DHS rife with wasteful spending
This month will mark 10 years since the Department of Homeland
Security opened its doors. The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001,
forced us as Americans to fundamentally rethink the threats our nation
faces and our approach to defending the homeland. As the 9/11 Commission
Report documents, “Before 9/11, no executive department had, as its
first priority, the job of defending America from domestic attack.”
Not since the creation of the Department of Defense had our government so hastily deployed historic levels of resources, personnel and funding in order to restructure the government. Almost overnight, a new federal bureaucracy combined 22 disparate agencies with over 200,000 employees under one department. Naturally, the creation of DHS was an enormous undertaking with huge management and programmatic challenges. Recognizing these challenges and the time it would take to transform the department, the Government Accountability Office in 2003 determined that the transformation of these agencies into DHS would be “high risk,” meaning the potential for wasted taxpayer dollars was likely.
Continue Reading
Not since the creation of the Department of Defense had our government so hastily deployed historic levels of resources, personnel and funding in order to restructure the government. Almost overnight, a new federal bureaucracy combined 22 disparate agencies with over 200,000 employees under one department. Naturally, the creation of DHS was an enormous undertaking with huge management and programmatic challenges. Recognizing these challenges and the time it would take to transform the department, the Government Accountability Office in 2003 determined that the transformation of these agencies into DHS would be “high risk,” meaning the potential for wasted taxpayer dollars was likely.
Continue Reading
Here we are, a full decade later, and GAO has again
determined in its biennial report, which was released Feb. 14, that DHS
remains “high risk” in implementing key management initiatives critical
to mission outcomes and in the efficient and effective use of the
department’s resources. As the report noted, serious deficiencies still
exist in how the department buys technologies, manages its finances and
data and deals with low morale.
However, as the immediacy of Sept. 11 fades, and as our fiscal
burdens mount, we must ask the question: How wisely is DHS spending
American taxpayer dollars? On Feb. 15, I held my first hearing as
chairman of the Homeland Security Committee’s Subcommittee on Oversight
and Management Efficiency with this very concern in mind. Indeed,
examples of DHS waste are rife. As former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore
stated at that hearing, “Al Qaeda has said in their public statements
that their goal is to collapse the economy of the United States. … If we
waste money or carry out an ineffective program, … then we carry out
the mission of Al Qaeda.” All the hearing witnesses agreed that DHS must
implement a risk-based approach that guards against inefficiencies
while realizing we cannot protect against all threats. Episodes where
DHS officials focus on screening innocuous children and senior citizens
distract from the department’s fundamental mission.Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/03/dhs-rife-with-wasteful-spending-88823.html#ixzz2YwfnNxT4
No comments:
Post a Comment