Homeland Security agency grapples with staffing shortage

The government's primary agency for securing critical infrastructure is trying to resolve a staffing shortage as it implements an aggressive schedule to identify vulnerabilities and take corrective action.

The Homeland Security Department's Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection directorate is authorized to have 729 full-time employees, but had hired only 279 people as of the beginning of March, the agency's director, retired Marine Corp. Lt. Gen. Frank Libutti, told the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security on Thursday.

To address the shortage, Libutti said the directorate plans to hire 40 employees a month until authorized staffing levels are reached. The directorate has encountered problems competing with the private sector and other government agencies for qualified employees, according to Libutti, and the process of obtaining security clearances for new hires can take up to 18 months.

The directorate now relies on detailees from other agencies, primarily the Defense Department and National Security Agency as well as contractors, to compensate for the shortage.

"I don't want to leave the impression that we are not functioning, or we are only functioning to a limited degree, because that is not true," Libutti told the subcommittee.

Lawmakers, however, expressed concern that staffing shortages are affecting the directorate's ability to carry out its core responsibilities.

"I'm concerned about what's not being done because you don't have the manpower to do it," Subcommittee Chairman Rep. Hal Rogers, R-Ky., said. "You're severely understaffed and this turtle-slow clearance process is unacceptable."

Rogers said the directorate has one of the most important missions within DHS.

"Without a comprehensive and current inventory of our nation's critical infrastructure and key assets, and a coherent picture of threats, the department's efforts to implement the appropriate protective measures, deploy the right technologies and make the right decisions about grant allocations are severely hampered," Rogers said. "If your people are not getting the job done, in effect, the rest of the department is operating with one hand tied behind its back."

Rep. Kay Granger, R-Texas, said the subcommittee has had a problem getting information from the directorate and DHS overall. She worries that staffing shortages are contributing to that situation.

"I feel very sincere about the fact that the department is overlooking our responsibility and our help," Granger said.

Libutti acknowledged that the staffing shortage is a "critical deficiency," and said the directorate will provide Congress a detailed plan by April 14 to address the problem. He added that the directorate has more than 600 contractors and 161 detailees, along with 80 people waiting to be hired in full-time slots.

Libutti also outlined an aggressive schedule for performing vulnerability assessments of critical infrastructure nationwide, including banking and financial institutions, energy and chemical sites, transportation routes, telecommunications, government facilities, federal monuments and national icons.

Libutti said the directorate has identified about 28,000 sites of critical infrastructure in 13 categories. Within the next year, the directorate plans to visit and assess 1,700 of those sites. He added that the directorate has issued 83 alerts or threat updates since it began a year ago.

When asked, Libutti said the directorate has assessed 17 chemical facilities within the past year, but plans to do about 360 chemical sites during the next year.

Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard, D-Calif., said Homeland Security has failed to clarify what constitutes critical infrastructure, causing confusion at the state and local levels. For example, she said DHS, the state of California and the city of Los Angeles each identified a different number of critical infrastructure sites for the Los Angeles region.

"There's definitely a need for a national standard, otherwise we're going to be wasting limited resources," she said.

Libutti's directorate is requesting $864 million for fiscal 2005, which includes funding for 737 full-time employees.