House backs more FBI funding but with conditions

House lawmakers want to increase funding levels for the FBI to help it combat terrorism, cybercrime and conventional crime, but they also want to put the bureau on a shorter leash, according to the budget plan the chamber passed on July 23.

The House passed a bill, H.R. 2799, to fund the Commerce, Justice and State departments in fiscal 2004, and that legislation reiterated the importance of FBI funding by increasing its spending level $424 million. The total FBI budget under the measure would be $4.6 billion, and the Justice Department budget would be about $20 billion.

But appropriators remained wary about FBI spending. The House Appropriations Committee report on the bill calls for agency funding to be drawn from three separate accounts-on criminal and security investigations, law enforcement support and administration.

"The committee is supportive of efforts to focus resources on national security issues but remains concerned that resource allocation may have a negative impact on other FBI activities, including drug, violent crime, and public-corruption investigations," the report said.

The funding levels would be: $2.9 billion criminal, security and other investigations; $1.7 billion for law enforcement support; and $393 million for program direction and administration. To ensure that homeland security responsibilities do not drain funding reserved for other, more conventional crime-fighting, the appropriators directed the FBI to keep time-utilization and record-keeping records and to report on them biannually.

The committee report also stressed the importance of keeping technology current in order to combat terrorism and other crimes.

The biggest funding increases would be: $450 million to protect the nation from terrorist attacks, foreign intelligence operations, and cyberattacks and high-tech crimes, including $74 million for counter terrorism; $31 million to investigate domestic security threats; $28 million for field investigation support; and $15 million for additional analysts.

But the committee reiterated concern about the Terrorist Threat Integration Center expressed in a hearing by Virginia Republican Rep. Frank Wolf and Kentucky Republican Harold Rogers. The center attempts to unite FBI and CIA analysts under the aegis of a CIA-appointed official, but the committee said the physical relocation of the counter-terrorism division "may have a negative impact on information sharing with other components within the FBI."

The committee calls for the FBI to submit a detailed report within 60 days "regarding the specifics of the relocation" into the joint facility.

Appropriators also chastised the bureau for failing to establish an advisory board that Congress funded with $5 million in fiscal 2003. The board of outside experts would advise FBI Director Robert Mueller on science, technology, research, engineering and information management. The committee ordered the FBI to appoint members, convene a meeting and decide on an agenda within 30 days of the new spending bill's enactment.

Regarding Trilogy, the effort to put all of the bureau's computers on a single computer system, the committee noted previous cost overruns and expressed its expectation that the "virtual case file" element of the system be completed by the end of the year.