Lawmakers push Homeland Security to track visitor departures

At a hearing Thursday, lawmakers urged the Homeland Security Department to work quickly in implementing technology to track if and when visitors leave the country.

Members of the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Border, Maritime and Global Counterterrorism acknowledged the initial success of the entry portion of the US VISIT program, which uses biometric measures such as fingerprints and photographs to verify the identity of people coming into the country and check them against a number of watch lists. DHS has this technology in place at 116 airports and 15 seaports. It also is used at 154 land ports of entry for secondary inspection.

According to testimony at Thursday's hearing, however, DHS is not moving forward as effectively with the exit component of the program, and has not disclosed its plans for implementation.

US VISIT Program Director Robert Mocny said the department is planning to release a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking in June 2008, and will aim for extensive or complete implementation by 2009.

"We do now have a very detailed set of actions that need to occur between now and December 2008 in order for us to successfully implement this," Mocny said. Neither the members of the subcommittee nor the Government Accountability Office have received the details of this plan, however.

"Dates like that are nice to have as goals, but they should be meaningful dates that you can meet because you've thought through this systematically and therefore you have some confidence that you can in fact meet those dates," said Randolph Hite, director of architecture and systems issues at GAO. "There is a difference between a goal and a schedule."

In his testimony, Hite said the prospects for putting the exit portion of US VISIT in place are as uncertain now as they were four years ago.

Mocny said DHS hopes to incorporate US VISIT exit scanning into the airport check-in process for passengers leaving the country. But an airline representative at the hearing expressed concern, saying the industry had not been consulted and believes such a move would place an undue burden on both agents and passengers at the ticket counters.

James May, president and chief executive officer of the Air Transport Association, said requiring scans at airline check-in would reverse current efforts to streamline the process. He said that 30 percent of passengers currently check in online through their computers, cell phones or PDAs. Those passengers would not be able to do that if they had to undergo biometric scanning at the ticket counter.

May said his biggest concern was that the airlines had not been consulted before DHS announced its intention to make the biometric exit scan part of airline check-in. But he praised DHS for its collaboration with airlines during the implementation of the entry portion of US VISIT, and said he was surprised by the sudden change.

Airports may also feel a strain as the exit portion of the program is implemented.

"Airports are not designed to handle passenger departure controls," said Ana Sotorrio, associate director of governmental affairs for the Miami-Dade Aviation Department. "Passengers are already experiencing record delays and inconveniences."

Rep. Loretta Sanchez, D-Calif., the chairwoman of the subcommittee, said DHS needs to work with Congress to ensure that this portion of US VISIT is implemented while minimizing the negative effect on international travel.