Hearing of the Intelligence, Information Sharing and Terrorism Risk Assessment Subcommittee of the House Homeland Security Committee Subject: Homeland Security Intelligence at a Crossroads: The Office of Intelligence and Analysis Vision for 2008

Interview

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REP. ED PERLMUTTER (D-CO): Thanks, Madam Chair. Mr. Secretary, I'd like to start with -- you know, as we've talked about this, and I'll move to the Fusion Centers in a second. But we need to have strong security apparatus in place, and one of the places where there's been developments -- we've not quite finished it, is in this National Applications Office.

And I just have questions to you as to -- we have this space kind of intelligence system in place. It's moved over from the Geologic Survey or whatever department it was in. And one of the things we've been talking about is putting in the protocols to make sure we can use that in a way that benefits our country and aids in our security without stepping all over certain rights of privacy. Where are we on the protocols?

MR. ALLEN: We're in the final process of having the charter signed by the principals involved, the Secretary of Defense, the Attorney General, the Director of National Intelligence, and the Secretary of the Interior. We believe we have an agreed upon charter that will be very clear to you on permissible and impermissible uses of the National Applications Office. We really do believe that we have met your requirements and that of Chairman Thompson of your House Homeland Security Committee.

We are very confident that we have privacy and civil rights and civil liberties fully protected. We'll have a full-time attorney working within the National Applications Office, and this in addition to layered review that will occur in the National Geospatial Agency, because they will not accept a request for national technical means imagery without doing their own internal review. So I think what we have is something that you'll be very proud of and very pleased with.

REP. PERLMUTTER: Good. Let me switch to open source issues. I'd like to know what Homeland Security is doing today to provide open source information to assist local law enforcement agencies with all this information that's out there by the bucket full or the truckloads or whatever. Is there some kind of procedure in place to assist local law enforcement with this information?

MR. ALLEN: That's exactly what we're doing with this statement and the local government -- with this pilot project that I've described to you. One of the efforts is to grow our open source program in accordance with what they really need at the very local level, and I think we have a very good idea as a result of this pilot project in five states.

At the same time, we're getting four billets from the Director of National Intelligence. We're also getting some small funding support to put against our pilot project, which we hope to expand across the country. And we also then to train at the local level how to use open sources, what's of value and what isn't. So I'm very pleased that our open source program is going to, I think, take -- get real traction in this coming year. And we'd be happy to come back and talk to you in more detail on how we're using open source.

And there are a lot of research tools that will help you use open source more effectively, which the DNI and others, and CIA have, which we would also like to use in working with state and local governments.

REP. PERLMUTTER: Thanks. The committee has a bill that I introduced that might assist you with respect to open source, although I think that you really have a lot of the tools at your fingertips now, and I'm glad to see that you're really focusing on this subject.

I guess the last question I have is what kind of -- going back to the Fusion Centers. I always, when I'm asked questions about homeland security when I'm out on the stump in Colorado, I say one of the places where there's really been an improvement is the fact that the agencies, whether it's the CIA, DHS, FBI, are all talking to one another so that they get a whole picture of what might -- what kinds of threats might exist.

How are you coming up with credentialing so that information can go down to the local law enforcement agencies? Have you run into any trouble being able to pass that information down to the ground in Colorado or anyplace else?

MR. ALLEN: I think we're making progress. I think we need to make more progress. We look to the National Counterterrorism Center, as Chairwoman Harman said, to help be the overall integrator and assessor of terrorism threats, both domestic and foreign. But we are actually working very closely with the FBI and Central Intelligence Agency, other agencies that collect technical intelligence, in order to write for release.

We've sent something at the secret level today to state Fusion Centers, which we worked jointly with the FBI, which I showed to the secretary this morning. I said, "This threat we don't believe is serious, but here's an example of where we really have worked together with NCTC and the FBI and the ITACG saw it and approved it as well." So I think things are starting to work the right direction. I think we're on course.

REP. PERLMUTTER: Thank you. Thanks, Madam Chair.

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REP. PERLMUTTER: Only questions that I don't think he can answer in this particular forum, but I do have one. Mr. Secretary, assume for the moment or just for argument's sake that the president's budgetary priorities and the budgetary priorities of the Congress are different, and we don't come to some kind of agreement on appropriations bills. What effect would a continuing resolution have on the budget in your department?

MR. ALLEN: It would have a very, very serious effect. When we were under a continuing resolution last fall and winter, it had -- I could not send people to travel. We held up sending officers out to the Fusion Centers. It also inhibited us in a number of ways as continuing undertaking any new initiative of expanding what we do. Continuing resolutions are very detrimental to the efficacy of the federal government.

REP. PERLMUTTER: And I hope we don't come to that kind of result this time around, but I would suggest you have a contingency -- (laughing) -- plan in place.

MR. ALLEN: I thank you very much for that, because I think the risks and the threat to this country, the inbound threat in particular, is so serious that we have to have something in place to stay effective during any long continuing resolution.

REP. PERLMUTTER: I was going to ask some questions about FISA, but I'll leave those for another day and another setting. The last question I have, on the security clearances for local law enforcement, is there a backlog in clearing individuals? Like, let's say in Colorado there is a Fusion Center now. What problems, if any, are you running into in clearing officers so that they can get more general intelligence information?

MR. ALLEN: I don't know if any major problems.

When I came to the department, we had major problems in moving security clearances to state and local. We've cleared a lot of people. Nevada and California and New York, we've cleared over 100 people in New York City alone, so we do this, and most of the information can easily flow to those people at the secret level. Getting top secret compartmented clearances takes longer, but we're doing that. We did that for the people coming in to the state and local officials in the ITACG.

The DNI is leading a study to expedite the clearances. It takes about an average of several months, 100 and -- the president has, as you know, sent out a statement that says we have to do a better job in expediting the clearance of personnel government and non-government. I think we've made a lot of progress. And I work very closely with the Director of Security in Homeland -- in the department to expedite those clearances, and I'm quite a tiger at pushing clearances and getting people cleared.

REP. PERLMUTTER: Thank you.

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