, we
should keep level heads, even in the midst of the enormous
tragedy, and look at what happened. We can track it down to the
issue of intelligence, sharing of intelligence.
We are reminded of the young FBI agent way out west, who
had a document on her desk about an individual who was learning
to fly without learning to land. That information did not
translate, and Mr. Cohen I think I heard you mention the FBI,
or the sheriff mentioned the FBI. They have made great strides
now, but it did not get translated. It was not where it needed
to be, the sharing of intelligence. I cannot imagine a more
important point for this hearing today.
I will just lead into a question with this comment. On
Monday, I was with, and Dr. Colwell, you mentioned rural
communities. There are rural communities inside urban areas,
and I happen to represent that kind of area in Houston where
you can have a big city, but you go to areas that are not
connected, if you will; 24,000 people in the Fifth Ward. But a
very innovative nonprofit has established, with a homeland
security grant or an appropriations that we secured, to put in
a Web site in that community at a major place. One of the Web
sites would include access to first responders information in
time of, unfortunately, a crisis.
Interestingly enough, when it was reported, we know the
bloggers are out there. BlogHouston.com reported and said, I do
not understand what they are talking about. Everybody is always
talking about safety. Here is another project that has the word
``safety'' in it. What does it mean?
So here is, you know, the smart bloggers could not
understand that hooking up or putting technology or information
sharing in a community to be able to understand what is going
on a few miles down the road in downtown Houston, maybe there
is some threat; maybe a chemical plant has exploded, did not
understand it, could not make sense out of it, which shows that
we are not educating and securing the hometown.
So I would like to ask Mr. Cohen on this progress that we
may or may not have made in respect to this area, and I will
ask Mr. Edwards as well. You come from an area where you know
well the goodness of the Minutemen, but obviously they have
taken on another name. I think primarily because of the
frustration on some issues, but also they have gone to suggest
that they will be at both the northern and southern border.
What kind of informational access is important for you to
have in order to make the point that you have it under control,
and that the volunteers that we had in the revolution may not
be needed at this time because you have the local support and
state support that you need.
Mr. King. If I could just ask the witnesses to try to
expedite their answers because we do have two more questioners
and we have another panel following it, and we have to be out
of the room by 1 o'clock.
Mr. Cohen. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Congresswoman, what I need to know to do my job is I need
to know as best as possible what individuals and organizations
want to carry out attacks in the United States and of those
organizations, which ones have the capacity to do it. I need to
know how they operate, how they plan, how they structure their
communications and transportation networks. I need to know what
type of targets they want to attack, and I need to know how
they want to do it. I need to know whether to invest my money
in protecting against a thermonuclear bomb going off or someone
trying to blow up an LNG tanker.
I think to your point, and you make an excellent point, is
that if we do not have this type of intelligence, we have to
rely on conjecture. If we rely on conjecture, then that is how
racial prejudices creep into what we are doing. I think the
vast majority of people involved in counterterrorism activities
truly want to stop the terrorists from attacking our country.
But if we do not give them the information to do it
effectively, then that is when you are going to see people's
civil liberties, privacy, and you are going to see racial
discrimination enter into what we are doing.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Mr. Edwards, and, Mr. Colwell, if you
would as well.
Mr. Edwards. Native American people have been practicing
homeland security since 1492.
[Laughter.]
And you all will be relieved that we are still on the job
today.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. You are.
Mr. Edwards. We are still watching. Just like in World War
II, we had a tribe from the Seattle area go out into the ocean
in their canoes to spot German submarines off the coast. Now,
what would we have done with the information that we got? We
did not have any connectivity, but we would have fought to the
death defending the country.
We are almost in the same shape today on our borders. We
are there. We are watching. We are vigilant. We are American
citizens. We want to protect our country. We want to protect
our freedom, but we need the tools to finish the job.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Mr. Colwell, and I know that yours is on
information sharing, you might emphasize that, but the
importance of what you are focusing on in terms of that local-
to-local information sharing.
Mr. Colwell. Thank you.
I think I agree with my colleague here. I want to state
that there is a massive effort going on at the federal level in
the midst of huge reorganization initiatives, homeland
security; change of mission for the FBI; and also attempts to
clarify what the threat is. I think more than anything else,
the small towns and the rural, as well as the major cities,
need clarity of the threats so they can take the risks that
exist in that community and they will have a better idea of
what they need to do to prepare themselves.
My view is that the preparedness for this also has to occur
at the local level in addition to the initiatives that are
being carried on by the federal government. But there is a lot
of progress that has been made in sharing information, but
there is a lot of work left to be done. It is a long,
unidentified and unmet need, but it is now an imperative that
this occur.
My view is that the more informed our local law
enforcement, and when I say ``local,'' outside the major
metropolitan areas. The more informed they are, the more they
will be responsible, and they will contribute in meaningful
ways to our national security.
One last thing, crime has always been local. Even with
terrorist events, it is still local crime in that, although
there are federal laws and state laws. The local crime that
occurs still goes on, still the same volume. The jails are
still full, unfortunately, and the added burden of homeland
security calls for extra resources and demands, but the local
crime continues. It is just a question of clarity and helping
give information so that people can act on their own and their
own initiative in the context of homeland security.
Thank you.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Mr. Chairman, may I just put this is in
for the record to indicate that in dealing with the Minutemen
coming to Houston, I convened local law enforcement called
constables, and nobody has ever heard of them, but they had not
received any terrorism training, which I gleaned from just
having that meeting. So your points are very well taken.
I would conclude by saying I hope that we will have the
opportunity of hearing from you distinguished gentlemen, but
Sheriff Tommy Farrell, which I had hoped that we would have
been able to hear from from Mississippi, who has that rural
base of understanding of the lack of resources that he has no
been able to receive during his tenure. I hope we will have
that opportunity.
I thank you for your answers and your service.
Mr. Simmons. [Presiding.] The chair now recognizes the
gentleman from California, Mr. Lungren.
Mr. Lungren. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Edwards, I would like to know more about the program
that you have with various tribes and the Tribal Border
Security Pilot Program. Is it stood up completely now? What are
the objectives there? What do you do with respect to, if
anything, those that are on the border? What do you do with
respect to immigration? How do you share intelligence with
immigration? Has it changed since we now have the terrorist
threat aspect involved in all of this?
Mr. Edwards. There are currently 40 tribes that are on or
near the United States borders. They are usually not included
in a lot of the homeland security planning, at least prior to
the Department of Homeland Security including tribes in the
NIMS and the NRP.
I think at that point, DHS realized that in order to have a
good border strategy and protect our country from our borders
which should be our first line of hard defense for our country,
that we had to find out exactly what existed in capabilities
with regard to tribes and what were their needs to achieve
parity the tribal communities' emergency services and law
enforcement and that of the nontribal areas.
We, to do this particular thing, developed a capabilities
baseline based upon the national preparedness goals critical
task list and universal task list to develop some kind of level
that we could look and gauge and see and monitor where the
needs may be and what capabilities we had to work with our
neighbors.
We are almost completed with that. We have 38 of the 40
tribes participating, and the information that we got will be
put into searchable databases that will be able to give us
trends in different areas, and would also be a tool that we can
use to show where improvements exist and accountability. And
then if we have a problem, we can also pull from that 100-mile
radius to the area of the critical incident, because every
critical incident is local and you need to first pull in those
resources. But the report is due to be completed by December of
this year and we are well on our way.
Mr. Lungren. What is the geographic reach of those 40
tribes? That is, how much territory are we talking about? I am
talking about border territory.
Mr. Edwards. There are over 225 land miles of border that
are on tribal reservations, and there are also numerous
waterways between the United States and Canada.
Mr. Lungren. Okay. This is a question for the entire panel.
My perspective is based on the fact that I was here in Congress
for 10 years, 1979 to 1989, left and went back to California. I
was Attorney General there for 8 years.
While I was here in the Congress, I served on the oversight
committees for the FBI and had very good relations with them. I
thought everything worked well. Then when I was elected
Attorney General, I found out that I was local or state and
they were feds. And frankly, I ran into that problem.
I hear all this stuff about how we have improved the
intelligence gathering, but it seems to me in many cases I
discovered as the Attorney General, that the intelligence
gathering was one way. We gathered it. They took it. We did not
get much in return.
Mr. Cohen, you said things have improved. How much have
they improved? Has the culture changed?
Mr. Cohen. You know, I used to think when I was a police
officer that it was a bureaucratic or a turf issue, why
information was not shared. I have now come by the FBI with
state and local authorities. And the FBI is a great
organization. They do a very important job.
Mr. Lungren. That is on the record. I do not want anybody
to say we are attacking the FBI. I am trying to get to the
problem, which is a continuing problem that I hear about from
people in my state. I would like to know from your experience
how much has it improved.
Mr. Cohen. It has improved, but it has only improved from
the perspective that they share information and intelligence
more effectively with those state and local law enforcement
entities that are involved in the investigations that they are
conducting. That makes sense, because from their perspective
their mission is to conduct investigations into individuals and
groups. From the JTTF perspective, they are conducting
investigations into individuals and groups that may be involved
in terrorism.
They do not focus on, from an operational perspective,
emergency response planning, critical infrastructure
protection, or risk mitigation, the activities that I have to
focus on. So from their perspective and in their world, they
are doing a better job sharing information.
Mr. Lungren. How about your world, your perspective?
Mr. Cohen. In my world, I get more of a response, and we
have a great relationship with our local FBI, but the
intelligence that I need most often comes through DHS because
DHS has a multi-disciplined mission. They have a law
enforcement response, risk mitigation, consequence management
mission. They tend to provide me the intelligence in the format
that allows me to carry out my multi-disciplinary mission.
Mr. Lungren. Well, if they are gathering information and
they get it from the FBI and they are sorting it and then they
are getting it to you, that might be enough. Is it enough for
you?
Mr. Cohen. Eighty percent of the time. There are times that
it is not enough and I have to go through my own sort of
interpersonal processes that I put in place.
Mr. Lungren. You see, that is what I am talking about. I
found it was very serendipitous. That is, if we had a good
personal relationship with a particular staff, it worked out.
If we did not, it didn't. There was not a cultural imperative
that the FBI was going to work closely with local and state law
enforcement. I understand if they are investigating, local and
state law enforcement, because of a question of public
corruption. That is one thing, but I am talking about overall
attitude.
I am just trying to figure out from your standpoint, where
are we?
Mr. Cohen. I think we are getting better. We are not where
we need to be. I think the culture is beginning to change. It
has not changed yet. I think that even if the culture changes
within the FBI in totality, they still do not operationally see
themselves as part of the risk mitigation, consequence
management process and they are going to be reluctant to share
with entities outside of the investigative cycle.
Mr. Lungren. Mr. Edwards, with respect to the entities that
you represent?
Mr. Edwards. Well, I think that the FBI has made great
inroads in developing relationships and sharing information
with local and tribal entities. They have developed at the
associate-director level an Office of State and Local and
Tribal Operations. They reach out regularly to us. I was just
at a briefing with them on intelligence and information sharing
last Friday, and they are really focusing on what they can do.
They have a ways to go. They know it, but they are taking those
steps.
Mr. Lungren. Mr. Colwell, I know you are here for Pegasus
and for particular systems, but you have tremendous prior
experience with the FBI. Your comments?
Mr. Colwell. I think it is a complex issue. I think it is
important to note that the FBI has been mandated to change its
mission and it is doing so, has done so. Any student of
organizational change and development will tell you it takes at
least 27 months for an organization that size to effectively
start moving into its new mission and role. I think they are
well on their way in that area.
They have been and are prohibited still with a lot of laws
that prohibit disclosure to non-law enforcement personnel. I
think they rely, in my observation they rely then on
disseminating that information to a law enforcement official,
and it is up to them to translate that to those that need to
know in the community. Now, whether that is the best way to do
it, I do not know, but that is one of the ways they exercise
it.
Mr. Simmons. The chair thanks the gentleman.
Unfortunately, we are in a time constraint. We lose the
room at 1 o'clock promptly, with votes perhaps at 12:30.
I think the line of questioning from the gentleman from
California was excellent. When you talk about state and local
in California, California is a state that is the size of a
country, and so these are huge issues.
I would like at this point to recognize the distinguished
ranking member of the Intelligence Subcommittee, and then move
quickly to the next panel. The chair recognizes the ranking
member.
Ms. Lofgren. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am just going to
ask one question, and hopefully then hear from the second
panel.
The question I have really relates not how we can do better
by sharing information, because I think that has been explored
quite thoroughly and importantly, but really what protections
we are putting in place, the other side of the coin.
Mr. Cohen, recently there was an editorial in the Boston
Globe about the commonwealth fusion center. I am not saying
they are correct, but they criticized the center by saying
there was not accountability.
It reminded me of an issue that is currently being
discussed in California, and I do not know the truth of it. The
allegation is that the National Guard engaged in surveillance
of a group called the Raging Grannies, where I think the
average age is 75 years old, and a demonstration that was held
on Mother's Day of the mothers of soldiers who have died in
Iraq.
We need to look at that and find out whether or not that is
true. I cannot say it is true, but that is not something we
want to have happen, for two reasons. One, it violates
constitutional rights of people to express their viewpoints;
and two, it is a waste of time and money because the Raging
Grannies and the mothers of the dead soldiers are not a threat
to us.
What efforts, what steps should we put in place to make
sure that we prevent that kind of, if that were the case, I do
not want you to say that it is because we do not know that, but
that sort of thing, to protect against that kind of misstep, if
you will?
Mr. Cohen. Thank you. That is a great question,
Congresswoman.
First of all, one of the things that we have made a key
part of our statewide homeland security strategy is that we
sort of dispel the notion that security only comes at the
violation of privacy rights and civil liberties. That is a
false choice and it is wrong. You can be aggressive in fighting
crime. You can be aggressive in fighting terrorism and still
respect privacy and key civil liberties that are the foundation
of this country.
We are putting in place an advisory committee that is going
to include the civil liberties community and privacy experts to
help us think through issues regarding not only our fusion
center, but also issues regarding homeland security in general.
But I think at the end of the day, the most important
protection we have is allowing open and broad oversight.
My one concern from a personal perspective is as we have
gone down the road of expanding accessibility to information,
as we have gone down the road of trying to think through how
state and locals fit into this mix, we have, one, tried to
bring them under the umbrella of the intelligence community,
which according to our working group everyone believed would be
a huge mistake; and secondly, we sort of push back oversight,
whether it be legislative oversight, media oversight, or
independent oversight bodies within the executive branch.
So I think it is important that we are aggressive. I think
it is important that we work to protect our communities, again
whether it is from crime or terrorism, but we also have to put
in place aggressive oversight mechanisms to protect and make
sure privacy and civil liberties are protected.
Ms. Lofgren. Do the other two witnesses have comments on
this?
Mr. Edwards. Well, my beautiful mother is 75 years old, and
she is still threatens to go up the side of my head whenever I
get out of line.
[Laughter.]
Ms. Lofgren. But she is not a threat to the nation.
Mr. Edwards. Yes. Let's hope not. As a federal officer, I
may be alone. At least I was. And she is always right, no
doubt.
But, you know, I think that we have to have the federal
government in the form of Congress and the courts, Supreme
Court on down, to define for the local law enforcement and
gatherers of the information, what information is to be
gathered. Once we do that, then they will know exactly what
their limits are and they will go after that.
Mr. Colwell. There is a lot of precedent for that. All one
has to do is look at history in the 1960s and 1970s and it can
prove to be quite instructive on the concerns that you
expressed. Title 28, Part 23, I think, attempts to address this
and what the law enforcement agencies can do and should do,
especially when federal funds are involved.
So I think it is always an area that must be of concern,
and law enforcement needs to be sensitive to.
Ms. Lofgren. Thank you very much.
I yield back.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you.
I think a quick review of the green books of the Church
Committee or the brown books of the Pike Committee will show
that when the United States goes down that path, nobody
benefits and nobody wins. The purpose of intelligence
collection and analysis is to defend Americans and their
freedom and their liberties, not to in any encroach on those.
So I think it is a good question, and I think the answers from
the witnesses have been excellent.
I want to thank this panel for appearing before us today.
I would like now to invite the next panel to come to the
table.
It is my pleasure to welcome General Matthew Broderick,
director of the Homeland Security Operations Center. He will be
representing the Department of Homeland Security. He served for
over 30 years as an infantry officer in the U.S. Marine Corps;
commanded platoon, company, battalion and brigade level;
attended the Marine Corps Amphibious Warfare School, the Armed
Forces Staff College, the Naval War College and has a
distinguished military career.
He is joined by Mr. Josh Filler, director of the Office of
State and Local Government Coordination for the Department of
Homeland Security.
I would express to both gentlemen that you have had an
opportunity to hear from panel one. You have heard the
questions of the members of the subcommittee, as well as the
distinguished ranking member of the full committee. We would
encourage you, given the fact that we may be called for votes
at 12:30 or 12:45, and we lose the room at 1 o'clock, we would
encourage you to summarize your testimony and then give the
members maximum opportunity to ask questions.
That being said, we will start with General Broderick.
Ms. Lofgren. Excuse me.
Mr. Simmons. Yes
Ms. Lofgren. I just would like to make a comment. Mr.
Filler's testimony was not received until 7:30 this morning,
and the rules of the committee and the House require that the
testimony be submitted at least 24 hours in advance or 48
hours, I don't recall which, but certainly before 7:30 of the
day. I recall hearing in the last Congress where the chairman
of the Judiciary Committee actually adjourned the hearing
because Mr. Ziegler had late testimony. I am not suggesting
that we do that today, but I do think that it is worth noting
and we expect better than this. I hate to be critical, but I
must be. The committee deserves an opportunity to review the
testimony.
I thank the chairman.
Mr. Simmons. I thank the gentlelady for her comments.
We could pursue that further, but perhaps we will wait for
General Broderick and Mr. Filler to make their comments, and
then if they wish to respond on that issue, we would be happy
to hear what they have to say.
General Broderick, welcome, and we look forward to your
testimony.
STATEMENT OF BRIGADIER GENERAL MATTHEW BRODERICK, DIRECTOR,
HOMELAND SECURITY OPERATIONS CENTER, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND
SECURITY
Mr. Broderick. Good morning, Chairman Simmons, Ranking
Member Lofgren and distinguished members of the committee.
It is my privilege to come before you today to discuss the
primary ways the Department of Homeland Security shares
information through its operations center and through its
Homeland Security Information Network. Because I was asked to
expedite this, I will summarize it in a few minutes.
The Homeland Security Operations Center is a 24-7
operation. It is probably one of the largest ones in the
country. A large operations center, even by military standards,
would be 35 or 40 people on a shift. We have up to 84 people on
one shift representing federal, state, local and even county-
level representation.
It facilitates security information sharing and operational
coordination with federal, state, local, tribal, territorial
and private sector organizations. The private sector is a new
entry that we are proud to say that we have been able to pull
in with us. It comprises over 35 federal, state and local
government agencies.
It has three primary missions, two of which are core. One
is to try and detect and report suspicious activity throughout
the United States. The other core mission is to coordinate
incident management during catastrophic events within the
United States. The sub-mission within that is to provide
domestic situational awareness throughout the United States and
a common operational picture that everyone can participate in
at any level.
Currently, as you know, DHS leads in controlling the U.S.
borders and ports of entry. Because of that, we have new
insight into who is coming into the borders, who is coming at
the borders, and who is inside the borders, with ICE, CVP,
Coast Guard and TSA all combined now under one organization.
That provides us with great insight into who may be within the
borders that is a threat to the United States, or who or what
is coming at the borders. It allows us to collect that data
each day from situational reports from these components and
then share that information with the entire intelligence
community and as appropriate with other federal, state and
local organizations and private organizations.
What people do not realize is that that is a 24-7 job for
us, looking for suspicious activity, collecting it, and then
passing it on and making sure it is shared appropriately with
all agencies and all entities.
The second core mission, as stated in the National Response
Plan, is to share information and coordinate actions during
catastrophic events. It is the primary conduit for the White
House and the Secretary of Homeland Security to provide
domestic situational awareness when we do have a catastrophic
event.
It also provides a common operational picture in
situational awareness for the Interagency Incident Management
Group that meets during a catastrophic event. The IIMG are
senior-level executives from all the government agencies that
form in the Homeland Security Operations Center and provide
courses of action and recommendations on how to mitigate a
major national disaster.
The Homeland Security Operations Center also monitors all
the major events in the United States. There are five different
types. The national special security events, or the NSSEs, are
the major events usually sponsored by the federal government,
inaugurations, conventions. We provide people to those cities
as part of a staff with a principal federal official and the
connectivity back to the Homeland Security Operations Center so
that we will have good connectivity and good situational
awareness throughout an event.
The other four categories of events go from size from New
York City at the New Year's Eve event, which is a category one,
down to a category two which may be the Super Bowl; category
three may be the Kentucky Derby; and a category four may be
less. What we do, though, under three and four is that we go
into this local or state and offer our assistance. We go to
local sheriffs, if they are the ones responsible for the
security around that event, offer them assistance and
assessments of critical infrastructure. They may not be aware
that they have great security around that forum, but that there
is a chemical factory up-wind a half-mile away. We also agree
to provide them any pertinent information on intelligence that
may have an effect on that event.
The third part of homeland security is the Homeland
Security Information Network. We have broken that down into
communities of interest. One of the communities of interest is
law enforcement, and that law enforcement subdivides into two
communities of interest. There are the major law enforcement
intelligence agencies, the big ones. There are about 124 of
them, and we put that in a community of interest called law
enforcement analysis.
We also have another portal for law enforcement, and that
is just law enforcement sharing. All law enforcement agencies
go in there and they share information within that portal. We
have a portal for emergency responders. Those are basically
hooked to all the emergency operations centers throughout the
country. We have HSIN Intelligence. That is now linking intra-
DHS, our own internal intelligence agencies. We have HSIN
International, which links us with Great Britain, Canada and
Australia. We have HSIN Secret, and that is a new program being
rolled out on existing networks to all the states, territories
and 18 major police departments in the United States. It will
be online this fall. We have HSIN Critical Infrastructure.
We have 40,000 members from private industry on that
network. These are vice presidents of security, Texas Gas and
Oil; vice president for security, Texas Instruments; Northrop
Grumman; Boeing, a very large audience. We asked for 16,000 in
our pilot and 40,000 signed up. We are in 17 major states right
now.
Mr. Simmons. If you could summarize, General.
Mr. Broderick. Yes, sir.
Homeland Security Information Network is the network the
country needed to link all agencies together, fire, emergency
responders, leadership and police.
Sir, it has been a privilege to pass this information to
you. I conclude with my prepared remarks and I will be happy to
answer any questions you may have.
[The statement of Brigadier General Broderick follows:]
Prepared Statement of Matthew E. Broderick
Introduction
Good morning, Chairman Simmons, Representative Lofgren, and
distinguished members of the Committee. It is my privilege to come
before you today to discuss the primary ways the Department of Homeland
Security (DHS) shares information through its Operations Center and the
Homeland Security Information Network.
Homeland Security Operations Center (HSOC)
The Homeland Security Operations Center (HSOC) is a standing 24/7,
interagency organization that is the national-level hub for domestic
situational awareness and operational coordination pertaining to the
prevention of terrorist attacks and domestic incident management. The
HSOC facilitates homeland security information sharing and operational
coordination with other Federal, State, local, tribal, and private
sector organizations. It comprises over 35 Federal, State, and local
government agencies.
The HSOC has three primary missions:
--Daily receipt and reporting of information from all available
sources on suspicious activity, throughout the United States
--Incident management during catastrophic events within the
United States
--Domestic situational awareness and development of common
operating picture
Currently, DHS has the lead for controlling U.S. borders and ports
of entry. The HSOC's day-to-day responsibilities include identification
of possible terrorist threats to the Nation by collecting and reporting
suspicious activities on who or what is approaching, attempting to
cross, or residing within our borders. Collection and reporting of that
information is shared with the entire Intelligence Community (IC), with
a primary focus of providing information to the FBI, the National
Counter Terrorism Center (NCTC), and the Office of Information Analysis
(IA) within the DHS Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection
(IAIP) Directorate. Those entities, rather than the HSOC, perform the
intelligence analysis function. The information also is shared with
other appropriate Federal, State, and local agencies, as well as with
the private sector, primarily via the Homeland Security Information
Network, which I will address momentarily.
The most critical element of the daily information gathering and
refinement cycle is sharing the information gathered with IA, which
then passes on possible threats to the Office of Infrastructure
Protection. The HSOC follows a structured timeline throughout the
course of the day. Beginning at midnight, DHS organizational components
submit daily situational reports that are collected and vetted by the
HSOC prior to being passed on for analysis. This provides a cursory
first screening of information to avoid an inefficient use of IC
analytical resources. This information also serves as material for the
Secretary's morning brief and for the interagency Secure Video
Teleconferencing (SVTC) that takes place twice daily. A product called
the Homeland Security Operations Morning Brief, comprised of mostly
suspicious activity reports minus any information on U.S. persons
contained within criminal intelligence protected by privacy laws, is
shared on a Sensitive but Unclassified (SBU) level with about 1500
Federal, State, and local intelligence and law enforcement agencies and
subscribers. In the morning and afternoon, a SVTC occurs with NCTC as
chair and other members of the intelligence community. Information
obtained the day before is discussed and shared as are requests for
specific actions. DHS has been able to provide new insight and
visibility into this process with its reports on who is entering, or
trying to enter our borders; information, which in past years, would
have been stove piped within individual agency data bases. Midmorning,
all agencies within the HSOC meet and an intelligence brief is shared
with all representatives and they are encouraged to share this
information with their respective agencies. At the end of each day,
HSOC-generated items are closed out or passed forward, if appropriate,
and the cycle begins again.
As stated in the National Response Plan (NRP), another core mission
of the HSOC is to serve as the national-level hub for information
sharing during catastrophic events within the United States. It is also
the primary conduit to the White House and the Secretary of Homeland
Security for domestic situational awareness. Sharing of information and
operational coordination is conducted through Emergency Operations
Centers (EOC) at Federal, State, local, tribal, and regional levels,
with the State Governors and their Homeland Security Advisors, as well
as in relevant format with the private sector. During these incidents,
situational awareness is also passed to the Inter-agency Incident
Management Group (IIMG).
The IIMG, comprised of subject matter experts at the Assistant
Secretary and Senior Government Executive level from most Federal
agencies, is established within the HSOC. The IIMG provides strategic
level recommendations and courses of action, prior to and/or during a
catastrophic event, for consideration by the Secretary and other senior
officials. In order to allow these representatives the time to focus on
courses of action and recommendations, the IIMG members have reciprocal
desk officers within the HSOC to provide them with continuous
situational awareness and for requests for information.
The HSOC is also responsible for monitoring special events. These
events come in five levels dependent upon the situation participants
and estimated crowd number. The five levels and examples are:
National Special Security Events (NSSEs): Inaugurations, etc
Level 1: New Years Eve in New York City
Level 2: World Series
Level 3: Kentucky Derby
Level 4: Local Events
In each case, the HSOC offers senior watch officers to support
major events in other cities or helps local officials ``plug in'' to
national level intelligence and information sharing as it pertains to
their particular event.
The Homeland Security Information Network (HSIN)
The Homeland Security Information Network (HSIN) is the primary
conduit through which DHS shares information on domestic terrorist
threats, suspicious activity reports, and incident management between
and among all DHS stakeholders. It is set of tools and data sources
that support DHS customers defined as users within multiple communities
of interest (COI). It also provides collaboration and information
sharing while enabling the stakeholder organization to determine the
information and communications streams of value to its needs. The HSIN
is a capability that provides secure and protected, real-time
interactive connectivity among users at all levels of government,
critical sectors and private industry with the HSOC.
The HSIN directly supports the Department's strategic goals to
identify and understand threats, assess vulnerabilities; determine
potential impacts and disseminate timely information to our homeland
security partners and the American public; and detect, deter, and
mitigate threats to our homeland. Specifically, it is designed to allow
users to gather and fuse all terrorism-related intelligence; analyze
and coordinate access to information related to potential terrorists
and other threats; develop timely, actionable, and valuable information
based on intelligence analysis and vulnerability assessments; ensure
quick and accurate dissemination of relevant intelligence information
to homeland security partners, including the public; and provide
operational end users with the technology and capabilities to detect
and prevent terrorist attacks, means of terrorism, and other illegal
activities.
HSIN is a user-friendly system. It enables Federal, State,
territorial, local, international, tribal and private sector users to
communicate and share information both with each other and with DHS in
a real-time, secure and protected Web-based environment. This system
provides participants direct access to an extensive suite of functions:
mapping, a robust search engine/library, instant messaging and chat
(collaboration) and an information-posting capability which interfaces
with both DOJ's Law Enforcement Online (LEO) and the Regional
Information Sharing System (RISS) networks. We currently have tens of
thousands of users and we project to have hundreds of thousands of
users by FY07.
Currently, the HSIN Communities of Interests include:
HSIN Counter Terrorism (HSIN-CT): the common portal for
all Federal, State, territorial, tribal, and local government
agencies to share information relating to counter-terrorism and
incident management
Law Enforcement (JRIES LE-A): for law enforcement
agencies that have major intelligence analysis departments
(150 or more members)
Law Enforcement (LE): for all agencies dealing with LE
Sensitive data (F/S/L) that meet the DOJ definition of Law
Enforcement Sensitive
Emergency Management (EM): for Federal, State, tribal,
and local levels (local refers to county/major city) emergency
operations centers to deal with major incidents
HSIN Intelligence: being set up for use by the internal
DHS intelligence community
HSIN International: allows for rapid dialog between the
HSOC and Canada, the United Kingdom, and Australia during a
crisis
HSIN SECRET: an immediate, inexpensive, and temporary
approach to reach State and local homeland security and law
enforcement sites that can receive Secret level information,
pending full deployment in fiscal year 2007 of a new DHS Secret
backbone called HSDN
Critical Infrastructure Warning Information Network (CWIN)
The Critical infrastructure Warning Information Network (CWIN) is a
Federal government-operated network within HSIN that provides mission-
critical, yet survivable, connectivity. CWIN Communities of Interest,
include:
Entities in the private sector vital to restoring the
nation's critical infrastructures(e.g., electrical, information
technology, and telecommunications)
Entities in the Federal and State government, vital to
maintain government-wide connectivity with DHS; sector-specific
agencies and resources; State Homeland Security Advisors; and
Emergency Management Centers.
Most importantly, CWIN provides survivable DHS capability for
information sharing and collaboration for critical infrastructure
restoration when primary forms of communication such as the Internet
and Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) are inoperable because it
is not dependent on the public internet or PSTN. CWIN is used routinely
for testing and exercises as well as information sharing to ensure
operational readiness when the need arises.
HSIN Critical Infrastructure (HSIN-CI)
The HSIN-CI program was designed, implemented, and deployed as a
DHS-directed and regionally coordinated private and public self-
governing program, with a vetted audience (approximately 40,000
members, 90% private sector) for national, regional, and local
information sharing and all hazards, 24/7 alerts and warnings. The
technology to support the program field operations was installed in the
secured facilities of the FEMA Regional District Offices in FEMA
regions IV, V, VI, and X. Participation includes private and public
members from the 19 states within these regions and, because the
program uses the Internet, HSIN-CI has membership from all 50 states.
The HSIN-CI program is administered through Regional Managers from
the FBI's Field Intelligence Groups, at the direction of the HSOC. CI
members nationwide promote the HSIN-CI program within their areas of
expertise, creating a self-administered and vetted private and public
membership built upon existing relationships and communication lines
that is locally administered and governed in coordination with DHS
(HSOC). Public notification options in HSIN-CI include two-way voice
and short message service (SMS) messaging based on current location
and/or proximity to an event, and a publicly available collection of
suspicious activity reports. HSIN-CI members can submit reports, as
well as receive sector/location-specific information from submitted
reports.
HSIN Critical Sector (HSIN-CS)
HSIN-CI is designed to enhance the protection, preparedness, and
crisis communication and coordination capabilities of the nation's 17
critical infrastructure and key resource sector owners and operators,
HSIN-CS is primarily a mechanism for information sharing and
collaboration within each specific critical infrastructure sector and
the Federal government.
The following is the list of Critical Infrastructures and Key
Resources, as defined by HSPD-7: Agriculture and Food, Public Health/
Health Care, Drinking Water and Waste Water Treatment Systems, Energy,
Banking and Finance, National Monuments and Icons, Defense Industrial
Base, Information Technology, Telecommunications, Chemical,
Transportation Systems, Emergency Services, Postal and Shipping,
Government Facilities, Dams, Commercial Facilities, Nuclear Reactors,
Materials, and Waste
HSIN/US Computer Emergency Response Team (HSIN/US-CERT)
This is the focal point for addressing cyber security incidents
within the federal government. The portal is an information
dissemination mechanism to communicate relevant cyber information.
Using a suite of tools such as secure messaging, forms, secure chat
rooms, alerts, and shared libraries, US-CERT pushes necessary
information to a broad or targeted audience, as required.
HSIN Current Status
The HSIN is operational in 50 States, the District of Columbia,
five U.S. Territories, 53 major urban areas, Emergency Management
Agencies, Homeland Security Advisors` Offices, Governors' Offices,
State Law Enforcement Agencies, National Guard Centers, mayors of major
cities, Emergency Operations Centers, and city law enforcement
agencies. It is operational in three foreign countries: the United
Kingdom, Canada, and Australia. HSIN SBU is currently being expanded at
the state and local level through a pilot program involving 7-8 States
in order to determine how the system can best be utilized within
different governance structures. HSIN SECRET is being deployed and
tested at 50 state EOCs and 18 additional State and local LE
activities. There are pilot programs in 11 Information Sharing and
Analysis Centers (Electric, Water, Food and Agriculture, Public
Transit, Oil and Gas, Nuclear, Dams, Chemical, Postal, Nonprofit, and
Health/Public Health). Plans are in place to begin deployment of a
SECRET level component of HSIN to State and Local sites, and HSIN is
being rolled out to all DHS component agencies.
HSIN has become a cornerstone of the Department's ability to
communicate with homeland security partners and stakeholders across the
nation. We will continue to build on our success as we extend
connectivity to a wider user population and improve the tools
availability for communication, collaboration and analysis of
information.
This concludes my prepared remarks. I would be happy to answer any
questions you may have at this time.
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[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] 27686.003
Mr. Simmons. Thank you very much. We will put the full
statement in the record. For the record, I enjoyed my visit out
to the HSOC. You run a tight ship, and thank you for your
service.
Mr. Filler?
STATEMENT OF JOSHUA D. FILLER, DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF STATE AND
LOCAL GOVERNMENT COORDINATION, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
Mr. Filler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member
Lofgren, and members of the subcommittee.
First, I do want to apologize for the late presentation of
the testimony. All I can say is that it will not happen again
in the future.
I am Joshua Filler. I serve as the director of the Office
of State and Local Government Coordination at DHS. I want to
thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to
discuss the department's intelligence and information sharing
programs with state, local, territorial and tribal governments
around the country.
As the committee is well aware, the exchange of information
between the department and our partners is crucial to the
mission of Homeland Security. Our efforts consist of keeping
our partners informed of and facilitating their participation
in DHS policy and program development.
We have a number of methods that we employ in order to
share information with all of our partners around the country.
As General Broderick indicated, we have our Homeland Security
Operations Center. Within the HSOC, we also have a state and
local watch desk. This is a 24-7 watch that maintains constant
connectivity to state and local officials, law enforcement,
EOCs around the country 24-7.
We also host bi-weekly calls with all of the state homeland
security advisers. John Cohen is actually one of them. We do
that every 2 weeks. We have a formal agenda. We discuss issues.
We exchange information, best practices and basically maintain
open lines of communication.
We also host monthly national organization calls, which
includes all of the law enforcement, first responder, National
Governors Association, U.S. Conference of Mayors, every month
similar to the bi-weekly call. We have an agenda. We have
subject-matter experts that come on and brief issues, and again
maintain that ability to keep in touch and make sure we are
communicating on a regular basis.
We also obviously share information in the context of
intelligence and incident management. We do this at both the
classified and the unclassified level. As General Broderick
noted, much of this information is shared by the HSOC and our
Office of Information Analysis through the Homeland Security
Information Network. It is also shared by the state and local
watch desk and through teleconferences, faxes, and secure
email.
To date, DHS has provided over 250 unclassified and
classified homeland security threat advisories and bulletins,
including joint DHS-FBI bulletins to our state, territorial,
tribal and local partners. Of that 250 number, approximately
225 are at the unclassified level. These bulletins have
included summaries of terrorist tactics used overseas, such as
in Madrid, Baghdad, Riyadh and more; potential threats to
jurisdictions or economic sectors in the homeland; potential
terrorist indicators; and assessments of the strategic intent
and capability of al-Qa'ida and other terrorist groups to
attack the United States.
Of course, all of the DHS operational components, CBP, ICE,
Coast Guard, regularly share information at the tactical level
with all of their partners at the local level.
DHS has also facilitated a clearance program for state,
local and tribal officials around the country. While we are
committed to sharing information at the unclassified level, we
know there are times that information should be shared at the
classified level. So currently we have more than 250 state and
local government officials with either secret or top secret
level DES clearances. There are an additional 150 state and
local officials who have non-DHS clearances that have been
permanently certified with the department so that we can
regularly share classified information with them as well.
We have also deployed numerous communication modes, systems
including video teleconferencing capability to every state in
the country, two in fact to every state. One is in their EOC;
the second is at the state's choosing. We are also in the
process of deploying secret telephones to every state and many
major urban areas around the country.
DHS is also deploying a secret-level data network, the
Homeland Security Information Network that General Broderick
oversees. We are in the process of putting that out at the
secret level as well.
Just to sum up, I think it is important to note that while
we talk about all the different modes and methods of sharing,
if I could just very briefly walk you through what happened on
July 7 when London was attacked. On that morning, when DHS
learned of the attacks, the Department of Homeland Security
immediately began reaching out to our federal, state, tribal
and local partners. This included the secretary personally
calling key governors and mayors in major states and cities
that had large mass transit systems, urging them to immediately
deploy additional security to those systems.
The department later, through my office, hosted two
national unclassified conference calls with all 56 states and
territories, major cities and counties from around the nation.
Shortly thereafter, the deputy secretary hosted a similar
national call and announced that the alert level would be
raised to Code Orange for the mass transit systems only. I then
personally hosted a call and we told all the first responder
associations, tribal organizations and other government
organizations that we were raising the alert level.
Later that day, the department, jointly with the FBI,
released a bulletin outlining what had happened in London and
giving the best intelligence picture we could at that time.
Mr. Chairman, I know my time has run out. Let me just sum
up by saying I again appreciate the opportunity to be here and
am happy to answer any questions you may have.
[The statement of Mr. Filler follows:]
Prepared Statement Joshua D. Filler
Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Lofgren, and Members of the Sub-
Committee:I am Joshua D. Filler and I serve as the Director of the
Office of State & Local Government Coordination (SLGC) at DHS. I want
to thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss
the Department's intelligence and information sharing programs with
state, local, territorial, and tribal governments, and for your ongoing
support of the Department of Homeland Security's efforts to keep
America secure.
As the Committee is well aware, the exchange of information between
the Department and our state, tribal and local partners is crucial to
the mission of homeland security. SLGC, in addition to its other
authorities and responsibilities, currently serves as a national
coordinator and clearing house in DHS for information sharing between
the Department and state, local, territorial, and tribal governments as
well as the first responder community. We operate under the basic
premise of providing as much information as possible to those who need
it. We accomplish this using several different methods of coordination
and information dissemination. .
Our efforts consist of keeping our partners informed of and
facilitating their participation in DHS policy and program development
actions, such as implementation of the Real ID Act, the Security and
Prosperity Partnership, the National Response Plan, and the National
Preparedness Goal. We also issue press releases and other announcements
covering the full range of homeland security events, including grant
announcements such as FIRE ACT grants and Law Enforcement Terrorism
Prevention Grants; the Secretary's public speeches and testimony,
including his recent testimony before the House and Senate on the
future of DHS; and fact sheets on major homeland security issues such
as mass transit and maritime security, critical infrastructure
protection, identification of fraudulent passport documents, and much
more. All of this information is provided to ensure that our partners
are kept constantly up to date on what DHS is doing and that they are
made a part of the process.
Information Sharing Methods
DHS employs a number of methods to share this kind of information
and to keep the information sharing channels open at all times. First
and primarily, DHS maintains the Homeland Security Operations Center to
be the ``eyes and ears of the Nation'' for homeland security. The HSOC
is a 24 hour a day, 7 days a week operational watch. Within the HSOC is
the State and Local Watch Desk which is the primary communication arm
for sharing all of the information I just described with our state,
local, territorial and tribal partners, and for certain intelligence
and incident management information that I will describe in more detail
later in my testimony. The State & Local Watch has access to multiple
points of contact within each state and from around the nation
including police chiefs, tribal leaders, fire chiefs, homeland security
advisors, emergency managers, governors, mayors, and county officials.
Second, the Department, through SLGC, hosts bi-weekly conference
calls with the state and territorial Homeland Security Advisors and
other officials to ensure they have a consistent and formal means of
communicating with the Department on general issues. The calls are
split into three parts: the Northeast; the South and parts of the Mid-
West; and the Mid-West and Western states. The calls are an open forum
for the free exchange of information and an opportunity for
collaboration between DHS and our partners and include a formal agenda,
read-ahead materials and subject matter experts from across the
Department and the government as a whole.
Third, DHS also hosts a monthly conference call with all of the
state, tribal, local and first responder associations to provide them
routine updates on what is happening at DHS and the federal government
as a whole and for the opportunity to exchange ideas and best
practices. Like the bi-weekly calls these association calls include a
formal agenda, read ahead materials, etc. Recent calls have included
information on the Port Security Exercise Training Program (PortStep)
and updates on the Department's Second Stage Review process.
Finally, SLGC and other DHS officials from all of our components
stay in constant contact with our partners through other less formal
means. We regularly attend conferences and meetings around the country
to brief our partners on what is happening at the federal level and to
hear from and learn from our partners directly on what is happening in
their jurisdictions. We also work with the Office of the Private Sector
to make sure that there is a constant, mutual exchange of information
with our private sector partners.
All of these methods and interactions that I have described help to
ensure that DHS stays in touch with its key partners in securing the
homeland.
Intelligence and Incident Management Information
DHS shares intelligence and incident information at both the
classified and unclassified level. Working with our partners in the
federal government, DHS works to ensure that our partners at the state,
tribal and local level have useful information they can either act upon
immediately, use for situational awareness, or for strategic planning
and more. Much of this information is shared by the HSOC and our Office
of Information Analysis through the Homeland Security Information
Network (HSIN), the State & Local Watch Desk, or through
teleconferences or video teleconferences, secure faxes and secure
email.
The Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection element of
DHS participates in the Intelligence Community Information Sharing
initiatives through the Community Interoperability and Information
Sharing Office under the DNI. DNI policy is that all terrorist related
intelligence is disseminated at the unclassified level through the use
of ``tearlines.'' The majority of this kind of information can and
should be shared at the unclassified level. This ensures maximum
distribution among the first responder and homeland security community
around the nation. DHS has worked hard with the Intelligence Community
to ``write to release'' classified information into unclassified
products as rapidly as possible, while ensuring the protection of
intelligence and law enforcement sources and methods. This will
continue to be a priority.
Since its inception, DHS has provided over 250 unclassified and
classified homeland security threat advisories and bulletins, including
joint DHS and FBI bulletins, to our state, tribal and local partners.
These have included summaries of terrorist tactics used in overseas
attacks, such as in Madrid, Baghdad, Riyadh and more; potential threats
to jurisdictions or economic sectors in the homeland; potential
terrorist indicators and assessments of the strategic intent and
capability of al-Qa'ida and other terrorist groups to attack the United
States.
The operational components of DHS also routinely share information
with state, local and tribal officials. For example, in close
coordination with DHS/IAIP, the Coast Guard disseminates intelligence
information throughout all levels of government and, where appropriate,
the private sector. They are able to provide actionable tactical
intelligence to Coast Guard operational commanders and state and local
partners through Maritime Intelligence Fusion Centers (MIFC). At the
state and local level, the Coast Guard facilitates information sharing
between government partners through Area Maritime Security Committees
(AMSC). The Coast Guard has also created Field Intelligence Support
Teams (FIST) to collect and report intelligence information and liaison
with federal, state, local partners. Furthermore, Coast Guard
Investigative Service (CGIS) conducts investigations that produce
actionable, human intelligence.
In addition, CBP Border Patrol Agents routinely work with and share
information and intelligence with local, state, tribal and federal law
enforcement agencies. One example is the Integrated Border Enforcement
Teams (IBETS) along the Northern border. In many IBET locations there
are local, state, federal and Canadian government representatives with
whom we share information to increase operational effectiveness.
The United States Secret Service is also involved in task forces
with state and local law enforcement partners. One such task force, the
Electronic Crimes Task Force, is comprised of computer and electronic
experts that perform forensic analysis and investigations into computer
and electronic crimes.
Finally, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) maintains two
tactical intelligence facilities that collect and disseminate real-time
and operational information and intelligence, in both the maritime and
land border environments. This information is shared with Intelligence
Community and law enforcement agencies at the state, local and tribal
level, in a variety of formats, and at multiple classification levels.
While DHS is committed to sharing information at the unclassified
level, we know there are times that information should be shared at the
classified level to ensure maximum specificity. DHS also provides such
classified information to our partners on a routine basis.
In order to better share classified information, DHS grants
federally-sponsored security clearances to appropriate state, local and
tribal officials with an ongoing need for access. There are currently
more than 250 state and local government officials with SECRET and TOP
SECRET-level DHS clearances, and there are an additional 150 state and
local officials with non-DHS sponsored clearances who have been
permanently certified (perm-certed) to DHS to allow them to participate
in the Department's classified briefings and receive classified
products. Furthermore, the Department has funding for several thousand
more SECRET-level clearances for state, local, territorial, tribal, and
private sector homeland security officials who can demonstrate an
ongoing need for access to classified information.
The Department has also deployed several classified SECRET
communications systems. In 2003 and 2004, DHS deployed two secure Video
Teleconference (VTC) units to each state. One unit has been placed in
each state Emergency Operations Center (EOC) and a second has been
placed in each Governor's Office, or an alternate location of the
State's choosing. DHS now has the capability to host all 50 states at
once at the classified SECRET level.
In addition to the VTCs, DHS has deployed secure telephones to each
state and several local governments. A secure phone has been deployed
to each state EOC as well as to each state Governor's Office or
alternate location. DHS also now has a secure conference call
capability that is capable of hosting 18 secure calls simultaneously at
the SECRET-level. SLGC is also working with the Office of Security and
the Office of the Chief Information Officer to deploy several hundred
excess secure phones at little to no cost to cleared state and local
government officials with a need for additional phones.
DHS is also deploying a classified, SECRET-level data network
called HSIN-SECRET that Director Broderick will discuss in more detail.
This system is being deployed to every state and to 18 additional state
and local homeland security and law enforcement sites. HSIN-SECRET will
be available through a dedicated laptop computer and by those officials
with a clearance on file with DHS and a HSIN-SECRET user account. Upon
its completion, HSIN-SECRET will allow the Department to rapidly
disseminate classified threat data and other information to state and
local officials.
While a summary of modes of communication is important, let me
provide the Sub-Committee with a few important examples of how some of
these modes work and the type of classified and unclassified
information that is shared. Recently, DHS hosted a national threat
update via SECRET VTC with all 50 states, the FBI and the National
Counter Terrorism Center (NCTC). The briefing consisted of an update on
a variety of threat streams and lessons learned from tactics used in
Iraq and other overseas locations. The briefing was followed-up with a
written classified summary distributed to all 50 states.
An even more recent example involves the London bombings. On the
morning of July 7, 2005, upon learning of the attacks, the Department
immediately began reaching out to our federal, state, tribal and local
partners. This included the Secretary contacting key Governors and
Mayors to discuss the London attacks and the need to provide immediate
additional security in major mass transit systems.
After further consulting with the Intelligence Community later that
morning, the Department, through SLGC, hosted two national unclassified
conference calls with all 56 states and territories and major cities
and counties from around the country, along with the FBI. On the first
call, the Secretary outlined what had happened in London and discussed
the possibility of raising the alert level in the United States.
Shortly thereafter, the Deputy Secretary hosted a similar national call
and announced the alert level would be raised to Code Orange nationally
for the mass transit sector only. I then personally hosted a call with
all the first responder and state, tribal and local associations to
announce the raising of the alert level. Later that afternoon, DHS and
the FBI released a joint unclassified bulletin to our partners
outlining the intelligence picture we had and the basis for raising the
alert level for mass transit in the United States along with specific
protective measures for the mass transit sector. Towards the end of the
day, another national call hosted by DHS with the Coast Guard and the
U.S. Department of Transportation was held to announce the raising of
the maritime security level to MARSEC 2 for passenger ferries carrying
150 passengers or more.
Tribes
As mentioned before, the sharing of information does not extend
only to the states and local governments; tribal governments are also
an important information sharing partner. To build relationships and
share information about the Department with tribal officials, DHS
personnel regularly participate in tribal association meetings,
conferences, and other events including the National Native American
Law Enforcement Association annual conference, the National Congress of
American Indians annual conference and the United South and East
American Indian annual conference. The Department also worked directly
with the leadership of the Mohegan and Mashantucket-Pequot Tribes from
Connecticut in 2005 during the Top Officials (TOPOFF) 3 exercise.
At this time, the majority of the unclassified threat information
communicated by DHS to the tribes is distributed via email to
appropriate officials as well as posted on HSIN. The Department's
ability to communicate information to the tribes is limited by a lack
of email connections among tribal leaders; however, we have been
working to bring tribal nations into HSIN. Several tribal nations in
California and Arizona are currently using HSIN.
Fusion Centers
As the Sub-Committee is aware, many states and large urban areas
have established intelligence fusion centers to better collect,
analyze, and disseminate homeland security information. Several federal
agencies, including DHS components and the FBI have representatives
working in these fusion centers. The Department's Homeland Security
Advisory Council Intelligence and Information Sharing Working Group and
the Department of Justice's Global Justice Information Sharing
Initiative have worked closely to establish baseline standards for
fusion center to operate under. The Department will continue to work
with all of our partners, including the DNI, DOJ, and state, local, and
tribal officials, to further enhance these standards and integrate
these fusion centers around the nation.
Conclusion
Information sharing with our state, territorial, tribal, and local
partners is one of the key priorities of the Department of Homeland
Security. Since September 11, 2001 we have made tremendous progress in
this area. However, we still have much more work to do. We at DHS will
continue to make adjustments, we will continue to enhance our methods,
and we will continue to work closely with all of our partners to better
secure the homeland.
Once again, I thank the Sub-Committee for providing me this
opportunity today as well as for their continued support and valuable
input. I look forward to answering any questions you may have.
Mr. Simmons. I thank you, General Broderick and Mr. Filler.
A very brief question from me, and then I will defer to the
distinguished ranking member.
I talked earlier about cultural changes in the intelligence
community in our government with regard to intelligence
information sharing. I also understand that the Department of
Homeland Security is in the process of a reorganization. If the
Homeland Security Operations Center, which is currently part of
the IAIP, is taken out of that entity, how might that affect
positively or negatively your mission for information sharing?
That is question one.
And then to you, Mr. Filler, for all of the host of calls
and bulletins and other activities that you are engaged in,
what kind of feedback loops do you have in the system where
your customers, the people that you are contacting and
communicating with, have the opportunity to tell you how useful
that is so you can tailor that program to their needs?
Mr. Broderick. Sir, in response to your question on the
HSOC, we do not intend to change the way the HSOC is currently
set up. We realize that that is really the fusion point between
ops and intel and that it must remain and actually get more
robust. But we do not intend to break that synergism. As you
know, there is a high side with a lot of intelligence, and a
low side with the consequence management and a lot of law
enforcement. We intend to keep that fused together.
The positive part of the reorganization is that it gives
the HSOC now a direct voice to the secretary and it also allows
the HSOC to go down faster on the operational side and try to
work operational coordination at a level that we did not have
before. Before, there was a buffer. Border and Transportation
Security oversaw many of our components. So it was another
layer.
The layer worked fine except that it was slower in the
process. Now we can go directly down to these operations
centers, access that information, get it back up and hopefully
coordinate with state and locals faster. So the process should
be fast.
Mr. Filler. Sir, we actually exercise as number of ways to
get feedback. Most of the time when we actually put out a
product to our partners; we actually have a customer
satisfaction survey attached to the document so they can
informally tell us whether they found the information useful,
timely, so on and so forth.
For those who would prefer a less formal means, one of the
purposes of my office is to be a conduit to our state, tribal
and local partners so that they have a place to go to tell us
what is working, what is not working, and do so in a
confidential way if they want to, but to make sure that their
concerns are getting into the senior leadership of the
department. Sometimes they do that through a confidential
conference call; other times through the biweekly calls that I
described they will take the opportunity to pass that
information there. But there are very, very, very robust
methods to get that information in.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you very much
The chair now recognizes the distinguished ranking member
of the full committee, Mr. Thompson.
Mr. Thompson. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Last week, this committee heard testimony with respect to
transit security. One of the things we found out is the
department did not have a transit plan for security. A lot of
this came about because of the unfortunate situation in London.
We have since found out that there are some 100-odd deadlines
that the department just ordinarily has missed, most of which
have been requested by Congress.
General Broderick, I see that Chairman Rogers in House
Appropriations deducted $5 million from the administration's
request because the Homeland Security Operations Center did not
provide the mandated 5-year implementation plan. Where are we
on that plan at this point?
Mr. Broderick. Sir, we submitted the 5-year implementation
plan from my office on time. It has had problems working its
way up through the system, but at my level, we were able to
provide that out we thought in a proper time. The
implementation plan is in effect. We do know where we want to
go as far as the Homeland Security Information Center, and
where we want to go with our system, and where we want to go
with our center and how we want to develop those systems.
Mr. Thompson. If this plan that you refer to is in effect,
can you provide members of this committee with a copy of it?
Mr. Broderick. Yes, sir. I would be glad to.
Mr. Thompson. And so do I assume that whoever is reviewing
whatever you submitted, that it is still somewhere in the
pipeline for review?
Mr. Broderick. Yes, sir. My concern is trying to gain back
that $5 million and I have been requesting that it be pushed
almost on a daily basis.
Mr. Thompson. Mr. Chairman, I would just like to note for
the record that in my sitting on various hearings before a
committee hearing testimony, what the general is saying is not
unusual. It appears that the people who have the responsibility
for preparing many of the documents requested by Congress, they
are actually doing their job. But for some reason along the
way, the process is more or less stymied, if not stopped.
I think at some point we will have to perhaps ask the
secretary if he can unblock the logjam by which we have heard
testimony that occurs from getting the congressionally mandated
reports to a committee, because I think it is important for all
of us to have the information, since some of the information
obviously is for various plans for different departments. I
think we, along with the public, should have a right to know.
I yield back.
Mr. Simmons. I think the ranking member's point is well
taken. Certainly, the loss of $5 million is an adverse impact
for the Department of Homeland Security. Our interest here is
to strengthen and oversee that department and make it as
effective as possible. That is, I think, our goal. So I welcome
the ranking member's comments on that subject.
The chair now recognizes Mr. King, the gentleman from New
York.
Mr. King. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I want to thank General Broderick and Mr. Filler for their
testimony.
I would like to focus, Mr. Filler, on your situation, since
you really are in a unique position of being at both ends of
this process, having served in New York City and now being at
the federal level.
Which deputy mayor did you report to, Rudy Washington or
Joe Lhota?
Mr. Filler. Joe Lhota.
Mr. King. Joe Lhota. Okay.
Again, thank you for your service to New York. Obviously,
New York was in the forefront of providing local protection for
antiterrorism, and I want to thank you for that.
You sat here during Mr. Cohen's testimony. He made a number
of points basically saying that the system is not where it
should be; that occasionally conflicting information is given
out; sometimes too much classified information is given out. If
you were back in New York right now and you were dealing with
some federal bureaucrat called Josh Filler, how would you feel
you were being treated? How would you feel the information was?
Would you feel that the system was working properly?
Mr. Filler. I would say he is working hard, trying to do
the right thing.
[Laughter.]
Mr. King. Spoken like a St. John's man.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Filler. I would say, Congressman, that yes, things
really have gotten better. I notice even in the time from 9/11
to my departure in New York City that things were getting
better; that the shock of that event really did drive a lot of
good things happening. But as John Cohen said, they are not
where they should be. There are still times where information
is not shared or if it is shared, it is so compartmentalized
that people who do need access to it do not have it or their
underlings have it and senor leadership at the local level or
state level might not actually have it.
So I think great progress has been made on two fronts. On
the cultural side, I do think that we have changed the culture
in part in law enforcement and intelligence, but it has not
been changed to the point where it needs to be. I think
development of systems like HSIN, the creation of DHS, all of
these things have helped push the ball down the field. But if I
were at the local level, I would still probably be frustrated
at times that I am not getting all the information I think I
need, or there may be times where I am getting conflicting
information from different federal agencies.
So again, I think we have made a lot of progress, but we
still have more work to do.
Mr. King. Do you feel within your own department that some
of the agencies you have assumed control over are not
cooperating fully with each other, have not accepted the
concept that they are now working for the Department of
Homeland Security and they still have their own turf they are
trying to protect?
Mr. Filler. I would say this, that the integration of DHS
is an ongoing process, and the second-stage review and the
secretary's reorganization of DHS is designed precisely to that
point, to make sure that we are organized in the best possible
way to achieve our mission. That includes integrating our
operational capabilities, integrating our intelligence
capabilities.
So while, again, I think a lot of integration has gone on
over the last 2 years, we are obviously not where we should be
and I think second-stage review bore some of that out and the
secretary has now made a decision on where he wants to go.
I think everyone in DHS comes to work in all of the former
22 legacy agencies with the idea of how can they better secure
the homeland; how can they better work within their department;
and how can they better work with their partners at the state,
tribal and local level. What we need to do is create an
environment for them where they can do that in the best
possible way.
Mr. King. General Broderick, do you have anything to add to
that?
Mr. Broderick. I agree, sir. I think that the second-stage
review showed that there were warts out there, and rightfully
so. I mean, people build organizations that have a lot of pride
and when we came in, we asserted ourselves over them as the
``higher headquarters.'' It is like the federal government over
state and local. There is always going to be that little bit of
friction of we are those guys.
But I think that with the second-stage review and trying to
build this one team and this faster conduit for coordination
with the ops and the intel, the recipient on the other end, the
state and local are going to find that it is a lot smoother
organization, and we can get information to them quicker.
Mr. King. I want to thank both of you for your service.
I think that it is easy for us to find fault. I am not
trying to do that. I think what the committee wants reassurance
on, though, is that the process is going forward; that the
department realizes things are not perfect; they realize that
local police are not getting the full cooperation, probably
more so from the FBI than Homeland Security, to be honest with
you, but at least they still feel that there is a certain
breakdown in communication.
I think what we again really want is the assurance that you
realize that and you are moving forward, and I really commend
you for what you are doing.
Mr. Filler, again, thank you for what you did in New York
City.
Mr. Simmons. I thank the gentleman from New York.
I am now going to recognize the gentlewoman from Texas, Ms.
Jackson-Lee, with the caveat that I will stick to the 5-minute
rule because we are going to lose this room at about 12:50 p.m.
The gentlewoman from Texas?
Ms. Jackson-Lee. I thank the chairman very much. It must be
attributable to lawyers, and I am not sure if the gentleman is,
but when we are probing we are probing, but I thank him for his
kindness.
Let me also thank you, Brigadier General, for your work and
certainly let me thank seemingly a good friend of my friend
from New York, Congressman King, and we thank you for your
service as well.
I just want to focus on this question of local translation
of intelligence, if I might, and really say what I have said in
earlier remarks that I think this is the key to our security.
People laugh, but I do think hometown security is homeland
security. I sit next to a very distinguished member of Congress
from New York, and I have not heard of one homeland security
meeting where the Congresswoman has not spoken about the need
for assistance and resources in the local area.
But let me share with you what I said earlier about the
structure in Texas. It is a law enforcement group called
Constables. I think part of the issue is in working with
Washington and working with the corporate headquarters, if you
will, is knowing what is happening outside the beltway. And so,
I would be interested in finding out first of all what efforts
have been made, if you will, to understand the structure in our
local communities.
I bring up the Constables because there have been some
efforts to do threat and terrorist training with conspicuous
entities, police, sheriffs. But when you get down to many areas
in this country, they have their own names. For example, I am
sure there are different names on Indian reservations or
pueblos that do not fall into ``police.'' So I am concerned
that we are not connecting by getting the information from
local communities, to find out what their structures are.
I will be asking the Homeland Security Department to give
training to Constables and their staff because they were left
out of the loop when that training came into our region. But I
would first like to pose that question.
What better ways are you working to ensure that you know
the structures and you are reaching those local entities that
may not be as well known and conspicuous, but work in the areas
that first responders work?
I would also ask the question, does the reorganization that
Secretary Chertoff announced last week have any direct impact
on better improvement of local-state communication, meaning
Homeland Security's local-state communications?
Mr. Filler. Congresswoman, that is a very good question. I
think it raises a very important point. We need to understand
our partners. I think we do it in two ways at DHS.
First, my office in particular, when we hire people, we try
to hire people who have a background at the state, local or
tribal level. In fact, we have someone from Texas in my office
in a very senior position who works with local governments, so
I am familiar with Constables, and I learned it from him.
And so I think that is a very important part of what we do,
not only within my office, but throughout the department, that
we bring people in who understand how things operate, how they
are structured at the local level, county level, tribal level,
state and territorial level. So I think if we do those things,
that will obviously help the department's internal mechanisms
better understand its customers.
Secondly, I think aggressive outreach, and that is another
part of what my office does, maintaining that constant contact,
getting to know people, getting to know their structure, their
leadership, their laws and rules that govern them. Not every
state is the same. Not every county is the same. Not every city
is the same.
I come from New York, which is a strong home rule state. So
the mayors of those cities have tremendous responsibility and
independent authority from the state. New Jersey, just across
the river, is different. The governor there is a very powerful
executive and the state wields great authority.
So understanding these distinctions is absolutely critical,
and I could not agree with you more.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. Brigadier General, and as you answer that
question would you just also add the ways in which your
intelligence analysis is different from the NCTCs, and
particularly as it may relate to being effective in getting
intelligence to our local communities. Are you just analyzing
the same data or are you bringing in a new perspective to the
analysis?
Mr. Broderick. To answer that last question first, ma'am,
NCTC looks at information globally, so we are actually
providers and then we are takers. The great thing about that is
they are getting their information from multiple sources, both
internationally and nationally, and then they are able to push
it back down. What we try to do is we try to look at it from a
state and local perspective when we get it.
What is it that domestic U.S. intelligence requires? What
do we need out of that?
So as they push that information back down to us, we are
able to go back with requests for information that we think are
more structured for state and local people, and try to get it
down to actionable intelligence, unclassified, or the lowest
level of tear-lines that we can get when we push that back
down.
So we are hoping that we are being the advocate for the
state and locals, and we are trying to push that information
down as quickly as we can in actionable-type informational
form.
Mr. Simmons. The chair now recognizes the gentleman from
Washington.
If the gentlewoman from Texas wants a third round, we will
accommodate her.
Ms. Jackson-Lee. I thank the chairman.
Mr. Simmons. The gentleman from Washington?
Mr. Reichert. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I do agree there has been progress in the last couple of
years, so congratulations on that work. I also appreciate the
fact that you recognize there is a lot more work to do, as all
of us recognize that absolutely true fact.
How important do you think first responders are in
collecting intelligence information on a day-to-day basis
during their job on the street, when it comes to homeland
security?
Mr. Broderick. I think that is the domestic intelligence
collection effort. I think that is where the rubber meets the
road. We clearly recognize that that is where we are going to
really get the information and quickly and on-hand. We are
going to get information that might not have gone through
normal intelligence channels. It may have just been something
that a very savvy police officer saw in the street and
questioned, and that may be the key to the puzzle.
We have noticed in the U.K. on other instances that it is
just an observant law enforcement or private citizen who
noticed something a little different, and they reported it, and
it was able to go up, and they were able to prevent several
incidents. I really believe that that is where it all starts.
That is why HSIN now is going out at the local level. We have
hit the state level. We have hit the major city level now. We
have gone to the first seven states and offered free to link
all of their local communities in both fire, emergency
response, and their emergency operations centers and try to
link that so that they can share that information with the
state, with themselves and up to us.
Mr. Reichert. Are you familiar, either one of you, with the
LINKS system?
Mr. Broderick. Is that the one in Washington State?
Mr. Reichert. Yes, sir.
Mr. Broderick. Yes, sir. I am sort of, sir.
Mr. Reichert. Sort of. Well, I guess that is my point. We
do not have a seamless, really a system in place to share that
kind of information, so if a first responder is very important
in collecting that data.
For example, not too long ago we had a state trooper stop
someone on the highway, and they were written a citation and
they were allowed to leave. Two months later, as the ticket
goes through the process, we recognize that this is a person
who has committing crime and sending money to Al Qaida. So we
had to track that person down again.
If we had real-time information in those police cars, and
that has been something that I have been working on since
September 11, as the sheriff in King County, with the Seattle
Police Department, in connection with LINKS, but it has not
happened yet.
I commend you for the cooperative effort and the energy
that you are putting forth there, and the relationships that
need to be built, which are absolutely necessary.
But back to where the rubber meets the road, it is action
that has to happen. There has been a promise that has been
proposed to us through the FBI and the U.S. Attorney's office
in King County and Seattle. Do you see that coming together in
the near future sometime?
Mr. Broderick. Yes, sir, I do. As I said, we have not
started the third phase. We went to the state level. We went to
the major city level. Now we are starting at the local level.
But simultaneous with that, we are working with the FBI on all
their major products that they have out there--LEO, RISS--and
we are trying to get that all to be interoperable so that all
that information is shared through one database and we can turn
it around and get it back out there, or we can recognize that
is actionable intelligence and get the proper authorities.
Mr. Reichert. Is the DHS integrated initiative certainly a
key factor or key component of this effort?
Mr. Broderick. Yes, sir.
Mr. Reichert. Anaheim, Seattle?
Mr. Filler. I am familiar with the Anaheim, Seattle, and
there are two others.
Mr. Reichert. Cincinnati.
Mr. Filler. Cincinnati. And yes, I think we are constantly
looking at ways to try to make these things interoperable. I
think the integration effort is really a technology effort. We
are trying to find some best practices in the technology field
that we can then use in other parts of the country. I think one
of those things obviously is our ability to integrate different
systems. I know Matt's office has worked very hard to try to
integrate RISS, LEO and HSIN, but there are obviously other
systems that should be integrated as well.
Mr. Reichert. Great.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield the balance of my time.
Mr. Simmons. I thank the gentleman from Washington.
The comment was made that the gentlewoman from New York,
Ms. Lowey, is a great expert on homeland security. That has
certainly been my observation. I thank her for her patience,
and she is now recognized for her questions.
Mrs. Lowey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to follow up on your comments, General.
First of all, let me thank the General and Mr. Filler for
your presentations.
If there are seven states chosen for some coordinative
mechanism between firefighters, police, EMS workers, I
certainly have not been aware of it. Frankly, since the
beginning of our contact with Homeland Security, we have been
asking for a federal initiative on interoperability because we
continue to get no direction.
I am a New Yorker. My district is just north of New York
City, but I consider myself part of a region. I must say, Mr.
Filler, I have been tremendously impressed with the work of Ray
Kelly and the New York City department. But if there is an
interoperability plan with some direction from the Department
of Homeland Security that is operating in seven states, I would
love to give you the opportunity to brief me further on it and
perhaps I will use my time for that.
Mr. Broderick. Yes, ma'am.
Mrs. Lowey. Is that what you referred to? Did I hear
incorrectly?
Mr. Broderick. No, ma'am. What we have done now is the
third stage of going out with HSIN is to go to individual
states, and New York was the first state we went to, and offer
to link all the emergency operation centers, the police
departments and the leadership into whatever system they
wanted. What we did not want to do is be prescriptive. We
wanted the states to come back and tell us how they would like
to organize themselves and how they would like that information
to flow and to link each other.
We work with Bart Johnson at the New York State Police. He
has hooked us into their fusion center. New York State already
has a very intricate system on its own, and they asked us to
link in at the fusion center and at several larger points, but
that they felt that the system underneath them was adequate at
this time, and they are re-evaluating whether they need to take
HSIN and use that system.
Mrs. Lowey. I am not sure what that really means. I
appreciate the opportunity, Mr. Chairman, to pursue this.
We have been looking for direction from the Department of
Homeland Security. In fact, I recall probably a year ago there
was an RFP that went out so that the Department of Homeland
Security could get some direction down to the localities about
the interoperability of their systems. I am really shocked to
know that New York State thinks everything is just fine.
Now, when you go down to the state, do you hear problems of
frequency? This is an issue in New York City. It is an issue in
Westchester County. I have been hearing this for 3 years. Right
now, no one is talking to each other.
And so I am still a little confused as to what you are
offering the state and what they say they have. If you are
implying that the state thinks that they have an effective
interoperability system so that they can communicate with
information sharing, I am puzzled, and maybe I should go to my
next question. Could you explain?
Mr. Filler. I think I can try, Congresswoman. I think there
are two different issues here. I think we are talking about
interoperability of a data network, HSIN, RISS, LEO, versus
interoperability of communications, primarily radio
communications, during an incident which obviously was
something that the 9/11 Commission and others looked into.
The issue of interoperability of communications primarily
through radio communications is really something that the
SAFECOM Office and our Office of Interoperability and
Compatibility has been looking into for some time.
Mrs. Lowey. Have they accomplished anything?
Mr. Filler. Well, there a number of?
Mrs. Lowey. We will not deal with that since it is not your
office.
So you are focused on the information sharing. I
misunderstood.
Mr. Filler. Correct.
Mrs. Lowey. Okay.
Mr. Broderick. Yes, ma'am. I think you were talking about
radio communications, ma'am. I was talking about something
else.
Mrs. Lowey. I see. So I will not burden you with that
question because we are still waiting to get response on the
other. It will be 4 years I guess in September, but maybe we
will get it right eventually. I am optimistic.
Let me get to the question about the information sharing.
Perhaps you can clarify it. Are there tools inherent to
homeland security operations center dispatches that allow the
local enforcement officials to hone in on information that
might be relevant to them, without having to comb through
information that is not? How is this done when you are either
the General or Mr. Filler?
Mr. Broderick. Ma'am, we are now establishing what we are
calling a current operational picture. It is based on iMAP
data. iMAP is geospatial data that lays down all infrastructure
and what all the cities and even many of the rural areas
possess for infrastructure. Within that layer, though, we are
building intelligent suspicious activity layers where law
enforcement people can come in and just access those layers and
pull out the information they need. They have the ability to
come in and look at key infrastructure and query that
infrastructure and see how that infrastructure is progressing
in their area, whether it needs protective measures, how it is
going to influence certain events that are going on in that
community.
This is a progress in being right now, but we are working
with L.A., Washington, D.C., on what local police departments
would need to go in and pull that out without having to query
through all of our other data. They can go in and use it at
their own time.
Mrs. Lowey. I see my red light is on. Thank you, Mr.
Chairman.
Mr. Simmons. I thank you very much. I would be happy to
extend to the gentlewoman an additional couple of minutes if
she would like to take them.
Mrs. Lowey. Thank you for the generosity. Then perhaps I
will pursue that.
If you are increasing the availability of actionable
information to local law enforcement, what I hear is really a
dearth of funds locally, and they need the funds to be able to
move forward and to implement. How can you ensure, or how will
you ensure that locals have the funds sufficient to ensure that
this information can actually be used?
Mr. Broderick. Well, I will let Josh answer the rest of
that. On my side, ma'am, both with HSIN and with COP, the
current operational picture, it is free to them. So we provide
all the means necessary for them to do that.
Mr. Filler. The fact that it is free I think obviously
helps, but there is a wealth of funding, as you are well aware,
that has been distributed to first responders, state and local
governments since 9/11. We have specifically outlined to them
that much of that funding is eligible for information sharing
to buy the systems, the equipment, the software so that they
are able to actually analyze data, share information among
themselves and with the department.
Mrs. Lowey. I will not pursue this, but you must know that
maybe New York City is different, but most of my communities do
not have a fraction of the money they need for training, for
equipment purchases. And there really has not been sufficient
money that is coming down to the local. Even New York City,
which has been able to benefit from some direct grants does not
have what they need, as you well know. So I think after
developing the plan, we need to make sure that the locals have
what they need to implement it.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you very much.
I want to take this opportunity to thank our witnesses for
providing their very valuable testimony.
I remind members that we have additional time to submit
questions for the record. The record will be held open for 10
days to submit questions. I believe that the distinguished
ranking member of the committee requested a report of the
General, and we would look forward to seeing that report,
understanding that it has not been cleared through the
department, but perhaps we can see it in some form in response
to questions from members of the subcommittee.
Let me just conclude by saying that information sharing is
a critical component of our homeland security, now and into the
future. And yet information sharing, intelligence information
sharing is something new and different, so there are challenges
involved. This subcommittee, the members of this subcommittee,
I believe all want to be participants in making this process
work.
I lost constituents on 9/11. I do not live in New York. I
live in Connecticut, but my daughter lives in New York. On 9/
11, the apartment that she occupied was not reoccupied because
of that terrible tragic attack. Members of my family continue
to live in New York City and in other areas that are potential
target areas.
So we feel a certain sense of urgency, as I am sure you do
as well, that we want to be successful; that we do not want
another attack. And we certainly do not want to think that at
some future date those who oppose us would be successful
because we held a piece of information that was not shared.
So again, thank you for your testimony. Thank you for your
service to the country.
Hearing no objections, this hearing is now adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:38 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]