Subsequent to the events of September 11th, an increasing premium has been placed upon the value of sharing such information and there is more demand for it from our partners perhaps than there has been in the past and we are attempting to satisfy that demand. That is direction we received from Director Mueller directly, indicating that he desires us to ensure that the sharing of information with our law enforcement colleagues is timely and thorough.

To that end, we have undertaken all the various steps that I alluded to in my oral testimony, and I believe that those steps have in fact been effective. Take the example you brought up, the sheriff's department, a deputy is housed in our space now, is a full time integrated partner with us as an investigator. There's two purposes for that. One is to serve as a very specific conduit for information back to his own agency, but really more so the responsibility of the members of the JTTF is to be alert to the equities of their individual constituent home agencies. I am not a deputy sheriff, I do not necessarily know what Sheriff Clarke, in this instance, might personally find to be of special significance to him, although I can use my common sense and judgment in that regard. But by having people from individual agencies with us, they can be alert to their own special equities and they can raise those issues with us and say in a given case, this is something that my particular agency would like to know more about, it is particularly important to us, something that might be lost on us through inadvertence. We can avoid that by having colleagues from other agencies housed where we are. I myself have been a detailee to the Central Intelligence Agency and I know that works very well, because in protecting FBI equities there and promoting agency equities back to the FBI, I have seen how both agencies can benefit from that. I think that same model is working on a very specific scale in the Joint Terrorism Task Forces.

Mr. HORN. Well, that is good news. And if other FBI offices are doing that around the country, I would give them a parade. We have had nothing but cooperation from the FBI on all the hearings we have had, and as well in Washington or in the field. So we are delighted that you are moving ahead on that type of situation.

Let me now call on-it will not be all we will ask of her, but we will start with Jayetta Hecker, the Director of the Physical Infrastructure issues, she represents the Comptroller General of the United States. He has a 15-year term, so neither President nor Congress could get mad at him because he can still be there. And he has done a marvelous job, Comptroller General of the United States Walker. One of his top people is Jayetta Hecker.

So we would like to know from your Federal, across-the-wholenation view on some of these. Give us your thinking on this.

STATEMENT OF JAYETTA HECKER, DIRECTOR, PHYSICAL

INFRASTRUCTURE, GENERAL ACCOUNTING OFFICE

MS. HECKER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Petri, we are very pleased to be here today, and focus, if you will, on the key aspects of this proposal for a Department of Homeland

with State and local governments. That is the presentation that I have had for you today.

I have four areas that I would like to cover. Some are broad areas and comments about the proposed department and then three that flow from that-key aspects of effective partnerships between levels of government in terms of the roles, the performance goals and finally, the appropriate government tools that are used. As you mentioned earlier, our comments are based on the fact that GAO has been looking at key programs targeted to control and prepare for terrorism for well over 5 years. I have got about 30 reports that are attached to my-references to reports attached to my statement, and most significantly recently, the Comptroller General spoke just last week on the new department and we developed a comprehensive statement and I have a few points to summarize from that today.

My position everyone else's is kind of self-evident, where they come from and why they know anything about this-my responsibility is that in support of congressional oversight. I oversee all the work looking at key surface programs, in which case I work very frequently with Chairman Petri in the Surface Committee. Also emergency management programs and also all the maritime programs, so I have experience and we have worked looking at major Coast Guard challenges in this new environment, maritime and port security. I have worked looking at the transformation of FEMA and the full range of responsibilities and then of course surface programs as well.

The main point about the department is that it really holds promise, but it is anything but a quick fix. We are concerned that in fact, it will take substantial time and additional resources to realize that promise. And I think one of the interesting things is a lot of the comments that you have heard today about the challenges, intelligence sharing and clearances and relationships with different units they are not fixed by formation of the department. So the underlying challenges really remain and the bringing together of some of these related agencies does not solve the problem itself.

Our main concern really though is that the challenge of effectively clarifying and partnering the different roles of government is not lost in the significant challenges of putting this department together. They will face enormous challenges in information technology, which I know you know a lot about, and the component agencies have their problems, so putting them together is a compounding of problems. They will face enormous challenges in blending their work forces, in financial management, in acquisition tools. And none of that gets to the point about really building effective partnerships with State and local governments.

So our concern is as the department is formed that there be adequate and continuous focus really on the building of effective partnerships with State and local governments. Basically, my statement talks about three areas where we think there is required focus in not only the department-but the strategy that still is not prepared that needs to guide the department, and that is the effective roles of the different levels of government, moving toward effective goals and measures of what preparedness is. Right now,

we do not have those measures. We do not have an idea of how well prepared different levels of government are. There are efforts to define standards and there have been reviews, but there is no agreement of what preparedness is or what homeland security is. And finally, tools.

So these are really the critical areas in the formation of the department and the essential nature of building effective partnerships, we are concerned not be lost in the process of pulling together the department.

Mr. HORN. Thank you. Do the gentlemen from Wisconsin have any questions?

[No response.]

Mr. HORN. Then we will move into the health-related issues and we will start with the Commissioner of Health, city of Milwaukee, Dr. Seth Foldy. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Hecker follows:]

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee:

I appreciate the opportunity to be here to discuss issues critical to successful federal leadership of, assistance to, and partnership with state and local governments to enhance homeland security. As you are aware, the challenges posed by homeland security exceed the capacity and authority of any one level of government. Protecting the nation against these unique threats calls for a truly integrated approach, bringing together the resources of all levels of government.

In my testimony today, I will focus on the challenges facing the federal government in (1) establishing a leadership structure for homeland security, (2) defining the roles of different levels of government, (3) developing performance goals and measures, and (4) deploying appropriate tools to best achieve and sustain national goals. My comments are based on a body of GAO's work on terrorism and emergency preparedness and policy options for the design of federal assistance,' our review of many other studies, and the Comptroller General's June 25, 2002, testimony on the new Department of Homeland Security (DHS) proposal. In addition, I will draw on GAO's ongoing work for this Subcommittee, including an examination of the diverse ongoing and proposed federal preparedness programs, as well as a series of case studies we are conducting that examine preparedness issues facing state and local governments. To date, we have conducted interviews of officials in four geographically diverse cities: Baltimore, Maryland; New Orleans, Louisiana; Denver, Colorado; and, Los Angeles, California. We have also interviewed state emergency management officials in these states.